... just Laura

Bella Blvd: Mother's Day Cards

Today, on the Bella Blvd blog, we are sharing Mother's Day cards. I pitched in with two cards of my own, and for once, I have cards made and ready to go, days ahead of time!

When I sat down to create my cards, I had some colors in mind that I wanted to work with. And right away, I turned to the Tail Waggers & Cat Naps collection. Yes, I pulled out a pets collection to make my Mother's Day cards. I love the brown woodgrain paper, and used that as the base of my card. And the circles paper is another favorite. It has random colored hearts in some of the circles.

It also has paw prints in some of the circles. Which I figured I should cover up, right ;) So I took a regular old hole punch, and punched out some of the heart circles from a leftover piece of the circle paper. I used mini pop dots to adhere them directly over the paw print circles. It gave the card some added dimension at the same time.

I used some of the same patterned papers for my second card, but added in a bit more pink this time. I used a cloud border punch from Fiskars on a few of my patterned paper strips, and layered them along the bottom of the card.  

In these photos, the flag appears to be a shade of blue that doesn't really match the aqua patterned paper. Interesting. I'm positive that it matched in person. LOL. I liked the idea of mixing the flag, the chipboard letters, and the mini alpha stickers, to create my card sentiment.

Supplies Used:

Kerri Bradford Studio: NSD Week - Photo Templates

As part of the week-long NSD celebration at Kerri Bradford Studios, today is all about the photos!

Photo templates! One of my favorite things to use on my layouts. I've been using photo collages on my layouts for years and years. I used to sit and create my own collages, which is fun. But takes forever and a day. This is why I am such a huge fan of photo templates. It has all of the design work done for you, and you simply drop your photos into the template and POOF ... you have a photo collage!

I created this fun collage, using some photos I randomly took of the girls and myself, back in January. No big story behind them. I just took my camera upstairs one night, snapped some photos of them where they were, and left. I might not have scrapped these photos together, when originally looking at them. But I had the fun Bright Side papers out, from one of the new My Minds Eye collections, and knew they would match perfectly and tie in the colors in the photos.

I love the simple look of white on white. I don't do it often, but I thought it would be fun to do with these flowers. The larger photo collage has a lot going on and takes up a lot of space on the page. So I didn't want to add to many other elements that would make it feel cluttered.

I like how the white on white adds interest, but also keeps the design clean and easy on the eyes. I added some threaded buttons to the centers of each flower for a fun touch.

I cut my title, using a few of the Bright Side patterned papers. I love Kerri's titles, that allow you to cut a word, or several of the words, from different papers. Adds such interest to the title.

Supplies Used:

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For my tips and tricks part of the week, I created a little video on how you can play with your templates a bit and customize them to fit your different photo needs. The template I used on this layout originally held 11 photos, but I only used 8 photos. You'll see how I did that in the video. A few things I have to say about the video. I thought it would look clearer, but it seems quite blurry. You have no idea how many ways I tried saving this and uploading this, to make it better. Didn't seem to help. It might work better to watch on Youtube, if it's looking cut off here. I've been sick for 5 days, so excuse the voice or any sniffles you hear from me. I'm a rambler, so no matter how many times I did this, I could not get it any shorter :)

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Kerri also asked us to share 5 of our favorite things. Hard to pick just 5 favorite things. But when asked to choose, I made impulsive decisions. Java Chip Frappacino's from Starbucks, which help me get so much done every day. Pinterest, which helps get me inspired, when I'm in a creative rut. Jeans, which are my daily staple to my wardrobe, and I just love a good pair of reliable jeans. Music, because I can't live without it. And Friends, which is my all-time favorite TV show, and one that I have recently become addicted to watching late at night on Nickelodeon ;)

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Now, I'm not quite done. I still have the shape that Kerri designed, per my request, available as a FREEBIE DOWNLOAD today. But only for today. If you don't go and download it today, it goes into Kerri's magic vault (wouldn't that be so cool to see if she really has one ;)), and will be available to purchase, along with all the other daily freebies, at the end of the week.

So head over to Kerri's blog, where you can find my FREEBIE shape, and also enter in her giveaway for the day. It's a gorgeous one, so you'll want to get your name in there!

And there's even more!!! Kerri is so super generous and sweet, that she has given me TWO $25 GIFT CARDS to give away to two of my lucky blog readers! How awesome is that! Just leave me a comment, and I will randomly choose two winners on Friday!

Pebbles Guest Designer - Country Picnic

I'm back today, with the rest of my projects that were featured on the Pebbles blog yesterday, as a Guest Designer! I shared my projects with the Hip Hip Hooray collections yesterday, and today, it's all about the Country Picnic collection. 

This collection is gorgeous! I love the shades of greens and pinks, paired up with white and krafts. This was another one of my layouts, that I started to create, without even having any particular photos in mind. When it came time to dig out some photos, I came across these photos I took of my friend Deneen's daughter, Holly. I have already created a layout of her twin sister, Heather, so it was only right that I scrap a layout about Holly as well.

Once again, I started with my favorite paper saving trick (the second trick on that post), to create the base of my layout. I cut out the entire center of the embossed green dotted paper, and the white heart paper as well. I just left the framed around all four sides and layered them together, since I knew my kraft dotted paper would cover the inside parts that were missing. Do you notice anything funny with the hearts? Kills me that once I got to adhereing photos and embellishments, I wasn't paying attention and now the hearts are sideways. LOL.

I love that Pebbles came out with the corrugated alpha stickers! They are available in 3 colors, and are a great size for titles. I trimmed a strip of flowered patterned paper, just a tad bit wider than the alphas, for my title piece. I cut a notch at one end of the strip, distressed the edges, and machine stitched right down the center before adhered my title letters.

Just a little side note. Green is my favorite color, and this shade of green is my favorite kind of green! I have tons of this green in my house, including a lot of the walls :)

The dimensional flowers were my favorite embellishment in this collection. They have thick, canvas-like petals, and a fun button in the center.

I also created a set of cards, using some scraps and the layered kraft tags. The layered kraft tags are so pretty, and have so much dimension to them. I love that it looks like you put a lot of work into creating the tags, but all you had to do was pull them out of the package!

I started each card with a white cardstock base, and I gave each one a light mist of pink misting spray. I used one of my border punches along some green cardstock, and adhered a small strip along the left edge of the card.

Then I dug out a scrap of pattern paper, distressed the edges, and adhered along the bottom of the card.

Then I adhered the layered kraft tag to the card at a slight angle, peeking out from behind the pattern paper strip. I added a few of the masking tape stickers along the side of the tag, and stapled down the tag strings.

I had lots of fun working with the Country Picnic collection! Thanks to Pebbles for letting me work with their super fun products, and for letting me join them on the blog today! Make sure to go over to their blog, and check out the rest of my projects. I also did a fun little Question & Answer thing, where you can read a few fun tidbits from me. AND, there's a giveaway over there, so you'll want to leave a comment for a chance to win! 

Supplies Used:

Pebbles Guest Designer - Hip Hip Hooray

I'm super excited to be guest designing on the Pebbles blog today! I worked with two different collections, so I thought I would share one collection today, and one tomorrow. First up, is the Hip Hip Hooray collection!

This collection is all about birthdays and celebrations. So I knew I wanted to scrap one of the girl's birthday parties. I hadn't done anything yet with the photos from Sarah's 11th birthday party, which was almost two years ago. It was a swimming party, of course (she's a fish!). And the photos all looked great, paired up with the fun, colorful Hip Hip Hooray papers. I choose two main photos for this layout. One group shot, and one of the birthday girl.

I started out by doing my favorite paper saving trick, and framing my page with a few strips of the glittered dotted patterned paper. I trimmed down a sheet of white cardstock, and misting it with some pink misting spray, and adhered it to the center of the page. I knew I wanted to use the glittered flag banners in the upper corner. The banners come with two flags in one, so that you can fold them over, and string them along the cord that is included. Which I think would be cute. But I also knew that if I simply cut them in half, and seperated the flags, I could get even more banners out of it! I added the fun little sequin candy dots inbetween the flags.

For my title, I wanted to mimic the banner in the upper corner. I choose a fun banner "Birthday" title from the Silhouette store, and cut it from one of the aqua pattern papers. I used the pink glitter alpha stickers to add the "Happy" to my "Happy Birthday" title. I really love those glitter alphas. They're thick, and I didn't find glitter all over the place, like a lot of glitter stickers will do.

I adhered my die cut title to the page, using pop dots. Then I tucked in a few of the adorable pinwheels, to embellish the title.

Some journaling. I find that most of our birthday parties have the same stories. There's lots of swimming, games and joking around, eating, presents, cake and ice cream. Just what a party should be about!

The upper corner needed a little something, so I added her age. It's a very important fact to get down on the page, since all of the swimming parties start to look the same ;)

But I didn't want to stop there. If I'm going to scrap some birthday photos, I'm going to scrap the entire party. Even though my two main photos were the focus of my layout, and this one page could easily stand on it's own, I wanted to add all the other photos in as well. I decided to use some divided page protectors, from Becky Higgins.

I'm actually going to have 3 of these pages, to go along with the single page paper layout. So I will have two 2 page spreads in the album, to cover the entire party. This first page has a selection of photos from the swimming fun. The next page will have photos from the games they played out of the pool, and the last page will have photos of the gift opening and cake and ice cream.  

I printed photos in three different sizes. I did a few 3x4", which will fit perfectly in the page protectors.

Then I printed some at 2.5x3.5", which I then matted on white cardstock, and then on some pattern paper.

And lastly, I printed some at 2.5x2.5". For these, I started with a 3x4" piece of white cardstock, which I misted with the pink misting spray. I took a scrap of dotted patterned paper, distressed the edges, and adhered in the corner. Then I adhered my photos using pop dots. I finished embellishing with alpha stickers and other embellishments. This entire page only took me about 20 minutes to throw together. I still need to do the other 2 pages, but I wanted to show what I had so far.

Since I am ALWAYS in need of birthday cards, I decided to use some scraps to make a few cards. I used my Silhouette to die cut "Party" from some pink patterned paper. 

For all of these cards, the thin strips of pattern paper across the bottom or top of the cards, are actually the UPC strips from the sheets of paper.

I had lots of fun working with the Hip Hip Hooray collection! Thanks to Pebbles for letting me work with their super fun products, and for letting me join them on the blog today! Make sure to go over to their blog, and check out the rest of my projects. I also did a fun little Question & Answer thing, where you can read a few fun tidbits from me. AND, there's a giveaway over there, so you'll want to leave a comment for a chance to win! Come back by here tomorrow, and I'll share the rest of my projects using the Country Picnic collection ;)

Supplies Used:

hello spring - a kerri bradford studio layout

i have a layout up at kerri bradford studio today.

i know that pretty much everyone, everywhere, has had some strange weather this past year. just two weeks ago, we had some of the craziest thunderstorms, a bit of rain, and even some hail. not your typical april weather for us here. but the following week, we had some gorgeous weather. it finally felt like spring, with all of us dragging out capri's, shorts, tshirts, and flipflops.

the girls were outside taking photos of themselves one afternoon, using their ipod touch's. it's what kids do, right? sarah alone has over 3000 photos on her ipod. lol! i find some great ones in there though, and i often think that i should save them and use them for something.

i "borrowed" some of their photos from that one afternoon, to create this layout. because the ipod touch's don't get you the best quality photos, i knew i wanted to keep them fairly small on the layout. i choose a filmstrip type photo template from kerri's storyboard #6 kit, and filled 3 of them with photos. because the coloring wasn't the best on a few, and because they changed shirts at some point, i decided to change all of the photos to black & white to keep a consistent look.

i wanted to add a touch of black across the top of the page, and went looking for a border to use. i came across these birds on a wire and had to use them.  

i choose several papers from amy tangerine, along with the black dot paper from crate paper. the colors might not be your typical "spring" colors, but i thought they gave a more funky vibe to go along with my teenager and my pre-teen's photos. i always love to use the titles with different fonts on them, and that i can cut from several different papers. it adds such a fun look to the titles.

i cut several daisies, from different pattern papers, in varying sizes, and added threaded buttons to the centers. to add more color to the page, i dug out some wide turquoise ribbon and adhered it across the page.

Supplies Used:

CK's Simple Scrapbooks Special Issue + Giveaway

Creating Keepsakes has a new special issue that just came out, called Simple Scrapbooks.

I'm sure a lot of you remember Simple Scrapbooks magazine, which came to an end a few years back. This special issue is filled with tons of ideas for simplifying our scrapbooking process.

As seen in the Simple Scrapbooks Special Issue, from Creating Keepsakes magazine. Copyright Creative Crafts Group. Posted with prior permission from the publisher.

My layout was created for an article about scraplifting. I was given a layout from a previous issue to lift, and I choose the flowers as my main focus of the scrap lift. I'm sure this would make more sense, if you had the issue and could read the article. LOL. Trust me, I lifted the flowers. The original layout also had lots of layered pattern papers along one side. I got the same look, by using a large piece of a pattern paper that was all borders. One piece of paper, versus combining lots of strips of paper. Same look, less time.

The pre-made flower embellishments, from Basic Grey, made this layout super quick and easy to create. The flowers are all 3-D, and have lots of dimension and layers, and even tiny rhinestones on them. I just took them out of the package and stuck them down. Easy peasy.

I just randomly came across these number die cuts, from Pink Paislee, while digging for the flowers. It was a very random decision to use these, and I choose a totally random number to use.

I used those number die cuts, to come up with my title. "Reason No. 714 Why I Love You". And then I came up with my journaling, based off of the title.

Supplies Used:

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You can check out some additional online extras (free printables, downloads, sketches, etc) RIGHT HERE. We also have a sneek peek for you, at the inside of this issue:

We're giving you even more chances to win a copy of this new special issue. Below, you will find three names of fellow participants, who are also each doing giveaways. Head over to each of the following blogs, check out what inspiration they're sharing, and then leave a comment to be entered in their drawings. You might even find new names on some blogs, for even more chances to win.

Joey Manwarren

Kim Watson

Piradee Talvanna

And for a chance to win a free copy, here on my blog, simply leave me a comment on this post. I will randomly choose a winner on Friday. Good luck! 

pool time - a bella blvd layout

this past saturday, we had our first sketch for april up on the bella blvd blog. we are really excited to have the one and only becky fleck designing exclusive sketches for us! i got to work with this sketch:

i knew i wanted to use a few horizontal photos, so i decided to flip the sketch counter-clockwise, one turn. when i was teaching at the CKC's the last two years, i taught a lot of the sketch classes. i always reminded everyone to rotate their sketches. you get so many more options out of a sketch, by simply turning them around and around.

i used some of the simply simona chipboard alphas for my title. i LOVE these letters! i added a few threaded buttons to the centers of the O's, and a chipboard accent to the center of the P.

i didn't really have any specific journaling for this layout. i have TONS of photos every year of the girls in the pool. we don't have a pool, by my parents and my brother have pools. there's only so much i can say, year after year, about them swimming and having fun. lol! so i decided to use the "summer checklist" sticker in place of my journaling. I used mini brads to "check" off the things that applied to these photos.

the sketch had a fun little banner on the top of the layout. since i had flipped the sketch for my layout, i didn't want to add a sideways banner. so i created a fun little banner to add to the opposite side of the page. I used a banner punch from fiskars, stapled the top of each piece, threaded some string through the pieces, and then adhered them using pop dots.

Supplies Used:

sweet cheeks - a bella blvd layout

i have a few CHA projects that still havn't been shared yet. two of those went up on the bella blvd blog this week, so i thought i would share them here as well.

look how cute little zachary is! he was six months old in this photo. i used the baby boy collection for this layout. i honestly wasn't sure about using the giraffe print patterned paper at first. i thought it would to busy for my style. but i love how it ended up looking on here. it's almost like i create a smaller layout (i believe the main part of this layout is 10"x10"), and then mat it on the background paper.

i will fully admit that i got a little embellishment-happy on this layout. lol! while i was working on the gob of CHA layouts for bella, i tried really hard to get a little bit of all the new embellishments on every project. the difference on this layout, was that i used quite a bit of each embellishment. it's all cute stuff, so why not go a little crazy, right ;)

i love to take the cardstock stickers (like the "sweet cheeks" sticker), and adhere them to cardstock. that way, you can adhere them using pop dots, or layer them over other elements, without worrying about them sticking to things you don't want them sticking too. i have been addicted to my distressing tool lately too. by dragging it around the edges of the sticker/cardstock piece, it actually gives the appearance of the piece being thicker then it really is. almost makes it look like chipboard.

love the little miniature stickers! i wanted to add a touch of green in the upper corner of the layout, but couldn't find a sticker that worked. this green chevron piece was part of a chipboard border. i just cut off a piece in the size i wanted, and cut into the end at a diagonal.

i started this card with the "BABY" border strip. i trimmed it to fit, and then built the card about that piece. i cut the long ruled journaling sticker in half, since i only needed part of it, and then added the chipboard "boy" letters on it. a few word stickers, torn pieces of designer tapes, and buttons, and i was done.

Supplies used:

summer 2010 - a layout share

i think this is going to be a good week on the blog, my friends! i actually have layouts/cards to share every day this week. including saturday. should make up a little bit for the last few slow weeks over here ;)

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lately, i've really been wanting to scrap a few events, get-togethers, birthdays, and things like that. these are all layouts where i know that i have TONS of photos to choose from, and i want to make sure and get as many as i can onto my layouts.

this is where i get hung up though. i have been struggling to figure out exactly how i want to go about scrapping these photos. do i want to use divided page protectors, and keep it pretty simple? do i come up with a page design, and then size all my photos accordingly, print them out, and trim them up? do i just do a quick print at costco, trim them all myself, and just do my best to fit them on the page? do i create digital layouts? do i create photo collages and print as one large photo? i can't tell you how many times i have debated back and forth on these ideas. on a whim this weekend, i went with the last idea, for the photos from this family get-together from a while back.

i have a TON of digital templates from janet phillips, thanks to an amazing black friday sale i came across last thanksgiving. i love that she has so many two page templates. sure, you can take one or two collages, and use them together for a two page layout. but for some reason, that's not always as easy as it sounds, to make them look cohesive. i love that these are designed with the two pages in mind, so that they flow together so nicely. i started with this template here, which holds 23 photos.

here's how my template looked, once i got all of my photos dropped in. for a few minutes, i debated actually making this a digital layout. but i had some papers picked out already, and really wanted to do a real paper layout. so i figured i would just print out the photo part of this design. it was late at night, and i didn't want to wait to upload and order this from costco, which would be my first way of printing something like this. so i decided to play with this, and see if i could print it myself.

i started by taking off all of the other elements in this digital design. i deleted the side papers, the bracket, and the title. so i was left with what you see here. just the photos, all pretty in their collage.

these templates are set up as a 24"x12" image. so i knew i had to break this into two pages, in order to print. i simply cropped the two pages out seperately, both at 12"x12". here is the first page of the spread.

and here is the second page of the spread. the next thing i did was to resize this down to an 11"x11" image. i knew i was printing this out at home, and i can only print 8.5"x11" on my photo printer. i wasn't sure what the final dimensions would be on the actual photo part of the page, but figured i could easily take off an inch to help bring the size down a bit for starters.

then i cropped out JUST the photo part of the page, leaving a bit of a border around the edges. i copied and pasted that onto an 8.5"x11" canvas, and the photo collage fit perfectly on there. what you see here, is what i printed out. i did the same thing for the first page. if the collage had been too big, i would have just adjusted it to fit the page. {i did this same trick for another layout that i'll share tomorrow, and i'll explain how i had to resize it even more before i was able to print}

and here is how they look on my layout. the first page.

and the second page.

a reminder of what the pages look like together. i love how the photo collage flows so nicely on the two pages. fancy pants is a generous sponsor of the CK dream team, and i just love getting their boxes with the new collections. last week, one showed up on my doorstep, and it included the new wave searcher collection, which is what i used for this layout.

one thing that i love about doing these layouts just for fun, and not to meet any design team or magazine requirements, is that i can include some older products here and there. remember these plastic letters from heidi swapp? from years and years ago? i have a TON of these, and used to hoard them, claiming they were "too special" to use. goofy, i know.

fiskars is another super generous sponsor of the CK dream team, and just sent over a box of new punches last week. i used the groovy rainbow interchangeable punch, which works with the interchangeable punch starter set, on some of the brown distressed pattern paper. i love that these punches take up so much less space, and the interchangeable pieces stack up so nicely together. you just snap in the one you want to use, and you're ready to go. so easy.

here, i combined two of my favorite embellishments that fancy pants has in their collections. the chipboard banner stickers and the buttons. i'm a huge fan of both of these.

overall, it's a pretty basic layout. the photo collages take up a lot of the space on the pages, so there's not a lot of room left that you have to fill up. but i find that for layouts based on holidays, events, vacations, etc ... anything where you have TONS of photos ... photo collages are the way to go. at least, for me they are. i absolutely love that i fit 23 photos on this layout! i had a small handful of photos that didn't make the cut for this layout. but they were all about the food we ate that day. i decided to make that a page of it's own, and i'll be sharing that tomorrow ;)  change of plans: will share that layout on friday.

suddenly a boy: a bella blvd layout

i have a new layout up today, on the bella blvd blog.

i look forward to our "free-for-all" layout days, which our designers have once a month. it's a chance to scrap about whatever we want to scrap about. no rules or restrictions to what collections or products we use. it's a great way to create some layouts that i've been wanting to do, just for fun.

it started when i took this photo of him last week. 26 months, going on 27 months. 2+ years, if you will.

and it made me think back to this photo of him. 7 months old. just a little thing.

time really does fly by so fast these days. it sort of seems like he magically became a full-fledged boy out of no where. he still had a few of those "baby" qualities about him. and then one day, he didn't. he was suddenly a boy.

i'll be honest. it bugs me just a teensy-tiny bit that my journaling printed a little crooked on the ruled pattern paper. lol! i'm sure no one would notice that except me. and i'm sure i'm weird for feeling the need to point it out to you all.

all of bella's new products started shipping out last week. so keep your eyes out for them, at your LSS's and online retailers. i know you can find them HERE at 2peas ;)

our crazy family: a bella blvd layout

today is saturday sketches, on the bella blvd blog. and it was my turn to play along. this week, we're using a sketch from becky fleck.

i know i have scrapped this family photo before, on one of my CHA layouts. since those layouts don't come back to me, i wanted to get this photo scrapped on a layout for my own albums. and this sketch was perfect for it. i pulled out lots of bella's family dynamix pattern papers to get started.

a few things to point out, in this full shot of the layout. the pink border piece is from the new chipboard elements set. these borders are about 8 inches in length, so they won't stretch all the way across a 12x12 page. but since i only needed it to show on the top and the bottom, i just cut it into 2 pieces, and adhered them seperately. also, i used a few of our new buttons in the upper left corner. i wanted a simple look, that didn't compete with the papers. so i choose a few floral buttons, and just used them upside down, so just the natural wood shows.

i stayed pretty true to the sketch. i did change up the title piece a bit. instead of using a full circle to hold my title, i used a half circle, and went a bit larger in size. this was partly done because i had already adhered flowers all the way across the page, forgetting that i needed my title in there.

i wanted to add some texture to my page with the flowers. i hand cut them from a sheet of patterned paper, and then wadded each one up into a ball. just like you would a piece of garbage. then i flattened them back out, and adhered them to the page using pop dots. this is SO simple, and yet it adds lots of texture and dimension to the page.

check out the bella blvd blog today, to see three more designer's take on the same sketch.

make sure and stop by next week. i have 2 giveaways that will be going up early in the week, and you won't want to miss them ;)

the very thought of you - a kerri bradford studio layout

i had another layout up at kerri bradford studio yesterday. i really should have posted this yesterday, since it fits with the february/valentines/love theme. and now it's march. we can still have some love though, right ;)

this was one of those layouts that i started without photos, or without any idea of what photos i would use. i knew i was making a love themed layout. and i knew i wanted to use the love story collection, from fancy pants. i figured i would go looking for photos at some point. but i ended up pulling these photos of the girls, from years ago, that i had printed out for another layout.

i knew i wanted to use the circle background, from the more background basics kit. my intention was to cover the entire 12x12 page with these. three rows, with four in each row. so i started out cutting twelve circle backgrounds from white cardstock.

on the first run though the silhouette, when i cut the first eight, it turns out i should have changed my blade. i knew it was wearing down a bit, but i figured i could get a bit more use out of it. i spend forever trying to get these off my mat, and all the circles out. that'll teach me to be sure and have a good, sharp blade.

i pulled out my pattern papers, and started trimming an assortment of papers into the same size as my circle background pieces, and rounding the edges. i adhered them all together, and lined them up on a sheet of aqua cardstock.

i had two photos of the girls, that i printed for another layout. they were printed quite a bit larger, but it worked out perfectly to trim them into the same size as my circle background pieces. somewhere along the line, i decided to add the strip across the center of the layout, and only use the circle background pieces along the top and bottom.

i used my title and subtitle, to do double duty for my journaling as well. i like to think i'm pretty good about journaling, but sometimes, i don't have a lot to say. i got my title piece from the smitten kit, and cut it from a text patterned paper and some pink cardstock.

i wanted to keep the rest of the embellishments pretty simple, since there was already a lot going on with the different patterned papers. so i simply cut some hearts, from the XOXO kit, using different patterned papers and cardstock. a single threaded button on each heart and i was done!

valentine's day - a kerri bradford studio layout

i had a new layout up over at kerri bradford studio yesterday! i got my silhouette out, broke out some new papers, and created two new layouts over the weekend. in between a full day of soccer and regular life stuff, of course.

for the month of february, we were focusing on "love" projects. i honestly wasn't sure what i was going to do, until the day i was digging around on my external hard drives, and came across these photos from alyssa's kindergarten valentine's day party at school. these photos are from 2001, which means they're 11 years old. and i've never scrapped them. these were actually digital photos too. i didn't hop onto the digital wagon until around 2006, so these were from alyssa's dad's camera.

digital images back then, are a lot different than digital images these days. lol! but i fixed up all the images a bit. there's a few blurry ones, but that's ok. i used a template from kerri's storyboard #1 kit, and printed out this photo collage. i used to use photo collages so much more in the past, and kind of got away from it because of magazine work. i've been having fun with them again though, since kerri has SOOOOO many great ones to choose from.

i used the large circles from kerri's background basics kit, on my red & white dot pattern paper (from bella blvd). this is one of those square background shapes, so i actually only cut a small section of the shape to use here. i cut three rows of the circles, just a tad bit shorter than 12 inches high. i also used the scalloped scribble border from kerri's borderlines #1 kit, on some aqua cardstock. i've used that shape before, and it's so cute.

for my title, i cut out the "valentine's day" shape, from kerri's XOXO kit, from aqua and red cardstock. i also cut the word "day" from white cardstock as well, to layer under the red word. i felt like it needed a little bit of white on that corner of the layout. you might notice that my "valentine's" word looks a little worn.

well, i had this bright idea to cut a few hearts from that same aqua cardstock. i positioned them to cut below where i had cut "valentine's" from, since i had just enough cardstock left to fit them. i had already removed my cutting mat from the silhouette though, so i knew i couldn't line it up perfectly. well, i forgot to delete the word "valentine's", before i hit the "cut" button, so it went and cut that word again. and i wasn't lined up, since i wasn't planning on cutting it. instead of starting over, i just used the word as it was. with a little raggedness to it, which i personally think looks fine ;)

i wanted to be sure to add the year to this layout, since it was from so long ago. i found the 2001 in kerri's decade 2000 kit. i did add a very light misting of mister huey's calico white spray from studio calico, to my 2001 piece and to my hearts.

here's one of the hearts that i cut out, using kerri's smitten kit. i ended up cutting these from the aqua cardstock, red cardstock, and some of the pink scrabble patterned paper (that and the woodgrain paper are both from jillibean soup).

when i went to crop this photos of the girls together, there was this huge blue pole next to them. i could deal with the blue showing behind them, but not with a huge blue pole next to them. so i just cropped them over to the side, and i figured i would add a little embellishment to the empty space on the photo.

i also added some little pearl accents to the hearts, and randomly next to my title piece. i shouldn't say randomly. i like things to appear "random" at times, but i put a TON of thought into the placement of each piece. lol! just a cute little extra touch.

i have one more "love" themed layout that i did for kerri over the weekend, that i'll be sharing later this week. stay tuned ;)

hello - a layout share

the this & that charming collection, from echo park, was one of my favorite new collections at CHA. i already managed to pick up a lot of my favorites from the show, and have started to play with all of them. i put this layout together over the weekend. it's pretty simple in design. but sometimes, simple is a nice change ;)

so, here's the story behind this layout. a few weeks ago, on a day i didn't have any daycare kids, i got a phone call. turns out, it was zachary, who had gotten a hold of grandma's cell phone and managed to call me. i was the last person she had called, and he must have just hit a button to re-dial me. he was talking a mile a minute. i didn't understand a lot of it, being that he just turned 2 years old at the end of december. there's a ton that i DO understand though, which is fun. after about 10 minutes of yapping away to me, grandma realized that he was actually talking to someone, and not just pretending. she was trying to get the phone back from him, and they ended up hanging up on me.

but zachary wasn't done talking to me, i guess. because he called back. at one point, i heard grandma say "laura. i can't get the phone from him, so just hang up whenever you have to go". lol! i finally told zachary that i had to go, and that i would see him the next day, and i hung up. well, he ended up calling me back two more times. it was all pretty funny. apparently, he had a TON to say to me.

later, grandma then sent me an email, "from" zachary, thanking me for talking to him. i thought it was so cute, so i saved the email. i thought it would be fun to scrap the story. well, when i was digging for photos last week for some other layouts, i came across these photos of zachary from a few months ago. he was talking on our old-school playskool phone. the one with the rotary dial. lol! i decided these photos would be perfect, to go with the story about his phone calls to me.

i copied and pasted part of zachary's email to me, and used it for my part of my journaling. click on the photo, to see it larger, if you can't read it here. feels kind of nice to have an idea for something, and get the story scrapped within a matter of weeks.

beautiful - a bella blvd challenge layout

i have another layout share today, as part of our challenge week, over on the bella blvd blog. our week-long guest designer, shannon tidwell, has done a great job this week, leading our challenges. and today's is all about using punched circles on your projects.

this is actually one of my CHA layouts. when we were starting to put this challenge week together, i realized that a bunch of the CHA designers has used punched circles on their projects. so it seemed perfect for a challenge. one of the patterned papers in the baby girl collection, has all of those big, colorful polkadots on the backside. i knew i had to punch them out and use them in a fun way. i started the layout, by trimming down my pink cloud paper, and matting it to the center of my white cardstock background.

i left plenty of room around the edges, since i knew the punched circles would need some room to groove. i worked on one side at a time, and tucked the circles under the cloud paper, slightly overlapping them as i went. i made sure to spread out the colors, and make sure i had some polka dot circles in there too.

once they were all arranged around the four edges of the layout, i machine stitched around the cloud paper. first off, because i love the look of machine stitching. and secondly, it's a great way to add some extra support to your page. i try and use great adhesive, but you just never know how well things will stick over time. with the machine stitching, those papers aren't going anywhere.

for my title piece, i used the purple journaling block from the cute cuts paper. i simply cut it in half, and adhered them side by side, making sure my title letters would fit. to give the tops of the journaling cards a more finished look, i added the chipboard measuring tape along the top.

make sure and stop by the bella blvd blog, to check out what the other designers did with this challenge. and you can also go back to earlier in the week, for anything you missed. we also want YOU to join in on our challenges too. we're inviting you to play along, and then upload your projects showing your take on any or all of the challenges. you can link your layout at the end of each post this week. we're giving one lucky participate a prize package worth $100! but to be entered in the random drawing, you have to participate. for each project you create and link on our posts, your name will be entered in the drawing. so the more you create, the more chances you have to win. have fun, and good luck!

happiness: a bella blvd challenge layout

we have lots of great stuff going on this week on the bella blvd blog. first off, we have a special week-long guest designer joining us. shannon tidwell! i've been a long time fan of her work, mostly at 2peas and for KI memories. it's been a lot of fun working so closely with her on this feature. she's heading up a week long challenge feature, where we have a different challenge every day this week. shannon has created lots of layouts for the challenges, and then our design team is playing along as well.

today's challenge is to use patterned papers from at least 4 different collections. that's actually really easy for me. i've always loved picking and choosing patterned papers from lots of different collections, and using them together on one layout. so i decided to double the challenge for myself. i choose patterned papers from EIGHT different collections for this layout.

the great thing about bella blvd papers, is that they have such great tone-on-tone patterns. this makes mixing papers easy to do. and you'll find so many of the same colors and shades, in many of the collections. when i was looking for a green patterned paper for this layout, i ended up with about 5 different choices, from 5 different collections, all of which would have worked. same with the aqua, or red, etc.

i thought it would be fun to do another sunburst on my layout. it's such a great way to use lots of patterned papers, and it looks super cool too! but, these sunburst do take a lot of work and thinking. lol! i snapped a few quick photos, while i was creating mine, to let you peek at my process. keep in mind, this is just the way i do them. doesn't mean it's the best way ;)

the word "happiness" from the sunshine & happiness chipboard set, was the starting point for this layout. when i went to choose my papers, i used these colors to make my choices.

and here's the final papers that i decided on. like i said, there were lots of choices for each color. i just made sure to have a good mix of patterns. chevron, polka dots, plaid, etc.

i knew i wanted my sunburst to go across the top of the page. so i cut a piece of white cardstock to the same size that i wanted my sunburst to be. i believe this is 4.5x12 inches. usually, you'll want to have something placed over the center of the sunburst. a photo, an accent, etc. my intention was to put my title over the center, and i knew i was going to use a large circle to add my title too.

so i arranged the circle template over where i knew i would be putting it, and then traced around it, onto the white cardstock. i made a pencil mark in the center of the circle, along the edge of the paper. then i used my ruler to draw the lines out ... from that center pencil mark, to the outside edge of the paper. i varied the size of the bursts, making some thinner and some wider.

since i was going to be placing a large circle over the center of the sunburst, i knew i didn't need the bursts to go all the way to the middle. if more of the bursts would have shown, and i had something smaller being placed over the center, i would have traced the lines further in. if that makes sense. after drawing all my lines, i numbered each burst, so that i could easily keep track of where they go. otherwise, it's like a puzzle, getting them back together. then cut them all apart, using your paper trimmer.

i then used each burst, as a template, to cut out my patterned papers. i used just a tiny bit of removeable adhesive, to stick the template piece to the backside of the patterned paper, and then cut them out. i won't lie. i spent FOREVER getting a color combo and arrangement that i liked. several of these bursts, i cut out numerous times, from different papers, trying to get the right look.

then i adhered each piece to a 12x12 sheet of white cardstock. this is just the piece that i'm building my entire layout on. i started with the two orange corner pieces, and then worked my way in. on a few other projects, where i have created sunbursts, i have machine stitched along each burst. which takes FOREVER. so i skipped that on this layout.

and here you can see where i placed my large circle, over the center of the sunburst. i used my circle cutters, to cut two different circles, slightly varying in size. the top piece is an embossed white cardstock, and the bottom is a text paper. i adhered the layered circles to the layout using pop dots.

in my journaling, i mention "all my girls".

i should clarify that only two of these are technically "my girls". the other four are previous daycare girls of mine. i've always lovingly called almost all of my daycare kids "mine". i used a photo template from kerri bradford studio, to create my photo collage.

i used my favorite grid patterned paper for the bottom part of my page. i really need to get more of it, because i'm down to my last sheet. the text paper along the left side, is the same paper that i used as the bottom circle on my title piece. the text is mostly red, which i thought was good, since i only used one piece of red paper on my sunburst. plus, lots of the words in the text are printed in other colors. most of which are the other fun colors that i used. it was meant to be used.

i ended up with all of these oddly shaped scraps of patterned paper, from cutting out my bursts. the day i created this layout, i had bought this tiny flower punch. i picked it up, after i realized i had no small flower punches, and recently, i had the need for one. since it was on my desk, i just decided to use it. i punched these little flowers out of each of the six papers i used on the sunburst. i adhered them along the text strip of paper, and then added little silver accents to the centers. i finished embellishing the layout with lots of little word stickers, in my six coordinating colors, and a few chipboard clouds.

make sure and stop by the bella blvd blog all week long, to check in on the fun. there is a TON of inspiration going on, with LOADS of new projects being shared. and we want YOU to join in on our challenges too. we're inviting you to play along, and then upload your projects showing your take on any or all of the challenges. you can link your layout at the end of each post this week. we're giving one lucky participate a prize package worth $100! but to be entered in the random drawing, you have to participate. for each project you create and link on our posts, your name will be entered in the drawing. so the more you create, the more chances you have to win. have fun, and good luck!

slice informercial - a layout share

i'm back with another layout share for you. another layout that was started, then put away and forgotten. only to be pulled back out last week. this one is about my slice informercial trip that i took about 2.5 years ago.

i had started this layout forever ago. but i really didn't get very far. basically, i had two sheets of white cardstock, and all of the photos attached, just like you see here. i was lifting myself, from another layout i had done about a different trip, and using the same sort of photo placement. so the photos on here were all arranged and adhered, with the idea that i'd be adding all my pattern papers around them. 

then i created THIS layout for an assignment. which didn't work out, so i blogged it. and i even mentioned the fact that i had this layout started, but had just never finished it. even though i had a layout done, i still wanted to finish this one at some point. it had more photos, and more room to tell the story. 

while at CHA, kristin and linda at were sweet enough to share some of their new lily bee papers with me. i decided to put them right to good use, and pulled out several sheets to use. i started with the pink polka dot strip across the center of the pages. when i went to adhere it, i realized that my white cardstock page wasn't quite 12 inches wide. which seems strange, since cardstock is 12x12. lol! it was a noticeable amount too. so i decided to trim down a tad bit from the top and bottom as well, and then mat both pages on green cardstock.

i used a notebook paper border punch on some of the aqua and yellow dot pattern papers, and then layered them together across the top of the pages. i also used a scalloped edged punch on the yellow patterned paper, to go across the bottom of the pages, and a small strip next to the photo you see above.

all of my photos across the bottom of the pages are 2x3 inches in size. such a great way to get lots of photos on a layout. i have 16 photos across the bottom, and 4 larger focal photos across the top. i also pulled out some fun flowers from bella blvd, to embellish the page. i had wanted to give a little seperation between the word "slice" and "infomercial" in my title, and the flower was perfect. there are four flowers in a pack, so the other three decided to find a spot to stay as well.

i used some of my bella blvd simply simona chipboard alphas for my title. they fit perfectly on that pink strip of pattern paper.

i had plenty of room for journaling on this layout. i fit the first part of my story, on the first page. and then a larger journaling piece on the second page. i printed my journaling on some older scenic route grid patterened paper. love that stuff.

yay! another trip and adventure scrapped and in the albums! feels good! i will most likely print out my blog post about this trip, and add it into the album somehow. i love going back and reading those, since i tend to have more info in there, since i usually blog about it while it's fresh in my mind.

winter CHA 2010 - a layout share

every once in a while, i find myself in this "get-er-done" mood. where i pull out things i've been putting off taking care of, and dig out things that i just never got around to finishing. sometimes, this applies to things around the house. and sometimes, it applies to scrapbooking stuff.

when i got back from CHA two weeks ago, i was feeling super inspired and really wanted to scrap and be creative. then i realized that i was creatively drained at the same time, from all of the projects, blogging, etc, that i had done leading up to CHA. so i went into my "get-er-done" zone, and decided it was a good time to tackle some of my half finished layouts.

winter CHA 2010 was the first CHA i had attended, a full two years ago. and i started a layout about it shortly after the trip. i was all gung-ho, and wanted to get these photos scrapped and in the album. originally, i had the top 2/3 of what you see here on my two pages. white cardstock background. new dear lizzy pattern papers across the top (new at the time, since that show was when she released her first collection). all the photos were just like you see them here. then i had a transparency across the bottom of the pages, along with some thickers for my title. i never did like the letter stickers i choose for my title, the transparency didn't look right, and i had a ribbon on there that just wasn't doing anything for me. that's how i left it. never finished it.

then about a year ago (probably after CHA last year), i pulled it back out to re-work it. i ended up taking off the transparencies from the bottom of the pages, and replaced them with the aqua polka dot paper. and then i left it again. never finished it. no title, no nothing.

another year later, and i decided that it was about time to actually finish this poor, neglected layout. i'm sure if i was starting all over, from scratch, this layout would look totally different. but i worked with what i had going, since i really did like the arrangement of the photos and the patterned papers. and truthfully, i really didn't stress over anything i added. just grabbed stuff and went with it.

kind of like how when i look at the placement of these glittered chipboard flowers and the flair buttons now (only hours after having added them to the layout), i'm not sure i love where i decided to adhere them all. but it's all good. every now and then, it's nice to NOT have to worry about making every layout perfect or trying to make it live up to what someone else thinks it should look like. i deal with that in assignments and "work" layouts. so i enjoyed these "just for me" layouts.  

for my title, i wanted to find some chunky chipboard letters, since "CHA" is such a short word. i came across these super old glittered chipboard letters from making memories, and decided to use them. i like the mix of lowercase/uppercase, and fonts. the little wooden letters were in a bag next to the glittered letters, so i just went with it and used them for "winter". once again, i was just grabbing whatever i came across first.

my intention was to put "2010" under "winter". the number stickers were the last thing i added to this layout. once i picked the peachy thicker numbers (to match the peachy ribbons), they didn't fit next to my title. so i just adhered them at the top of the page.

not sure that wooden letters and glittered letters really go together. but they're both brown, and that's all i cared about at the moment ;)

for my journaling, i typed up three seperate text boxes, and then printed them on a grid patterened paper. i wanted to trim them into tag shapes. i made a few of my cuts a bit too close, so that when i cut the corners off the tops, i came super close to cutting off a letter or two. that bugs me a little. but i wasn't about to waste good grid paper to re-print it. lol! just went with it.

i even cut a bit too much off the bottoms, and they looked too short. so i dug some scrap pieces out of my garbage, and adhered a strip to the bottom of each tag, to make it appear longer. i'm sure no one would have noticed that. but now that i pointed it out, you can totally see it on this one, right? lol! i finished the tags by stapling some dear lizzy ribbons to the top of each tag.

and there you go. my winter CHA 2010 layout is finally done!!! two years after i started it. i love how working on something like this, and finishing it, makes me feel SOOOOO accomplished. silly, i know. but it does. and i have two more of these "get-er-done" layouts that i'll be sharing soon. a layout about THIS trip. and one about THIS trip. both layouts were started forever ago, and then pushed to the side. feels good to have them all done finally.

valentine - a creating keepsakes layout

happy valentine's day! i was thinking that it was too bad that i never got around to creating anything "valentine-ey", so that i'd have something cute to put up on the blog today. then, i happen to remember this layout that i never got around to sharing. i took THIS LITTLE TRIP just about a year ago, and this was one of the 24 projects i had put together for it.

i had created some samples to show how to incorporate "pockets" on your scrapbook pages, using pattern paper. this was one of the layouts that i threw together at the last minute. i knew i wanted to do long pockets, across the entire page, and had to come up with something fun to tuck into those pockets. that's when i thought about valentines.

i miss all the little valentines that the kids do when they're little. my girls are 12 & 15 now, and it's been a few years since passing out valentines was considered "cool". lol! at least i can look back on their valentines from their younger years. i have them all saved and in their school albums. but i went ahead and pulled some of sarah's out, from first grade, to use on this layout. 

i used some fun fancy pants pattern papers, and cut them into varying size strips to go across the page. i cut them at a bit of an angle, since i didn't want them going perfectly straight across. i wanted them to tilt a little here and there. before adhering them down, i machine stitched around the edges of each paper strip. then i adhered them, adding adhesive to only the bottom and sides of the strips. i started adhering them at the top row, and worked my way down, slightly overlapping each strip. since there's no adhesive on the top, you'll have created "pockets", and you can then tuck things inside.

i added a few large buttons, to either side of the page. i picked out a favorite photo of sarah from first grade, and added it to the layout, along with a quick chipboard title. i should really go and add something on the layout, to show what year this was and what grade. i was in such a rush, when i was creating these and getting ready for the trip, that it was all about being as quick as i could.

fun & games - a creating keepsakes layout

i have a layout share today from scrapbooking ides for every season, a special issue from creating keepsakes.

As seen in the Scrapbooking Ideas For Every Season special issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine. Copyright Creative Crafts Group. Posted with prior permission from the publisher.

for this assignment, i was asked to create a layout with a gameboard inspired background. and it was supposed to be winter themed. this threw me a bit. after all, we don't have "winter" here where we live in california. so we certainly don't have many winter themed moments. then there was the "gameboard inspired background". what could i do with that?

after much thinking, i came up the perfect board game to use as inspiration for my layout. scene it! it's one of our favorite games to play, here in this house. we have a wide variety of scene it games. a few disney channel versions, disney movie version, nickelodeon channel version, twilight versions, etc.

i started by taking out one of the game boards, to use as a template for my layout. i knew i was doing a two page spread. and it turned out, that the game board was the PERFECT fit! i set two sheets of blue cardstock side by side, lined up the board on top, and then traced the board onto my cardstock. i cut those out, and then adhered them to my pages.

i used a white grid pattern paper for the base of my pages. i wanted a clean background, to let everything else stand out. the grid just adds a bit more interest, than plan white cardstock. i also added a few strips of black/white pattern paper, and a embossed red cardstock, along the tops and bottoms of my pages.

then i got to work finding photos to add to my "gameboard". since the girls (and admittedly, both joe and i as well) are huge disney channel and nickelodeon channels fans, i set out to find our favorite shows and stars. google images was my friend for this. i typed in what i was looking for, and then searched for the best photo i could find, in a size that would copy well for printing. for our favorite tv shows, i looked for great cast photos whenever i could.

i then pulled up each photo in photoshop, and resized them all to 1 inch x 1 inch. when i placed each photo onto my full sheet to print, i copied each one several times. i think i printed each photo 4-5 times, just to be sure i would have enough photos to go around the gameboard. after they printed out, i used a 1 inch square punch to punch out each photo.

i then set out to arrange the photos around the board. i spent forever on this part, trying to get them all lined up perfectly. i adhered each and every piece, using pop dots, for extra dimension. my "fun & games" title was cut with my silhouette, from black cardstock. i simply centered it across the two pages, and cut it where the pages meet, before adhering it.

i also cut some circles from a few different shades of blue cardstock, using a circle cutter. those mimic the circles on the actual scene it gameboard. the arrows were cut from the same red embossed cardstock that i used across the top and bottom of the pages. i simply dug up an old chipboard arrow, and traced it on the backside of the red cardstock, and then cut them out.

two things i have to point out about this layout, just because i thought they were kind of funny. this was supposed to be a "winter themed" layout. i was told that playing boardgames could be a winter activity that we do, which still makes this a winter themed layout. except that, after i had send this in, it dawned on me that the girls are wearing tank tops/tshirts in their photos. kind of a giveaway that i took these photos during the summer.

and when i sent this layout in, i was asked if i would be able to provide photo releases for all of the people in my photos. i had to laugh when i emailed back and said that they were all actors and actresses, and that i found all of their photos on google. i did NOT laugh when i was asked to provide links to all of the places where i had found these photos, which led me to google search them all over again. lol! i think it's also a great way to tell who has kids and can name all of these stars and shows, and who does not have kids (or your kids aren't quite old enough yet for some of these) and has no clue who the people in these photos are :)

the player - a kerri bradford studio layout

i'm switching gears a bit today. i've had SO much bella blvd stuff to share. but i also created a layout last week that just went up on kerri bradford's blog a few days ago.

i was feeling the need to do a fun sports layout, and decided to scrap some of alyssa's softball photos from 6 years ago. all of my papers are from the making the team collection, from bella blvd.

this layout design just sort of happened by accident. i had printed my photos as 2x3's, and i also had one more photo that i printed larger. i didn't end up using that one, once the layout got going. anyways. i trimmed my photos up, leaving a nice white border around each one. i knew i wanted them on a big strip of white grid patterned paper, to go the length of the page.

i had adhered the photos across the grid paper, overlapping them a bit as i went. my intention was to trim off that entire strip, and then add it to my page. i didn't pay much attention to where i adhered them on the sheet. once i started pulling out pattern papers, i decided to just build right on the grid paper, working around where i already had the photos. i think it worked out nicely.

i had a little gap between the last two photos. i had planned on filling it in with something, but i wasn't sure what. i simply took a few thin strips of blue and green patterned papers, and adhered them in between the photos, and then machine stitched down the middle. i also used some of the brand new designer tape from bella blvd, to tape down my photos. i love that yellow chevron tape the most!

i knew i wanted to use the circles from the background basics kit. i LOVE cutting the background shapes on my silhouette. i'm not lucky enough to have a cameo (not yet anyways ;)), so i'm still cutting on the silhouette SD. so i can't cut the full 12x12 background shapes. but it's all good, because i can still cut shapes 12 inches long for fun borders. i just selected a portion of the design to cut out, and adhered that across the top of my page.

the stars are from the ol' ballgame kit. i resized them to a few different sizes, and cut them from black cardstock. i picked out a few brads and a button, to add to the centers of each star.

kerri has lots of fun titles and phrases in the ol' ballgame kit. i choose to use "the player" for my title, because i knew my journaling would be more about alyssa as a softball player. and not so much on her team, or how the year went.

i tend to go towards my regular journaling strips the majority of the time, which i love. but when i have more to say, a few journaling blocks work so much better. i also found one of the new flags from bella blvd that coordinated with my layout nicely, so i tucked it behind one of the journaling papers.

bella blvd sneak peek: designer tapes

please tell me you've been visiting the bella blvd blog each day this week. and tell me you'll visit it every day next week too. we just have SOOOOO much new stuff to share with you, i don't want you to miss anything ;)

it's day 5 of our two week long sneak peek week. and i have to say. this is one of my favorite reveals! check out what the fabulous stephanie has come up with for us (also check out her blog, since she has some really exciting news of her own. i'm so happy for her ;)).

designer tapes! how incredibly awesome are these! i have to admit, up until now, i have never tried using tapes. or washi tapes, as they're often called. i have a few rolls of tapes, but have never even though to use them. when stephanie finally shared some peeks of the new products with me, this was one of the ones i was most excited about. i love the colors and the designs. they have all my favorite colors, and i can see these working on any and all of my layouts. and once i tried using them, i was hooked!

this is my "focus on tapes" layout. there's some additional new products on there, that you'll learn more about next week. but my main goal on this layout, was to show off some ways to use the tapes. i choose this photo of my girls and my friend deneen's twins, that i took almost two years ago. i love the colors in it, and knew it would work well with the tapes.

this doesn't show any tapes, but a fun new chipboard piece that i pop dotted of my layout. i used some colored mini safety pins to add a few miniatures stickers.

one of my first ideas with the tapes was to tear off pieces, and create a frame around my photo. i know this isn't a new idea or anything. but i love how it looks.

the tapes are so easy to use, and are forgiving too. if you change your mind or need to move or adjust the tape, you can very easily remove it, and then stick it back down. i love that, since i do tend to change my mind a lot.

i also added some of the blue gingham tape behind my chipboard title letters. my letters already stood out on the graph patterned paper. but i think it just adds a fun little touch, when you add that little bit of interest behind the title.

the end of the tape was also perfect for helping secure my "life is good" flag. it wasn't planned. but i thought the flag would be cute up there, was needed somewhere to tuck it in. you can't have a flag just hanging out on it's own, right? i do have adhesive on the back of the flag, but it looks as if the tape is holding it down.

head on over to the bella blvd blog, to see the entire Designer Tapes reveal, piece by piece. and make sure to leave a comment over there for the giveaway, for a chance to win-it-before-you-can-buy-it!

bella blvd sneak peek: we're expecting

we've had three great days of sneak peeks on the bella blvd blog so far. but we still have SO much more to show you. time for day four!

so, we revealed the baby boy collection and we revealed the baby girl collection. but what about the moments that come BEFORE the little boy or girl bundle of joy's arrival? that's where bella's next collection comes in. 

we're expecting is a new mini series by bella. kind of like a mini collection. there are three double sided patterned papers, miniatures stickers, chipboard elements, and stamps. the great thing about these products, is that they coordinate perfectly with the baby boy and baby girl collections. so you can pick up a few pieces from the mini series, and mix them with the baby collection of your choice.

i hope you weren't expecting me to scrap photos of myself when i was pregnant. lol! not going to happen. i borrowed this photo from my local photographer friend, krista lund. she took this gorgeous photo of her friend jessica. i would give anything to have looked that amazing when i was pregnant.

the pink and the blue patterned paper have the "i'm pregnant" and "mommy to be" text on one side, and the cute measuring tape on the other side.

jessica was having a baby boy, so i pulled some other papers and stickers from the baby boy collection. i didn't realize it at the time i choose this photo, but it ended up going perfectly with the oranges and greys in the boy collection.

the third paper in the mini series, has they yellow/white clouds on one side, and the cute little stork birds on the other side.

hands down, i think this grey chevron patterned paper is my favorite out of all the new papers from bella. i've never been big on scrapping with greys. but i've been loving it a whole lot more lately. i added the chipboard "expecting" title to the bottom of the page. to help the white letters stand out a bit more, against the grey paper, i added a few strips of the yellow ......... wait, i can't tell you what it is yet. that reveal is coming up tomorrow ;)

this cute chipboard stork originally had a purple wing. that didn't quite tie in with my colors for this layout. so i took a scrap of orange patterned paper, and hand cut a wing to adhere over the purple. i adhered him with pop dots. i have used a TON of pop dots for my CHA projects.

head on over to the bella blvd blog, to see the entire we're expecting collection, piece by piece. and make sure to leave a comment over there for the giveaway, for a chance to win-it-before-you-can-buy-it!

niko boy - a bella blvd layout

this past weekend, i made 8 new layouts for bella blvd. start to finish, 8 layouts in 2.5 days. it's too bad i can't share any of them with you. lol. sorry, that was mean. soon, i promise. CHA will be here before you know it, and we'll be able to share all the new products and designs. you're going to love them! luckily, i had to do a layout for the bella blog this weekend too (yeah, make that 9 layouts total). at least i have one to share for now. 

yesterday, was "free-for-all" day on the blog, where the designers can scrap any sort of layout they want. i decided to do a boy layout. it had been a while since i had created a boy layout, or scrapped about the daycare kids. my actual intention was to scrap about little dude zachary, since he's around here all the time. but as i was searching for photos, i came across these of my boy nikolas. i have scrapped a few of these photos before, but on a layout with haley, about how they came to visit me one day. i wanted to do a layout just about him.

every time i do my little paper saving tricks on layouts, i think to myself "i should take photos of the steps so i can share". and then i don't. i'm going to do that today. it's on my list.

i used the mr boy collection, from bella. i love the papers and colors in this collection. it's not always easy to find good boy scrapbook products. but this collection is definatley a fun one. i layered a few of the pattern papers together, machine stitching them all together. nikolas also went by the nickname "niko". and i always called him "my boy". which is where my title "niko boy" came from.

i added on some chipboard accents to embellish the page a bit, using pop dots on a few of them. overall, it's a pretty simple layout.

gotta get back to work here. i have errands to run, since i don't have any daycare kids today. finally, a day off, and the girls are back in school after a 2.5 week break. time to accomplish stuff. and i still have an extreme number of layouts and cards to make, and even an altered project tossed in there to mix it up ;)

christmas 2010 - a bella blvd layout

finally. a new layout to share. it's been a while since i scrapped anything, layout wise. this one went up on the bella blvd blog today.

i knew i had a layout to get done for this week, and wasn't really sure what i wanted to do it on. since i'm the one that writes the bella blog, and sees all the assignments coming in, i've loved seeing all the great christmas layouts from the design team. i'm sure i've mentioned this before, but i'm just not a huge christmas scrapper. no idea why not, since i have lots of photos from every christmas. maybe it's the daunting task of narrowing down all those photos and working them onto a layout.

but i decided to go for it, and i knew i would start with a good photo collage. i've gotten away from my photo collages that i love and used to use ALL the time. i miss them. so this layout started with a collage of 16 photos from our 2010 christmas get together with my side of the family. i printed this out at 7.5 x 7.5 inches, and rounded the corners.

i started with pieces from the christmas wishes collection. i knew i wanted to use the red chipboard "christmas" alphas, which would add a nice amount of red to the layout. next, i went looking for greens and browns. i ended up pulling the brown woodgrain paper from the tail waggers and cat naps collection, because i loved the way the collage looked against it. once i had my main colors of red, green, and brown, i added in some touches of aqua and yellow, using the stickers and chipboard border piece.

it was a very last minute decision to add this little chipboard reindeer. i had this empty space, and figured i would add the date or a few more stickers. but the reindeer was so cute in the package, and he fit nicely there, so i added him.

this journaling could go with just about any christmas get together with my family. and i love that. we have our traditions, and our way of doing things, and i love doing those things every year.

and a quick photo of us from this christmas. it was a busy holiday weekend, with three family get togethers in three days. we were all so tired yesterday, and spend the majority of the day trying to recover from all the hustle and bustle of the festivities.

flying high - a bella blvd layout

sorry i went and disappeared on you for a few days. being sick is no fun at all. it knocked me out for two days, but i'm feeling so much better and trying to catch up. i even did a little scrapbooking!

i had a layout scheduled on the bella blvd blog today. wednesday's are free-for-all days for our designers, where they can make any themed layout they want, using any collection they want. i love that even though it's the middle of december, i could create a fun, summertime layout.

this photo of the girls is a long time favorite of mine. it's from 8 years ago, and i took it at my parents house. when the girls were little, joe and my brother (and even my mom and dad) would toss them super high in the air, while in the pool. it was a favorite activity, and i have SOOOOO many photos of them doing this. but THIS photo? well, this photo was the best one that i ever got. it makes me smile and giggle just looking at the expressions on the girls faces. and how hilarious is sarah, all sideways, with her pigtail braids flying about? love it!

my parents have had this photo hanging on their fridge for probably about 8 years. and every time i'm over there, i comment on how i need to dig out my negative and have it reprinted. but i never do it. a few weeks ago, they were on vacation, and we were over visiting with jenny, their dog. and i was standing their looking at the photo, and then i just took it right off the fridge. took it home with me, scanned it into my computer, cleaned it up, and had it printed as an 8x12 enlargement. easy peasy.

by the time i added it to my layout, it sort of looks like an 8x10. there was quite a bit of empty space on the bottom of the photo, so i just shorted it to make room for more pattern paper and color. because there was empty space on this photo, i was also able to add my title directly to the photo, using some alpha stickers.

i dug through different bella collections, to find papers that matched well together. sure, using a collection is easy, since it all coordinates together. but i have fun pulling from all different collections, and i love the challenge of finding pieces that go together. i started by looking for pinks and aqua's, to go with the girls swimsuits. i added in the yellow, mainly because i wanted to use the yellow scalloped border sticker.

i went looking for a ribbon to add next to the photo, and came across this colorful one from american crafts. it had my pink, aqua, and yellow in it. and then i just added some extra embellishments in browns and green, to match the other colors in the ribbon. these fun chipboard buttons are from some older bella blvd collections. i threaded a few of the buttons with some jute string, and added some silver mini brads to the centers of a few as well.

i also came across this chipboard piece, that say "this is sooo awesome!", and i just knew that i HAD to use it. how perfectly does it go, placed above sarah? because i'm pretty sure that is exactly what was going through her little 4 yr old head when i snapped this photo ;)

i thought it would be funny to add this little disclaimer to the layout. i'm almost positive that the original photo had my brother in it as well. he's directly to the left of joe, when looking at the photo. but the photo on my parents fridge was an 8x10, which came from a 4x6, and then i enlarged to an 8x12. so maybe he got cut out, unintentionally. but one could think, just looking at the photo, that joe in fact threw BOTH the girls up, for this shot. not to say that he couldn't have tossed them both, because i'm sure he could have. but there was another set of hands involved. the girls saw this layout yesterday, and said i "dissed him". lol!

and for the record, this past summer, the girls tried to get joe and my brother to toss them up like this in the pool. for old times sake. let's just say, their feet didn't even get out of the water ;)

birthday pool party - a creating keepsakes layout

i just wanted to say "thanks" for everyone's comments on my last post. it's nice to know that i'm not the only one that occasionally just has to shut down, and ignore the world for a few days. well, not really the world. just the things that i didn't want to think or worry about anymore ;)

as seen in the Scrapbooking Holiday's and Celebrations Special Issue, from Creating Keepsakes magazine. copyright creative crafts group. posted with prior permission from the publisher.

when i was asked to create a summer birthday layout, i was all over it. my birthday is in june, sarah's is in june, joe's is in july, and alyssa's is in september (which is still summer around here). and the majority of my family and joe's family all have summer birthday's as well. most of our parties end up being pool parties. so i dug around and found a birthday/party that i hadn't scrapped yet.  

what i came up with was sarah's 8th birthday. i knew i wanted a lot of photos on my layout. i always end up with tons of photos, and i do my best to get at least one photo of each guest. i don't think everyone ended up on this layout, but all of her closest friends did. i always try and include a few photos of the birthday girl opening gifts, and at least one photo with the cake. i printed 9 of my photos at 3x4's, and 3 of them at 3x3's.

for my title, i used a favorite mix of alphas. chipboard alphas, which in this case, i used bella blvd. and my favorite alpha stickers by doodlebug.

i'm not even going to admit how long i spend arranging these three stickers. i tried so many different configurations, as if it was a major life decision. lol!

i choose pattern papers from the beach babe collection from fancy pants for my layout. the colors worked perfectly with all the girl's swimsuits. and i thought the fishies were so cute, because we have always said that sarah is truely a fish in disquise. that girl can swim the entire day, and never get tired. i thought the little "bikini brigade" border strip was really fun too.

i printed my journaling on the backside of one of the pattern papers, that had a distressed solid yellow on it. it was easier then trying to find yellow cardstock that matched perfectly.

to add a little "birthday" feel to the "summer" feel of the papers, i added some fun birthday stickers from making memories and carolee's creations.

now that i finished sharing a summer layout, i really need to get on the christmas wagon here. lol! my pre-lit tree only has about half the lights working. and we don't have the patience once again to try and figure it out. so i'm stringing a few strands of lights on it, to fill in the gaps. which reminds me why i have a pre-lit tree to begin with. because i detest stringing lights ;) i need to get one more strand, and then maybe i can decorate it. it's been set up for 5 full days, and still doesn't have ornaments on it. hopefully, i can work that in this weekend. in between 3 soccer games, and a christmas parade.

becoming emily - a layout share

it's monday. i'm not always a fan of monday's. but i guess it was pretty nice to have a nice, long holiday weekend. i actually did NOTHING for two of those days. just laid around, watched movies off the DVR, watched six straight hours of "friends" on thanksgiving night (every single thanksgiving episode from their 10 seasons, and a few i watched twice), did some digital scrapping, and just did a whole lot of relaxing. it was lovely :)

on to a layout share. awwww. isn't emily the most precious little baby! photos like these make me wish i had photos like that of  my girls, when they were babies. i had borrowed some photos from my photographer friend, krista, for a few projects, and i just had to scrap these photos of her youngest daughter.

this die cut brown patterned paper is from studio calico. actually, all the pattern paper on this layout is from studio calico. i really love the large cut out circles on the die cut paper, and it was my starting point for this layout. i cut a 12 inch strip to use along the left side of the layout, and then a smaller strip to use on the bottom right corner of the layout. so i still have a good sized piece left over. 

when i was searching through my huge stash of thickers for my title, i was mainly looking for brown alphas. i have a lot of these fancy cursive style fonts. am i the only one that has one heck of a time, lining these up? i can never get the tilt of the letters right, but still have them perfectly straight, as i like them. lol!

i added some white trims to this simple page design. the larger lace scalloped trim is from making memories, and has been in my stash for years and years. the smaller white scalloped trim is from american crafts. a few rhinestone brads finished off the page.

i got chills - a bella blvd layout

i have a layout up today, on the bella blvd blog.

when i first saw bella's new mid-release collection, winter wonder, i fell in love with the colors and patterns of the papers. they are papers that i can see myself using on everyday layouts, just like THIS one. but when i got to the stickers, they were definately winter-themed. being a california born-and-raised family, that does not experience "winter" as so many of you call it, how would i ever make use of those stickers?

then i accidently came across these photos of sarah. from years ago. hmmmm. these are as close as i'm going to get to "winter" photos. what i should tell you is that i took these photos in august, i believe. which, where we live, is the dead of summer. an average day for us would see temperatures in the low-to-mid 100's. so why is my child all bundled up, as if she was freezing to death, or headed out to the snow?!?!

partially, because she's a bit of a wingnut. and partially, because she said she was cold. i think she had just taken a shower, probably after soccer practice. and she claimed she was cold and couldn't get warm. maybe because we had the air conditioning on, seeing as it was SO hot outside. lol! and sarah being sarah, she took full advantage of her coldness to get a good laugh. she piled on TONS of clothes, scarves, mittens, hats, and jackets. anything she could find. she actually does this sort of thing all the time. quite the funny one :)

i really wasn't sure where i was going with this page, when i started. i cut the four strips of the green and aqua patterned papers, and adhered them to the outside edges of the page, to create a framed look. i added the snowflake paper to the center of my "frame", and cut the large circle from the pink pattern paper. my intention was to add my journaling where the ribbons are, and my ribbons where the journaling is. somewhere along the line, they got flopped.

before i adhered my snowflake patterned paper to the page, i misted it with some blue spray ink. just a touch, to add some interest to the paper. then i used some glitter brads to accent the centers of some of the snowflakes on the paper.

are you all ready and prepared for thanksgiving, tomorrow? i've been put in charge of making a ham. sounds easy enough, and yet, i have never bought or made one before. there's a reason i don't consider myself a real "grown-up". since a real grown-up has more than likely cooked a ham, by the time they're my age. lol! i must figure that out this morning. wish me luck :)

they r just so cool - my mind's eye guest designer

i have two more projects to share from my october guest designer gig, for my mind's eye. these were both created for the MME november newsletter.

i was given this sketch, by MME designer jana eubank, and was asked to create a two page layout from it. i use sketches quite often, but this was the first time i have turned a one page sketch into a two page sketch. turns out, it's pretty easy to do.

do these photos look familiar? i think only one of these photos appeared on my layout from yesterday. but they were all taken at the same time. do the colors of my papers look familiar? a bit different from my layout i shared yesterday, and yet the layouts have the same feel to me.

when i sat down with the sketch, and my big stack of MME papers, i had the idea to scrap these photos. the other layout had photos of all four of the girls. but i wanted to do a layout, with just my girls. i had TONS of pics from that day, and i wanted to get more of them in the scrapbook. once i printed my pics, and went to pick out papers, i kept finding myself drawn to certain papers. the ones that i used on the layout from yesterday. lol! it was hard to get that layout out of my head, i guess, and imagine the photos with other papers. 

i started my two page layout, by stretching the outside border across the two pages. that way, i had the brown woodgrain paper going around the outside edge of both pages. i also added the verticle strip of pink glitter paper to the first page, and layered a strip of aqua paper that i punched using a large scalloped border punch.

want to know a quick way to add a border around your layout? while a lot of my layouts look like i have matted a large paper to the center of my background paper, i have a few ways to get this look, while saving paper. for this layout, i simply cut six 1x12 inch strips of the brown woodgrain paper. i snipped off the ends of some of the strips, at an angle, to give it a mitered look. then i just adhered all the strips against the outside edge of my background cardstock. i basically "framed" my entire spread.

i have my large pattern paper circle, just like the sketch. except i adhered my circle, so that it goes onto both pages of the spread. i added my title to the circle, which i had machine stitched before adhering to my layout.

the sketch called for two photos, along with a block of journaling. i decided to move my journaling, and shifted the photos down a bit. to stretch the sketch across two pages, i just kept going with the photos. i managed to get six photos across my layout.

i love white cardstock. one problem i have had in the past, is that if i have too much white space on white cardstock (confusing?!?!), then i don't love it. it feels empty. this is one reason i'm loving using the mists. i simply spritzed on some green mist. obviously, this takes a little planning ahead. knowing what area you want to mist, and where your photos and embellisments are going to go. i did mist the white cardstock, before i adhered down the brown strips of pattern paper.

i had a few of these die cut journaling tags, that had the little flag ends on them. they're larger tags, that had some text at the top. i cut them both down a bit, so that they would fit well on my layout. some simple hand journaling, and brads to embellish, and i was finished.

i was also asked to create a card, off this sketch.

i created a mini version of the sketch, on this tiny 4x4 inch card. same idea, with the brown strips of pattern paper, added to the edges of the white cardstock card base. then i added a small square of pink pattern paper to the center, and machine stitched around the edges.

i have the verticle aqua strip of pattern paper, along with a small scalloped edged piece of cardstock. i figured if i kept the basic design and paper placement like the sketch, i could take some liberties with the rest of the sketch. like my sentiment.

check out the MME november newsletter, where you can find full detailed instructions, on how to create both the layout and the card.