It's Cold Outside....
I'm just going to get to the good stuff first, because I know many of you signed up to win the beautiful "All Moments Remembered" scrapbook kit and are anxiously awaiting the announcement of today's winner! Well, using an online random number generator, I found a lucky someone to take home the kit. Here's the winning comment:
"I love the new Heather Bailey...I even purchased some of her patterns and fabric to start sewing again...along with my other healthy addiction...Scrapbooking. I'm currently working on our fun summer pictures with the family and friends. I'm starting on all the altered books to give as Christmas presents. Ok...I have my work cut out. So I hope I can have this lovely paper to use. Thanks for all your great work."
Posted by: christine | September 04, 2008 at 12:17 AM
How's that for a super awesome freebie? I want to quickly thank All Moments Rememered for providing today's give-a-way. Please take a moment to visit their site at www.allmomentsremembered.com
It's happening. The crisp cool air of Autumn has arrived at our front door step and for the first time in four months, Ethan is wearing a sweatshirt jacket outside while playing. He's even outgrown it a bit. I picked up the Jacket last Spring. I can't believe we're about to experience forty degree weather once again. In some small minute way, I don't mind the change. I've come to appreciate the cool down after three months of high humidity combined with insufferable heat. It's a nice change for once and what makes it even better is that it's the perfect excuse to stay inside and scrapbook.
While inside this week, I've been hard at work catching up with your emails. Thank you to all of you who signed up for the new Retrospection Project Kit Newsletter. You should of received a response upon signing up via email. If you used the sign-up box in the sidebar, know that you've been automatically added to the list already and you won't need to worry about receiving an emailed response from me. Everyone that signed up via email, will be added manually. I plan on the completion of the list by late next week. First newsletter will be sent mid-December.
As a young child, I used to watch my mother cook pastries in the kitchen while anticipating left overs from her mixing bowls. To this day, I'm still crazy about cake, cookie, and brownie batter...no matter how bad these editable items are for my heath. Smile. While making Peanut Butter Chocolate Lover Bars a few weeks ago, I allowed Ethan some leftovers from the mixing bowl. Like a typical toddler, he ate every last bite while making the biggest mess in the world. Watching him eat from the mixing spatula reminded me of just how quickly we all grow up to be well behaved adults (ya right?!). Does time fly or what? I'm curious to know if I'm the only grown-up that still loves a little cookie or brownie batter once in a while? I'm certain we're all a little guilty of pastry loven'...before it ends up in the oven. I see nothing wrong with cleaning the spoon after mixing up some yummy goodness.
With this layout, I decided to create what I refer to as "panels". These are places on the layout where I've coordinated small sections of collages. Doing this allowed me some opportunity to try out new ideas without feeling like I was jeopardizing the entirety of the layout. If a section didn't turn out as planned, I simply removed it and tried something else. Creating the layout this way presented me with a greater sense of freedom. Usually, I focus most of my creative energy on the "big picture", the entirety of the layout. This can often be intimidating and exhausting. It's easy to get lost when looking at 12 x 12 sheet of paper. Sometimes, breaking a layout down into smaller sections can help make the creating of a layout easier. Here, I broke the layout into three medium size sections. Two of the sections accent a photo and one stands alone. The "loner section" (very top) helps to offset the weight of the large photo on the opposite side of the layout. Note that each section is unique, but similar to the rest of the sections on the layout. I've kept all three sections unified by repeating the use of like colors and patterns throughout each section. This provides flow and stabilizes the layout.
Above, I used heart shape chipboard to accent my flower. Don't have any leaves? Try using alternative supplies to accent flowers on a project, such as heart shape chipboard, stamps, flourishes, hand-cut felt, ribbon, pins and more. There are so many ways to accent flowers that you almost don't need "leaves" to make them look real or beautiful.
This area of the layout is all about bits & pieces. I did a lot of cutting of labels, stickers, ribbon, and more. I rarely use anything as is, including the center pink label which was given a flower center using a flower shape punch. I backed the open flower area of the circle with glittered textured paper. Doodlebug creates an assortment of glitter papers. I enjoy using glitter paper in small quantities, such as above. By doing so, I avoid a serious glitter catastrophe; my least favorite thing to clean after a long night of scrapbooking.
I've had these beautiful gold foil butterfly stickers sitting in my personal stash for quite a long time. I wasn't really sure what to do with them until a few days ago. To give the gold foil butterfly a little more dimension, I combined it with two different size Fuchsia felt butterflies from Heidi Swapp. The two butterflies are stapled together and adhered to the layout as shown using Glue Dots.
The open die-cut pink flower paper is from Making Memories. I removed it from one of their mini journal notebooks. I cut it to size and backed it with Fuchsia color paper. I stamped a scallop circle around the flower and applied a red, thin circle rub-on just within the inner edge of the stamped circle.
Lastly, I applied tiny light gold epoxy stickers to accent the swirls beneath the butterfly.
Above, I removed the center from a Making Memories die-cut pattern piece of paper and backed the opening with Hambly transparency. I then backed the transparency with a dark peach cardstock, which I painted just slightly using a pumpkin orange acrylic paint and dry brush.
The wee little one is crying. Off to rescue him! Have a great weekend everyone!
