Prairie Song

Prairie Song by Mona Hodgson is the first book in her new series Hearts Seeking Home. Although this is the first book in this series it continues the stories from her series The Quilted Heart. You could read this book without reading the other series but I feel like the other books allow you to get to know the characters of this book. I would definitely suggest reading The Quilted Heart series first if possible.

The Boone Lick Company Wagon Train is getting ready to head west. Families and friends are parting ways, some are staying in Saint Charles while others are venturing westward. Anna Goben is hoping that the trip will help heal her family after they suffered the loss of her brother in the Civil War. Caleb Reger  one of the trail hands wants to hide his secrets and his pains from the war. Anna and Caleb really don’t like each other very much and want to avoid each other as much as possible but God may have other plans.

I enjoyed reading this new book. I’m glad it picked up where The Quilted Heart series left off. The book leaves a few unanswered questions which drives me nuts as I have to wait for the next book. But overall I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who loves historical, romance novels. I think you will enjoy this series. If you have read The Quilted Heart series then you definitely want to start the Hearts Seeking Home series to see were the journey leads the families who left Saint Charles. Just like her other books this one is filled with adventure, love, disappointment, highs and lows.

I received an advanced reader’s copy of this book with no anticipation of review but I decided to review it anyway.  You can now purchase this book here.

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Heritage Kit by Project Life

I just received my second Project Life Core Kit from www.amazon.com . I love genealogy and have been looking for a way to do a scrapbook of all of the wonderful, old family pictures I have collected over the last few years. Once again life has gotten in the way and I haven't had the time to sit down and finish scrapbooks the way I would like to. Becky Higgins just released the Heritage Core Kit and this has become my perfect solution. When I saw that this kit was coming I waited patiently  not so patiently on this kit. I was keeping a close eye on her blog awaiting the announcement of this new kit. Well it finally hit the shelves of amazon and I purchased it quickly. My hat's off to amazon who got it to me in 2 days. Thank you amazon prime :) Now I have my solution and I have been getting my pictures together. I'm a little weird, I will scan all of my originals and keep them in a safe place. I will likely scrap the copies. I know this sounds strange but I keep my scans on dvd's in a safe and these irreplaceable originals will also go into the safe.

 

When I received my kit I immediately fell in love with the mute brown and black tones. The cards will work well with any type of picture; colored, black and white, as well as sepia. Keeping with the great quality of the designers of Project Life the cards come in a sectioned box with a magnetic closure with suggestions to help you get started on the lid. I loved this kit so much when I opened the box but then it hit me I have some photos that I would like to feature on a traditional page so I immediately went shopping again. :) I purchased the matching 12x12 papers and the page dividers. Although, the pages will not be divided on a monthly basis I will divide they my generation.

 

The 12x12 papers are of the same quality as the core kit cards, my only complaint would be they do not come packaged as well as the cards. They are packaged with a cardboard insert to keep the papers from bending and then shrink wrapped. They aren't as easy to store with the kits as I would like them to be. Once they are opened they are loose and could easily be damaged. It would be nice if the paper had better storing packaging. I used the box that my page protectors came in to store the paper so that it wouldn't get damaged or seperated from my kit.

 

 I'm hoping to finish this album and include some family history to pass on to my daughter and hopefully she will be able to pass on a little of our heritage to her children if God sees that in her future.

Project Life by Becky Higgins Review

I am usually a traditional scrapbooker but I have recently come across a product that I am absolutely in love with. Project Life by Becky Higgins is a new way to look at scrapbooking. It is designed to scrap your everyday life without taking too much time. I have to be honest I am a little intimidated by a product that is supposed to make my scrapping easier. The reason being is I don’t typically scrap everyday life, I tend to scrap trips, holidays, and events so this has been a challenge for me. I have yet to dive in full force but I am determined to do it. One of my major problems is getting caught up on printing pictures that I so long neglected but I am working on it. I have managed to stay somewhat up to date for 2013 while trying to go back and print from prior years. I had only been printing things that I was in the process of scrapping. BIG MISTAKE now I’m way behind and it is costing a fortune to print. Oh well I am going to get there.

Now for Project Life, I purchased my 1^st kit on HSN when it was a special value of the day. It included an album, 60 page protectors,12  page dividers, and 1 Core Kit  that includes 616 cards. I chose the Jade edition. The core kit has enough cards to complete album.  I think the cost was close to $50.00 but I have enough materials to complete and entire album with no additional cost.

1^st – The album is very well made. It is a three ringed binder type of album with plenty of room. There are metal corner protectors and metal plate window on the binding for labeling your project.

2^nd – The page protectors include spaces  for 4x6 cards and photos as well as 2x3 spaces. The protectors that came with the kit on HSN included 40 pages that the 4x6’s spaces are in landscape, and 20 pages the 4x6 are in portrait orientation. The protectors seem sturdy and the cards fit into the pockets nicely. You can purchase page protectors for your Project Life project that have various orientations of pockets as well as traditional 12x12 pages if you want to include a few more “traditional” pages.

3^rd – There are 12 page dividers (designed to separate your 12 months) They are printed acetate dividers and are equally beautiful. Don’t forget to remove the clear covering that protects them. It is very difficult to see and if I hadn’t read about someone trying to remove them I wouldn’t even have known they were there.

4th – The cards in the core kit are absolutely beautiful. The paper quality is wonderful with the weight equal to a light weight to medium weight card stock. Most are double-sided and match beautifully with each other. They are designed so that you can slip them into the pockets with little thought and they go great with each other. You do not need any glue or scissors for your project. Now if you are like me you are going to want to add a little bling. Wink wink. But the album will look gorgeous without any bling. The cards come in a divided box with a magnetic closure. It is very well designed and thought out. There are suggestions to help you get started on the inside cover of the storage box and a few of the cards that aren’t double-sided have suggested placement guides.

In short Project Life is a great way to document everyday life, which are the important moments that tell who we really are. It is for the busy person who doesn’t have a lot of time to sit down and spend hours on layouts. So if you feel like you want to scrapbook and don’t have the time this will be a wonderful way for you to get started. Or if you feel like you are never going to get caught up, maybe you can in a weekend.  And if you are like me and usually scrap themes you can easily adapt this system to do so with no problems. I definitely recommend Project Life to anyone who wants to document your life!!!! Thank you Becky Higgins for bringing us this wonderful, new way of scrapbooking.