Playing With Paper

I've been playing with paper this morning and enjoying myself. I've made a layout for Your Scrapbook Stash using their Friday Sketch and a mixture of My Mind's Eye and Hot Off The Press papers.

• I've stamped letters onto paper and cut them out
• I've cut rounds of paper, distressed and inked them, stacked them up
• I've stamped journaling blocks and cut those out too

• I've torn a paper border and punched another
• Finally I've cut a circle of paper using my magnetic circle cutter from We Are Memory Keepers (I had to use it sometime!). Great fun and a light-hearted page featuring my daughter and her boyfriend.

WOYWW

I'm cheating a little in order to take part in WOYWW this week! This is my desk last Saturday before I packed everything away into my cupboard!

I had just finished my entry for a challenge and on the desk are papers from Hot Off The Press 'Vintage', my faithful paper guillotine, and a box where I store my distress inkpads. And yes, it was a very nice cup of tea, thanks, but the mug's empty here!

For once there's not one stamp to be seen. Unusual for me, as I really enjoy stamping and rarely have a crafting session without using a stamp on something! If you were wondering why there's a pot of embossing paste on the table - it's just the right size to draw around for a paper circle I needed!

Now I'm off to look at everyone else's desks. Maybe I can pinch a few storage ideas!

Brown Eyes Or Blue?

Just finished this layout for the DD Ad Challenge. I've used two photos of Karen taken in 2008 which have been 'processed' in Photoshop so that her naturally blue eyes appear brown!

I used papers and journaling blocks from Hot Off The Press 'Vintage' range, and also used the papers to make lollipop flowers. There's a great tutorial for them on Coventry Ann's blog  http://coventryann.blogspot.com/2009/09/lollipop-flowers-tutorial.html

The layout has 3D elements that don't show very well on the main photo so there's a couple more below. The title is made with Making Memories white alphabet rub-ons. I love these rub-ons as they will go onto just about anything!

Talking of titles, as I seem to be, I would like to try American Crafts Thickers. Haven't got any yet as I'm trying to use up my current stash, but it's a line I really like the look of.

Do you have a favourite stash item for making titles? I'd love to know if there's something you wouldn't be without, or maybe, a different technique to try with items I already have! Also, I'm just plain nosey when it comes to crafting and how others achieve the lovely results they do! I'm a bit reluctant to ask individuals on their blogs how they achieved their title on a layout, and they might not reply anyway. But if I'm asking you here, and you choose to tell me, well, that's a good way of finding out!

Outside My Comfort Zone

It's funny sometimes that you're stuck for an idea, then inspiration hits you from an unexpected place!

I've been thinking about doing a layout called 'crafting too much', and sort of had the journaling I wanted to say ready.. but I didn't have a photo to use on the page and was therefore stuck about where to start.

Enter the T-shirt I'm wearing today. I like the applique flower detail (which is why I bought it in the first place) and I suddenly realised that the flowers are cut from a piece of striped material, very similar to a sheet of paper I have in my stash from Hot Off The Press .

Now I knew I wanted to use striped flowers on my page, and I just had to use up a sheet of white cardstock (from my American Crafts box of 60!) and I'm in a blue and brown phase at the moment. Things were starting to come together. I chose some bird stamps from Graphicus and a small flower from The Stamp Man and got to work.

Here is the resulting scrapbook page. I agonised over whether or not to put it up here for the reasons below, and I'm not sure the journaling is clear in the photo. Click on the image to make it larger.

This layout is way outside of my comfort zone!  It is actually a First!

I have never put together a page without a photo. I have never used white for the main page. I dislike my own handwriting, featuring it as little as possible, and this is the most handwritten journaling I have ever done. I just don't 'do' doodling on pages (too modern). I rarely stamp onto patterned paper..... I could go on about how difficult this layout was for me to make. But I won't.

I'll put it down to experience and file it in my 'Things We Do' scrapbook.

I hope you noticed that all the branches on the tree are not full. 

Obviously, I'm still not crafting enough!

Just Playing

My computer room, despite painting it this weekend along with the hallway, is very bland. I have a pinboard with photos of family etc and all the desktop and printer paraphernalia (including the endless cables) on the floor and three shelves. I have room for a chair and not much else. My 'Computer Room' is actually a broomcupboard that I've taken over! But it sounds good to call it that.

It still needed brightening up after the painting. Something playful, colourful and cheap.

So this morning I made a plaque of sorts from my stash to stand on top of the pinboard. I had some Heidi Swapp chipboard letters and, of course, papers, ribbons and brads in my stash. I wrote on some of the paper (Hot Off The Press Vintage Papers), used distress ink on all the edges and played with brads and bows! The only other thing I had to do was strengthen the blue paper backing which I did by gluing two pieces of cardboard together, the type you find inside large transit envelopes. I save envelopes to re-use anyway so I had plenty to rummage through. It took a couple of hours to do and I enjoyed just playing around.

So here it is adding a bit of cheerfulness to my cupboard computer room. And there's a sneak preview of my crafting space in picture 1 - i.e. the table I use in my lounge.

That's also a clue to the subject of my next post!