How to Get the Most Out of a Kit?

Still working with Scrapbook Circle's August offering and as I have said before I was gonzo for this kit.  Most of the pages created were of scenic photos... which are usually problematic for me. 

But what I really wanted to talk about a little bit was how to actually work with your monthly kit club offering to get the most out of it.  I was able to make seven pages from this particular kit.  I got nine pages from the one Gossamer Blue kit I experimented with.  How does this happen? 

Gotta slice those papers up.   Just.  Have.  To.  Cut.  Them.  Up.  

And this is what it looks like. 




Often there is a print on BOTH sides of the paper that I particularly like and that I want to use.  So why choose between them?  Slice it up and use a bit of both...on the same page even. 

That wonderful Native American type print on the dark woodgrain background is simply gorgeous, but I also liked the gray hash mark print on the opposite side.  And I felt that as much as I loved the white and dark wood grain native print, it would be just too, too much if used as a full background.  By slicing it and flipping the larger middle piece over I got to use both sides. 

I did the same thing with the small triangle/mixed color stripe paper; loved both sides, so just slicing them into strips and flipping them over allowed me to see and use both sides.  Then I re-assembled the strips and glued them onto a 12x12 background piece that I am not likely to use at all.  That piece came out of a pad of paper and I knew I wouldn't miss it. 

Add photos, title and just a bit of embellishment and here you go. 

The photos are (kind of) a panoramic out over the canyon, so I just trimmed them up and put them side by side.  They really aren't on full layering pieces of paper; it's just little leftover strips and pieces tucked in to appear as if there is a larger piece behind the photo. 

As I said I mostly attacked  photos of a canyon park that we did a little side trip to on our trip along Route 66.  Palo Duro was very pretty, but it wasn't easy for me to scrap.  Not until I got this kit.  I have more photos of the canyon, but I think those will go into a Project Life type photo page and then I will mix that right into the travel album alongside regular 12x12 pages. 

And, as much as I have loved working with this kit, I am (as they say) over it now.  Ready to move on.  Also, I think the sign of a good kit--- that you burn right through it--exhaust it really and then you are ready for something else.  Which is exactly what will be coming in my next kit! 

I will have a couple more pages to post from this particular kit, whilst I await the arrival of the September kit(s).   

later all!
Cheryl

More is Better

Sometimes serendipity takes over... "more is better" not only applies to my page title but is also pretty descriptive of the page design. 

I was watching a video on ohsnapgonzo's you tube channel and she was working up a layout with all these strips of paper and I thought it was so very cool that she was not seeming to worry about color coordinating anything, but was just going for it, gluing all the strips across the page and curling up some of the edges.  Plus, what a wonderful way to use up scraps! 

So here's my take on the strip piecing technique. 

The Jacob man insisted (way back when--I think he was 4 here) that he could indeed wear both pair of sunglasses...so he did.  More is better, he said. 

And with all the paper layers on this page...more is also better....  Plus it was just a lot of fun to grab a stack of strips and start gluing 'em down.  Now I think this technique would look really good with stitching across the strips.  But with no sewing machine, I opted to draw in some sketchy black pen lines on some of the paper strips.  And since there is so much going on with all the various paper patterns, I trimmed the whole thing down and centered it on a black piece of cardstock and kept embellishments to a minimum. 

I also spied another layout done using the same paper strips kind of technique, but this one arranged the strips by color, in a rainbow fashion. I think I have this layout pinned in my scrapbook folder on pinterest. 

But I thought I would try the technique on a more monochromatic page.  And this time, I only did a half page with the strips, varied the width of the paper strips more, inserted some scalloped border punched pieces plus a couple of stitched border pieces (those were from Basic Grey).   

I will definitely be using this method again.  Loved using up all those bits and pieces!  (Yeah, I know, it's getting a little weird how much I am into the using up the scraps thing.  Just. Cannot. Seem. To. Stop.   Note:  I also do not seem to have any shortage of scraps with which to amuse myself. )

does this require a 12-step program? 
Cheryl