A Different Mayflower

A few months ago I made an additional page for my 2019 album in order to fill in a gap in the story of our daughter's university choice (Yes to University of Sussex). That created a gap in the album which I'm returning to fill now. 

There were a couple of candidates for subjects that I hadn't previously scrapped, and I chose a photo of a steam engine called Mayflower. I had read something on line a few days earlier about her being driven along our local line en route to the Bluebell Railway in Sussex and I turned out early one Saturday to see her go past.

I picked my way through my scraps box for vintage/distressed papers in soft blues, rusty reds and muted browns (based off of the stripy paper to the left of my photo) and cut them into strips which I lined up across the page. I then tucked a mix of ephemera and die-cut labels in among the strips, making the cluster on the right larger than the one on the left.

Supplies

Paper - The Robin's Nest, Bo Bunny, My Mind's Eye

Letters - Prima, Making Memories

Word Stickers - Tim Holtz

Ephemera - Unknown

Epoxy Star - Freckled Fawn

Gems - 

Ink - Memento

Tools

Big Shot

Dovecraft Label Die

The Works Patterned Circle Die

Fiskars Apron Lace Border Punch

Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch

Yes to University of Sussex

I called my 2019 album 'done for now' more than a year ago, but there was a gap in my daughter's story that I wanted to remedy. We looked at various universities for her, including Sussex where she ended up but, although I took photos on some of those visits, I didn't take any at Sussex. Thus the scrapbooks go from us looking at other places to her starting at Sussex without any mention of our visit and her decision to make it her first choice.

When I realised this, I decided to take photos when we collected her at the end of the spring term (March 2020) but Covid disrupted that and I eventually took them in March this year. I particularly wanted spring photos so that they would match the time of our original visit and the trees and flowers would look right.

I took four photos of the buildings that surround Library Square, and used them for the 'Conceptual Art' challenge at For the Love of Pretty Paper. This challenge was an oddity as we had to work from a printed list of instructions without seeing a picture of what the final layout should look like. I'll admit that I didn't follow all the instructions, but I felt it was more important to make a page I liked then to stick to them rigidly and be less happy with the result.

For comparison purposes, here's the original page made by Karen/Scrapdolly who also wrote the instructions.

It all felt too left-heavy to me, so I pushed everything to the right by extending the paper across the top of the page, adding an extra square on top of it and spreading out the layering of the vertical papers and photos. I also rotated the banners at the top of the page, added some labels at the bottom left and dropped the line of bunting.

I also linked up with Hey Little Magpie who set a much more straightforward challenge to use three or more photos on a page.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bo Bunny, UK Crafts

Paper - Pink Paislee/Paige Evans Whimsical
Enamel Dots - Pretty My Page, Freckled Fawn

Tools
Silhouette Portrait

Big Shot
Dovecraft Label Die
X-Cut Pennant Die

Art Fair

I had called my 2019 album "done for now" back in February, but I knew then that there were a few possible pages that I could add. Having made one for my daughter's university accommodation, I needed to even up the pages again which I did by making one for an art fair that we attended back in November. My husband was an exhibitor and he sold a couple of paintings that weekend.

It was National Scrapbooking Day at the beginning of the month with the plethora of challenges that that involves. One that caught my eye early on was a sketch challenge from Lottie Loves Paper. I printed a photo of my husband in his stand at 6x4 rather than 6x3 as in the sketch and printed 2" circles of parts of his paintings to run in a line below it, each one matted on a pinked circle to match the sketch.

I used scraps for everything but the background on the page, starting from the stripey paper and picking co-ordinating pieces in blue, green and grey.

Supplies
Paper - Fancy Pants Country Boutique, The Robin's Nest Boys Stripe, Pebbles/Jen Hadfield Everyday
Vellum - My Mind's Eye Necessities
Letters - American Crafts
Labels - 7Gypsies
Puffy Stickers - MAMBI
Enamel Dots - Echo Park
Mist - Mister Huey's

Tools
Big Shot & Studio Calico Pinked Circle Die
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Template

Hello Brighthelm

I've been sitting on this page for a while to keep all the Far East posts together. I made it at the end of March for a collaboration between For the Love of Pretty Paper and Quirky Kits which gave us a sketch which didn't suit any of the Malaysian photos that I was scrapping at that time, but was perfect for a couple of photos from last autumn.

The photos are of our daughter at her university accommodation (Brighthelm), taken on the day that we dropped her off at the start of the academic year. The sketch suited the mixed orientations of the photos, but I extended the horizontal papers so that the photo on the right was not quite so isolated.

I started by choosing a ledger paper for my background (since the page is education-related); this was the last whole sheet that I had from My Mind's Eye's Cut and Paste so I pulled out all my scraps from that collection too. Luckily I had enough co-ordinating pieces left to fit the sketch (and I have completely killed that collection now).

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper - My Mind's Eye Cut and Paste
Letters - Pebbles
Stickers - Basic Grey
Enamel Dots - Craft Consortium
Puffy Stars - MRI
Puffy Hearts - Studio Calico
Ink - Memento
Mist - Docrafts, Cosmic Shimmer

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
Hobbycraft Star Punch

South West Coast Path

I'm almost at the end of my 2019 album now, with this page filling in a gap from July. I could call it 'done' but I'm pondering adding a couple more pages if I can acquire the photos I want.

My husband and father-in-law generally walk a section of the South West Coast Path each summer, and the scrapbook page can be problematical for me as I wasn't there and have no idea which photos are significant for them. Hence they get left to last more often than not when it comes to completing the album.

I bought a stack of blue paper when they started this project and have used it as the background each time, along with a printed map of the route. I browsed for a sketch, hitting on an old one from Sketch Support which started me off, though I switched from two portrait photos to three landscapes on the left side. 

I embellished where indicated on the right page and on the edge of the left page. I never feel like adding much embellishment to a double page as there is already a lot for the eye to take in, so these are just simple clusters topped with die-cut seaside motifs.

Supplies
Cardstock - Unknown
Paper - Craft Creations, Doodlebug Petite Prints, Carta Bella Ahoy There, Bo Bunny Early Bird
Label Stickers - 7Gypsies
Washi Tape - Ebay
Glitter Tape - Hobbycraft?
Pearls - Artoz
Ink - Ranger

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
Big Shot & X-Cut Beach Hut Dies
X-Cur Small Circle Punch

Wild Tor

Julie's Page

My husband finished last year with a now-traditional trip to Dartmoor where he and a friend camped at Wild Tor. I picked a couple of photos and printed them at 4x6, but I hit a mental block about how to scrap them.

Putting out a plea for sketches or scraplifts online had Julie offer me a few suggestions. I used to follow her blog (but it's fallen silent recently) and like her style so was happy to pick one of her pages to scraplift and get me going again.

I had a 6x6 pad that I wanted to use, so I chopped the horizontal paper strips of Julie's page in two and used six patterns in 12 half-strips behind my pair of photos. The vertical strips came from my scraps box where the red was attached to the blue branding strip; I cut each colour in two and punched one side of the red.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, Unknown
Paper - Pinkfresh Studio Escape the Ordinary, American Crafts/Dear Lizzy Stargazer
Letters - American Crafts
Die Cuts - Pinkfresh Studio
Puffy Stickers - Pinkfresh Studio, Fancy Pants
Vellum Arrows - Studio Calico
Ink - Hobbycraft

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Big Shot & Spellbinders Circle Die

Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life

Jocandy22's Page

This page was completely inspired by a Scrap Squad scraplift to celebrate their 500th member last autumn, but it took me a long while to actually make it. The original page was made by Jocandy22 and is in the gallery at Studio Calico. The colourful, mixed-alpha title is not my thing at all, but I made a more restrained version to mark our daughter's first day at university.

I had two photos, so expanded the bottom section of the page to hold them neatly, with a few more layers than the original.

I haven't done the journalling yet as I'm still working out what will go where, and whether there will be other pages for either our initial visit to the university or her accommodation there. I only stuck three sides of the ledger paper to the background, so this page is essentially a large pocket which can hold the 'story' of her university applications and offers if this is the only one I make.

Supplies
Cardstock - Readicut Crafts
Paper - American Crafts/Dear Lizzy Lucky Charm, Pebbles Season's Greetings, PhotoPlay Like a Girl, American Crafts/Shimelle Head in the Clouds
Letters - American Crafts
Phrase Stickers - Tim Holtz
Glitter Tape - Advent Calendar Swap
Paperclip - Doodlebug
Enamel Dots - Carta Bella
Star Gems - Simply Creative
Ink - Memento

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
X-Cut Circle Punch
KaiserCraft Bubble Wrap Stamp

Twelve Days of Snowmen

Just before Christmas, I found out about a new sculpture trail in London which combined the Twelve Days of Christmas song with Raymond Briggs' The Snowman. There were twelve Snowman sculptures laid out on a trail between London Bridge and Tower Bridge, each one decorated with design from one of the Twelve Days. Something like this always draws my attention and so my daughter and I headed out to complete the trail on one of the quiet days between Christmas and New Year.

Even before we went, I know I would have 12 photos to scrapbook, all the same size and all portrait in orientation, so I was mentally planning this page even before I had the photos. I decided to try and cut The Snowman on my Silhouette and back him in the original colours from the story, to stand tall beside all the photos of him in different incarnations. I found a colouring book image online and was able to convert this to a cut-file which I backed with white mulberry paper to mimic the texture of the snow, and I'm so pleased with the way he turned out.

Twelve photos and my snowman needed a double page; I normally use two papers the same for the backgrounds of my doubles but my snowman looked so good against the spotted paper that I had to use it and find an alternative for the other side.

I'm trying to use my scraps rather than new sheets so my colour scheme came from one of those; the squared paper on the two sides was a good match for the grey of my spotty background and it also contains soft orange and purply-pink which guided the rest of my choices. Finding the stripe was serendipitous as it includes both of those colours and the green of the snowman's hat and scarf.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania, Craft Sensations
Paper - Pink Paislee Citrus Bliss, Pebbles/Jen Hadfield Warm & Cozy, Lawn Fawn Sweater Weather, Paper Adventures
Die-Cuts - Advent Calendar Swap
Puffy Stickers - American Crafts/Shimelle
Washi Tape - Ebay
Enamel Dots - Simple Stories, Stampin' Up!
Ink - Memento

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
Big Shot
Sizzix Film Strip Die
Sizzix Star Die
Woodware Tag Die
Hoobycraft Tiny Star Punch

3 amigos

I'm still working my way through December photos, and this rather poor selfie is the only one I have from a walk in the Lake District that month, a walk that I should have skipped as the weather was atrocious (hence the lack of photos; we couldn't see the views through the mist).

Original Page

My page is a scraplift, one set as a New Year's Day Challenge by Scrap Squad on Facebook, which I think was originally made by one of the Studio Calico design team though I got lost in a maze on Pinterest trying to confirm this and credit the creator.

I recently came across this cloud print by Basic Grey in my stash, and put it to one side ready for this page; everything else came from my scraps box, mostly keeping to the colours in that paper apart from a tiny splash of pink to match our coats.

I altered the page design to use a larger oblong photo and moved it further into the page, but I mimicked the circular photo of the original with circles behind mine. My photo mat doubles as a pocket which holds my journalling.

I'm also linking up with the January challenge from Hey Little Magpie, which was to create a clean and simple layout with one photo and lots of 'white space'.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, Papermania
Paper - Basic Grey Mon Ami, Glitz Design Uncharted Waters, Bazzill Basics, American Crafts/Amy Tangerine Plus One, OneCanoeTwo Creekside
Number - American Crafts
Letters - Fancy Pants
Stickers - Studio Calico
Washi Tape - Ebay
Ink - Hobbycraft
Mist - Docrafts

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circle Templates
X-Cut Circle Punch

Xmas Run Basildon

Gill's Page

Being a parkrunner leads to crazy things, like running a 5k on Christmas morning. Our nearest Christmas event was in Basildon, where we also made use of their selfie frame.

My page is a scraplift of one by Gill Birch in the Scrap Squad group on Facebook, which was itself a scraplift of a page by EllenT at scrapbook.com, a challenge set to celebrate Gill's birthday. 

I preferred Gill's version to the original, and flipped it sideways to start my page. I used a mask to ink some squares on the background to echo the original doodled grid, and cut a stack of hexagons from some Christmas papers to layer up around my photo. My title is an example of stretching your alphas as far as possible as 'run' started out as 'uuu'. The santa hat was a lucky find and fitted in perfectly above the title. I kept the rest of the embellishment quite simple, with the last of a pack of puffy stars and some red gems. 

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania, Stampin' Up!
Paper - Advent Calendar Swap
Letters - My Mind's Eye, Basic Grey
Puffy Stars - Bella Boulevard
Word Sticker - Tim Holtz
Paper Clip - Doodlebug
Gems - Advent Calendar Swap
Ink - Memento

Tools
That Special Touch Grid Mask
Big Shot & X-Cut Hexagon Die

Christmas 2019

No-one here likes me taking photos of them in Christmas Day, so last year we compromised on one posed family photo for the scrapbook. Sadly, none of the pictures we took were very good, so I decided to add some interest by cropping each of us separately from the best photo, matting them, and then overlapping the pieces to put the picture together again.

Laura's Sketch

The rest of the design was inspired by a sketch from Laura Rumble for For the Love of Pretty Paper, with the large word across the page.

I wanted a lighter paper behind the photos as they are quite dark, and then a large pattern for the background as so much of it would be on show. These two patterns are actually both sides of the same paper; I carefully cut out an oblong, matted it on red cardstock and then stuck it back over the hole. There is also a piece of scrap paper on the back for stability.

Supplies
Cardstock - Stampin' Up!
Paper - Carta Bella Christmas Market
Numbers - Dovecraft
Die-Cuts - Advent Calendar Swap
Phrase Sticker - Crate Paper/Maggie Holmes
Enamel Hearts - Marianne Designs
Glitter Tape - Hobbycraft
Ink - Ranger
Mist - Docrafts

Tools
Silhouette Portrait

Run Fell Foot

FTLOPP Mood Board

I'm not normally a fan of mood boards, but For the Love of Pretty Paper published one as part of their winter series of challenges and for once it actually inspired a page from me. This was a two part challenge, to scrap an everyday photo of ourselves and to use the moodboard.

My photo is us at Fell Foot parkrun in Cumbria last month, and I picked out aqua, brown and leaves from the moodboard to get started, then added woodgrain and bookprint patterns, a few touches of gold and a puffy camera. Looking at the board again, I added a wood veneer bird, similar to the one in the parkrun logo, swapped the puffy camera for a wooden one, and squeezed a wooden ampersand into the cluster on the right.

Supplies
Paper - Carta Bella Fall Blessings, Authentique Durable, OneCanoeTwo Creekside, KaiserCraft Secret Bird Society, Little Yellow Bicycle Acorn Hollow
Letters - October Afternoon, Prima?
Die-Cut - KaiserCraft
Border Sticker - Basic Grey?
Word Sticker - Crate Paper/Maggie Holmes
Washi Tape - Efco
Wood Veneer - Studio Calico, Freckled Fawn
Enamel Shapes - Marianne Designs, Doodlebug
Ink - Ranger

Tools
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch

TGO3

I'm filling in a gap in my 2019 album today, going back to May when my husband did The Great Outdoors Challenge for the third time, walking across Scotland from west coast to east coast. It merits a double page, and I asked him to choose the best 4-6 photos to illustrate the walk. He obliged with six, including his boots in the sea at the end, so I added his feet in the sea at the start and also a map with the track of the walk.

I scraplifted myself for this one, copying a summary page that I made for our holiday in Austria a few years ago. This time I printed the four view photos at a larger size to go in the middle with the sea pictures and a group photo of some of the walkers at the edges.


Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper - DCWV Romantic Life, Prima Zella Teal, My Mind's Eye 29th Street Market, 7Gypsies Avignon, Fancy Pants Swagger
Letters - American Crafts, Prima
Border Sticker - Fancy Pants

Tools
Fiskars Shape Cutter & Circles Templates
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Big Shot & Little B Arrow Die
X-Cut Circle Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punches

Workplace Shenanigans

Our grown-up son has almost disappeared from my scrapbooks, so when he showed me a series of photos that he took at work, I was keen to get copies and scrapbook them. He was originally trying to take a new photo for his security pass when one of his colleagues photobombed him and silliness ensued. 

I printed six photos and used Sketch #192 from Sketch-n-Scrap for my page. This one has four portrait photos, but it wasn't too much bother to adapt it for six landscape photos instead, although it meant moving my title down below the photos.

I started out from the 'One of a Kind' paper on the left, a scrap that I've been wanting to use up, and based the rest of my paper choices around it. Most of them are fairly old, and hard to match with more modern embellishments, so I went with simple punched shapes and gold glitter tape. I also added staples and brads for the 'Pin the Tail on the Donkey' challenge from our birthday cybercrop over at For the Love of Pretty Paper, a challenge to use embellishments that fix things together (though I've swapped the tiny blue brads for larger brown ones since taking this photo).

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, Papermania
Paper - Sandylion One of a Kind, K&Company, Jillibean Soup, My Mind's Eye
Letters - Basic Grey
Glitter Tape - Hobbycraft
Brads - Papermania
Staples - American Crafts
Ink - Ranger
Mist - Docrafts

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
American Crafts Stapler
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
Hobbycraft Star Punch

Cruise Norway

I finished my Norwegain Cruise album a couple of weeks ago, but there was one more page needed, a summary page that will go in my 2019 album and point out the existence of the holiday album. I took a similar approach to the one that I made for our holiday to Austria in 2014, creating a cutfile from the country's name and backing each letter with a photo from the trip. 

I was part way through making this page when our birthday party cybercrop started over at For the Love of Pretty Paper, and I put it to one side until I realised that I could finish it for one of the challenges. 'Guests' asked us to use lots of the same type of embellishment on a page; I was already planning to use up some of my leftover puffy stickers from the main album on this page, but the challenge made me add more and just using the red ones gave me ten in total without looking excessive.

Supplies
Cardstock - Papermania
Paper - Pinkfresh Studio Out and About, Pinkfresh Studio Let Your Heart Decide
Letter Stickers - Echo Park
Puffy Stickers - Pinkfresh Studio, Elle's Studio, American Crafts/Shimelle
Ink - Memento

Tools
Silhouette Portrait 

Celebrate

We had eighteen challenges in the recent birthday cybercrop at For the Love of Pretty Paper, and the very last one, 'Midnight Madness', was to combine any five of the others on one page.

I chose to do these with a group photo from my friend's 50th birthday party. Coincidentally, all the guests in this picture wore black sparkly outfits while the birthday girl (centre) was in dark cerise pink so I used that as the main colour in my page. I had pinched some of the table confetti from the evening to use on the page if I could, and it worked out quite well.

I didn't choose my five challenges in advance, but kept a list beside me and worked out which ones could be included as I went along. I ended up with something sparkly or glittery, circles, lots of layers, new stash (silver glitter tape) and lots of the same embellishment (gems).

Supplies
Paper - My Mind's Eye Collectable, Hot Off the Press Garnet Sarabook
Vellum - My Mind's Eye
Letters - American Crafts
Frame & Glitter Tape - from Advent Swap
Enamel Hearts - Marianne Designs
Gems - Simply Creative
Ink - Hobbycraft

Tools
Big Shot & Doily Die

Going, Going, Gone

Last month, the chimney of a retired power station near us was blown up. We knew in advance and quite a crowd turned up to watch, safe on the opposite bank of the river. I took a series of time-lapse photos and printed three of them to run across the page in a horizontal line.

I've adapted this month's single page sketch from Stick It Down by extending the row of photos. I matted them first on black cardstock then looked for a patterned paper with black in it, pulling out a stripey one from Junkitz with a 2005 date. The problem with paper that old was finding anything else to match the colours in it, and I ended up using plain cardstock for the rest of my layers and I couldn't find a second paper to make the split background.

My page also fits another of the birthday party challenges at For the Love of Pretty Paper where 'Sleeping Lions' asked us to create a page with a horizontal design.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill, Papermania, Stampin' Up!
Paper - KaiserCraft PS I Love You, Echo Park Winter Park, Junkitz Winter
Washi Tape - Ebay
Enamel Dots - Echo Park
Ink - Hobbycraft
Mist - Docrafts

Tools
Silhouette Portrait
Big Shot & Little B Arrow Die
Fiskars Postage Stamp Border Punch
Woodware Scalloped Circle Punch
X-Cut Corner Punch

Christmas Starts Here

We ended the year over at For the Love of Pretty Paper with a cybercrop to celebrate the group's fifth birthday. The admin team organised 18 challenges across New Year's Eve which is far too many for me to do them all, but gives me a wide variety to choose from.

I started with 'Musical Statues' which asked us to use a vertical design or vertical stripes, and picked December's single page sketch from Stick It Down to go with two photos from a Christmas party that we attend every year.

I like to use a traditional colour palette of red, green and gold for Christmas photos; for this page I mixed a variety of old and new papers from several different manufacturers.

Supplies

Cardstock - DCWV, Stampin' Up!

Paper - American Crafts Be Merry, Carta Bella Christmas Market, Simple Stories DIY Christmas

Letters - We R Memory Keepers
Glitter Tape - Hobbycraft?

Puffy Stars - Bella Boulevard

Ink - Ranger

Mist - Docrafts

Tools

Silhouette Portrait

Big Shot & X-Cut Star Die

Woodware Tiny Star Punch

BBQ Fun

I have four pages left to go in my cruise album, so I should get it finished by the end of the month, which is marvellous as the last one took me almost a year to complete. However, I am waiting on a delivery of photos for those last four pages so I can't make them yet.

While I've been concentrating on the cruise album, I've been neglecting the rest of 2019. This was going to be the year that I kept up with scrapping the year as we went along, and I was fairly good at that until August when I was scrapping summer photos, but nothing since.

I have a list and a plan, and even some photos printed, so this page is from July when we had a family barbecue at my brother's. The photos are from the many-a-side volleyball and badminton games that we played, and I used Scraplift #29 from the Scrap Squad on Facebook, which was a page by Sara Epsy for Page Maps.

I chose a triangle-print paper for my background, but it's the only one that I have from that collection so the cream was hard to match. However the design of the page meant that I could cut a strip from it and turn it over, while the red print covers the gap. I do have the matching enamel dots so I took the opportunity to add all the triangular ones here, copying the row of wood veneer triangles on the original page but moving them up slightly.

Supplies
Cardstock - Bazzill
Paper - My Mind's Eye Hooray!, American Crafts/Dear Lizzy Lucky Charm
Letters - American Crafts Thickers
Stickers - Crate Paper/Maggie Holmes Sunny Days
Enamel Triangles - My Minds Eye Hooray!
Washi/Glitter Tape - Tesco, Unknown
Ink - Ranger
Mist - Docrafts

Tools
Big Shot
Dovecraft Label & Tag Dies
X-Cut Camera Die
X-Cut Circle Punch

Tea for Two

We celebrated our silver wedding anniversary last year, and one of our presents was a voucher for afternoon tea at a local hotel. It took us almost a year to redeem it, but we had our tea a few weeks ago so this is another page for my 2019 album.

I printed four photos in a variety of sizes, but then shuffled them round the page a few times without hitting on a decent layout. But then I acquired a copy of Becky Fleck's Page Maps book, and this is a scraplift of one of its pages. The original was a double page in 8.5 x 11 but I used about two-thirds of the layout for a 12x12 instead.

I've used yellow, stickers and spots for Week 1 of the Summer Fiesta at For the Love of Pretty Paper, and also yellow and food for the Scrap your Summer event at Lottie Loves Paper.

Supplies
Paper - Bo Bunny Early Bird, Kit 'n Kraft
Letters - American Crafts
Stickers - Crate Paper/Maggie Holmes
Puffy Hearts - American Crafts
Ink - Memento

Tools
Big Shot & Doily Die
Fiskars Bracket Border Punch