Hip Kit Club: Lovely

Working with the April's Kits from the Hip Kit Club has been a complete joy. The kits are a reflection of all the wonderful feelings that Spring brings-sunshine, warmth, happiness, new beginnings, green grass, and flowers....and all of these have influenced my projects, including this next layout, Lovely.

When deciding upon my approach to document this happy and candid moment I knew that I wanted my finished project to reflect the simple delight that playing in the water on a warm day is. One way of doing this is through color and I chose to focus on the yellow, pink, and minty greens found in April's Kits.

The design of this layout is basically a grid. A large and not so obvious grid, but still a grid. I find that for me, this type of design works really well when you are working with a larger sized photo on a smaller canvas. Here my photo is a little less than 4x6 and my page size is 8.5x11.

My larger photo size also influenced the amount of embellishing that I did.  Rather then competing with the picture, I chose to embellish minimally, keeping the design soft and simple to let this photo of my oldest daughter playing in the muddy puddles shine. The Webster's Pages' grid paper from the April Embellishment Kit worked really well to bring in more interest without overwhelming the overall design.

In the end, I have a layout that I love and a memory captured.

Wishing you a great week!

Michelle

Hip Kit Club: Super Hero

My oldest daughter has been a big fan of princess dresses since she could wear them, so you can imagine my suprise when given the the opportunity to dress up for her preschool's "Princess and Super Hero Day," she chose to go as a super hero! Luckily, we were able to come up with a costume and this next layout made for the Hip Kit Club using the April Kits, documents this.

 

 

Doesn't she make an amazing Super Hero??  I think so :). I went with the lots of of neutral and muted tones in this layout so as not to contrast too much with the purplish pink in the photo.

 

 

I cut out a square from the Webster's Pages patterned paper with a sentiment that I thought went really well with the subject of the layout and made sure to feature that in the design.

 

 

I wanted just a bit of pink in my layout, so I layered a piece of patterned paper from the 6x6 Amy Tangerine Paper Pad from the April Project Life Kit underneath the photo. (By the way, I love the variety and options that a small paper pad brings!) Thanks for stopping by this morning and wishing you all a super day!

 

Michelle

Guest Designing for The Cut Shoppe

Yesterday I was up on the blog for The Cut Shoppe as a Guest Designer for Ashley Horton's online Etsy shop which specializes in digital cut files. Before I share my project here, I want to share a little about The Cut Shoppe:

At The Cut Shoppe you can find fun digital Cut Files for download, to use on your paper projects, including layouts and cards! All cut files are available in PNG & SVG formats and are original designs. And we now offer Printables in PNG and PDF formats! You can follow the Blog at www.thecutshoppe.blogspot.com and connect with us on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram.

 

 

Since Ashely opened up her shop last year, I have been turning to her for new and fun cutfiles to use in my scrapbooking such as in these layouts here. So when she contacted me about possibly doing a layout for her, of course I was like "Heck yes!" It was a no brainer :). I absolutely adore her products and my enthusiasm for the opportunity was a 100% genuine. And last week, when I finally got to work on the project, I had a blast!

 

 

Using the La La La Love You Cut File, this is what I made:

 

 



 

 

 

 

Silly photos from daughter + La La La Love You + a really cool silver elephant = a great time :).

 

Please stop by The Cut Shoppe and check out both the store and blog-you won't be disappointed!

 

Michelle

 



Park and Sweet Life

I will tell you, when I see big alphas I cringe. Full body cringe with a little bit of a shudder. You know, just a typical response to something outside my comfort zone ;). Yet despite my intial response, working outside the comfort zone usually results in something good, so I rolled with the giant alphas in Studio Calico's April kit and made some layouts that I ended up totally loving!

 

Park was my first layout I made using those monster sized alphas and I chose to take the basic approach of using a grid. Basically I was sticking to something that I know while incorporating something new.

 

 

For my second layout, I used a Studio Calico sketch which features the alphas (you can see it here.) This is my way of making myself comfortable with something new. Trying out another's idea so that I can get the feel of things. By already having the placement of my letters determined I was able to play around with the rest of the design and embellishments instead of freezing up.
 

 

As you can above, I stapled all of my letters to the cardstock as a way of anchoring them, which is unusual for me, but I was too scared to sew through them instead. In retrospect, I think they would have held up just fine and I should have probably just did a test run with the letter Z :).

 

 

Do you have any types of product that makes you want to run and hide from? Or am I possibly the one who lets a gargantua sized alpha scare them?  LOL.

 

Thanks for stopping by.

 

Michelle

 

Hip Kit Club & NSD

The Hip Kit Club is celebrating National Scrapbook Day with a 3-Day Online Crop! Yay! Here are the details:

MAY 1ST - 3RD, 2015
8AM - 11PM EST DAILY

Challenges & Chats hosted by our talented HKC Design Team Members.
Prizes awarded for every challenge!!!
We've got freebies too!

WHERE:  HIP KIT CLUB MEMBER FORUM ON FACEBOOK.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1517288525193552/

*IF YOU AREN'T ALREADY A MEMBER OF OUR COMMUNITY, JUST VISIT OUR HIP KIT CLUB MEMBER FORUM AND CLICK TO JOIN.  IT IS OPEN TO EVERYONE!!!

Hope to see you there!

Michelle

Hip Kit Club May Reveal

Happy Friday everyone! Last night the Hip Kit Club May Kits were revealed and today I want to share those with you.

Main Kit

 

Embellishment Kit

 

 

Color Kit

 

 

Project Life Kit

 

 

Paper Kit

 

 

Cardstock Kit

 

 

Wow, right?? I can't even begin to narrow down my favorites this month. First off, the color scheme is amazing and fresh. The blue just really sticks out to me, but the green is right behind it. And the embellishments--looks just like my scrappy wish list! The mix of manufactors is great too--Pink Paislee, Dear Lizzy, Chickaniddy, Pebbles, Evalicious.....and did you notice the bit of Crate Paper's Poolside in the Embellishment Add-on??  Wow, just wow.

 

Well there you have it, I have professed my love for these kits and hope a little bit of it has rubbed off on you :). I have linked up all the kits to make it super easy for you to see a detailed list of contents. All kits are available for order now and will start shipping the first of May!

 

Michelle

Hip Kit Club: April

I have had so much fun playing with April's kits from Hip Kit Club, so much fun in fact, that I have two layouts to share with you! First up is For Sale, a layout I made to document my little girl's budding entrepreneurship.

I was super happy to find the grid paper from Elle's Studio in the April Main Kit (and in the Paper Kit too!) because it serves as a really great background for all the colorful products in this month's kits.

The photo in this next layout really gives you a picture of what my cameral roll looks like on my phone right now--lots of green and bright, happy colors. Lucky for me, April's kits really compliments them.

I chose to go with a basic grid design here so that I could work in several elements such as the awesome white and silver camera from the Amy Tangerine Epherema Pack in the April Main Kit.

Aren't the new gold phrase Thickers just gorgeous?

Well there you have it, two new projects using all the awesome goodies in April's Kits from the Hip Kit Club! Looking forward to sharing a new project with you next week.

#Life

Recently with the new re-launch of Big Picture Classes and the opportunity of enjoying a short period of free membership to the site, I have been exploring the classes BPC currently has to offer. My favorite so far is a class taught by Lilith Eeckels that focuses on scrapping quickly and today I want to share a layout that the class inspired.

 

After doing a quick pick of supplies, I really set out to get the layout done in under thirty minutes and I was (suprisingly) successful. 

 

 

It honestly felt great to get this memory documented and in the books. I kept the layout pretty simple and re-used some of my basic design go-tos. Basically, I took much of the over thinking out and just played with pretty supplies--nothing wrong with that!

 

Michelle

Elle's Studio: April

The months are flying by and the release of Elle's Studio's exclusive April Kit has arrived! We are excited to bring you another kit that is FULL of fun journaling and embellishment tags to help you capture your memories and share your stories--and don’t forget, if you purchase it today (April 10th) you save $2 with our launch day special pricing! Here is a look at the contents of this month's kit:

 

Digital cutfiles and printables that co-ordinate with April's Kit are also available:

 

 

Also today, a new Design Team Gallery is live and here is a look at the two projects I contributed using both the April Kit and Elle's newest collection Cienna:

 

 

 

And to makes life even sweeter, Elle's Studio also has grab bags available, too - this only happens twice a year so this is your chance to stock up and SAVE! There are three different types of bags to choose from: Scrapbook, Stamp, and Journaling Tags. These grab bags are available while supplies last, but they probably won't last long, so make sure you grab them now!

 

 

Wow! Lots of fun stuff going on right??  Make sure and hop on over to the Design Team Gallery for more inspiration and to see the lovely April Kit in action!

Michelle

Fast

For my son's 14th year (um, did I really just say 14??), I am doing a 6x8 album and I find that when I put together layouts they come together super fast, like so fast I am sure I am totally doing something wrong! Ha ha. Here's the latest full page layout I put together for him:

 

I recently purchased my first ever alpha stamp and this is my first attempt at using it. As you can tell, the first two letters were not as crisp as the second two. I think that the textured cardstock is a little difficult for an amateur stamper llike myself and I made a mental note to next time go with an untextured cardstock and see how that works.

 

 

 

 

 

Overall, I love working on my son's album this year. The smaller size is just perfect. He's a busy, active, and sometimes camera shy teenager (at least when I am taking the photo) and I struggled the last year trying to get enough photos to fill a bigger album. Switching to a 6x8 Handbook was definitely a great decision :).

 

Michelle

 

 



Hip Kit Club: Sweet & Happy

Lately I have been following a few online discussions related to background choices for layouts and it has really made me think about my own. For awhile now, I have been doing the majority of mine on a white cardstock base. I like the way color pops off a white background and the "clean" look that a white based layout has. I also see lots of white in online galeries and can certainly say its a common trend. My second most used type of background is patterned paper. I am particularly fond of using any sort of neutral or natural looking patterned paper such as the woodgrain paper from the Hip Kit Club March Kit that I used in this layout:

One of the pluses of using a woodgrain or neutral patterned paper is that is will go well with the other colors that you choose to work with. I chose the pink plus sign paper and it really jumps right off of the page.

What kind of backgrounds do you like to use for your projects? Do have an automatic go to background or do you mix it up? After writing this I am thinking that I might need to branch out a bit from the white and do more with patterned paper and colored cardstock.

Wishing you a great day!

Michelle

Hello Beautiful

Last week on the Elle's Studio blog I shared my take on the Thursday Sketch and now I want to share it here with you.

The sketch, which you can here, is a basic grid design based off of this layout by Jill Sprott. Using Elle's newest collection Cienna, here is what I created:

 

 

 

Now, in anticipation of the reveal of both Elle's Studio's exclusive April Kit and a new Design Team Gallery on Friday the 10th, I want to leave you with a few sneaks of my two projects:  

 

 

See anything that you might like? I will be entirely honest here--these layouts nearly put themselves together! Ha ha. But really, the combination of the April Kit and Cienna is a match made in scrapbooking heaven. Absolutely looking forward to sharing the full projects here with you real soon!

 

Michelle

Citrus Twist Kits April Reveal

Today I am super happy to share the reveal of my projects using the Citrus Twist April Kits. This month I worked with both the Main "Flight of Whimsy" and the "Adorable" Embellishment Kits. Here is what you can find in the kits:

Main "Flight of Whimsy" Kit

 

"Adorable" Embellishment Kit

 

 

 

This month I was able to create three layouts and one card. Here they are in no particular order:

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Make sure and hop on over to the Citrus Twist Gallery to see what the rest of the designers have done this month-I am sure you will be as impressed as I was!

 

Michelle