December Daily® 2015 | Day Two
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Welcome to December Daily® 2015 | Day 02.
Today in the process video you'll get to see me change my mind and adjust course mid-way resulting in a Photoshop tutorial included below about how to adjust the December Stories Vol. 2 6x8 layered templates to 3x4. All in a days work. Ha. If you are interested in why I make the choices I make I highly encourage you to check out the process videos where I speak a lot freer than I do in these posts.
As a reminder, here's what Day 02 looked like as a foundation page:
And here's a look at what Day 02 turned out looking like after adding a photo and words and a few other things:
Today's story is about taking Anna to pick out a toy for Toys For Tots. Her school was collecting toys and she was very emphatic that it was what we needed to do (Go Anna Go) so we did it.
The photo was taken using my iPhone and printed with my Epson PictureMate PM400 here at home.
I like real-life shots like this that show her size compared with a bunch of things in the store. I also added a cardstock sticker right to the center of the photo and added a hard-to-see transparent sticker that says "holly jolly" on the back of the sticker from Day 01.
The second page for today includes four pockets. Inside the top left pocket is a "be of good cheer" card from the Cheer Story Kit™ + a transparent "tis the season circle" that was included with a Studio Calico kit last month. The embossed #2 was part of my Foundation Pages (super fun to emboss on those large chipboard letters). The journaling (which is the place where I changed my mind - you can see it in the video below) card includes a gold-embossed stamped title "I love this because" from the Holiday Circles stamp set. In the fourth pocket I ended up cutting up the "stuff" card from the Main Kit, attaching it to a piece of gold star vellum, and then adding a perforated phrase strip from the Cheer Story Kit™ to finish it off.
Something else to note on the journaling here is that I framed it as a short letter/note to Anna.
Here's a look at it outside of the album:
DAY 02 | STEP BY STEP
DAY 02 | HOW TO ADJUST A LAYERED TEMPLATE TO CREATE A 3x4 JOURNAL CARD
SUPPLIES
Please note that some supplies are not linked below for pieces that were created previously but can be found via my Foundation Pages post.
Cheer Story Kit™ ("be of good cheer" card + kraft perforated phrase)
Epson PictureMate PM400 (for printing 5x7 and smaller)
Studio Calico Highlands Kit (yellow-orange "tis the season" circle)
SHARE YOUR DAY 02
I'd love to have you share a link to your Day 02 album pages below. Please link directly to your post vs. a general blog link.
Comments
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40 comments
So sweet Anna! :) I also love including perspective in the photos I choose. I know that when I tell my letter to Santa story I will include a photo of the kids mailing their letters against the postbox. They grow so much each year!
Replies to beckany
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Anna is certainly of Good Cheer! #goannago
Replies to Michelle06
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Beautiful story! She's so grown up! I have loved watching your videos from class taking a look back through your DD albums. Your kids were so cute! And Simon is soooo tall now and is a young man rather than a boy. Man, time flies! Thanks for sharing your pages.
Replies to hgauvin
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Hi Ali,
I was wondering, if you use different page protectors or why aren't your cards swimming in the page protectors? Mine are way bigger. I now wait until the pp are available in your shop again.
Replies to andreacollects
Hi Andrea - mine were sent awhile before the actual albums + page protectors came in (so collected from a previous batch of page protectors). The ones in the album ended up being a bit larger, which for people who embellish is great - some people love them, some people not so much. In the future my preference is for them to be true to size.
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What a sweet memory this will be. Cheered me up today. My girl is ridden with anxiety over the past few days, it's a full time job to ease her pain...but I have found some good in each day and I will strive to do so today too. Sometimes the calendar date just doesn't match up perfectly with our emotional and medical needs. Sigh.
Replies to ScrappinMyHeartOut
Of course not :). Sending love.
Thank you Ali - we have redirected that anxiety away for a while with a walk on the beach and a Christmas smoothie! I have my story for today :)
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It's a beautiful, touching, and meaningful story. To be truly empathetic is a wonderful thing. Love that, she's a great kid. Michelle t
Replies to mtercha
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Thank you so much for including the "how-to" videos. I know it's time consuming but I really appreciate hearing your thought process aloud. As for the video tutorial, I have a specific question about the text box. I'm using PS Elements. When I have a text box and I grab the corner to adjust the size, it actually changes the font and I can't (for the life of me!) figure out how to keep the font the same size. Do you know? Thank you!
Ack! Also, when I try to grab the corner of the text box from your template, the whole box moves instead of just the corner to expand the box. :-(
Replies to sa_scully
Morning - no idea why grabbing the corner would change the font (you mean literally changes it to a font with a different name or do you mean stretching it)? If the whole box is moving when you try to click on the box I'm guessing that the Move Tool (black arrow) is selected instead of the T tool (type tool).
Oh, no. I mean the font size changes.
I'm guessing that's because you might need to hold down the "shift" key when grabbing the corner (or NOT hold it down - one or the other) to keep the font size proportions the same.
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I am really enjoying your videos. This really helps me get my stories and help me stay focused on this project.
Replies to happytoscrap
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Lovely story Ali! Thank you so much for your process video! BTW-the Facebook Chat was a blast last night!!!
Replies to Kellysill
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Awesome story, Ali! The spirit of giving is one of those things I worked to instill in my kids when they were little. Now that they are grown, it's so fun to see how those lessons took hold. From the stories you've shared with us about Anna and Simon, I know they're going to grow into very loving, giving adults!
I do have a technical question. I know you photograph your layouts in front of a huge window. How do you eliminate glare on the page protectors?
Replies to Divinemsq
I think the way I'm making that happen is by moving the table back away from the window - this is not a direct light window (the sun doesn't shine into the window except at certain times of year) rather just a natural light window (indirect). I also move my body while looking through the lens to find the angle with the least glare.
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Ali, dont know where else to go with this but I am having a serious issue with orders i placed on 11/20. I have opened 3 conversations with your customer service and dont seem to be getting anywhere. Bottom line is i dont have the product im really sad and upset and Im gonna have to dispute the charges with my cc. :(
Replies to angymuse
Morning! I'm so sorry to read you are having an issue. I forwarded this on to my Customer Service manager and we will get to the bottom of it and make it right.
thanks Ali.. btw thanks so much for the YouTube videos.
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Thank you for showing the before foundation and the after with the real story. Its super heplful!
Replies to tealmyre
Sure! I will try to remember to do that :).
Yes! I was looking at an old DD post (probably your first DD album) and saw that you were doing that back then. Very helpful indeed.
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Love that I'm not the only one who stops and re-does her journaling mid project. ;)
Replies to achristian
You are not alone!
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I love this Process of documenting December. Thank you! xoxo
Replies to Wilna
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Great layout, love the scale of photo. I jumped into December Daily (which I am calling December Documented to keep the pressure off!) on Tuesday afternoon. So far so good. Always reminded that the stories are what matters most.
Replies to papergoddess
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I love that you posted another process video!
If it's not too much trouble, and since I know you see these posts very timely, can you alert your customer service that I responded to their conversation they started with me? I'm afraid I'll miss out again if someone doesn't see it soon.
Replies to elli
Happy to do that.
They took care of me. Thank you.
Great!
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Love this layout and love the story. So wonderful and thanks for the video, I love them!
Replies to Bellaa75
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Hi Ali I am having the same experience as angymuse. I received my kit ages ago but the album still hasn't arrived. I had a similar problem 3 years ago when the kit didn't arrive until January (and SC was similarly unhelpful). I also have contacted customer service however they have not replied. It would be so great to be able to do this album in December as it was stressful doing it in January as the same time as PL.
Replies to meilin42
Hi! I forwarded this on to my Customer Service Manager to look into this situation for you. Please know that generally conversations are responded to within 24-28 hours. They will figure out what has happened and make it right for you.
Here's a little tidbit I found out. If you update your existing conversation with additional info or another comment, the 24-48 clock starts over.
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Thank you for encouraging me in this project. I have a question for you personally, Ali. When I "lived" December 1 and 2, I found I had about 7-8 stories happening in my life ranging from an unexpected snowstorm to having a new furnace installed (3 days of messes) to preparing for a major medical procedure--all of these worth telling. I noticed you do one story, but what happens to the other things in your life during this month? Do you use Project Life or make full layouts or just skip those events? Thanks for any insight.
Replies to slmnontec
There's a couple things you can do - make your story be a list of all the stories that occurred (that's still "one" story). Another thing you can do is spread the stories out over the month when you encounter a day where the story might be less obvious. For this project I do usually stick to one story per day but as you'll see tomorrow I've kind-of added two together. Other stories for me go into PL and others don't get recorded - that's pretty normal :).
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Hi Ali, I just wanted to say thank you for how you are going about this for us. I always love your DD posts but the extras this year are so helpful to actually get my own done. I am so far wanting to do it every spare minute rather than saving it up for my days off. It's only December 4th mind :-)
Well done Anna, a good heart.
Replies to JenHart
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