border punches

Blogtoberfest Day 4

October 4, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 1 Comment

Companions on a journey

Today is the fourteenth anniversary of the day I married my beloved. I was talking to my bro last night, who said, “No way would I say it’s been 14 years! It seems more like four!” To that I say, “Amen!”

You know, I had a little suspicion—even while we were dating—that life with Matt might fly by. In particular I remember one beautiful Saturday afternoon back in 1996, after we had spent most of the day together exploring town, eating out and hiking through a park. Matt turned to me and said, “Woah, we’ve been together for eight hours and it hardly feels like two. Imagine how fast 20 years could go by together!” He was right, and now I know how fortunate I am to have time feel so swift with him. Because it tells me that I’m happy and where I should be. I’m so grateful for that and for his love.

The layout I’m sharing today is one I did based on a quote from Pythagoras (Ionian Greek philosopher, mathematician and founder of the religious movement called Pythagoreanism): “Friends are as companions on a journey, who ought to aid each other to persevere in the road to a happier life.” I think this quote aptly describes our friendship and marriage. I also chose to use several patterned papers from October Afternoon’s Boarding Pass line to accentuate the “journey” theme.

Friends are as companions on a journey, who ought to aid each other to persevere in the road to a happier life. ~Pythagoras

So, my challenge to you today is to take inspiration from this layout in one of three ways: 1) Do a layout or card that celebrates a friendship; 2) do a layout or card that features a favorite quote; 3) do a layout or card that highlights a journey of some type (physical, spiritual, emotional, etc.). If you do, please link it up here in the comments so we can come and peek!

Punch it down

September 28, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 1 Comment

Twisted Sketches has revealed its latest sketch, #121, and the twist is “punch.” Be sure to head over to the site to grab the sketch, then create something and link it up! 🙂

Here’s my Design Team layout inspired by the sketch.

I love using Twisted Sketches to inspire me to tell stories I might not have thought of telling.

I actually struggled for a while, trying to come up with a layout based on this week’s twist (punch). I knew I could always just include an embellishment created with a punch, but I really wanted my topic to somehow incorporate the twist. Then it hit me that you punch down dough when you’re making bread, and I had the perfect story to tell!

When it came to cooking and baking, my Nana—my paternal grandmother—had mad skillz. She commanded a kitchen. Of course, that came from a lot of practice, as she owned and ran restaurants throughout my father’s childhood and young adulthood. In fact, I don’t think she ever baked a loaf of bread. Instead, she always pulled out her huge metal bowl and dumped a whole 5-pound bag of flour into it and baked several loaves of bread.

And I never saw her follow a recipe. In fact, when I was a teenager and wanted to try baking bread for the first time, I asked Nana to tell me how to do it. She didn’t have a recipe to share with me, so while she baked a batch one day we captured what she did. She would pour a big handful of salt into her hand (her usual method of measurement) and then pour it into a measuring cup so that I could record the amount. We had a lovely time together putting her recipe down on paper, but honestly, how often am I going to need to bake several loaves of bread at one time? 🙂

For years now, my brother and I have been inspired by Nana to bake bread, too. Even though we don’t make it often (usually at holidays), we both love the process of combining and kneading simple ingredients to turn them into loaves of home-baked magic. It’s a slow, homey procedure. It requires patience while the dough rises. Then it offers a therapeutic opportunity to punch it back down (If you’re going through a stressful time in your life, I highly recommend baking a loaf of bread on a Saturday morning to get out your frustrations.). And finally, it’s hard to deny the sense of pride you feel when you take that fragrant loaf out of the oven and serve it to your family.

With all the fall and winter holidays that are on the near horizon, as well as the cool fall days I’m hoping to experience soon (temperatures are still rising to over 100 degrees in Austin), I think it’s time to break out my bread pan and flour. It’s time to get a little punchy!

Juicing for health

September 14, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 4 Comments

Twisted Sketches has revealed its latest sketch, #119, and the twist is “start.” Be sure to head over to the site to grab the sketch, then create something and link it up! 🙂

Here’s my Design Team layout inspired by the sketch. It’s about how we just started juicing and are really enjoying it.

This bunch of vegetables and fruit that was ready to be juiced was so pretty that I had to take a few photos!

I want to explain a little more about my layout than just the surface facts. The truth is that when I was designing this layout I was thinking about fear and how we all deal with it. This was on my mind because we personally faced a really big fear recently.

Matt began noticing some physical changes that concerned him and made a doctor’s appointment to look into it. Before having even one test run on Matt, the doctor plied him with stories about cancer in men his age. So while we awaited the day that Matt could have the test the doctor ordered, we talked about…everything. The possibilities. The probabilities. What we would do if we received bad news. How we should change our lives if we received good news. I honestly believe that Matt started making lists of things he wanted to do to prepare me to be without him. Gulp…it was a hard week.

So, with this palpable fear orbiting us, we started looking at actionable ways to live with a daily commitment to good health. The truth is that we are like so many people: we know that we’re supposed to make healthy choices, but we’re not always sure how to make that a daily priority. For instance, how do you eat good foods when you’re on the road making customer visits all day like Matt does? How can you get anything resembling a balanced day of nutrition if you eat out? The choices out there are so bad! Think about the portion sizes, the saturated fats, the additives. It makes your head spin when you really focus on how unhealthy our food supply has become.

Then, on the night before Matt’s test we watched a documentary called “Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead.” Sounds gruesome, doesn’t it? But it wasn’t. In fact, it was quite inspiring. It was the story of a man who was overweight and suffering from an auto-immune disease who turned to radically changing his diet as a way of getting control of his physical problems. He started making his own juice combinations (mostly vegetables and some fruits) and barraged his body with great nutrients. He drank juice only for 60 days and lost the weight as well as the need for his medications (all under the care of his physician)!

Now, I’m not trying to convince anyone reading this to juice. Really. I just want to tell you how Matt and I have dealt with the health scare that we underwent. We used the fear as motivation to take a hard look at our habits. And making a positive change in our diets (by adding fresh juice to our day) makes us feel more in control of our healthy futures. Knowing you’re making good choices lessens fear about your own future. At least it’s working that way for us!

Soo cute! Using bright patterns with a black-and-white photo

September 8, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo Leave a Comment

How cute is this photo of me and my little brother from 1969? I know: we were cute, our outfits were cute, the expressions on our faces were cute, the way the photographer had us positioned was cute. Cute, cute, cute! Now I will attempt to write the rest of my post without using that word even one more time (for your sake as well as mine).

So how could I fail to use sweet, colorful patterned papers to highlight all this adorableness? I wanted this layout to feel bright and colorful and young and fresh, so I turned to some of the older lines (Family Dynamix, Tail Waggers & Cat Naps) as well as one new line (Making the Team) from Bella Blvd.

And I think this got the job done, don’t you? The bright colors show off the black-and-white photo rather than competing with it. Also, portraits can sometimes feel a little stale, so by surrounding this one with fun banners, butterflies and buttons I kept the eye hopping and happy. At least I think so! What do you think?

I couldn't help myself from using lots of colorful patterns with this black-and-white photo.

Movie quotes make great page titles

August 31, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 1 Comment

Twisted Sketches has revealed its latest sketch, #117, and the twist is “long.” Be sure to head over to the site to grab the sketch, then create something and link it up! 🙂

Here’s my Design Team layout inspired by the sketch. The quote I used in my title comes from my husband’s favorite movie, Joe Versus the Volcano (1990). Tom Hanks’ character says to Meg Ryan’s, “Been a long time coming to meet you. A long time on a crooked road.”

The title on my layout is a quote from my husband's favorite movie, Joe Versus the Volcano

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