Re-using old designs

It has been a busy month for me! I collected student papers virtually, commented online, then finished  assessing the papers and submitting my grades. To make it more exciting, my district required me to go in for 4 of the last 9 days of school (while I was in the height of grading, of course!) to clean up EVERYTHING in my room and pack it away to make room for a deep scrub this summer and to help collect student materials. All this after I broke my toe. Gah.

I did some reading, some gardening, and some cross-stitching here and there, but I mostly graded. Now that school is out for the summer, I will have more time. Here's my inaugural summer page:

It is a traditional page I make every year that comes as the last page of my album. I pick my favorite 9 photos from the year and put them in a digital template.

The general design is always the same; the decorations differ. Here I started with an OLD piece of My Mind's Eye paper that was an ombre green/blue design; then I selected the Studio Calico muted cloud paper from my craps to serve as the title block. I used some new better stickers I got from Elle's Studio plus my standard chipboard letters from Jillibean Soup. (I ran out of O's, so thank you, button Stash! That's the best letter to run out of.)

At this point I took out my die cuts, which I organize by color in an office hanging-file folder case, pulled bunches in a few colors that seemed to fit the same muted tones, then played around fitting them in. I borrowed heavily from old My Mind's Eye and Elle's Studio dies.

Since I was doing a color challenge with my CKMB friends online this week, I challenged myself to add color in different mediums too: I stamped the numbers in orange on the right, I used orange thread in my machine instead of white, and I broke out my misting templates and added some painted flourishes.

So that's how I manage re-using old designs: Same structure, selecting basic papers, and then playing with product and techniques to make it fresh.

August scrapbook pages for Simple Scrapper

Hello! I have some pages to share using August inspiration from Simple Scrapper.

This first  page uses a new story starter and an older sketch, telling the story of my childhood love of fishing with Grandpa and how my boys are following suit. (The title rhymes with "history.") It also uses some old products--the My Mind's Eye kraft patterned paper, an old Jillibean tag, and some Studio Calico Atlantic and chipboard photo turns. Here's some details:

Next is another new story starter and old sketch. That's me in 3rd or 4th grade in the Azores, stomping grapes on a school field trip. I used a lot of Project Life cards on this page instead of cutting up patterned paper.

Finally, using a new sketch and old story starter, is a page that pairs some photos of my husband as a child with current photos of him and our boys. I mostly used October Afternoon on this, mostly vintage Road Trip products. I loved that line. I also used some vintage Simple Stories.

 Instead of cutting up paper for the circles, which were in the sketch, I stitched.

Thank you for checking out my pages! Please visit Simple Scrapper for more inspiration and consider a membership, where you'll get even more inspiration.

How do you spell "portcullis"?

I have scrapped more Lego pages than I can count. Ever since Rowan and Dominic started the Lego Club, I've put together pages of their club days. Recently, Rowan has asked me to take photos of his creations. Since this seems to be because he wants to remember them, I complied. Here's the latest:

I used Studio Calico's February kit for this page.  Since I had only one 4x6 photo and a couple 3x3 photos, I set them together on a bigger mat and embellished around them. Here's some details:

 

Confession: I teach English, and I don't know how to spell Portcullis. I do now--two "L's"--but when I laid the title down at first, I only had one "L". When I journaled, Microsoft Word helpfully informed me that there were two "L's" so I had to correct the title. That's why the "I" doesn't want to stick. I'd moved it. 

%#$@!

I added the Glitz banner to sort of reflect the sweeping chains I picture on a castle drawbridge. Keep in mind I am no expert on castles.

  

Lots of fun embellishments in this kit, so I layered and clustered them across the page. I am a slave to the visual triangle, which I did with the embellishments.

 

Thanks for sharing this page with me! Tell me--do you scrap your hobbies or your families? Do you do them multiple times like I do?