So Lucky

Blessed would be a more appropriate word but since March is the month of Luck, leprechauns & green I'm just going to go with it.  This page was made in the same way as the other two but it has a completely different feel.  I mixed it up by using 2 patterned pages that feature bold black words on a white background.  One of the patterns is oversized and the other is much smaller.  I really like the contrast in the patterns.  One thing that I found really interesting about this page is how the photo mats & embellishments contrast with the black & white background.  In LOVE with this and will definitely use the style again. 

The blue-green color scheme reminds me of an ombre style color scheme but instead of the colors fading from dark to light in one color, they go from blue to green.  I hope that makes sense.  Just one of my wonky ways of looking at things. 

The embellishment that ended up being my favorite on the whole page is the sequins with the enamel dot in the center.  The white on cream color just make me happy.  When I placed the sequins, the hole in the center was so distracting and I couldn't stop looking at it.  I spotted some white ranger enamel and wa-la, bring on the joy! 

Another thing on this page that is noteworthy to me is the green paper that I used to mat the small word pp.  I mentioned on another post that one of my goals is to use what I have.  What I had was a lime green sheet of neon cardstock.......

This would not work.  Not at all.  So I broke out my mist and painted it with these 2

The end result was fantastic.  Not only did I end up with a color that was spot on for my lo, but the paper buckling gave the whole layout some lift without me having to use a single pop-dot.  I could have flattened it out but I really liked the way the edges lifted. 

 

 

Speaking of lift, one of the reasons that I decided to go with my own design calendar this year instead of a predesigned one was because I truly enjoy fat, juicy pages.  I do need to keep my finished product in mind so some of my pages have to have flatter embellishments.  The dimension that this wavy page adds gives me the look of a fat page without all of the bulk. 

The detail shots below show how flat most of the elements are.

 

 

 

 

 You can clearly see that flat does not have to = boring.  The edges of the paper add lines & separation, the colors add pop and the shapes give you the feel of fullness without the thickness.

Glue.  One of the things that can be used to give a layout more substance is a heavy glue.  It really stiffens up your paper and because the glue is wet, unlike a tape runner or glue stick, your paper will wave & lift.  Wet glue is obviously not appropriate for all uses but is very good for pages like this where you need strength and form. 

So I have a question for you.  How often do you clean your work space?  I admit, I cannot start a new project until I have put everything away from my completed one.  Even if I am working on a page in a mini-album, I have to clean my space before starting a new page.  If I don't, I can't find anything and I end up taking a long time to finish and sometimes I get so frustrated/distracted that I don't finish at all.  Can anyone relate or am I weird?  Here is my desk during a project.  It really isn't that bad but I just started this so the disaster has not struck yet. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

The Thing I Love Most About

having family over for a meal is the sharing.  The sharing of stories, the sharing of time and the sharing of recipes.  My family and I love spending time together and will use any excuse to visit each other. 

My sisters and I like most of the same foods and 3 of us love to try new recipes so we are always exchanging.  One of my brothers will eat anything as long as it is accompanied by meat and the other brother will eat anything that is wrapped in bacon!  I love that someone is always trying something new, even my meat loving brothers. 

My husband loves that I try so many new recipes.  I have recently gotten back into the habit of planning our menus and have been cooking with a new recipe every night.  The two dudes that live with me are in heaven.  I have also been cooking less food.   As my children leave home, I have been finding it very hard to cook smaller meals. 

Since I began cooking at the age of 12 or so, I have had to prepare food for a large family and adjusting to cooking for 3 has been the impossible task.  We ALWAYS have leftovers that no one wants to eat.  Always.  My fridge looks like a Tupperware wasteland. 

I have tried everything to no avail.  Leftover night, new meals from the leftovers, packing lunches and snacks.  Nothing works to keep this leftover mountain manageable.  But, I digress.  I was talking about trying a new recipe.  On the menu for tonight is a recipe from The Best of the Best.  It was created by Emeril Lagasse and was fairly simple with easy to find ingredients.  No preserved lemon in this dish.  

No photos either but I like to think that if it had had one, the dish would have looked exactly like this........

with the exception of being styled.  I think I nailed it.  It tasted delicious and bonus......  No leftovers!

On the creative front, one of my goals this year is to use what I buy, when I buy it.  I have really cut back on my scrappy purchases but thanks to the incredible designers in the paper crafting industry, I can always find something new and interesting to create with.  One thing about scrapbooking, I never feel that there is a lack of interesting supplies. 

These are my most recent purchases:

 

Some of this is just plain supplies that I needed more of like the tombow glue, spray bottles and staplers.  But the rest is pure creative spark......

 

I have been hearing so much about the pan pastels and seeing so many projects that have that smudgy, chalky look that I finally invested in them.  They were pricey!  I got a set that included colors that I use a lot of and my plan is to use the pastels to create backgrounds and ink edges......

 

 

I love to create mini albums and want to use these ring binders to turn an old book into something interesting.........

 

 

No plan for this but seriously.  Gold hearts on washi tape.  Had to give it a home!

 

 

Ditto on the ombre bling.  It will be cut apart and added to everything I make until it runs out. 

 

 

 

Neenah white is everywhere and everyone is using it.  Thanks for enabling:)  It is the only reason I bought this since I am zero picky about cardstock most of the time. 

 

 

Amy Tangerine paper stack.  Nuff said.  I have seriously already used several sheets....

 

 

I love those hearts!  I should have bought more :(  Bold gold is still very, very pretty and useful to me and these embellies are generic enough that I can use them in a million different ways.  So are the Pink Paisley stickers.  There are 4 sheets of chipboard stickers in this pack!

 

 

Well that's all for me folks.  Have you been able to find new crafty things to come home with you?  I'd love to hear about it, especially if you don't have a scrapbook store near you.  I don't and really miss having a large selection of products to choose from (even though I still manage to spend all of my scrapping dollars teehee). 

 

Thanks for stopping by and have a crafty day!

 

Making Progress on my Calendar

I have started on March (yeah me) but the great news is that February is completed.  It is pink overload, big time.  Anywho, the basic design follows the plan that was sketched out at the beginning of my project.  Following a plan keeps me from having to make time consuming design decisions for each and every page.  But I don't want it to be boring either so I keep it interesting by changing the number of photo mats, position of the mat/s on the page and of course the papers and color scheme.

The month of love is more than likely going to call for photos of us and of the things that we are doing to celebrate each other (flowers, candy, cards, parties.....).  The papers are really busy and bright so I tried to place all of my embellishments tight to the photo mats and very monochromatic.  Love it.

Another of my creative goals for the upcoming forever is to stop using my pinterest board for just looking.  Honestly, it has been very freeing to allow myself to just create.  I probably scrapped 5 pages all year long for my family (most of the albums and pages that are on my blog get sold on ebay:).  Sasha Farina is definitely one of my favorite scrappers, ever.  Like stalker type favorite.  Crazy love her work and am always pinning her stuff.  Finally, I actually scraplifted something.  She is so inspiring!  I am the worst scraplifter in the world and my page does not come close to touching her design voodoo but it makes me so happy! 

This is a link to hers on my pinterest board.......

This is mine

 

 



This layout is about my niece and how sweet she is.  I loved how she was smiling and how dark the background is in contrast to her bright pink sweater.  Not set on the journaling yet but I will eventually add it.  I tend to put my journaling on the back of my layouts about half the time because it makes it easier for me to write something meaningful.

What I mean is, it takes some of the pressure off because I feel that if it is on the back of the layout, I can write without the pressure of having the journaling be perfect.  So if I misspell a word and scratch it out, it doesn't feel as if I ruined the entire page.  It also gives me more space in case I am in the mood to ramble:)  Here are some closer looks at what I did...... 

 

Lots of dimension going on here.......

 

When was the last time you saw a snap?  I added some sewing thread in an infinity pattern to give it interest.  I also added brads to the centers of the flowers and dots of stickles randomly for sparkle...

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are a lot of throwbacks on this page.  Tearing, snaps, stickles, brads and vellum but also some new products/techniques too.  Hope you enjoyed. 

 

As always, thanks for stopping by and looking around.  I would love to hear from you and welcome your comments.......

 

Shere

Decorating My House With My Scrapbook Pages

Hello there craftnistas. 

It's all about the decorating today.  We moved into a new house (is it still new if we have been here for 4 years? haha) and we are still decorating.  What to put on the walls and in the rooms has seriously become a bomb of indecision for us.  We have plenty of stuff, I make plenty of stuff and we certainly buy plenty of stuff but we stall, big time, when it comes time to actually decorate with it all.  I know that we are not the only non-decorater types that have this problem.

So in order to stop the madness, I decide to start decorating with our family photos.  It's not a huge decorating project but it is a very personal one for us.  A baby step to be sure, but a step nonetheless.  Husband is 100% on board and thought it was a great idea to start with the 100's of family photos that we have and to put said photos in the rooms that are most used by the people in them.  For instance, one of my sisters always stays in the same room so we are going to put her pictures in there and in the family spaces like the family room and sunroom.  The children have a dedicated space so all of the kids photos will go in that room.  I love the idea of them being able to find their pictures on my walls when they come to visit.  Hopefully, they will feel even more at home.  Here are just a couple that made the cut.....

 Being the crafty girl that I am, I had to celebrate by making something.  I have a million of these cheap brass frames and I wanted to create something special with one of them.  I didn't want to do something for the wall but for the side table in my sunroom.  This is the type of frame that I used.  They can be just about anywhere and are very inexpensive......

The first thing that I did was cover it with a light coat of gesso.  I don't mind that the brass shows through or that the paint may wear off over time.  I really like that vintage, distress type look.

I added some plain old acrylic paints, inks and sprays to give it some personality. 

Still looks like a cheap brass picture frame with paint on it but the magic will happen soon.  As the frame dried, I went to work on the layout. 

Since it is of me & my sisters, I used lots of pastel colors and flowers.  This is a permanent solution folks.  The layout is very dimensional so 1, I have to build it in the frame and 2, I have to remove the glass.  To begin, I simply sketched out my basic design and grabbed a whole bunch of stuff from my stash.

I placed the base layers (all the flat stuff like pp and photo mats) directly on the easel back of the frame. 

Next, I placed the backing back in the frame and than add all of my fluffy stuff, inks, title and photo. 

 

 

This is my completed piece ready for the photo of me & my sisters.  I plan to put it on the side table in my sunroom.  I love it and my sisters are going to love it too.  In fact, I will probably have to make one for each of them.  

Thanks for stopping by!

It's a New Year

And definitely time for a new calendar.

I love, love, love Basic Greys annual calendar.  But every year it gets harder to find especially with so many LSS's closures.  So this year, I decided to use my hoarder sized stash to make my own. 

With the decision to make it myself, came even tougher design & logistics decisions. 

• How do I display it?
• Do I print the calendar pages myself?
• How am I going to incorporate it into my families albums?  Am I going to incorporate the calendar pages?
• Will I put pictures on the layout as I make the pages or take a picture during the month of the album?
• What size do I want?
• Where am I going to put the blasted thing?
• Can you see the frustration starting to build?  This is why I always purchased a premade one!

But, I finally stopped aggravating myself and just did it. 

• I picked up a paper pad from AC Moore and a calendar from the dollar spot at target. 
• Sketched out my basic page design.  Somewhat.
• Decided to display it in the office on a large 3 ring binder that I can reuse year after year.  This is still not set in stone.  The calendar I picked up is pretty big so I may have to have my husband rig something up. 
• And, I will make my own binding to save the pages in.  Because my calendar is huge, it won't fit in the 8 1/2 by 11 album I purchased for it and I don't want to put it in a 12 by 12 album.  Don't know why not, I just don't. 

This is the calendar I picked up at Target. 

 

The paper is really thin.  It is definitely worth all of the $1 that I spent on it.  But no worries, I plan to reinforce it with layers of cardstock and very strong adhesive......

And my first page. 

I love it!  I can't wait to put a photo on it!!

I plan to follow that basic design plan for all of the pages.  Each will have a patterned paper background, with an 8 1/2X11 foundation on white cardstock.  The patterned paper background is cut to the size of the calendar page and because I am leaving that top part mostly blank, it won't interfere with whatever binding I decide to use.  Right now I am thinking ring because I would like to keep the actual calendar pages that are on the back of each layout. 

The details are what can make a page really special for me.  I added a lot of small touches to the pages in the calendar because I felt that a lot of big elements might take away from the calendars simplicity or the photos by having too much presence.  Plus, a lot of stuff is bulky and my calendar wouldn't have laid as flat as I wanted it to once it was on the wall (I have made one in the past that looked a lot like a shelf once it was on the wall, it was so fat :)). 

 

I used the arrow washi tape here and on another spot on the layout.  If you look closely, you can see where I changed the direction of the tape so that the arrows point at each other :)  It is almost embarrassing how happy that makes me....

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making time to scrapbook/create anything is a real challenge for me nowadays.  With a busy travel schedule and an even busier high school homeschooler, I found that in order to be productive with my crafty ideas, I have to make creating a conscious decision or I will not do it.  I really won't.

There will always be dishes in the sink.  It's true.  So I may as well use some of my time to do something that will not always be there waiting on me.  Creating everyday is liberating.  Lovely.  Relaxing.  With that being said, take a look at my latest stash buster.  This is a scraplift of a baby card that I found on pinterest

Here is the link to the original card.   I know right.  Doesn't look anything like it.  The worst scraplifter ever lives right here.  The card was created by Lisa Martz and I found it thru pinterest.  She does wonderful work and I really loved visiting her blog.

The pictures of my little guy with his face all painted up like Dracula are perfect for this layout. 

These pictures crack me up.  They were taken after he had come back and he was a wreck!  His makeup was all over his costume, his teeth were falling out and he had eaten all of the "blood" that was on his lips and around his mouth.  He could not have been happier, lol. 

 

 

So happy with how the beat up glitter brad came out.  You can see, just a little, the lightly distressed edges of my photo........

 

 

 

Google eyes anyone?  I placed them right in the corner..........

 

 

 

 

 

All of the thread is from where I clipped danglers after I sewed my edges.  It was laying in a big pile on my desk so I threw it under the mat........

 

Okay, so I was looking at my stats and saw that I made one post in 2013 and one in 2014.  Prolific I am not but if blogging is something that I want to keep doing, and I do, I have to do better.  I will do better.  What is a good blogging goal?  I don't know but 20 post a month sounds good.  Lets do this. 

How about you?  Are you a blogger who needs to post more or are you a reader who is only interested in reading?  If you're a blogger how do you decide on how much to post and when?  Just curious but I would love to hear from you.   

Thanks for stopping by!