2015: Anheuser Busch Brewery Tour
Another stop that we made on our Thanksgiving Dinner was to the Anheuser Busch Brewery Tour in St Louis. I should be clear to share that I choose not to drink alcohol, but the tour is fascinating even for those that do not drink. I have enjoyed taking our exchange students there, and they are always sad that they are not old enough in the United States to participate in the free samples that are given out at two times during the tour. During this visit, our exchange student Henry, decided that he was going to make a sad face in every picture because he was not allowed to drink 😦
For this spread I had to use red paper to match the logo of the Brewery, and had fun with the ephemera that I collected on this trip – there is a piece of beechwood used in the fermentation process (picked up in the massive fermentation room), a coaster from the biergarten at the end of the tour, our ticket for the tour (By the way – it is free!), and magnetic borders for the photographs that I purchased from the tour.
Tour Tips:
- Arrive early as tours can fill up quickly, and later tours tend to be much larger, and it is harder to hear the tour guide.
- Be aware that at two points in the tour they will provide alcohol to the tour members. During the tour a sample is offered, and at the end of the tour drink cards are given for people to make their own selection. The drink cards can also be exchanged for a soda drink for the kids, or for teetotalers like me :).
We have been on this tour a couple of times – so here are the creations from our other visits:
2015: St Louis Science Center
As part of our Thanksgiving vacation we went to the St Louis Science Center. I misread the time that they opened so we ended up getting there an hour early! The St Louis Science Center is a massive complex that will engage your family all day long. It is free to enter, but there is always a special exhibit that you can pay more to enter, and tickets to the Omnimax theater as well. We were able to see the Ripley’s Believe It or Not! travelling exhibit which was pretty fun to interact with.
I chose “sciency” background papers and borders for this project – diamond stamp, graph paper, and geometric shapes. I put the program on the left hand page on top of the plastic page protector so that it could be opened for the viewer to read. On the right hand page I made a pocket out of triangles for the brochures to go in, so that they could be taken out to read. I did this by using a long strip of adhesive tabs along the bottom and the side of the triangle to assure that the brochures did not fall through. As is my usual habit, the ticket to the event was added to the page to remind the viewer of the date that we had this amazing experience.
2015: Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving is a new holiday for our exchange students, as it is a uniquely American holiday. So we like to make sure that they get the full experience. This year we went to my parents house for a couple of days where our exchange student met my nieces and nephews (they loved him if you can’t tell from the pictures), had traditional Thanksgiving dinner at my parents house, and then the next day had Thanksgiving/Christmas dinner and gift exchange at my sisters houses (with all of her kids). They had a new kitten which we all enjoyed playing with (see if you can find him in the photographs). We took Henry to Walmart on Thanksgiving night so that he could experience Black Friday and I think that he thought that we were all crazy (and he is probably right!).
I selected the background paper for this spread from a Fall paper book, and I cut the turkey out using my Cricut machine. In order to give the wing a letter more definition I put a thick sticky tab underneath the wing to make it stick out from the page. I did something that is not usual for me – I journaled on this page. I did this because there were so many different things happening on this page, and I thought it would be important to explain them.
2015: First Tattoo
For my son’s 18th birthday I told him that I would get a matching tattoo with him. Now, before you judge me, I already have 3 other tattoos, and I knew that at 18 he could get a tattoo on his own, so I thought it best to be with him during his first tattoo, and to help pick what it was going to be – so that it didn’t end up being an evil dragon or something crazy. The tattoo is the adoption symbol, with our adoption date in the middle. Levi has his on his arm, and I had the same tattoo put over my heart. We went to Article 19 to get them done.
I choose a darker background for this spread to mimic the black of the tattoo. The left hand page has the drawing we created to give the artist an idea of what we wanted. There is also a picture of the tattoo being done, and the business card of the artist. I used my Cricut machine to cut out the design in the black border, and used the cutout leftover portion for the page, as it was more striking than the cutout itself.
I did use some of the cutout though as an accent on the photograph of the final product on the right hand page. I used a double border of silver and black on this photograph as it is the only one on this page, and I needed to help it be more commanding of the space.
2015: Komets Ice Hockey
I woke up on this Saturday morning and was trying to think of something fun to do with the boys. I went online and realized that I could get some relatively inexpensive, but nice box seats, for the Fort Wayne Komets Hockey game. We sat in the Clubseat section where we could order food and have it brought to us!
I used two ice hockey background pages that I had in a sports paper pack, and used a thin black border around the pictures, menu, and tickets. The black border went nicely with the large black puck on the right hand page. I added a few Jolee’s dimensional ice hockey stickers to complete the look.
2015: Indianapolis 500 Museum Tour
Another experience that we like to take our exchange students to is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum. We normally just take the short bus tour around the track and look at the museum, but they were running a special for a behind the scenes tour and I thought that it would be fun to do that.
For the first spread I used background paper that looked like tire treads and one of vintage cars. The left hand page has two brochures that are not mounted to the page, but instead sit inside the plastic page protector. It also has a sticker from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The right hand page has pictures from the track and the pagoda. We got to sit in the press boxes, and stand in the winners box as part of the behind the scenes tour.
This second spread is a mix of several things. Between our museum tour and the behind the scenes tour we had to go get lunch, and our exchange student, Henry, really want to go to a White Castle! Interestingly enough, all of our exchange students wanted to do this, but after going once, they never asked to go back again. So on the top right hand page we have a picture of Henry outside of White Castle and a burger box behind it. The right hand page has pictures of Henry outside of the Museum and also pointing to the last German winner of the Indy 500.
The left hand page has the paper from the pin that we had to wear on the behind the scenes tour (I carefully took the pin apart so that I could save the paper), a picture of Henry inside a mock car from the museum, and the brochure for the behind the scenes tour.
We have been to this location a couple of times so I wanted to share some of the previous scrapbook pages that I have made for this location:
2015: Mississinewa 1812
One of our local annual events is Mississinewa 1812 which is basically a reenactment festival, with lots of food and period vendors. We always arrive early to enjoy the food and then to watch the reenactment battle.
I used vintage looking background paper for this spread, and used a double torn border to create interest on the page. I put the ephemera on the left hand page (program, ticket, and a printing press poem). The right hand page has pictures from the day. I used the same border paper for the pictures and the ephemera to tie the spread together.
This is an event that we have been to several times and I always enjoy scrapbooking it. To see how I have done this in previous years see:
2015: Football
It seems like I scrapbook a lot of football pages! Today’s blog features 4 spreads that I made for our exchange student, Henry for the Fall 2015 football season. The above spread features the official team photograph and other photographs that I took myself on media day. The school colors are blue and gold, and you will see that reflected throughout these four spreads. I found the Golden Eagles sticker at a local print shop in the “clearance” section which was awesome. I think that they are meant to be car window stickers, but I thought that it would work nicely on this page. Be careful if putting a sticker like this on a page – because it will be impossible to re-position it if you don’t get it in the right spot.
This spread features pictures from games and from after the games. The bottom right hand photograph was taken after the last game played on our home field and is kind of sad seeing Henry looking out over a field that he has played on for the last time. The background for this page is football field lines, with end borders made of pigskin. I carefully cut the “82” out of a page of athletic numbers to add to the border.
The above spread is from the athletic awards program. I used blue and gold for the theme of the page. On the left hand page the program is carefully threaded around a gold strip so that the program can be removed to be viewed by the reader. On the right hand side I put a “O” for the letter jacket. Henry did not earn his letter until after the swim season, but I thought that it would be nice to have hear. On the right hand page I also created a pocket for the other documents from the season to go into so that they can be removed to view.
This last spread contains ephemera from the season. The left hand page has all of the stickers from Henry’s football helmet. I wrote some tips on how to preserve these that you can read HERE. The right had page has some of my tickets from watching the game, as well as a collection of all of the programs from the games. I did not affix these to the page, but rather just set them into the plastic protector page so that they can be removed to read.
2015: Michigan Fall Farm Trip
One weekend we decided to take a quick day trip up to Michigan and we visited a farm that allowed you to self pick pumpkins and apples!
So obviously I had to pick pumpkin background for this spread. I used an orange plaid paper to border the photographs on the right hand page, but I did not use any border on the left hand page. You will also notice a peacock feather on the left hand page that we found in the farm yard. I really struggled with how I was going to attach the feather to the page. I ended up using tape to tape down the spine, and then used thick mounting tabs to attach the photograph over the spine. This means that this photograph sticks out from the page, but it also adds some nice depth to the page.
2015: Trip to the White House
I was fortunate to be invited by the President of Indiana Wesleyan University to attend the Fifth Annual President’s Interfaith and Community Service Campus Challenge meeting at the White House. The meeting was actually held in the Eisenhower Executive Office building, but it was close enough for me (I have actually been inside the White House on an earlier trip to Washington D.C.). President Obama did not attend the meeting, which was a little disappointing, but it was fun to be in that setting.
For this spread I chose to use a patriotic theme, and used stars and stripes. I then double bordered the two photo sets with two shades of blue to mimic the Whitehouse.gov screen that was in the room.
The pictures on the left hand page are from the meeting, while those on the right hand page are taken outside of the White House after the meeting, and from a tourist shop that has recreations of the Oval Office and the Press Room – so don’t think that I got in that far!
