:: week nine ::

Today the Paper Issues DT are highlighting the I AM collection by Simple Stories.  I am loving this collection and I'm glad I was able to be a part of this product spotlight! I chose to use parts of this collection for my Week 9 project life spread.  It was exactly what I needed to complete this project.

How do you handle documenting difficult stories in your Project Life?  

Week nine was a really difficult week for us, both personally and professionally. 

My One True Love and I work in the same school district, and have worked at various buildings over the years. During this week we lost two long time district employees to murder suicide (they were married).  MOTL and I knew them both fairly well, and it was devastating for everyone involved.  They also left behind this sweet dog; a therapy dog that went to school to be with students every day. Primos is a survivor, so I made him this card.

And here is the left side of this week's two page spread.

This entire side of the layout is dedicated to the story of Sherry, Mitch and Primos. The way I chose to document this story was through hidden journaling. 

The two cards above started out as just plain white card stock (4x6).  I typed my journaling on the inside and then embellished the outside.  That circle stamp is from Ali Edward's Story Stamps.  I used washi from my stash, and the other elements are from the I Am Collection.

 When you pull out the card, you can open it up to see the journaling inside. One of the cards tells the basic story of Mitch and Sherry as we knew them.  The other one is all about Primos and what I did with Primos that day.

In some cases I used I AM patterned paper and just cut it down to size.  Other times I used the cards that come on 12x12 sheet with the collection.  For one of the cards on this side of the layout, I used some of the patterned paper, but cut it so that most of the sentiments worked. Then I took some of the stickers in the collection and put more appropriate sayings right over the less meaningful ones to make this card work.  I like how this collection is really about strength, journeys, beauty and goodness.  These are all great words to help tell Sherry's story, as well as how we have responded to the tragic even in our small community.

I decided to dedicate the whole other side to happy stories, and stories that tell about how thankful I am to have my family, and how life does go on, a new normal arrives at some point.  We still dream, our children grow, and we smile again.  Here is the right side of the two page spread.

This week our nephew turned ten and we had a birthday gathering at My One True Love's parent's house. Our nephew got a dog for his birthday!  What could be better than that?

The above card is one of my favorites because I love the paper clip!!!  :-)  That paper clip actually came from a Swag Bag at Paper Issues!

Here is a look at how the two page spread came together.

The I AM collection was perfection for this week's stories.  If you'd like to pick up this collection, a Swag Bag or just about anything else you need -- check out the Paper Issues store and use the code orangegearle for 20% off your entire purchase!