scrapologie

Valentine Delights

How about some food inspiration for Valentine's Day?  I love these cookies (cookie cutters from Williams Sonoma):

and this personalized chocolate heart (Williams Sonoma):

These sentiment cookies (also Williams Sonoma) are just fun! 

And this quilted cake from Dean & DeLuca is amazing:

 I love finding the perfect treat for my loved ones for Valentine's Day...

Paris Book (7 Gypsies CHA)

Thanks for your kind comments! I wanted to share a few pages from the rest of the Paris Book. I have been to Paris but it's been a long time (over 20 years ago!) and I am dying to go again. Because I wasn't much into photography at that time, I have few photos of that maiden voyage. So when I saw these new book board covers from 7 Gypsies, I knew I wanted to create a minibook about the Paris I remembered, so I turned to Flickr to supply the photos. The book utilizes paper, gaffer tape and paper tape from the new Venice Collection. The book board and brass plaque are new items being introduced at CHA. There are many Gypsy tags utilized in the book as well, along with a naked index pocket, and all of these lovelies are products from 7 Gypsies. What I do is I do an advanced search on Flickr under everyone's uploads, and check the following boxes:

Only Search Within Creative Commons Licensed Content

Find Content to Use Commercially

Find Content to Modify, Adapt or Build Upon

That will bring you a range of photos that you can utilize for your own projects, in most cases the artists do want you to credit them with the original photos (as you should do, anyway!).

So here is a peek inside the Paris Minibook that was created for 7 Gypsies for CHA Winter 2010, followed by attribution to the photographers:

There's a few more pages -- but you get the picture....

And without further ado, here are the photography credits, many thanks to these fabulous photographers for sharing their work so freely!

  1) Blue Cafe - by david.nikonvscanon
  2) Eiffel Tower - by schillergarcia
  3) Green Door - by alq666 

  4) Les Deux Magots - by Serge Melki

  5) Le Metro - by Pedro Simoes7

  6) Macarons - by uggboy

  7) Accordionist - by torcellotrio

  8) Paris Flea Market - by extranoise

  9) Laduree - by Sam Felder

 10) Artist in Montmartre - by ingirogiro

 11) Fromage (cheese) - by Jean-Louis Zimmermann

And here's a vintage image to share; makes me want to set to work on handmade valentines for sending, right away!

Love's Offering

CHA Projects - 7 Gypsies

I've been knee deep in CHA projects since I returned from Hartford. Seven Gypsies has two gorgeous new collections that are debuting at CHA - Avignon and the Venice Collection that was introduced a little earlier. Both lines are so gorgeous, you're going to love them! You can check out the Winter Catalogue here. I love the photo trays - and created a Wedding Themed photo tray with the Venice Collection; (most of the photography is stock from istockphoto). Aren't these papers just gorgeous??

And here's a layout I created with the gorgeous new Avignon collection:

Here's a peek at some gorgeous new book boards that I used to create a Paris themed mini-album (I'll post the entire album later this week:

Tomorrow, I'll post some of the new CHA offerings from Jenni Bowlin -- equally gorgeous things! If you're going to CHA --- have a great time! Wish I could be there but since I can't, having some of my projects there is the next best thing!

And here's a vintage image for you too -- Valentine images to come in the next few days!

Older and... wiser?

I am here in Hartford for training for my job, and the reason I am here for training is that I made a lateral move within the company some months back when the job that I had done for 14+ years was being re'org'd and transferred to an office in Illinois. As a result of the lateral move, I had to change the line of my work within the company, hence the increased travel. As a result of this travel, I've met several employees (new hires), many of whom are fresh faced college graduates. Today, our instructor decided to allow us the pleasure of listening to music while we were engaged in a training exercise. A few of us 35 and 40 somethings began rocking out to "Money for Nothin'" by Dire Straits when some of the young'uns asked us what song it was that we were listening to. They had never heard of Dire Straits. They displayed equal puzzlement when someone requested a Devo song. ("Who's Devo?" they queried innocently, much to my utter chagrin!)  I think at that moment, I truly realized that there was a divide between the generations - and was mildly surprised to find that I was no longer part of the generation of youth. Not that I mind it. I am definitely happier at 41 than I was at 21. And I never really had to go through any huge adjustment to turning 40 when 40 hit. But I couldn't help but be struck with a sense of my age, for the first time today. When it gets to the point where they don't recognize Sting and U2, that's when it's really going to hit me hard.

Where Art Reigns Queen

The Toilet of Venus, Francois Boucher, 1751, Oil on Canvas. Housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, bequest of William K. Vanderbilt, 1920. 

We had a lovely time in NYC. Bob forgot to bring my camera so sadly I have no photos to commemorate our visit, but I do have some wonderful memories. We took the Amtrak Saturday morning and arrived in NYC around 10 am.  We grabbed a bagel at one of the eateries in the subway -- which was fine until Bob pointed out a baby mouse that was scurrying around scavenging for food (not in the eatery we were in but in one of the main passageways). I felt sorry for the little mouse, but couldn't help but be grossed out at the thought of a rodent sharing the same rental space as all those food vendors! 

We then took a subway to the Metropolitan Museum of Art which was just amazing. I was trying to decide between the Met and MOMA and settled on the Met. There was so much to see -- and we had so little time. We had to condense our choices of what to see and finally decided upon Greek and Roman Art (the marble sculptures were so beautiful, I could barely stand it!), Arms and Armor, Medieval Art, European Sculpture and Decorative Arts (love loved this!), and European Paintings (Boucher and the Rococo and Baroque artists are among my favorite). We also did a quick walk-through of the Art of The Samurai, a special exhibition that ended yesterday.There was so much more I wanted to see but we were short on time. We stopped at the American Girl store to pick up an outfit for Alekha's doll (promised since she had to stay home with the grandparents) and then went to Tiffin Wallah on E. 28th to satisfy our craving for Indian food. We headed back to Penn Station after checking out the Borders across the street and then caught the Bengals versus Jets game before taking the Amtrak back to Hartford. A really wonderful weekend and SO inspiring. Art is just amazing, especially when you see that which combines fine arts with history. I was in art heaven 

If you're looking for something fun and interesting to read, I have been reading a really fantastic book series called Fablehaven, by Brandon Mull. If you love Harry Potter, you'll like these books as well. It's a wonderful fantasy series in children's literature. Of course no one trumps JK Rowling, but Fablehaven does a great job of holding its own.

 

Have a great week!  Can't wait until I'm back in my own little house on Friday. There's no place like home.

 

(belated) happy new year wishes

 

I have some housekeeping to do around here. Time to dust off the old blog and start posting again. No worries, I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. Just been traveling WAY more than I want to be. I am blogging from Hartford again (and celebrating the fact that this will be my last visit here for a long time). Nothing against New England. I'd just much rather see it in the fall, and when I don't have to be here for work! Bob is flying in tonight and we'll be taking the Amtrak to NYC again tomorrow. We plan to spend the day at MOMA. I'm dying for some company - staring at the walls of my hotel room doesn't register too high on the entertainment factor!

I will be back home Friday; in the meantime, here are a few of my layouts with the January JBS kit and a sweet vintage postcard to appease you. Hope 2010 brings you much in the way of joy, health and peace.