Summer Card Camp

I was finally able to play along with the color combo for the first week of Summer Card Camp with Kristina Werner and Jennifer McGuire. I pulled out some old Basic Grey 6x6 pads (Green At Heart and Lemonade) for my card, and combined it with Papertrey Ink's Fillable Frame #5 die and Lawn Fawn's Quinn's ABC's (which I colored with a blue copic). This is what I came up with...

I did a bit of paper piecing on this one. I used some regular printer paper and drew out some lines. I cut the pieces apart and temporarily adhered them to the patterns I picked out so I could cut them out for a perfect fit (the blue is from Lemonade, while all of the other patterns are from Green At Heart). Layered them all on top of the blue. Then I die cut my focal point, stamped the sentiment and colored it in. I used Jennifer's techinque from Tuesday and colored around the edge of the negative portion of the die cut, trimmed, and adhered around the die cut. I am loving this technique!!! I added the button tied with twine for interest.

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Lawnscaping Challenge #12

I haven't done a Lawnscaping Challenge in quite some time so I decided to play along with challenge which is to create a card based on the sketch above. I love using card sketches and will often pencil something out before I start to create, so this was a perfect challenge for me!! Then, I got to creating and seemed to hit a block. Here is the first card that I created...

I liked it...but I didn't love it! So then I stopped thinking so much, got out of my head so to speak, and just played around with my stuff...and came up with this one...

Can you believe this is the first time I've stamped that typewriter!!! Loved coloring it in red!! Thought about pink, but the red went so much better with the text on the pattern paper. Added a small punched strip (using a postage border punch), tied on some red baker's twine, added a button, and called it done.

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Smile

I finally broke out my June SC kit for this layout and played along with Shimelle's sketch of the week (which you can check out here if you'd like).  I am not going to lie...this is probably the most difficult layout I have put together to date. Not in that is was difficult to get everything together and assemble (hello, I was using a sketch and a kit), but in that the subject matter was very difficult. However, that being said, this is one of those times when the memory and emotions must be captured right away and not put on the back burner for a few days, weeks, months, years. I knew I had to do this now, as hard as it was.

Just over two weeks ago, my husband and I had to let our beloved Apollo go. I say that we had to let him go to play in endless fields of sunshine. It was the hardest day of my life to this point. We do not have kids, our pets are our kids. He was our second pet and our first dog. We got him just after we got married. This page will hold the final place in his scrapbook.

I knew that I wanted to use the smile tag because of the number of smiles he brought to our faces over the years! So many happy memories. I am sure, however, this is probably not the way Amy Tangerine had intended this tag to be used, but I ran with the idea. I paired it up with the blue October Afternoon letter stickers and Charlie Chaplin's "Smile" to create the title. Instead of a journaling block, I made the envelope from the SC exclusive pattern paper in the main kit. The day after we lost him, I wrote quite a bit in my journal...memories, thoughts, emotions. Again, I knew I had to get it out while it was all still raw. As hard as it was, and with as many tears that stained the page, I knew that it was something I had to do. That envelope hides the journaling, hides my thoughts from that difficult next day. Somethings deserve an envelope!

For the little cluster of embellishment at the top, I used brads from one of the add-ons. The sticker from the add-on was also a perfect fit!!

I will be back tomorrow with some happy Lawn Fawn cards. Sorry to make this such a sad post, but thanks for stopping by!
Deb

Three Fun Projects

So I decided to take a break from all of the Hawaii vacation layouts I had been putting together and broke out some Echo Park! I actually broke out a few different collections, and used three to show here today. I just LOVE Echo Park!! I think I actually have every collection in my stash, with possibly only a few exceptions! I pulled out some photos to scrap and rather than try to use the same collection on all three projects (which I easily could have done), I wanted to play with a two that I haven't used yet...Little Boy and Springtime. Why have I not used these yet?? So much fun to get crafty with!! I also used some of my favorite Playground papers too!! I'll have complete supply lists at the end of the post. So hang on...here we go !!!

My first layout features the Little Boy Collection (and a few For The Record letter stickers...the small red words). It is really just a lot of layering until it works for me. I started with the dots on the side and then the big blue dots to ground the photos. Since the patterns in the collection coordinate so well together, the rest came together very quickly!! I love the letter stickers in all of the collections too! I am becoming addicted to them! They make putting together titles super easy since you can mix and match collections as I have done here (and you can mix and match the sizes withing the collections as well...also as I have done here)!! I usually start out with just the letters that come in the collection pack...then end up buying a few more sheets of the letters because I run out of this letter or that letter!!!

I saw this quote on Pinterest and knew it would fit these pictures perfectly. I did have to change the quote a bit to include 'grand' as the quote is "children become readers on the laps of their parents." Both my niece and nephew love to read, which at 2 and 4 is fantastic. My nephew LOVES interactive books...something with buttons to push so he can be involved. On this day, he only had a few of his books with him as my sister's family was visiting my parents. He was having so much fun reading with Grandpa (my dad) that he just kept going back for more...even if he had already read them. He didn't care, he wanted to keep reading with Grandpa...it was so cute!!

For my second layout, I decided to focus on my niece swinging on her new swing set. Tell me that the Playground collection wasn't perfect for this!! The only part of this layout that is not from Playground is the yellow dot pattern up the center...that is from the Sweet Summertime collection from last summer (yep, I've still got a little of that left...I hoard my favorite papers people)!! But how perfectly does it go with Playground?!? That's another thing I LOVE about Echo Park...you can mix and match the pattern papers between collections too!! Who knew...more bang for your buck!!! This time, instead of layering everything, I only layered the border strip across the middle. The stripes along side the yellow dots are that skinny and fitted right up against the center strip. Then I trimmed the green dots to fit right up against the stripes. This way it gives the illusion of being all layered without the bulk and without using up all of this fab paper!! I punched the clouds to add some interest to the top of the page.

The title on this one comes from one of my much loved stamp sets by My Favorite Things. It was just too perfect for these photos!! I love playing with titles lately. Using something fun like on these two layouts rather than just saying something like "Reading with Grandpa" or "New Swing Set." So much more fun this way!!

Finally, I decided to make a card using the Springtime collection. With the exception of the tag sentiment, everything on the card is from ONE sheet of pattern paper!! It's got 4 6x6 squares on the 'B' side which are perfect for cards!! Oh, and those dots on the far left side are from the UPC strip on the bottom of the paper. LOVE how more and more companies are doing this!! I just trimmed off the pattern and added it to my card! It was perfect!! The flowers were cut from the 'A' side of the paper. I layered a yellow flower on top of a pink flower, crumpled up the sides and popped the yellow flower up with dimensional adhesive. Then I added some glossy accents on the green spot in the center for more dimension!! And the sentiment tag (from the journaling cards) is perfect!! This collection actually gives you a few choices for sentiments for a card like this, but the pink edges of this block fit my card perfectly...so a birthday card it became!! So quick and easy to put together...almost everything is done for you!!

I hope you enjoyed these projects!! I am really thinking that my next stash diving project will consist of a bunch of these papers because I had so much fun putting these projects together!!

Thanks for stopping by...and have a great weekend!!
Deb

Supplies: All Supplies are from Echo Park unless noted
(Grand)Parents:
Pattern Papers: Little Boy Collection: Awesome Dot, Cool Stripe, Rockstar, Journaling Cards
Stickers: Little Boy Alpha Stickers and Elements Stickers, For The Record Alpha Stickers
Cardstock: Kraft (Bazzill)
Punch: Notebook Paper Border Punch (EK Success)

Whee:
Pattern Papers: Playground Collection: Red Rover, Heads Up Seven Up, Merry Go Round, Rimon Says Border Strips, Capture The Flag; Sweet Summertime Collection: Sunny Spots
Stickers: Playground Alpha Stickers;
Cardstock: White (American Crafts)
Punches: Large and Extra Large Clouds (Fiskars); Double Embossed Dotted Edger (Fiskars)

Happy Birthday Card:
Pattern Papers: Springtime Collection: Floral Fun, Journaling Cards
Cardstock: Solar White (Neenah)
Punch: Double Scalloped Border (EK Success)
Other: Glossy Accents

peaceful

Ok, this is seriously going to be my last layout from my Hawaii trip a few years back (2004) as I am seriously running out of mojo to create the last few layouts. I sit and stare at the photos and the paper for so long...I need a break. I don't usually scrap one event or trip all at once, so to do this many layouts all at the same time is so out of the box for me. Don't get me wrong...I absolutely love the 'stash diving' process, but the next time I do it, I am going to have to use a bunch of photos from a bunch of different events!! And I will be doing this again...it really changed the way I scrap and put layouts together!! Can not say enough great things about it!!

On to today's layout. I had this photo enlarged because I loved the palm trees. This was taken on our final night in Hawaii. We went down to the beach to watch the sunset (I shared a photo of that yesterday) and I turned directly around to this. There was a concert going on in the distance, couldn't tell you who or what, but I was mesmorized by the peacefulness! Even with all of the hustle n' bustle, time just did not move as fast there as it does here!! I loved it! I wanted to bottle it up and take it home with me!!

Anyway, just a quick post today!! Got some new Lawn Fawn stamps in the mail yesterday that I couldn't wait to get my hands on...so I am off to finally get them inky!! Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

One Fine Day

I am a little late in getting this post up. Usually this one goes up on Monday!! That's all thanks to a lovely Sunday off of work...and lovely LAZY Sunday off. Those are my favorite kind!!

Also, sorry for my absense from blogging. We had an unexpected event occur on the 11th, and all of my posts after that had already been set up to go. I am just now getting back to the craftiness and blogging. I wanted to share my latest layout that I put together for Shimelle's most recent sketch of the week. In the sketch, she calls for a large photo, I used 8x8 and filled the space to the left with a combination of embellishment and journaling, highlighting our final night in Oahu watching the almost perfect sunset (only a few clouds away from perfect...but it was stunning nonetheless)!! Oh, and I am not sure that you can really tell, but in the photo there are a bunch of black spots in the water to the right...those are surfers!! I think there were surfers in that ocean 24/7!!

I adore that city scape paper from American Craft's new Margarita collection (it's the Mambo pattern), but an entire sheet of it is very overwhelming for me. So I just found what looked to me like a natural line in the cityscape, trimmed it out, and fit in directly to the left of my photo. Then I layered on a details sticker that matched...perfect embellishment!!

I also paired up some of the shiney brads (they are the diamond brads to be more specific...same collection) with my Martha Stewart circle burst punch (pretty sure that's not the exact name of that one...oh well). The paper used for those punches however, is one of Doodlebug's Petite Prints...matched perfectly!! And I really wanted to use yellow for the base not orange and most of the 'B' sides of the American Crafts paper is orange. So Doodlebug it was!!!

I LOVED that blue for my title block...but it just looked to plain as a solid block. Literally as soon as the postman delivered my Studio AE stamp set, I got it inky! Love this month's set!!! I just stamped the words randomly in lines across the block with Pacific Point ink (from Stampin Up). Turned out exactly the way I wanted and not an ounce of plain left!! Love it!!

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Oahu Memories

I put this layout together for another of Shimelle's Sketches of the Week (love these). You can check out the sketch here. It's also another layout from my original stash diving adventure. It wasn't made with the original bunch of layouts (I shared the last of those yesterday), but it was made from some of the left overs without adding any new patterned paper into the mix. I did add some Basic Grey Basics paper that was already out on my desk for my journaling. The journaling just blended in too much with the blue background to not add the basics paper. Otherwise, I stuck pretty closely to the sketch.

We made lots of memories on Oahu!! Waikiki right across the street. Diamond Head greeting us every day. The surf boards in open air, guest drop-off, lounge area. Our horrible experience at The Cheesecake Factory (and our free cheescake). The laid back lifestyle. How jammed backed Honolulu was. Our long walk to Local Motion. Pearl Harbor and the history associated with this site. Macadamia Nut Mahi Mahi with Linguini in a Roasted Garlic Sauce (so yummy...at the Tiki Bar and Resturant in the Aston). Sunny skies everyday. The Luau and the best pork I have ever had!! Those are just a few of the memories we made!!

I am in LOVE with these glitter thickers!! I can't believe I waited this long to use them!!

Love those tags too...adds just the right amount of embellishment.

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Diamond Head

So not only were we blessed to have Waikiki Beach directly across the street from our hotel, but every day when we opened out hotel door to go anywhere we were greeted by Diamond Head!! When we checked into our hotel, we found out that we had been upgraded. I am not exactly sure what we were upgraded to, just that we were bumped up. Our room was actually on a balcony so to speak. Instead of a normal hotel where there was a corridor of rooms on both sides of the hall way, this hotel was set up a bit differently. There were the normal closed in hallway, traditional hotel rooms. Then off the back side were the rooms with the hallway that was open on one side and the room on the other. So we had our tiny, scary, small-cement-slab-coming-out-of-the-side-with-no-visible-supports balcony off our sliding glass door, then we had the balcony that was much larger and safer (and communal) out our front door.

The photos we took of eachother with Diamond Head in the background were literally taken with the other person standing in our door way!! It was perfect. Again, not a five star hotel, but five star views for sure! I was obsessed with taking photos of this extinct volcano...wanted to get the perfect shot, kept trying to get the entire think into the frame (without any of those other pesky hotels proved to be impossible). And I also mixed color photos and black & white photos on this layout.

I did a little stamping on that tag. It's a sentiment from the American Crafts stamp set that coordinates with the Margarita line (sorry I can't remember the name). It was a perfect fit!!

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Waikiki Beach

I have another layout from my stash diving experience!! Winding down now!! That means I may need to give it another go soon!!

My husband and I were blessed to have Waikiki Beach directly across the street from out hotel on Oahu. We may not have stayed in a five star hotel, but the view was certainly worth it!! Afterall, we were mainly just in the room to sleep, otherwise we were out and about!!

During one afternoon we actually went down to the beach!! Who goes to Waikiki and doesn't go to the beach. We wanted to fit in a whole bunch of other things into the few days we were on Oahu, and hitting the beach was one of them. The weather was perfect, the water was perfect, and the view was perfect!!

Loving those tags for an extra little detail. Tied some bows with baker's twine for that added touch!! Loving how this layout turned out!!

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

10 things

This is actually my second post for the day, but I wanted to participate in this event. 10 things is a monthly event for those who participated in Shimelle's Beyond Blogging for Scrapbookers. And there is nothing specific of what those 10 things should/can be!!

I've decided to use this event to share/create my bucket list. So over the course of these monthly events I will share 10 things I want to accopmlish, places I want to visit, people I want to meet, books I want to read, and other various things.

So for this first 10 things, I've decided to list 10 places I want to visit. One of the big items on my bucket list is to visit all 50 states in my adult life (meaning since I've been living on my own...or year 2000). I am happy to say that I have already visited a bunch of places...but these mark the top 10 places I want to visit ...

1. Grand Canyon
2. Hoover Dam
3. Yosemite
4. Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs
5. Seattle Space Needle
6. Original Starbucks at Pike's Place Market
7. Mount Rushmore
8. Old Faithful
9. Harpers Ferry
10. Art Insititute of Chicago (to see my favorite painting by Seurat)

What are 10 things on your list? I'd love to know!!

Thanks for stopping by!
Deb

Discover

So the first portion of our trip to Hawaii was paid for by my husband's company as he was rewared with being in their Circle Of Excellence. That meant that we had some events to attend that had been put together by his company (including a morning of games, dinners, brunches, a 70's themed event one night, and one prepaid activity, among other things). Most afternoons we had free. So one afternoon we went walking around the hotel grounds taking in all of the sights...and they were both breathtaking and priceless!!

These photos focus on the laval rock coastline and black sandy beaches that are common on the Kona coast. And the black sand feels just like regular white sand. It is like nothing I have ever seen before, but hope to see again!!

And yes, this layout was one that I did during my stash diving!! I have two more to share of my original round of stash diving as I eventually had to add in a few more pattern papers so I will be able to complete the album. But this process really has made me reconsider how much pattern paper I buy!!

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Priceless View

I have another layout to share from my stash diving adventure last week. Actually planning to go another round of stash diving today!! Loved it and I got so many layouts completed. For this layout, I used photos from around the hotel. The land and water scapes were so beautiful all over the grounds of the hotel, I couldn't resist taking a bunch of photos!!

I broke out some AC Mix Tape for this layout too (it's from the City Park Collection, but the pink went so well with the Margarita collection, I had to use it). The label with my journaling is from Jillibean Soup.

I will be back with another layout tomorrow!! Just a quick post today!! Thanks for stopping by!
Deb

Modern Luxury

The first leg of our trip to Hawaii had us staying on The Big Island at the Hilton Waikoloa Village. It was  a beautiful resort with all of the ammenities you could ask for!! It has a variety of resturants to suit everyone's tastes, a museum walkway or a boat ride to get you from point A to point B, or a train (we took all three when we were there but favored the walk because we saw something new every time!!). There were shops on site and a short trolly ride a way too, a spa, mini golf, an 18 hole golf course, and a number of pools (not to mention the perfect ocean views). It really had everything one could want!!! I loved it!! If we ever make it back this is certainly on our list of places to stay!!

I loved that fountain too!! For the meals that were provided (the first part of the trip was paid for by my husband's company as a reward to him for his outstanding work there) we ate in a courtyard overlooking a pond of water that you could swim in or baddle boat in (sandy beach and everything). The fountain flowed into that pond and had a pass through on the back side. It was a great touch!!

I still can't believe we had the opportunity to visit Hawaii!! I do hope to return there one day, but there are so many other places on the bucket list right now...I'd love to visit them all at least once before making return trips!!

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Sunset

This layout is one of the last that I had put together using the 'creative stash diving' process. I knew that I wanted to put these photos on a two page layout and had to do some pretty hard thinking on how to make sure they flowed well for my eye. I was a bit indecisive about it to be honest. I kept playing around with the placement until I finally felt like it worked...and I loved it!! So sorry about the glare on these pics...this was a hard layout for me to photograph!!

These are very special photos...even though they were taken with my point and shoot film camera (it was 2004 and I was just getting into digital photography). I knew that we were facing west when we were on The Big Island and I really love sunsets...so naturally I wanted to capture at least one sunset on film!! These are from our very first night on the island!! I picked different times to snap some photos so I would get the sun at different points in the sky, then some with the sun on the horizon. I love these photos, even though they might not be the best, but they take me back to the exact moment this happened!! I remember it clear as day, as if it just happened last night!!

I decided that I wanted to just have a longer title for this layout and really let the photos speak for themselves. I was able to say everything I wanted to say in the title...so I decided to just do some stamping in my empty block on the left side of the layout. Love this type of stamping (from Nichol's May Scrapbooking Stamping class over at 2peas in case you were wondering) and I think I am going to have to give this a go again, but on a bigger strip next time!!!

Thanks for stopping by!!

Deb

Kona Coast

I put this layout together using the process outlined in Shimelle's Creative Stash Diving workshop that I talked about yesterday. It was one I made mid-way through my scrapping process and also utilized her sketch of the week for this past week. Not gonna lie...love this weeks sketch!!

I used American Crafts' Margarita Collection for this layout. The line fit perfectly with the trip to Hawaii that I husband and I went on in 2004. Love the all of the bright colors!!

The strips under the title and embellishment are the B side of the barcode tabs found on the pattern papers within this collection! I love that American Crafts does this now...there is nothing to waste anymore!!

Thanks for stopping by!
Deb

Shimelle's Creative Stash Diving

Last week the True Scrap workshops went on sale ala carte and I picked up Shimelle's Creative Stash Diving. You can check it out here if your interested in any of the workshops. Without giving anything away, let's just say I was very sceptical about the process, but I gave it a go anyway. If anything, I paid good money for the workshop and the process Shimelle outlined was worth a try. I was able to complete 4 double page layouts and three single page layouts using the 6 steps from the workshop using only the supplies in the photos below. I had some stuff left and didn't even use other items. I will be sharing the layouts this week, starting tomorrow, and this is certianly a process I will be using again!! I highly recommend this workshop if you haven't already figured it out.

I LOVE this hipstamatic app on my iPhone!! Oh, and you can check out more details from Shimelle herself on this workshop right here, if you're intersted.

Thanks for stopping by!!
Deb

Papertrey Playhouse Challenge

The idea for this challenge came to me a few days ago...and it turned out exactly as I had envisioned it!! I am always happy when it happens like that. Sometimes, I have these great ideas in my head that just don't work once they get down onto paper....almost as if something gets lost between the brain and the hands putting the idea to paper. I hate when that happens and I am thankful that it didn't happen this time!!

I first stumbled upon Papertrey Ink because of a card that Kristina Werner had made (you can see it here) way back in January 2009. When CHA was in Orlando that summer, I had plans to go to the super show specifically to check out Papertrey Ink (all because of that Ocean Tides Satin Ribbon) and my hubby was prepared to go with me. But at the last minute, I changed my mind and we didn't go (I know, I know...still kicking myself about that to this day...but it just pushed the day I became addicted to PTI back by only a few short months). I ended up placing my first order before Christmas that year (can't remember if it was the end of November or early December). I loved seeing the projects with Turning a New Leaf and Homemade. Those design team projects pushed me over the edge from observed to addicted fan!! I used those two stamp sets right away and have used them a few times since, but not in the last few months.

So that became my challenge: think back to your first PTI order...what did you get? Chose at least one of those stamp sets and break them out again...get them inky again!!

I also love the versatility of PTI products!! I started out as a scrapbooker...mixing my beloved photos with fun papers and embellishments. I then, almost natrually, move into the world of cardmaking. But over the last few months, I have moved back into scrapbooking. I still make cards, especially when I don't have a lot of time on my hands and I NEED to get crafty!! I wanted to show how easliy these stamps work for scrapbooking just as they do for cardmaking. I broke out my Turning a New Leaf stamp set and made a pretty scrapbook page for my wedding album.

I layered some of the stamped leaf images with die cut images (that were stamped as well for a tone on tone look). You'll also notice some Pretty Pastel and Distressed Dot pattern paper, Beautiful Blooms #3 layered flowers, and Angled Labels as well.

The images that are stamped inside the Angled Labels are from Lawn Fawn's Happily Ever After set.

I am loving all the layers of the leaf images. And those flowers are so cute too...layers of Pretty Pastel pink pattern paper and vellum, tied together with a white PTI button.

I really enjoyed getting this set inky again...one from my very first PTI order. I hope you too will enjoy revisiting one of those first sets that you got too!!

Thanks for stopping by today!!
Deb