Happy Sunday!

Can you believe that the first week of 2017 has already gone by? It's going way too fast for me since I'm running out of time to get in my Project Proposal for my dissertation which needs to in the post in two weeks as it is due by the first of February. Yikes!

It's been storming here in Northern California for the last two days. I love the cold wet rain of autumn, winter, and early spring seasons. As I type out this blog post, I'm sitting at my desk looking out into my backyard and watching the raindrops splatter on the windowpane. I'm slightly worried that the deluge might just overflow our swimming pool. Enough said about the storm that's drenching Northern California at the moment and on to the post of the day: Week 2 Layouts.

As you've read in my previous posts, I work with two planners. One to haul around in my bag whilst the other stays at my desk right next to my research materials and my trusty MacBook Pro.

In my Mini Happy Planner, I decided to go with a green theme, using the Big Dill stamp and die set from the Sweet Stamp Shop for the embellishements. I went with this theme since it's the start of the term and I've got a lot of things to do and prepare for. I've also used a couple of stamps from Kelly Purkey and MommyLhey

The layout is also a departure from logging all the miles I've completed daily and the detox plan. That didn't quite work out as we're still working through some of the sweets we've gotten over the holidays, particularly the big tin of Walkers Shortbread Cookies and the tub of Maltesers, all of which were purchased at the big box store Costco. It's not often Costco carried some of your childhood favorites, so into the trolley it went. I'll do the detox next month.

In the Classic Happy Planner, I've used a variety of stamp sets that ranged from the Sweet Stamp Shop, Studio L2E, Lawn Fawn and Kelly Purkey. However, the bulk of my stamp comes from the Sweet Stamp Shop. I think it might be safe to say I've got a bit of an obsession with their stamps.

For this week's theme in the Classic Happy Planner, I went with the coffee theme. For any post-graduate student working on a 45 page dissertation, caffeniated beverages are a must. Since I'm cutting on my coffee intake as I've consumed lots over the holidays and we can blame that on the seasonal coffee creamer flavours, I'm going back to consuming my absolute favourite drink .... tea.

In this planner, you can see the weekend flags weren't stamped quite as well and I tried to mask it by colouring in the letters. It was the first time I used chalk ink and I don't fancy it. the VersaMagic Chalk Ink doesn't stamp quite as clean as the Memento Fade-Resistant Fast Drying Ink. I also found that the brown and red colours left a red stain on my clear photopolymer stamps. Could it be I just need a little more practise?

I've also used some brown washi tape and some scrapbook paper scraps to embellish some of the boxes. I'm not a big fan of negative space when I'm decorating my memory keeping planner. Actually, I don't like a lot of negative spaces in both planners that I manage to use every bit of the space provided.

What about you? What kind of layout do you have for this week? Do you have any favourite stamps and what are your thoughts about chalk ink. Let me know in the comment section below!