Your Family Heritage in 10 Easy Questions

Many scrapbookers by default become the designated family historian.  It makes sense, after all we are the ones who always have a camera handy, save wedding invitations, keep graduation ticket stubs and even collect funeral programs.  At some point in time many scrapbookers are faced with the idea, thought, dream or dread of doing a detailed family heritage project.

For me, it is one of the biggest items on my creative “to-do” list.  I have gathered information from some people in my family.  But, in no way am I finished. 

In order to help myself, and hopefully someone else.  I have created a family interview worksheet with 10 simple questions. The goal is to help get people talking or if nothing else, at least gather the high points about people’s lives. 

In a perfect world, every family member would be an open book and chock-full of colorful stories.  In reality not everyone is excited about the idea of “telling their business.” So, there will be some people that you will be lucky to get a simple yes or no from.  In any event, it is important to remain respectful of people’s wishes and to handle their stories with care.

If you would like, click here to download a copy of the worksheet and maybe it will help you gather some interesting bits of information from the interesting characters that make up your family.

Flags, Flags and more Flags!

So, I’m a little late to the party on creating flags for layouts.  I finally bought a punch to see if I’d like it.  And I love it!  I’m always looking for ways to showcase as much of the patterned paper I hoard buy as I can.  This is a fabulous technique for doing that.  The punch made pretty quick work of it and I snipped off the sides of a few of them to vary the sizes.  I can see using this technique on more layouts in the future.

The layout I’m sharing in this post is just a fun one documenting something my husband says to me when we go out to eat.  He knows that almost as soon as we sit down, I’m pulling out my camera taking plenty of photos.  So, when the main course arrives, he knows not to dive in right away.  He’ll wait until I’ve taken a few shots then he asks:  “Can we eat now?”  Too funny!

  

Can we eat now? by Moanica Caston.  Cardstock: Bazzill; Patterned Paper, Chipboard, Brads, and Stickers:  My Mind’s Eye; Alphas: America Crafts Thickers, Jillibean. 

What other new or not-so-new trends are you feeling right now?  I need some ideas! 

Moanica

Family is Everything

My project this month has to do with FAMILY.  We all hold this word and the actual individuals in our family very dear.  So when I saw that phrase displayed,  the next step was to put it to work in a project that I hope will inspire others.  One of the local craft store sells a lot of charger plates.  These crafty items have a range of possibilities for creations.  I decided to create something that can be displayed on a table or a mantel.  I die-cut some chalkboard paper for the center of the charger and wrote the names of some of my closest family members inside.  Over the side is a cascade of paper flowers and die-cut leaves. My trusty die-cut machine helped me to create the sentiment.  I hope it inspires you to create something similar for your loved ones.