One Tough Mother: December 2011

Saturday, December 31, 2011

2012 Project Life Prep

This is my last blog post of 2011. Wow! I'm really looking forward to 2012. Lots of goals, as I mentioned the other day...

One thing I'm really excited about is continuing my Project Life. 2011 was my first year doing Project Life, and I fell in love with it very quickly. For 2012, Becky Higgins (and her design team) have outdone themselves with the new designs and updated products.

As one of my most favorite Christmas gifts, I was given the Clementine edition. I realize that there are still a few people who are unfamiliar with Project Life and all it's awesomeness...and even if you are familiar with it, you may not have seen the new Clementine edition yet.

So, a tour:

This piece of lovliness is the Clementine edition binder in all its glory :) Becky partnered with We R Memory Keepers to make the new binders and they are fantastic. Nice and shiny and sturdy and fabulous!

Here's the Clementine edition Core Kit - full of goodies! This is the box that holds all the necessities - journaling cards, stickers, and title cards. Here's a closer look at all of these things:

These cute boxes hold all of your 3" x 4" journaling cards.

These are the cards you use to fill one journal card slot on each week's layout. The cards displayed on the bottom are part of your first and last page layouts.

Here are your title cards, and larger first and last page cards. Aren't the designs just scrumptious?!

First and last page cards

Title cards - one for each week's layout.

These are the folded journaling cards. Each card has a design on the front and the back, so you end up with 8 designs to choose from. Use these when you have a little more of a story to tell than will fit on your regular journaling cards.

Here are the stickers - some sheets have the days of the week, both in color and transparent; other sheets have just numbers, again in color and transparent. The orange sheet of stickers is arrows. You can use these on your journaling cards to point to the picture you are writing about, or any other creative way you can think of.

Becky thought of everything! This is inside the binder - it keeps the pages nice and sturdy and helps the book close easier.

I always keep my Becky Higgins boxes - as you can see I'm kind of an addict :) The boxes themselves are super fantastic, too. The big ones in this picture hold all of the keepsakes from my daughter's school days, from preschool through 3rd grade (she's in 4th grade now). Not sure what I'll use the small box for yet, but I'll think of something!

So now that I've unpacked all my goodies, I organized it so it's easy to grab and go. I got this cute divided fabric tray at Target for $5.99! Shut-up! Yep, $5.99. And it's the perfect size for all the cards and stuff.

See? Perfect.

Journaling cards here...

Stickers and folded journaling cards here...

And title cards and pen here!

I've got a dedicated and organized space for my 2012 Project Life. I'm ready!

Come on 2012!

Happy New Year!

Thursday, December 29, 2011

So Ummm...I Made A Mini - Personal Binder, That Is

***UPDATE: Some people have had problems downloading the documents. Please try the following links for the Google Docs version. Please let me know if you continue to have issues. Sorry for the inconvenience!!!***

Revised Links for Docs

August 2012 Calendar

September 2012 Calendar

October 2012 Calendar

November 2012 Calendar

December 2012 Calendar

Weekly Pages 1

Weekly Pages 2

Christmas is behind us, and now we look forward to a new year. Start your new year off by getting organized!

Back in September, I showed you my Family Binder. Since that time, that tutorial has had 1,580 page views! Shut the front door!

Well, I'm the kinda girl who likes to keep my planners with me at all times, and it's a little hard to carry around that big ol' family binder...plus, it's made to sit on the counter to be easily accessible by the whole family.

Soooo.... I made a mini! :) And I'm really excited to show you how - you're welcome!

Here's what I bought:

All of these products were purchased on Amazon - I've included links in the list below:

I made new calendar pages to fit my mini binder. When I made my Family Binder, I shared links to download all of the monthly calendar pages. So for the mini, I simply edited the page size to 8.5 x 5.5. Right now I only have Januray, February and March to share with you. I'll only be keeping 3 months at a time in my mini personal binder.

Here are the monthly pages for January - March:

January download HERE

February download HERE

March download HERE

I also made new weekly planner pages - here ya go:

Download HERE and HERE

Now keep in mind that all of these printables are formatted for 8.5 x 5.5 paper. So you have to make that size paper to print on.

It's easy - get out your trimmer and cut a regular sheet of paper in half. A normal size sheet of paper is 8.5 x 11, so cutting it in half makes it 8.5 x 5.5. Easy peasy!

(Or you could do what I did and be stupid. I didn't use my brain at first and ended up cutting the long side to 8.5 and the short side to 5.5. Then I realized, DUH, cut it in half and it's the same thing!)

I used white cardstock (cut in half) to make my cute little cover:

Oh yea - you need to punch holes in your paper to put it in your binder. You can buy a hole puncher on Amazon that fits 8.5 x 5.5 paper, or you can do what I did.

Use one of the tabbed dividers as a guide and use a standard one-hole punch to punch holes, like this:

You only need 3 holes, not six, for this particular binder.

So there you have it! A nice new handy dandy mini personal binder - way easier to carry around than that big family binder.

Whatcha think? Like it? I love it so very much! Looking forward to putting it to good use in 2012!

UPDATE: I finally made the rest of the calendar pages - download them all HERE.

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Wednesday, December 28, 2011

2012 Realistic Resolutions

Ok, whoa. Looks a bit different around here, right? I promise you're in the right place! This is still One Tough Mother...I've just revamped a bit. Cleaned up the place, decluttered, and remodeled. I hope you love it as much as I do! Please take the time to check out a few new features - see the buttons over here on the right? -->

Go ahead, play around. Take a tour. Tell me what you think!

Ok, on with the show...

2012 is right around the corner! Are you ready? Have you made your resolutions yet? Some people resolve to make no new resolutions because they rarely stick to them.

This year, I challenge you to make goals - realistic resolutions. The key to sticking to them is making them visible, and, again, realistic.

What I mean by "realistic" is "do-able". If you don't exercise and resolve to climb Mt. Everest, that's not realistic. But you want to get healthy, right? Ok. What's realistic to you? Lose 15 lbs. by June? Be able to run a half-marathon by December? Make that your goal.

It's a great idea to write down your goals and keep them handy so you can stay focused and on track. I made the above word picture showing my own personal goals and resolutions for 2012. Some are broad, such as "Breathe" and "Play". Some are more specific, such as "Learn to sew" and "Eat veggie". But they are all visible in this format. I'm printing a large one for my office and a small one for my planner so I can see it each and every day.

There are a couple ways to make your own word picture. One way is to go to Wordle and create one of their cool word pictures. Or, do what I did and make your own on Picnik. Here's how:

1. Download my blank 8.5 x 11 jpeg HERE.

(Let me know if you have issues - I'll email it to you. When you click the link, it will look blank because it's just a white rectangle to allow you to edit fully.)

2. Upload it to Picnik and go to the "Text" tab to begin.

3. Then, start typing your goals - phrases, words, whatever. Use a different font and color for each one so it stands out on its own.

4. Once completed, you can go to the "Stickers" tab and add stars, hearts, or anything else to fill in the spaces.

5. Then print it out in different sizes and keep it VISIBLE.

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One thing you might notice in my word art is a goal to get healthy - I have "Exercise More", "Play", "Eat Veggie", and "Be Strong". Also listed on there is "Be Accountable".

I need you to be my accountability partner on this goal, if you don't mind. :)

Now, I'm not a strict vegetarian. I love meat and will still eat it from time to time. However, briefly this past summer I ate vegetarian for about 3 weeks and felt better than I have in ages. I also lost 10 lbs - bonus! So I have made it my goal to eat vegetarian Monday through Friday each week. I'll occassionally share veggie recipes with you from time to time, too.

Also part of my "Get Healthy" plan is to start exercising regularly. I have found an amazing circuit training routine that fits into my busy schedule and I can do it from home. Perfect for me!

I plan to do the Tough Mudder circuit training initially 2 days per week, then building up to 3 days per week. Why Tough Mudder? Well, the name was kinda catchy ;) but I like the idea of an at-home circuit training workout that takes no more than 30 minutes to complete. That works for me. I don't plan to participate in their Tough Mudder challenges, but I do like the workout!

If you're interested, you can find the printable workout HERE.

I'll keep you posted on my progress, too - and I'd love to hear about your goals to get healthy so we can hold each other accountable and have a better chance of sticking with it. It's easier to do this together!

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Something else I'll be doing beginning January 1st is participating in Ali Edwards' class One Little Word. I'm really looking forward to this class, available through Big Picture Classes.

My word for 2012?

Yep - Strength.

Not just physical strength. My family and I have had a roller coaster of a year in 2011, emotionally. We've lost loved ones to suicide (two in one year), lived through an almost life-threatening motorcycle accident (the hubby is great now, though, thankfully), continue to fight a personal battle that is ongoing for a little while longer....the list goes on and on. Needless to say, we are glad to see 2011 come to an end.

But, through it all, we are grateful for what we have. And what doesn't kill us makes us STRONGER.

2012 will hopefully be a year in which my family and I can regain our strength. Emotional strength, physical strength, and even spiritual strength. My faith has never waivered through all the ups and downs, but I know I can be stronger in my faith and closer in my walk with God, and I intend to work on that in 2012.

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Finally, I plan to get back into photography. I love taking pictures, but I quit trying so hard to get good shots and just took pictures. I miss my good shots - I have a bunch of them from 2010.

So, to help me take better pictures, I've signed up for daily prompts from Capture Your 365. I'll be sharing a lot more of my pictures with you, as well as my Project Life layouts. Not only will I concentrate more on the quality of my photographs, but I hope to get more involved in scrapbooking those memories.

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So there you have it! My 2012 Goals. How are you planning to make 2012 a better year?