Green Horned Unicorn

Pixel to Paper

For this week's Pixel to Paper, I'm focusing on the felines. I adore my furkids and love to give their cute, fuzzy mugs lots of prime real estate on my layouts. Again this week, I have two brand new pages to share!

My digital layout, Cool Cat, was originally created for Photoshop Friday: Convert A Photo To Black & White at jessicasprague.com, which was released on February 3. 

Product Credits: Patterned Papers, Candy Candy & Elements {Cosmo Cricket available at jessicasprague.com} + Typewriter Lettering {Sahlin Studios} + Paint Splatters {Paislee Press, Kitty Designs}

Journaling reads: 

Baxter cat, you win the title for coolest cat - hands down. Your laid back personality and endless curiosity always lead to entertaining moments. Whether it's your excitement about a new box, napping in a bag, the kitty rolls you do outside, your persistent ploys to get a treat , or just snuggling up on our laps while we work, we love every moment we have with you. You're soft, you're handsome, you're sweet, you're funny and you're a perfectly cool cat. ~Sept 2011

Using my Cool Cat layout as inspiration, I set out to create a paper layout. Since I focused on Baxter in the original page, I decided it was Bugsy's turn to shine with this bright and colorful layout, titled Purrfect.

Product Credits: Patterned Papers, Fabric Paper, Stickers & Thickers {American Crafts} + Cardstock {Bazzil} + Mists {Ranger, Studio Calico} + Pen {Smash}

Journaling reads:

Bugsy, you are fuzzy, sassy, smart, soft, demanding, protective, full of attitude and utterly purrfect!

I'm very happy with the way both layouts turned out. I love the bright pops of color and the fun scattered elements and, of course, the paint splatters!

Thank you for taking a moment to stop by my blog. Have a wonderful week :)

You can find more Pixel to Paper inspiration by clicking here. If you create a page based off of the inspiration provided, please feel free to leave me a link - I'd love to see your work!

Sunday Scrapbook Update

It's Sunday and I thought I'd take some time to share a few more of the layouts (both digital and traditional) I have created so far this year.

First up, is a layout titled DBacks and is actually a page I intended to scrap last year, but forgot all about. When I was cleaning out my studio a few weeks ago, I came across these photos and the ticket stub sitting in a file folder, along with some of the October Afternoon Rocket Age collection. I have no idea what my original plan was for the page, so I started from scratch and came up with this page.

Product Credits: Patterned Papers & Miscellany Pack {October Afternoon - Rocket Age} + Mists {October Afternoon & Studio Calico} + Thickers {American Crafts}

Next, I have two digital pages, both featuring manufactuers more commonly known in the paper scrapbooking arena. Both Jenni Bowlin and KI Memories have teamed up with jessicasprague.com to offer their wonderful projects in digi form!

Product Credits: Patterned Paper & Journaling Card {Jenni Bowlin} + Flower & Kraft Paper {Paislee Press}

This layout features a few Hipstamatic prints from last Valentine's Day (2011) that I finally got around to scrapping. You might recall my story of receiving duplicate bouquets.  

Product Credits: Patterned Papers & Elements {KI Memories - Pop Culture} + Typewriter Keys {Echo Park}

My last layout highlights the only photograph of Nate and I from my sister's wedding. ONE. That's it. I don't know how it happened, but this is all we got. Taken on my iPhone with bad lighting. At least we got one, right? 

I hope you had a wonderful weekend! Thank you for taking time to stop by :)

Frequency Change Approved: An Exploration of Aviation Photography

For those who may be unfamiliar with the term, "frequency change approved" is a phrase used by Air Traffic Controllers, granting an aircraft permission to switch radio frequencies. It’s also the name of a blog Nate started last year. While he hasn’t been active on the blog much in recently, I really like the name - so I stole it. Now before you get upset, I stole the name to use on a project - a project I was creating for him!

For his main gift this year, I created a photo book, using imagery Nate captured throughout 2011. I may have mentioned it before, but Nate is an aspiring aviation photographer. He’s relatively new to it & doesn’t have any fancy equipment, yet many of his photos can hang in the mix against those with more experience and more expensive cameras and lenses. Yes, my boyfriend awesome :)

The official name of the book is, “Frequency Change Approved: An Exploration of Aviation Photography”. I love this book. Even if I had not made it, I’d want to buy a copy. But then again, I’m a total aviation nerd.

This project was one of my best as far as trickery and deception go. I actually worked on this at night, often with Nate nearby. I sneakily downloaded many of the photos from his Flickr account and then nonchalantly asked him for larger images of some of photos, telling him I was going to create art projects for our walls (which I do intend to do, so it wasn't a complete lie!).

There were so many images that I ended up spending hours sorting them into categories and rating them in Bridge. The 4 and 5 star winners went into the book (sorry 3 stars, there just wasn’t enough space). Sorting the images and deciding how to group them in the book was by far the hardest part. Once I had that down, I uploaded them and began to fill up page after page.

I created the book using Blurb's Bookify software and was very satisfied with the program. I'm not a fan of downloading one-off software onto my computer, but something that works as easily as this is well worth it. It saved me a lot of time (as opposed to working online) and worked pretty much flawlessly through the entire process.

Here are a few of the finished pages:

I must say, when the printed copy arrived in the mail, I squealed with joy - the book was perfect! From the semi-gloss cover to the upgraded luster paper, it was exactly what I expected (which if you know me at all, you know I set the bar really high). In fact, I was so satisfied with the quality that I’m going to order my Holiday Memories 2011 album through Blurb as well.

If you'd like to look through the full-version of the book (I'd highly suggest it!) you can view it here on Blurb or via the slideshow below.

Frequency Change Approved by Photographed by Nathan Hennessy | Make Your Own Book

Thanks for stopping by and taking a peek at Nate's present (and letting me brag just a little bit)!

Twelve Months of Us

One of my Christmas gifts from Nate in 2010 was a Fuji Mini Instax 7s. The camera is perfectly imperfect, with it's faded images and blown out colors. It's unpredictable nature makes the wait for the image to develop even more exciting.

As soon as I received the camera, I knew I wanted to make a mini-album full of Instax photos. I quickly decided that I wanted to document Nate and me throughout the 2011. I've seen similar projects of families snapping a photo each month or mothers with their children, like my friend Julie does (you can read about her project in the right sidebar of her blog).

So, each month throughout 2011, Nate and I took an Instax photograph of ourselves. While I haven't even begun to assemble the mini-album to hold the photos, I thought it would be fun to share a side-by-side comparison of the photos we took in 2011. They are displayed left to right, top to bottom, starting with January in the upper left. 

Side Note: It's very difficult to take a photograph of these little glossy, faded beauties!

I really enjoy seeing the images displayed like this. It's interesting to see our outfit choices, hair styles, background scenery and even who is stretching their arm to capture the shot. Usually, I held the camera while Nate pushed the shutter, hence the number of images where my face looks stretchy or strange.

Completely random things I noticed:

• I wore the same dress in both February and March. And, the dress in the June and August photos is a duplicate too. I guess you can tell what my favorite winter and summer dresses were! 
• Nate wore the same tan t-shirt three times, which beats me. Clearly, we need to work on changing out our wardrobes a bit!
• You can tell when the summer heat began to get to me, while I was trying to grow my hair out for Molly's wedding (see July, August, September and October).
• In only two photos is my naturally curly hair actually curly. Once it looks good, the other is horrible!
• It's entertaining to examine Nate's ever changing facial hair from month to month. The months he has no goatee, he looks so young!
• Even though I don't necessarily love how I look in each photo, I love having an entire years worth of photos, capturing Nate and I together.

This was a really enjoyable project and, each month, I looked forward to snapping the next photo with Nate. Hopefully, if he's willing, it's a project we can continue through 2012. I think it will be fun to have these photos years from now and look back at how young we were and laugh at hairstyles and trends.

Do you have a tradition capturing certain photos/events on a monthly basis?

Rollercoaster

November was certainly a month of highs and lows. With those highs and lows came a lot of mixed emotions, thinking and not much else. November looked something like this: 

• Attended my sister's wedding 
• Attended my grandmother's funeral (just a few days after the wedding)
• Made back-to-back trips to Nebraska (two days apart), spending 9 days there in all
• Chopped my grown out hair (for the wedding) into a short and sassy 'do
• Celebrated Thanksgiving with Nate's family
• Put up our Christmas trees (yes, we have two), but not the rest of the decorations
• Wrote and designed a book for my nephew's Christmas gift
• Started (but cannot bring myself to finish) many other Christmas projects

It's a short list, but the top two events account for a lot. It's strange the way emotions sneak in and effect you in ways you never imagined. It seems I needed just a bit more time than I had anticipated to get life back to normal after this strange, rollercoaster of a month.

I'm hoping I can still pull off a few fun holiday DIY posts in December and get back in to the game with my creative & design teams (which I took a short break from). I miss being creative, although it seems I have no creativity in my veins at the moment. 
 
Thank you to everyone for your kind words about my grandma and for understanding why I haven't been around a lot lately. 

And now on to happier, more normal things...

I do have one page left to share from my November Creative Team assignments at JessicaSprague.com. Fortunately, it's a funny one that makes me smile.

Product Credits - Queen of Quirk & In the Making

These funny photos are of my mom and I clowning around in the pool during her visit this past September. Although I'm loving the 70-degree fall weather here in AZ, I kind of miss swimming in our pool... :)

Greg + Molly - An Engagement Album

Last week was a little rough - in more ways than one. On Monday, I was excited for a fresh new week and the exciting things it would bring. I had lots of plans, including attending a Diamondbacks playoff game (with amazing seats) and more importantly, flying home to attend my sister's bachelorette party and wedding shower. 

But, it seems fun and excitement were not in the cards for me. Long story short, I ended up being very sick and missed work and the playoff game. By Thursday, I was on the mend (or so I thought) and still hopeful to make it back home. Friday I woke up sick (again) and after a trip to the doctor was diagnosed with upper respiratory infection AND a sinus infection. If that were not enough, the doctor strongly advised against travel. Since I know the misery of flying with sinus issues, and the fact I didn't want to risk making others ill, I had to stay in Arizona and miss my sister Molly's special weekend.

To say it was a MAJOR BUMMER would be a gross understatement.

But, if you look hard enough, you can find a silver lining in anything - even being sick and missing out on family events. What is that silver lining, you may wonder? Well, I had plenty of free time to play on my computer. You see, one perk of being a digital scrapper is that you can scrap in bed. Which is precisely what I did! I figured if I couldn't be there for my sister, I was certainly going to make her something meaningful and memorable.

The results? Pretty cool, if you ask me! While being cooped up, I was able to put together and album to house Molly and Greg's engagement photos. The beautiful photos you will see were taken by my talented cousin Jill, of Jill Riese Photography.  

Here are a few of my favorite spreads from the album:

To create the album, I used the Curated album kit, a collaboration between Kitschy Digitals and Paislee Press. I embellished the album using lots of other goodies from Kitschy Digitals. 

I created all of the pages in Photoshop and uploaded the final layouts to Shutterfly, using their custom path to create the book, which is being printed as I type! 

You can see the full album below. Please take a peek and amire the lovely couple and the amazing photography! Oh, and the cute book too :)

Click here to view this photo book larger

Although the week didn't turn out as planned, I think I managed to salvage what would have been a lost week and turn it into something somewhat positive. I hope in doing so, I created a special memory for Molly & Greg.

30 Day Photo Challenge >> Wrap-up and an Album

Ah, the good old 30 Day Photo Challenge. I imagine since I only posted up through day 26, some of you may suspect I didn't complete it. Well, guess what? Your suspicions are wrong! I actually completed the challenge on-time, however, it was during my internet hiatus, and while I was in Duluth, so I didn't get the chance to post the final photos. Not ony did I complete the challenge, I also created a book to showcase the photos. First, here's a look at the photos:

DAY 27: AFTER DARK | A bonfire in the fire pit at Steve and Jeanie’s house after a fun Saturday spent on the lake and eating at Gordy’s.

DAY 28: DAILY ROUTINE | Spending time on the internet, reading blogs and searching for inspiration is a daily must for me!

DAY 29: PURCHASED | Salt Water Taffy. Yum!

DAY 30: IN MOTION | Me - jumping like a fool next to Pike Lake.

As I mentioned a while back – my goal at the end of the challenge was to create a book to house the photos and photo notes. Using the same template I designed to showcase the photos here on the blog, I created a soft-cover, 5x7 book at Shutterfly. Using their custom path, I uploaded all my individual files and quickly compiled them into an adorable little book. 

Click here to view this photo book larger

In addition to the photos, I added a few more informational pages to the beginning and end of the book. The first page highlights a list of the daily photo challenges. The next 30 pages are the photos I captured. After the photos, I included  a page which details the challenge and why I participated. The last four pages are a photo legend - which includes details about each photograph. This way, years down the road, I’ll remember the details of the little bits of life I captured throughout the month.

It really was a fun little project and certainly something I'd like to do again. In fact, I'm compiling a list of my own promts to turn into another challenge which I'm considering hosting here on my blog sometime this fall. Sounds fun, right? Any takers? :)

Did you miss me? :)

After a slightly longer blog break than anticipated - I'm BACK! So, just what have I been up to? Here’s a really quick high-level recap:

• Seven-day vacation to Duluth to visit Nate’s family. We spent endless hours by the lake and on the lake - usually with a cocktail in hand! Many photos, stories and details to come :)
• Created brand new products for the GHU Shop! A few items are in shop now with more arriving in the next few weeks.
• Finished the 30 Day Photo Challenge. I also created a book, which I had printed at Shutterfly, to house all the images and details of the challenge.
• Worked on a new blog series.
• Did some freelance design work.
• Avoided the internet when possible – per my self-imposed internet hiatus.
• Crafted with some of my favorite ladies.
• Avoided the still 110-degree desert heat by watching baseball and episodes of Mad Men (I want Joan's wardrobe!).
• And, believe it or not, I actually did relax. A little. Yes Mom - I actually relaxed if you can believe that...ha!

I won’t bore you with any more details at the moment – but you will certainly hear more about quite a few of the items I listed in upcoming posts.

While I was away, I also completed my August creative team projects for JessicaSprague.com – a few of which I will share with you today. I’ve got to include a little bit of eye candy, right? :)

First up, is a bright and fun page titled, “Rockstar”.

Click here for a full list of product credits.

My niece, sassy Miss Kylee Rae, is always willing to ham it up for the camera. During our day trip to the Grand Canyon, she hopped up on a wall & exclaimed, “Take my picture!” With her aviator sunglasses & her little legs crossed she struck this pose. By the look of it, she’s certainly ready for rockstar fame! 

Next, is a page titled, “Clowning Around”.

Click here for a full list of product credits.

This series of photos really did start innocently - I SWEAR! Missy and I were trying to pose together (a shot we never did manage to get) when the kids jumped in and threw up bunny ears. From there – it all went downhill. Arms were flying, tongues came out and we ended up with the final shot at the bottom which is one of my favorite photos of recent time. It cracks me up each time I see it!

Well, that's it for now friends! I'm off to get caught up in blog world and see what YOU have all been up to :)

End of Summer Blog Break & 30 Day Photo Challenge >> Days 23-26

You read it right – I’m taking an end of summer break! Every now and then, I feel that it's important to unplug and take some time for myself to regroup and recharge. So, I'm taking a self-imposed break from the internet and blogging (scary, right?!). I may still sneak in some online time, but for the most part I'll be spending the next week or so away from the internet focusing on a few special projects.

I'll return after Labor Day with a new blog series, new craft related posts, updates to my 30-Day Photo Challenge, and of course, lots of scrapping goodness! In the meantime, feel free to take a stroll through the archives of the most popular content here at Green Horned Unicorn by clicking on the links below:

• What a Girl Loves
• I Made This!
• General Scrapbooking Archives
• Digital Archives 

And because I can't leave you without a little inspration of sorts - I thought I'd share with you the  most recent installment of the 30 Day Photo Challenge - Days 23- 26.

DAY 23: SUNSET | A view across the street as taken from our front yard.

DAY 24: A SMILE | Just me and a smile :)


DAY 25: SUNFLARE | A view of Pike Lake, MN at sunset during an evening cocktail cruise on the pontoon boat with Nate, his dad and Jeanie. 


DAY 26: SOMETHING OLD | An amazing old 1950s Cross Craft restored by Nate's dad. It's a beauty!

And, with that, I'm signing off! See you in September :)

30 Day Photo Challenge >> Days 18-22

Here is another installment of the 30-Day Photo Challenge! Only one more week to go :)

DAY 18: IN MY BAG | Not much! I carry a big bag, but this is all your normally find it. I mean really, what more does a girl need besides a debit card, lip balm, a notebook and a phone? :)

 DAY 19: WHERE I SLEPT | Our partially made bed.

 DAY 20: WHAT I READ | I read magazines! A lot of them in fact. I think I subscribe to around 10.

DAY 21: PRETTY PATTERN | Love this pattern on a piece of Sassafras cardstock from the Ellie's Tale line.

DAY 22: TREES | Some pretty sunflare shining through the fronds of a pineapple palm which lines a wall in our neighborhood.

The 30 Day Photo Challenge is hosted by Oh So Lovely. A collection of my photos from the 30 Day Challenge can be found here.