So, it is OFFICIALLY FALL! I know not every city is blessed with cooler weather, with leaves starting to change colors but one thing we can all expect this time of year is those YELLOW SCHOOL buses coming to pick up all the kiddos. The flourish of FIRST DAY of school photos on Facebook is a reminder to empty nesters, about those days of nudging our little ones out of bed, HURRYING them in their daily routines, finding their homework and lost shoe, and doing our best to move them toward the door before the tardy bell! I know many of you going through this hectic time may be thinking it will never end but it DOES and then there will be plenty of ME time, so savor these sweet days.
I would love to ask our prayer warriors out there to say a prayer for all of these sweet children that many parents are entrusting to our schools around the world. My scrapping buddies were talking just the other day about how things have changed so much since the days WE attended school. How in the “olden” days, YES, there would be a scuffle in the hallway where teachers would break it up but by next week? Everyone loved each other again. Today, sadly, our children leave home and a fight could mean a trip to the hospital or worse! Bullying and cyberbullying are rampant. It is shocking to me that 1 in 5 kids contemplate suicide( the leading cause of death in teens) at a time in their life where things should be, well FUN. Instead, our sweet children of today are growing up way too quickly and their innocence is destroyed at such young ages.
When other kids, social media, and society in general start to have more influence on your kids than you do, it’s time to fight to instill YOUR values in them. To give them a shield of protection through self-esteem, encouraging healthy friend groups by pushing them toward sports teams, volunteer groups, and clubs as well as making sure they know they are loved infinitely by our Lord and Savior. I know when mine were little, sometimes it was like pulling teeth to get them to get up to go to church on one of their “only days to sleep” but I took every chance I had to pump in the positive from any direction I could, so that the negative had no room to creep in! If you do not have a church home, please know that all churches are not equal. If you have kids, look for a church that has a strong youth program with lots of activities. Hanging around with other church kids does not mean they will not see, hear, and experience bad stuff because let’s face it, we are ALL a work in progress. But, I do feel peer groups are powerful and if you find a church where your child finds a peer group where they fit in, they will WANT to go to church instead of complaining about a missed day of sleep.
Keep your kids BUSY but not overly so. Busy kids have less time to invest in foul play!
Hug them lots.
Remind them of their gifts.
Be the house where kids can come where there is supervision but remember to be the parent always. Friendship comes later!
But most of all, have grace when you feel you have failed. Parenting is TOUGH.
Last, since you are here looking for school ideas for your family scrapbooks, I know that you already are doing one amazing thing for your family. Our photos and stories are a great self-esteem builder! Include letters of love to your children ESPECIALLY when you feel like your little innocent baby just turned into Jekyll and Hyde! These hard days are fleeting and when the spoken word cannot be heard, the written one can be powerful. Leave your album open for them to see and chip away that hard shell little by little.
The School Dayz Collection by Creative Memories is a comprehensive line designed to make a few pages of noteworthy school activities that happen from year to year or an entire book to record your child’s journey from pre-school to graduation! If you are interested in doing an album with school memories all in one place, check out this YouTube video that describes how easy this can be done with this line, and how by incorporating full-size pocket pages for precious artwork and projects and the 8.5×11 pockets for awards, letters of recommendations and other keepsakes, you can have all their school stuff safely in one place. You may want to store it all in this gorgeous School Dayz coverset!
With that, these pages are dedicated to all the busy moms of school-aged kids out there. May these help you to create super-fast pages so you have more time for YOU.
Thanks for reading. Blessings to you!
Beckie Belote
Creative Memories Advisor, Newport News, VA
The ABC’s border across the middle was a nice touch and was a sticker strip that came in the collection and the mat for journaling was in the mat pack. I added the highlighter embellishment to it with a foam pad to give it dimension. You will LOVE the oversized embellishments in this pack!
This is a super easy spread. The yellow paper at the top and at the bottom were front and back of the dual-tone white core cardstock that is available for a limited time. I like it that the dual-tone papers are different colors on each side and look great together. I added texture by cutting the gold star paper and the bright yellow piece with the PINKING blade in our straight trimmer. It’s one of our newest ones and I love it since it is a dramatic cut. The double mat on the left in the blue colors are also Dual-tone papers. Notice how they look vintage with the white patches showing through? That is the beauty of WHITE CORE card stock! Simply rub it with an emory board or sandpaper and you get that worn look that is just gorgeous. Above that mat, I used our embossed hexagon punch with the same paper and also roughed it up to show off the embossing better. The lockers on the top are from the sticker pack and of course, the oversized embellishments, layered with foam squares on the mat from the mat pack, really make this layout pop.
This layout also uses the HOLE technique that I described in the first layout. I love the use of the oversized rectangles for mats that I created with the rectangle patterns from the cutting system. It is such a dramatic look and really adds such visual appeal. I again, couldn’t resist adding more oversized embellishments with foam squares to that mat from the mat pack. So pretty!
This layout couldn’t be easier. The side borders were just strips of the paper that was designed already like that. The colored rulers are in lots of different colors so you can choose three colors that go with your page spread. The Bookshelf border punch is great for your school pages and on one of my mats , I just use it as a punch to add an artistic look to my partial oval photo. I again used the rectangle pattern to cut out one of the pre-done mats from the mat pack and matted it in pink to be the major embellishment for this page spread. Notice how the pink and green mats look weathered? Again, they are dual-tone white core cardstock so this look is easy with your emory board!
This is such an easy layout. The borders were made by using the border maker system with the notebook cartridge. I love that cartridge so much for this kind of project! The triangles are super easy too. First cut two 4×12 inch strips. Stack them on top of each other so that MATCHING SIDES are FACING each other and the other matching sides are facing outward on the top and bottom. Then Cut them on the diagonal. The other element I added that makes this page look super creative is the PRE-DECORATED and LAYERED XL mat! These are perfect for popping that 4×6 “first day of school” photo in!
This is another easy and stunning page. I love cutting 6×6 squares on a diagonal to create triangles for the corners. The toppers look hard but it really is just two paper strips, one thicker than the other stacked on each other. I used the scallop blade in my trimmer to get the pretty edge on the gold piece. The pale yellow with the red apples was a sticker strip! And last, I added that white strip cut with the notebook border maker cartridge! I added embellishments to the mat and also that super cute school bus with foam squares to add balance to the other page.
I used the decorative trimmer for this topper. I like to cut two 4×12-inch strips first with the straight trimmer and then fold the like sides onto each other before cutting BOTH at the same time with the decorative trimmer. That way, you don’t have to measure how wide the cuts are since they will be identical. After cutting once, I pushed the papers through and did one more cut for the smaller snake-looking cut. FLIP the snakes over to get two different patterns. For the scissors topper, I did that with the scissors border punch (another great one for school) I cut it out on white paper and colored with red and silver pens to get that look. I also added another one of those XL layered photo frames.
I love this layout. I cut two squares. One 6×6 and another at 5×5 and cut them on the diagonal, and layered them for a super fast and fun look. I let the embellishments pop by setting them on top of circles cut with the circle punch mounted on foam squares.
I used a favorite border maker cartridge for this topper. The SHUTTER LOVE bmc cut out of red paper. I then simply COLORED the cameras black to get this two-colored border. I also used the inverted corner option on our corner rounder to add a little eye appeal to the mat that says BREAK A LEG along with some extra popped embellishments. You may also notice the use of the COLONIAL blade on the red mats. I love how this layout shows how versatile this collection is.
Last, here is another page using the HOLE technique described on the first layout. When your papers are so drastically different, you can do the same ideas over and over and get drastically different looks. At the top, I added a border with the notebook border maker cartridge again and for the topper, I cut out holes with the circle punch and flipped the hole to reveal the fun pattern underneath. I added hexagons with the embossed hexagon punch too. This page was made complete with more large embellishments and a mat!
