Bringing Back the Sketch with Practical Scrappers

Happy TGIF this morning, everyone!  Over at PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS, we have decided to bring back sketches - can I get a big HOO RAH?!?!  That's right, over the next two weeks we have a fun card sketch and not one, but TWO, scrapbook page sketches for you!  My layout was creating using this wonderful SKETCH by Liz Chidester. 

My family and I had a fun photo shoot this past weekend so I had lots and lots of pictures to choose from.  My papers are from LILY BEE 's Christmas Cheer Collection (Lily Bee! - LOVE these papers and don't know how I could have missed out seeing their last few collections!)  - except for the background paper, which is a leftover piece from an older Lily Bee collection.  I chose two close-up headshots of the Bebe for this layout and decided to journal about her smiles - which aren't always so frequent these days.  Her getting-to-be-a-teeneger-OMG-crazy-hormone-surging-fueled mood swings have had us both running to our respective bedrooms and slamming the door shut a few times!  So when she is happy and cheerful - I want to scrap about it! 

I liked the very muted pale background for these close-ups of my child, but I felt they kind of made the pictures get a little lost in the midst of all the busy patterns in the papers.  To help draw the eye to the photos, I simply outline them in black marker.  Yes, it IS okay to write and draw on the front of your photos - I promise!

The banners and simple Chevron-style arrows were cut out with my Silhouette Cameo (best scrapbooking invention EVER - hands down)  I decided to play with the negative space trend a little and alternated using banner outlines in place of "complete" banners.  And to add a little dimension and continue to draw the eye to the pictures, I added my Chevron arrows in contrasting patterns on top of one of the banners, both under and on top of my pics.

My bits and pieces are just that - random things from random packaging, which were hanging out on my work table just begging to be used. The Christmas Cheer title is actually from the bottom part of my Lily Bee paper - you know, the strip you cut off and throw away. My "waste not, want not" Grandmother would be so proud of me! 

And that's it for me today.  Be sure to head over to PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS to see what other fabulous takes on the sketch our wonderful DT has come up with!

Just Because

Whew!  I am finally home after spending 3 weeks -  much longer than I would have ever imagined -  in the cold North!  And now that the crazy last minute grocery shopping and Thanksgiving Feast meal preparation activities have died down, I let out my belt a few notches and...scrapbooked.  Yep, I've got it bad.

With my brain just one calorie shy of going into food coma, I decided I would create a simple homage to my geekdom - no in-depth, insightful journaling needed.  To quote a wise (sailor) man, "I yam what I yam."  And that's all there is to it!

How did I make this layout, you ask?  Well...I started with this SKETCH by Fancy Pants. What can I say - it had a banner and I couldn't resist!  Due to my food-induced brain shutdown - I kept my layout simple and stayed very true to the sketch.  And, hey, that goofy smile on my face in the picture pretty much says it all...don't need much more embellishment than that, right?

Of course, I used my Fancy Pants papers from The Good Life Collection - it's one of my favorites, right now.  I made a few small circles with a circle punch and layered them with pop dots.  My stencil words were made with my Silhouette Cameo.

 

The tags for my banner were also made with my Silhouette Cameo (gosh, I LOVE my Cameo!).  I placed contrasting paper behind the arrow cutouts to make them stand out.

 

 

A little handwritten short-n-sweet journaling mixed with a few words in different font letter stickers = a nice long-ish title, don't you think?  Some paint splatter and a few machine-stitched accents, and my "just because" layout was completed!

 

 

And that's it for me.  What have you created - just because - lately?

Best Friends - More Practical Scrappers

Our challenge today over at PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS was to find 10 different ways to use ribbon.  Because I am obsessed with banners, I decided to make a small one using ribbon in place of twine to hold my banner together.  The "pennants" of my banner (along with every other piece of paper on this layout) are from TERESA COLLINS' gorgeous Everyday Moments Collection.  This line of papers was perfect for this snapshot of my two oldest daughters at the younger one's recent wedding shower.

Here's a close-up of my ribbon banner:

I loved using all the whites, light blues, and pale grays in this collection, but I wanted to make sure the layers stood out, so I decided to machine stitch my border and my ribbon in contrasting black and I outlined each piece of paper in black marker.  I love the added dimension the black outlines give everything.

I also added pop dots behind several pieces like this one to help them stand out a little more.

 

Can you tell how much I love layers on my layouts???

 

That's all for me today.  Want more inspiration for that ribbon stash you've been hoarding - be sure to check out all the other wonderful ideas at PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS!

A Challenging Weekend - Part Two

My cousin asked me to create a layout about his daughter, who just turned 16, using the picture of my choosing from his Facebook albums.  (We don't live close to each other so Facebook pics seemed the easiest choice, especially since I stalk them all the time anyway!)  I found this wonderful picture of her swinging as a small toddler and knew that I had found THE picture.  Next I needed a good sketch to get my mojo started.  BIRDS OF A FEATHER just happened to have the perfect sketch posted for the May challenge, so I decided to...ahem...kill two birds with one stone.

I used Simple Stories papers, which were perfect for fussy cutting.  Most of this cluster is made of SS bits and pieces (with a little Pink Paislee and Basic Grey thrown in for good measure).

 The journaling and title came to mind as soon as I saw the picture.  It's part of the Chorus to"WHEN YOU COME BACK DOWN" -  a fabulous song by Nickel Creek that is a long-time favorite of mine.  How did I make the journaling strips?  I simply ran a piece of scrapbook paper through my printer and printed the lyrics on it, then cut the paper into strips and glued them on my page.  I outlined the edges of my strips with black marker so they would stand out a little better against the background patterned paper.

The banner was so easy to make.  I punched out circles, folded them in half, and glued them onto Baker's Twine.  I glued down some pretty wooden buttons (by Prima) on top of my half-circles to add a little more visual interest. 

I figure I've done a pretty good job because, once I finished, I was reluctant to pack my layout up and ship it off - lol!  Here's hoping that this layout will make someone's sixteenth birthday just a little bit sweeter...

Until next time...keep it crafty!

Challenge Yourself!

Are you sitting around trying to get a little scrappy inspiration this Sunday afternoon? I was in the same boat until I found this GREAT challenge going on over at the LET'S CAPTURE OUR MEMORIES forum. It's the 8 Week Challenge, which is exactly what it sounds like. A new challenge is posted each week. You can complete the challenges in any order, at your own pace, as long as all are completed at the end of the 8th week. What's the prize? A $50 gift card to the LCOM store!!! I created this layout for Week 1, and I am getting ready to work on a Monochromatic Challenge for Week 2. Week 3's challenge has just been posted, so there is lots of time left to play!!!

Want some more challenges? Check out BIRDS OF A FEATHER , which has 4-5 new challenges posted each month. They run from the first of the month to the end of the month, so there is plenty of time left to play along with the wonderful Scrap Chicks!

Still need a little inspiration? Well, then, head on over to PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS , which has ideas for every type of layout imaginable over at Idea Central. And while you are over there, take the time to vote for the FANTASTIC layouts that have been submitted for the Layout Contest.

And now, a few words about my layout before I sign off and get started on my next project. The LCOM Week 1 Challenge was to use more than 3 pictures, use a square shape, and have "2011" in the title. I knew immediately that I wanted to do a grid layout, but I had just recently completed a LAYOUT with my favorite pictures taken during 2011 so I had to think of something different. I decided to go with completely random favorites (a book, a movie, a website, a drink, and a take-out food) and chose a (long) title to reflect my idea.

This bottom cluster of...randomness...started as just an envelope and journaling tag behind my picture. But I kept adding little bits and pieces until I ended up with this:

Signing off and heading back to my scrap table!