Weiden Mini Album

As soon as I finished up the Monaco Mini Album I started on the next one! As long as I have the mojo to keep making minis, I'm going to take it and run with it. I am loving getting our travel photos off the computer and into something that can physically be touched and flipped through :)

First, a flip thru:

Our HHG (Army lingo for 'Household Goods') got packed up on June 25-27, but I need some scrappy things to tide me over until mid-SEPTEMBER (it takes a loooong time for things to get from Grafenwöhr Germany to Seattle Washington!!!). Guess what I kept? My Cameo and sewing machine... I can't live without them for that long! Fast forward to today and I am super glad I've brought them along, I've been using them as much as ever.

Then our UAB (Army lingo for 'Unaccompanied Baggage') got picked up just two days later on June 30th. That shipment was allotted 1000 pounds and will arrive mid-August. I put a few buckets of scrapbooking collections, my Typecast Typewriter, Stitch Happy sewing machine, and all my coptic books and recent mini albums in that shipment. Still, a whole month without some of my favorite things! Oh, and there's also a 100 pound bucket of candy for my family in our UAB; I kid you not it weighs that much. #gummybearsforlife

My suitcase of scrapbooking supplies coming with me on the airplane was still heavy as... so I packed up two flat rate boxes with my Oh My Heart and Fancy Free Pink Paislee collections (I kept my Take Me Away collection which is what I used to make this mini album), embossing powders and things because I forgot to leave behind my watermark ink (an essential part of the embossing process... oops! First stop after we land: Ben Franklin Crafts!), and a whooooole bunch of punches (I kept one - the mini bow punch - which I did use in this album, you'll see!). Those USPS Priority Mail boxes should arrive to me at my parent's house in Washington within a week. So basically, all my scrap supplies are scattered literally all over the world right now and I hope they'll all get to me safe and sound eventually!!

Back to the mini album! Last Saturday we went to Weiden for what was supposed to be a quick trip to the toy shop - we ended up walking around the town for 2.5 hours.

I will always have a special place in my heart for Weiden - it was the very first city that we explored upon moving here in 2013. We had been stuck in the hotel, car-less, for almost a whole month and we were going stir crazy, to say the least. We lived in Germany, but couldn't experience Germany! It was maddening! Thankfully our friends let us borrow their car and we drove the 20 minutes to Weiden. I remember thinking to myself as we were walking around, "Holy cow, we LIVE here! It's like a fairytale!" The pastel buildings, quaint old town square, church steeples, and flowers galore, seemed unreal and too cute to be true! That feeling never went away and I'm going to miss it so much.

I think it's fitting that we came "full circle" - we started with Weiden and ended with Weiden. Hence the round shape of the album.

When I'm making these mini albums, I choose my photos first, print them at home, and try to figure out the pages and placement of photos first. Then I create the "filler" pages - the ones with stitching or backed die cuts and no photos. Those are actually my favorite!

Once all the photos and pages are in place, then I usually add lots of machine stitching to keep the papers together and create texture - I've kept the threads long here, I may go back and trim them up a bit.

Then comes the embellishing! I go through the album page-by-page and add the stickers, ephemera, pockets, and bits & pieces that make the album unique and fun.

Journaling is one of the last steps. I mix hand written journaling and typed/printed/trimmed journaling. It's been quite the challenge trying to finish this mini album without my printer! The last day we had our car I ran to my favorite drug store called Rossmann where they have Kodak instant photo booths and printed off all my pics. And then for the printed journaling there is an office center here in the hotel where I figured out how to print onto my own cardstock.

See! I used the mini bow punch that I held onto!

The base of this mini album is a circle - about 4" across. As I was coming up with filler page ideas I scrolled through my Silhouette library and found round things like flowers and wreaths that would make fun interactive elements.

I will miss going to the aviary in Weiden - cages upon cages of pretty birds! 

On a transparency I fussy cut a bunch of flowers from Take Me Away Paper 17 and adhered them in a crescent on the right edge. I thought about writing "sehr schön" (very beautiful) with a white pen in the middle, but didn't want to mess up and it looks pretty as is so I left it.

Flowers flowers everywhere!

Details: 1. I fussy cut the buildings from Paper 13 and adhered them in rows - this paper is so perfect for European towns! 2. I hand stitched through a fussy cut embroidery hoop from Paper 20. 3. A crescent of sequins and sentiments tucked underneath.

This is the very first page I made even though it's the 2nd to last page in the album. I cross stitched through Paper 03. I love the texture and colors!

I always like to include a family photo - one of my goals upon our return to the states is to print our family selfie from every adventure we went on and put them in a massive frame with a small caption of the date and place.

On the cover I stitched paper wedges and used mini Heidi Swapp letter stickers for the title. The houses are fussy cut from the 6x6 Paper Pad and I added a bow clip with stamping inside.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing all these mini albums lately! I've already started the next mini album which will be about Le Mont-Saint-Michele in France. Or I may go back and try and finish my Cinque Terre mini album that has me stumped - all the photos and papers are in place, but I don't know what to do next! We shall see! Thanks as always for stopping by!