6S Highlights

I can't believe that it's nearly May and I haven't finished last year's scrapbooks yet. However I have filled in another gap with the help of a scraplift challenge at Scrap Whispers. I took this layout from Georgina as my inspiration for my daughter's end-of-school-year page. I do one each year, always on alphabet paper, with a selection of school photos which don't merit a whole page.

I love the fairytale alphabet paper that I used this time, but it's a bold pattern which could have fought with the photos for attention. I didn't want to cover too much of it and thought that a circle of vellum would be perfect to tone down the intensity of the colours but still allow the beautiful lettering to show through.

Supplies
Paper - Karen Foster Storybook Letters, First Edition Spring Feast (plus scraps from stash)
Vellum - Paper Adventures Cream Ribbon
Letter Stickers - American Crafts Remarks, Jenni Bowlin Studio
Ink - Papermania

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circle Template

The Cumbria Way

I've had the time now to come back to Challenge 7 from Shimelle's scrapbooking weekend:

I skipped over it at the time as the layout I had in mind was a time-consuming double pager. My husband walked the Cumbria way last Spring and I wanted to turn his photos and blog posts into a double page. I have attempted it before - I was originally planning to turn the blog into a mini-album - but I gave up on editing the text. When I read that Shimelle had put Facebook printouts in an envelope on her page, I thought that this might be the solution. Just print the blog posts out on A4 and stick it in an envelope. Ultimately, there were 15 pages of text so I needed a very big envelope, and turned most of the right hand page into one.

I also found squashing his 48 photos onto two pages impossible. I cut them down to 33 and added two 6x12 pages in the middle of the page. Just need to buy the page protectors for this now.

It's not perfect - the sheer number of landscape photos makes for an uninspiring page - but it's done. I've filled in a gap in my 2011 album, and 'done' is good.

EDITED: 4 May 2012

I said last week that 'done' is good, but every time I look at this page I really don't like it. I normally work from my photos, choosing a rough layout and then picking complementary papers. This time I chose the green paper first and made the large envelope. This lead to the kraft panel on the right which I mirrored on the left and this gave me a place for my title. I chose the spotty paper for the edging as it was a good contrast, and used the same paper as a 'seal' for the envelope. All the time, I really liked the page, but once I added the multitude of photos I was disappointed with the result.

I called it 'done' but it's been niggling me all week. I've gone back to the page today, and taken it apart. I decided to group the photos for each day on different patterned papers and round the corners of each group. It's still far from perfect but I'm much happier now.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania Kraft Basics
Paper - Cherry Arte Arcade (Reverse), Kit 'n' Kraft, MME Wild Asparagus, KaiserCraft
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Numbers - Authentique Petite Circles

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
EK Success Corner Punch

1.2.3

I was all scrapped out by Sunday afternoon and I didn't finish the last two challenges from Shimelle's online scrapbooking weekend; in fact I had a complete break until I saw a new challenge on the forum at My Scrapbook Nook. All those who signed up are to scraplift any layout from the person above them in the list. I got Diana B and chose this layout from her gallery:

I took the opportunity to combine it with Challenge 16 from Shimelle (better late than never):

Initially I was going to scrap one of my children at three different ages, just as Diana did, but then I remembered a trio of photos that I pulled ages ago of my nephew, son and daughter in the same baby chair. The colour scheme isn't typical for baby photos but I think it works.

Supplies
Paper - Sandylion Boy Oh Boy
Scraps - Basic Grey Indian Summer, Fancy Pants Summers End, K&Co Hannah, Crate Paper Little Sprout
Numbers - American Crafts Thickers
Border Sticker - Crate Paper Farmhouse
ABC Embellishment - Making Memories?
Ink - Dovecraft

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Fiskars Shape Cutter and Circle Templates
X-Cut Small Circle Punch
'Ordinary' Hole Punch

Montmartre

And Challenge 14:

I have several photos from Montmartre in Paris which don't have anything in common apart from their location, and don't merit a whole page each. I decided to make four mini-layouts, each with its own sub-title and journalling, and combine them on one page. I used the same 6x6 paper pack for each but  the fourth section demanded a punch of bright red. The Thickers were originally grey, but I painted them to give a better contrast with the background paper.

Supplies
Paper - Basic Grey Archaic (Timeworn 12x12 & 6x6 Paper Pack)
Card - Papermania
Letters - American Crafts Foam Thickers

Tools
EK Success Corner Punch
Fiskars Shape Cutter and Circle/Oval Templates

Circus Skills

Challenge 13 from Shimelle:

The pink in the printable reminded me of some photos of my daughter which I was planning to scrap with a sketch from Scrap Whispers so I decided to combine the two. I veered away from the sketch a bit once I decided to use this checker-board paper and I used a flower trim along the join.

I used the pink section of the printable twice, in different sizes, for my title and journalling.

Supplies
Paper - The Paper Loft Flips-Flops (Pink Checkerboard), Chartwell Studios 
Printable - Little Musings
Trim - from Stash

Peaceful

The last one for today is Challenge 12:  

I picked a photo of my children on a swing; I took a few but I mis-timed some as the swing moved and my son was pulling faces in some so this is the only decent shot. I've used it once at full frame so we can see the whole swing, and once where I've cropped it to focus on their faces.

The title 'Peaceful' refers to the fact that they seem to spend most of their lives squabbling (as siblings do) but here they pretended that the swing had rocked them to sleep, so they were quiet for once.

Supplies
Paper - Basic Grey Blitzen (Polar Blue), MME Wild Asparagus Collection
Vellum - from Stash
Letters - Basic Grey Blitzen

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circle Templates

Meeting the Goats

And Challenge 11:

I picked a couple of papers that I bought a year ago when my LSS closed down and haven't used yet; then I picked a couple of ancient (1999) photos of my son at a Farm Park. I really like the spotty paper but it hasn't worked on any page in the last year. Perhaps I should start from the paper rather than the photos and use up some of these older sheets...

There's no journalling at the moment as I have more photos from the same day for another page. I may journal on one page, or on both, but I'll decide that later. The squares are on a stark white background and there's no white in the spotty paper so I toned it down with chalk. I'm not sure about the blue letters but I am dangerously low on brown Ts.

EDITED 3 JUNE 2012
I never really liked this page. The squares and circles come from the same collection but they didn't look right together and I didn't like the blockiness of the title. When I was making another page from that day I decided to pull this page apart and re-make it. There were actually three pages in the end, all using the same papers and letters. The blog entries are here, here and here.

First Day at Nursery

I have two days and eight challenges left from Shimelle's online scrapbooking weekend, so I am not going to get them all done. This is Challenge 10:

I immediately knew which papers to use for this challenge - I won a prize pack from Shimelle and Pebbles last August which included papers and embellishments from the Floral Lane collection. These papers are the boldest ones I have - even the 'B' sides are brightly coloured - and I have only used a few pieces from the border sheet. I picked out 'A Little Hello' as this is my favourite and looked for photos of my daughter to go with it.

I layered some white card over part of the florals but the contrast was too stark so I used a background stamp on it. The yellow motif on the right was cut from a 'Home Sweet Home' sticker.

Supplies
Paper - Pebbles Floral Lane (A Little Hello & Just Because)
Card - White Scrapbook Insert
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Jenni Bowlin Studios Tiny Circle Alphas
Embellishment - Pebbles Floral Lane Dimensional Stickers
Ink - Dovecraft

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Template
Lakeland Clear Background Stamp

On the Edge

And Challenge 9 from Shimelle: 

I first discovered Shimelle's blog last August when I saw an advert for a previous online scrapping weekend. She had already posted a 'Sketch of the Week' which I liked but I decided to concentrate on the crop and come back to the sketch later. This sketch had space for a small panoramic picture at the top with a larger one in the middle which I thought would suit some pictures I had taken of Stanage Edge in the Peak District, but I didn't go back to it for a long time...

I played around with it just a little, adding a couple of panels of paper and using less embellishments than Shimelle. I also used a block of four photos instead of one big one. I don't usually use two spotty papers on one page, but these worked well together and the dots on the brown one are embossed for a bit of texture.

Supplies
Paper - KaiserCraft Blue Lemonade, MME Wild Asparagus
Letter Stickers - Basic Grey Nordic Holiday
Arrows - atd

Brrr!

I'm skipping over Challenge 7 (Put it in a Pocket) for now, as the page I want to do is a double page and will be quite time-consuming. I'll definitely come back to it, even if it's after the official deadline for prizes.

So, Challenge 8:

I'm certainly guilty of buying stamps and not using them. I had my eye on a set of Papermania alphabet stamps for ages, waited for a 20% off coupon for the shop and bought them. I have Papermania letter stickers in several colours in this font and I really thought that I would put the stamps to good use. Guess how many times I have actually used them....none. I've looked at them over and over again but sometimes they don't fit with the page, and I can't stamp outline letters on a dark or busy paper, so they've just sat there, until now.

I planned to stamp my title in the ochre ink, and made my photo mats match by inking white card direct from the inkpad. However, once I had stamped the title, it was lost on the background. I inked more card, stamped in brown, cut out the letters and layered them over the original stamping. It was a bit fiddly but I'm very pleased to have used the stamps at last, and I WILL be using them again soon. I promise.

Supplies
Paper - Fancy Pants About a Boy, White Scrapbook Insert
Ink - Papermania, Dovecraft

Tools
Papermania Alphamania Clear Stamps

Dancer

There's no pretty graphic for challenge six from Shimelle: find a layout you love that isn’t in a style or colour scheme you’d usually use and scraplift it with a twist that makes it yours.

I had this magazine page in mind for some photos of my daughter, but could I find it last night? Well, I did eventually - it's by Fiona Beckman and it's on page 9 of the Complete Scrapbooking Handbook Volume 2. I hope I'm not breaking any copyright rules by including a photo of the page:

I was attracted to this layout because of the assortment of photo sizes. My photos are of my daughter in the outfits from a dance show. I had loads of good pictures of her posing in the pink dress, a couple in the blue and just one in the denim, and I didn't like the outfit at all. Who wants to dance in denim dungarees?

I took Fiona's monochromatic page and changed it to soft pastels. I swapped over the two larger photos and squeezed in an extra one in the bottom row:

The background paper looks very plain in this picture, but it's actually covered in dance words which I didn't want to obscure too much, hence the space at the top right.

Supplies
Paper - Sandylion Ballerina, plus pink scraps from stash
Mesh - from stash
Chipboard Letters - Woodware

Hiraethog & Carneddau

And a fifth:

I chose to copy the panoramic photo - using one of the view from our cottage in Wales last week. With words like Hiraethog and Carneddau it has to be Wales. I also punched a trio of circles which I stitched to the page, picking up on Wilna's monotone butterflies and the stitching on her page, and I stamped the flowers randomly to add some interest to the background. 

Supplies
Paper - Cherry Arte Arcade (Reverse Side), Chatterbox Small Spruce Argyle
Rub-On Letters - Making Memories
Thread - DMC
Ink - Papermania

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Flower Stamp - an old magazine free gift

The House in the Clouds

On to challenge 4:

I picked a couple of pictures from a holiday in Suffolk and chose a red-brown as my third colour to match the cladding on the building:

Supplies
Card - Chartwell Studios
Paper - Kit 'n' Kraft, docrafts Spring Chic
Peel-Offs - Gold Label

Tools
Fiskars Bracket Border Punch

James

Shimelle's third challenge this weekend was to try a different style of scrapbooking from your normal look. 

I like pages with a small photo of a person and a cluster of papers and embellishments when other people do them, but I don't normally try them myself - possibly because a lot of my pages are travel related. I went looking for something to scraplift and picked a page by Katarina Damm-Blomberg and an old photo of my nephew. 

Supplies
Card - Chartwell Studios
Paper - Scraps including HOTP, Adornit, Fancy Pants, Paper Adventures, Making Memories
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops
Letters - docrafts

Art Underground

The second challenge of Shimelle's scrapbooking weekend was all about mixing papers. This isn't really a problem for me as I tend not to buy whole collections of paper, preferring to pick and choose individual papers that I think I will use.

For this page, I picked two 4x6 photos from the Metro in St Petersburg last summer. I started by scraplifting myself (from this layout) but changed things as I went along, ending up here:

The background paper is from Daisy D's, plus Bazzill cardstock and bits from the K&Co Hannah, Bo Bunny Et Cetera and First Edition Spring Feast collections. 

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper - Daisy D's Small Flower-Petal, K&Co Hannah, Bo Bunny Et Cetera Stamped, First Edition Spring Feast
Letters - K&Co Hannah, Bo Bunny Et Cetera Combo Stickers

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Fiskars Bracket Border Punch
EK Success Corner Punch

HMS Belfast

I've just come back from a week in Wales with a camera full of photos to scrap. However, Shimelle's online scrapbooking weekend has started, and I find it easier to do her challenges with photos that I already have to hand. Wales will have to wait and the first challenge (posted on Friday) was to scraplift a layout from Jaime Warren:

I used the panels of paper in the middle of the layout, but I reversed things to have a plainer background and a bolder pattern for the panels. I added a diagonal scattering of paper circles and gems rather than the flowers and clouds in the original:

I decided to hand-write my journalling, but my writing goes uphill and I'm rather disappointed with that. I may add another panel of paper and re-do this before the page goes into an album.

Supplies
Paper - Echo Park Silver Stripes, HOTP Blue Compass, Crate Paper Mia Whirl
Letters - Anita's Glitterations
Gems - Dovecraft
Pen - Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pen

Tools
X-Cut Small Circle Punch
'Ordinary' Hole Punch
EK Success Corner Punch

Online Scrapbooking Weekend

A date for your diary:

I took part in Shimelle's crops in August and November last year. She posted a huge variety of tutorials and challenges and I got lots of pages done. I am really looking forward to the next one.

Shophouses

Another Malaysian page, the traditional Chinese shophouses in George Town. I scraplifted myself for this one, but the original isn't posted anywhere online.

Supplies

Cardstock - DCWV Far East Stack, K&Co Hannah Scrap Pad

Paper - Unknown

Ribbon - DCWV Far East Ribbon

Letters - Scenic Route

Tools

Fiskars Apron Lace Border Punch

EK Success Corner Punch