Hello! It’s been ages since I posted to this blog despite it being an ongoing goal of mine to revive this platform. I love to write. As much as I love to create things with pretty paper, my real passion is writing. So why am I not doing more of it?? So many reasons and that’s really not the point of my post today. So let’s get back on track!
I have been participating in LOAD (LayOut A Day) Challenges since May of 2011 – sometimes I’m all-in and manage to create a layout every single day of the challenge, sometimes I’m only part-time and complete just a few layouts. It used to bother me if I didn’t get the whole challenge completed, but as my life got busier with children and work, I had to give myself a break and adopt the strategy that any completed layout, any documented memory, is a check in the WIN column. Take the win and move on!
This time around, since I now own an Arts & Crafts store and am actively trying to build my local and online paper crafting community, I have challenged myself to stick to it! To git ‘er done, as they say. AND to post to my Instagram every day as well as my store’s Instastories. Yikes! So far so good though. As you can see from my Instagram, I am on target. So let’s take a closer look at the challenge and at my first 7 layouts this month.

Every LOAD challenge has a theme that drives all the prompts. This time we are looking at the TV show Friends and using the characters, set elements, and story arcs to find story and technique prompts to use.
Day 1 – I’ll Be There For You (Opening Credits and Fountain Scene)

We took our story prompt from the opening credits of the show – the theme song and the story of how the opening credit sequence (you know, the one in the fountain) came to be. We were to scrapbook something we didn’t plan on doing and/or use a musical title or embellishment. I am using this LOAD to add more pages into my 2017 UK Trip album so this prompt led me to tell the story of getting a ride from my cousins house (after a family dinner) to our rented flat in this classic car. It was gifted to my cousin on his 50th birthday, and reminded my eldest daughter and I of the Weasley’s flying car from the Harry Potter stories. Later that same trip we’d SEE the flying car – check it out.

While choosing a background paper with musical notations on it came easily, I struggled to come up with a title. I love music but don’t have the type of brain that can pull random song titles out at the drop of a hat. So Google was my best friend. I started searching for songs with ‘car’ in them, and then songs with ‘drive’ – there are a lot of songs out there dealing with cars by the way! The song “Drive My Car” by the Beatles has this great chorus which is where I finally got my title. I didn’t have any e’s left on my sheet of letter stickers though, so turned my 3’s upside down and voila, E’s!
Day 2 – The Apartment

For Day #2, we took a closer look at Monica’s apartment. Our story prompt was to scrapbook about what, or who, is home to us, and/or to use the colour purple (since Monica’s apartment is a very bright shade of purple!) Edinburgh feels like a second home to me (I lived there for almost 2 years after university and completely fell in love with the city), so I went through my photos from our day trip there and found some to scrapbook. I don’t have a lot of purple supplies but clearly I have enough that when given a challenge to use them, I can rise to the occasion! LOL! The background paper is one from Wild Whisper and has been sitting in my stash since our ScrapHappy Family Reunion in 2019. It feels so good to get it into my albums!
Day 3 – Central Perk

Our prompt was about our go-to spot for connection with friends – where do we hang out and what do we do there? For technique we were to use circles – maybe even a coffee stain or watermark. I couldn’t really think of any one place that I hang out regularly with friends so I decided to look through my vacation photos until I found ones that I could make fit the prompt. These ones of me and my two youngest daughters having lunch at a diner in Oban fit the bill. As for the technique to use circles, I was pressed for time so decided to use a pre-made background from Vicki Boutin’s Color Study line. This one had all sorts of circular elements in the background – some even looking coffee stain-ish! To pick up on the circles I also die cut some out of coordinating papers and placed them vertically to line up with the colours in the background. But I wanted everything to be very random and messy, just like the background paper (and life with these two for that matter).
Day 4 – Monica “I know!”

I departed from my UK photos for this one. Our prompt was to scrapbook about something we know or say all of the time and/or to use a sketch. I completely forgot about using a sketch but very much had fun scrapbooking some of my favourite phrases. I used two stamp sets from Shimelle Laine that are all “real life” phrases (not the common “best day ever” phrases you typically get in scrapbook collections and stamp sets.) Then paired them with a couple of slightly cheeky selfies, papers in fun colours and themes, and a title that is by far my most used phrase. Sometimes scrapbook layouts can be pure fun!
Day 5 – Rachel’s Hair (The Rachel)

At first glance this layout and these photos may seem at odds with “The Rachel” but bear with me (see what I did there?) Our story prompt was to scrapbook about something we’ve always wanted, did we get it, and what do we want now? For technique we were to use a scrapbook supply that we wanted really badly and couldn’t wait to get. So how do photos of my girls posing with a bear fit this prompt? Well, for as long as I can remember, I wanted to be a Mum. When I was smaller I didn’t have a number of desired children, only a girl and a boy, but as I got older, I wanted lots of children – 4 or 5 to be precise. And girls. I wanted girls. (Having 4 brothers I decided I was done with boys LOL)
I got my wish! I now have 3 girls and while I no longer want more children, I am very proud of my little brood. They get along fairly well for the most part, and on this particular trip, were incredibly well behaved. They are also total goof balls! Rarely do I get them to pose nicely for me. My eldest is turning 18 in a couple weeks and my youngest will be 13 next month. So very close to have all teenagers, just in time to see them start to leave the nest. They are truly my pride and joy!
As for the technique side of the prompt … when I decided to scrapbook these particular photos of my girls, I immediately thought of Shimelle’s Little By Little collection which was probably my favourite collection of hers. I still have a few sheets of 12×12 paper left of it, plus a much decimated 6×6 paper pad, a few die cuts, and a very few stickers. She’s no longer designing products for American Crafts which is probably very good for my wallet, as I would pretty much load up my cart with her products every time she came out with something new.
Day 6 – Chandler

Chandler had a very unique personality so for this prompt we were to scrapbook about our personality. Are we introverted or extraverted, funny or serious, and do we get along with everyone or prefer to have things done our way? For technique we were to use colours that match our personality. I don’t know how accurately I did that last one, but since I do love a whole rainbow of colour, maybe. As for the story, I chose a photo of the books I received at Christmas to show my nerdy side. I’m a bit of bookworm! Then I used various stamps from sets about books (and quite a few about the Harry Potter books because I may be slightly obsessed with those in particular) to highlight certain ideals I hold. The background is made up of squares cut from a sheet of Paige Evan’s Wonders collection that looks like a quilt. I cut the whole sheet up into its individual squares then chose my favourite patterns and made a grid of them. The grid is to show my highly organized nature, while the ripped edges and cluster of things around the photo shows my messy side.
Day 7 – Joey “How You Doin’?”

Today we were challenged to scrapbook a day in our life and talk about how we are doing (no really, how ARE you doing?) For technique we were to use a catchphrase as a title (which is where my title came from and yes, I’m talking about the dog! LOL)
I had big plans for this layout that didn’t happen as I thought, but I actually really like what I do have down on the page so I guess it all worked out in the end after all. I had planned to take photos of my day throughout the day and then scrapbook them all to show a chronological type thing. Ali Edwards does this great Day in The Life project which is what I was envisioning in my head. Helps if you remember to take photos beyond the morning routine though! So I just went with what I had which were photos from my (mostly) daily walk with my dog Scout. I use that time to listen to a podcast and kind of get my head right with the day. The catchphrase part came when I saw the “hey good looking” sticker and decided to use it to create a longer title.
Okay, that’s all I’m going to LOAD on you today (bad pun #2 – I’ll stop now). Week 1 is in the bag and week 2 is well on the way to being completed too. If you want to learn more about the LOAD challenge, my store, the ScrapHappy membership group, or anything else I’ve mentioned, please either click on the links in this post or write me a comment below. And look for more posts from me soon. Looking forward to getting back to writing and sharing in this format!