The Pen Scrappers

Description

The Story

I have a pretty good memory for detail and remember stories that others in my family have forgotten.  That said, there is a limit to my abilities.  Life happens at such an alarming rate that it is impossible to retain everything I want to remember.

One of my favorite focuses in scrapbooking is words.  As a former linguist, I have a fascination for language.  I love to record the things I remember my grandparents saying and how they differ or not, to the world we live in now.  I also love to record the funny things my children say and stories in their perspective that are typical of their age and growth.  I think it’s fun to document my said and unsaid responses.  It will be so neat for them when they get older to see how they perceived the world and a little something for me to hold onto when they have “flown the nest”.

“The Truth about Monsters” layout focuses on a conversation we had at the dinner table one ordinary Monday night.  Ella and Luke’s Daddy was working a night shift and so I had them all to my self.  With Halloween just days away, monsters were a hot topic of conversation and with a pen and paper never far away, how could I not take note of the following conversation:

Luke: I had a monster in my closet in Alaska when I was 2.

I’m thinking: Wow!  He remembers this? He was afraid of his closet. He would refuse to go to bed until we had closed his closet door.  No monsters as far as we could tell…Just shadows.

Ella: Monsters don’t exist… Except sometimes… Like in Texas where there are mummies…Where Hailey and Alexis live. Maybe they will see some.

I’m thinking: This girl has a fixation on Texas and where the heck is she getting her info on mummies? Does she even know what a mummy is?  Gosh I must be more naive than I thought.

I join in: So what do monsters like to eat?

Luke: They like grass….

Ella: They drink blood…

Luke: They eat poop.

Ella: No they don’t! They eat people.  Mummies don’t eat grass.  They like sand.

Luke: …And ghosteses like footprints…and garbage…and trash… and cheetah girls…

I’m faster than Ella… YES Sireeeee!

Ella: …And I’m smarter than Luke… Are you going to call me a baby?

Luke: No but you’re not going to be my “chi chi” girlfriend…

…whatever that is, and so the conversation digressed.

The Process

The focus of this layout was the story and so I kept the design simple.

I dragged the image of my children using my Bamboo Fun pen on a layer above FotoBlendz clipping mask.  I then “clipped” the image of my children to the FotoBlendz using the clipping mask function in Photoshop.  Press Ctrl + ALT + G (Photoshop) and Ctrl + G (Elements) to clip the paper to the mask so that it appears to have been cropped to that shape.

I embellished my page with a ready-made Halloween overlay and kept the palette monochromatic with a punch of color in the title to bring focus to that particular word.

The page was completed with uneven lines of text in varying font sizes.