White + Autumn Hues

I don't normally do simple LOs well, but I'm happy with how this one turned out. It's based on the current White+1 challenge, of using white + autumn hues + a joker card.

The title is "A Joker in Italy".

Journalling strips read "I bought this hat in Venice and made it my "mascot" for the remainder of our "Simply Italy" trip, much to Christine's chagrine!"

Materials:

-Bazzill

-Christina Re paper

-Bo Bunny leaves

-Stamp It chipboard alphabets

-K&Co. "A" sticker"

-Stamp It rhinestones

-Marvy brushmarker in brown

-And of course the joker card

A sunny LO...

I actually worked on this LO for Blog Til You Drop's "Recycling" challenge, but it tied in perfectly with the current Sisterhood challenge, so decided to go for another 2 in 1, lol!

The title is - Cooling down in hot Spanish sun.

I figured yellow is a sunny enough colour.

The photos were taken at the Plaza de Espana in Seville.

Materials:
-Bazzill
-The blue background is a piece of kitchen towel that I've recycled by inking with little ink pads
-My Mind's Eye paper
-Bazzill and Heidi Swapp flowers
-Ribbon
-Journalling tag by My Mind's Eye
-Brads by Craft Affair
-7Gypsie tape
-Rhinestone circle by StampIt
-Alphabets by Creative Imaginations and KI Memories
-Dymo labeller
-Flourish by Collections, inked with stamp pad, and covered with Crackle Accents

I love the three strong, primary colours all together in this LO!

U are so cute

This LO combines sketch 16 from the 52 Weeks website, as well as the April challenge from Scrappers at SG, which was to create a LO about a child more than 1 year old. I did add quite a few embellishments and the extra small photo on the top left corner, but otherwise, it does roughly follow the 52 Weeks sketch. The little girl is a cute little orphan I met while volunteering in China. The journalling says it all - it reads:
"I don't know her name, but this little girl really stole my heart. She was unable to speak because of a severe cleft palate, the very reason she had been abandoned at Fuling Orphange - yet she was incredibly expressive in her own little ways, and remarkably intelligent too! Here she is, putting on her own shoes so she can go outside and play - amazing for a 2 year old! I hope and pray she'll be adopted so she can have the necessary surgery in order to be able to speak. If I could, I'd adopt her myself!"

Materials:
-Bazzill
-Daisy D's and Making Memories papers
-Stamp It rhinestones
-Ribbon, staples and cupcake paper, on which I've written "Fuling Orphanage, August '07"
-Craft Affair brads
-Hairclips
-Heidi Grace die cuts
-Craft Affair alphabet stickers
-Making Memories clear corner shape

Possibly too many colours on the 1 layout, but I really like it somehow! :)

Pencil Lines Sketch 80 and Sisterhood Challenge 51

Well, a bit late, but this LO combined a sketch from Pencil Lines with the Sisterhood challenge of using a song title as the title of the LO. These photos were taken in Prague, and the Czech Republic is also known as Bohemia or forms part of it or something like that...so I thought it was apt. :)

Materials:
-Bazzill
-Christina Re, Daisy D's and Scenic Route Paper Co. papers
-Bo Bunny flowers
-Chipboard alphabets by Craft Affair
-Other alphabets by Lil Davis, Creative Imaginations, Craft Affair, K&Co and Basic Grey
-Ribbon
-Sepa Accents on the chipboard

Instead of the journalling block, I added a 3rd flower...but otherwise, stays pretty true to the sketch.

Pencil Lines Sketch 81

This LO was based on a Pencil Lines sketch, except that I thought it looked a bit bare, so I also added the border and the row of flowers on the left hand side.

Materials:
-Bazzill
-Making Memories, Prima and Penny Black papers
-Craft Affair, Prima and Heidi Swapp flowers
-Bella chipboard alphabets, coloured by pressing down on an ink pad
-Glossy accents and webbing spray to highlight the circle cut out from cardboard

Not sure how I feel about the orange. Ideally, I would have liked a black background, but it's the colour I use most so had run out! I thought I'd experiment with orange, as the flowers in the photo on the right are mostly orange, and orange + red = fire to me, which pretty much sums up the flamenco. I still think it would have been better on black though!

Sisterhood "Follow the Leader" and Scrap the Music "Love Like This" Combined LO

Here I followed Deanne's LO on Sisterhood of Scrap and used the title "Love Like This" from the Scrapping the Music website. The LO started out fairly similar to Deanne's, but then I added layer upon layer and it's ended up quite different! I just don't do minimalist too well!

Materials:
-Bazzill
-Paint including crackle paint around the photo
-Bo Bunny flowers
-The black/red/white flowers/love "papers" are actually a napkin - I used 1/4 on the top left corner, and cut out squares from another 1/4 piece for the bottom of the page
-Ribbons
-Diecuts, chipboard and stickers by Basic Grey, Creative Imaginations, Bella and Heidi Grace
-Journalling square by Prima

The journalling reads "When I stumbled across this pair of cats at the Caracalla Baths in Rome, I just had to take a picture of them. Even when I got in close to take the photo, they paid no heed of me, completely absorbed in each other. I hope that one day I will find a...(love like this=title)".

Sisterhood "Rook" and HMITM "737-500" (Challenge 78) Combined LO

Here, I've combined 2 challenges.

Criteria for "Rook" on the Sisterhood website:
1. Use a bird in the LO - I cut this out from a Basic Grey patterned paper and stuck it to the right
2. Faux or real stitching - rub-ons to the left of the LO
3. Try to use black as the main colour - background, hope this is enough!

Criteria for HMITM challenge:
1. 7 rub-ons = 3 sets of faux stitching rub-ons to the left, circle on one of the photos, 3 rub-on letters (the "r" in "Prague", "e" in "times" and "o" in "old")
2. 3 photos
3. 7 stickers = the clock on top right hand corner, and the letters "a", "g", "e" in "Prague" as well as the letters "i", "m" and "s" in "times"
4. 5 flowers at bottom right hand corner - looks like 3, but I've layered 2 flowers on top of each other for 2 of them
5. 0 buttons and 0 ribbons - easy, used brads and German scrap instead to substitute!

Title is "Prague - Time of Old", but the full journalling reads "Taking a walk through Prague is like stepping into times of old".

Materials list:
-Bazzill
-Basic Greyand Craft Affair paper
-Napkin (cut out the black flowers/branches on top right hand corner from a napkin)
-Collections journalling tag
-Prima flowers
-7Gypsies brads
-Craft Affair photo corner
-German Scrap
-Rub-ons by Heidi Swapp and Heidi Grace
-Stickers by Creative Imaginations, Lil Davis and Porta Craft
-Bella chipboard letters coloured with Treasure Gold
-Basic Grey diecut letters
-Dymo labeller

Sisterhood "Monopoly" LO

Not sure if B&W counts as monochromatic, but since white is technically an ABSENCE of colour, I guessed this should be OK!

Challenge rules:
1. Monochromatic
2. 1 piece of patterned paper - I only used one piece but tore it into 2 bits and staggered them on the page
3. I word title = "Midnight?"
4. I paragraph journalling - this reads "Watching the sun set, and then seconds later rise again? This was truly an unforgettable experience! -Midnight Sun, Nordkapp, Norway, June 2006."

Materials:
-Bazzill
-Paper and chipboard letters by Craft Affair
-Prima flowers
-Collections journalling card
-7Gypsies brads
-Christina Re pearl brad
-Ribbon and hairclips

The LO was based on a sketch by Pagemaps, but I wasn't able to enter that contest as it was a "family fun" page, and I'm still trying to get through my stack of holiday photos so chose to just borrow the sketch.

Scrapping on a budget!

I was issued a random challenge on the Forever Always forums - to create a LO using:
1. Arrows
2. Home-made transparency
3. Photos without people

These criteria seemed to fit in really well with the LO I'd been planning for the April 1, 2, 3 challenge, so I decided to combine the 2. The 1, 2, 3 criteria:
1. Make your own embellishments
2. Stamp with an everyday object
3. The word "April" and/or "Showers" somewhere on the LO

Here's what I came up with -


Title: April Flowers

I started with photos of flowers taken at Keukenhof in Holland. The next step was to create my own embellishments. For these, I used a facial cotton pad to stamp the sun and the flower centres. I then clipped bent paperclips around the orange stamped image to make the sun. I clipped untouched paper clips to make 2 flowers and topped off with a button in the centre of each. The biggest flower has a painted cotton pad as the flower centre, with plain cotton pads cut in half to make the petals. Everything is held together with a large brad. I also used one painted cotton pad as the "o" in the word "flowers". I cut green arrow shapes from cardstock and stuck them down beneath the flower centres as stalks. The sun's rays actually are 4 arrow-heads too. The last step was to make my own transparency. By this stage, my page was already looking pretty cluttered and I really didn't want to add too much more, so I just made a transparency tag - just punched holes all around, threaded ribbon through and tied at the top.

Very happy with this LO as it was cheap to make but I think fairly effective.

Other materials used:
-Bazzill cardstock
-Creative Imaginations, KI Memories, Lil Davis and Sei alphabet stickers
-Craft Affair chipboard "S"

Scrapmojo's "Office" and Sisterhood's "Pass the Parcel" Combined LO

The Scrapmojo challenge was to create a LO using an office type title - my title is "Subject: Leslie". I'd initially intended to combine this with the Sisterhood's "Connect 4" challenge. Silly me - I thought we just had to use 4 circles, didn't realise they had to be interconnected! But then I realised I had at least 5 layers on the LO, eg flower/"live" label layered onto the Collection chipboard circle layered onto the photo layered onto pink cardstock and then onto the green cardstock. So decided it was good enough for the "Pass the Parcel"challenge. In fact, if you count the button and ribbon on the flower, it's more than 5 layers!

Anyway, materials:
-Bazzill
-Ribbon
-Tag
-Paper clips bent to make flower leaves
-"Live" label by My Mind's Eye
-Paper by Basic Grey
-Word sticker by Lil Davis
-Guitar pick and sticker by All My Memories
-Alphabet rub-ons and stickers by K and Co, Heidi Swapp, KI Memories
-Chipboard "S" by Bella, which has been painted with crackle paint then inked lightly in brown
-Brads by Craft Affair
-Bo Bunny flowers
-Keyboard letters were bought from Stamp It
-Chipboard circle by Collections - painted brown, then sanded back and dry-brushed in white

One Little Word "Best", Sisterhood "Taboo" and Create "Recycle" Combined LO

A 3 in 1! This week's One Little Word was "Best", and I combined it with the "Taboo" challenge at Sisterhood of Scrap, which stipulated that a LO be made of someone I love but without using the word "love" or any hearts in the LO. I also decided to recycle a few items so I could enter the LO in Create's "Recycle" challenge as well!

The title of my LO is "Mum You're the Best", but the full journalling reads "Mum, though we don't always see eye to eye I still think you're the best".

Materials:

-Bazzill

-Daisy D's paper

-Chipboard butterflies - sorry, I can't remember the manufacturer of these and haven't got the packaging anymore

-Hair clips

-Flowers by Bo Bunny

-The cardboard that I've matted the photo on is recycled from a packet of stickers and the backing of the Bo Bunny flowers

-Dymo labeller

-Ribbon

-Alphabet stickers by Creative Imaginations, Heidi Grace, Lil Davis, KI Memories - I also recycled old scraps of black Bazzill to layer the stickers on

-Chipboard letters by Craft Affair

Forever Always April Sketch and Sisterhood "Tag" Combined LO

I used the Forever Always April sketch in combination with one of the Sisterhood of Scrap Anniversary challenges - the "Tagged" one that stipulated use of at least 3 tags and 3 flowers. Am very pleased with how it turned out - nice and clean, which is a change from my usual cluttered LOs!

The 3 tags are the acetate one with the word "Remember", the denim one to the left, and the little tag attached to the bottom-most flower, giving details of where and when the photos were taken ("Santorini, Greek Islands, August 2005). The first 2 tags are by Creative Imaginations, while the last one is a generic one bought from the Newsagent's as a bundle.

The flowers are by Bo Bunny.

Other materials:

-Bazzill

-Paper by Creative Imaginations

-Ribbon, staples

-Button brads by Craft Affair (a great new discovery at Target stores!)

-Marvy pen

-Alphabet stickers by Heidi Grace

-Alphabet stamp in Circa font, cut out, edges inked and stuck onto dark brown Bazzill just to give it that little extra lift

Pencil Lines 13/4/08 and Sisterhood Week "Scrabble" combined LO

I used the Pencil Lines sketch for this LO, and also combined this challenge with the "Scrabble" challenge at Sisterhood of Scrap. This meant the title had to include a word made out of any combination of the letters "BASMTORF" or something like that. Anyway, my word was "frost", and the title is "A Touch of Frost".

Materials:

-Bazzill

-Papers by KI Memories, Basic Grey and Jasart

-Alphabet stamp in circa font

-Heidi Swapp ghost shape snowflakes

-Scraptivate gem brads

-Snowflake stickers were I think by Creative Imaginations.,..or maybe KI Memories

-Snow-shaped felt by Queen and Co

-Circle punch and Dymo labeller

-Ice candy icicles by KI Memories

-Alphabet stickers by Creative Imaginations

-Die cuts by KI Memories

Might not be visible, but the white panel up top right corner is embossed with snowflakes.

I love snow, so this was a fun LO :)

52 Sketches 13/4/08 and Sisterhood Week "Jump-rope" Combined LO

I combined the sketch from the 52 Sketches challenge with the "Jump-rope" challenge in Sisterhood of Scrap's anniversary week of challenges. This required us to use:
-fibre
-3 photos in the LO
-a song or song title

My song and Lo title is "Winter Wonderland".

Fibre is mixed in with the ribbons above the title and also wrapped around the journalling tag, on which I've written the first verse of the song.

Materials list:
-Bazzill
-Ribbon and fibres
-White gel pen
-Die cuts by EK success
-Stickers including alphabet stickers by Daisy D's
-Journalling card by collections

Simple LO, but I'm pretty happy with it :)

HMITM "7" and Sisterhood Week "Paintball" Combined LO

Day 1 of the Sisterhood of Scrap's 1st anniversary challenges stipulated use of paint.
The HMITM "7" challenge was to use 7 each of word stickers, buttons, flowers, brads, labels, letters in title and anything else we wanted.

This is what I came up with...

Title: Reflect - letters by Basic Grey
Photo: Self-portrait taken in Brussels - the image is of my reflection in a giant Christmas decoration (a silver ball!)

Word stickers are by Bo Bunny, Creative Imaginations, Colorbok and My Mind's Eye.

Flowers are by Prima.

I interpreted "labels" as being journalling spots, tags, that sort of thing...

My 7 "anything else" items? I chose "7 scrapbooking favourites", and they are:
1. Paint
2. Chipboard shapes = the butterfly on the painted "f"
3. Heidi Swapp flower centres - LOVE a bit of bling!
4. 7 Gypsies index tab
5. 7 Gypsies phrase tape
6. German scrap
7. Fancy Pants rub-on. This is the circle around my face on the photo

Journalling was just random musings (reflections) about myself.

Scrapdragons "Fool" Challenge

This challenge was to:

(1) Use the word "fool" in the title/journalling

(2) Use something unexpected

(3) No 2 products from the same manufacturer

The title of the layout is "Foolin' Around" - photos taken in Pisa.

My unexpected items:

-ring pulls for the "o" letters in the title

-bent paper clip for the "l"

-sandwich bag tie bent to form the first "n"

-metal tag from a pair of shoes for the third "o"

-backing of a sticker cut to make the "u"

-backing of double sided tape tomake the second "n"

I HAD to improvise with letters due to the "no 2 products from same manufacturer" rule!

Other materials:

-Bazzill

-Basic Grey and KI Memories papers

-ribbons, staples

-Journalling card by Collections

-Prima flowers to dress up the ring pulls and metal tag

-brads

-Alphabet stickers from Lil Davis, Heidi Swapp and Webster's Pages

This was a fun layout to use up little odds and ends in my stash, and I'm pleased with the "fooling around" feel of the layout - very appropriate, I think!

Scrapjacked - April 2008

I had fun with this jack, since:
1. I LOVE Venice!
2. LOVE these photos I took there
3. LOVE red/pink/black/white layouts
4. LOVE German Scrap
5. LOVE transparent embellishments and vellum
6. LOVE flowers
7. LOVE gemstones/bling
8. LOVE little tags and charms
9. LOVE ribbon that has words on it
10. LOVE hearts

In fact, I had so much fun that I just kept layering one thing on top of the other and forgot to jack the circle that goes around the photos! By the time I realised, the page was starting to become a bit too cluttered, even for me, so decided to leave that part out...oh well... Still pretty happy with how it turned out anyway.

Materials:
-Bazzill cardstock
-KI Memories and 7Gypsies paper
-Patterned vellum
-Journalling block from Creative Imaginations
-German Scrap from Scraptivate
-Ribbons and pin
-Flowers by Heidi Swapp and Prima
-7Gypsies "Photography" stickers
-Jewel brads by Christina Re
-Transparent shapes by Making Memories
-Rub-ons and alphabets by Big W Crystals, Heidi Grace and Sandylion

Sisterhood of Scrap - Hidden Elements LO

This is a layout I did based on a challenge derived from a group that I meet with. It had to be about winter, and had to include some sort of recipe for winter. Instead of a food recipe, I decided to scrap about a 'recipe for an unforgettable winter.

There are 2 hidden elements on this page:

1. The smaller one contains my 'recipe' - tickets to a northern hemisphere country', 'a good friend to travel with', 'a sense of fun and adventure', 'warm clothes', and 'take lots of photos'.

2. The larger one contains lots of photos of beautiful snowy scenery - sorry about the flash shining on the photos! In addition, a tag pulls out from the back page, containing the itinerary of our holiday.

The journalling at the bottom reads about how I love Australia, but the warm, non-snowy winters here just don't quite have the right Christmassy feel. Can't remember what materals were used, but basicaly includes Bazzill cardstock, winter/snow paper, winter/snow slide frames, ribbons, snowflake stickers, gemstones, and a Dymo labeller.

I was quite pleased with this LO, but then, snow, pink, pale blue, ribbons and gemstones are among my favourite things! :)

I love scrapping baby photos! :)

This layout was inspired by Scrapbooking Memories' call for "Baby" LOs.

Materials used:
-Bazzill cardstock
-Patterned paper torn into strips and flowers cut out
-Sei alphabet stickers and alphabet brads
-Alphabet stamps
-Round circle punch to punch out circles at bottom of LO
-Buttons
-Butterscotch stamp pad and a sponge to give aged look
-Tag and ribbon - the tag pulls out from behind photo and contains journalling

Scrapbooking Memories = Inspiration

Here is one of the layouts I was inspired to create after getting a Scrapbooking Memories subscription 2 months ago.

Materials used:
-Bazzill cardstock
-My Mind's Eye "All About Me" Flowers/Aqua paper
-Ribbon, brads
-Stickers by Bo Bunny "White Random Thoughts", Big W Crystals and Lil Davis "Lil Trinkets and Treausres"