Pumpkin Carving

Okay, I have been sucking at keeping this up to date. I have been creating (albeit slowly) lately and not posting so I will try to start posting, even if it's a quick photo.

Here is my latest using my Scraptastic and Gossamer Blue kits from October.

I have also been trying to decide on what kit club I want to go with.  I had incredibly specific things I was looking for and after several months of looking I finally figured it out.  Here's what I was looking for:

1.  No stamps included - I rarely stamp on my layouts (to be honest, on ANYTHING) so didn't want a stamp included as the cost of that included means less other product in the kit.

2.  No or very little cardstock (and if cardstock neutral usable cardstock).  I have an entire Expedit cube full of 12 x 12 cardstock from years of kits and I never use any other than white, cream, kraft and occasionally grey.  So again, I don't need more and cost of this means less other stuff.

3.  Thickers - It's a weakness so I wanted them in every kit OR at bare minimum not other alphas that I'll never use (too big or not usable colours).

4.  A fantastic DT and active kit club members!  Part of the awesomeness of being part of a kit club is being inspired by the DT's creations and by others in the club using the kits. I'm a busy lady, and inspiration helps a lot.

5.  New product.   I am also on a BUDGET so getting the latest and greatest in my kits means I spend far less on the product I wanted but didn't think I was getting in kits (and when it shows up in kits months later and I bought it... sooooo annoying).

6.  Shipping doesn't take forever.  I'm in Canada and most kit clubs are not.  Shipping can mean I wait weeks for the kit everyone in the States got only days after release. That, to put it bluntly, sucks.

So, what kit did I land on?  I'm excited to say the Hip Kit Club.  Their DT do process videos constantly (not on my list but a huge bonus) and it met every single picky thing I was looking for.  I just received their November kit which is excellent.  It's got lots of Xmas-y stuff in it and I have LOTS of October kit stuff left to use so I will continue to post my creations from the October kits for the next while and as we move into the Xmas season... you will see my Hip Kit creations coming soon.

Thanks for stopping by!

Jen

Kit Storage

Sorry it took me so long to get back to this. I had company all last week and... well, I wasn't able to sneak away up here and finish this off.  So here I go again now!

First, my last 2 months of kits are stored in empty Project Life page protector boxes.  This is a relatively newer system I'm working on.  You can see them there:

To the right of my Project Life stuff there are boxes with labels you can't read :)  I use a bit of washi tape on the ends and label them with the month and name of the kit that is in it.  These are my Sept and Oct Noel Mignon kits - which is my montly scrapbook kit and the only kit I get currently. These kits are HUGE and keep me more than going all month long for both layouts and Project Life spreads! 

So here's what is in these boxes:

Not so helpful but that's the view from the top.  I completely and TOTALLY stole this method from Tracey Banks (Mercy Tiara).  She hangs up her alphas and long sheets on a peg board while I leave it all in the box but otherwise, stolen from seeing her work in her You Tube process videos. And ironically, about 2 weeks after I started this, she did a video about her kit storage.  It was funny as I'd pieced it together first! (wish I'd been lazier and waited until after this video... but I didn't know she was doing it, LOL)

So the bottom of the box has my cardstock, then patterned paper (this kit is well used), then my alphas. This kit has a photo tucked in as I was messing with a layout and it all got shoved back into the box. The ENTIRE REASON I use this method.  Easy, fast clean up but it's all still right there when I am ready to pull the box down again.

So, the silver tray has the larger embellishments in it.

The crystal dish has the smaller embellishments in it. All easy to find and poke around in.  My very wonderful and thoughtful friend Sweet Scrapista bought me the tray and dish.  I had told her I started using this for kits and funnily enough so had she (and we hadn't even talked about it with each other!!).  So when she saw these, she bought them and sent them to me.  BEST SCRAPPY GIFT EVER!!

So there you have it, my kit trays.  Once I get the majority of the kit used up or am just ready to move on, I put all the stuff left into my stash and the next month's kit goes into the tray.

This method now means I don't need to store a lot of kits elsewhere but the few I do have from before are all in one of the blue cubes in my expedit:

Next post will be my new method for embellishments!  I hang them all on book rings.  It's new, I love it and I am USING UP so much stuff cause I can see it and it doesn't take me long to find anything.

Until then...

Jen