Monthly Archives: October 2013
2008: USS Midway
2008: USS Midway
One of the wonderful things about living in San Diego is the great number of activities available for families. One of these is the USS Midway. Wikipedia shares this history of the USS Midway:
USS Midway was an aircraft carrier of the United States Navy, the lead ship of its class. Commissioned a week after the end of World War II, the Midway was the largest ship in the world until 1955, as well as the first U.S. warship too big to transit the Panama Canal. A revolutionary hull design, based on the planned Montana-class battleship, gave her better maneuverability than previous carriers. She served for an unprecedented 47 years, saw action in the Vietnam War, and was the Persian Gulf flagship in 1991’s Operation Desert Storm. Decommissioned in 1992, she is now a museum ship at the USS Midway Museum, in San Diego, California, and the only remaining U.S. aircraft carrier of the World War II era that is not an Essex-class aircraft carrier. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Midway_(CV-41) ).
You will notice that there is some glare on this page that comes from the plastic protector sheets. I based the color scheme of this page off of the patch in the top left corner. The borders for each of my pictures is taken from the colors in the patch.
In the top right hand corner is a car window cling sticker that I received from a friend, and I affixed it to the page with brads. Since it is a reverse window cling sticker it sticks to the page protector which is one reason that I could not take these pages out to photograph them.
I also glued a pressed coin to this page as well. We often collect these on our adventures to give to my father who collects them, but this one I kept for the scrapbook.
Related articles
- Lessons from the USS Midway (trafcom.typepad.com)
- The Aircraft Carrier The USS Midway For… (h16613.com)
- More San Diego (bainbridgesinusa.wordpress.com)
- San Diego promotes 100+ kids free deals in October (fox5sandiego.com)
2008: Cirque Du Soleil
2008: Cirque Du Soleil
We were fortunate enough to have the traveling Cirque Du Soleil Show – “Corteo” come to town and we were able to get front row seats! I have been a fan of Cirque Du Soleil for many years, but this was the first time that I took my son. He was actually a little afraid at first, especially since we were sitting in the front row – he thought that it was going to be a scary show. But once it started he got into it and now we are both avid fans. We go to a show every time that we can. In fact, I am a little scared to take him to Las Vegas because of all the shows there and I know that we will spend a fortune trying to see all of them!
The first spread above was really fun to make. I love the bright colors of the Cirque Du Soliel tent and wanted to match it with the background paper. So I found two solid colors of blue and yellow that matched the tent, and then hand cut the yellow stripes to lay on top of the solid blue background.
Because I love the tent so much I had a 8×10 print made for this page. On the right hand side of the spread is a key chain that I purchased in the gift shop, and the Cirque Du Soleil Title is cut from the popcorn box that you can see my son holding in one of the pictures.
2008: Cirque Du Soleil: Corteo
As you cannot take pictures during the show or inside the tent I decided to make this page full of ephemera from the event. On the left hand side is the program from the event, and the right hand page actually contains material from the costumes of the performers! Now, before you think I went around with a pair of scissors 🙂 – the gift shop was selling clear Christmas ornaments that were filled with these pieces of scrap material. I paid way to much for it – $16 – but I thought that it was a fun memento of the experience.
To help portray the whimsy of the event I used brads to affix the light blue material to a white paper background and then additional brads to attach items on top of that material. I purchased the peacock feathers and the white fluffy string at a local craft store to help finish out the look of this spread. I will share that this was an extremely difficult project to work on – the material kept wanted to move or curl the background paper – but it was worth the effort to figure it out.
View Scrapbook Pages from other Cirque Du Soleil Shows that I have attended:
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- An Update on Cirque du Soleil (perf570.wordpress.com)
- Cirque du soleil- Amaluna (averycracauer.wordpress.com)
2007: Grandma kissing Santa Claus
2007: Grandma kissing Santa Claus
I have taken a several month detour to share the scrapbooks from our year with our exchange student, but now I am going to return to our regularly scheduled programming of the first few years with my adopted son. We will pick back on up Christmas Eve of our first Christmas together:
I had purchased a Santa Claus outfit on Ebay and asked my father to wear it on Christmas Eve to hang up the stockings. We were staying at my Aunts House and my son and I were sleeping in the living room in a pull out bed. Once my son had fallen asleep my father came into the room to hand the stockings up and my son woke up. He started shaking me to wake me up and he whispered “Santa is here” – it was the cutest thing. My dad kept putting presents around and my son was watching from under the covers.
My mother came into the room and I was able to capture her kissing my dad – my son got upset that grandma was kissing Santa Claus and thought that Grandpa would be mad! It took a little while and then he realized that Santa was actually Grandpa!
Related articles
- The Sun, Editorial in 1897, Yes Virginia there is a Santa Claus! (duckatdickens.wordpress.com)
- Christmas Around the World – Indonesia’s Celebrations (festivefair.wordpress.com)
2013: Final page of Exchange Student Scrapbooks
2013: Final page of Exchange Student Scrapbooks
I decided not to post the last few pages from the scrapbook for our exchange student – they were of his going away party and a collection of momentos and I felt that these pages were too personal to share on this blog. I also completed these pages after our exchange student had returned to Sweden, and I mailed them to him without taking pictures of them.
I did want to share the last page of the album though. The reason for this is that it is often hard to decide what to put on the last single page in the album as it needs to summarize the album and conclude it, while doing it only on a 12×12 page. I created this page the day before he left and sent it with him on the plane.
The whole page is designed to hold an envelope for a personal letter than I wrote to him, sharing how much we enjoyed hosting him, and how much we were going to miss him. I wanted to put it in an envelope because it was a personal letter to him that I didn’t want other viewers to read.
He shared with me later that it was over two months after he returned home that he finally felt like he could read the letter because of the emotions that he had in leaving. I felt the same way – he had written a letter to me and gave it to me on the day he flew back, and it was many weeks before I could read it because I felt such a great loss.
Even though I felt that loss and our home felt empty for many weeks the experience of having an exchange student in our home was a wonderful one and we decided to do it again this year!
Related articles
- 2014: Final Page of Second Exchange Student Scrapbooks
- 2013: St Louis Cardinals Game (mascrapping.com)
- Exchange Student Programs (paq0002.wordpress.com)
- Building a family within the Exchange Program (jperaki1.wordpress.com)
2013: Shopping and The Shaved Duck
2013: Shopping and The Shaved Duck
One of our last family activities together before the going away party was to go shopping together in St Louis and then to eat at a Triple D Restaurant – “The Shaved Duck“.
While we were shopping our exchange student found a glasses kiosk that sold fun glasses and we had to try them on. Our favorite was the pixelated glasses which really makes it look like the glasses were added later with a computer. Our exchange student’s mother had also asked him to buy some lotions at Victoria’s secret – so we got a crack out of carrying the Victoria’s secret bag around the mall 🙂
English: Food Network star Guy Fieri judges a dish during the Iron Chef BBQ Competition at the Tiki Bar Monday. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
One of our new family traditions is to try and eat at Triple D featured restaurants whenever we travel. There is a website called http://www.flavortownusa.com/ that you can use to located restaurants close to where you are. Since these restaurants have been featured on TV, they usually are very full, and we usually try to eat off schedule (usually 3pm) to get into them without a wait.
The Shaved Duck was amazing and we had a great time. We always order everything that was featured on the TV show, and have never been disappointed. We were even able to get the chef who had been featured on the show to come out and spend a little time with us. Guy Fieri always leaves a tag in the restaurant and we get a picture of it.
This was one of those times where I had pictures that I wanted to use, but not enough for a double spread. For the shopping I picked the pink color from the Victoria’s Secret bag, and for the Shaved Duck I pulled the green from the sign and the green in my son’s shirt. In order to tie the two pages together I used background pages that were in the same tone, and then to add visual interest to the page I layered torn papers within the same color family to each side.
2013: St Louis City Museum
2013: St Louis City Museum
As part of our last week celebration we went to the St Louis City Museum. The museum is basically a collection of architectural salvage from 19th century buildings as well as seemingly endless miles of tunnels, passages, and bridges made from salvaged items. One could easily spend all day at the City Museum and never find all of the hidden corners. There are outdoor attractions, and indoor caves to explore. It is well worth the admission price.
The City Museum occupies the former International Shoe Company building. Tennessee Williams worked at this factory for a while and became depressed with the monotonous work. A co-worker at the International Shoe Company became the the inspirational for character Stanley Kowalski in “A Streetcar named Desire“.
I purchased the City Museum laser cut in the top right hand corner in a local scrapbook store, and the patch in the top left hand corner was purchased at the museum gift shop. Per my usual tradition, I made sure that the entrance arm bands also made it onto the page. You have to purchase an additional arm band to go to the rooftop, but again, I believe that it is worth the extra price.
Notice on the left hand page that I had to cut one of the pictures down to fit it on the page under the armbands. Don’t be afraid to cut pictures to make them fit, just be careful so that you don’t make an incorrect cut. “Measure twice and cut once!”
2013: St Louis Cardinals Game
2013: Cardinals Baseball
For our last week together before our exchange student went home to Sweden, we took a family trip together to the St Louis area. The trip centered around going to a Cardinal’s baseball game, and I bought the most expensive seats I have ever purchased for a baseball game. I usually sit in the nose bleeds or the bleachers. But for this special occasion I decided to sit on left field in better seats.
We arrived early to be able to eat at the Old Spaghetti Factory in Laclede’s Landing, and then we took the Metro to the game. We arrived before the gates were open, but enjoyed the gift shop and walking around the stadium looking at the statues and the other sites. We had an incredible time at the game. It is nice to know that we saw the Cardinal’s at the beginning of their latest World Series Championship Season 🙂 !
I used baseball themed background paper and placed an assortment of pictures and ephemera from the day. My favorite picture is the bottom one on the left hand page where you can see the St Louis Arch from the Stadium. I wanted to take this picture, because I have a picture from the top of the Arch looking at the Stadium from earlier in the year –> St Louis Arch scrapbook page.
Click for larger version
Related articles
- World Series: Fresh-faced Cards vs bearded Bosox (news.yahoo.com)
- Tom Verducci: The Cardinals are going to the World Series again. Get used to it (sportsillustrated.cnn.com)
2013: Road Trip: Kansas
2013: Road Trip Across America: Kansas
This is the last spread in our road trip across the United States. By this point I had been driving for 4 days and I was pretty exhausted. I was forgetting to take pictures, and frankly there wasn’t too much to take pictures of in Kansas anyway!
But I did remember to take a picture at the Welcome Center at the border of Kansas, and the attendants inside gave me a packet of sunflower seeds! So that was about all I had to put in the scrapbook.
I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with this spread when I discovered this wonderful sunflower background paper and just decided that this whole spread would be themed in yellow. Don’t be afraid to use a full page picture like this, especially if it helps to drive home the point of your theme.
On the right hand page I attempted to create a feel of a basket which also served as a holder for the Kansas map. I put the entire packet of sunflower seeds (including the seeds!) on the page and glued them down. They are now in Sweden so I hope that I didn’t break any international laws about seeds!
Scrapbooking tip: Welcome Centers and rest stops often have free maps of their state and local area. So they make nice free ephemera for your scrapbook, and serve as an educational tool for others who are viewing your scrapbooks.
Related articles
- Spicy Roasted Sunflower Seeds (cmduncan88.wordpress.com)
- Festival of Flowers: Week 11 (sonelcorner.wordpress.com)
- In Praise of the Sunflower Seed (rawlivingfoods.typepad.com)
- Morning Sunflowers | Lawrence Kansas Photographer (gallery32.wordpress.com)
2013: Road Trip: Colorado
2013: Road Trip Across America: Colorado
This spread continues the roadtrip and the experience in Colorado. You will notice in the bottom left hand corner is a picture of Casa Bonita, which I highlight on the spread right before this one.
I had a lot of fun creating this spread – it highlights pictures from several of the things that we saw while we were in Colorado. One of my favorite things about this page is the picture with the large stuffed bear which is in a truck stop in the middle of nowhere in Colorado. A friend of our exchange student had this exact same picture taken with this bear about 2 weeks later and I realized it when I saw it on Facebook. It really is a small world sometimes.
To make the page more interesting I tore some background papers to create the layered border effect on the left hand side of the page. I also tore some transparent paper to create a holder for the Colorado Map. I affixed it to the paper with brads so that there would not be a residue on the transparent paper from a sticky tab or glue. The brads create just enough pressure to help hold the map in place.
Scrapbooking tip: Welcome Centers and rest stops often have free maps of their state and local area. So they make nice free ephemera for your scrapbook, and serve as an educational tool for others who are viewing your scrapbooks.
While the buffalo head coin seems a little random on this page – I purchased it at the same truck stop as the stuffed bear and thought that it would serve as a nice souvenir for our exchange student from the United States.
Related articles
- Rocky Mountain Heights (jewelsofthesky.wordpress.com)
2013: Road Trip: Temple Square and Casa Bonita
2013: Road Trip Across America: Temple Square and Casa Bonita
As I got to scrapbooking this part of the trip (Utah and Colorado) I realized that I had 3 pages of material for each of these two States. I didn’t want to create a total of 4 spreads for six pages, so instead I used this buffer spread between the two States to accomplish this.
The left hand page showcases our time in Salt Lake City at the Temple Square, the headquarters of the Mormon Church.
The right hand page showcases our favorite restaurant in Denver, Colorado – Casa Bonita. I will be real honest that the food at Casa Bonita isn’t that great – but the atmosphere makes for a fun experience. They have Mariachi bands, puppet shows, magic shows, and even cliff divers. The restaurant is very dark, and unfortunately none of my pictures from inside the restaurant turned out very good and I had to resort to using a postcard that I bought at the gift store.
Putting a serious religious monument right next to a crazy restaurant experience could have been a dangerous thing, but I used the background papers to tie the two events together. The left hand page is elegant and old. The right hand page mimics the elegance, but changes color to match the colors in the postcard of the cliff divers.
Related articles
- Welcome to Salt Lake City! (jacobtripplee.wordpress.com)
- Salt Lake City – Temple Square. (millsinusa.wordpress.com)
- Temple Square in SLC, UT – Salt Lake Cities finest Tourist Location (subhamlove2013.wordpress.com)
