Part 3 - Sideways and Upside down

The sketch I've been using the last couple of weeks gets flipped around today to accommodate 3 uncropped 4x6 photos.

The photos were taken at my aunt's 90th birthday.  She's the strongest woman I know enduring many, many surgeries to treat her degenerative joint disease.  During this time, she was recuperating from another illness at our local assisted living facility.  She's as sharp as ever.

She is back home now with her husband of over 70 years.  I visited her last week.  Her only complaint is that she can't do all her 'work' like she wants to.  The house isn't spotless and that displeases her.  I hope that is my only complaint at her age.

For the page, I used some accordion flowers as embellishments.  I've linked the videos together so you can see the one on flowers as well.  For the largest flower, I wasn't happy with the button initially glued on so I glued some Two Peas flair right over it.  Their flair is very flat which was a big bonus in this case.  It's a cute and a bit more modern touch on a page with older styles and embellishments.

A touch of Washi finishes things off.

Watch at YouTube:


I have one more page for this sketch coming along.  It will have 4 photos.  I also have another process video coming and a blog hope on Saturday.

And if you like having lots of sketches to make scrapbooking fast and easy, don't forget about my new sketchbook found here.  So lots going on here.  Hope you'll visit again!

A Peaceful Walk - Page, Sketch and Video

Mid-September should be the height of migratory season.   The Canadian National Park website even listed the particular birds that we would see.  Well, they were either early birds or taking a detour because the only fowl we saw were two ducks who seemed very much at home in the marshland.

No matter.  It was a perfect walk in the breeze, so peaceful after zipping around freeways and trying to take in everything we could in museums for two days.

For the page, I was going for a peaceful, neutral look.   I'm not much of a neutral person so gold and navy ARE neutral to me.  The background paper from BasicGrey's Persimmon line was perfect.  It looked like the cattails we saw among the grasses and reeds.

For embellishment, I stamped an image and used some pastels on Studio Calico canvas leaves.  I also added a bingo card embellishment.  The photo mats are some cardstock repurposed from another project.

Here's the video at YouTube:


Sketch:

I enjoy doing these process videos.  I'm always looking for ways to make them more useful.  Suggestions are most welcome.

Thanks for watching!

Lawn Mower Repair 101 - Page,. Video, Sketch

Lenny titled this page for me.  Although, Dillon likes to tear apart lawn mowers and any other piece of mechanical equipment more than actually repair them.  I'm not sure exactly what happened with this one though I think the end result involved 'riding' it down the driveway and it isn't a riding mower :-)

The paper is from All About A Boy, appropriately enough, by Echo Park.  I rarely buy 2 pieces of the same pattern paper unless they are part of a pack but this is my 2nd piece of this one.  I really needed a third as I liked both sides so much.  You are seeing both sides here, the little gears and the woodgrain are the same paper.  So the video goes through cutting up and flipping the paper on the same page.

The gear embellishments are some mistables from Prima.  I added some silver liquid pearls and a few brads.

A couple of regular office paperclips finish it off.

Watch at YouTube:


Here's the sketch:

Thanks for watching today!

Paint and Gesso Background

Paint is such a fun medium.  It is also readily available and mostly very inexpensive.  Although... I have been experimenting with some different paints for mixed media and have gotten into some pricey ones - pricey for me anyway.  The red "heavy body" paint in the video below was $14 full price.  Of course, I waited until Michaels had a sale :-)  Still, most of my paints are craft paints that are less than $1 a bottle.  I've also used some gesso and ink on this background.  It is just so fun to mix these different products together and play with colors.

The dimension on this page really doesn't show in the videos.  It looks a bit messy here but it is cool in person. (I'm sure they don't say 'cool' anymore but I still do.)

The embellishments are those from a video a couple of weeks back on making your own chalkboard embellishments.  I thought they were perfect for a page about Dillon who at 12 just started Junior High.  Jaime is a teacher so even more applicable to have the chalkboard look.  She now has 5th and 6th graders.

I left the journaling blank so she could fill in what she wanted when she put the page in her album.
She's always calling and saying 'Do you know what my kid did today?'  The answer can go either in the proud or the 'I can't believe he did that!' category.

The pink color here is some glossy craft paint which I really like.  And it is super cheap.

The red is the expensive Liquitex which I also like.  I just like too many things!

Watch at YouTube


Sketch:

Thanks for stopping by today!  Later in the week, I'll have a new Christmas card featuring Washi tape.

Dyeing Easter Eggs

I'm a terrible speller.  Automatic spell check is a wonderful invention.  Unfortunately, there isn't one for scrapbook pages so I have to use my old paperback dictionary. Good thing or I would have been 'dying' Easter eggs on this page rather than 'dyEing' eggs.

I didn't find this out until I was all set on these glitter foam Thickers, a type I so seldom have a page for.  So I used an upside 'z' that went a few rounds with my scissors.  It's a little large but it is an 'e.'

The photo was one Jaime took at Easter at her mother's house.  Don't the kids look very intent on their task?

My little ovals are chipboard pieces left over from letters like the middle of 'o's an a's.  I always throw these scraps in a drawer and use them for lots of things mostly as spacers.  This time they made a row of embellishments.  Originally they were for another page but just didn't seem to quite work - too cutesy for that subject.  They must have been waiting for this page.

I used some rub-ons to dress up a couple of them.

I seldom buy holiday specific product.  The only thing remotely specific to Easter I have are these stamps that were part of a large set.  A few drops of mist seem to go with the theme.  How could you dye eggs without spilling a drop or two of dye?

So here's the process video and sketch

Watch at YouTube:


Sketch:

Thanks for stopping by today.  I know I'm a bit behind having an Easter layout here in early September.  A nice thing about scrapooking is you can celebrate a holiday anytime of the year :-)

Embossed Vellum Butterfly 2 Page layout

My husband loves to visit one of the art and craft galleries in Asheville, NC.  He thinks it is better than a lot of museums.  They do have gorgeous things at all price points.  They are also very kind in allowing a little photography.

We went there to celebrate his birthday this year after going to the Folk Art center and then having lunch at Boston Market.  My parents were a bit perplexed that he picked a sort of fast food restaurant for his birthday dinner but he loves the place.  There are only 2 anywhere close to us and 'anywhere close' is about 60 miles one way or the other.  So it was a treat.

Mother had in mind her own treat and dropped massive hints about a bakery just short of the gallery so we stopped there for a treat on the way back.  I like how my Mother thinks :-)

For the page, I actually started this weeks ago and it just wasn't coming together so I set it aside and recently came back to it.  In the beginning it was to be a one page layout with 4 photos and the exhibit card.  It was just too crowded so I spread it out on two pages and added the squares with the vellum butterflies.

The video shares more about how these are created and applied.  A hot glue gun helps them hold their shape without anything showing through the wings.   There is also reverse stamping to get the butterfly on the right hand page to face the right way - in this case, to face left.

I just recently learned reverse stamping and it is so handy!

Watch at YouTube


Here's the sketch:

We had such a lovely day.  I'm glad I expanded this to a 2 pager.

Thanks for stopping by today!

And this little piggy went to...

Truffles for their wonderful chicken pot pie in wine sauce.  And he took along another little piggy who had crab cake rather than her usual meatloaf.  Both were sated and happy after a relaxing meal in the contemporary restaurant.  It wasn’t crowded since it was Memorial Day and the local business people who often dine there were absent.  And then one little piggy went off to the beach and one had a leisurely afternoon nap. Can you guess which one?

This is my favorite travel layout so far this year.  The papers from Echo Park's All About a Boy don't seem like they would fit a contemporary restaurant style but they do - at least the B sides do.  The woodgrain background is also from this collection.

The layout also took me back in time to my early days of scrapbooking in the 1990's when I didn't know there was such a hobby and thus all these great materials to go out and buy.  Back then, I used my photos, plain white cardstock from the office supply store, those sticky Hallmark albums, Microsoft Word, Power Point, and my trusty Epson dot matrix printer.   I depended on my computer to create titles from WordArt and images from clip art.

No where in my vast current stash did I have any food embellishments that fit this layout so I again turned to Power Point and clip art to find some food and a pig image.  I've added some additional color after printing and use Maya Road wood veneer frames.

More on how the page came together at YouTube:


Here is the sketch:

Thanks for watching!

A Living Room - Process video

We don't have a separate living room and den; we just have one room and so we use this room all the time.  We read, watch television either on the real TV or on my laptop, eat sometimes, pet the cat, talk, and visit.  It is a busy place for a house with only two people.  Oh and the cat, we mustn't for get His Majesty who reigns in every room.

I grew up in a house with a formal living room that was only used when I was dating.  My Mother keeps the room immaculate now and it is gorgeous but more of a museum than a living space.  My goal is to use every inch of my house.  I'm excelling in my craft space/guest bedroom where I have every drawer filled with product - ah, but that is another story.

For this page, I used several shots taken in the last few months of activities in our busy room.  There is one in the kitchen of Lenny and I cooking together but it is all open.  I used a 3x3 grid and 6x6 papers for each of the sections.  The small scale prints make these papers perfect for matting.  The coordinating 12x12 papers fill in the rest.  The page also has a few of those tiny journaling cards for embellishments.  Also for embellishments, I cut out some of the paper designs and added some butterflies colored and stamped.

The biggest challenge for this page was figuring out which Washi tape to use.  I must have rolled and unrolled a dozen tapes before settling on a the red and teal.  The striped one I tried so hard to use in the video finally found a home on another layout later on.

I shared this page in the Scrapinar but didn't show any of the video so here it is.  The video goes pretty fast.  It was so long; I may have gotten carried away with shortening it.  Let me know what you think - faster pace or should I have slowed it down a bit?

Watch at YouTube


And here is the sketch:

Thanks for stopping by today!

Using Mini Journaling Cards (Process Video)

After what seemed like months with only trips to the grocery store and other errands, we finally broke out of here in April!  I'm exaggerating a bit yet still it was really nice to have some day trips and other activities.  

For this page, first shown in the 6x6 paper pad Scrapinar, I used the tiny journaling cards in several 6x6 pads.  When they shrink down the size of the prints, cards that are normally 3x4 become 1 1/2" x 2" and are a great size for embellishments.

This cute little paper clip is a Two Peas in a Bucket exclusive item and comes in several colors.  The brads are some older Basic Grey product.

The title gave me a challenge and a few false starts before I settled on colors.  "G" and "O" are some of the last letters I had from an older raw chipboard set.  I painted them a very dark rust so they would stand out against this map print from Webster's pages Color and Composition 6x6 pad.

The process video for this page is at YouTube and also here:


Here is the sketch for the page.  You could have more or fewer photos in the photo strip.

Thanks for stopping by!  I'll have several pages from the Scrapinar in tomorrow's post and another video later in the week.

Sometimes it takes awhile to figure out...

how to arrange a page.  This is one of those pages.

I've been asked to do a video on my sketch process.  I decided to do this one as it was soon apparent that this layout wasn't going to just come to me and there would be quite a bit of thinking and maybe tweaking involved.

If you watch the video, a few things
1)  Most layouts don't take me quite this long to decide how I'm going to arrange them but some do.  This is just one example.
2)  I originally planned to leave this real-time but it ran long so I voiced over the last part.  My hands are way out of sync with my voice.  I talk with my hands and so they are just gesturing up a storm!
3)  I don't spend much time on actually drawing the sketch as I don't have software that will capture my movements on the computer in video form.  So most of the focus here is on the front end of the process.

So this video is a bit different.


Still it generated a sketch:

For the page, I used some Heidi Swapp mistable butterflies to coordinate with my misted background.

And I used more of those rhinestones painted with fingernail polish shown in this video:

Also for the page, I used several papers from the coordinating 6x6 paper pad that goes with the background paper.  I don't talk about this much in the video but if you want to learn more, be sure to sign up for the Scrapinar on Wednesday.  I don't have this particular layout in the Scrapinar but I have another one with these papers and more about using 12x12 and coordinating 6x6 pads.

Follow this link and it will get you to registration for the Scrapinar.  If you can't participate on Wednesday evening, no problem.  Just preregister and you can watch the video later.

Thanks for stopping by!

gone Fishing Page and Video

 


Last summer's fishing adventures were a tad less adventuresome thanks to a motor on the raft that gave my husband and his grandson quick access to the lake shore.  They are both looking forward to this summer's fishing trip.

For the page, I took up a couple of CHA challenges:  Stretch your Supplies from Shimelle.com and Use 5 Tools from Two Peas in a Bucket.  The Quint-essential flower stamp from Stampin' Up! coordinates with 2 scallop punches and a whole bunch of circle punches. I also used my scallop border punch on the layout.

The other challenge I faced was very dark photos that seemed to recede further with the bright colors I chose for stamping and papers.  To make the photos pop a bit more, I matted them with white cardstock.  The scallop pieces were all distressed so they blended more with the photos.

Here's the process video:


Thanks for watching today!

Story first and then Sketch

I have something to celebrate.  Today is my 1000th post!  I started blogging in February of 2009 and never really imagined where it would lead.  Thank you for stopping by.

So now onto the layout.

When I started this page, I really didn't know what kind of arrangement I wanted.  I decided on a large letter title and figured it would go under the photos but that was about it.

So I did something I used to always do before even beginning a page.  I typed up my journaling.

By typing the journaling, I could see how much room I needed for it but more importantly I saw that I needed some space for journaling both before and after the title.  This led to the layout.

The story here is about our little squirrel my husband has named the Pirate.  He only has one good eye and he is thief.  He steals the bird food pretty much every day all winter as long as the feeder is stocked.

Here is the journaling:

Every day, usually late morning

Jasper will be on his box

and that tail will start to twitch rapidly.

He has spotted…  (The PIRATE)

  

The little squirrel may have only one eye, but he has it trained on our bird feeder just about every day.  Jasper may have both eyes fixed on our squirrel but that is as far as he goes.  It is up to us humans to chase him away or the birds will go hungry.  We let our little one eyed thief have some first.  Sometimes he scampers back to the woods, other times he just climbs back up the chimney and out the trumpet vine to try it all again.  This is his 2^nd or 3^rd winter with us.  He has even invited friends to his favorite fast food hangout.  Who can blame him?  Free and easy food.

For the page, I used Crate Paper's Acorn Avenue collection.  With a name like that you might except fall themed papers with lots of autumn leaves, little squirrels and plenty of gold and rust.  You'd be disappointed.  You wouldn't be though if you wanted versatile papers.  There are papers here for every season but the only acorns and squirrels are in the stickers and die cuts.

The squirrel die cut really didn't go with the papers so I used some white ink to tone him down a bit after a failed attempt at recoloring him.  Apparently I have as little control over paper squirrels as I have live ones.

For the title, I ripped off the top layer of these large chipboard letters and then painted on colors that matched my papers.

Lately, I've been seeing lots of triangles and arrows running up and down and across layouts.  For this one, I used a particular paper in the collection to get that effect.

This is one of those pages that makes me smile.  I'm very pleased with how it came out but more because it reminds me of the moment each day where Jasper and I went into little frenzy of acknowledging and then running off the squirrel.  Despite his theft, he is very cute and fun to watch so we hope to see him this fall.

Here's the video to watch at YouTube or here:


And here is this week's PDF file with sketch and tips.

Thanks for visiting today.  I hope you will return tomorrow as I am participating in a blog hop from the Counterfeit Kit Club blog.  I have a fun and different kind of layout.