Froggy Finds: Exercise

Hi, this is Polly Beth (aka StoryKeeperBeth) and I’m so excited to be writing my first blog post as a new Polly. Since it’s National Exercise Day today, at least in the United States, I thought I’d highlight products that we can use to scrap those stories related to exercise, nutrition, diet and general health & wellness. It’s possible to browse products by theme in the shop but there is no theme capturing this specific topic so I had to dig a bit using the Advanced Search and some keywords such as: health, exercise and fitness. I found quite a few products you can use to document your health journey.

The kit Healthy & Fit by Kristin Aagard has cheerful pink and purple colors and lots of elements to tell your fitness journey.

I love the emphasis on body positivity in this kit, Love Your Body by Sahlin Studios.

If you prefer more muted colors, this collection, Fit, by Lynne-Marie “fits the bill” and includes journaling cards, papers and elements in turquoise, orange and grey.

The Don’t Weight, Diet Now kit by ninigoesdigi has an energizing color scheme of bright blue, pink, yellow, red and black, and there are unique enamel pins that coordinate with the kit.

These silhouettes by Grace in Color are really fun and could be used with any other papers and elements of your choice, or if you are looking for journaling cards I found the ones below by Gina Miller.

If your exercise of choice is playing a sport, there are some terrific products in the store. These can be found by browsing in the store under the theme of sports, but here are a few I particularly liked.

The kit Sporty: Tennis by Kristin Aagard is ideal for documenting playing tennis for exercise and/or fun. If Tennis isn’t your exercise of choice, Kristin also has kits on: Baseball, Football, Soccer, Bowling, Basketball, Volleyball and several other sports.

Martial {he}Arts by ninigoesdigi has everything you need to create wonderful layouts about practicing martial arts. I really like how colorful the kit is and all of the brushes and elements of people doing martial arts.

While not exactly about exercise, Splash Boys Brushes & Stamps by Lynn Grieveson would be an excellent choice to use on any layout about swimming or other water sports.

The weather is finally getting better in the Northern Hemisphere, Spring is here and it’s time to get moving again. If you are in the Southern Hemisphere there’s always winter sports and the gym to keep you moving until better weather arrives.

So, Happy National Exercise Day and happy scrapbooking your health & fitness journey.

I was born in North Carolina and grew up all over the place because my Dad worked for Citibank and was transferred every few years. I lived in: New York State, Ireland, England, Belgium and finally Baltimore, Maryland which I call home. My husband was in the Navy, so we moved around a lot for those 8 years but now We’ve have settled down in Barrington, Rhode Island with our Pug dog. Our only child, a daughter, lives with her husband and daughter in Pennsylvania — I wish they were closer! I had a 30+ year career as a Law Librarian and an Academic Librarian which I loved, but took early retirement last September which has freed me up to be a Grandma and to really get in to all of my hobbies — digital scrapbooking, as well as knitting, reading, taking walks, and hanging out with my dog. I’m also learning to play Mah Jongg.

My creative style is primarily clean and simple, but I do enjoy trying out new styles but am uncomfortable using lots and lots of elements on my pages. My primary motivation for scrapbooking is to document my life and to tell stories, so my layouts always have at least what the photo is and a date, and often there is a whole story. My default style is either using one or two photos only and making them the star of the layout or using a lot of photos to document an event with minimal elements and journaling. Templates are great for this and for many years I always used templates as a starting point, but lately I have either not been using them, or I will take one as a starting point and then change it to suit my needs.

My words of advice for new scrapbookers are: You can’t do it wrong, just get started and enjoy the process. Be patient with yourself as you learn new techniques and skills.

I am inspired by my fellow scrapbookers at the Lilypad, and by our designers’ products. I love color and am drawn to art, layout, products and images with lots of color. I start with the story I want to tell and the photos that document it and draw from the colors in the photo and from the theme of the story. I use Lightroom to organize supplies, and Photoshop to create layouts.