Archives for March 2015

Sakura : Japanese Cherry Blossoms

March 30, 2015

Spring is my absolute favorite season here in Japan (despite my killer hay fever). It’s not too cold, not too hot. The sun is shining and a light cardigan will suffice when you decide to take a stroll around the neighborhood. But, the best part is definitely the cherry blossoms. I was away from Japan for about 7 years and this was probably one of the things I missed the most. Our house is on top of a little valley that is lined by cherry blossom trees, so when you walk out of the house, you’re walking through a tunnel of pink. It’s absolutely breathtaking and there are no words to describe it. Every year, I try to capture the beauty of it via my iPhone, DSLR and my point and shoot but it never does it justice. So, so, so gorgeous. My grandma recently moved into an old peoples home a few minutes away from our home, but she’s not a huge fan of walking (she was bedridden for 5 months so she’s still rehabilitating) so she doesn’t get out much. Today, the skies were blue and gorgeous, the temperature in the 70’s (or mid 20’s if you’re a Celsius person like me) and it was the perfect day to take her out to experience the breathtaking beauty around our house.

family lamppost mamagrandma nomigawa sakuracloseup

My grandma looks good for a 90 year old, wouldn’t you say? 🙂 We ended the day with a lunch at Futakotamagawa Rise and I finally gave in and bought a Traveler’s Notebook from Loft after watching Amy Tan’s video about her trip to Kauai. I’ve decided to use it as a journal/diary for my 27th year of life 🙂 We’ll see how that goes!

L’s 1 Year in Japan Mini-Album

March 27, 2015

WARNING: SUPER PICTURE HEAVY POST.

The month of March in this household is a pretty eventful month. March 20th marked one year since my fiancé moved to Japan. As seen in my last post, March 23rd was my birthday. March 30th is a year since he proposed. So, yes, it’s a crazy month. I wanted to do something to commemerate his year in Japan so decided upon a mini-album inspired by Stephanie Bryan (one of my favorite crafters of all time). A couple of weeks before I decided to make a mini-album, she posted a blog post about a mini she made for her and her husband’s 8 year anniversary. It was so beautiful and inspiring that I decided to take a shot at my first ever actual mini-album. I was SO happy with the result and L was so, so happy – he claims it made him cry. This statement cannot be confirmed as I was asleep when he saw it… ha. I went through my stash and pulled out a bunch of patterned papers I love, journal cards, some vellum, embellishments, a date stamp, printed my pictures and went to town. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

27

March 26, 2015

March 23rd was my 27th birthday! Do birthdays ever make you look back at life and think about what you thought you would have accomplished by this age, back in the day? Does that make sense? When I was a teenager, 27 seemed SOOO old. I thought I’d be married and thinking about kids by now. Instead, I’m engaged but not even thinking about a wedding and definitely not thinking about kids. Instead, I was counting down until the 23rd because we went to DISNEY SEA!! Hahahaha that cracks me up.

I’m on spring break and L took the day off to spend it with me. So much fun. Will be working on a mini-book for this trip. Looking forward to it 🙂 As of right now, I am down with some kind of cold. Literally feel like death. Figured I could stay in my room and scrap but didn’t even have the energy for that. Instead I binge listened to podcasts and played Candy Crush. Yup. #27

SC Details Mini Album

March 15, 2015

I recently enrolled in Tina Aszmus‘s Details Mini Book class at Studio Calico. Can I just say that this class is quickly changing my life? If you haven’t noticed, I’ve been struggling to keep this blog up to date because I’m finding it really hard to make time to create. I know, nobody can make excuses about time because if you’re passionate about something, then you MAKE time for it. But this class has really helped me to scratch that crafting itch. It’s basically a mini album where you document all the little things in life. I always have bits and pieces, photos, receipts, business cards, etc. that I want to document but find that it just doesn’t belong in my regular Project Life album. I use our PL album as a family album so why would my uncle want to see a gum wrapper from when I went to see my favorite band live? (Hahaha, kidding. Kind of.) ANYWAY enough blabbing. Here’s what I have so far.

The cover. Haven’t done much customizing for it yet. The chipboard cover came with the class kit from Studio Calico. Love it! I also added a few stamps from a past PL kit, and a floral ephemera that was actually a gift tag. I just cut off a little piece where the ribbon was attached and glued it onto the book.

The first page is a quote I printed off Ali Edwards’s blog. She’s been sharing inspirational quotes over at her blog and I’m obsessed with them. This one speaks volumes to me as I always try to have a positive outlook, even in the worst of times.

I included this photo of my Morning Routine as I always laugh at how ridiculous I feel filling 3 mugs and one thermos full of coffee first thing in the morning. But it’s a necessity for this little family. The water color card came with the class kit.

This double page is something I ripped out of a magazine and cut into two 4×6 pages. I love the colors, and make-up is, quite frankly, my first love. I included it as a little inspiration and a reminder of what I love.

The left side of this page is just another page out of magazine that I ripped out and cropped to size because I liked the colors and the textures of the page. The other side is a page out of my doodling/script writing notebook. My One Little Word this year is “trust”. I had been playing with brush script and doodling in my notepad earlier on in the day so I ripped it out of the notebook, trimmed it to size and punched some holes in it. The label came with the class kit.

I have so many “favorite” pictures with Lester but this is my most recent favorite. It’s from a little adventure day trip we went on to Yokohama – a port city across the bridge from Tokyo. It was such a fun day and I love when photos can take you back to a certain moment and help you feel what you felt at the time.

One of the prompts in our class is to include hidden journaling of a secret. Obviously, I’m not tell you what I wrote (lol what’s the point of a secret if I’m sharing it in a public blogpost), but I wrote something down, folded it and included it into a glassine bag that I have been collecting with my SC kits.

So that’s about all I have so far. Oh, and I have a letter to myself in 10 years but that’s way too embarrassing to share. I think I’m going to make it a ritual to upload what I add to the album whenever I get a chance. I hope you all enjoyed! The class enrollment is open until March 31st so I would recommend anyone who’s interested to join along as it’s such a fun class that I’m so happy I decided to take!