Friday, September 28, 2012

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's the cutest little super hero ever!  Well to me he is. 

This was from Jacob's first real Halloween at age two.   Looks like he didn't quite know what to make of the party and costumes at daycare.  I think this may be one of those pages that go into Nana's album---they can fight me for it! 


I was inspired from watching a video on Prima's You Tube channel.  Drew Scott was making a lovely, very layered page and he did it by cutting up one 12x12 sheet of journaling boxes into different size boxes and rearranging them under the photo.  So, although my page looks n-o-t-h-i-n-g like his very vintage page, it is the jumping off place that got me started. 
  
Papers and journaling boxes are from Echo Park's Little Boy collection.  I also tucked in just the corners or edges from a few stray scraps and stickers that were out on my desk at the time.  The little clouds with the lightening bolts were on the opposite side of a piece of the Echo Park paper and all I had left was a scrap... but it was just enough to cut out three of them.  And, as long as I was cutting stuff out, I cut out some stars and added those with pop dots.  To balance the red from the top left corner, I added the Remember This sticker (from Jillibean Soup) in the opposite corner.  Liked the extra touch of red so much, I added the red pearls.  Last was to draw in all the stitch lines and do my journaling. 

And, oh yeah, this little wonder boy is so going to be added to Nana's album. 

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Today's page was originally made as a page kit sample (without photo or title) for an event at the store I worked for.  I always liked it but filed it away---until I pulled out Jackson's birth photo to scrap.  I guess today, new mommies bring outfits to the hospital for birth photos now and Kim had Jackson in this little brown outfit.  Cute, but not a good fit for the usual soft colors you think of for new baby layouts. 


Then I remembered this page and pulled it out to put it into use.  I added the little punched hearts to pick up on the heart on his shirt and the title (chipboard alpha from Basic Grey when they had those "chocolate" alphas in white, dark and milk chocolate---loved those!).  I wrote in the particulars of date of birth, weight---but that was it.  And yes, if you are looking closely at the writing, this little guy was not so little, 9 lbs. 11 oz.  He is a bit of a pork chop, this one! 

The printed papers are all from Bella Blvd., I think it was called a Guy's Life.  I'm not sure anymore.  But it was (and still is) my all time favorite Bella paper collection.  I adored the browns and soft blue. 

So I guess if there is a take away thought for today, it's that if you've made pages (without photos) as part of a class or as a make & take, pull them out.  You might find a nice surprise in a ready made page, just right for a photo needing a home. 

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Just a quick post this morning--have to get going and get ready for work.  This was one of those stray photos that didn't belong to any particular event, there was only one like this, so a one-pager about the Jacob-expressions was born. 

Journaling is about one morning when Boppa was a bit grumpy and Jacob leaned around his shoulder, raised one eyebrow and asked, "How's your day?"  Cracked Boppa up...end of grumpieness. 


I finally broke into my pack of Echo Park's Times and Seasons for this one.  Since the photo is black and white, I could have used any color combo really, but wanted to keep to kind of a monochromatic, black and white (off-white kind of) and added just spots of color in the layers under the photo. 

Large alphas are Thickers and the tiny alphas are from Making Memories.  Ruled tape is from 7 Gypsies, diagonal striped washi is from Bella Blvd., and the green dot is a generic one from who knows where.   Spattered some paint---and added a few brads, both plain black and gray ones amongst the paint spatters and a few sculptured bronz-ish square ones (old Making Memories set).  The couple of chipboard stars are from a Bella Blvd. chipboard sheet, and the ticket stubs and banners were cut from a sheet of the Times and Seasons paper.

And that's it--I'm off ! 

Monday, September 24, 2012

More "catch up" pages for Jacob!  Took these photos at the Lake Hodges dam museum in California.  My dad used to take us up to the over site area when we visited to show us the progress in the building of the dam.  Jacob, at four, was thrilled with these massive tires for the monstrously big trucks used in the building of the project. 


I don't know why they never got scrapped before now.  I've had them printed for ages and had the paper for years.  Just never put them together.  But when I pulled out this old line from Basic Grey (the old Vagabond collection), the grungy blues, greys and tans were perfect. 


I layered up two of the distressed "solid" blue papers along with the dotted pieces, the check, the stripe and added a punched border strip and a strip of tickets from Prima I think. 


Alphas are Thickers and Webster's Pages. The large banner sticker is from Glitz; the alphas on that are from Cosmo Cricket.  Journaling is on a pull out piece at the far right side and I stuck a small clip on this.  I cut a few banners and stapled those on, and added a black flower.  Debated on the flower after it was on--thought maybe a gear shape or two would be better, but I've decided to leave it. I think it's a tiny bit of whimsy and softness.  Anyway, it's staying.

Now I have a big pile of empty page planners and I think I will take some time today to go through photos and papers and fill them up again. 

Happy Monday!    

Friday, September 21, 2012

Just a little more girly goodness.  I'm not sure why I had this one stray photo of Miss Izzy, whether it was one I got from Kim or the only one snapped this particular afternoon or what, but since there was only one and I have no idea what was going on that day, I made the layout about her clothes.  Her mommy takes great care to dress her so very cute. 


She had on these bright striped leggings to go with her flippy little skirt and flowered shirt and I just have to laugh when I see her bounce down the hallway with that little skirt shwishing back and forth.  That's my journaling. 

The layout is much the same as the Jacob and the bunny layout posted a week or so ago.  But looks very different because of the photo size and different colors.

Papers and letter stickers were pretty much all from Echo Park's Life is Good and Little Girl collections, even the banners were cut from these papers.  The piece that was different was the small piece of purple that I matted the photo onto--that was way old, Fusion from Basic Grey (I never get rid of my Basic Grey papers) and tucked in a clip from Making Memories Take Note embellishment pack.  Then sprinkled some paint in opposite corners, punched a few hearts to scatter in there amidst the paint sprinkles, and added a bit of Stickles glitter too.    Still needed a little something, something--so I added a very decorated fabric brad from  K&Co.

Hope your day is full and fun today!  I have off all day and will be spending it in my little scrap room (well after I get the dogs out, the dishes done, and the floor vacumned---oh yeah, I think the garbage needs to go out too...  well I'll spend almost all day in there, sigh). 
  

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Time for a bit of little girl goodness.  And a change up in scrapping styles.  While I am enjoying (a lot lately) this kind of free form scrapping; the tucking in of small scraps of paper with tags and stickers and bits and pieces of journing tags sticking out, these pages wound up being much simpler. 


And that's ok with me.  I tried loosely placing strips of paper behind the lead photo and try as I might they just kept getting straightened out and lined up.  They just looked better to me straight and then I tucked in the piece of brown and thought oh yeah--it needed a border.  So there you have it...  sometimes you just have to let the paper do what it wants to. 


It's a quick post today...  I guess the overriding message is that it's ok to change up the style of your scrapping.  Otherwise every page would look so similar, it wouldn't be as interesting to peruse those albums.  And just like the selection of color, or paper---maybe the style needs to be dictated by the photos (or, er, um... the papers, if you let them...). 


I used papers and flowers from Prima, cardstock from  Bazzill and pulled out my Cricut to cut the title and the swirls.  It's called "Get Happy" cuz when I look at our little Miss Izzie in these photos, that old song, "Come on, Get Happy" started playing in my head....  (y-e-a-h, I can see what you're thinking, she has issues---she let the paper go where she thinks it wants to and the photos sing to her--ok, maybe a little less caffeine is in order...) 

Have a scrappy good day everyone (and it's really ok if your photos sing to you)! 
 

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

I have to say I am having just the best time digging through my piles of papers and putting together photos with a selection of papers and other goodies and packing them up in my page planners.  And then, I sit and work up a bunch of pages and get all excited at how many page planners I am emptying out!  Can you say, easily amused.... 

I found just a couple of Halloween photos taken from the year that Kim and Nick got married.  Jacob was all weirded out about this wedding to begin with and then he was a little worried about making it home in time for Trick or Treat, would his Mom and Nick get home in time to see him off, etc. etc.  And he wanted to be scary, not cute.  s-c-a-r-y   And he wanted a lab coat--which was kind of impossible to find for a slight-built 9 year old boy. 


I wound up using a white dress shirt in a small men's size and altering it by cutting the cuffs and shirt tails off, then hand hemming it in the car on the way home.   The "blood" accents were created a la Jacob, the mad scientist.  The s-c-a-r-y mad scientist.  Anyway this is what my journaling is about that is hidden away in the little brown paper bag at the left side of the layout. 

Cobweb-y paper and black and white dotted papers are old Making Memories, the cut out pumpkin and s-c-a-r-y guy are from an old Rusty Pickle paper, the green dot is Life of the Party from Basic Grey.  Green foam Thickers make up the title.  I added a little border strip sticker, the green felt rick rack, a bit of a ticket stub and spattered a little beige paint.  Oh, yeah. and I also punched some circle prints for new eyeballs for the pumpkin and scary guy.  They had button look eyes before, and I was going to add real buttons on top, but I liked the colors in the punched circles better. 

And another one of the page planners is empty...  giggle, giggle. 

 

Monday, September 17, 2012

I am at that point in scrapping Jacob's photos where I have to make a decision.  Do I go back and rework photos and pages from 16 years ago?  I truly have already made the decision to do this.  My decision to redo these pages is not just based on my skill at scrapping having improved (which hopefully it has), but it's based more on the fact that I started scrapping when Jacob was a baby and photos were not digital.  Some I need to make copies of before putting to paper again.  But what it's really about is that I started scrapping with no real ryhme or reason as to who the albums were going to.  They were based more on event than anything else.

Now there is no problem with scrapping this way.  No reason not to.  But it's not how I scrap now and it is not why I scrapbook.  I want people to know how I feel about them.  I want it documented how I felt about things going on in this time and place (more on that another day). 

So tonight I start to dismantle those pages I started with 16 years ago, not because of the style of the pages or my skills at the time, but because they do not tell the story I want to tell. 

Now, in the midst of all my rambling, I do have a layout to share.   It is almost "punkin" pickin'  time after all! 


The papers I used were really all partial pieces, well other than the kraft cardstock base.  They were from the old Rustly Pickle, Basic Grey, Paper Loft, and Imaginations (I think---that orange and cream harlequin is a really old paper).  Some of the pieces needed a little definition, I thought, so I drew in some sketchy lines and again around the edges of the pages.   


Alphabet letters are Thickers and Cosmo Cricket Tiny Type. 


I placed several small clusters on the pages made up of paper strips, washi tape, border punched pieces, tabs cut from a Pink Paislee journaling pad, and journaling or title stickers (sometimes just a piece or two snipped from a sticker) on each of the pages, and added my journaling.  

Have a happy day, where ever you are. 





  



Thursday, September 13, 2012

When I look at the layout I'm posting today, it occurred to me that so many of my favorite photos are not the birthday party photos, or Christmas or event type pictures, but my favorites seem to be those that are the everyday little moments.  These seem to be the things that touch my heart the most.

These little snippets of time are what I want my grandchildren to remember.  And I hope they can see themselves through my eyes and know how much they are loved.  While I enjoy making pretty pages, this is really my driving force I think. 


OK, the particulars.  I had one sheet of a craft die cut paper from Fancy Pants that I picked up oh, a couple of y-e-a-r-s ago at a stamp and scrap show.  It matched (wonder of wonders) some pieces of Fancy Pants that I had in my stash.  Sorry, haven't a clue as to the actual name of the collections this time.


I split the die cut paper and placed the two pieces at opposite sides on two pieces of kraft cardstock, then tucked in the blue and striped pieces. 

Oooops, I just realized that I didn't take a picture of the two pages together!  

Anyway, the alphabet is from Little Yellow Bicycle.  It was a great color of navy blue and navy seems to be a hard color to find in alpha stickers, so I've used this one a bunch. I added some strips from a K&Co. border pack, and punched one border piece using the Fiskars bracketed border punch.   The tickets and tags are a combination of things from Prima, Tim Holtz, and Echo Park.  I scattered a few brads and a couple of buttons and a couple of the tiny word stickers from a Cosmo Cricket Tiny Alpha set and stapled on a couple of snips of ribbon.   Printed my journaling, cut it into strips, inked and outlined the edges and stuck on a couple of tiny paper clips before I glued 'em down. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

Monday, September 10, 2012

And we are back to boy photos and filling in those gaps in Jacob's album(s). 

I've wanted to scrap these couple of photos of the Jacob-man devouring watermelon for quite some time and once again had tried them out on several different papers.  And I'd had these papers for quite a long time too, but it never occurred to me to put them together.  I was bent on using greens and reds because of the watermelon, I guess.  I tried picnic-y looking papers, I tried summer-themed papers with reds, greens and a bit of blue--that was closer-- I even started a layout with those.  But it just wasn't "right." 


I'm not even sure what prompted me to grap these papers (from Basic Grey--ummmm I think they are from Lime Rickey).  But I did and what a difference it made.  The dark blue, sunny yellow, the pink-y red and bright greens just help pop the photo. 


The stickers are a real mish mash from Crate, Lily Bee, and Echo Park.  I made the little flags from Lily Bee's banner stickers and a couple of toothpicks. 

I had lightly inked just the very edges of the main papers to eliminate that tiny white edge from showing and to mimic the outlined irregular boxes of color, so then I loosely outlined the edges of the two pages, added my journaling down the right side along the curvy edge, popped on some buttons and called it done. 


I was soooo much happier with this selection, than any of the more themed papers that I had originally selected.  Even the title, (I cheated and just used the Sweet, Sweet Summer sticker) as the title just seemed to fit with our guy chompin' away at that sweet slab of watermelon. 

Anyway, happy day all! 

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Just a little something girly---well, cuz there's a boatload more boy pages coming up. 



Anyway, we all have those days when our hair just will not lie down and do what we wish, right?  However most of us do not get to look this cute when it happens! 

I only took one photo of the two pages together... mostly because as you can see, the sun was kind of coming through the trees and while it's pretty-- it doesn't make for good photos for blogging. 

The papers are from Basic Grey, the Luscious collection.  And again, this was an exercise in stretching paper.  I had one full sheet of the green small print (used in the background) and one full sheet of the distressed solid green (also in the background), the rest of the papers were only partial sheets.  I used the white filler paper from a couple of page refills as a base to glue all the pieces on, then split the green papers across them.  After that it was a matter of piecing the remaining papers in, punching a border and adding embellishments, title and journaling.

The title was a bit much all in hot pink, but using the green wouldn't work against the green background, so I took a another cue from Miss Izzie's clothes and used a soft gray alpha set to break up all that pink a little.   Journaling is down the left side, flowers are from Prima, the accordion folded pieces are layered stickers from Basic Grey.  I think the border stickers are off a Crate Paper sticker sheet. 

OK, stretch those papers and make them work for you.  Oh, yeah and enjoy your next "bad hair day"! 




Thursday, September 6, 2012

If it seems that I am playing favorites, scrapping so many more pages of Jacob than my other two cutie-patooties, well I kind of am.   Scrapping more of him right now that is.  Grandson #1 is 16 this year-- that means I need to have his albums complete for graduation in two years.  Now I know two years seems like more than enough time to put together  a scrapbook album or two (or three, maybe four in this case).  But it will go by in the blink of an eye.  Just the way the last 16 years seem to have gone by!  And I have had a lot of catching up to do, plus repairs and secondary pages to be made.  blah, blah, blah, yadda, yadda, yadda.... 

My goal has been to focus on the partially done layouts, the repairs, and rework done on older pages and then move on.  There are plenty of Izzie and Jackson photos and layouts to come.  Although I will probably sneak in a couple of Miss izzy and Mr. Jackson here and there. 

Soooooo, this layout is still Jacob!  The photo was one of my favorites and I had tried it out on various backgrounds and just kept setting it aside as I wasn't happy with the combinations or the colors.  When they first got their dog, they signed up for puppy classes.  It seemed like a good thing to do.  Sit, stay, ok.  However, when it came time to introduce puppy to the agility course---well he was having none of it.  So Jacob thought he would show puppy what to do....  what can I say?  That's my Jacob! 


This time, I used (yep, you guessed it) more of Echo Park's Little Boy and It's a Boy's Life collections, plus one strip (the navy blue patterned pieces) of Basic Grey (I think from their June Bug line).  For a paper collection that I originally bought just for the red, white and blue pattern papers, I've gotten some real mileage out of these lines!  And that makes Nana's wallet happy, as well as my eyes! 


Even the stickers, borders and the title alphabet are from the Echo Park lines.  I especially like the sticker that says I do all my own stunts! 

The original photo on the first page, I had printed at 8x10.  And it was cute... but too big.  Rather than reprint, I just trimmed it down.   It's bigger than 5x7, I don't know by how much, didn't measure it--just kept laying it down on the page till it looked right. 


Added my journaling (h-a-n-d-w-r-i-t-t-e-n) and drew a couple of arrows, ba-dum-bump.  Another one done!   



Monday, September 3, 2012

I did it!  I created a page "a la Shimelle"!  You see I am a much more linear scrapbooker.  I mean I do love layers of paper, but I tend to use them in borders or in blocks rather than building out from under the photo.  Plus, I mostly make two-page layouts, just because I ususally  have 3-6 photos that lend themselves to a two-page layout, rather than squishing them all on one page--or printing them small to fit them in. 

And I rarely place my journaling directly on the page--unless it is along an edge or perhaps around a photo.  I just don't like my handwriting and it just distracts my eye when I see a block of it on a page---all its' imperfections just seem to scream out at me.  I know, I know, I know; it's important to include your own handwriting (I would love to see/have my grandmother's handriting on photos or recipes--am hoping my mother kept some of her letters.  I kept letters of my mothers' just for this reason.) 


Anyway, I only had this one photo of Jacob with the bunny.  The photo was taken at preschool, kind of like a school photo.  One shot was all you got.  I've been watching all of Shimmelle's videos at Two Peas in a Bucket and had it in mind to try building the irregular layers of paper out from the photo, spatter some paint and tuck the title in tightly on the arrangement of paper(s). 

I used some older My Mind's Eye papers (from their Laundry Line collection), a few little pieces from one of their 6x6 pads, a piece of older Making Memories paper (with the postage stamp edge), a punched border piece that was just laying on my desk top leftover from another layout, and then I wanted that doily tucked in look---but what? No doilies!  So, I cut up the backing up from a package of Primas.   And that little leaping bunny?  That came from a Melissa Frances pack that I found when I was cleaning out stuff!  Haven't even a clue as to how old it is.  Kismet!!!   Title letters are Thickers.  Spattered some paint and added the buttons.

Sounds quick, huh?  But in reality this took me all afternoon!  This process was a bit foreign to me and it took me longer than if I had fallen back on my regular process.  But it was so totally worth it.  I love the page and I will definately be working more at this process to be able to include more pages like this in my albums.  So, try something new and then try it again.  It was fun and refreshing to mix it up. 

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Well I did say I had gone back and made secondary pages for a bunch of layouts that were store samples and this is one of them.  I also had a bit of repair work to do on the original page as it had gotten a bit woe-be-gone what with being handled so much.  Some of the paper had curled up and quite a few of the gemstones on the flourish  had gone AWOL.    Between the two pages there are 102 of those little buggers now.  Yeah, I am that weird that I had to sit here and count them.  


I dug and dug, but I did not have all the exact papers I had used on the first page, so I had to improvise a bit.  The papers are from Basic Grey's Ambrosia collection and fortunately I did have more of the flourish print.  But I used a distressed gray piece from another of their collections for the background and pieced a couple of the lace strips at the very top and right under the row of photos.  I'm so glad I had the flourish paper, because that really carried the design across the two pages, that and adding the thin little strip of orange at the top of the second page.


The orange, gray and black colors were perfect for a young Mr. Harley, receiving his "leather" riding vest and gloves at his 8th birthday party.  (Note: unwrapping gifts with riding gloves on IS cool, duh.)


Not a lot of other embellishments on these pages beside the cut work involved on the flourishes, the black gemstones, and a bit of a rub-on applied to the photo mat.   The title letters -- those are older Heidi Swapp alphas again -- they were the perfect orange for this.   Zig zag borders were cut from a Sizzix die; this had to be pieced too because the die doesn't cut a 12-inch piece. 

All in all, I am happy with the result, and even happier that the "holes" in Jacob's albums are getting filled in.