Mixed Media + Layout

I've been playing around with mixed media a bit lately and decided to finely put a bit of it on a layout.

 

 

This page is blue cardstock and on it I've used a Stencil and with it I used an artist's knife to smear Gesso over it.  This has resulted in the unusual yet nice 1/2 circular design in top right and bottom left corners.  Gesso is great for work on pages because it dries so quickly and doesn't warp your paper.  I've then cut a 12" circle using the new Martha Stewart Circle Punch, best product I've purchased in a long time, it takes all the guesswork and measuring out of creating circles and the bonus is that you get gorgeous edges as well.  I then cut another one using the same punch, that is only 6" across.  This punch cutes from 6 - 12 inch circles.  Then got into my flower stash which I can't help doing with my granddaughters pages, and a few other smaller embellishments from my stash, mainly the bird at the top and in the centre at the bottom is a cute little resin embellishment which has a butterfly on it, this was made by an Australian Company called Handmade Halo Designs and I love all there products.  Thank you for looking.

 

 

Designer Showcase: Winter

Brrrr! December was really cold. Then we had a few days in January when we hit warmer temps.  My daffodils started to pop up! Last week we plunged into the single digits with negative wind chills on the Fahrenheit scale!  I think winter is letting us know that it is not quite over!

Cathy here to bring you this weeks Designer Showcase. Our theme is Winter!  These projects are going to highlight all the chills and thrills of winter. But they will also warm your heart!

Isn't this so cool? I love how Cindy created her title.  She made the circles just like the stone and wrapped the word "curling" around it!  Then she repeated those colors in the stripe in the middle of the page. This gives the page the feel of the motion of the curling!  Really neat.

This layout, also by Cindy, is just so adorable. It's all about the first time her son saw snow.  The background paper is embossed with snowflakes - great way to add some interest and texture to pages.  I also like how Cindy offset the photos on the far left and far right of the double page spread.  

  

Winter in Northern Michigan is a great place to play and Marlene wanted to do a page highlighting snowshoes but couldn't find an embellishment to match.  The snowshoes were made using a Cricut Expression and Cricut Craft Room by welding three different characters, then cutting out four snowshoes.  Magic Mesh was placed on top of two cuts (bottom/base), then the remaining cuts were layered to cover the base.  The mesh was easy to trim, since it went on top of the bottom cut, the outline was very visible.  The mesh made great webbing for the snowshoes.  Such a clever way to create her own embellishments!  The bling in the title and the trees adds to the feeling of a chilly winter's day!

Lesley has shared two wintry layout with us. In this first one she captures the Magic of Winter using some holiday papers and elements. She added snowflakes and beautiful white lattice to bring out the winter side of things. Great way to stretch your scrapping budget by making use of leftover supplies.

In this second page, Lesley has reflected the brightness of winter with the choice of her background  patterned and accent papers.  That huge snowflake matting her photos is the perfect addition to the page. It adds to the cool wintry look with its blue colors and bling, yet the subtle shape lends itself to representing the sun and warm happy memories!

Our final project to share with you is a card that I made. Winter is a great time to send warm wishes to friends and family.  I used these digital papers since the blue colors and snowflake patterns really represent winter.  To warm the card up a bit, I created the hot cocoa mug using my Silhouette Cameo. I added "steam" by cutting a piece of vellum and adding some Stickles bling to it.

We hope that you are finding your winter days to be warm and filled with memories to scrap!

Making Resin Embellishments

Hi, it’s Gael here today and I’ve been having fun making my own resin embellishments.  I’d like to show you what you need and how I make my resin embellishments.

You will need the following - 2 part resin (I use the one from the local “Spotlight” store), some moulds,  gloves,  a small disposable plastic container and a stick for stirring.

NOTE: Follow the instructions on the resin as it may vary depending on the brand you are using. 
For the brand I use I pour equal parts (for example - one cap full) of the Part A Hardener and Part B Resin into the plastic container and stirred for at least 2 minutes using the wooden stick.  
It’s a bit hard to see in the photo below but you do get air bubbles at this stage. 

There are a number of mediums you can use to colour the resin, in this example I used white acrylic paint.  After adding the paint I stirred with the wooden stick until well mixed. 

At this stage it’s best to let the resin sit for a minute or two as this reduces the air bubbles.

Then pour the resin into your moulds.

I like to leave the moulds for about 24 hours to ensure the resin is set hard.

When you come back the next day just flex the mould and the resin embellishment should easily come out.

As you can see it’s not hard it just requires a few moulds and the resin and you’re ready to go. 

Thanks for looking and I hope you try making resin embellishment.  It’s a lot of fun!!

Reader's Pages: Year in Review

Happy Monday!!  Cathy here, and I'm so excited to be bringing you some Reader's Pages today. We've got some really cool Year in Review pages to share. So let's get to it!

Michelle shared a few pages that she has created.  This first one is completed with photos, embellishments and journaling. She used a blocked look to get all those photos on the 2-pages. I really like how she offset some of the photos. It really helps to highlight them.

Michelle also shared a few pages prior to adding her photos. Let's us get a "behind-the-scenes" look at the design process. I really like how Michelle works with coordinating papers and adds a touch of shape and pattern to each of her designs.  She also adds just enough embellishments for interest but allows her photos to be featured.  You can see more of Michelle's work at her blog Homespun Scrapbooking.

Next up, we have a few digital pages from Rachel. In this first one, she has also blocked the photos and included one from each month of the year. I really love the way she did her journaling.  She ran through the highlights of the year and listed them in chronological order by month. This allowed her to include so much information in a concise way. It also makes you realize just how busy a family can be! 

On this page Rachel focused on the year from her perspective.  This is like one big Pinterest board of visual memories. She included tons of photos that are special to her. I love the way she designed the page to have emotional emphasis through the negative space.  The placement of the year and brackets gives the feeling of looking into the future and the excitement of making many more memories.

This page is also by Rachel. I just love that she took a look back at her year through the books that she read. From what I've heard, she read a lot of books!  These are her top 12 picks. What a great idea and fun way to look back over the year at accomplishments that you or your family have made.  You can see even more of Rachel's work in her gallery at The Digi Chick.

Kristin shared this adorable page that she created.  The page is filled with shapes and patterns and textures. Did I mention that it is a digi page? Just so much to love on this page. The little doodle hearts are so cute and really let you know that these two are in love. I like how Kristin carried the curve of the hearts and big circle into the design of the tabs for the months. Such a neat idea to capture similar photos each month to use on a project like this.  With so many using Instagram and other cell phone photo apps, it makes it easy to collect these close ups of you and your loved one (or two - check out the month of May - love how they snuck that little guy in there!) Visit Kristin's galleries at Sweet Shoppe Designs or scrapbook.com to see more of her creative work.

And now for dessert.... Susan created this "sweet" page "This Year in Cupcakes". It is a yummy page with the wonderful cupcake photos and the use of washi tape. Sorry, but I couldn't resist the puns, just like I can't resist these cupcakes! The washi tapes add a lot of color, pattern and eye candy to the layout. Placing them on an angle really helps to add movement and flow to the design too.  This would be a great idea to do with leftover scraps of designer patterned papers too.  I also like how Susan brought the cupcake shapes out of the photos and onto her page with the use of circle journal spots.  Such a tasteful page! (You knew that pun was coming, didn't you?)  Susan has a gallery at Two Peas in a Bucket where you can see more of her designs.

For more Year-in-Review inspiration, check out these 2 previous posts on Ideas For Scrapbookers: Designer Showcase: Capturing Life; and Exploding Box.

Thank you ladies for sharing your amazing designs and creativity with us and our readers!

I did my best to gather some info on the products that these gals used for their creations:

Rachel

Family Highlights: Template: Paper Blocks - In Review by Michelle Batton; Digital kit: Thankful by Elise's Pieces.
This is My 2012: Template: Misty Cato's 100 things (revised);  Digital kit: Life Story by Sherwood Studio;  Alpha: Life Story Chalked Alpha by Sherwood Studio
Top 12 Reads: Template: Insta-Love Holiday Templates by Nettio Designs; Digital kits: The Upside of Down Kit and Journal Set, Copper Road, Memory Keeper, Fierce Beauty, Shabby Couture, and Journey, all by Etc by Danyale. 

Kristin

Us in 2012: Template: Year in Review by Penny Stringmann; Digital Kit: Talking About Us by Studio Basic Designs

Susan

This Year in Cupcakes: Alpha: Thickers by American Crafts; Journaling Spots: Anna Griffin (red, yellow, blue), Little Yellow Bicycle (yum, made with love); Washi tape: My Mind's Eye, Target, Queen & Co., Freckled Fawn, Wal-mart, Martha Stewart, We R Memory Keepers, Bella Blvd., KI Memories

(sorry, I was not able to get a list of the papers etc used for Michelle's wonderful pages)

Hybrid Interactive Layout using Silhouette

On a vacation in Wyoming we had a ton of fun trying on cowboy hats.  We didn't get pictures of all of the hats that we tried on (believe it or not), but we did take a few.  I just had to create a scrap page to remember all the fun that we had.  When I started to lay it out, one page got to be too crowded. So I made it a double page.

I designed the layout in my Silhouette Studio Designer Edition software. I set my design size to 12"x24" to accommodate the 2 12'x12" pages.  Then I set out the photo blocks and elements that I wanted to include. 

The digital kit that I used is a collab by the designers at The DigiChick called Howdy Ma'am. It's a great kit for travel, outdoors, edgy,  camping, hiking, you name it.

When I look at each of the photos, I think of a western "wanted" poster. That's where the title of the page came from "Wanted Cowboy Hats". I used a few western and cowboy inspired shapes from the Silhouette online store to create the title. The letters for the word "hats" is a font called Outlaw. I typed the letters in the Silhouette software, then filled them with a color to match the digi papers.  I then used the offset option in the software to create an edge around the letters, like a sticker.  I turned the cut lines off ("no cut") for the actually font, but kept them on for the offset. I then print and cut the letters.

I also print and cut the swinging saloon doors.  My Cameo cuts pretty spot on for print and cut (yes I have calibrated it), but sometimes it might be off just a tad, especially if there isn't enough light when it reads the registration marks. So rather than just fill the door shapes with the digital papers, I create a box shape around the shape I want to cut. I then fill that box with the digi paper and turn the cut lines to "no cut" for the box, but let the shape still be set to cut. This way I get the color/pattern paper all the way to the edges of the shape that I'm cutting.

To get the look of metal for the hinges, after print and cutting them, I coated the top of them in Top Emboss. I then covered them with copper embossing powder and heat embossed them until it melted all nice.  A little bit of ink on the edges gave them a worn look.

Here's a look at each of the 2 pages

Left side

Right side

And here's a peak at the photo behind the saloon doors

Designer Showcase: Journal Cards

Have you been seeing journal cards on projects?  I've seen them popping up in all sorts of kits, both digital and traditional. They seem to have gotten a big push with Project Life. Now they are being used in a number of ways.  Hi there! It's Cathy here to share this weeks Designer Showcase, which, as you probably guessed, is all about journal cards.

Project Life is a scrapbook methodology created by Becky Higgins that was started to help simplify the process. To help get your memories and your life recorded, but to do so in an effective and efficient manner that leaves you more time to spend on.... your life.  To do this, she incorporates the use of  photo pocket pages and 4x6 journal cards to help you get it done.  You can read more about Project Life here.

K&Company has also used similar ideas with their Smash books. They have coordinating Smash Pads that make the journaling so much easier!

You can use these products and techniques in your own style of scrapbooking.  Many scrapbookers have been making their own journal cards.  Whether you use predefined prompts, or just let the writing flow, the end result is the same: you are getting your life recorded!  Here are some projects where we've used journaling cards.

In the layout above, Marlene was scrapping a fun day that needed a bit of explanation   She had created the layout with a blocked area for the photos.  This didn't leave her much room for journaling.  So she slipped a journaling card between the main part of the layout (blue) and the outer frame (black). She attached a string to the skunks tail that when pulled reveals her journaling. Clever!  A great use for a journaling card and a great way to place your journaling if you want it to be hidden.

This is an older double page layout that I did. I cropped journal cards, envelopes and my photos all the same size (I think they are 2x3").  I added journaling to the cards and placed some ephemera from our trip in the envelopes. A bit of paint on a roller stamp made a border frame. Without a lot of elements to layer, it was a quick page to create that captured many fond memories.

This is another quick page that I created (quite some time ago). My one son and I love to ride Rock n' Roller Coaster when we go to Disney World.  The photos are the ones that you can buy at the shop and the end of the ride.  I used a journal card that had the prompts pre-printed on it.  It made it so fast to get down the basic facts. I then added a Disney sticker and a Prima rhinestone guitar and the page was done!

These are part of an album in progress. My apologies for the poor photos of it.  I'm currently working on this in my spare time.  It has photos from a trip that we took to Hawaii. There are so many wonderful photos and fantastic memories to include in the album.  Rather than doing my typical scrapbook pages of all the photos (which would take me a long time), I'm creating this album that has 4x6 prints of the photos as well as some hand made journal cards. I've been using my Silhouette Cameo to create the journal cards. Some are shapes that can be purchased in the Silhouette Online Store (they have lots of them!).  Some I create by "welding" shapes or fonts.  They are making it easy for me to document the trip as I work on the album.

I'm sure that many of you have used journal cards creatively in your projects. We'd love to see them. Send them to me at scrappycath(@)gmail(.)com (minus the parentheses) and we'll showcase them in an upcoming Reader's Pages post!

NEW Contributing Artist!!

Hey, Pam here! I love day's like today. Introducing new contributing artists is one of my favorite posts. To be able to share so much talent here is so fun!!  I am always so excited (yes I still get excited) when new people join in with the blog! Cathy and I are honored to have Sarah Routledge join the team!  We had Sarah guest design with us in September and she created the most adorable birdhouse.. you can see the posts here.  Please stop on by Sarah's blog here to congratulate here and and see more of her work: http://sarahs-scrapbook.blogspot.ca/ . Let's get to know her again and then I will be posting a few of her favorite projects.  You will see why I adore her projects sooo much!!!

My name is Sarah and I live in Ontario, Canada. I am a married, working mom to one beautiful little boy. I started scrapbooking about five years ago, and immediately fell in love with it. I absolutely love the creative process of putting together a scrapbook page. I love trying different (non-traditional) materials and new techniques; one of my favourite things to do is to make handmade embellishments. Although most of my work is layouts, I also enjoy using my scrapping supplies for other crafty items (e.g. holiday and home décor). I currently design for ScrapThat! Kit Club, Imaginarium Designs, The Paper Mixing Bowl Challenge Blog and the Scrap for Help Challenge Blog - and I am so thrilled and excited to join Ideas for Scrapbookers. You can see my scrapbooking creations on my blog: Scattered Pictures and Memories.

 

 

Thanks so Sarah for joining as contributing artist at Ideas for Scrapbookers!!

Designer Showcase: Calendars

Welcome to Wednesday!  Some people celebrate Wednesday as the "middle of the week" - it's half way through the work week. Which means we're on our way to another weekend!!  Here at Ideas For Scrapbookers, we celebrate with a little Designer Showcase.  And to keep track of all those days, we thought we would focus on calendars.  (Did you like that segue??)

Calendars are a great way to display and share your memories. You can make calendars in all sorts of shapes and sizes.  Pam created this calendar to reflect a particular date.  She included a precious photo and quote from her son.  This could stand alone as a monthly calendar.  I can just see it as a CD sized calendar on a desk, or in a flip book style calendar.  It could even be used as a date element on a scrapbook page. Lots of versatility here.

Digital scrapbook supplies can be used to create a calendar as well.  I used to make my calendars using paper and traditional supplies.  When I started getting more into digital scrapping, I found it fun to create the calendars using my digi stash.  I still print them out and bound them using my Bind-it-All.  I design the top and bottom each as an 11"x8.5" image. That way I can print them on letter sized paper.  It can be a little tricky figuring out your printer and how to print two-sided so that you get the right top facing the correct bottom, but once you do, it's pretty easy to create your own calendars.  You can include photos and elements on special dates like birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, etc.

By the way - before I had the Bind-it-All, I would simply stack the months as they should be bound, then punch 2 holes where the top meets the bottom. I would tie a small loop of ribbon through those holes to "bind" my calendars.

Another way that you can scrapbook a calendar is to create it digitally, then upload those pages to a photo service that creates calendars, like Shutterfly. You'll receive a beautifully printed and bound calendar ready for gift giving or hanging up! Or you can use a photo service to create the calendar from start to finish.  They have many designs to choose from and allow you to include one or many photos per page.

You can also create desktop wallpapers that include a calendar.  I like to change my desktop monthly.  Sometimes I create my own, but there are a lot of free desktops available for you to download and use. This makes it easy to change up your wallpaper often. One that I really like is The Shabby Princess.  Each month they share a beautifully designed desktop in .png format with openings for your photos . Just download it, open in your photo editing software, and add your photo(s) underneath the design layer. Easy-peasy!

I found another great resource to help with making a calendar. This one doesn't include photos, but it could be used for making a calendar to include in your scrapbooking or craft projects.  It is called the Harmonized House Project. It includes lots of printables that you can use to create a calendar to keep you organized, and keep track of a busy family life.

Hope this inspires you to create some calendars. Use them to organize your family or work life. Or make them a part of your Project Life scrapbooking.  They also make great gifts!!  Have fun creating!

Update: Digital kit credits:

October calendar (Wizard): Kit: Wizarding Magic by ScrapMatters Design Team (2010 no longer available); Calendar Topper Templates and Calendar Bottom Dotted Lines by Graham Like the Cracker (retired)

April Calendar: Kit: 2013 Calendar by Chelle's Creations.

January 2013 Desktop: by Shabby Princess.