Pin it!

No, not another reference to Pinterest, but a title inspired by a piece of paper I spotted in the shop. 

At the recent retreat, I picked up the collection pack for the new Echo Park 'Note to Self' range.  I'd been waiting for the papers to come in to the shop ever since I spotted the viewmaster image on one of the papers in the CHA sneaks.  It wasn't until I opened the pack up that I saw the corkboard paper.  It's the reverse side of a striped sheet, so isn't immediately noticeable but I fell in love with the print and, after a chat with some of the girls, decided that it would be perfect for 'pinboard' style layouts (thanks Sarah!).

My aim was to create the look of a noticeboard with bits and bobs 'pinned' on.  For my first page, I created my own piece of notepaper using a lined sheet from the pack and a notepad punch.  The composition evolved with the addition of other elements from the pack and some bits that I liberated from the other DT girls (thanks Lou for the washi tape, Tracy for the woodgrain dymo tape and Jen for the blue glitter!)  I also created a frame around the whole page by making holes all around the edge with a paper piercer to echo the holes that pins make in a pinboard.  During our late night scrapping giddiness, the little blue hearts actually adorned another couple of parts of the layout but that's a whole different blogpost ;)

The photo was taken on Mother's Day by my daughter and my journaling is a reminder to make sure that we make time to be a couple and do things that make us happy without the children once in a while.

I have Lou to thank for one of the ideas on my second layout: to create another noticeboard effect, I used strips of washi tape and stuck brads where they cross, to look like the type of board which has ribbons pulled across it to tuck notes into.

To continue the theme between these pages, I 'borrowed' (thanks Jen!) a small section of an Authentique sheet with the male and female images on them to repeat the images used in my first layout.  So on the following pages for George and Oliver, there are two little boy images and I have a girl one saved up for a page about my daughter too.

There's not a great deal of journaling on this page, just a selection of photos  and embellishments to show the things that George can be found doing right now.  The new letter stickers from Studio Calico are a perfect colour match for this line of papers and I used them to label some of the small photographs.

My last twist on the pinboard theme was to mount a piece of the corkboard paper onto a piece of kraft card to make it look like a framed board.  There were some photo corners on the sticker sheet that I wouldn't normally use but they were perfect to edge the corners of the cork paper.  

Right now, Oliver uses a lot of words and phrases that are very  unique to him and I used this as an opportunity to record some of them.  To continue the theme, I used some Studio Calico Scrap Pads like post-it notes stuck onto the wall with little messages of journaling on them.  I attached a few with brads and also found some very old 'snaps' that need setting like an eyelet which I added to the top corner of the photograph.

Finally, to show another way in which I've used this collection pack and the theme of pinning and noticeboards, I made this page entitled 'Choo Choo!'.  

I used a strip of the cork paper behind the photostrip, before adding some of the sticker borders from the collection pack.  One of the papers had lots of small cricles on it which inspired me to punch them out and create the confetti-like areas.  I also punched some smaller circles using my crop-o-dile and added some of the metallic brads which I'd used on my previous pages.

I've noticed that a few manufacturers have released some embellished paperclips and had a go at making my own to hold the photograph onto the cork paper.  After hunting high and low for a paperclip, I finally found a blue one which luckily coordinated and added a tiny strip of a matching paper to the top, cutting the ends diagonally to make a banner shape.  The final touch was to frame the noticeboard section of the page with some machine stitching.

Thanks for reading and remember to link up any layouts that are inspired by our ideas or use the products from the shop.  Leave a comment here or on our Facebook page so that we can come and have a look :)

Click on the links to find the products that I used: