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Sketches for Scraps Thursday: Easter duds

May 12, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 1 Comment

I found a sketch by Shimelle that I just love for using up some of our patterned paper scraps. It’s for one photo, and I like its versatility for embellishing.

Find this sketch at http://www.shimelle.com/paper/949/scrapbooking-sketch-of-the-week/

Here is the layout I completed with it, all from scraps 6×6 or smaller.

My mom is an excellent seamstress and made many an outfit for me, including this tulip dress for Easter 1990

It’s a photo of my family (sans Dad, the photographer) right after Easter Mass in 1990.

It’s one of those photos that was taken from too far away and includes distracting background details. But I love it because it reminds me of important things. Like that my Mom, who is an excellent seamstress and has made me many, many special outfits over the years, made the dress I’m wearing in this photo. The fabric featured bright-colored tulips scattered across a black background. I wore that thing to death because I really felt good in it and loved that it was homemade.

I also like that Phil, having fun being a bit uncooperative, insisted on eating his after-church snack even though I’m sure my mom moaned at him to get rid of it. And don’t you love to be reminded of the cars your family drove at certain periods?

Yeah, this photo isn’t good; it’s great. Because technically good photos just cannot trump great memories.

The subtle science and exact art of letter writing

May 5, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 8 Comments

While I didn’t get up at an obscene hour last Friday to watch the royal wedding, I’m a romantic, so I did follow along throughout the day watching and reading about it.

Everything was beautifully orchestrated and everyone was gorgeous. But it wasn’t the spectacle of the event that drew me so much as the opportunity to immerse myself in this great celebration of love. Who among us can see a couple like William and Catherine, young and in love, and not feel our hearts swell?

How often do we have the opportunity to share a grand display of love? Well, certainly shutting down an entire country’s economy for the day and globally televising our declarations of love aren’t in the cards for most of us, but there is a small yet very meaningful gesture available to us any day. It’s the love letter.

Watching William and Catherine vow to love and honor each other all the days of their lives made me itchy to share some mushy sentiments with my husband.

Advice for the love(letter)lorn

But have you attempted to write a love letter? It’s daunting trying to translate those kinds of emotions into words! We can’t all be Victor Hugo:
“My adorable and adored: I have been asking myself every moment if such happiness is not a dream. It seems to me that what I feel is not of earth. I cannot yet comprehend this cloudless heaven. My whole soul is yours…”

Wow, would I love to be able to write this way! Fortunately, there are people through the ages who have excelled at just that. We all like to take inspiration from other artists’ work, so let’s take a look at a few resources that showcase letter-writing artists:

Perhaps these wonderful love letters—of all styles—can help start your words flowing. Keep in mind, though, that the most important element of a good love letter is that it contain honest words from your heart. The rest is gravy.

Of course, my medium of choice for this billet-doux was a scrapbook layout. Although my words are not going to go down in the history books for their style, my hope is that the substance will be always inked on Matt’s heart.

This love letter to my husband is meant to remind him of what I cherish about us.

The significance of stories in our lives

April 13, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo Leave a Comment

Twisted Sketches launches its 96th sketch today, and the twist this time is “card.” The sketch and the design team’s interpretations are awaiting you at Twisted Sketches’ site…and here is my design team contribution using the new sketch:

When we found this 1886 copy of "Sense and Sensibility" at a used book store we had to buy it!

I started with the “twist” when deciding what to scrap for this one. “Card” gave me a little trouble, I don’t mind telling you. Then it hit me—library card! So I took photos of the front pages of this wonderful old book Matt and I recently purchased at a used book store and told its story on my layout. (Notice the patterned paper with the bonnets and top hats on my layout. I couldn’t wait to pull that out and use it for this theme.)

The story

Matt and I met in Chapel Hill, NC, in February 1996. Our first date included a lovely dinner at Aurora (a restaurant that sadly is no more) and then a movie at the old Carolina Theater (also sadly gone and converted into a Gap store—surely the world needed another of those rather than a 63-year-old treasure of a theater!).

We had such an evening. Sigh.

The movie we saw that night was “Sense and Sensibility.” It was very romantic. I was already a Jane Austen fan at that point in my life, but Matt was unsurprisingly unaware of her gifts. In my experience men tend to need an introduction to Miss Austen by a female who either already matters to them or to whom they want to matter. 😉 Let me just say that if you have a romantic bone in your body and you haven’t yet see this one, please do yourself the favor.

Fast forward 15 years, and Matt and I were recently perusing the rare book room at one of the Half Price Books locations in Austin when I spied an old copy of “Sense and Sensibility” on the shelf! It’s an 1886 copy—125 years old—and in rather good shape. Of course we bought it. I think we can be said to have just enough sense and sensibility to know when to grab up something with that kind of significance!

My Fortress of Scraptitude

April 12, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 4 Comments

I was scrapping this weekend and decided to take a photo of the project/mess on my craft table and turn it into a layout. I’ll admit that I was nudged into doing this because of Kristina Werner’s cute post a while back, 90% of real crafters make real messes, where she challenged crafters to “own” the messes we make. (My layout is based on one of Shimelle’s recent sketches.)

Welcome to my Fortress of Scraptitude. 🙂

I make a pretty big mess when I scrap, as do most of us I think. But I’ve realized that I don’t have much of a pattern about clean-up. When I read others’ blogs about this subject they seem to fall into one or the other category:

The crafter who makes a mess and then cleans everything up before starting on the next project OR
The crafter who makes a mess and keeps on working until there are so many scraps and tossed aside tools in the way that she can’t see her layout or card any more

I’m a little different (big news, I know). I certainly don’t clean after each project. Sounds nice but takes too much time away from my creative flow. I also never let things get so bad (on my desk) that I clean only because I can’t work any more. No, I spread out…a lot. Matt calls me a “stacker.” I have little stacks everywhere. My craft desk came with a chair, but I hardly ever use it; it’s too convenient a place to stash the things I want out of the way but within reach. My craft room doubles as our guest bedroom, which is awesome because the bed is just to the right of my desk and a perfect place to stack more crap. It’s the perfect setup…for a while.

I eventually get overwhelmed by this stack-heavy environment and realize that it’s affecting my creative mojo. That’s the perfect time to clean! It means I’m motivated, which is the best we can ever ask for when it comes to cleaning, right?

Here are a few more photos of my creative space, in the interest of full disclosure. 😉 Why don’t you tell me a little about how/when you clean your scrap dominion?

Here is a shot of command central in my Fortress of Scraptitude.

Stacks surround me, along with a glass of red wine for inspiration.

My craft closet is sort of organized. Aren't you proud of me?

This is the only photo I have of my paternal grandfather

March 30, 2011 By Janice Daquila-Pardo 4 Comments

"Pater familias" is Latin for "father of the family"

Today the Twisted Sketches site launches its 94th sketch, and it’s a good one! The sketch as well as the design team’s interpretations are all waiting to inspire you.

This is my rendition of the sketch. It highlights the only photo I have of my father’s childhood that also includes his father. I never met my grandfather, as he passed away in my dad’s teenage years, so I adore this photo. This portrait was taken in 1944, making my dad 11 years old.

I chose the Latin “pater familias” as my title because it means “father of the family.” In fact, the term pater familias had specific legal meaning in Roman times, when the head of the family was expected to be a good citizen to his own familia as well as to the broader community. In theory at least, he held powers of life and death over every member of his extended familia through ancient right.

It’s quite interesting to read about, but honestly the first time I ever heard the term was in the 2000 film, O Brother, Where Art Thou? Such a good movie. Here’s the clip:

I don’t know about you, but I really love creating a layout where just about every product used is from a different company. It feels like a little more of an accomplishment to me than creating a page using all products from the same line. In this design the patterned papers are from Crate Paper, Webster’s Pages, My Mind’s Eye and Making Memories. The trims are from Making Memories and Hobby Lobby, and the rub on is from K&Company. Now that’s just good, clean scrapping fun!

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