Orford Castle

This page is based on Sketch #50 from Sketch-n-Scrap, though I switched it around to suit my photos. It's another sketch with hearts, but I chose a different theme, scrapping old holiday photos from Orford Castle in Suffolk.

I used larger photos than in the sketch, so I also increased the patterned paper sizes. I cut red letters on my Big Shot for the title, but they were a bit flimsy so I backed them with brown cardstock letters which I offset slightly and I am much happier with them now.

Supplies
Cardstock - DCWV Linen Closet Stack
Paper - K&Co Hannah plus Scraps
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops
Brads - Papermania
Washi Tape - Unknown
Ink - docrafts
Photo Turns - LSS

Tools
Big Shot & Alphabet Dies
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Daisy Punches

Love Orange Food

Another challenge page today - this one is for Paper Secrets' mid-month sketch with a twist. This time the twist is to use products that begin with each of the letters of the word LOVE.

I started from the photo - a single portrait photo - and picked one of my daughter as a baby. It was taken just after I fed her, and she was smeared with orange baby food.

I'd previously cut and not used the piece of spotty paper so it was easy to pick that one and add a floral from the same collection as the basis for the page. My LOVE items are: Label stickers, the word Orange, Vellum and Echo Park paper (the measuring tape).

Supplies
Cardstock - Moments (Scrapbook Insert)
Paper - MME Miss Caroline, Echo Park This & That
Vellum - Paper Adventures
Letters - Simple Stories Take a Hike
Label Stickers - October Afternoon
Flair - Studio Calico
Butterflies - Prima
Gems - Papermania
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Bracket-Shaped Square Template
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Annual Photos

The end of the month is fast approaching, and I have more challenges that I want to do than I have time to do them. 

Lots of sketches this month featured hearts, including this one from Brenda Ragsdale, but I swapped them out to use circles with two photos of my cousin's children that she sent me. (The sketch is part of a four-way set of challenges but I haven't combined any other parts this month.)

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper - Amy Tangerine Ready Set Go 6x6, Basic Grey True Love 6x6
Letters - Fancy Pants Wavesearcher
Stars - Studio Calico
Embroidery Thread - DMC
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Fiskars Circle Templates
Bazzill Paper Piercer

In the Bath

I haven't done a Monthly Challenge at UKScrappers for ages, but this month's colour inspiration challenge sparked my interest. The colour palette made me think of Pink Paislee's Prairie Hill collection so I pulled out my remaining scraps. I got these papers in a kit a couple of years ago, and I have made quite a few pages; sadly my scraps were just that now, and I had to pull in a few other papers to have enough for another page.

I employed my normal technique for the end of a kit - pile up all the pieces and plonk a photo on the top. This time the photo is one of my children in the bath a very long time ago. I made my stack of papers before choosing a background, and tried it against several before picking the grey tiles.

Supplies
Paper - Pink Paislee Prairie Hill, MME Miss Caroline plus other scraps
Letters - Crate Paper Little Sprout
Word Stickers - MME The Sweetest Thing
Ink - docrafts

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch

Wild at Heart

The team scrap-lifting game at Scrap Whispers is well under way, as is the new round of individual challenges. This page is for their Challenge 166 - to use circles across the page, plus inking and stamping, and no more than three embellishments.

We don't have to cut our photos into circles, but I decided that I would, and that the best photos to cut up would be ones of animals rather than people or places. I found three photos from London Zoo where there was a lot of plain background that I could trim away, and pulled out one of my bags of scraps for more circles. (I sorted all my scraps into co-ordinating sets last autumn.)

I started from plain smooth cardstock which I stamped all over with olive green ink and a random dot background stamp; then I spattered it with paint. Once I'd spread out my circles I decided I needed something at the top and bottom of the page. I stamped my title and drew faux stitches around the edges of the paper pieces.

I have two circle-cutting devices - the Fiskars Shape Cutter and the Kreaxions Circle Cutter. They have their advantages and disadvantages and I couldn't have made this page without either of them. I used the Fiskars Shape Cutter for the photos and patterned paper. I can normally cut an accurate circle with it, but sometimes it does slip, and it is limited by the fixed sizes of the templates. In contrast, I can cut any size of circle with the Kreaxions Circle Cutter as it works like a pair of compasses with a blade in place of the pencil, BUT it leaves a small hole in the middle of the circle. I used this one to cut all the mats just a little larger than the fixed photo/paper sizes, and the holes are covered up.

Supplies
Cardstock - Chartwell Studio, DCWV Neutral Stack
Paper - Basic Grey, Kit 'n' Craft, Sandylion and others
Ink - Ranger Distress Ink, Papermania
Paint - Folk Art

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Template
Kreaxions Circle Cutter
Lakeland Background Stamp
Craft Creatives Alphabet Stamps

David - Rebecca

This page finishes a set of four pages from a wedding; I shared the first three yesterday, so you may want to scroll back and look at them. My page design was largely dictated by the leftovers from making the first three, and I repeated the stamping, the punched circles and flowers and the gold hearts once again.

Supplies

Cardstock - DCWV Neutral Stack

Paper - Sandylion Hearts, Basic Grey True Love 6x6, Crate Paper Story Teller and others

Letters -  Anita's Glitterations

Doily - Papermania

Peel-Off Hearts & Lines - probably Anita's

Gems - Papermania Dew Drops

Washi Tape - Unknown

Ink - Papermania

Tools

Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Woodware Daisy Punch

Imaginisce Tree Stamp

Mary & Stuart

I'm sharing a trio of wedding pages today - one conventional 12x12 and two divided pages. When I originally planned this album I was overwhelmed by this set of photos; there aren't a lot of them, but they were mostly single photos or pairs of photos that related to different aspects of the day. It looked like either doing lots of one or two photo pages, or cramming them all onto a double, and I didn't really like either option.

Then I was inspired to use a divided page protector by the fourth video in Shimelle's Return to the Collection class. I don't know why I didn't think of it for myself as I am using them for my Norwegian cruise album, but I didn't. Anyway, this format allows me to put all the different photos together because each one still gets its own miniature 4x6 layout within the divided page.

The 12x12 page features the bride and groom and the rest of the wedding party, and has my only 4x6 vertical photo. The large hearts on the red paper are obscured, but I used pieces of the same paper in the divided pages.

I didn't have enough photos to fill all the pockets - the red hearts makes a good filler, and I included the invitation in another pocket. I've dug into my old stash of wedding stickers and rub-ons too as the colours matched the wedding colours so well.

I've tried to continue the same motifs through the pages, so there are lots of gold lines and hearts and lots of scalloped circles, a few flowers and the same lettering for all the subtitles. I also repeated some stamping in green in several places - the tree stamp that I used has pretty swirly branches and I overlapped those and omitted the trunk to get a mass of swirls across the 12x12 page and on the edges of a couple of the smaller cards.

There is one more page from the day to come - afterwards the bride and groom gave us a professional photo of our children who had been Page Boy and Flower Girl. That one will come next in the album and shares the same colour scheme, but I'll blog it tomorrow.

Supplies

Cardstock - DCWV Neutral Stack

Paper - Fancy Pants Love Story, Sandylion Hearts, Basic Grey True Love 6x6, Crate Paper Story Teller and others

Letters - American Crafts for Crate Paper DIY Shop, Anita's Glitterations

Numbers - Basic Grey Blitzen

Doily - Papermania

Peel-Off Hearts & Lines - probably Anita's

Epoxy Stickers - Royal & Langnickel

Gems - Papermania Dew Drops

Rub-Ons - Unknown

Gold Thread - Madeira

Washi Tape - Unknown

Ink - Papermania

Tools

Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Woodware Daisy Punch

Imaginisce Tree Stamp

I am very grateful to everyone who organises blog hops, giveaways and challenges. I have been lucky enough to win stash from a few and these pages would not have been what they are without your generosity. The 6x6 papers and the tree stamp came from these (I just wish I could remember exactly which ones); the washi tape came from a stash swap organised by Scrap365 on Facebook. 

Great Grandad

This is my page for Paper Secrets 1st February Sketch with a Twist. This time the twist is to include items that start with each of the letters of the word KISS.

I substituted the heart from the sketch with a bracket-shape and used larger photos. The photos are old ones of my children with their great-grandfather, and the paper is nearly as old as the photos.

My KISS items are: paper from K&Company, Inked edges, Stitching and Stickers. Happily this was a lot easier than the word WINTER that they set last time.

Supplies

Paper - K&Company, Basic Grey, Junkitz

Letters - American Crafts

Stickers - Bo Bunny

Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools

Bracket-Shaped Square Template
Sewing Machine

Fiskars Apron Lace Border Punch

Ishavskatedralen

The 'Cathedral of the Arctic Sea' in Tromsø is really only a parish church, but judging from the crowds of tourists and the high admission price, it's more popular then the actual cathedral. Its bright white concrete structure and its position on low land near the bridge mean that it can be seen from all over the city, and it's very photogenic.

Last time we visited Tromso a funeral had been taking place in the church so we could only view the outside; this time we were able to go in and see the magnificent stained glass window for ourselves.

Supplies
Paper - Pink Paislee Portfolio, MME Follow Your Heart
Letters - docraft Me to You
Chipboard - MME Lost & Found 3
Washi Tape - The Range
Gems - Papermania Dewdrops

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Tromsø - Cathedral & Library

Another page from Tromsø, with a different style of page protector as I wanted some larger vertical pockets for this page and the next one (which obviously lies on the other side and uses the same pockets). 

I turned my title on its side to use the 2x12 pocket. The three photos in the top part of the page are of the cathedral, which is really quite small by most European standards. It is the only wooden cathedral in Norway, and the most northerly cathedral in the world.

The bottom pocket has a photo of the library, a striking piece of modern architecture, which was originally a cinema, and I wrote my journalling on a couple of tags in the final pocket.

Supplies
Paper - Pink Paislee Portfolio, MME Follow Your Heart
Tags - Pink Paislee Portfolio
Letters - Basic Grey
Washi Tape - October Afternoon, Queen & Co, The Range
Label Sticker - 7Gypsies
Butterflies - Prima
Gems - Dovecraft
Button - from Stash

Tools
Big Shot & Alphabet Dies
Woodware Postage Stamp Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Tromsø

Our Norwegian cruise last summer feels like a long time ago now, but scrapping it is bringing back lots of happy memories. I did the first batch of pages last autumn, but then it took me a while to order another batch of photos. I'm doing this album with divided page protectors, so I'm getting all the 4x6 photos printed professionally rather than relying on my home printer.

I got the second batch of photos back this week, and I've completed four pages from Tromsø. The first one has our arrival (in the fog, so just one photo) and our visit to Polaria - an 'Arctic-themed discovery centre' with a small aquarium.

This page will actually be three pages later in the album as I did two pages about specific buildings that will lie between these two. It has a photos of the marina, the four cruise ships that were in Tromsø that day and some of the statues and monuments from the city. The bottom row is the view as we left (so much better than our foggy arrival) and the glorious sunset that night.

Just a quick word about the photographs themselves. I ordered my first batch from Truprint and discovered that they were just a bit narrower than the 6" pockets, which meant that I was adding filler strips to the edges of my photos so that they couldn't move around too much in the pockets. This batch came from Photobox, and they are truly 6" wide and fit nicely in the pockets. I shall be sticking with Photobox from now on.

Supplies
Paper - Pink Paislee Indigo Bleu, Pink Paislee Portfolio, MME Follow Your Heart, Crate Paper DIY Shop,
Letters - American Crafts, Studio Calico
Washi Tape - October Afternoon, The Range
Brads - Papermania
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Tiny Star PunchX-Cut Small Circle Punch

David

This is the page that I made from the third video in Shimelle's latest class - Return to the Collection. The class is about using one collection pack for six pages, but I've pulled in other papers to suit this particular photo.

One thing that Shimelle talked about in her video was the idea of building up an embellishment cluster from the pieces that are in the collection pack. I've had the owl sticker for ages and it's from the sticker pack that matches the doily print paper so I tried hard to use it here. There's some wording on it too, which I've covered up with the frame and the star.

Supplies
Paper - Paper Adventures Vintage Workshop, Crate Paper Restoration, Crate Paper Random, Graphic 45 Kraft Reflections
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Word Stickers - MME The Sweetest Thing
Owl Sticker - Crate Paper Restoration
Washi Tape - The Range
Frame - from Stash
Gems - Papermania / from Stash

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Postage Stamp Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch

592

An odd title, but this is the number of the engine in this set of photos - sadly it doesn't have a name. It's the engine that the boys were watching in my last page (Trainspotting) and this will lie opposite it in my album so I used the same supplies and a simple 'stack up three photos against a border' layout that I have used a couple of times before. It came together really easily as all the decisions had already been made.

Supplies 
Paper - Simple Stories Awesome, Crate Paper Random
Journalling Card - Elle's Studio
Numbers - Jillibean Soup
Word Stickers - Crate Paper Restoration
Washi Tape - Trimcraft, The Range
Ink - Ranger Distress Ink, StampCraft

Tools
Big Shot & X-Cut Ticket Stubs Die
Studio Calico Doilies Stamp Set
Papermania All Aboard Postmark Stamp
Hobbycraft Star Punch

Trainspotting

I'm returning to Shimelle's latest class now; Return to the Collection has six videos for six pages from a single collection pack. I have watched all six videos now, but this is only my second page from the class. It features a pair of offset photos, and some stamping on the background which runs under the photo block.

I had gutted the background paper of my first page (Hardwick Hall) when I made it so I started with that piece as my photo mat and pulled in some red cardstock as a second mat.

I do have photos of the trains as well, and my next page will be a companion page for this one.


Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania
Paper - Simple Stories Awesome, Crate Paper Random
Letters - Jillibean Soup
Word Stickers - Crate Paper Restoration
Washi Tape - Trimcraft, The Range
Ink - Ranger Distress Ink, Papermania, StampCraft

Tools
Big Shot & X-Cut Ticket Stubs Die
Studio Calico Doilies Stamp Set
Papermania All Aboard Postmark Stamp
Craft Creatives Alphabet Stamps
Hobbycraft Star Punch
Woodware Tiny Star Punch

52 Walks - January

I started the year full of good intentions, you know the ones - eat better, lose weight, exercise more. One way that I plan to fulfill the 'exercise more' part is to combine it with scrapbooking. My usual exercise is plain old walking but I usually walk the same routes and get bored with them after a while. I decided to make a greater effort to walk in different places each week and to record each walk on a 6x6 page. I managed to stick to this for January and these are my first six pages:

Title Page:

Introduction:

Walk 1 - Lion Gorge: Following a footpath through part of a local nature reserve to see where it went, ending with a muddy scramble up a bank to the main road.

Walk 2 - I drove to Harlow for this one - an orienteering event in the very muddy Latton Woods.

Walk 3 - More mud, this time in Weald Park, Brentwood. I was there so early in the day that I had parts of the park to myself.

Walk 4 - A local (though long) walk to the Herbert E Brooks Memorial Gardens where a holocaust memorial has just been erected.

So far I'm enjoying this project, both the walks and the scrapping, and I have a long list of places to go. This month has been a good mix - a local explore, an organised event, a wander around a familiar country park, and a walk to visit a specific place. Here's hoping that the weather is as kind to me in February.