Hi, I’m JennV and I’m excited to be here to talk about what many argue is the first principle of design….balance.  I’ve been scrapping for 10 years and I never tire of designing a page.  I’m one that will turn my layers on and off in photoshop a hundred times with my finished file using only half of the layers that are buried in there.  I will play with this design, then that design, add this flower, balance it out with a word strip on the other side.  When I design a page, there is nothing more important to me than the balance of it or in some cases, the lack of balance!!  This quote from Matisse sums up my thoughts perfectly….

Technically speaking, balance is the equal distribution of visual weight around a midline axis/point.  As humans, we like to see what is called bilateral symmetry.  This is essentially the repeating of the reverse of a design on the opposite side of the axis/point, in essence, each side becomes a mirror image of the other.  This balance is considered formal, ordered, stable and quiet…but can also be boring.

To show this design principal in action, I designed a layout for each balance type using the same kit with the exact same elements for each layout.  Here is my layout showing symmetry.  I used At The Farmer’s Market by Mari Koegelenberg and Sugarplum Paperie.  All the elements and papers are distributed down the vertical axis so that each side is a relative mirror image of the other side.

While symmetry achieves balance through repetition, asymmetry achieves balance through contrast. Asymmetrical, or informal balance, involves different elements that have equal visual weight. Many things can influence visual weight, such as position.  The further an element is from the center, the “heavier” it feels.  So you can balance a large center object with a smaller object on the edge.  Some other factors that will influence visual weight we intuitively know…a larger element and/or element with an intense color feels “heavier” in a design.  The more complex a shape, the heavier it will feel.  A diagonal orientation carries more visual weight than a horizontal or vertical one.  Finally, multiple smaller objects can balance a larger one.  Asymmetrical balance is considered more casual, interesting and dynamic than symmetrical balance, but it can also be harder to pull off.

Here you can see an example of asymmetrical balance.  I balanced the heavy photo with a bold colored paper strip at the top of the layout.  I framed the word strips with the painted dots and added in the lighter colored background behind the photo to draw your eye to the photo.

Finally, we have the last balance design …and it is breakdown of balance…the end of all things sweet and good….it’s called Discordant balance!!

Discordant is defined as disagreeable, at variance, conflicting, clashing, jarring, grating….essentially it doesn’t sound good!!!

However in terms of design, a discordant balanced design can suggest movement or flow.  It can be used to make a statement or just catch someone’s eye.

Here is an example of a a discordant layout.  Again, I used the same elements as in the previous two layouts.

Whether we like it or not, there is a balance in everything we do.  We hear about work/life balance ad nauseum. We eat good foods and exercise, but might balance that out with an occasional trip to Krispy Kreme!!! Study, study, study for that Algebra test and then watch Amazing Race the next night. We scrap all day and night and feed our kids cereal for dinner as we try and finish the “last” layout…..wait, that would be an example of no balance….LOL!!!

Too much of one thing never works. Whatever your design preference for balance, it is important to try new things and switch it up every now and then.   I’ll leave you with one of my favorite quotes on the matter of life and balance…….

 

 About the Author:  JennV is a lover of history and art (luckily she lives 5 miles outside of Washington, DC) and an accountant by training.  She currently stays home with her two boys and is pursuing a career in photography, when she is not busy volunteering for every school and county initiative!!

 

Hi there!  Kacy here with a post about the pursuit of health and fitness (and documenting it, of course!).

I work out every day and try to watch my weight.  Some of that is definitely vanity, but I’m also approaching 40 years old, battling some chronic health problems (underactive thyroid, endometriosis), long days sitting at work, and an absolutely insatiable love of junk food.    I have included pictures from the gym and some of my hiking adventures in my project life album, but have never really documented a workout, a health problem, or even what I love to eat aside from an occasional layout about cupcakes.

MMMMMMM, cupcakes!

Um… where was I?  Oh – a layout with only photos of food or pictures of my feet on a treadmill doesn’t really appeal to me.  This got me thinking about other ways to scrapbook my workouts and the various health challenges I’m dealing with.

FITNESS

When I’m out hiking, I usually turn on the GPS on my phone and use the My Tracks Google app to track my workout.  I’m an engineer and I love numbers and graphs, so I like the visual representations of the data collected during my workout.  I also figure it might come in handy if I ever get lost.  How about using some screenshots from the app to go along with some photos of my hike?

Supplies Used:  Days of the Week Saturday and Days of the Week Friday  by Mari Koegelenberg and Sugarplum Paperie

Phone or computer screenshots from Runkeeper, MyFitnessPal or even your Fitbit might help you tell a more complete story.  If you don’t use any of these apps or websites, try including a Google map of your latest adventure in one of your layouts.  What other ways can you think of to document your pursuit of fitness?

DIET

What do you eat?  What do you like to eat?  There could be two very different answers here!  😉  Since my diet is mostly devoid of any nutritional value, I borrowed this layout from fellow CT member Alina to talk about her Way of Eating (or WOE, which is how most of us feel when watching what we eat).  I thought it was great that there were no food photos in the layout – or am I the only person who can’t get the pretty food blogger-type photos to turn out?

Supplies Used:  A Fresh Start by Zoe Pearn and Digital Scrapbook Ingredients

Another great idea I’ve seen is a copy of the recipe in the layout, having someone take a few photos of you while you cook something special, or even getting the kids involved.  What other ways can you think of to document your “WOE”?

MOTIVATION

You can tell a lot about a person by what is on their IPod.  Mine has more Britney Spears than I like to admit and much more gangster rap from the 1990’s than you’d think! I think a good playlist is a fantastic way to keep yourself motivated at the gym and to distract you during a long and boring run on the treadmill.  What’s on yours?

Supplies Used:  Spin the Record by Amanda Yi Designs and Two Tiny Turtles

If music doesn’t float your boat, maybe you are motivated to reduce your cholesterol, or by a pair of pants you want to wear, or an upcoming reunion/wedding/trip.  What is your motivation?

HEALTH

As scrapbookers, we sometimes gloss over the things that aren’t going particularly well or make us unhappy.  I am totally guilty of this – if you only knew my from my scrapbook layouts (especially the ones posted online), you would think I’m an active, happy, energetic, organized woman who lives with a cute cat.  If you actually know me, you are now rolling on the ground and laughing. 😀

I thought it might be interesting to look back in a few years and see the crazy that is my daily medication schedule.  Every day I take my thyroid meds, vitamin D, an antidepressant, probiotics, magnesium, more thyroid meds in the afternoon, birth control pills, multivitamin, L-tryptophan, melatonin, and a Benadryl allergy tablet.  These are all scheduled around what time I ate or the last pill I had to take.  It’s beyond irritating, but I have to keep on top of it to function “normally”, so I suck it up and get on with it.

Supplies Used:  A Fresh Start by Zoe Pearn and Digital Scrapbook Ingredients

I think it might be interesting to include copies of blood work results or my doctor’s notes after an appointment.  What other ways can you think of to document some of the health issues you are dealing with?

I hope this post has given you some ideas to work with.  Wishing you good health and happy scrapping!

About the Author:  Kacy is an Environmental Engineer living in Arizona with a elderly, cranky, pudgy, but insanely cute calico kitty.  She enjoys scrapbooking, crocheting, dancing awkwardly to electronic dance music, Grumpy Cat, Scottish accents, drag queens, cupcakes, bacon,  Stephen King books, smirking, very crude inside jokes, and men in kilts.

Hi everyone! I am so excited to be here with you today to talk about one of my favorite subjects – scrapbooking family history! A heritage/family history scrapbook album is wonderful way to document your family’s history and create a lasting gift for future generations. Some people find scrapbooking family history to be a challenge so I thought I’d help out a bit by offering a few different ways to document your family history in your scrapbook pages.

 

One of my biggest tips regarding family history scrapbooking is to just get started. It’s easy to be overwhelmed with the photos and memorabilia from the past and wanting to be sure each and every page is perfect. I have found that just jumping in is one of the best strategies for getting the pages done – find a photo or a story that you really want to document and JUST DO IT! It’s often a good idea to start simple – using neutrals and muted tones which are more traditional colors for historical photos. Trying to focus on keeping it simple can help you get started. Neutrals and traditional motifs can help you create beautiful but fairly easy pages that don’t require a lot of fuss! Here are a few examples of pages using ‘traditional’ heritage supplies to create beautiful pages for your family history scrapbooks!

 

 

One of the things that I often hear people say about heritage scrapping is that they don’t scrapbook family history because they do not have photos about the events of their family’s past. Although I certainly understand the trepidation that comes from not having photos, I have a few suggestions about how to document those events and experiences from the past  despite not having photos with which to base a scrapbook page! My first suggestion is to think outside of the box and scrapbook a page that tells the story of the major historical events have impacted your family. One example of this technique, is a page I created about the fact that my maternal grandfather was stationed at Pearl Harbor when it was bombed by the Japanese and how that experience affected him and his family. It was a difficult page to create because it outlines some very personal and difficult experiences but I love that it tells the story of our family within the larger context of the world around them. I didn’t have any photos of my grandfather at Pearl Harbor so I googled photos of the Pearl Harbor bombing and found this photo which was perfect for the theme of my page! Don’t be afraid to search for relevant photos online that might capture the themes of your page!

 

Other ideas for scrapping family history pages when you don’t have photos include the following –

1. Document pop culture of the past
2. Tell stories from the past and use scrapbooking supplies on the page that will reinforce the theme of the story you are telling! One of the main things future generations will be interested in is the stories you have to tell so be sure to document them regardless of whether or not you have pictures that go with those stories.
3. If you have memorabilia from the past, you can always use that in lieu of a photo to tell a story.
4. Do you have any furniture, glassware or art that you’ve inherited from a family member? If so, take photos of all of those precious ‘things’ so that you can tell future generations about the things from the past.
5. If your family has certain family recipes or foods that are significant, be sure to document those in your scrapbooks. You can make the dish and use a photo from today to document those recipes or you can do a photo-less page that outlines the recipe and why it’s significant to your family’s heritage.

Another thing that I have often heard people say they struggle with in scrapbooking the past is that they prefer using modern supplies (vibrant and bold, for example) which we don’t tend to see used with older photos. I love to use more current kits and supplies on my heritage layouts – so I definitey recommend you give it a try! No one said that older photos had to be neutral and muted! Add some color and use more modern motifs to add that extra something to your pages! Here are a few examples that might help inspire you to use more modern supplies and motifs on your family history photos!

 

 

I really hope these suggestions and ideas are helpful to you and allow you to begin to document your family’s history! Don’t forget that  there are no rules for scrapping the past – it’s your scrapbook & you should create pages that resonate with you!

So, now it’s your turn! I would love to see what you can do to pursue history by using one of these suggestions to create a family history page.  I’m hosting a challenge over on the forums and I hope you will come play along!  Check it out at The Drawing Board: Challenges.

About the Author: Amy lives in Reston, VA with her husband of 13 years and their 9 year old boy/girl twins. Their 18 year old daughter is in the midst of  her second year at West Virginia University!  Amy has been scrapbooking since the early 1990s but discovered digital scrapbooking in 2005 when her twins were born and has primarily scrapped digitally since that time. She is passionate about telling her family’s stories and documenting their life together! Amy is a huge reader (mostly literary fiction) and is a pop culture junkie! She also LOVES all things beauty & makeup!

Hello, hello! Cynthia here today bringing you this awesome lovey-dovey article. But—if you thought this would be yet another Valentine’s Day post, prepare to be surprised! How often do we forget to actually do what WE love? When was the last time you ate a whole bag of lemon drops while watching Dr. House? Uh, ok, that may be just me, but in all seriousness, how often do we put ourselves last and fulfill the needs of our significant others, kids, co-workers, friends, etc. first?

For example, I do love to watch Dr. House,  ER, Grey’s Anatomy and all those hospital shows while my hubby truly despises them. He says he can’t stand the idea of seeing someone in pain (when most likely he can’t stomach the idea of blood, even imaginary). So I don’t watch them, or else watch an episode here and there when he’s not home.

 

Another thing I love to do is cook elaborate dishes and desserts, but when you are constantly on the move with little ones (and one that is THE pickiest eater ever) I end up cooking the same things over and over again. Every once in a blue moon, I do indulge in my inner Marthe Stewart and whip up something super fancy or at least, something new to break the routine.

I also love gardening, but don’t seem to find the time to do it. I have a gazillion pots that are just begging to be filled and also a gazillion plants in those horrid plastic containers. *sigh*

So my challenge to you today (and every day if you can!) is to find those big and little things that you love but don’t often have the time to do, and recapture them. Pursue them even if it’s for an hour, or if you only get to reminisce about that city you loved when you first visited. Make the time to have at least a few minutes of “me” time every day, I promise everyone around you (even if they don’t know what you’re doing!) will appreciate it. But mostly, you will love to pursue your (mostly) forgotten loves every day.

Head on over to my Scrap your Love Challenge here in the Forum, where I’ll show you a couple of ways you can scrap those other loves in your life! Can’t wait to see what you love!

 About the Author: Cynthia is a CT Member here at The Digital Press. She lives in sunny (way too sunny!) Mazatlan, Mexico with her hubby and their 8-going-on-40 yo daughter, plus the 2 most spoiled Westies who ever lived. She loves reading, cooking, photography and of course, scrapping!

 

 

Do you ever feel like you are stuck in a creative rut? You might take a look through your gallery and see that a lot of your pages look the same, or you don’t even feel inspired to create a new page because you feel like it has all been done before, or… you can’t even decide what to make for dinner anymore because you are sapped of any and all creativity. Well, maybe you don’t have these problems, but I certainly do. And when I’m lacking in creative mojo, there are a few things that will get me back into the creative zone:

• I use Pinterest to search for art/design/color or really anything that jumps out at me and makes me feel like creating. Sometimes it is a quote, sometimes it is someone’s art, sometimes it is a list of ideas or creative kickstarters.
• If Pinterest isn’t doing it for me, I will turn on some of my favorite music and do a little afternoon dancing. I think that if we get physical and ignore our mental blocks, they can dissolve themselves.
• Magazines or scientific/technological websites will often give me a punch in the gut because of the interesting things that are happening on their websites or between their pages. An article about 3D printing, beautiful descriptive language in National Geographic, or reading about advances in medical technology can offer creative inspiration… especially if it isn’t something you would usually read. It gets you outside of the typical box and lets you take a peek into another world.
• People-watching/eavesdropping. I admit to being an eavesdropper. Not always. But sometimes, you catch a nugget from a conversation that immediately draws your attention, and then your imagination. Follow that, and you reach creativity. Listen to those around you. Jot down key phrases or note something you liked about their personality or style.

It is always important to find what really works for you. You can read a lot of different opinions on creativity, but if one or the other doesn’t work for you, it is a problem. You have to find what keeps you inspired and creative. Here are some other thoughts/ideas about creativity:

 

 

Now that you’ve seen a variety of different ways to pursue creativity, it is your turn. Join us for the Pursue Creativity Challenge in The Drawing Board challenge forum.

About the Author: Kimberlee is a lover not a fighter; a stay-at-home gran, a poet, and a lifelong learner. She grooves on saturated colors, Tuesday dance parties, optimism, glitter and sunshine. She colors outside the lines.  She is a dreamer. She is a collector of moments.  She is all about the story.  Kimberlee completed her MFA in Creative Writing and is currently working toward a M.Ed. in Instructional Design.