Project Life: March ’17

May 14, 2017May 14, 2017 Diana Sanchez2 Comments

I had no idea at the time but my last post was my 100th blog post for the Lovely Pear!!! I cannot believe my little blog has made it this far! Thank you to everybody who stops by to read my posts! Also, I’d like to wish all the moms out there a lovely Mother’s Day!

I decided to be done with my March layout. This was a first for me, having trouble with a layout because there were too many pictures. I did create smaller middle pages, and I have three so far and I actually need to add one more, but I’m ready to move on from March so I can start April! Just thinking about it makes me feel like I’m starting to fall behind, which then makes me feel lazy about it, meaning I won’t finish it (I’ve learned to accept that this is who I am but I shall try to power through this!)

The good thing is, I finished my two 9×12 pages and I’m ready to share away! Obviously March for us was all about our Moab trip. I love how I was able to get pops of yellow on the layout. All the inserts I used are from Push Print Studio’s Winter-16 collection.

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I did a lot of handstamping on this layout compared to my other layouts from this year. All the stamps I used are from Kelly Purkey’s monthly kit membership.

I love how “The world is waiting for us” (from the Go See Do kit) paired nicely with this black and white photo of the three of us. I used Tsukineko’s Brilliance Graphite Black ink and my MISTI to get it to look nice and crisp.

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I also used the “my journey starts here” stamp, also from the same kit, on this picture of the Abyss Canyon overlook. The white ink I used for this was Tsukineko’s Brilliance Moonlight White.

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I found this picture of AJ and thought it was neat (thank you GoPro), especially when I made it black and white. I think I really liked it also because I found it after AJ had gotten his haircut, plus I love the motion in the picture. At first I printed it as a 4×3 and then decided to make it an 8×6.

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I heat embossed the “go. see. do.” stamp using Mama Elephant’s Sunshine Pigment Ink and Simon Says Stamp Clear Embossing Powder. I LOVE embossing!!!

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And lastly, here is March’s journal card. Monthly Overview-Mar

Thank you guys for checking out my 101st blog post, I’m excited to see what the next 100 will be! See you next time!

My Favorites

March ’16 Top 5

April 5, 2016October 10, 2016 Diana SanchezLeave a comment

Hello everyone! We are getting closer towards our closing date for the new house! But… of course, this is a bittersweet time for me. Moving not only means a new house and better area for us but it means saying goodbye to my childhood home, my family’s home, and the pear tree my dad planted in the backyard. This past weekend we also said goodbye to Shadow and Lucky, our ducks. It was VERY, VERY hard for me. I did not take it as well as I thought I would even knowing that they were going to our friend’s ranch, here in the same city. I think everything is just hitting me all at once. But, I’m trying my best to think positive and to welcome this new adventure with wide open arms and I’m ready to embrace this new chapter in my life. I tend to get scared with changes but I know my husband and I have worked really hard for this new house, and that is something I am very proud of.

So enough about that.

Today I have a “normal” Top 5 for you guys! I know it’s been a while so if you don’t remember why I had to stop my regular Top 5, check out this post.

I was finally able to do some shopping, and most of this stuff I was able to get at Hobby Lobby with my 40% off coupon (gotta love that coupon).

March '16 Top 5

1. Fiskars Deluxe Paper Trimmer with Aluminum Cut Rail

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I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve been pretty happy with all my Fiskars paper trimmers. This is the third one I have purchased. The first one is similar to this but it’s a rotary trimmer. It worked just fine up until I got the Sure Cut Deluxe Paper Trimmer. The Sure Cut just cut better and has been my go-to until now. Because of the aluminum cut rail, I get straighter lines, which is a must-have for my printed photos.

2. Hero Arts Kelly’s Coffee and Donuts March '16 Fave 2

The coffee addict in me just had to have this stamp set! It’s perfect for your planner and also for Project Life. I think the coffee cup, coffee beans, and the donut would be perfect as a background stamp. Now I just need to plan a coffee or donut date so that I can mark that special occasion in my Midori calendar!

3. Heidi Swapp Lightbox March '16 Fave 3

I just love this! Once I started planning what my new craft room was going to look like, I just couldn’t imagine it without this lightbox. It also didn’t help seeing all the pictures of it on Instagram. I’m so ready to decorate with this, especially for holidays!

4. A Beautiful Mess Emojis Stamp Set March '16 Fave 4

Who doesn’t love emojis? This is another great stamp set to use for planners and Project Life. This set deserves a thumps up, a fist bump, a dance number with your twin, and a “put your hands up in the air and wave’em like you just don’t care”, that’s what that emoji is, right?

5. Mama Elephant Zenith Borders Stamp Set March '16 Fave 5

You know I love me a background stamp, yet I don’t know why it took me so long to get this stamp set from Mama Elephant. This would be perfect for making your own Project Life inserts or for making backgrounds for cards. Imagine doing a repeating pattern in pastel rainbow? Egads!

I’m excited to be able to do this kind of Top 5 but I don’t know when the next one will be. This will be a very busy month for us. If everything goes according to plan, we should be moving next week. My entire craft room has been packed up, I waited until the last minute to pack my “essentials”. So please bare with me, not only are we moving but going on a trip a week after that! So much fun stuff coming up!

Thanks guys for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed!

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(Photo courtesy of Bldg 25 Blog)

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!

Card Making

Joyeux Anniversaire!

October 14, 2015October 13, 2015 Diana SanchezLeave a comment

Bonjour everyone! Today I am sharing a new card I made for a friend. She wanted to give this card to her grandmother for her 96th birthday. I decided to do some watercoloring for this card because I had so much fun with my Halloween cards, but I wanted to try a difference technique.

My friend wanted the card to say “Happy Birthday” in french along with her name. I thought this might be a little hard since I don’t own any stamp sets that have french sentiments but I was able to download a pretty font and I just printed it out instead.

I used Mama Elephant’s Freestyle Florals stamp set and made a pattern on Canson watercolor paper. I stamped the flowers and leaves with my Versamark Emboss Ink Pad and used clear embossing powder from Simon Says Stamp.

For the colors, I used my Peerless “Complete Edition” and “Pretty in Pink” watercolor sets.

I was very happy with how the flowers popped once I colored in the background in blue. I also love the way the watercoloring looked once it was completely dry. I highly recommend getting Peerless watercolors if watercoloring is something you’re interested in but don’t want to spend too much money on because you are a beginner.

I hope my friend’s grandmother had a great birthday and enjoyed the card and I hope you guys enjoyed it as well! Au revoir!

Items used:
Stamps: Mama Elephant Freestyle Florals
Ink: Tsukineko Versamark Emboss Ink Pad
Paper: Canson Watercolor Paper, Papertrey Ink White Card Set, Papertrey Ink Summer Sunrise Cardstock
Other: Simon Says Stamp Clear Embossing Powder, Peerless Watercolors, Peerless Watercolors Pretty in Pink, Ranger Water Brush

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!