Project Life: January ’16 (Part Two)

February 14, 2016 Diana Sanchez2 Comments

Hey guys! Today I’m sharing the rest of my January Project Life layouts.

I have always wanted to use the Design P pocket page for one of my layouts so I decided to use one with these pictures I took of our new house. The center is a 4×4 card from the Stampin’ Up Moments Like These digital set and I typed on it using the Becky Higgins Jonathan Font. (I am LOVING digital sets right now!)

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For this next page, I used the Becky Higgins Everyday Edition and Cottage Living paper packs and some Kellie Stamps. These are just random photos I took during January. 20160214_110222-2

And last but not least, I used a Design H pocket page to end the month and a 4×6 card from the Cottage Living Core Kit and one of Kelly Purkey’s label stamps. 20160214_110040-2

As you can tell, we’re pretty excited about the new house, fingers crossed that everything goes as planned!

So as you can see, I am loving mixing and matching pocket pages. There are still more techniques I want to try and play around with and I hope I get to try those soon.

Thank you for stopping by!

January ’16 Top 5

February 1, 2016February 1, 2016 Diana SanchezLeave a comment

Something I started to do this year is reading, and I mean REALLY reading, blog posts. I’ve always enjoyed checking out blogs, but I would usually just skim through posts and just look at the pictures or the blog design. Now I actually sit in bed and read posts from my favorite blogs and not only do I look at the pictures but I absorb every part of the written material, I read the “about me” pages, and even read the comments and I learn bloggers writing styles. I’m very proud of what has become of The Lovely Pear yet there is so much to learn and I feel like I’m barely wetting my toes in the pool of blogging.

This month I want to share my top 5 favorite bloggers. I enjoy these blogs because they have bad-ass looking sites, I love how they write, their message, crafts, pictures, and style. Each one is unique in their own way and I have to admit that I get excited when they upload a new post!

Jan '16 Top 5

1. Give A Girl A Blog

First of all, the name itself is so clever, second, I just love Kellie’s style. Looking at Kellie’s blog page made me realize that the look of my blog was important (which I’m still trying to work on). I also enjoy reading her “currently” posts and I love her Project Life layouts and the crafts that she does. I first found this blog when I saw her stamp sets on Instagram, and after buying all the sets I could get, I’ve been hooked. Plus this girl can give you the 411 on essential oils and you get hooked up with freebies when subscribing to her blog. And, I give her full credit for the idea of my Top 5 posts!

2. Kelly Purkey

Kelly opened the door of Project Life for me. I had really never noticed how photography and journaling could play such a big role in Project Life until I saw Kelly’s layouts. She makes memory keeping look so easy but so fun. I’m still trying to get that great food shot like she does, maybe it would help if I ate something other than pizza and tacos. I love using her stamps and dies for my Project Life layouts and I always go back to her blog when I need some inspiration.

3. Damask Love

Amber’s blog is one that I really enjoy because I have that “omg, that’s how I feel!” moment when I’m done reading one of her posts. Yes, her blog is super cute, and yes, she takes GREAT pictures, but that “she gets me” feeling I get is why I read blogs in the first place. You can find great tips and DIY projects on this blog, and I obviously enjoy the “Damask Loves” posts.

4. Becky Higgins

So when I say I like to “sit back and relax”, first thing that comes to mind is Sunday mornings, sitting in bed, and reading Becky’s “Good Life With…” posts. I do this every Sunday before I start my day. I feel like I learn a new life lesson with these posts, and I enjoy learning new things from different creative people. You can also find great photo/tech tips and loads of Project Life inspiration!

5. A Beautiful Mess

I just wish I was born with Elsie and Emma’s style and creativeness! Their blog has everything, from crafts to recipes, interior design to blogging tips, and to top it off, they’re the creators of the Messy Box! They also just came out with their own app and I can’t wait to try it out (still waiting for the Android version)! Just like their style, they have very unique photos and I really enjoy reading their posts.

If you haven’t already, you really need to add these blogs to your Feedly subscriptions. My reviews seriously don’t do these blogs any justice. Let me know what you think and feel free to let me know what some of your favorite blogs are so I can add more to my feed!

Project Life

Project Life: October ’15

November 27, 2015November 27, 2015 Diana Sanchez1 Comment

Hi guys! I know I’ve been MIA lately, I have been so busy and any little free time I have had was used to relax. November started off pretty bad for us. Shadow, our male duck, was injured pretty badly but fortunately it was not as bad as we thought and he is doing and looking great! It was a team effort taking care of him and bringing him back to good health, but we managed to do that for a week and a half. It took a lot of time but it was well worth it. Just FYI, it is hard to give a duck oral medicine…

After we passed that storm, we had a crazy idea to look at houses one Saturday and long story short, we’re building a house! This happened all within one month, we’ve been back and forth with the builder, lendor, and realtor. We’re super excited and super busy trying to spruce up our current home.

Even though I tried to relax whenever I got the chance, I worked on my October Project Life layout little by little. October wasn’t a very busy month but I had a lot of photos from when my family came down to visit. How could I not use my nephew’s picture as my monthly cover photo?!

Most of the background papers are from the October Messy Box kit. You might also remember a couple of inserts I did for my October Top 5 using Illustrated Faith’s stamp set, I used those as backgrounds for my Instax pictures.

For this month, my “faves” were:

Amazon Prime Commercial (You know, the one where the guy is carrying his dog in a baby sling. Well it’s a fave because of the song that plays in it, I can’t get enough of it!)
The Amazing Race (So fun to see the couples arguing!)
The Voice (I heart Gwen Stefani!)
Fugees (I listened to The Score all freaking month, still am actually)
Cheesecake (When is this not a fave?)
Micheladas (Same, when is this not a fave?)

I used stamp sets from Studio Calico, Kellie Stamps, and Kelly Purkey and ink pads from Ranger and Tsukineko.

That’s it for my layout, I did have one more thing I wanted to share. Because we have decided to buy a new house and it came unexpected, my husband and I are putting ourselves on a tight budget until everything is done (meaning we’re moved in, and our current house is sold). My “allowance” has been put on hold and I will not be able to buy as much crafting supplies like I’m used to. So instead of doing a Top 5 of my favorite products that I bought, I have decided to switch things up for these next couple of months and maybe do a Top 5 of my favorite blogs or Instagram accounts, something along those lines. I think it will be fun plus, it’ll make me use supplies that I already have and haven’t used, I actually have plenty.

Thanks for stopping by and putting up with me and my blog while I try to get things situated. I hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving!

Project Life

Project Life: September ’15

October 23, 2015October 23, 2015 Diana Sanchez2 Comments

Hello everybody! I finally got to work and finished my Project Life layout for September. It was a fun month, the highlight was definitely our trip to Austin!

For my “cover” picture, I snapped a quick pic of what I found inside the duck’s cage once we got home from Austin. As you can see below, I printed a 8×6 picture of AJ at Top Golf and cut it down in three pieces.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Studio Calico’s Laina Alpha stamp set. I always use my MISTI whenever I stamp my monthly “cover” picture. I also used stamp sets from Mama Elephant and Kelly Purkey.

I recently signed up for A Beautiful Mess’ Messy Box kit and I used some paper, washi tape, and the speech bubbles from it.

So, this month’s faves were:

Ancestry.com (so awesome, I actually met a cousin I didn’t know I had and we sent each other pics of our parents from back in the day)
The Weeknd (I have “The Hills” on repeat)
Tumblr (Who doesn’t want to see unlimited GIFs of Friends and Harry Potter?!)
Margaritas (enough said)
Crossword Puzzles (I downloaded an app called DCC and I have to play the daily puzzle before I go to bed)
Tortoise Hair Clip (Damn the day I walked into Old Navy and found that clip near the register, I never want to do my hair ever again! I can just put it in the clip!)

I wanted to show you guys the before and after of the picture I took of AJ and the picture of the duck eggs. I use Adobe Lightroom to edit all my pictures. I took both pictures with my Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge and then edited them on my computer.

The software was a little tough to figure out at first but after playing with it, watching a couple of YouTube videos, and buying presets, I can’t imagine not using it, ever! And it’s also because of this, I enjoy taking more photos. Every picture I’ve used for any layout has been edited with Lightroom.

That’s it for now, thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you guys next time!

Project Life

Project Life: August ’15

September 7, 2015September 7, 2015 Diana SanchezLeave a comment

Hello again! I am actually done with my August Project Life layout the first week of the month! I learned that it is SO easy to do your layout if you have a lot of pictures and luckily I took plenty this month because of our trip to Dallas. I was done with my layout in one day which is a new record for me, it usually takes me longer because of my indecisiveness. I’m very happy with the shots I got and I even pushed myself out of my comfort zone and took a couple of selfies (gasp!).

During our trip we stayed at the Gaylord Texan Resort and they happened to have the inside of the hotel decorated with a “The Wizard of Oz” theme. I took a picture of the ruby red boots as we were about to check out, you can see that pic below. It ended up being a great pic to use as my “monthly cover pic”.

My dad is a huge baseball fan and my husband and I were able to take him and my mom to a Texas Rangers game. We had such a great time and it was awesome to take pictures of him checking out the field to be able to share with my sisters and for him to keep as a reminder.

I used a couple of Studio Calico alpha stamps (Laina and Alex & Ben). I also used my typewrite a lot for this layout along with a flair button and parcel tag from Pink Paradise.

I used label stamps and dies from Studio Calico and Kelly Purkey and a couple of sentiments from Kellie Stamps. For ink I used Ranger Archival Ink in jet black, Brilliance in moonlight white, and Mama Elephant Creative Color in winter. All the patterned paper I used is from Studio Calico.

I was able to get good shots of the concert with my Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge, that is after I turned on the HDR. I realized this AFTER the first band played… meaning I got no good pics of Deftones, only of Incubus. The good thing though is I have good pics from Deftones the first time I saw them, and I got good shots of Brandon Boyd shirtless, so all is ok.

We have another trip coming up this month, this time we’ll be going to Austin for my sister-in-law’s wedding. AJ’s birthday is also this month so we have some fun stuff planned for that so hopefully I’ll have plenty of pictures for the next PL layout.

See you guys next time!