Christmas boys

Before the holidays end and I take down the decorations (which will be soon, since there is more tree on floor than on tree), I wanted to share a couple pages I made for Sketch Support this past month.

Both are pages of my boys. I tend to scrap Christmas layouts for the family, not for their albums, but I decided since they love the holidays so much, I should put together a page with their memories from the holiday too.

I didn't worry about journaling. Instead, I selected pictures from the season to represent the month for them. Here's what I did:

It was a two page sketch, but I narrowed it to one since I used fewer photos.

I added stars and stitched glimmer for fun!

Here's Dominic:

I used GCD Studios' Scandia Jul for this page--the bright colors and graphic patterns were perfect for the sketch.

I have trouble stitching with twine, so I drew a line with a ruler and pencil, laid glue down, and stuck the twine down. I did something similar with the bows: I tied them, then glued them down.

Another fun thing: Rather than having the ornaments overlap the photo and papers, I used my circle cutter to cut a slightly larger circle to house them.

Have a great New Year's weekend! I plan on (finally!) editing my Disney photos from 2010 using my Christmas gift, PSE 10 (woot!) and going to a crop on the second at Archiver's with some friends. And hopefully, we'll get snow so my boys can play outside in their boots.

Just messin' around

Now that I'm on winter break, I have time to mess around with my blog formatting. I am planning something fancier, but I thought I'd try to make some basic changes right away that I've been wanting to do for a while. So if you come back this week and things look different, that's why.

On that note, if anyone knows how to size the header photo to fit the space, link me up! I am always willing to admit my current incompetence. :-)

Best Christmas Ever

Like it is for many people, December is a super busy month for us. The boys perform in the church program, there's a taekwondo test, my grades are due, we're preparing for the church choral program, plus all the normal busyness of the season. The one thing missing from the season? Snow. I really want to change my banner photo, but I can't. It sort of looks like March outside. Craziness.

One thing that has been weird for me this season is scrapbooking. To put the tree up, we have to move the easy chair I normally scrap in. I've discovered I've had a hard time scrapping when I'm not in my normal seat. Go figure.

So recently, my scrapbooking has consisted of planning and idea generating. Christmas itself has given me plenty of ideas. Even though we got to bed last night at 11:30 after attending the candlelight service (Derick and I were singing), the boys woke up at 6 A.M. ready for gifts. Boy did they have fun. After Dominic opened one gift, he wandered over to Derick and me, let out a big sigh, and said, "Best Christmas Ever." I'm not even sure what he opened.

His words made me pull out some paper and list why this could be the best Christmas ever. Here's a few:

1. Lola at our feet.
2. A bucket full of Little Miss Matched socks.
3. The family jog in the afternoon.
4. Lego Ninjago for each boy.
5. The Zombies wearing Santa hats in Plants Versus Zombies.
6. The sound of Lego sorting and hummed Christmas carols in the boys' rooms.


7. The boys in Dominic's room, playing games with their newly constructed Legos.
8. Me hiding by their door and tossing in a shrieking Angry Bird.

One of my favorite books is Little House on the Prairie. I don't remember which one it was, but I know in one book two sisters (Carrie and Laura?) talked about how Christmas gets better each year. I sort of feel that way. I know Christmas can be a melancholy season for some--one friend of mine who recently lost her mother, for one--but it's also a season to reflect on the great gifts we have been given, not all of which cost money and many of which are human (or in the case of Lola, canine).

Merry Christmas to everyone, and a blessed New Year.

In the bleak midwinter: my design process

That title is misleading. It's not really been bleak here in Minnesota this year. Very little snow, very little cold. In fact, it should be 40 degrees this weekend! I'm going jogging.

Still, midwinter in Minnesota means almost no sunlight. I leave for work in the dark and arrive home in the almost dark too. That means it's very hard to take pictures of my layouts. I tried it outdoors, which didn't really work well. I'll just have to figure something else out until the Christmas tree comes down. (Our tree is in front of the picture window, the only natural lighting source indoors.) Here it is:


I started the page typically for me: I picked the photos with the idea of the story behind it. One photo was obviously the "starring" shot, so I printed it big; the rest were 3x3.

Next, I selected papers, this time from the left overs from Studio Calico's November kit Handmade. Indoor shots tend to be kind of dull color-wise for me, so I picked subdued hues; since my son was the most colorful thing of the page, he would stand out more against subdued hues.

At this point I figured out how to lay the photos on the page, fitting the papers in between. I made a block layout because it was the easiest way to put these photos together in a balanced manner. I tend towards asymmetry, so I like the way it looked.

At this point I picked embellishments and the title lettering. I selected the leaves because they looked a little bunny earish, and set them against a button. The letters were from a kit; I overlapped them slightly as I lay them down.

Here's where something typical happened for me: I realized I'd like to stitch some stuff down right next to some dimensional accents. So, I pried the buttons off carefully, stitched, and lay them down again. (Confession: this is the point I tend to mess up, ripping the paper or something. Then I have to fix it. Remember: no mistakes, only creative opportunities. Or there's this reminder by Ryan G. a la Handmade Ryan Gosling, if you prefer.)

Right now I journaled. I like doing the strips of journaling, since I can fit them almost anywhere.

Finally...finishing touches. The page looked a little blah, so I pulled out my twine and tied bow ties around the buttons. It was thematic and added a nice detail to the page. Just what I needed!

So there was a little glimpse into my design process. Thank you for reading! Please let me know how your design process goes, especially how it's different. I love to know how others create.

Muted Christmas hues

A holiday confession:

I really don't love scrapbooking Christmas.

There! Off my chest! My month is so packed, I can't even begin to think about December Daily, and scrapbooking with traditional colors makes me never want to look at anything red or green again.

But this combo of colors makes me want to scrapbook the holidays:


See how subdued they are? Classy and fresh!

To get over my dread of making innumerable layouts from December, I used PSE 7 to make a collage that captured the entire month of December 2010:


I used black and mint for accent colors and depended on the light orange and cranberry red for the main hues.


I couldn't find a cardstock hue in just the right orange, so I created my own with a texture wheel and a light orange ink.


I wasn't much for extensive journaling, so I made a list and printed on a transparency to make the stamped background paper visible. To make the numbers stand out more, I punched mint circles from cardstock and set them under the numbers.

Here's the GCD Studios products I used:


Spring in Bloom Tags, Ribbons, and Mosaics


Funhouse Coney Island


Funhouse Shooting Gallery (I hand cut the mint-green stars from this paper.)


Funhouse The World's Greatest (I also hand-cut this one, the mint green banners this time.)


Funhouse Ribbon Spool (The red and white striped twine is like a candy cane!)


Die cut borders from Homespun Chic

Have fun experimenting with a subdued version of the traditional colors!

A Black Belt, a 5K, and Queen

A couple weeks ago, I wrote about inspiration. After jogging with my boys to train them (and me!) for a 5K, I came up with a title for a layout. I then took a photo (well, my husband did), and I printed it out and made this page:

I used Studio Calico's Handmade kit for this.

The journaling came directly from my blog, a first for me. It made it so easy to just copy and paste. Wowza.

I stitched some photo corners around the photo, something I have really liked doing lately:

As usual, I did a little stripping. The top strip of paper I hand cut from this piece of October Afternoon paper. I stitched over it and added buttons just for fun.

I had a Fancy Pants chipboard flourish that had been lying around for a while, so I decided to use it as a misting mask. I didn't want dramatic mist, so I used yellow and Mister Huey's Shine. I also punched some patterned paper circles and stitched them down with cross stitches, another thing I've liked doing lately.


Thanks for looking at my project! I'm very pleased with how it turned out, even though I'm red as a lobster in this picture while my boys don't even look like they ran at all.

What have you done lately that you are proud of but haven't scrapped?

Winner!

How's this for random? I plugged the number into Random.org, and it selected number 1!

Marg said...

Thanks for the awesome tutorial! I have yet to play with my Lost and Found papers but now, you've got me thinking! I tend to use very basic patterns and like stamping on my cards. Thanks for sharing your time and talent at Ella!

December 5, 2011 7:14 AM

Marg, please email me at jennyrahnlarson at yahoo dot com and I will send you the coupon code!

Ella Friends blog hop: Cards!

Welcome to the Ella Friends blog hop! This has been a wonderful year working with such a talented and friendly bunch of women. I'm honored to have been on this team.

As a final farewell, we are hosting a blog hop focusing on cards. Our ideas come from this wonderful ebook:

31 Thank You Cards, by Kimber McGray, Heather Nichols, and Kristina Werner. The book is filled with design inspirations for creating various beautiful cards. At the end of this post I have information on a giveaway that can include an ebook, so be sure to read to the end!

I took inspiration from the challenge to let a beautiful piece of paper shine. Here's what I did, on a Congratulations card:

I cut out the intricate design from a piece of Lost and Found paper from My Mind's Eye. (I never use those intricate part for layouts, so it was great to put it to good use on a card!)

I also took inspiration from another challenge: to use multiple colors of mist with a template. This time, though, I used it on a layout! The book is not just great for inspiring card ideas. I used a piece of die cut paper from a Studio Calico kit as the template, and these three mists:


Mister Huey Shine, Maya Road Buttermilk Cream, and Mister Huey Lemonade. I laid down the Buttermilk cream heavily because it's the lightest, followed by a smidge of Lemonade, then a dousing of Shine.

I turned the template sideways for an interesting angle:


Then covered the edges with paper to color only the inside of the template:


Here's the design (upside down):

When I looked at the LO the next day, I thought the top looked too empty, so I decided to add another misting with the same template.

Since I had already adhered the rest of the LO, I covered them up with wax paper to prevent mist seepage.


And here's the finished LO, complete with additional details:

Design inspired by cards! I may go back and stitch lines under the journaling. Still deciding.

Thank you for visiting my blog! All of you can use the code CARDHOP one time for a $2 discount off of the ebook 31 Thank You Cards; code expires 12/10/11.

Now for the giveaway: Please leave a comment telling me what you like to do with cards--design wise, product wise, you tell me! Your comment puts you in the running to win a Gift Card to Ella Publishing, which you can use to buy this wonderful ebook. I will keep comments open until Wednesday, December 7 at 8 P.M. CST.

Thank you for visiting my blog! I hope you can stop by again. Now please visit the wonderful creations at the blogs of the other Ella Friends participating in this hop:

Brenda

Monika

Donna

Francine

Jenni

Valerie

Keshet

Mary Jo

Diana

Have a great Monday!

New Year

I am thankful to be invited for another year of designing for Sketch Support. I've loved working with Allison Davis' designs, and the community has been fabulous! Here was a page I did for my reapplication (click on the picture to see it larger):

Yes, the page is a little bent. Not sure how that happened, but oh well. I used Studio Calico's Field Guide kit for this.

Every year our family goes to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum to enjoy the beautiful summertime. This time we went for a wedding. I scrapped our family tradition of going for a walk in the gardens and the trees.

Here's some details:

Yellow, green, and tan were a lovely color combo. And I really like adding a few cross-stitches to a page for a little somethin' somethin'.


This weekend I will do my darndest to finish my grading for the first term. Then I can decorate for the holidays!