Nettio Designs

Design + Creativity + Adventure = LOVE

The 28 at 28 List: Seven Days to Go

POSTED ON IN Life Adventures, the 28 at 28 List

For those that don’t have my birthday written down as a national holiday in their calendar, (and really, why don’t you, haha) my 29th birthday is coming up on May 24th, which means as of today, I officially have only seven short days to finish up my 28@ 28 list. Derp.

Back in March when I last updated you on my 28 at 28 List progress (read all about my list here), I had completed 13 of the 28 items with 15 items still left to go.

Well I’m pleased to announce that as of today, May 17th, I have completed 16 of the 28 items, with 12 items still left to go. In seven days. Double derp.

The good news is despite my normally awesome procrastination skills, I have been kicking things into high gear around here in an effort to get ‘er done.

Since I know I don’t have time to finish everything at this point, I am focusing my efforts on the items I am most excited about and not worrying about the rest. I figure I’d much rather finish an item I love than spend a bunch of time on an item I was never that excited about in the first place. That’s right, I’m looking at you #15 – Learn to Shoot in Manual Mode.

So I thought with only a week to go, I’d post a little behind-the-scenes peek of some of the craftier (scrapbookier?) projects I’m currently working on:

#10 Complete a December Daily 2010 Album

A look at my desk right now:
Decemberdaily preview

Why yes, that page does say “Today is December 14.” Did you not realize we’ve traveled back in time? Haha.

Number 10 on my 28 at 28 list is to complete my December Daily 2010 album so despite that it is obviously no longer December, I am pushing forward to finish this album for two reasons:

1. I LOVE this album

I LOVE looking through it and revisiting all the Christmas memories, some of which I’d totally forgotten even though it’s only May. (Is that a sign I’m getting old? I’m thinking maybe.) It makes me sad seeing it in an unfinished state.

2. If I finish my December Daily mini-album I’ll be able check off not one but TWO items off my list

I’d be able to check off both #10 Complete a December Daily album and #18 Complete at least one themed scrapbook album. That’s what I call getting more bang for my buck.

13 of the 25 pages are already finished and day 14 is almost done, which means I’ve got 12 more pages to finish in 7 days. I’m thinking this is going to be a tough task to complete but I’m going to try my best to get into the holiday mood. I am however drawing the line at listening to Christmas music in May. A girl has to have standards.

Random embarrassing Nettio scrapbooking moment: As I was flipping through my December Daily album on Saturday, I found myself thinking “Wow, my handwriting looks REALLY good on these pages!” And then I realized it was the custom handwriting font Darcy made me. And felt a bit silly. But, see? That’s how awesome her fonts are! You should get your own custom font here.

#25 Create an art/scrap canvas

This is the other big crafty task I’m attempting to tackle this week. I’ve been wanting to create an art/scrap canvas forever, ever since I saw this art canvas by Ali Edwards several years ago (photo found here on Flickr):

Ali-canvas.png

Art canvas by Ali Edwards

I absolutely loved the clean lines and blocking (no real surprise there, I don’t think I’ve met a blocked design I didn’t love), the mix of photos and paper and the fun touches of paint. But I’ve never gotten around to making one.

So when I was writing up my 28 at 28 list I purposely added this item to my list with this specific inspiration piece in mind so rather than reinvent the wheel, I’m going to go ahead and use Ali’s canvas as a jumping off point for my own.

My current plan is to use digital supplies for the blocking creating my design in Photoshop first and then printing all the blocks out with my printer and adhering them to the canvas. Seems easy enough.

Ali’s original canvas was 24×30 inches which makes each of the squares around 6×6 inches, but I’m thinking I’m most likely going to scale the squares down to a closer to 4×4 inches so I can print four squares to a page and save some paper and ink.

It’ll be an interesting crafting adventure for sure. Hopefully one that doesn’t end with me covered in paint. Haha.

Also in the works…

In addition to my craftier projects, I’m also working on a few non-crafty projects.

Last night, I finished my 5th non-fiction book last night, Tina Fey’s Bossypants so that’s one more item I’ve checked off this week. Go me.

I’m hoping to squeeze in two more classic movies (I’ve watched three) and possibly a bike ride over the weekend. Adam and I have been talking about the bike ride for a few weeks now but the main hitch is we’ll have to rent bikes because the bikes we own were destroyed by rust back in college when we had to store them outside. (We were clearly terrible Davis bike owners.)

Now It’s Your Turn

So what about you? Are you working on any awesome layouts or projects this week? Up against a tight deadline? Let me know in the comments! And if you’ve got any suggestions for must-see classic movies, I’m am open to recommendations so feel free to share those as well.

Fraudulent Drugs Are A Huge Global Problem

Friday Faves: Pregnant in Heels

POSTED ON IN Stuff I Love

Happy Friday everyone! After taking last Friday off to celebrate National Scrapbooking Day, I am back today with my second edition of Friday Faves.

For those who are new to Friday Faves, my Friday Faves posts are an opportunity to share a little bit more about some of my Faves that show up on my Faves layouts.

Each Friday here on the ol’ blog, I’ll be sharing all the deets behind one of my current obsessions faves: what it is, why it is oh-so-rockin’ my world right now and why you should love it too. These faves may or may not be scrapbooking related (in fact, I can guarantee they won’t all be) but I can guarantee they will be fun and hey, you might even discover a new fave of your own!

In my first Friday Fave post I featured my love for Pinterest, but for my second Friday Fave, I am going to leave the computer and scrapbooking world behind and delve deeper into my love obsession with reality tv and chat about one my absolute favorite new shows…

Pregnant In Heels

Pregnant in Heels

If you’ve never seen or heard of this show before, Pregnant In Heels is a docu-drama on Bravo which follows the life of British-born (with one of the craziest British accents I have ever heard, haha) maternity fashion designer Rosie Pope as she navigates her role as a Maternity Concierge.

What’s that? You’ve never heard of a Maternity Concierge before? Prior to this neither had I. (But then as a non-Mom, I’m not exactly up to date on all the hip maternity trends, haha)

Based on what I’ve gathered from the show, the role of a Maternity Concierge largely equates to meeting any and all demands her rich New Yorker clients throw at her no matter how crazy or bizarre they may seem.

And to do so without laughing. Which is tougher than you might think.

Most of demands are fairly innocent: helping a woman get over her fear of needles, baby proofing apartments, putting on a charity maternity fashion show.

But some of the demands definitely sway toward the more bizarre…

Like the woman and her “work” husband (aka her gay husband & NOT the father of her child) who wanted Rosie to prepare a proper British tea lunch so they could ask her boss, who happened to be a British Lord, to be her baby’s godfather.

Or the parents who wanted a focus group of experts created to help them name their baby. Just like you’d name a new product.

Or the zookeeper who wanted a maternity painting done of herself. On top of her beloved pet horse. Naked. (The husband pretty much summed up the hilarity of the situation when after the surprise painting was revealed he casually said after 10 solid seconds of silence, “THAT was definitely not what I was expecting.” It was awesome. LOL)

Why Pregnant In Heels Is Awesome

In keeping in the same vein as another fave show of mine, Private Chefs of Beverly Hills, the real magic of Pregnant In Heels for me is while Rosie’s clients clearly do not see how crazy their demands are, Rosie most certainly DOES.

Although always the pinnacle of professionalism, the look on her face throughout the show definitely shows her true feelings. I imagine if we could hear her inner dialogue, the majority of the time it would be something like, “OMG, you have GOT to be kidding me. She can’t be serious, can she?”

And that my friends makes for some awesomely hilarious TV.

Now I’ll admit, there are moments when I feel a wee bit bad laughing at all these pregnant woman. I’m sure all those hormones can do crazy things to you. But I think I can safely say that if I ever turned into a Pregnant-zilla (Mom-zilla?) I can pretty safely say I will have no desire to have a portrait painted of me. Naked.

And because I felt this new pop culture FAVE of mine deserved to be documented, I even created a fun little layout featuring a brand-new kit from Melissa Bennett called Retro Chic:

Pregnantinheels 250

If you’re a fan of Amy Butler’s fabric, I think you’ll definitely love this kit because the pattern papers have the same color and pattern vibe as all her yummy fabric.

And that brings us to the end of today’s installment of Friday Faves.

I’ll be back next week with my list of the top 5 struggles of digital scrapbookers based on your responses on this post. Of course you can go read through the responses for yourself but my post will awesomeness. And a chart. Haha.

Anyone else ever seen Pregnant In Heels? Did you find it as awesome as I did? Let me know in the comments! And feel free to share a FAVE of your own too.

Pregnant In Heels airs Tuesdays 10/9c on Bravo TV

**Disclaimer: Any and all products from Sweet Shoppe Designs are given to me free as part of my work as a SugarBabe at Sweet Shoppe Designs. But I will only ever recommend products I love and think you would love too.

Can I take Levitra if I am taking other remedies at the same time

The Nettio Guide to Surviving National Scrapbooking Day

POSTED ON IN Announcements

Happy National Scrapbooking Day everyone! Everyone ready for one of the biggest scrapbooking (and shopping!) days of the year? I know I am!

Since this isn’t my first time navigating the craziness that is National Scrapbooking Day, here are my top tips for how to survive the scrapping and shopping craziness:

1. Stick to a Budget

Yes, that’s right, I used the dreaded B-word.

Now I know what you’re thinking. Having a budget will totally cramp your NSD shopping style! But here are my reasons for recommending a budget:

You’ll shop smarter when you realize buying that 40% kit at one shop would mean you’d have to forgo another kit somewhere else. When you’re facing down deeply discounted products, this becomes super important. Do you really want to end up buying a bunch of products you don’t really love just because they’re a deal? Believe me, I have been there and I don’t recommend it, haha.

Having a budget also means you’ll avoiding waking up with that post-NSD oh my god, did I really spend that much? panic attack from viewing your paypal account on Monday morning. Monday’s are hard enough, let’s try to not add to the stress.

2. Keep A List of Must-do Events

Have a must-do chat/game/sale you just don’t want to miss? Make a list of any favorite events, times and deadlines so you’ll be sure not to forget anything in all the excitement. Nothing worse than realizing at 12am Monday morning that you just missed one of your must-do sales.

3. Have Fun

Yes, NSD can be one of the craziest, most stressful scrapbooking days of the year. Sale deadlines, slow servers and discounts galore is enough to make any digital scrapbooker’s head spin. But at the end of the day, it’s just scrapbooking. If you’re not having fun, what’s the point?

And now for the news I’m sure you all really want to know about…

It’s NSD at NettioDesigns!

In honor of National Scrapbooking Day this weekend, I’m releasing not one but TWO awesome new template packs. That’s a grand total of six template-y goodies!

I’m not going to lie, these might just be some of my favorite templates I’ve done yet. I kind of want to use them myself. Is that totally weird? I’m thinking maybe, haha.

Ok, Are you ready to see them?

First up, in keeping with the FAVE-O-RITES theme from last release, I’ve got a BRAND-NEW set of FAVE-O-RITES templates based on my February Faves layouts…

FAVE-O-RITES Vol. 2 – The February Faves Super Pack

Favoritesvol2 preview

Along with two February Faves-inspired templates, this template Super Pack also includes a bonus Top 10 Faves layout template. Perfect for documenting Top Ten lists, Monthly Faves or any other bite-sized bits of journaling you can think of.

The name of my next pack of templates will probably come as no surprise to anyone who has been following my scrapbooking for awhile, haha.

Based on my absolute LOVE of pattern paper, I introduce the first in a series of paper-centric layouts perfect for all my fellow paper lovin’ digital scrapbookers:

I Heart Paper Vol. 1 Template Pack

Iheartpapervol1 preview

Paper strips, paper blocks, awesome clustering and bold titles, this awesome three-pack of templates has it all! Perfect for documenting any and all of your life moments, events and adventures.

It’s Time to Save

And of course what would NSD be without a SALE!

20110506 NSD20

That’s right, everything in the NettioDesigns Shoppe is 20% off through Sunday night!

Just use coupon code:

nsd2011

to save 20% off everything in the NettioDesigns Shoppe.

Just make sure you are 100% ready to checkout before you enter the code in your cart. If you try attempt to make changes to your cart after the coupon code has been entered, your cart will be emptied. I know, sad, haha.

This will likely be the last time the entire shoppe is on sale for awhile so if there’s something you’ve had your eye on, I highly suggest you take the plunge. I promise it’ll be worth it, haha.

Attention all NettioDesigns Newsletter Subscribers!

Be sure to check your email for a NettioDesigns News exclusive subscriber-only discount! Want to make sure you don’t miss out on any future exclusive NettioDesigns News discounts? Sign up for NettioDesigns News here.

Only one thing left to do before the NSD festivities can begin and that is to announce the giveaway winner from this post.

And the Winner Is…

Thanks to my handy-dandy random number generator the winner of both FAVE-O-RITES Vol. 2 – The February Faves Super Pack AND I Heart Paper Vol. 1 Template Pack (I told you the winner would be lucky!) is…

Lucky number #13 – Natalie!

Congrats Natalie! I’ll be sending you an email with your prize! Thanks again to everyone for playing along!

Ok everyone, that’s all for today! Have a GREAT National Scrapbooking Day everyone!

Can I take Levitra if I am taking other remedies at the same time

A BIG Thank You and a NSD Sneak Peek!

POSTED ON IN Announcements

Hello everyone! I am currently hard at work on some amazing new goodies for National Scrapbooking Day but I wanted to pop in real quick to send out a big squishy thank you to everyone who stopped by my last blog post and shared their digital scrapbooking struggles.

I will have more to say on the subject in a future post, but for now, I wanted to let you know that I am oh-so-excited by your responses not only because so many things you struggle with are topics I was planning to chat about here on the blog, but because they are also things I very much struggle with too. And it’s always nice to know you’re in good company, right?

I will be announcing the winner of the giveaway tomorrow when I reveal my National Scrapbooking Day New Releases. Let me just say, this winner is going to be one lucky digital scrapbooker! Because I’m not kidding when I say that these templates may just be some of my most favorite templates I’ve done yet.

I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait a little bit longer to see what I have in store but because every blog post is better with a photo, how about a little NettioDesigns NSD Sneak Peek of one of my new releases?

NSD 2011 Sneak Peek

I’m so excited for you to see them!

I better get back to work now but I’ll be back later tomorrow with my top tips for surviving National Scrapbooking Day along with the giveaway winner announcement and the scoop on what will be happening here at NettioDesigns. Want to make sure you don’t miss out on any of the fun? Sign up for the NettioDesigns newsletter right over there —-> in the sidebar.

Anyone else excited for National Scrapbooking Day?

How Can Customers Lower Their Remedy Costs

5 Years Down, 5 New Scrapbooking Goals To Go (AND a Giveaway!)

POSTED ON IN 5th Scrapiversary

Well April, it’s been fun…

With April coming to a close, it’s means it’s time to wrap up my 5th Scrap-i-versary Celebration. So far this month I’ve told the story of how my digital scrapbooking journey began, shared my FAVE digital scrapbooking project ever, revisited some of my scrapbooking hits and cringe-worthy misses and counted down the last 5 years of digiscrapping.

To close out my 5th Scrap-i-versary Celebration, it seems only fitting that for my 5th and final Scrap-i-versary post, we leave behind the days of scrapbooking past and turn our attention toward the future. Revisiting some of my favorite and least favorite layouts and projects during this month made me realize there were a few changes I would like to make around here.

So with that here are five of my digital scrapbooking goals for my next scrapbooking year…

1. Get Back to My Scrapbooking Roots


As I mentioned in my hits & misses post earlier this week, back when I first started digital scrapbooking, I scrapped both square (12×12 or 8×8 really) and rectangle (8.5×11 layouts) and regularly swapped between a more paper-esque scrapbooking style and a more graphic magazine style.

Over the last several years I’ve really gotten away from this but I would love to get back into the habit of mixing things up, keep things fresh and stepping outside my scrapbooking comfort zone more often.

Expect to see a wider variety of page sizes (maybe even a pocket page protector or two), as well as styles, and maybe even a paper or hybrid project thrown here and there too for good measure.

2. Scrapbook More of Our Traveling Adventures

5scrapgoals 2

One of mine and Adam’s absolute favorite things to do is travel. As Adam will be the first to tell you, if you ask me what I want to do over the weekend, my answer 9 times out of 10 will be “I just want to GO somewhere!” We love visiting new places and seeing new sights. It’s one of our favorite things about the military lifestyle. But if you were to look through my scrapbook albums would you likely know this about us? Nope.

In the five years since I started digital scrapbooking, we have lived in Korea for a year, taken trips to amazing places like Japan and Hawaii, and taken our first ever trip to Disneyworld and soon, NYC. We’ve gone on numerous road trips and camping trips and explored some awesome places like Yellowstone and Carlsbad Caverns.

But how many of these trips would you actually see if you flipped through our scrapbooks?

Zero.

Sure there may be a page here or there but for the most part, these memories and photos remain safely hidden away in our minds…and the depths of my computer hard drive.

So goal number 2 for this year is to get my travel scrapbooking on and actually document some of these amazing trips we’ve been lucky enough to take over the years.

which brings me to Goal #3…

3. Get My Organizing On

5scrapgoals 3
By far the biggest obstacle holding me back from scrapbooking our travels is the sheer number of photos. Coming back from a trip with 800-1000 RAW photos to sort through is a daunting task!

If I’m going to embrace travel scrapbooking this year, I really need a photo and scrapbooking system that can handle the large volume of photos I’ll have to deal with. The Great Computer Spring Clean-a-thon was a great start but there is definitely still a lot to do when it comes to getting my organizing system into tip-top shape.

So expect to see lots more posts about my adventures in organizing (and mis-adventures, I’m sure, haha) here on the blog. I am determined that this year will be the year I find a systems that WORKS.

4. Scrapbook 100 layouts by the end of 2011

5scrapgoals 4
Now I’m sure there are some of you who would find the idea of 100 layouts in a year laughable. You probably scrap that many layouts in a month with a baby in your arms and two toddlers running around. Ha.

The truth is in the five years I’ve been digital scrapbooking, the most number of layouts I’ve ever done in a single year has been 85. Which means 100? Kind of a bold goal for me.

By the end of April I will have completed 15 layouts (that’s an average of 3.75 a month for you fellow math nerds out there) which means I’ll have 8 months left to scrap 85 layouts. Averaging 10.6 layouts a month. Eeek.

My CT requirements with make up a minimum of 32 of those 85 but that still means I have at least 53 layouts to scrap on my own. It’s going to be a challenge for me I know, but I am excited for the prospect of getting back into a more consistent scrapbooking rhythm again and taking time to scrap layouts that are just for me.

Plus more layouts from me = more template-y goodness for you. It’s a win-win, haha.

5. Turn NettioDesigns into one kickass place to hang out

5scrapgoals 5

Yep, that’s right, I am putting this out here. For all to see. Haha.

When I started NettioDesigns back in February, I knew it was going to be a learning experience. Just how BIG of a learning experience I don’t think I realized. Haha. So things around here definitely got off to a slower start than I would have liked as a I slowly learned how to balance scrapbooking, a digi website and life. But with three months under my belt I am definitely getting into a groove and I’m ready to start ramping things up around here. Time to take some of these plans and turn them into action.

What does this mean for you?

More.

More templates. More scrapbooking adventures. More tips. More tricks. More tutorials. You name it.

Which brings me to this…

I want to hear from YOU

What do you struggle with when it comes to digital scrapbooking?

Is it coming up with a fresh new design every time? Mixing and matching elements and papers? Maybe you have a layout that just didn’t work out the way you hoped? Organizing, Photoshop, Mac vs PC, Backing up your files…

Whatever it may be, big or small, easy or hard, I want to hear about it. Now is the time to ask your burning scrapbooking questions.

Have an awesome idea for a template, a tutorial you’d love to see?

Feel free to share that too.

Now is your chance to get those burning digital scrapbooking questions answered.

And just for a little added incentive…how about a giveaway.

One lucky commenter will win my next template release for FREE.

I know you like free.

How to Enter

To enter, all you need to do is leave a comment here on this blog post letting me know what you’re struggling with (or what you wish you could do better) and what you would love to see here at NettioDesigns when it comes to digital scrapbooking.

That’s pretty easy, right?

Want to increase your chances of winning? Post about this giveaway on Twitter and encourage your digiscrappy friends to come give their input too. Link me up to your tweet in a separate new comment to earn an extra entry.

You’ve got until Tuesday, May 3rd, 7am EST to post your comment to be eligible to win. Winner will be announced on the day of the new release.

And with that, my 5th Scrap-i-versary Celebration comes to an end. It’s been a fun five scraptastic years so far and I’m so thrilled with all the memories I have scrapped but I am definitely excited to see what the next few years bring scrapbooking-wise. Should be a fun!

Psst…want to make sure you don’t miss out on any of my future scrapbooking adventures? You should sign up for my blog RSS feed here.

Fraudulent Drugs Are A Huge Global Problem

Counting Down the Last 5 Years of Digiscrappy Goodness

POSTED ON IN 5th Scrapiversary

With my 5th Scrap-i-versary Celebration winding down this week, I thought today would be a good day to spend some time breaking down just what five years of digiscrapping fun has added up to around here. Perhaps with a little help from my good friend The Count…

Count

Whoops, wrong Count…(but seriously my favorite Count ever)

Let’s try this again…

The count

There we go, that’s better. Take it away, Count von Count!

370: The total number of digital scrapbooking layouts I’ve scrapped since April 7, 2006

2006: The year with the least number of layouts (38)

2009: The year with the most number of layouts (84)

13: The number of layouts I’ve scrapped so far in 2011

77: The number of layouts I scrapped for The Digi Dares in 3.5 years as a Darer

48: The number of layouts I would counts as All About Me layouts

16: The number of layouts with the word FAVES in the title

3.5: The average number of hours it takes me to complete a layout

12: The total number of Creative Teams I’ve been on in the last 5 years

6: The number of Creative Teams I’ve been on at any one time

4.5: The most number of years I’ve been a single Creative Team (Zoe Pearn)

3.5: The number of years I’ve been a Sweet Shoppe SugarBabe

23, 225: the number of photos I’ve snapped since I purchased my Canon Rebel XT in 2006
(Is it any wonder why I dread organizing them, LOL!)

6441: the most number of photos taken in a single year (2010)

2: the number of computers I’ve used for scrapbooking

1: the number of those computers that was a Mac

1069: the number of days since I officially switch to a Mac

2: the number of versions of Photoshop I’ve used (CS2 & CS3)

2: the number of versions of Lightroom I’ve used (1 & 2)

239: the most non-Photoshop/computer money I’ve spent at once for scrapbooking-related goodies (Totally Rad Actions 1&2)

7: the most number of layouts the same single photo appears on

7: the number of scrapbooking competitions I’ve participated in

1: the number of scrapbooking competitions I won

2: the number of layouts I’ve had published in a print magazine (Creating Keepsakes & Scrapbooks Etc.)

4: the number of times I’ve been a guest on the Paperclipping Digi Show

20: the total number of digital scrapbooking templates made from my layouts so far

4: The number of scrapbooking albums I currently have (Us, People, Places, Things ala Stacy Julian’s Library of Memories system)

4: the number of times I’ve attempted a December Daily album

0: the number of times I’ve completed my December Daily album

16: the total number of weekly layouts I completed for my Deployment: 365 Project

40: the highest number of comments I’ve received on any single layout

12,554: the highest number of posts/comments I’ve left on any one site (DigiShopTalk)

24,937: the total number of posts/comments I’ve left on DigiShopTalk, My Scrapbook Art and Sweet Shoppe Designs combined

17.3: the total number of DAYS that amounts if I averaged one post/comment a minute (INSANE)
(Seriously, 17 days of posts/comments BOGGLES MY MIND. I knew it was a lot but dang, that’s insanity.)

So there you have it. Five years of scrapbooking fun broken down for some mathtastic nerdiness. Anything I missed that you must know? Ask and i shall calculate…using my handy dandy calculator, that is, haha.

Count Blah photo found here. The Count photo found here.

Fraudulent Drugs Are A Huge Global Problem