Labrynth

After about 8 months of no scrapbooking, I took out all my favorite messy craft supplies and created a page called Labrynth.  Boy did it feel good to get scrapbooking again! I cannot express the kind of joy that I got from it.  I felt so much excitement and so much creativity that had just been screaming to get out! 

The main thing I wanted to do on this page is create a strong contrast.  Keeping the background dark and the foreground bright.  I used distressing techniques to make the rough edges and used inks to make it look aged.  A small piece of toille print for the top corner has a columned structure on it similar to the one in the photos.  The photos are matted with a yellow print that I toned down with distress ink, so it matches the look of the other papers. And I finished it off with ribbons and flowers to match my color pallete.

The journaling says "Epcot 2012", "English Garden Maze", "Adrian told Alexandra that this was called a Labrynth!".  The photos were taken at the England pavillion at Epcot Center.  The children loved this little area off from the main path.  They played for more than an hour just chasing each other through the maze.

Proud to be Artsy - Webster's Pages, Melody Ross & Prima Flowers

I seldom make a layout about myself, but I started a challenge last summer to write a layout about why I scrapbook, what it is I like the most about what I do.  This is why I made this Proud to be Artsy layout.

The journaling is on a little tag and it reads:
"It takes my breath away when colors coordinate just perfectly.  Frilly Fibers excite me.  Glimmery items just thrill me.  Art is Emotion!"

That says it all!

This layout is created with Webster's Pages Life's Portrait line papers.  I cut the border freehand, distressed the inner edges and inked it all over.  I finished it off by attaching some delicate light blue lace to the bottom along the ridges using brads.  The inside paper is must brighter for contrast.  The picture of myself is circled with three embellishment clusters and anchored at the bottom by layers of lace and ribbon.  The title, Proud to be Artsy, is a textile tag by Melody Ross, and the flowers around it are all Prima flowers.  I colored three white flowers using various inks in colors match my layout.  Then a big blue flourish sits above it.  On the opposite edge of the photo is my journaling tag.  I started with a plain manila tag and then inked it in the same colors to match.  I finished it with ribbon at the top and lace at the bottom.  Then added flowers all around it.  Then at the top are three roses over a Webster's pages canvas tag.  I finished it off by stamping the word Artist vertically using a Tim Holtz stamp, and tracing the inside with a gelly roll glitter pen.

Products Used:

Webster's Pages Lifes Portrait - Love Yourself Paper
Webster's Pages Designer Trim - Delicate Pink
Prima Innoscence White Flowers
Melody Ross Designer Collection - Textile Tags

Lollipop, Lollipop!

I decided to pick up a treat for my little girl when I was at a store just before picking her up.  I chose this huge lollipop and could not wait to give it to her.  She hardly ever gets candy, so at first she tried to take a bite out of it, and it was puzzling her that she could not.  I tried to show her to lick it instead, but she just kept trying everything until she got some.  I thought it was the cutest thing ever, so I sat her down in the front yard and started snapping pictures with my camera. 

My sister says that the pictures look like something out of a magazine, but all I can see is my cutey-pie enjoying her lollipop discovery.  She clearly started saying the word lollipop on this day.

I used several swirl stamps on this page, and finished it with a huge yellow ribbon with a metal embellishment in the center.  Then I added lots of journaling all around the page in the inner most matting.

Sunshine

I just love how my little girl looks in pigtails.  She was just as adorable as can be riding her new tricycle and I just had to pull out my camera.  I think her smile says it all.

In this page, I started with a gorgeous background paper from 7gypsies.  Added some scraps and cutouts from Bo Bunny and My Minds Eye.  And then I added three of the photos I took of my little girl on her trike.  I placed then at a slight diagonal just for a whimsical look.  Then I added bright beautiful Prima flowers to match her bright beautiful smile.

The color combinations on this page is just so cheerful.  This is truly my favorite layout so far!  I hope you enjoy it too.

Retro Photo and Webster's Pages

I was brushing my daughter's hair after a bath as she was distracted watching TV. I looked down and noticed that she was sitting there in her towel with her gorgeous hair and it reminded me of some old famous painting of a woman in her towel. So I had to pull out my phone and snap a picture of my beauty. I took a regular photo, followed by a photo using hipstamatic, an iphone app that makes my pictures look like they were taken in the 70s. Of course, the hipstamatic photo was the best one. And to my surprise, it came out perfect when I enlarged it to 8x8 and printed it out at my local 1 hour photo place.

This layout was created using Webster's pages products. I love their lines because everything is so very dreamy. The bottom of the layout has a row of Webster's bloomers and along the side I have a set of prima vines decorated with various little embellishments here and there. I especially enjoyed using the Melissa Frances tiny frames.  They are so cute.  I absolutely love this layout, and I truly love how much my little girl amazes me each and every day.

Websters Pages - Bloomers - Flower and Trim Ribbons - Green
Websters Pages - Lifes Portrait Collection - Imagine your Life
Websters Pages - Lifes Portrait Collection - Light the Way
Websters Pages - Lullaby Lane Collection - Dreamland
Prima - Valentine Vine Collection

Colors, colors everywhere!

I recently had some alone time with my little girl and I took her to a new park in the area. We had the place to ourselves, and she wanted to go exploring. She tried out each structure in the playground and then noticed a path leading into several rows of newly planted trees. She walked down the path with Mommy a few steps behind her, snapping photos with her iPhone. Up and own the various paths she went, picking up rocks and examining each twig on the grown. She's my little explorer!

I had to use lots of colors for this layout. Then i had to pick just a few photos to use, which was almost impossible with a cutie like this. So picked out my favorite 7 photos, lol! I created two separate clusters of embellishments, at opposite corners, and used chipboard letters to spell out my title: Play.

This layout definitely is all about having fun! I sure enjoyed making it.

Almost 2 - Layout with Little Yellow Bicycle

I love this line by Little Yellow Bicycle. Its called Vita Bella and I went kinda nuts and purchased every sheet and every embellishment for this line. Its all gorgeous!

So when I pulled out this beautiful photo of my daughter wearing blue, and looked through my stash of blue papers to find the perfect one, I just had to go with the Vita Bella line.

I added to this paper a blue ornate sticker and some lace paper from KI Memories, and finished it off with some white prima flowers inked to match. I also inked the blue lace paper to make it match even better.

I love this layout because it has so many customizations and I feel that its one of my more artsy layouts.

Try it yourself. I used the following:

Little Yellow Bicycle - Vita Bella Collection
Prima Innoscence Small Flower Mix 35
Prima Innoscence Large Flower Mix 36

Webster's Pages - Garden Gala and Life's Portrait

I was in pure heaven making this layout, surrounded by all my stash of lace and flowers and mixing and matching until I created the most adorable layout of my little girl. For this layout, i started with Webster's Pages Tea Time paper from their Garden Gala line and then cut a strip of circle patterned paper for the background from the Refreshing paper from that same line. I added a strip of mauve colored cardstock under it with rounded corners and separated with some green Prima lace ribbon. I diecut a pair of flourishes in the same mauve cardstock and added it to each side, layered with miscellaneous matching scraps. Then I topped it all off with the most amazing bouquet of flowers. I started off with a Prima leaf on each side and loaded each one with several e-Line mixed vintage flowers (love the price of those e-Line flowers) and then topped each one with a Flora Doodles Petaloo Jolly Christmas Mini Florettes (each has a cute gem in the middle) Then I made a popped up journaling oval for my title, and added a 3-D mini butterfly on it with tiny gems on it. I used American Crafts mini marks to rub in the word "My Beauty" as the title. I then cut out several elements from the Webster's Pages Pure Grace paper from the Life's Portrait line. That included the flower cluster above the ribbon and the ornate circles that I used behind the photos. I used my Martha Stewart ribbon punch on the strip between the photos, and added Prima packaging as a photo mat. Lastly, I used a tab that reads Memories from Cosmo Cricket and topped it all off with a gorgeous red butterfly from Prima.

Websters Pages - Garden Gala Collection - Refreshing
Websters Pages - Garden Gala Collection - Tea Time
Websters Pages - Lifes Portrait Collection - Pure Grace

Graphic 45 Communique Layout

2009 was the year that I was introduced to Graphic 45 papers by my friend Gine. She told me all about the beautiful papers while we were at a friends house, and as soon as I got home I had to pull up the website and see for myself. She was right, the papers were just breathtaking! So beautiful, a combination of vintage and brights mixed together to create very graphic classy pages. I fell in love immediately.

The last of my favorite layouts from 2009 was this layout made with Graphic 45's Communique line. It showcases a picture of my mother in law with her two daughters and her granddaughter. I thought it went perfectly with the society page's clipping about the world's prettiest girls. At the top corner I created a larger clustering of many of the collection's tags and other embellishments all inked to matched the antique look of this layout. The journaling block was a piece of white cardstock that I aged with different shades of brown ink. And then i finished off the page with a border of Prima ribbon. I feel pretty proud of my first vintage layout.

Supplies used in this layout:

Graphic 45 - Communique Collection - Society Page
Graphic 45 - Communique Collection - Pen in Hand
Graphic 45 - Communique Collection - Die Cuts - Tags

Prima Natural Obsessions Collection Layout - Curly Top

This layout is most amazing to see in person, and its because of the amazing paper line from Prima called the Natural Obsessions Collection. Its a thick texture rich paper that adds so much dimension to the page. Its just amazing. This is my second favorite layout of the ones I did in 2009.

At the bottom I have a strip of Prima Voila to anchor the page.

In this layout I also added some prima flowers and a prima ribbon that I losely curled and looped to add even more dimension. I just love how this layout came out. And the contrasting yellow letters just pop!

Again, I do not like the photos that much, I wish they were not so dark.

Products Used:

Prima - Natural Obsessions Collection
Prima - Prairie Flowers Collection

Basic Grey Urban Prairie Layout - Clustering of Embellishments

Now that a new year is here, I was looking through my 2009 layouts and noticing some special moments when I tried new techniques, and attempted to step things up a notch in terms of layout design. I picked my three favorite layouts out of all the ones I did in 2009 and will be sharing them with you here on my blog this month.

My third favorite layout is one I did using a paper pack from Basic Grey's Urban Prairie line. This line of paper had several butterflies and girly colors which went perfectly for my baby girl's photos. In this layout, I was experimenting with clustering of embellishments to create a point of interest on the page. You can see where my title is that several coordinating embellishments are grouped together to make this cute area with tons of interesting things to look at.

What I learned in this layout was to be patient when cutting out paper butterflies from a 12x12 sheet, because it is so worth it once you pop them up and add that sense of dimension. I also learned how much a not-quite-perfect photo can distract from a pretty layout. The lighting could have been better in the photos.

Overall, I am proud of how it looks and I would not change a thing. I challenged myself to design a layout that is a step above what I was doing at the time, and I feel proud of the outcome.

So I humbly present to you, this layout as one of my favorite works from 2009.

Girly Girl - Crate Paper Mia Collection

I was so fortunate to be able to play with the whole Mia Collection from Crate Paper. It had so many different papers and embellishments in sage and hot pink. I would have never combined those two colors, but crate paper impressed me with this paper pack.

Such gorgeous papers and embellishments. Just perfect for a layout about my beautiful little girl. I started with two borders that I cut down and layed in the center of the page, just below the main image. Then I cut a vine of leaves and flowers from a 12x12 paper and added it with pop dots. I tucked a jounaling circle below the bottom border and added an oval sticker with the date. At the opposite corner, I added a smaller photo surrounded by a custer of other embellishments layered one on top of each other. Then at the top right I added a tab and decorated it by added a circle and flower embellishement behind it. Then I finished it off with the title around the tab.

I especially love the way I found a dark paper for the background. It made all the photos and embellishments *pop* from the contrast. I am just thrilled with how it came out.

Shopping Spree Layout

This layout is just so much fun, I love it! It is created using My Mind's Eye papers. The first is from the Abbey Road line called Hello World Shopping Spree paper, and the other is from the Lucky Me line called Open Toed Paper. These papers seemed perfect for my daughter's first trip to go shop at the mall.

Ever since she was born, she had a huge facination with barrettes, braceletes, earrings, ribbons and lace and all things girly girl. She is such a cutie, and everytime she sees something she likes she has to touch it and try and put it on. And did I mention that she is just 1 years old! So I gave her quite a treat when I took her to the mall and let her out of her stroller in what she came to think of was the most heavly place on earth, the Clarie's store. She walked around and touched everything and tried to put things on, and despite the looks from the store staff, I let her loose and followed her around with my camera snapping away. She loved it! And Mom got the best pictures of her little lady for her scrapbook. :)

Fun with Fragments, Epoxy stickers, and Say it With Crystals

This page was made with clear Heidi Swapp ghost flowers that were altered by affixing patterned papers behind them, and gems on them. Also used were clear acrylic rectangles called Tim Holtz's Ideology Fragments which were altered by affixing matching pattered papers behind them. Both tabs were also altered with markers or gems. And lastly the crystals were cut apart so I can lay them in a direction that best fits my page design.

This layout is very special to me. I went into labor to deliver my beautiful baby girl. I spent most of the labor at home sitting at my dining room table scrapbooking this page. In between each contraction I just continued merrily to work on my scrapbook page. lol! I figured that the best way to get through something painful like labor was to spend my time doing my favorite activity - scrapbooking.

Now, days later I go to put into my album that special scrapbook page and I am just amazed at how beautiful the page came out. I guess those labor hormones made my creativity soar.

World War II Monument Page

This is a page I created today using Bazzill Bling cardstock and Bo-Bunny (Bella Journee - Santorini Poppies) paper. I cut out the red flowers with the faux gems pictured all around it and layed it on matching Bazzill Bling paper. I kept the gem theme and used Say it with Crystals in a couple other areas of the page to match. Then I inked the word peace which was on that same paper and used pop dots to give it dimension.

This page is about a World War II monument I photographed in Liberty State Park (NJ) last year. I also took a picture of the new york skyline to document how it looked in 2007 before the new tower gets erected.