border punches

Congratulations card: Grab life by the beans

October 21, 2014 By Janice Daquila-Pardo Leave a Comment

Not every card we send needs to be sweet, right? This one has just a little attitude.

I’ll admit that I don’t make enough cards to send to people I love. I plan to make and mail them, but I usually wait too long and then the moment passes. But not this time!

My brother just went through the frustrating process of searching for a new job. Happily, he was offered and accepted a new position that he started today, and I couldn’t be happier for or prouder of him. New beginnings are so wonderful…

Product/technique notes

I used a few stamps from the “Cyber cafe” set from Paper Smooches, colored the coffee cup with Copic markers and embellished with paper from Little Yellow Bicycle.

Halloween 1975: Divvying up the loot

October 13, 2014 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 8 Comments

It was Halloween night in 1975, and my brother and I had just come home from haunting our neighbors for treats.

I remember quite well donning that homemade gypsy costume. I loved getting to wear the huge black hoop earrings (well before I had pierced ears) and head scarf. And what little girl doesn’t yearn for the opportunity to wear gobs of makeup? Unfortunately, I can’t remember where my mom came up with that flowered dress I was wearing, although I know that many of my costumes over the years came straight out of the depths of her closet.

Phil looks like he must have already downed some candy by the time this photo was taken because I’m pretty sure that red blotchy area around his mouth started out as a full set of red clown lips. And who doesn’t love a clown with a practical streak who wears a stocking cap on a cold Ohio Halloween night?

But as I was working on scrapping this memory, one thing that really stood out to me was the packs of candy cigarettes on the table. Can you believe people gave those away to children and that parents didn’t think it was a problem to let their kids “smoke” them? The good old days!

Product/technique notes

I crafted this layout based on this great PageMaps sketch created exclusively for Back Porch Memories and am entering it into their November guest designer contest. My products came from quite a variety of companies: The papers are from KI Memories and Fancy Pants, and the stickers and other embellishments are from American Crafts, Bella Boulevard and Studio G. I really love the added detail provided by that Martha Stewart punch-around-the-page spider web.

Reminder:

Don’t miss out on participating in my Blogtoberfest sketch contest for a great holiday-themed prize package!

Altering my family chili recipe for our vegetarian lifestyle

October 1, 2014 By Janice Daquila-Pardo Leave a Comment

Come celebrate Blogtoberfest with me all month!

As today is World Vegetarian Day, the kickoff to Vegetarian Awareness Month, I created a layout to celebrate one of my family’s favorite meat-centric recipes that I have changed to accommodate our vegetarian diet.

When I made my mom’s chili for my college friend, Jim, he loved it and dubbed it “Daquili” (for my maiden name, Daquila). I’ve made it ever since—very often in the colder months. But when we took on a vegetarian diet a few years ago I couldn’t give up on my chili. So I’ve recreated it without meat, and now we call it Daquili v. 2!

Celebrate Blogtoberfest with me all month!

This October I celebrate four years of scrapbook blogging! And that makes me feel like having a little party, so I’m hosting Blogtoberfest. Sorry, you’ll have to supply your own beer and brats, but I’ll bring the paper-crafting inspiration:

sketches
tutorials
product reviews
free cut files
a giveaway: I’ll reveal the details a little later

“Roll out the paper.
We’ll have a barrel of fun!”

I do hope you’ll join me often this month and help me celebrate the good things that scrapbooking brings to our lives.

Our shared graduation party

September 15, 2014 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 5 Comments

What a big day high school graduation is in the life of a teenager...and his/her parents!

My younger brother and I went to school together. And by that I mean that we started first grade on the same day in 1973 and graduated high school on the same day in 1985. In fact, we started and graduated college on the same days as well, but that’s a story for another day. We essentially attended school as twins, even though we’re 13.5 months apart in age (because Phil started a year early).

So of course we celebrated our graduation party together. Mom and Dad put together a lovely fête in our Willoughby, Ohio, back yard and invited our friends and relatives. The top photo is of Dad, me, Mom and Phil. The bottom photo includes our grandparents on Mom’s side (seated), our Uncle Earl and Aunt Mary Lou, our Nana on Dad’s side and our Aunt Rose.

Product/technique notes

I created this layout to participate in the Scrap & Play challenge #9. The patterned papers are from a K&Co Amy Bulter pad and the journaling card, stickers and washi tape are from My Mind’s Eye’s “Now & Then: Dorothy” collection. I cut the title on my Silhouette, and the border punches are by Martha Stewart and Fiskars.

I believe in memories

March 23, 2014 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 1 Comment

In the left photo is my father with his sisters, Mary Lou and Frances.

The 24th sketch challenge has been posted at the SCRAP & MUSIC challenge blog! Head over to the site to grab the sketch, which I’m proud to have designed, and play along. This sketch came with the song “Better together” by Jack Johnson.

This is my final challenge with the Scrap & Music team. I have so enjoyed being a part of this new endeavor since it started a year ago. I’ve loved creating sketches for people around the world to use as inspiration in their scrapbooking. And designing with sketches and music together provides a real kick to the creative engine; I can highly recommend it if you haven’t tried it. Thank you to Scrap & Music for a great year! I wish them more and more success over time.

My layout

I really like how looking at the lyrics to a song can force me to pull a layout together that wouldn’t have otherwise happened. As I was reading the lyrics to “Better Together” the line “I believe in memories they look so, so pretty when I sleep” jumped out at me. Obviously, I believe in memory keeping, so I thought about using a set of photos on this page that I couldn’t capture again.

In the summer of 2000, my father’s side of the family planned a reunion. We held it at my cousin, Robbie’s house in Pennsylvania. It was a wonderful day of togetherness, and we took a lot of photos. But before the day ended we pulled together some smaller family photos. The left shot is of my father and his two sisters, Frances and Mary Lou. The right photo is of my parents, brother, Matt and me. Because we have lost both my dad and my Aunt Bubbles (Frances) since this reunion, these photos are precious.

Product/technique notes

I used a combination of products from We R Memory Keepers’ “Happy Campers” and Lily Bee Design’s “Family Portrait” collections to create this page. I created the title in the Silhouette software and cut it on my Cameo.

The challenge

The challenges on this blog involve following the sketch and using a title on your layout with a line from the provided music. Below I’ve included the video as well as the lyrics for this song:

“Better Together” by Jack Johnson

There’s no combination of words I could put on the back of a postcard
No song that I could sing but I can try for your heart
Our dreams and they are made out of real things
Like a shoebox of photographs with sepia-toned loving
Love is the answer at least for most of the questions in my heart
Why are we here? And where do we go? And how come it’s so hard?
It’s not always easy, and sometimes life can be deceiving
I’ll tell you one thing, it’s always better when we’re together

Hum… It’s always better when we’re together
Yeah, we’ll look at the stars when we’re together
Well, it’s always better when we’re together
Yeah, it’s always better when we’re together

And all of these moments just might find their way into my dreams tonight
But I know that they’ll be gone when the morning light sings
Or brings new things for tomorrow night you see
That they’ll be gone too, too many things I have to do
But if all of these dreams might find their way into my day to day scene
I’d be under the impression I was somewhere in between
With only two, just me and you, not so many things we got to do
Or places we got to be, we’ll sit beneath the mango tree now

Yeah, it’s always better when we’re together
Hum… we’re somewhere in between together
Well, it’s always better when we’re together
Yeah, it’s always better when we’re together

I believe in memories they look so, so pretty when I sleep
And now when, when I wake up, you look so pretty sleeping next to me
But there is not enough time
And there is no song I could sing
And there is no combination of words I could say
But I will still tell you one thing
We’re better together

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