In The Cat Cave

Off on another another adventure.
I can breath again.
It’s the moments in the airport before the gate opens up that allows me to breath.
In and out.
In and out.
Slowly now.
In and out.
It doesn’t matter where I am going. If it’s just me and my passport with no one else to worry about, I can find my peace.
I can worry about me.
And when I board the plane, no one can find me.
No one can contact me.
Everything is out of my control.
And that’s when I can taste the air.
Where am I going again?

CREATING PROCESS

"It had been a long month.  The first of June found our family in Mexico but my life was being rushed as vacations meant I had a lot less time to get the annual financial statements filed. Working late, eating on the fly and rushing from one place to another.  I was overwhelmed.  It was June 30th and Ryan had cooked a BBQ. After supper while the kids were outside on the trampoline, we watched the news.  Something we don’t do often for one reason or another.  There was a local missing girl and we continued to hope there was more information on her case.  Instead I watched the weather man, Eddie Sheer do his newscast from a “Canada 100” sign at the bottom of signal hill.  I turned to Ryan and said “I wanna go there”. Not sure why but Ryan replaied “Let’s do it.”  We asked the kids whether they were interested and neither of them wanted to join us.  Throwing in an ice cream got them strapped into the SUV.  I grabbed my DLSR camera and took a few pictures on the way down.  It was a gorgeous day. The fog will start rolling in soon, I am sure. When we got to the spot the news crew were just finishing off their final sign off. Perfect timing.  We stood and waited for them and then started to take our pictures.  A line began to form behind us so all of a sudden I felt rushed in my pictures.  It didn’t matter.  I didn’t get the picture I wanted but I got a day of exploring after wards.  The kids ran down the trail and up the steep rocks.  With every foot step, I was a nervous wreck pictuing one of them running off a clift.  Ryan was getting irritated by my barks to stay close.  I couldn’t help it.  They sat on the cannons and sat in the grass. They raced over the grassy hills and looked for the light house. All the while I snapped pictures as the sun was setting. It was beautiful.  The night was warm and it was exactly what I needed to kick off a new month. Of course, we all ate ice cream to cap it off."



These layouts were created for SPARK magazine, which is a monthly magazine for members of the Simple Scrapper online community. Owner, Jennifer Wilson provides sketches and story starters each month that help drive inspiration in your quest to document your memories.

My design style was very clean and simple.  It started out with the story typed using the Remington Noiseless typewriter font within Photoshop Creative Cloud.  This was printed out on Whisper Whiter cardstock by Stampin' Up! on 8.5"x 11".

As a subscriber to the Ali Edwards Story Kits, I found some chipboard elements and embellishments that quickly brought this layout together.



If you would like more information on the Simple Scrapper Membership, please contact me. In addition, you can now see ont month of SPARK magazine for free!  This will help you see all the inspiration and resources that Jennifer Wilson provides.

Cathy

It's never easy to document a loss.  However, I was prompted by a Story Starter from Jennifer Wilson's Simple Scrapper to give it a try.  Although the layout isn't perfect in my mind, I don't believe I could ever really scrapbook it perfectly.

I started with the story and used the celebration of life cards as the photo.  However, a photo really isn't necessary. Ali Edwards had a Story Kit named "Tough" therefore; I used elements from that kit to create the clean and simple page.

As I started this process, I realized that I would pop on Facebook Live and document the process.  Check out the video if you are interested.


This was hard.  The past few weeks we knew that Natasha was not doing well. We hadn’t been hearing much from her except from a scattered message here and there.  We knew she had a hard time texting and often it was her husband or friends messaging us.  She took a turn just before Christmas and we all knew she would soon find her way as an angel.  Every thing had been pre-planned.  We had been talking about it for months.  A bucket list, quilts and knitted hats for the hospital babies were being made, funeral favours and secret tasks were planned.  But when it came, it was too quiet.  Rhea and I met in Goobies to make the trek to Natasha’s celebration of life on December 27th.  Natasha was a friend that I met through scrapbooking and as was Rhea.  It’s this hobby that brought three of us together.  She was something special and the world is certainly at a lost without her.  Her illness re-ignited my faith. Something I never thought would happen. I suppose that might be her greatest gift to me.  Even after almost a year has gone by, I find it hard to explain to those close to me what Natasha meant to me.  I wrote a card to Ray, her husband sending my condolescences and perhaps that’s the best way to describe it. 

“Dear Ray.  I am a little bit of a mystery friend.  We spoke a lot but mostly by iMessage. Natasha was my every day.  Like a cup of coffee. Only it was an every hour cup. We have many stories but my brain is too mushy to think.  It wasn’t “good morning” – it was “what’s for breakfast?” or ‘ I am worried about..’ She solved many of my day to day dilemmas (how do you cook frozen peas?) She. Was. My. Every. Day. And because of that, you all were too. From the bottom of my heart, I am so sorry for your loss.”

And so, documenting her funeral isn’t exactly something I want to do but for some reason it feels appropriate. There was pink everything. And peep favours and a release of pink balloons.  There was a coating of snow and while as pallbearers, I could hear every crunch.  I heard every breath.  And I avoided every tearful eye.  Not ready to let her go, Rhea and I left to go home with “something missing”.   I still think of her often for many reasons.  Little reasons. Like… I washed, folded and put away three loads of laundry!  Every time I reach for my Lock n Lock Tupperware containers and every time I make frozen peas.  She’s probably watching me and wondering how I make it every day without her.  I really am not sure either.  But I am ready to live this life the way she’d want me to… we are heading to Disney soon where I am sure to meet her there.

Thanks for the lessons and the friendship Tash. Love always, Cathy.

I've been having a tough time getting back into the swing of things.

Simple Scrapper's seasonal Refresh course fell on my lap and I decided to take a couple swings.  Gosh, it's nice when you feel inspired.

Using inspiration from Jennifer Wilson's Refresh course, I created my intro page to my 2016 album.  This year, I am going with a 8.5x11" album so this page protector from Stampin' Up! was cut down by an inch. Yes, this means I have to re-do the holes as well.

Like Ali Edwards, Jennifer encouraged students to document your reason why.  And so I did.

The Premium Membership at Simple Scrapper provides skills and shortcuts to help you simplify and find more meaning in your memory keeping.