Project completed

Whilst at the Eclectic Keepsakes crop today I finally did the last layout for the 4x6 Photo Love project that Shimelle ran over 2011.  12 photos on one layout - done and dusted!

Excuse the quality of the photos, but it's that time of day and that time of year!  Only mid afternoon but already having to put the lights on in the house.  

I was so pleased to go to the crop today even though I couldn't stay long as I was still feeling poorly.  Whatever this bug is, it's horrible and I'm fed up with it!  From what I hear from others, it's a two weekly thing so hopefully I am now half way through.

As for those cups I showed in yesterday's post, I am happy to say that I am not the one who has to polish them (there are over 40 prizes awarded and that's a lot of polishing!)  At our school we have a policy of year 8 girls being given one day a year off of timetable to be our 'student receptionist'.  They sit at a desk in the main reception area and sign in visitors, sign for deliveries, get messages to students and generally help out wherever possible.  The day before Senior Presentation Evening is the day that the student receptionists are given the cups to polish.  For some reason, give a 12 year old an opportunity to roll up their sleeves and get dirty and they are happy as a pig in ... clover.  So when I gave them the cups, dusters, rubber gloves and a tin of 'Silvo' their eyes lit up!

4x6 Photo Love November (belated)

Dear Shimelle,

When you are designing your very clever multi-photo layouts please bear in mind the challenges you are giving us not only to follow them, but to take photos of them afterwards!

It wasn't until I received the prompt for December that I remembered that I had never actually got round to doing last months.  I distinctly remember thinking 'I don't have eleven photos of the same theme' but obviously that was as far as I got.  Now this is one project that I am absolutely 100% determined that I am going to finish and so I could not let November pass by in a blur of 2 empty page protectors.  So I figured that it was in November 2010 that I went to the Cologne Christmas Markets therefore I am completely entitled to bore you with photos from that which I have shared before.  

Here comes the photography problem.  It is a double page layout with a slim divided page protector sandwiched between the pages.  On a dull and murky day, how do you photograph that.  

You start with the double pages on their own, out of the album.

You then put the divider alongside the first page

You then take about ten photos that you discard before putting the layout in the album and taking a photo of the back of the divider next to the second page.  Does any of this make sense?

Now I need to have a look at how the project will end with the 12 photo December edition.  Has anyone out there managed to complete the whole album before the end of the year?

October 4x6 Photo Love

I am really enjoying this project that is organised by Shimelle where every month you increase the number of photos on a layout and this month we had to use 10.  Eeek!  One of the main problems that I am having is finding a large amount of photos all linking to the same theme - clearly I need to go on that round the world trip to rectify the situation!  So for this month I used some photos that my husband took when he went on a trip to Florence and the surrounding area in Italy last year.  Instead of doing a normal layout, we had to use a divided page protector.  (Which I didn't have so the trusty sewing machine came out and I made a do it yourself version - seems to have worked just as well though!)

The background to him going on this trip always makes me smile.  Friends of ours went to this area a couple of years ago and my husband had said how much he would like to go there too during the very early summer before it got too hot and crowded with tourists.  Now, I work in a school and am not allowed time off during term time.  Just because we have 12 weeks off at various times of year, they don't seem keen on letting us have other time off in addition or in place of that time.  It's a very inflexible place to work!  So I said to my husband that as it was a place he really wanted to see,  and June was the ideal time to go, why didn't he have a few days away with his friend?

So one evening we went to our friend's home and the husbands went upstairs to their study to book their trip while we shared a glass or two of wine downstairs.  After a while they returned downstairs, smiling and already planning the places they would be visiting.  'All booked?' we enquired.  'Yes' they happily replied.  'When are you going?' asked my friend to her husband.  He told her the dates.  All went quiet.  Apparently he had chosen the weekend that coincided with their 30th wedding anniversary.  Ooops! 

4x6 Photo Love - July

7 photos on one page?  Bit of a challenge - but Shimelle came up with a brilliant idea for making a concertina element to the layout so you could have photos front and back of the piece you pull out.  A perfect project for using the photos we took at our son's graduation in July!

4x6 Photo love with 6 photos

When I saw Shimelle's design for this month's photo love I thought I had come unstuck.  I had lovingly chosen 6 photos especially with this in mind, all taken the Sunday of the joint celebrations for my sister's 40th wedding anniversary and my god daughter's christening.  Can you imagine how my heart sank when I saw the design was for six portrait pictures when mine were landscape?  I heard a little voice in my head saying 'Go on, freestyle it, you know you want to ...' and next thing I knew I was at the Eclectic crop, with papers on the desk and photos in place.

Bearing in mind it should have been a row of portrait pictures, I think the alternative came out ok.  I like the blocky feel to the pages.