the graphic look

I'm not really very good at clean and simple but had an idea of using quite a few of the various kinds of word stickers and thickers in the kits all together and I think it kind of worked.

I started off by placing my photos behind one of the Project Life Everyday Edition Speciality Cards. I then decided that everything would benefit from the black pen treatment and had to very carefully go round the inside of the photos hoping my hand would not slip (as it sometimes does. I cut strips from various papers and layered it all up. I usually make sure that all my papers touch in some way but I really like the result of leaving some of the small strips floating on this one.

I then added my variety of words to the left, filling in spaces with puffy hearts, brads and one of those dear little bows from the embellishment kit (I used a rolled up glue dot to secure it). 

Those fab Gold Foil Thickers are great as there are loads of each letter. I placed this next which gave me an idea of how to space my journalling. To be really graphic I should have created journalling lines to keep it neater but there is only so much "clean" I can do!

It is Cardigan, CARDIGAN you fool.

On holiday we went to Cardigan Castle one day and the country park another. I have made three layouts about these trips (so far) and on two out of three I have just discovered that I wrote Camarthen instead of Cardigan. Now I am going to have to think about how to correct it. Dimwit.

Here are the layouts anyway....

This is not a great photo. Taken at 3pm and already the light was failing. I'll try and replace it soon. The photo on the scrap page is not great either. The original wasn't too bad but my printer was running out of ink and I only had cheap photo paper left. But I was desperate to scrap so decided to use it anyway. Especially as it tells the story of a less good time.

I used the papers from the Lite kit but added in items from the lush Shine Out Loud embellishment kit. And after I had made it and was onto another I decided to sneak in the rub on from the main kit as I though "Oh, ok" said it all really.

I used the Pink Paislee Cedar Lane Greenspacepaper as the background and added some Heidi Swapp gold lame mist sprinkles. Whilst that was drying I painted some of the mist onto the fabulous die cut tree, a label that I cut using a die and two of the lush vellum leaves. The vellum is so thick that it didn't shrivel although they did bend a little.

I layered up my papers with one of the Project Life Everyday Edition Speciality Cards which I cut in two. It took me a while to work out what to do with the title as I had used quite a few of the gold letters by then but I thought using the black and the gold worked ok.

I added in the fine washi tape from the last kits and once I had done my (wrong, wrong, wrong) journalling, finished it off with some of the awesome Simple Stories We Are Family Bradz and a cute layered sticker owl. I used some black enamel dots as well but mine are not as matte as the ones in the Embellishment kit.

Here is the other layout with the big mistake

This one mixes up leftovers from all the kits. I began with the  Bazzill Smoothies cardstock in Waterfall from the main kit. Yes, that Gold Lame mist is out again. This time I tried very hard to make proper splodges with the ink rather than delicate droplets.  

I matted my photos and layered them on toning papers, adding little punched out labels and the ampersand from the Dear Lizzy acetate sheet. That also had a "Party animal" circle that I cut out, stuck to some spare paper and layered stickers on top of to create my title (the letter stickers are from my stash - Simple Stories DIY boutique).

I tried to be fairly random in the positioning of the brads, rub on and stickers but I find that quite hard!

I was pleased with the idea of using the Pink Paislee Memorandum gold foil frame embellishment to frame my writing. Less happy when I realised the error... 

A few puffy stars and hearts finished things off.
Now... how do I change the word to Cardigan, any ideas?

Veni, vidi, scrappi

I came, I saw, I scrapped it the same day!
Its very rare for that to happen but we had a lovely day out last week and it still left enough time for me to do some crafting in the evening. Result! I used the Catch a Leaf Lite kit only

The lovely Dear Lizzy Documentary Gold Foil Acetate speciality paper makes it quite difficult to photograph properly...

I layered the Patina and white cardstock, cutting out the middle of the Patina cardstock first. I sprinkled some Heidi Swapp Gold Lame glimmer mist onto the white cardstock and left it to dry. I used a LOT of that mist with these kits as you can never have too much gold in my opinion.

I cut strips of the Pink Paislee Memorandum Ledge, using both sides of the paper, plus a strip of the Pink Paislee Cedar Lane Walnut Street paper to stop the whole thing being too pastel. I stuck the camera from the Dear Lizzy paper into the top strip

 and layered the "happy" over the large middle strip. I like the way that you can see the pattern beneath as well.

The letters for the title are from the Pink Paislee Memorandum alphabet sticker booklet - another reason for the brown paper addition otherwise they would have been lost altogether.

The photos were then added - the bottom photo had foam pads stuck under it and a clothes pin on the top for decoration. A punch was used to create a little scallop border underneath using some of the spare patina cardstock.

Final touches were the lovely paper heart, some sequins from my stash and the journalling. I felt that black pen would be too harsh but the gold is quite hard to read, I have a grey pen somewhere and must dig it out as that might have been better.

Be still my beating heart

I actually gasped when I lifted the Pebbles Jen Hadfield Homemade Gold Wood speciality foiled cardstock out of the kit box. It is so, so, so beautiful.
So I knew that it had to be the centre piece of a layout. I was tempted to cut it up and use it in lots of little pieces but in the end I was glad that I used the whole thing as my base

I was also delighted to note that the Memorandum Time Clock Paper featured a red spot pattern very similar to that on my dress (my husband says that I look like Minnie Mouse in that outfit). So I chopped up lots of the strips of the paper and layered them behind the photo. I also layered in the Oversized roll ticket shape tag and added a big square of the Carta Bella Fall Blessings Autumn Trees B side behind the photo.

When it was all stuck down I wanted some more definition and so did some outlining with black and white pens. I used one of the words from the Memorandum Gold Puffy Stickers and some of the wonderful gold Thickers for the title.  

I was going to rub on all of the rub ons but I did find the first one that I tried (the flowers) quite hard going. So I put all the others onto vellum and it was much easier. It also meant that I could play about with the placing until I was happy.

I was able to add in some more puffy stickers and the feather clip at the bottom (except I thought that it looked like a leaf, so that is what I am going to call it). 
The weather was lovely on our day out but the place not so great - however the amazing Quirky kit turned the whole thing wonderful :)

Golden Moments

Its a lovely name for an absolutely gorgeous kit from Quirky Kits this month, full of wonderful patterns and fabulous little details. Here is how it first inspired me

These photos  - and I think the set of the show had an orangy cast which meant that the Mango cardstock  was a perfect foil. Leo included some sketches again this time and although her suggestion was to use white cardstock in the middle and a patterned backdrop, it made more sense for me to reverse it. The Kaisercraft A Touch of Gold Razzle patterned paper in black and white made a great base.

I trimmed some other pieces of the papers from the kit. I added some black stripes to the Kaisercraft A Touch of Gold Gleam paper to better echo Jack's striped suit. I also added more black, gold and orange triangles to the other side of the paper but in the end most of them were covered up!

I took some of the lovely American Crafts Dear Lizzy Documentary Rub on transfer embellishments and rubbed them on to white cardstock before cutting them out. I loved the circle from the Memorandum Gold Puffy Stickers so carefully trimmed out the words from the inside and laid it around the rub-on phrase that makes the subtitle.

I layered the photos, the two smaller ones are raised on foam pads and I added in the large gold paper clip.

I adore those great big American Crafts Gold Foiled chipboard Shoebox alphabet stickers and was going to try and eke them out a bit more. I stuck on the "24 hours" and then added die cut letters with some of the spare Mango cardstock (I gutted it before layering on the Touch of Gold Razzle paper). But the letters just didn't look right so I peeled them off and added more of the large ones. It was worth it (although don't look too hard at the paper underneath as not all of the die cut stickers came off as easily as they might do)

Just a sprinkling of more of the lovely gold embellishments and the layout was done -  and some golden moments captured