Blog Archives
2014: The Loft
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One of our adventures in 2014 was a trip to the Loft Restaurant which is part of the Traderspoint Creamery, near Indianapolis, IN in Zionsville, IN. We had lunch upstairs and then took a tour of the farm. The meal was amazing, and the atmosphere was rustic, but comfortable. They have an amazing cheese “cellar” that you can see into from the restaurant which is pretty cool.
I chose a rustic wood theme for this spread to match the wood of the barns and the restaurant. On the left hand page are pictures of our meals, along with some brochures and a menu from the restaurant. I used some card stock to create a holder for the brochures so that they can be removed, and fastened it down with two brads.
The right hand page has pictures from inside the barn that they rent out for weddings, the cheese “cellar”, the cool brick wall of the barn foundation, and the entrance sign to the property. I finished of the page by using some wood veneer tags for decoration.
2014: Indianapolis Motor Speedway
2014: Indianapolis Motor Speedway
Our exchange student’s grandmother, aunt, and cousin came to visit for a week while he was staying with us. We wanted to take them all to see the local attractions and being near Indianapolis, this included the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The Speedway has a museum that is very cool to look at, although I am not sure that it would keep the attention of younger children. You can also take a bus ride around the track which is a lot of fun to do. It gives some sense of how long of a track it is, and how fast the Indy cars are going.
For this spread I used some “road line” picture background paper on the left hand page, and regular grey cardstock on the right hand page. To mimic the brick finish line on the track I used some brick paper and put it vertically on the page. As you know part of my philosophy of scrapbooking is to include ephemera from the location or event that we have visited – so this spread includes tickets to the museum and bus ride, a pressed coin, a sticker from the museum, and of course, a brochure from the museum.
2014: Spring Break Trip
2014: Spring Break Trip
This spread is a collection of a Triple D restaurant that we visited in St Louis and pictures from a collection of stops that we made on the way home at the end of our Spring Break.
The Highway 61 Roadhouse and Kitchen is a bizarre restaurant that looks a little bit like Mardi Gras at New Orleans on the inside and is known for its Cajun food. The left hand side of the page celebrates this experience with pictures of our food and the obligatory pictures of Guy Fieri and his signature tag in the restaurant.
The right hand page showcases pictures from our trip home at the end of Spring Break. We stopped in Casey, IL to see the worlds largest wind chime – which surprisingly was worth stopping to see – its not too far off of I-70. We also stopped at an “Indian” trading post and had to have a picture with the teepee. For lunch we stopped at the Athenaeum in Indianapolis for a German lunch with our German exchange student. Sadly only one person in the restaurant spoke German at the time we were there.
I didn’t do anything too exciting with these pages technique wise as they comprised 4 different events and experiences. I did however layer background papers and use a torn paper effect, to give the pages interest.
2013:Zest and Triple D
2013:Zest and Triple D
One of our family traditions is to try and visit as many Triple D locations as possible. Triple D is a Food Network Show in which Guy Fieri showcases fun restaurants from around the country. There is a list of all the ones he has reviewed at FlavortownUSA.com and we have been to quite a few of them.
This spread showcases our meal at Zest in Indianapolis, IN. I tried all of the menu items that Guy reviewed on the show, and I must admit that they tasted great!
The color scheme for this page was taken from the logo of the restaurant which is orange, purple and pink. I used a solid orange background page and then used torn scraps from other projects to add energy and life to the page.
The right hand page contains the menu, a business card, and a carefully hand-cut photograph of the logo in the window of the restaurant.
The left hand side contains pictures of the boys, our appetizer, my yummy meal, and the Guy Fieri “tag” that he leaves in every restaurant that he reviews. For the “Tag” photo, the orange color of the wall in the picture did blend well with the background page, so I used a different orange colored border to create a space between the two oranges which helped for the colors to work better together.
2013: Triple D and Zest 2
The picture to the left is of the exact same pages but placed in the opposite order. There are many times when I make pages like this that can be placed in either order.
I usually create an album full of pages before I actually insert them into the album all at once. This way i can balance pages out across albums and I also have more time to decide how I want to place the pages like this one.
2013: Indianapolis Children’s Museum
2013: Indianapolis Children’s Museum
If you haven’t figured it out by now – my sister has passes to almost everything attraction – this time to the Indianapolis Children’s Museum.
The special exhibit was of Avatar, so of course I had to theme the pages in blue. The left and right borders are scraps left over from other projects, as well as the two horizontal bars on the left hand page. If you look carefully at the top Horizontal bar you will notice that it actually forms the top of a pocket that is holding the museum map. I created this pocket so that the map could be pulled out and viewed. Usually I would stick the map to the outside of the plastic page protector, but in this case I had too many pictures that I wanted to display, so I hid most of the map behind the pictures.
Tip: Making a pocket in a scrapbook page: I created the pocket by using my straight line cutter to cut a line across the middle-left 4 inches of the twelve inch page – leaving about one inch on the left side side of the page and 7 inches on the right side that is still connected. I then turned the page over and put a piece of tape over the edge that is left connected on both sides – this helps to strengthen the paper so that it does not tear. I then used a piece of card stock that is about 11 1/2 inches wide and taped it to the back of the page completely sealing the border so that the brochure will not fall out.
The left hand page showcases pictures from the Avatar exhibit as well as a patch from the museum store. The right hand page shows Luca, our exchange student, at some of the other exhibits. Luca discovered that the plastic pipes for construction also made a great musical instrument! The right hand page also displays Luca’s ticket for the museum and some “gold pirate coins” that were being handed out at the entrance way – the day we went it was apparently pirate theme day – I wish I had known because I have a sweet pirate costume!
I like to use tickets on my pages as they usually have the date and time printed on them as well as the name of the event/place. This way I don’t have to include too much journaling on the page as that is not part of my preferred style.
2013: Indianapolis Zoo
2013: Indianapolis Zoo
My sister has season passes to the Indianapolis zoo and invited our family to join them for the day. The seals are very near to the entrance to the park and Luca, our exchange student, thought that their barking was very funny. This was our first introduction to Luca’s contagious laughter – he was so loud in his laughing that the seals started barking even more which made Luca laugh even louder which of course set the seals off even more.
I chose animal print background pages for this spread and then focused on putting as many pictures on the page as I could. There was a massive “Ice Age” poster and I got a great shot of the boys in front of it with same surprised look as the animal characters.
As usual, I placed the map to the zoo on the outside of the plastic protector so that the viewer can open it to look at it. On the right hand page I put the stick that we used to feed the parakeets peanut butter – if you look carefully you can still see a peanut butter stain. I put the stick on top of the Member wristband that we used to get special perks in the park during the day.
2013: Indianapolis 500
2013: Indianapolis 500
We were fortunate enough this year to be able to attend the Indianapolis 500. One of the teachers at our High School is connected to someone at the Indy 500 and was able to take our exchange student to a special preview day ahead of the race, and the spread above includes the pictures and the ephemera from that day.
I chose to use a brick pattern background paper to reference the nickname of the grounds – “the brickyard”. The track was originally completely paved in brick, but now there is only a thin strip of brick exposed which serves as the finish line.
If you look carefully at the “Indy 500 or Bust” logo on the right page you will notice that it is plastic. It is actually a window cling that was mailed to us with our event tickets. I wanted to save it for the scrapbook so I stuck it to a plastic sheet protector and then cut both the sticker and the plastic sheet together so that it would be the correct way round. I then used brads to attach it to the page so that there would not be glue marks visible.
The second spread below are pictures and ephemera from Race Day. I included the event ticket, the event program, and a list of all of the cars and drivers for the day.
We really enjoyed the day, but I was exhausted by the time we got home that evening.
Click for Larger View
2012: Naptown Roller Derby
2012: Naptown Roller Derby
As part of our birthday celebration for our exchange student we went to the Naptown Roller Derby in Indianapolis, IN. While it was a lot of fun to be there, and to learn the rules of the sport, we we didn’t see as many injuries or as much blood as we thought (or hoped) we were going to. It may have been that it was their season opener against themselves, and they may have not wanted to hurt their own team mates.
For this spread I chose a blue background paper to match the blue rink that they were skating on. I used my Cricut Gypsy to design the red lines on the paper. I then used my Cricut Machine to draw the lines on the paper using a marker pen instead of the cutting blade.
As is my custom, I mounted the ticket to the event and the program on the page as well.
Related articles
- Roller Derby facts (respublica.typepad.com)
2012: Dinner Magic Show
2012: Dinner Magic Show
This page highlights a Dinner Magic Show, and event that I would never have thought to go to if it were not for Groupon. I purchased greatly discounted prices and we were on our way!
The event was dinner and table magic, followed by a magic show, and was held at the Indianapolis Propylaeum. If you click on the picture you can zoom in and read more about what a Propylaeum is on the historic marker on the left hand page. I hand cut the historic marker photograph to make it easier to read, and then also hand cut the border that surrounds it.
Since the venue for this event was historic and elegant I picked an elegant background paper for the left hand side. I used a corner cutter to create borders for the two photographs on the left page.
For the right hand page I used a domino paper to hint at games and illusions. It is difficult to tell from this photograph, but on this page I cut two of the dominoes out from behind the photographs and then used thick sticky pads to elevate them off of the page to add interest and dimension to the page.
2012: Rhythm Discovery Center
2012: Rhythm Discovery Center
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After we were finished with the NASCAR Drive Along Experience we went to downtown Indianapolis to visit the Rhythm Discovery Center – an interactive experience with percussion instruments. This is not a place to visit if you don’t like loud sounds! And, as usual, I got a great deal on groupon.com for our tickets!
We had a ton of fun at this location and it is a great place for families with kids of all ages to visit. My favorite part was the massive drum head in the entrance way – you can see it with the three handsome men in front of it on the left hand page. When you hit it with the mallet it made the whole area shake.
I based the orange color scheme for this page of of the brochure that I placed on the right hand page. Since this was a double sided brochure I took two of them so that I could show the front and the back easily.
If you click on the picture above and then click again to zoom in, you will also be able to see that I cut circles out of a plastic sheet protector to put on the left hand page. They are hard to see in the photograph, but they are visible on the page. This was done to represent the drum heads that we were banging on in the exhibit.
Related articles
- Greenotation (inabsentia0.wordpress.com)
- Rhythm Writing [Composition Fundamentals] (philipsmithcomposer.wordpress.com)
- Percussion Activities for Kids (livestrong.com)
