Ashley Wren`s cute prompts for writing.

Not much scrapbooking this weekend. Mostly work and no play… I have used all my spare time going through piles of photos. I have been lacy uploading photos to print the last year. My printer is not good enough for printing photos. And I believe Stacy Julian when she says you have to have prints. It is so much easier to work when you have the photos in front of you.

Picking the photos from the external hard disk and uploading for print takes forever. And I have to concentrate to get it right. I am so happy it is done. (Just about 10 hours left, but the computer will be working through the night all alone).

I will be making an album for Christmas; the rest will be waiting just in case I decide to take the LOOM class at BPS.

I had a little time working on Ashley Wren’s writing class. This tends to be very personal so I am just showing you her sweet prompts.

…I just had to join Ashley Wren`class.  She is such an inspiration. I got in just a few minutes before it started as usual, so I have not finished putting my journal together yet. The first lesson is up and it is looking great.  She is so good at what she is doing. My only problem is translating it all to Norwegian.  It is so easy to get into what she is saying that I keep thinking in English. And really…I can`t make a journal in English.

I haven`t been working with any photos since last Wednesday. I am getting some medical treatment and my hands are covered with some kind of shit at all time. Every time I try to do something everything I touch gets greasy. This is the last page I made:

Elin and Kristian - 2007

When I left for work this morning it was hardly daylight and almost at freezing point. By the time dinner was done with the sun was almost gone. It has been a great summer. Stacy Julian got me going all summer long with her Have more FUN class. It was challenging for a few days there…seeing the FUN in all this. Still working on that one, but I did enjoy the whole thing. July was great with the four very talented girls challenging our creativity. I loved Stacy’s photo album scrapbooking in August. I will be making a lot of those. And I never thought I would finish my 30 days Hath September album…but, I did.

Welcome October...

Most of all I enjoyed Tena’s 52 card pick up class. I had never learned anything about techniques before, so to be given 52 lessons in a row by this talented girl was fantastic. It was so fun to make these 5×7 cards and the deck look so great hanging right there by my desk. I will do this all over the next time Tena teaches this class.

The last card to the deck...

I also had the pleasure of joining Ashley Wren’s class at Scrap in style TV. That was fun. She is the most amazing girl. If I ever need ideas for scrapbooking I just go to the files of her class. She gives you a prompt….followed with 20 ideas of how to approach this…which gives me 20 new ideas…

Obsessed. Inspired by Ashley Wren.

Between all this “paperwork” we had a wedding in the family, the most important event this summer. Jan and Linda was the most beautiful couple and we had some really good days with family and friends. And I am so happy about the “honeymoon” baby arriving in May. Three babies in six years ….that make us feel blessed.

And the kissing just would not stop....

And finally at the end of the summer comes our two weeks at Viva Bahia, just totally relaxing and gathering strength for a long winter to come. I have to admit that I did spend some time on the computer looking up what was going on in my Have more FUN class, and I was seeing Stacy’s FUN colours all over the place.

Have more FUN at Mallorca...

It is 12 weeks before Christmas, and we just finished our class at Big Picture Scrapbooking. I had to celebrate that making a layout about this summer. Since I seem to be obsessed with Squares these days it turned out like this;

Intentional Play......Productivity.....Present-moment awerness....

At the end of this summer I have some thoughts about what I want to do with my time in the months to come. But right now it is all about Cathy’s Design Your Life, starting tomorrow. I do have a few other projects coming up also…..

I just want to say thank you all for a great summer.

Shopping…, originally uploaded by elinjanne.

Inspired by Ashley Wren’s class.

…SHOPPING…I don’t like shopping when I am on vacation. And I am talking about sun,beach,good food and funny drinks…..After staying in this place every summer for years, shopping can be a difficult thing to do. But, we need presents for the kids…We found something for baby Elin, but nothing for Kristian. Kjellaug is a smart girl, she knew what Kristian needs. So hopefully someone can buy this thing at home so we can give this gift to Kristian when we come home. I don’t think all the funny things you can buy on the streets are very healthy for the kids…

It is almost 10am and Kjellaug hit the beach a long time ago. Me…I like to have a slow morning. After some alone time in the computer room after breakfast I will join my brother for some coffee and talk on the terrace. That is my favourite time of the day. There is nothing I need to do, nowhere I need to be. I just love that….And then there is time for the beach…I could get used to spend my time like this…I think…

…the Unpredictable Requests….

And I can tell you that I will not get bored in a long time. I did not get that much scrapbooking done because I spent a lot of time writing down my own ideas, inspired by AW`s great requests. She is so inspiring. I will have something to work on long after Christmas. One of her first requests was to make small “windows” of pieces of acrylic overlay and paint. I made my four cute windows, painted them and put photos on them. I set them aside to dry. The only problem was….they did not dry…because I had forgotten to remove the film before using the paint. One of those funny moments…. I did not have the guts to do it one more time, so I made a bigger one:

Kristian - inspired by Ashley Wren

There is not much summer left but it has been a warm, nice day. There is still moments of traffic-jam at the Atlantic Road.

Traffic-jam at The Atlantic Road.

I had dinner at my brothers house today. He is having his in laws visiting and we did try to have a family photo taken. That is not easy….

We tried with three generations....

And we tried with four generations...

At lest we got them framed….that is better then nothing…I think….

I have one more photo I have to share. It is from last night. A young man – a newly wed – ready to take his bride out to party. Wearing the jacket his grandma knitted for him.  He is dressed just like his grandpa was when he  dressed to party in 1940-1950. Come to think about it…I believe I have some photos somewhere of both his father and grandfather in jackets like this. 

Talking about connections – ref. Stacy Julian. I will come back to that tomorrow…

…baby Elin came home with this friend today;

Blood sucker....

 Ok…… So the ladybug probebly don`t like to be called a blood sucker……..the newspapers seems to affect my brain…..

I am so grateful I don’t have a dog anymore. She came home with those beasts all the time. The newspapers are full of horror stories of how sick you can get being bitten of those small ugly things. I bet grandma got that sucker out of baby Elin pretty fast.

I have been productive today. I have made all my cards for last week, and I have played with Ashley’s prompts.

Using glitter and tacky tape on the photo turned out great irl.

In my “Have more FUN” class we have closed the July chapter and moved on to August. Stacy Julian’s philosophy of being productive and creative speaks to me. I really like her ideas of making mini photo albums. I almost finished this week album challenge tonight, and I have started on my second. We were supposed to make only one, but I have a lot of envelopes with old pictures I want to do something with.

The weekend is definitely over. I have eaten the last ice cream from the freezer and there is no coffee left. I am saving the last cup to heat in the micro in the morning. There is no way I can wake up without coffee. And there is no reason to stay awake without coffee.

…and I can start counting down for my vacation. I have decided that I am going to issue a statement to the young ones in the family; No babies or weddings in 2009. Why bother…they never listen anyway…and the babies are always welcome. This Saturday I am working the late shift – the first one in a long time. That again means that I have been spending time scrapbooking until now.

I did join Ashley Wren`s design school. She is giving me so many ideas for scrapbooking themes, that I had to get a notebook for my own ideas. I have to get them down on paper before I forget. I am getting older and forgets the most important things. We are not allowed to show our work in public before the class is over, so for now I will just show you my notebook.

My notebook for Ashley Wren`s design school.

I also have a new card to show.

Card nr. 24- using paint and trancparency.

The card was fun to make. This weekend I have some more card to make, if I can get my self to focus on something else then Ashley`s prompts. Ok, I better get ready for work.

…so i am making this short. My sister in law and I are going in to Molde for our yearly round of shopping tomorrow. We are having a countdown for our vacation and need to do some serious shopping before we go. I have to admit that I have not been shopping since our last vacation. That is embarrassing. Maybe I should have kept that a secret…

Here comes another truth – I rather be home scrapbooking. I joined Ashley Wren`s design class at Sistv and she is giving prompts like no one else. I find my self writing ideas for layouts like a mad man. I t is something about that girl. She is so good at jogging my memory. She can come up with one idea and give us a few thoughts on the subject, and I can fill a whole page with my own ideas. Things I never would have thought about on my own.

For now I am giving you my card number 23:

Tena is teaching us all kind of wierd things...

Well, I better go to bed so I can get a fresh start spending money in the morning.