More Charming....

It's Natalie again with my second page using the new gorgeous This & that "Charming" line from Echo Park.

I love the versatility of papers made of various patterned strips like the Border Strips sheet in this range - you could easily create a page with one of these and a sheet of cardstock or background paper alone. I used several strips cut from this sheet to add patterns under my photo.

I combined these with the worn-dotted border stamp from the My Minds Eye's Dilly Dally Adventure stamps - using versamark and copper embossing powder to suit my page. Heat embossing directly on my photo did make it crack a little, so I added a strip of the October Afternoon Farmhouse twine across the area to cover most of it up.

Again, the letters on the12x12 alpha sheet were great for my title, which I added straight on to my photo. The "Remember" wooden tab you can see to the left is also from the same sheet.

Hexagons and octagons are everywhere at the moment, so I hand cut a few for my page from scraps of the papers in clusters to my page. I added a stamped banner across one cluster, and heat embossed a heart directly on to the other.

My final embellishment cluster was made simply by popping some MME Miss Caroline "love" buttons and pins together. I love the contrast of the wooden button with the crystal-effect one.

 

The heart pin was actually a bright fuchsia pink, but I easily customised the colour to suit my page in three easy steps:
(please excuse the quality of these mobile phone pictures)
First I pressed the pin into a versamark pad to give it a good coating of adhesive:

 

Then I dipped it into the copper embossing powder:

 And finally after a quick blast with a heat gun, my pink heart had a copper finish:

Thank you as always for popping by the blog. There have been lots of new CHA arrivals in the shop this week, including Jilly Bean, SEI, Lilly Bee Designs and Simple Stories - so why not make that your next destination?!  ;)

My supplies included:

InLinkz.com

Charming pages for your album :)

It's Natalie here for the next two days to show you how I put the gorgeous Echo Park This & That Charming collection to good use in my album....

My fist page is this, documenting about how MR T and I love planning little photographic adventures for days out together.

As always, click for a larger view of any picture

I have mentioned before how I am thoroughly enjoying the A4 format at the moment, and it's a perfect, easy solution for when you hit that "which side of the gorgeous double sided paper do I use?" dilemma....as you can see from the picture below, after you have cut a 12x12 sheet down to make an A4 base for your page, you still have a generous strip of paper left to make use of the other side:

I created my title using the lovely 12x12 sheet of alpha stickers from the collection, which contains a mix of scrabble tiles and dymo label effect letters. They also contain lots of other stickers, including some journalling spots, tabs and banners.

I set them on a mat that I created by layering a doily and a circle of the Yardsticks paper on the corner of my page, and trimming away the excess when I was happy with the layout. I later added some tape and journalling strips.

I was super happy to discover that the gorgeous little ticket stamps in the new Dilly Dally "Adventures" stamps from My Minds Eye's Miss Caroline Range fitted nicely in my (pre-historic) original Sizzix ticket-shaped die cuts, so after die-cutting the shapes from some scraps of Kraft I stamped the tickets in blue ink. The see-through nature of the acrylic stamps made lining the image up with my cut shape easy. You an also see some of the border stamps from the set just peeping out below:

I added a second stamped ticket, this time in grey, to my second cluster of embellishments. The heart embellishment was created by ruffling some ribbon from the October Afternoon trim set and popping the yellow banner sticker from the 12x12 alpha sheet on top. I then hand cut a heart from some of the patterned paper, thread some grey twine from the trims though a wooden button from the Miss Caroline Fiddlesticks Pins & Buttons set and popped these on top of the banner. The cluster was complete with a couple of pins from the Fiddlesticks pack - they were quite bright for my page so I toned them down with a swipe of brown Stazon.

Pop back tomorrow to see a second page created with the papers, and another tip for customising pins.

Thanks for stopping by as always.

My supplies included:

InLinkz.com

Sugar high!

Funny stories always deserve to be scrapped, and this one has been waiting a few months to be documented. I had been holding out for the perfect papers to go with the photos, and the new Pebbles 'Hip Hip Hooray' line was just right. 

These photos tell a story that happened on Benjamin's first birthday. It was my bright idea to give him a cupcake to eat. I had seen some photos on Pinterest (oh that place has a lot to answer for!) of kids eating cake on their birthdays and though it would make for a cute photo shoot, along with the fact that you should always have cake on your birthday! Of course, I should have predicted it, the little one got a massive sugar high after smooshing cake all over his face and gobbling it up! It was so hilarious to see him prancing around the room, struggling to stay upright and making some very funny moves - he looked like he was doing a drunken dance! Part of me feels a bit guilty when I look at these photos, for I know there are mums out there that would thoroughly disapprove of giving a one year old a whole cupcake (and frosting!), but mostly I remember how funny it was and how much he laughed and had a great time. 

The wiggly lined paper was the first one I picked out - it reminds me how he was walking in wiggly lines, and I love the fun bright colours. I have actually mixed in a couple of papers from Pebbles' other new line - County Picnic. I often find that lines from the same manufacturer have similar tones and feel to them even if at first glance they seem completely different! If you are nervous about mixing up papers from different lines, why not try mixing two lines from the same manufacturer like this and see how well it works.

InLinkz.com

March Challenge

Ready for another challenge ? This month's challenge is brought to you by Ifa and I am challenging you to create a layout inspired by the work place.

Do you work ? I challenge you to scrap about your work, whether you love it or loath it. If you don't work, how about scrapping about your dream work ? What about using some office inspired supply to make your layout ?

Before you go away and create your layout, here are some examples created by the DT.

Nat is a teacher but prior to this she had a few diffrent jobs.

I love all the different pictures she used. This is what she said,

I've scrapped the fact that I am now a teacher a few times, however as I entered the working world when I was 16 and didn't go to uni until I was 25, I'd had a few different jobs before this. Until Ifa set this challenge I realised that these have gone unscrapped. The road that led me to make the decision to go into teaching was long and varied, made me the person I am today and taught me countless valuable skills, so the opportunity to document my career prior to teaching has been a welcome one.

I totally loved making this page - it was a challenge to trawl through old pics and find one that matched each time period, with the relevant people where possible. As for putting it together - I mixed up some really old October Afternoon die-cut sheets that I found at the bottom of a box along with scraps from new ranges that were quite literally lying on my desk from my last project, it was so fun to just pick up scraps and find a way to use them on the page. The tba that says "My Journey" is a file card that pulls out to reveal details and memories of each of my jobs.


Our new girl, Jen Garret has scrapped about her new job on the DT.

Jen said,

The photos are my LO's for the January kit and I used the leftovers from the January kit on the LO. I often tell my 3 boys "mummy's working" when I try to get away with scrapping when they are in the house. Now it's true!

I hasten to add, that when I asked, Jen said she does not get away with telling her boys this LOL.

Jen Naulls' pretty layout is next,

Jen said,
It's about going back to work after having Benjamin, and trying to find a balance between work me and mummy me

I am guessing Jen found a good balance as this layout is so happy and pretty. I wonder what she wrote...

Lastly, mine is about my son who wanted to be a Police Officer when he was 4 or 5.

At the end of his reception year at school, J came home with a CD. Their class teacher had prepared a Powerpoint presentation of all the boys in class and what they want to be when they grow up, complete with individual photos. I had completely forgotten about this ambition till a few weeks ago when I found it on my computer. Sadly, J is now 16 and does not really know what he wants to do.

I hope you are feeling inspired to join in. Link up your entry below so we can come and look. There is a £20 e-voucher to spend at Sarah's Cards for the winner. Come on, that's got to be worth getting the scissors and glue out.

Still waiting for baby.

I have another 2 LOs that I created for my friends baby's album to share with you today. Both are very simple in style, and use techniques showcased previously on this blog. See how to create a photo strip/collage here, and how to create spot colour on a photo here.

I dipped into old stash and used a piece of My Mind's Eye turquoise spotty paper that I fell in love with, and never used (we're all guilty of that aren't we?). The brightness of the tturquoise contrasted really well with the classic black and cream of the Teresa Collins paper.

I used the new American Crafts knock out border punch system, which I have to say, I really, really, really like. Such a clever idea, and takes up less storage space than other punches.

I mounted the photos onto white card stock, in card format, so that they opened to reveal journaling space for the mum to be to record about the guests, games and the gifts etc.

The Knock Out system is so easy to use. You need to buy the starter kit which includes the punch frame, and a dotted scallop cartridge. You also get 2 pattern pieces to help you align the paper you are punching.



The cartridge sits in the centre space, and the two little pieces are marked A and B and fit into the spaces either side.

Once the pieces are in place you punch as you would with any border punch.

To punch another design you simply change the cartridge and the little pieces and off you go. It really is an easy system to use.

If you want to own one of these they can be found in the shop here.

The last LO I have to share records a worrying afternoon spent at the hospital being monitored. Ever the scrapper, whilst we were there I took a photo of the foetal monitor and the printout that showed how active the baby had been.

I used a waste piece of card that had had stars cut from it on a craft robo (thanks Helen) as a mask. Using cream mist first, then slightly moving the stencil before misting with turquoise creates a shadow effect.

The LO was kept really simple with just a few strips of patterned paper a die cut for journaling to be added to. I added a machine stitched border around the edge and a section of random zig zag stitching to echo the patterns on the heart beat trace.

Hopefully the little man will behave and not cause anymore worry for his mum and won't keep us all waiting for too long before he makes his appearance.

Keep popping back every couple of days to see what the rest of the team have been up to, and for the chance to take part in challenges and win e-vouchers to spend in the shop.