Pocket Scrapping - Paris 1

I've been mixing 12x12 pages with divided pages this year, and our trip to Paris is no exception. There are some photos that really don't need a whole 12x12 page, but it's nice to be able to include them in the album anyway.

Up until now, I've been letting each month take as many pockets as it needs, but I finished April at the bottom of a page. When I counted up my Parisian photos, there were 10 cards, so I added a title and kept a pocket for tickets to make up 12, two whole pages. This is the first one, and I'll share the second on Friday.

There's lots of hoarded product here, kept with this trip in mind. The first pocket has map paper from October Afternoon's Travel Girl line featuring the centre of Paris. I think the washi tape is from the same collection and it shows the days we were in Paris - Sunday to Wednesday. The second pocket has a photo of our hotel - the background card and the smaller Paris metro map card are both from 4Heures37's Eiffel Avenue collection; I won the Paris postmark chipboard from a blog challenge last summer (thank you Crystal).

No hoarding on the rest of the cards. The third is the Pompidou Centre, then a selfie of the two of us that my daughter took in the Sainte Chapelle. Our tickets for the Sainte Chapelle, the Conciergerie and Notre Dame are in the fifth pocket. I didn't stick them down, but they are sandwiched between the background paper and a piece of acetate, with the letter stickers on top of the acetate. Finally, the sixth pocket has a photo of my daughter 'imprisoned' in the Conciergerie.

Notre Dame

I was watching a YouTube video recently where the scrapper made a double page with a sketch from Nuts About Sketches. I didn't care for that particular sketch, but any blog with double page sketches is worth a look, especially as I knew I wanted a double for my photos from Notre Dame in Paris. 

I clicked on a few of the labels for high numbers of photos and turned up this sketch from 2009 which has a good mix of sizes and orientations. I played with the photo sizes as the largest that I generally print my photos is 4x6; this left me an awkward gap on the far right, so I squeezed in three more tiny photos there.

Supplies
Cardstock - DCWV Linen Closet
Paper - MME Vintage Charm
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Gems - Michaels/Recollections
Ink - Ink It Up!
Buttons - from Stash

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Template
Studio Calico Doilies Stamp Set

Changing the Guard

I don't scrap chronologically, but I do keep my pages in albums by year. I started scrapping in 2008 and I've tended to work both forwards and backwards from that point depending on my mood and the challenges that catch my eye. I've finished a few albums (2004, 2006, 2008-10) and mostly finished 2003, 2005, 2007, 2011-12. I keep a list of pages that I need to make to complete these albums, plus 2013 (about 2/3 done). Going forwards, I'm obviously in 2014 (and I've concentrated on those pages recently) and going backwards I've reached 2002.

None of my recent photos suited this week's challenge from UKScrappers; nor did it fit with my list of 'missing pages' so I've fallen back on 2002 and a trip to London to see the Changing of the Guard. I only took three photos (pre-digital remember), one at Horse Guards Parade and two at Buckingham Palace.

Three photos? The bottom one of this pair lifts up to reveal the third. When I put the page in its album, I'll cut a slit in the page protector so that the flap can easily be lifted up using the chipboard button. I didn't feel that all three photos quite fitted together, as they are from two separate places, but I didn't want to make a second page for the Horse Guards photo on its own.

The Dizzy Dots set the challenge this week and they asked us to use a sketch from Page Maps, to use fabric or stitching, use a favourite colour from our wardrobe (dusky pink) and to use dots (the polka dot paper).

I rotated the sketch and altered the title section to accommodate my opening flap. There's not much journalling as the photos are 12 years old and I don't remember much of this part of the day.

Supplies
Paper - Bo Bunny Ambrosia, MME Vintage Charm
Letters - American Crafts Remarks
Chipboard Button - MME Market Street
Stickers - Crate Paper Restoration
Flowers - KaiserCraft
Perals - from Stash

Tools
Sewing Machine

Summer Fun

Before I made the last page, I had two similar three photo sketches in mind, and I wanted to use both of them. I've dropped back to last year for a set of photos from our day at Adventure Island, a small theme park in Southend-on-Sea and I'm using the mid-month sketch from Stuck!? Sketches.

This page will sit opposite another from the same day (Rage) which has a yellow background, so I chose yellow again. The polka dot paper is from My Mind's Eye so I pulled out all my MME scraps, mixing papers from three Miss Caroline collections. 

I stitched the circles on the sketch with my sewing machine. They looked terribly wonky at first, but now they are half-covered with paper I am happy with the way they look.

Supplies
Paper - MME Quite Contrary, MME Miss Caroline
Letters - American Crafts
Tickets - MME Miss Caroline
Word Sticker - MME The Sweetest Thing
Butterflies - Prima
Enamel Dots - Studio Calico
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Sewing Machine
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

Walk, Trot & Canter

I seem to be keeping on top of my 2014 photos so far this year; I took these photos of my daughter on Saturday and scrapped them on Sunday. That could all be about to change as the school summer holidays have started. More days out and less scrapping time for the next seven weeks.

My daughter rides most weekends, but mostly in an indoor riding school where the lighting is abysmal for photography. With the recent good weather they used the outdoor school and I could get pictures of her in action. I had a couple of recent three-photo sketches in my head so I deliberately tried for three shots of her walking, trotting and cantering.

The sketch I chose to use was the July Week 1 sketch from Let's Get Sketchy, though I flipped it to suit the direction of travel in the photos.

Supplies
Paper - Crate Paper Random, Dovecraft Sugar & Spice
Letters - American Crafts Sixth Avenue
Washi Tape - American Crafts
Gems - Forever in Time, Dovecraft
Epoxy Flowers - WHSmith
Mist - Cosmic Shimmer Mist (Teal Wash), Mister Huey's Opaque White
Ink - Ink It Up!


Tools
Woodware Tag Punch
Woodware Daisy Punch

Up to Their Necks In It!

I've been on the lookout for a four-photo sketch for a while, for these pictures of our daughter and our friends' son burying each other in the sand when we were on holiday in Norfolk.

The sketch I needed came from My Scraps and More Sketches on Friday, but I stretched the central panel to suit my wider photos and large title.

Last autumn I sorted most of my scraps into co-ordinating sets, and most of the pieces on this page came from my blue/yellow/beach paper scraps. The woodgrain paper is new, as is the die I used to cut the title. It cuts beautifully, but pushing out all of those tiny circles was a bit fiddly.

Supplies
Cardstock - American Crafts, Bazzill
Paper - Studio Calico Wanderlust, Pebbles, Paper Pizazz, DCWV, Craft Creations
Word Stickers - Authentique
Washi Tape - Waterstones
Gems - The Hobby House
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Big Shot & X-Cut Headliner Alphabet Die
Hobbycraft Star Punch
Craft Creatives Heart Punch
Bazzill Paper Piercer

Water Wars

I'm trying hard to stay caught up with my 2014 album, and these photos are from last weekend. We visited my brother and his family and the inevitable water fight broke out after Sunday lunch. I snapped a few photos from the safety of the doorway, and picked the best three for my page. 

I decided to use the sketch from the July challenge at UKScrappers, adapting it for three smaller photos on the circle of patterned paper. I also moved the paper strips behind the circle, and changed the position of the title, but I think it's clear that the page was inspired by the sketch.

Supplies

Paper - Heidi Grace, Studio Calico Snippets

Letters - Thickers

Circle Stickers - Anita's Glitterations

Gems - Forever in Time

Mist - DoCrafts

Ink - Ink It Up

Tools

Kreaxions Circle Cutter

10 in 10

It's been a little while since I shared a traditional 12x12 page, but I have one for you today. Last month, my husband took part in the 10 in 10 Challenge, climbing 10 Lake District peaks in 10 hours to raise funds for the MS Society. I wasn't there, and I scavenged photos from Facebook and Twitter for this page, the obligatory selfie at the start and the post-walk celebrations in the pub.

One landscape photo and one portrait photo can be awkward but with the imminent closure of Two Peas in a Bucket I had been reviewing Glitter Girl's videos, and spotted Adventure 54 where she had used this photo combination with a large journalling block, plenty of space for me to tell the story of the day.

This week's challenge at UKScrappers was set by Sue and she asked us to use four-in-a-row from this bingo card. I decided not to make a specific page for this, but to incorporate the elements into the next page where I could make them work.

I had already chosen the grid background paper and washi tape for this page (also two or more photos, numbers and squares) and I added stitching and wood veneer birds to complete Row 3. The birds might seem like an odd addition, but all these walkers use Twitter and share their walks via social media. In fact, my husband originally 'met' most of them via Twitter, and only subsequently met up face-to-face.

Supplies
Paper - Simple Stories Awesome, Simple Stories Take a Hike
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Birds - Freckled Fawn
Washi Tape - Efco
Ink - Ranger
Thread - DMC

Tools
Big Shot & X-Cut Ticket Stubs Die
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch

Pony Card

A quick birthday card today that I made for my pony-mad niece. 

The central motif was the last piece of a 12x12 paper that I knew I had lurking in the bottom of my scraps box. 

While rummaging for that I kept an eye out for anything else that might co-ordinate with it, coming up with a long strip of the floral paper which I cut into three to run behind the pony. 

All edges inked, a few gems and a sentiment and it was done.

Pocket Scrapping - April

Batch scrapbooking my March divided pages was much quicker than my one-card-at-a-time approach to earlier months, so I moved straight on to April. This was the month that we visited Paris, so I'm splitting my divided pages into three sections. Firstly I have the everyday stuff for the whole month, then I'll move on to pages from Paris and Disneyland, although they were really mid-month.

I've chosen a different colour for each month's background papers and April is a spring-like yellow. I had events/photos for just six cards this month which left one pocket empty at the bottom of the page protector. I've just put a piece of patterned paper in it for now so that I can start Paris on a new page.

Our month: spooky Edinburgh; an attempt at cooking curry from scratch; a day in London at the Globe Theatre and South Bank; gingerbread Easter bunnies; a fox that took a liking to our garden.

Pocket Scrapping - March

This year I'm combining pocket scrapping with my 12x12 pages, so the smaller everyday happenings appear in the book without taking up too much 'undeserved' space. I'm using the same divided page protector throughout the album, with 6 4x6 landscape pockets. Each month has a different colour and March is green. I adopted a 'batch' approach to this month rather than making one card at a time and I think that it made things faster. I printed all my photos, then chose all my background papers, then finished each card with embellishment and journalling. Each month has as many cards as it needs, and I started March in the last row of the previous page protector:

Our month: a swimming gala (no photos of the children were allowed, so I only have one of the empty pool); my nephew's 18th birthday (though he wasn't happy about photos either); our current car on its birthday; a walk around Hadleigh Castle; my husband's camping trip to the Lake District; my daughter's school trip to the Greenwich Observatory (with a photo from the internet); graffiti art of my name on the sea wall; the craze for loom bands; scout sleepover at Chelmsford Museum; Mother's Day cards and flowers; my win in Scrap Our Stash's birthday stash-a-thon.

"Starting Point" Pages

Starting Points are something that I first learned about from Shimelle Laine. She used to set challenges on her blog where she had started a page, with various papers in place, but not finished it with photos, title and embellishments. We would copy the starting point, but everyone finished the page off as they saw fit, with the number, size and positions of the photos varying from page to page.

I had decided to kill off my Basic Grey Plumeria collection, but I had no specific photos ready to scrap with it, so I've made a couple of 'starting points' which I will finish off at some point in the future. I've done this before with the last few bits from a collection and I have used all the ones I've made before, so I'm not worried about these part-finished pages cluttering up my scrap area for too long.

The first one just uses a few bits from my remaining papers. I had already fussy-cut but not used the two flower pieces and I imagined the trio of flowers and its 'ribbon' running below a row of photos. Although I have no idea exactly which photos I will scrap here, I have decided that they will run the full width of the page and probably be 3 4x6 portrait photos. I'll run the flower/ribbon piece below them and balance it with the scalloped border and the other flower above them. The photos will take up half the page so there won't be a lot of space for much else once I add a title and journalling.

My second starting point follows my normal strategy for finishing a collection - cut all the papers to rectangles and layer them up in a pleasing manner. However, I had a lot of scraps here, pieces too small or too irregular to cut into rectangles so I decided to punch lots of scalloped circles from these and run a row of them across the page. I still have some die-cuts and transparencies left from this collection so I used one of each, placing them on opposite sides of the page. I have a less fixed idea of the photos for this page, but I'm imagining either a single 4x6 landscape or a couple of smaller photos.

Finally, I had a quite a few punched circles left over so I used them with another transparency for a quick card:

And now I have absolutely no paper left. I still have a few more die-cuts and transparencies, but I've added them to the box where I keep embellishments that have reached the point of 'use it or lose it'.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, Color Set
Paper, Die-Cut, Transparencies - Basic Grey Plumeria
Ink - Ink It Up!
Mist - docrafts

Tools
American Crafts Simple Scallop Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Sewing Machine

See Him Go!

After the last page, I'm coming to the end of my Basic Grey Plumeria papers and I decided to kill off the collection if I can. The 1st July sketch from Stuck?! Sketches was perfect for using up scraps of paper.

I chose a couple of old 4x6 photos and cropped them down to 9cm squares (yes, I do mix metric and imperial measurements all the time), making my big triangles a little taller at 10cm high. There are no sizes on the sketch and I discovered that my photos and triangles weren't going to fit together in quite the same way as the ones on the sketch. Never mind, I rearranged them until I had something that I was happy with, layered the photos over the top and made a couple of embellishment clusters in opposite corners.

Stuck?! Sketches teamed up with Frosted Designs for this challenge and they added the twist of using a punch or die-cut. I didn't realise this before I made the page, but I have used a punch for the small circles in my embellishment clusters, so that fits their challenge too.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bo Bunny Shadow Dot
Paper - Basic Grey Plumeria
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Wood Veneer - Studio Calico
Gems - Making Memories
Stars - from Stash
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
X-Cut Small Circle Punch


  

Wonderful Day

A new month means new challenges, and I've managed to combine four of them in the making of this page. But let's start with photos and paper - the photos are from our holiday in Norfolk in May and my daughter is wearing a purple dress which led me to choose Basic Grey's Plumeria range. This was the first collection where I bought the ephemera pack and although I've used most of the paper I still have a lot of the die-cuts and transparencies left. I tried to use a few up here, including the title. 'Wonderful Day' is an exaggeration, but 'Very Nice Day' wouldn't be much of a title.

I used the 1st July sketch with a twist from Paper Secrets for my page; this time the twist is to use items for each of the letters of the word SPLASH. I have Sequins, Purple, Layers, Arrows, Staples and Hexagons.

Paper Secrets are sponsoring Scrap & Play this month so they are sharing the same challenge.

I was trying to use up some old stash on this page which fits in with Stash Challenge 16 at Scrap Our Stash, where they asked us to use at least five different items from a list. I chose die-cuts and transparencies (obviously), plus sequins and wood veneer pieces. I also used two different punches in my embellishment cluster - the scalloped circle and scalloped border.

Finally, Jen set this week's challenge at UKScrappers and she asked us to look at our process for making a page and photograph each stage. She broke it down into Good (paper & photos in position), Better (distressing, inking, embossing etc) and Best (all the embellishments). The photos of these stages are (at time of writing) in the UKScrappers gallery.


Supplies
Paper - Crate Paper Story Teller, Basic Grey Plumeria
Die-Cuts & Transparencies - Basic Grey Plumeria
Wood Veneer Arrows - Creative Embellishments
Staples - Making Memories
Mist - docrafts
Sequins - from Stash

Tools
X-Cut Scalloped Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch

La Conciergerie

It's been a few days, but I've made another page from Paris; this one is of the Conciergerie, formerly part of the royal palace, it was converted to a prison in the fourteenth century, and held more than 2500 prisoners (including Marie Antoinette) en route to the guillotine during the French Revolution.

I started my page with three horizontal panels of paper, but then I added two more (well, one and a border sticker really), and stitched a circle around my photos to break up the 'boxiness' of the page. I didn't leave a lot of space for writing, so I captioned the pictures and turned my largest photo into a pocket to hold a journalling card.

Supplies
Cardstock - DCWV Linen Closet Stack
Paper - Authentique Natural, Pink Paislee Indigo Bleu
Border Sticker - Fancy Pants Park Bench
Stickers - Authentique Natural
Letters - Anita's Glitterations
Gems - Papermania Dew Drops
Ink - Ink It Up!

Tools
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Woodware Label Punch