At the Top

This is a companion page for Climbing Snowdon which I blogged a few weeks ago, but I couldn't share it then. And the reason that I couldn't share it was that it was made as part of the team scraplifting game at Scrap Whispers. Three teams all start from the same scrapbook page and each team member scraplifts the layout of the person before them. The three end layouts can look very alike, or very different, depending how each team member interprets the page they are given.

This time I was scraplifting Sherri and I used her page as inspiration rather than copying every element. I liked the bracket-shaped square behind her photo and I made this a bigger feature on my page. I also swapped her large journalling block for a second photo. I'm not sure whether her background paper is one piece or whether she layered up strips on the right, but I added paper strips to my plainer background. Sherri has some metal embellishments on her photo, which I mimicked using a tag sticker with a brad and I used another brad as an echo of her flower.

All three chains of pages have been revealed on the Scrap Whispers blog this week - Georgina's Team on Monday, Nilsa's Team on Tuesday and Rosey's Team on Wednesday.

Supplies

Cardstock - Bazzill Dotted Swiss

Paper - Basic Grey, Cloud 9 Designs, Glitz Design

Letters - Making Memories, Jenni Bowlin Studio

Stickers - Simple Stories

Brads - Dear Lizzy, Papermania

Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools

Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch

Bracket Shaped Square Template

World in Miniature

Whenever I flip through my photo albums, there are certain groups of photos that I know how I want to scrap, but I just don't get round to doing them. They are mostly groups with lots of 4x6 photos, and I am generally planning to use a chapter from Shimelle Laine's 4x6 Photo Love class which ran at Two Peas in a Bucket in 2011.

I've decided to tackle one of these sets of photos today - a set of 12 from World in Miniature, an attraction in Cornwall which had models of famous landmarks. (My photos are from 2004; World in Miniature closed in 2008.) I'm using the November class which was intended for 11 photos, but it was easy to include one more.

The basic premise of Shimelle's 11 (or 12) photo page is a double page with seven photos, plus a 6x12 insert with 4 (or 5) more. This is the left page and the front of the insert:

and the back of the insert with the right page:

I know that I could have re-printed all of the photos smaller and fitted them on a 'standard' double page, but it seemed to be a terrible waste of photos to do that, and then what would I have done with the originals? I'm trying to convert all my old photo albums to scrapbooks and I don't want albums full of originals plus scrapbooks full of copies.

Supplies
Cardstock - DCWV Linen Closet Stack
Paper - Crate Paper The Pier, Papermania Portobello Road
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Bo Bunny Mama-Razzi
Stickers - October Afternoon, Bo Bunny Mama-Razzi
Washi Tape - The Range
Flowers - from Stash
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Sleepyhead

The mid-month sketch from Sketch-n-Scrap had a spooky feel, but scrapping hallowe'en was not a requirement. I decided to adapt the sketch for a single landscape photo of my son as a baby, asleep in his pram.

I chose the photo mat first and then wanted a subtle patterned background for my page; I chose this watercolour print from Crate Paper and decided to stay with the same collection for the rest of my page. 

Supplies
Paper - Crate Paper DIY Shop, DCWV Garden Party Matstack
Letters - October Afternoon
Washi Strip - Crate Paper DIY Shop
Buttons - from Stash

Tools
Sewing Machine

Wildlife

When I buy a paper collection, I tend to keep all the pieces together until I'm near the end and then I either add them to my scraps box or pile the remaining pieces onto one final layout. For some reason I've kept the scraps from s.e.i.'s Dill Blossom collection in their own bag for nearly two years without doing either. 

It's time to rectify that by using the remaining pieces on this page (including that circle which I cut previously and obviously didn't use). I spritzed the background paper with mist and laid out the papers before I chose my photos. They were taken in a local nature park when my then 7 year-old son's science homework was to look at the local wildlife. I wish his science homework was so easy now that he's 16!

Supplies
Cardstock - Chartwell Studio
Paper - s.e.i. Dill Blossom
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Bo Bunny Mama-Razzi
Butterflies - Prima
Gems - Making Memories
Mist - Cosmic Shimmer Mist
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circle Templates
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Ribbit

This week's Team Challenge at UKScrappers had plenty of options, but I still found it a bit tricky. Dawn asked us to use either a specific colour combination OR a starting point from Shimelle, circles, and buttons OR ribbon. Although I think the colour palette is really pretty, it didn't inspire me in terms of scrapbooking, and the starting point is one that I had passed over previously as not being my sort of page. Nevertheless I chose the starting point this time. I have circles on my background paper and in the embellishment clusters and a couple of buttons in the embellishments too.

The photo is one from a theme park trip, the only photo that I have from the day. The wording on the journalling card didn't suit me, so I turned the card upside down and covered the wording (now at the bottom) with a few punched shapes and stickers.

Supplies

Cardstock - Papermania

Paper - Kaisercraft Tiny Woods, Crate Paper Random, Crate Paper DIY Shop, K&Company

Letters - American Crafts

Journalling Card - Elle's Studio

Border Stickers - Making Memories, Bo Bunny Mama-Razzi

Stickers- Bo Bunny Mama-Razzi, Pebbles Fresh Goods

Buttons - Meiflower

Gems - atd

Ink - docrafts

Tools

Woodware Postage Stamp Punch

Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

American Crafts Notebook Border Punch

On Yer Bike

We're approaching the end of the month so I have a few challenge pages to finish and link up. This one is for Sketch with Stash Challenge #8 at Scrap Our Stash. The stash item this month is mist, paint, watercolours or gelatos. For me this is reduced to mist or paint as I don't have the others.

I picked my photos (my son and nephew as toddlers) and paper before deciding that I would use brown paint splattered on my cream background. It's been a bit gloopy recently so I thinned it with a little water and I got a much better splatter.

Supplies
Paper - Fancy Pants Little Sport
Letters - Fancy Pants Wavesearcher
Tag - Elle's Studio
Paint - Folk Art
Ink - docrafts

Wood Veneer Stars - Studio Calico

Tools

Hobbycraft Star Punch

Kreaxions Circle Cutter

Back to School

Today I'm sharing a page made with the October 15th Sketch from Stuck?! Sketches. My photos are old ones from the first day of the new school year back in 2004.

I almost always make school pages on alphabet or number paper so I chose this gorgeous Calligraphy print from Cosmo Cricket as the basis for my page, and worked from the oranges and greens in the paper.

I have a few more layers on my page than in the sketch, and I dropped both the circle and the banners, but I think the likeness is clear.

Supplies
Paper - Cosmo Cricket Evangeline, Basic Grey Dasher, Basic Grey Archaic, 
     Crate Paper Little Sprout, Sandylion Heritage, HOTP In the Kitchen
Letters - October Afternoon
Border Sticker - Crate Paper Farmhouse
Gems - Making Memories
Ink - docrafts

Tools
American Crafts Notebook Border Punch

In My Car

Another page with an old single photo today. This time it's for Brenda's sketch challenge at GrandDiva's Creative Corner. I chose a landscape photo, and considered cropping it, but ultimately I left it alone, and adapted the sketch to suit it.

I'm using scraps again here. I had a paper with boy phrases and toy vehicles on it, so I pulled the bag with that paper and the co-ordinating ones. I'm really glad that I took the time to sort my scraps into groups earlier in the week; it makes paper selection really quick and easy now.

I did start adding some embellishment to this page, but I felt that it distracted from the clean lines of the paper panels, so I cut back to two rows of brads and punched stars layered over the stars that were already on the paper.

Supplies
Paper - The Robin's Nest, The Paper Loft, Basic Grey, Lasting Impressions, Karen Foster
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Hobbycraft
Brads - Papermania
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Woodware Star Punch

A Day at the Seaside

This week's Team Challenge at UKScrappers was set by Ally and has four parts - to use pink or pink and blue, three or more photos, five (or more) lines of writing and a title that starts 'A Day At' or 'A Day In'.

I started from that title, and chose a trio of old seaside photos. I recently sorted my scraps box into about 15 sets of papers, so I pulled the bag with scraps of beach papers in it. I didn't actually use the specific beach papers, but I did use some blue and yellow papers from the bag. I tried to work in the pink from the challenge, but it wasn't happening.

Supplies
Paper - docrafts Spring Chic, Craft Creations Meadow Stripe
Letters - Stickopotamus, October Afternoon

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch

Tryfan

I'm filling in another gap in my 2012 album today - with photos from a walk that my husband and our friend did in North Wales. With so many pictures it had to be another double. I do like the Sketch Support website for double page sketches, and this page is based on their Two-Page Sketch #12, though I did change it a bit, especially on the left half.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, DCWV Linen Stack
Paper - Crate Paper DIY Shop
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Washi Tape - The Range
Gems - The Hobby House
Buttons - from Stash

Tools
Woodware Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
X-Cut Small Circle Punch

Bath Time

I made this page for Scrap Whispers Challenge 156, which was to scraplift a page from their guest designer Gwynn Asbury. The main things that I pulled from Gwynn's page were the patterned edge to the page, the collage of hexagons and the single photo. I really like her hexagons, but I have no way of cutting them easily, so I switched to circles (having also considered squares and triangles along the way).

I chose my photo and headed for my scraps box again, finding a stripy paper (that ended up being my photo mat) that I liked and which led me to a matching full sheet of squares. I cut my circles from the central squares and then used the holey sheet as my background (with the centre covered up and just the edge squares showing). I arranged my large circles in offset rows, and added smaller punched circles and clear epoxy circles to them to break up the rigid rows.

Looking back at Gwynn's page again now, I've noticed that she sewed around the edge, and I think that I will go back and do the same with mine.

Supplies
Paper - Daisy D's Playtime, The Robin's Nest (Shaped Piece)
Letters - Doodlebug
Ink - docrafts
Epoxy Stickers - from Stash

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Template
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Be Prepared

Following on from yesterday I have another page made entirely from scraps, and another page where I have combined two challenges. My colour scheme is from Rochelle Spears' colour inspiration challenge. I had a couple of patterned scraps that fitted this combination, and added some plain scraps.

My page layout came from a sketch at Scrap Whispers. Challenge 157 is a double page sketch, but we were free to use one half or the other instead of the whole thing. I chose the left side and scrapped a couple of photos from the prize-giving at the end of my daughter's scout camp.

Supplies
Cardstock - American Crafts
Paper - KaiserCraft Lush, Fancy Pants, Glitz Designs
Letters - October Afternoon
Ink - Ink It Up!
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops

Tools
Woodware Label Punch
Woodware Daisy Punch
EK Success Corner Punch

Kushi

Kushi is an Indian restaurant that opened near us earlier this year, and I'm combining challenges for this page about our first visit there. I'm using this month's sketch from Sarah's Cards with Challenge 155 from Scrap Whispers - use kraft cardstock, three or more patterned papers and a banner or bunting.

The sketch is the kind of layout that doesn't need any large pieces of paper, so I decided to work with my scraps rather then new papers. I found a couple of papers from the same collection, and added coordinating plains. Once I'd partially assembled the page I decided to move the title above the photos.

While going through my scraps box I decided to try and pull together a few 'kits' of scraps so that I use them rather than adding more. Come back tomorrow for another page from scraps.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania Kraft Basics
Paper - Fancy Pants Summer's End, Glitz Designs Laced with Grace
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Gems - Making Memories
Paint - Folk Art
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Kreaxions Circle Cutter
Hobbycraft Star Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Olympics

There's been one page in my 2012 album that has been bugging me for a while. It's a page I made last December for the Olympics, and there is actually nothing terribly wrong with it, but I really wished that I had used the same papers for this page as I did for my Olympic and Paralympic album. I left it alone for a long time, but having done the Paralympic page this week, I took the decision to re-do the Olympic page.

My layout was dictated by the sizes of my remaining papers (and there weren't many left). I used the last few large pieces of patterned paper to piece together a background, layered up my last neutral paper with my photos and ran a line of punched shapes along the right hand edge.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania Kraft Basics
Paper - Papermania Portobello Road, MME Wild Asparagus
Letters - American Crafts
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Fiskars Postage STamp Border Punch
Woodware Postage Stamp Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Label Punch
Woodware Tiny Star Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch

Crash!

The first October weekly challenge at UKScrappers had four parts - this sketch, a title from a book, autumnal colours and paints or mist.

The sketch sent me into my photo archives, all the back to 1998, for a single portrait photo of my son as a toddler. It was 4x6 but I cropped it slightly so that I could mat it on a 6x6 paper (a cream grid, but it looks plain white in the photo below). I used paint and a book title for my page, but I didn't follow the colour requirement, so I will only score 25/30 points for my team this week.

Supplies
Paper - Jillibean Soup Macho Nacho Soup, Basic Grey True Love
Borders - Jillibean Soup Macho Nacho Soup
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Brads - from Stash (Basic Grey?)
Paint - Stencil Collection
Ink - docrafts

Tools
X-Cut Scallop Border Punch

Paralympic Highlights

I've reached the point with my 2012 albums that I mostly have double pages left to do. This one is from the Paralympics; I did a whole album with my Olympic and Paralympic photos, but I also want a double page from the Paralympics in the ordinary 2012 album, as this was a big event in the year.

I decided to use the same papers from that album for this page, make a patchwork from the scraps, and add polaroid style photos to most of the patchwork squares. This turned out to be rather time-consuming as each square turned into a mini layout with its own journalling and embellishments:

The lighting is terrible in that photo, so here are the two pages separately:

I didn't set out to make another challenge page, but this one meets the criteria for Challenge 153 at Scrap Whispers - a double page with at least five photos and the title running across both pages - so I am linking up there.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania Kraft Basics
Paper - Papermania Portobello Road, MME Wild Asparagus
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Basic Grey Micro Mono
Labels - Maya Road
Washi Tape - The Range, Trimcraft
Ink - Ink It Up!, docrafts
Sequins & Stars - from Stash

Tools
Sewing Machine
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Postage Stamp Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch
Woodware Tiny Star Punch
X-Cut Small Circle Punch
Amy Tangerine Date Stamp

In Memoriam

A sombre title, but this is just a page about a memorial we saw in Cornwall last year. It stands at the foot of Rough Tor and was raised to the memory of Charlotte Dymond who was murdered there in 1844. It made me wonder what our towns and cities would look like if all murder sites were marked in a similar way.

This wasn't a subject for bright colours; I chose grey, cream and pink and worked from Shimelle's Sketch 26 - Scrapbooking with a Favourite Patterned Paper - though my journalling is below the photos not between them.

Supplies
Paper - First Edition J'Adore, Pebbles Fresh Goods, scraps
Letters - Anita's Glitterations
Washi Tape - Queen & Co
Stickers - Pebbles Fresh Goods
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops

Tools
American Crafts Open Scallop Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Flower Punch

A Photo for Nan

I recently signed up for a new workshop at Two Peas in a Bucket - Glitter Girl's Scrapbook Survival Guide. It's self-paced with five chapters covering different strategies for scrapping more photographs, staying inspired - not overwhelmed - by your supplies, getting more from your tools, working with your most precious photos, and developing confidence in your own scrapbooking style.

This page is a scraplift of one of Glitter Girl's sample pages, and it's another page where I have killed off a collection of paper. I had two part sheets left and I could just about cut and piece them together to create a 12x12 background. I embellished with an offcut from making that, plus stickers and pearls.

The photo is one that I took in order to have a picture of both of my children so that I could send it to my Nan last Christmas.

Supplies
Paper, Border & Stickers  - Fancy Pants Winterland
Letters - Fancy Pants Home for Christmas
Ribbon & Pearls - from Stash

Great Orme

A quick and simple page page today. I've used Basic Grey's Wisteria collection for a couple of pages in the last few days and I was really just down to scraps. I find the best way to deal with these is to cut them to rectangles and layer them up together for one final page.

I looked for more photos to complement the paper and chose some older ones from a holiday in Wales. I added one other paper from my scraps box for the photo mat, and kept the embellishing quite simple because there are so many patterns on the page.

Supplies
Cardstock - American Crafts
Paper - Basic Grey Wisteria, K&Co Hannah
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Gems - Making Memories
Ink - docrafts

Rough Tor

Back to the challenges, and this page is for Stash Challenge #8 at Scrap Our Stash. This was a Tic-Tac-Toe challenge, with the requirement to use a set of stash items that appear as three-in-a-row in the grid. I've been using a lot of brads recently and I have plenty of washi tape, so I chose the left column - washi tape, journal card and 5+ brads. This still left plenty of options in terms of subject and layout.

I have a list of pages to do in order to finish my 2012 album and I decided to do one of them - from Rough Tor in Cornwall last summer. I picked just two photos and used Sketch 11 from Shimelle - scrapbooking on the diagonal - from March this year. I swapped my layout over compared to the sketch as neither of my background papers were complete sheets and this way the photos cover the hole.

Supplies
Paper - Basic Grey Wisteria
Journal Card - Donna Salazar
Letters - Making Memories
Washi Tape - We R Memory Keepers
Brads - Papermania
Gems - Dovecraft
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Daisy Punch

Climbing Snowdon

This was another UFO that I had lying around. I'd actually done most of it, but I left the journalling for another time. It was to be one of a pair of pages, and I wasn't sure how to divide the journalling across the two. I've made the other one now, and it had more space for writing so it ended up all being on that page. The only things that I did to finish this page were to caption the photos and add a little backpacker sticker.

As the title says, these are photos from climbing Snowdon, which my husband, daughter and friend did last April. The other page has photos of them at the summit, but I can't share it yet. I'll link it up here when I can. It's here.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill Swiss Dot
Paper - Basic Grey, Cloud 9 Designs
Letters - Making Memories, Jenni Bowlin Studio
Sticker - Simple Stories
Labels - 7Gypsies 
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Bracket-Shaped Square Template

Wild Camp

A new month means a new round of challenges and the first one to catch my eye was the Sketch #42 at Sketch-n-Scrap.

I picked photos from a camping trip and intended to use the Take a Hike collection from Simple Stories for my page. However I found that the colours were too strong and that the papers were fighting with my photos for attention. I ended up using Basic Grey Wisteria with its softer colours, though a few bits of Take a Hike did find their way onto the page too.

Supplies
Cardstock - American Crafts
Paper - Basic Grey Wisteria
Letters - American Crafts Thickers, Simple Stories Take a Hike
Washi Tape - We R Memory Keepers
Brads - Dear Lizzy, Papermania
Stickers - Simple Stories Take a Hike, Anita's Glitterations
Ink - docrafts

Tools
EK Success Corner Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Amy Tangerine Date Stamp

Sixteen

Last weekend Scrap Our Stash held an ABC-123 blog hop and then launched their Blog Hop Challenge. The ABC part was two specific requirements relating to letters of the alphabet (e.g. Arrows & Brads, Chevrons & Doily) and the 123 part was a choice of three sketches. 

I chose Sketch 1 and the letters WX for Washi Tape and use an X in the title. The X might seem quite difficult, but I decided to scrap a photo from my son's sixteenth birthday.

There isn't much colour in the photo so I decided to go colourful in the paper as it is a birthday. I found the stripey paper in my scraps box and went from there.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper, Die-Cut & Brads - Hot Off the Press
Letters - American Crafts Thickers

Tools
Heidi Swapp Mega Mask (for Circle)
Amy Tangerine Date Stamp

Dawn

I'm making an effort to deal with some of my UFOs, those half-finished pages that I bundle into a bag when I can't make them 'work'. The first one is a photo of a sunrise that I had paired with papers from Basic Grey's Plumeria collection. 

I can't remember if this was originally a page for a challenge, but if it was it may even have been the terms of the challenge that restricted me and stopped me from finishing it at the time. This week I managed to finish it quite easily, layering up various scraps in the middle of the page (as I had already got the top and bottom borders in place).

Supplies
Paper & Die-Cuts - Basic Grey Plumeria
Vellum - from Stash
Letters - American Crafts Thickers

Tools
Amy Tangerine Date Stamp

Rage

I used to do the sketch challenges each month over at the Creative Craft World blog but there hasn't been one since May. I've recently discovered that one of their DT, Sue aka MiniOwner, is now running a similar sketch challenge on her own blog Me & Mine.

Her September/October sketch has three photos in a column, but I adapted it for two larger photos of my daughter and nephew on the roller coaster Rage  at Adventure Island.

I'm really happy to have used these brads up. They are really old stash that I often find are just too big for my pages. Having a whole row of them as a feature means that their larger size is actually an advantage here.

Supplies
Cardstock - American Crafts (Yellow), DCWV Natural Stack (Purple)
Paper - Junkitz Pastel Paperz
Letters - DCWV Christmas Alphabet Stack
Brads - Making Memories
Ink - Ink It Up
Chipboard, Sticker & Cord - from Stash 

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
X-Cut small Circle Punch