Gossamer Blue: November Sneaks

Hi all! Wanted to jump in here today and share some sneaks of my projects featuring the upcoming November Kits from Gossamer Blue!

This month I worked with both the Main Scrapbook and Life Pages Kits, along with the Life Pages Main Add-On and Add-On #3. Here's a little look at what I did:

Will be back on Sunday with the full reveal of my projects!

Michelle

The Cut Shoppe: Halloween Hop

Hi guys and welcome to my stop on The Cut Shoppe Halloween Hop!



When signing up to participate in the hop I knew right away that I wanted to make a mini-album! What?! I know, I know this is a total first from me, but I have had the idea/urge brewing in my head for awhile and I thought a Halloween Mini-Album would be fantastic! At least, I hoped it would be ;).

With this opportunity to create something new, I turned to The Cut Shoppe to supplement my Halloween supplies with some fun and spooky cut files. This is the cut file I chose to use: the Wicked Fun Cut File!

What caught my eye in this particular set was the spider web because I thought it would make a great element that could be "peaking" out from behind everything and you will find it throughout the mini-album I created documenting our recent trip to Disneyland.

 

When I was in the planning stage of the mini-album, I spent lots of time looking through my Pinterest board that you can find here. I even took down some quick notes, jotting down ideas as I found elements that I liked or techniques that I might want to include. In the end, I went with a basic tag/journaling card style album and included lots of layers and machine stitching. Here is a look at the inside of the album:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There you have it, my first mini-album! Turns out I LOVE making mini-albums--I had so much fun! This project turned out to be such a breath of fresh air and I felt so comfortable putting it together. So comfortable that I want to make another! What have I started......

Now what would a Halloween Hop be without a super spooky giveaway??  Fun, but not as fun, right? For my turn on the hop, I am giving away the same cut file that I used for my project: the Wicked Fun Cut File (as seen above.) Yay!  All you have to do is leave a comment telling me your favorite Halloween Movie and I will pick one random winner after the giveaway closes on November 2. The winners from each stop will be announced on TCS blog on Novemer 6th. Good luck!

Now for the next and final stop on the Halloween Hop, head on back over to The Cut Shoppe!

Michelle

The Cut Shoppe: Autumn

When scrapping fall photos, I love to include leaves in my embellishment choices. They rank right up there with the snowflake-I want them falling everywhere, including onto my layouts! This year though, a new fall motif caught my interest-the acorn! As I've seen them pop up in paper collections and here at The Cut Shoppe, I have been itching to put them on a layout and I did just that this past weekend using the Nuts About Fall cut file along with the Leaf It To Me cut file (I couldn't quite part ways with my leaves!)

I knew that I really wanted to feature one of the acorns in a big way, so I increased the size of two acorns and cut them out of a bold, blue paper. At this point I wasn't quite sure if I wanted to use one as my title or not, so I gave myself two options to play around with. Here's a look at my final layout:

I went ahead and chose the acorn with the leaf cut out of it, backed it with pop dots, and adhered a shiny gold paper underneath. By placing the acorn right there with my photos, the attention is immediately drawn to them.

Since I was featuring the acorn, I didn't want my leaves to compete with it. With this thought in my mind, I cut some small leaves out of both white cardstock and a lightly colored patterned paper. This way I could include all of the elements I wanted without overwhelming the page. When placing items such as falling leaves or snowflakes, I will generally follow the triangle rule and place them in three different spots.

Wishing you a great day!

Michelle

Old and New: Priorities

I love watching new scrapbooking supplies role out--nothing gets me more excited than seeing the new releases and then finally getting some of them. The side effect though is that some of my not-so-new supplies get pushed to the back of my mind and they get buried as my brain processes the new "hot" stuff. 

Lately this has been bothering me quite a bit because a lot of my older stuff is still totally awesome and I want to use it. This past week I decided that I needed to do something about this and brainstormed a bit on how I could go about using my older stash more efficiently.

As I was thinking about possible solutions, I kept coming back to the fact to a few things. First, nothing motivates me more than receiving a box of new goodies--just being honest here. And second, I prefer mixing my products up-it is very rare that I make a layout with only one collection.

One solution I came up with-a solution that is in no way mind blowing-is to mix in my new products with my older ones. Wow. I'm a real genious, right?? Ha ha. Well, this is at least something I haven't done in a really long time, so I committed to the idea and hit my stash.

My first move was to hit my older products. This made sense for me because I really didn't remember all that I had and figured it would be easier to find some newer products to co-ordinate with them because they are more fresh in mind.

What I picked out were some papers and products from what I believe is this past Winter's release. I had a mix of Pink Paislee's Bella Rouge, Pink Fresh Studios' Cloud Nine, Fancy Pants's Flutter, Maggie Holmes, and My Mind's Eye. The new items that I added were the sticker sheet and diecuts from Dear Lizzy's Documentary collection. Here is what I came up with:

Putting this layout together was lots of fun! I could not believe I had been hiding away the super cool plus sign paper! And the floral sticker from Dear Lizzy really pulled my layout together as well as added in some of that beautiful blue color. 

How about you-do you have any stash busting strategies??  Another idea that I have is to add some more hours to my day ;). Or how about goal setting or challenges? Lots to think about....

Wishing you a great day and as always, thanks for stopping by!

Michelle

Project Life Focus: 4x6 Cards

I have been happily combining traditional layouts with Project Life style pages for the past two years. After having spent a few years attempting two separate albums-one a traditional album and one a Project Life album-I finally found my sweet spot by combining the two. 

However, just because I have found my groove, it doesn't mean I am without my struggles. Today I want to talk to you about my biggest one--4 x 6 cards.

The problem I have with finding 4x6 cards to use, is that I don't have very many to find! With my sub to Studio Calico's PL Kit and my design work with Gossamer Blue, I get only a handful of 4x6 cards. Then throw in the fact that I am a little (too) picky about which ones I choose, I am left with only a few to use. 

Now the obvious and easiest solution would be to just buy more, but I have tried this and it does not work at all for me for the following reasons: I like variety and I am not to keen on repeating cards; I really don't have a whole lot space to store any of the PL core kits; I feel like it's too wasteful to buy more cards when I already have so much product at home--certainly I could make my own out of what I have right?

So what I have been doing recently to sort of tackle this problem is pull from what I already have and to keep a little bit more of an open mind about those cards that don't spark a whole lot of excitement for me.

Take for instance, this set of three cards:

These three cards range from the simply altered to completely made over. This first card began with a completely blank canvas. The card is designed with lines to include journaling and that's why I skipped over using it--I rarely (maybe never) write on larger cards. However, when I went back for a second look I decided I could use it as a background and went to town with some stickers, chipboard, and sewing.

The initial reason I skipped over this next card is that we didn't fly to Las Vegas-I drove there-which meant the "Jetsetter" sentiment didn't really apply to me (despite the fact that I have to drive really fast to stay alive on the way there). As I was working on the page for this set of photos though, this card and it's colors went really well, so I decided to look beyond "Jetsetter" and saw "adventure," "let's get outta here,", and "wander."  All of a sudden this card made perfect sense and with a little embellishing I had a card I was super happy about. 

This last card really embodies my true PL style-simplicity. Ironically, the the card itself was a little too simple so I jazzed it up a bit with a chipboard sentiment and enamel dots. 

In my dream world, I have lots of 4x6 cards that are ready to slip into pockets, but until that becomes a reality I am just going to have to make what I do have work for me.

Have a great day!

Michelle

The Cut Shoppe: Lovely

Fall is by far my favorite season to scrapbook. I definitely love the summer and enjoy all that it brings, but near the end of August I am so tired of the hot temperatures that I am usually begging for autumn to begin. I am so happy when I finally get to trade in my air conditioning and flip flops for warm socks, hot drinks, and pumpkin pie! Sweather weather is the best and most comfortable in my opinion!

Of course my love for fall extends itself to digital cut files and for this next layout I reached for the super versatile "Fall Finds" cut file which is currently available at The Cut Shoppe.

When planning my layout I knew that I really wanted to emphasize the pumpkin element of my photo and I chose to feature the string of pumpkins along the bottom edge of my 6x8 layout.

Since I was working with a smaller sized canvas, I ended up cutting off the last two pumpkins so that the strip of pumpkins would fit across my page. I could have just sized the pumpkins down to a six inch width in Silhouette to include them all, but I really wanted the pumpkins to be big, so I kept them as is. To adhere the pumpkins, I used a small amount of adhesive and then ran them carefully through the sewing machine.

If you love fall cut files as much as I do, I encourage you to jump on over to The Cut Shoppe Blog and check out what the rest of the design team is doing with the plethora of fall images that are available--lots and lots of inspiration I promise you!

Wishing you a great day!

Michelle

Oh, Yes

As much as I love everything about scrapping autumn, the reality is that I still have a stack of summer photos to get done. So even though I am skipping ahead a bit and documenting the fall festivities that are happening right now, I am making a conscious effort to continue to move forward with the summer stories.

Oh ,Yes is a layout documenting a fun picture I took of my teenager carrying his sisters' floaties down to the pool in July and I love it! The photo is one of my faves for the reason that I struggle a little bit with capturing my oldest--he's pretty good at detecting the moment when I hit the camera button on my phone! Haha. On this particular trip, he surprised me quite a bit about being pretty open to picture taking and I took full advantage.

Last month, I had a thing for circles. This month I am sensing a color blocking theme as is evident in this post here. I like to mix up my project designs, but I am super okay with repeating a recent design if that is what I am craving. Even though this type of layout is pretty simple, there are plenty of ways to add details and interest. One way I did this was by adding in a circular element and a few star shapes that are in opposition to the basic squares and rectangles. I also stitched around the photo and the journaling card in the top right of the page to bring emphasis to them.

So how do you go about balancing what stories you document? I like to keep current with my scrapping by remaining only a few months behind and I actually find it super difficult to scrap older photos from last year. I guess I like to scrap in the moment while it's still sort of fresh.

Wishing you a great day!

Michelle

Elle's Studio: October Reveal

Today's the 10th and that means it's time for the reveal of the new kit and gallery from Elle's Studio!  This month I took my cues from the cards and tags included in the exclusive October Kit and documented pumpkins and Halloween-two of my fall faves! 

Instead of jumping right in and sharing my projects, let's first take a look at the new products and class that Elle's Studio is offering this month.

October Kit

Printables and Digital Cut Files

Tradition Stamp, Acrylic Houses,  and Vellum Feathers

October Kit Mini Course

 

Here is a look at the two projects I made for the month of October:

The Thankful Collection (which is also available in the store!) is a great match for the tags included in the kit. 

Next, I chose a few photos to document from last year's Halloween. I paired the Halloween themed cards from the kit along with the fun glittery bat from the package of Halloween Acrylic and Glitter Foam shapes.

My pocket page style is pretty simple and I love that the cards and tags that come in the kits are pretty much ready to go. I generally go for a minimal amount of embellishment and then into the pockets they go! 

Now that I have shared my projects, I want to encourage you to jump on over to the Design Team Gallery for an extra dose of inspiration, but before you head out, make sure and note that there is free shipping available right now for purchases over $50 with the shipping code found below:

Wishing you a great day!

Michelle

The Cut Shoppe: Today

Holding on to scrapbook supplies and waiting for just the right project to use them with seems to be pretty common place. For me, this even extends to digital cut files and this next layout that I am going to share features a cut file that I have been patiently waiting to use.

The Little Letter's cut file appeared at The Cut Shoppe a few months ago in anticipation of all the back to school stories that were going to be recorded and I have finally found the time to use it! Yay!

The Little Letter's cut file is an alphabet background and that is exactly how I chose to use it to tell my daughter's own story about how she rocked the first day of kindergarten!

I worked on a 9x12 background and I sized the cut file to be even smaller than that with the idea that I would layer my papers and photo on top of it while leaving some white space. Since I thought that using an additional alphabet for my title would compete with an already busy background, I made sure to layer in a tag with a small title word.

It felt really great to finally get a chance to use this fun background on my layout-almost as fun as listening to my daughter tell me all about her first day of school! Wishing you a great day!

Michelle