It’s the summer break, and that means our campus turns into a construction zone. Shopkeepers change owners, shops get a facelift, so do many corners of our campus, and probably the biggest construction zone around is the new foreign faculty’s flat, which should have been done by now, but as a matter of fact, there’s no end to building in sight. For me, that means happy news, since I don’t yet have to move, which means I can enjoy my time doing other things.
Well, I hurt my finger the other day, and that means I can’t do much, no tennis, no other stuff, but I’ve been scrapping a ton. Need to get those pages for a photobook finished that I started at the beginning of the year. I will share the results with you as soon as I’m done with it, but first, I want to share another link to some fine photo actions. Simply click on the image above, or HERE to get to the place from which you can download these very easily.
The cafeteria on campus, which normally provides us foreign teachers with three warm meals a day, is closed over the summer break. This means that lately I have been cooking again, and I’ve been enjoying that rather rare pleasure. For dinner, I decided to give myself a treat and have a light German dinner, with homemade rolls (as bread in China usually is sweet, which German bread usually isn’t), cheese, meat and some vegetables. Yummy!
Have you ever looked at those shabby vintage style products and wondered how you could get your page to look a little more shabby? I certainly have. Many times. Especially when I use some background paper to clip to a strip for a label or journaling strip, and the result just doesn’t look shabby at all. But then I found a super easy way to actually get that shabby look, and all it takes is just a few steps in photoshop. Take a look at this page: There are several places where I clipped papers to a shape, and without inking the edges the result would look something like this: Then I inked the edges, and this is how that turned out: Pay attention to the edges … So, if you would like to know how to get that effect, here’s the deal: Inked Edges Step 1: In the layers panel, select the layer of the paper/photo/element you want to modify. Double click the layer in the panel to open up the Layer Style dialogue …
I’m getting myself behind again, and before I let that happen again, I must share one of my recent discoveries with you. It’s Suzanne Baird from Roadside Designs and she has a wonderful template series out that is perfect for scrapping your traveling memories. What I especially like about those templates is that they look like pages from a magazine with a very clean and simple design, and yet those pages (in my opinion) look gorgeous! Travel Journal – Western Frontier by Suzanne Bairds Each template has room for photos and journaling, and the composition is perfect if those two are the things that you want to focus on when scrapping your travel memories. Here are some sample pages that I snagged from her blog: And of course, you can use these templates to scrap any other topic besides traveling, too. Here is one page I created based on one of the templates from “Travel Journal – Western Frontier” (but of course not without giving it my own little “twist”): This was the apple I …
I think I found my next treasure, though I have to say that I almost had a fight with myself, since there were two layouts in the galleries that I really liked. But in the end, the winner is … (drum rolls please!) “My Bell” by WendyW I love her composition and shadowing, the color scheme, and how she placed her title, and aren’t the photos the cutest?
I’m so excited today! I’ve got another freebie for you! After the long break I had to take due to my further studies, I’m finally on the roll again, and it makes me happy! This one almost turned into a little headache, when I had finished it more than halfway through and then my software seemed to get stuck, but then my computer decided to rally its little spirit and allowed me to save everything without crashing. So here, without further ado, let me present my latest freebie template: This one is based on my layout “May 2011 Favorites,” which I just scrapped, and which about gives you an idea how far behind in my scrapping I’ve gotten myself recently. Anyways, with the weekend ahead, I hope you’ll get a chance to use this template, and as always: Happy Friday, scrappers! Note: Please do not re-distribute this template in any way (you may share the link to this post), and when you use this template, please make sure to credit it to Misty Hilltops Designs. …
I’ve got another perfect Chinglish example today. Found this one on the subway in Shenzhen on my way from the border of Hong Kong to the airport. Need I say more? Note: When posting anything in the Fun with Chinglish section, I don’t mean to show disrespect towards anything or anyone in any way. I’m simply sharing the fun we get to have with all those great signs & documents!
I can’t believe that my last post in the hybrid hub has been more than two months ago, but here I am back, finally managing to present you with another one of my very early creations. This is a card with a fairly simple design, using Julie Billingsley’s “Home of the Brave” digital scrapbooking kit. The kit goes with a 4th of July – all American theme, but that didn’t stop me from using it in a more generic way for this card. Basically, I attached three layers for the background added a two-layer strip, two stars and a label with the sentiment. That’s all it takes to get a quick card made.
The summer break is in full swing, and that means, our campus is deserted yet again! But take heart, it’s never as empty in the summer break than it is in the winter. The reason: There’s summer camps all over the place. Some for orphans, some for athletes, some for kids who want to learn English, and some for students who just get bored staying at home over the summer. That, by the way, is another reason why the campus doesn’t get as deserted in the summer as it does in the winter: Because quite a number of students stay around for the summer, renting apartments in the vicinity and use the quietude to study (at home, they’d be spending most of their days watching TV, which can get quite boring if you do that for a whole month). Anyways, for me the summer is usually a good time to brush up on my tennis skills, as every late afternoon by 5 pm the tennis court gets frequented by more or less capable players … …
