Christmas Fun

Hello All,

Welcome to my last blog post for the year 2013. I hope that you are all having fun wherever you are, and that the time spent on holiday, with family or friends or just some quiet time spent alone, is filled with reflection on the year past and filled with hope for the future.

The layout I made for this post is of some photos taken a long time ago when my kids were small and the excitement around a jolly Christmas Father still made their eyes twinkle. Well the youngest didn't think he was so jolly and the oldest was way to cool to show his excitement. The middle one could not wait to see him as the previous year he was the one screaming on Christmas Fathers' lap and this particular year he went to greet the man at the gate. Life through the eyes of a kid is awesome!!

I used the Simple Stories - December Documented - Collection as well as black and red American Craft card-stock.

With a Martha Steward edge punch I punched strips of pattern paper and then applied Stickles in various colours to them. These strips were attached to the top and bottom of the lay-out. For the saying on the left hand side I stamped a Kaisercraft stamp with embossing ink and then applied Ranger Antiquities Frosted Crystal embossing crystal. This embossing powder does not perform like normal embossing powder. When you heat it up the embossing powder becomes matte. This takes a little practice to get right, I had a few flops trying this. Once the saying was embossed I took ordinary blackboard chalk and applied it over the embossed area and rubbed it with my finger until I got a look I was happy with. The flowers and swirls were cut with the Silhouette Cameo.

The Christmas wreath is a Silhouette pattern. It was cut from the Hello December paper and then a few flowers and diamante were attached to the wreath. A ribbon was tied to the top of the wreath.

I fussy cut the elements from the Special Delivery paper and used them as embellishments on the layout.

Finally I randomly applied blackboard chalk on the top and bottom of the black card-stock. I used my finger to spread the chalk till I was happy with the look. 

This has to be the final step just before the lay-out is ready to be stored in plastic sleeves as the chalk tend to rub off while you handle the lay-out. I think if I ever have to redo this technique I will use a smooth card-stock, it seems to "hold" the chalk better. The heading of the layout was cut with the Silhouette machine from leftover pattern paper. Remember that all the products used are available form The Scrapbook Studio

Happy scrapping till next year - 2014

Lee

p.s May you all have a blessed Christmas time wherever you are!

Advent Calender

t is December. Less than a month to Christmas. Wow.. this year just flew by in a blur of motion and I am still not organised for Christmas.... oh well, so it will be - again. 

When my kids were little there was lots of excitement around Advent calenders. As they grew older they each developed their own take on an Advent Calender. The oldest would take it and eat all the treats on the first day. The second one left it till the 24th and then ate all the treats. The third one left it all till February before eating all the treats - gleefully in front of her brothers. She gets her payback - sometimes.

My first project for this month is an Advent Calender that I made. I had so much fun making this project!! All the products used in this project except for the patterned paper are available from the Scrapbook Studio.

To make this calender I used my trusty Silhouette to cut the calender as well as all the little bits of paper. The calender is a pattern I got from an online store called SVG Cuts. They have pretty awesome projects for various cutting machines. The front, back as well as the inserts were cut from white card stock. After they were cut the inserts and the front were inked with Walnut stain Distress ink and splattered with water.

The back page was coloured with some distress stain. This is the bit of the back you will see when you open the little door.

After this all the little inserts were inked, folded and glued together.

.....and then all the gluing started. Sorry for the bad photo but it was night time and I could not stop working, I was having way too much fun!!

The seam binding that forms the bow were coloured with some distress ink stain and attached to the side pieces with a stapler. The side pieces were then glued into place and the back was glued down. The front pieces of the calender was then attached in place. For the front I used some really old Kaisercraft Christmas paper 'Tis is the season collection from my stash as well as some leftover card stock. 

The background of number 5 was stamped with watermark ink and then some gold perfect pearls were brushed over it. 

I used some Cuttlebug embossing folders to add texture to some of the front pieces and brushed some more perfect pearls over it.

Number 21 was stamped with a Christmas stamp and some Walnut Stain distress ink.  

This picture shows the piece of the background paper visible when the little door is open.

Thanks for stopping by. Good luck to all of your preparations and planning for a wonderful Christmas time. If you are in doubt as to what to give a loved one why not get them a gift voucher from Scrapbook Studio? To all of you traveling on our roads please be safe, to those staying home..... Happy Scrapping!!

Lee

Marion Smith Designs is coming to Jeffreys Bay, South Africa!

Scrapbook Studio JBay is VERY proud and excited to announce our first International Scrapbook Event taking place in Jeffreys Bay! We are already 50% sold out so Book your seat NOW!

Playing with Cards

Hello All,

Making cards and tags is always a nice way to try out new techniques. If the technique doesn't work, you don’t have a whole 12 x12 page that lands up in file 13. I am not a tag person but love to make cards. If the background didn’t work out as planned I normally put it in a box and next time around use them to punch out embellishments for another project. Today I would like to share with you a couple of cards I made trying out some new techniques.

Card 1:  Distress Ink

To create the background, use some antique linen, vintage photo and walnut stain distress ink. Ink through some stencils using walnut stain distress ink. After this, splatter on some water and dry it with a heat gun. Normally the splatter of the water would be before using the stencils, but I forgot to do this so I just reversed the process, it still came out pretty cool. A splatter stamp and some Versafine brown ink was used to stamp the splatter image on the background. Stamp the typewriter twice and fussy cut to create a 3d embellishment, stamp the sentiment on the paper part of the top typewriter and ink it with some antique linen distress ink. Complete the typewriter using 3d tape. Punch out some flowers and inked them with worn lipstick, tattered rose and Victorian velvet distress ink as well as ink the edges with walnut stain distress ink. Use some diamante as the centres of the flowers. The seam binding was colored with the same brown and pink distress inks as used on the card. The matt for the background was coloured heavily with some worn lipstick distress ink, splattered with water, dried with a heat gun and then inked with some walnut stain ink. The card front was lightly inked with victorian rose and vintage photo as well as walnut stain distress ink. Complete the card by putting everything together and lastly tie the seam binding around the completed card.

Card 2:  Distress Stain

Dab some picket fence distress ink on a craft sheet, dab some stormy sky, evergreen bough and faded jeans distress ink around the picket fence distress ink. Spritz with water and drag the card background through the distress ink until you are happy with it. Dry with a heat gun and while drying spritz some water on the card to create some droplets. When the background is dry add a bit of wild honey distress ink to the background and ink around the edges with black soot distress ink.. Ink a background stamp with some picket fence distress stain and dry with a heat gun. Next stamp a frame image, as well as a sentiment on the background with black Versafine ink. Stamp the butterfly with black ink on an off-cut piece of paper. Ink the butterfly with some wild honey distress ink. Colour a few paper roses with shabby shutters and wild honey distress stains. The matt for the background was coloured with some black soot distress ink , spritzed with water and dried with a heat gun. The card was inked with some evergreen bough, and black soot distress ink. Attach the background to the matt and sew around the edge (machine or by hand). The film strip was attached with a tiny attacher. The staples were coloured with some alcohol ink to match the background of the card. Attach the roses and butterfly to the card. Use the snipped off stems of the roses, wrap them around a paper piercer and attach two of them behind the butterfly. Attach to the card and finish off with some diamanté.

Card 3:  Alcohol Inks

Dab the background was with some aqua alcohol ink on a piece of glossy card stock. Put some alcohol ink silver mixative on your craft sheet. Pick the mixative up with an ink applicator and some blending foam and gently dab through the stencil onto the background. Stamp some background images on the card, use first, second and third generation (I used a script stamp with Versa Magic Ocean Depth chalk ink, and a chicken wire stamp with some black Staz On ink) After this is done use an ink applicator with some felt, put some blending solution on the felt and dab around the card to sort of blur the background. Be careful not to put to much blending solution on the felt. You just want the edges to blur. Attach some washi tape to the left side of the back ground. Ink the edges with some Versa Magic Midnight Black chalk ink. With the background done use a dress form and stamp the image twice on the background, once with black Staz On Ink, and then with Versa Magic Ocean Depth chalk ink. Overlap the stamped images with each other. The third dress form was stamped on off cut white card-stock with Versa Magic Ocean Depth chalk ink, fussy cut it and lightly ink with peacock feathers distress ink as well as black soot around the edges. Embellish the dress form with some netting, ribbon and diamanté, and attach to the background overlapping the stamped dress form. The sentiment was stamped on off cut white card-stock with some Versa Magic Ocean Depth chalk ink. Lightly ink this with peacock feathers distress ink as well as ink the edges with some black soot distress ink. Attach to the background. Punch some flowers, ink the edges with some black soot distress ink, use some diamanté as flower centres. Attach these to the background. The card was lightly inked with peacock feathers and some black soot distress ink around the edges. Some grey polka dot washi tape was used as a frame before the background was attached to the card.

Card 4: Distress Paint Dabbers

Dab some distress paints on your craft sheet. I used wild honey, vintage photo, fired brick and some antique linen. Spritz the paints with water and drag the card through the paints until you are happy with the result. Spritz the card with water to make the paint react more and then dry with a heat gun. Dab some more distress paint on the craft sheet. With a distress ink applicator and some blending foam pick up bits of the distress paint and dab through various stencils onto the background. Cut half a circle from some off-cut patterned paper, ink with some vintage photo distress ink. The matt for the background was cut from dark brown card stock, and punched around two sides. Little circles were punched from a “flop” and used on the border. Attach the background to the matt. I used a sewing machine to create the rays of the sun as well as sew around the background and the half circle. The banner was cut from off cut white card-stock, inked with vintage photo distress ink and the sentiment was stamped onto it. This was attached to the card with some 3d squares. To complete the card attach some buttons. Attach this to a craft coloured card, which was inked with some vintage photo distress ink.

Remember, all the supplies I have used are available at the Scrapbook Studio

Happy scrapping

Lee

Scrapping those original photographs...

Hello All,

Scrapping those original photos can sometimes be daunting, especially if we compare the photos we have against all the layouts we see on the internet. When my kids were little I had no interest in scrapping and digital cameras were not an everyday item. The photos of events in their lives tend to either be a single photo, or they were photos given to me by people who attended the event, so some are developed as glossy photos and some matt. It was also before new born babies had photo shoots so the new arrival in the family was snapped by a very excited granny while the kid was held up behind a glass partition by an unknown nurse – enough to make your mojo run and hide in a closet for weeks.

I know we can scan these photos, photo-shop them and have them re-developed but I believe they are part of the story we are telling through our scrapping so I like to use them as they are. If there is a part on the photo you would really like to get rid off like a finger in front of the lens, try to cover that with an embellishment or two.

So today’s layout is of my eldest son's first birthday. He will be 20 this year – boy time flies! I had a lot of photos for this event in his life, and wanted to use them all. This made for a photo-heavy layout, so I decided to go light on the embellishments. A booklet was created for the left side of the lay-out to make more space for photos and some journaling.  

Products used:

White card-stock base

Black card-stock – photo matts

Echo Park – A boy's life – Imagination

Dark blue / Orange (red)

Simple Stories – Harvest Lane – Teal dot / Ledger

Black Soot Distress Ink

Corner round punch

Note book punch

Heart ink

Ever favorite Silhouette Machine

Tri-Boss Boofle embossing folder

Embossing pad and embossing powder

Honeycomb stencil – cut with the Silhouette machine

Randomly ink lightly through the honey-comb stencil on the white card-stock with black soot distress ink. I normally don't pick up new ink but just use the leftover ink on my blending foam. Ink around the edges of the white card-stock with black soot distress ink. Using the patterned paper cut them in various sizes, round the corners and ink the edges. Arrange them on the background.

Cut the booklet, round the corners, ink the edges and attach to the lay-out. The top photo shows the booklet open, the clear space is where I will put my journaling. Matt the photographs on the black card-stock and attach them to the lay-out.

The Happy Birthday heading and the number one was cut from off-cut patterned paper with the Silhouette machine, inked and then embossed with embossing powder. Various sizes of hearts was also cut from off-cut patterned paper with the Silhouette machine and inked. Some of them were embossed with the Boofe embossing folder and then some embossing powder was used on it. Arrange these elements on the front cover of the booklet.

Now I know what you are thinking: “A booklet! Yay, but how do I put a page like that in my album?”

Well, let me help you. Place your layout into the plastic sleeve. Mark the position of the booklet on the plastic sleeve. Once you have marked the position on the sleeve, remove the layout and put a craft mat into the sleeve. With a ruler and craft knife slit the plastic between the marks. Now put your layout back into the sleeve but let the flap of the booklet go through the slit in the sleeve. I find it easier to mark the position of the booklet but not to stick the booklet down yet. Then after I complete the layout, slip it into the sleeve and then just slip the booklet through the slit in the plastic and stick it down. Hope this helps!!

Mmmmm.... taking photos through a plastic sleeve is not that easy. It does however show the left side

of the layout in the plastic sleeve.

Remember all the products used on this layout are available at the Scrapbook Studio.

Happy scrapping!

Lee

Silhouette in Motion....

Hello All,

A Silhouette cutting machine opens so many doors in the way you can scrap and do other art projects. Did you know that you can plan out your whole layout in the Silhouette software? Planning what you want on your page, the size of your embellishments as well as where you want to place it.

 This is a screenshot of what my layout looked like in the Silhouette software. The word “awesome” and the splat are designs from the Silhouette online store. There are lots and lots of designs to choose from in the online store.  The superhero is a design I created myself to be paper pieced together. From here I moved all the pieces of the various colours to a new page to be cut.

And here is how the layout turned out………..

….pretty close to what I had planned, don’t you think?  When I work with a layout that has a lot of cut pieces I keep a holder with me to put the cut pieces in. This prevents that the sneaky dot on the “i” does not disappear. 

This is a picture of the first side of the background after it was completed.

The heading was assembled and then attached in place with some 3d foam to give it some more dimension.

This is a close-up of the wording on the layout after it was assembled.

Oooooh….. and here is the Super Hero that was paper pieced together. He is so cute. The super hero was attached to the lay-out with some 3d foam tape.

 Lastly, a close-up of one of the two bigger stars. I did some silver leafing on the stars and then ran them through a Couture Creations – World Fair Collection – embossing folder. After that they were attached to the lay-out.

Remember all the supplies used on this layout are available at the Scrapbook Studio.

Thanks for stopping by.

Happy Scrapping

Lee

My Mind's Eye - Continue

Hello All,

In my previous post, I shared a layout made with My Mind’sEye – "Find your wings and fly"- range of papers. Today I would like to share a follow up layout with the same range of papers. It really is a beautiful range of papers. All supplies used are available from the Scrapbook Studio. The photo is of me at age 2. In this layout there is a lot of layering and some machine stitching. It is a really busy layout but the range of papers goes so well together. All the bits of paper used on the layout were inked with black soot distress ink.

A craft knife was used to cut the “hold fast to your dreams” and “top priority” enough to slip the background in and then lies on top of the photograph as part of the embellishments. Ink them with black soot distress ink.

This is a photo of the left side of the layout, showing all the layers as well as some of the machine stitching. The doily was inked with black soot distress ink and then sprayed with some perfect pearl mists. Some twine was wrapped around the “Bloom where you were planted” embellishment.

A close up of the right side showing some more machine stitching a bit of paper that was punched with a notepaper punch and then inked with some distress ink - peeled paint and some black soot. 

The heading “Me @ 2” was cut with a Silhouette Machine.

 Thank you for stopping by.

Happy Scrapping.

Lee

1957 Mannequin

Hello All!

Today I would like to share a layout made with My Mind’s Eye – Find your wings and fly – range of papers. The photos are of my mother-in-law as a young girl. These photos were taken for her modelling portfolio. I had loads of fun creating this layout and I might just have a new favorite range of papers – for now! They are simply stunning.  All the products used are available at the Scrapbook Studio.

Products used on this layout:

Find your wings and fly – My Mind’s Eye patterned paper

White card-stock

Grey card-stock

Doily

MME – Stella and Rose Decorative brads

Petaloo Darjeeling collection flowers - paprika

Decorative Stamps – MME - Find your wings and fly

Kaisercraft texture clear stamp – grid

Ranger Adirondack - earthtones - slate

The Crafters Workshop 6x6 stencil – mini chicken wire reversed

Ranger distress ink – black soot, wild honey, fired brick

Mister Huey’s Ink

Perfect Pearl Mists – Heritage gold

Needle and thread

These photos show how to build the background of the layout. First decide where you want to place the reversed chicken wire stencil on the white card-stock background and ink it with distress ink wild honey and fired brick. The next layer is done over the stencil with the clear grid texture stamp and Adirondack slate ink. Then splatter the background with Mister Huey’s ink as well as Perfect Pearl Mists – Heritage gold.

Using the grey card-stock and patterned papers of your choice build the next layers of your layout. Using distress ink – black soot – ink all the edges of the paper. Place your photos on the layout and now you can start creating the embellishment clusters.

These photos show the method of how to make the paper rolls used in the embellishment clusters.  This is a nice way to add height to the flower clusters. 1. Cut paper in various widths but of the same length so that the paper rolls are all the same thickness. 2. Place some glue on the edge (inside) of the paper. Start rolling at the opposite edge around a toothpick. 3. Repeat this until you made all the paper rolls you will need, and ink the rolled edges. 4. Finished!

Use the doily to make a flower. The doily was treated with water, Mister Huey’s sprays as well as some Perfect Pearl – Heritage Gold mist. The inside of the doily was cut out and the edge section (lacy section) was used to make a zig-zag fold flower. One of the MME – Stella and Rose Decorative brads was used for the center of the flower. The leftover section of the doily was used to punch little circles.

The heading was cut with a Silhouette Cameo, and as a final touch some sewing was added to the layout. (Oops, so sorry, my heading seems to have lost the dot on the "i"!)

Finally a closer look at the embellishment cluster at the top left of the layout.

Thank you for looking.

Happy Scrapping
Lee :)

Sweet Child

Hello all!  

It has been a while since we have had some Design Team Magic!  But, sometimes amazing things take a little longer!  We are so excited to announce that we have asked Lee Dreyer to be our in house Design Team!  She is very talented and we can't wait to see what magic she creates for us in the months to come!

Please visit her blog te see some more of the magic she creates! Remember that you can purchase all products Lee uses at Scrapbook Studio!

 Today I would like to share with you a layout full of fun and techniques. As a rule I do not fussy cut my photos but these photos were perfect for fussy cutting. The colouring of the photos were also a bit difficult to match with paper, so with the help of a friend we found three really old Scrapsheet papers that worked well with the photos and the rest of the paper were created with inks, masks and stamps.

Creating the background:

Place the two card stock sheets next to each other to form a single canvas. ( I use a bit of masking tape at the back to keep them together.

Photo 1: This shows randomly stamped images on the background. The first stamp image was done with weathered wood distress ink randomly around the page. The second stamped image (Prima Clear Stamp - Romace Novel) was also placed randomly on the page in peeled paint distress ink. These images overlap the first ones in certain places. After inking the stamp, it was stamped first on a off-cut paper and then stamped on the background so it is a light image.

Photo 2: With the Silhouette cutter I cut a diamond background in two sizes to use as masks on the background. These were also randomly placed and with black soot distress ink and a ink blending tool lightly inked through the mask. After inking the blending tool I removed some ink on a scrap piece of paper and then inked through the mask. This made the black soot distress ink a bit less harsh on the background. The process was repeated with the smaller diamond background.

Lastly I added some "bubble wrap" stamping with distress paint - salty ocean - to the background. Take a piece of bubble wrap and dab with the distress paint. Place it on the background where you want it, overlapping the stamped images. Carefully press down on the bubble wrap to transfer the paint, lift and voila - "bubble wrap" stamp!!

Creating the strips behind the photos:

Photo 1: I decided that a dot and a stripe paper will look good with the layout but the only way to have them is to create them. On a white piece of card stock I stamped some stripes of dots with a America Crafts - Birthday stamp and weathered wood distress ink.

Photo 2: The dot paper cut to size and ready to use. 

Photo 3: The trusty Silhouette machine was used again to cut a stripe background. It was placed on a white piece of cardstock and inked with some peeled paint distress ink. 

Photo 4: The mask was moved over to cover the green stripe and a second stripe was inked in some weathered wood distress ink.

A close-up of the strip. All the pieces were inked in black soot distress ink and attached to each other with some Tombo green glue. The strips were then attached to the background.

Paper piecing the hot air balloon:

Photo 1: After deciding on the size of the balloon the various parts were cut from some chipboard. 

Photo 2: The pieces of the balloon cut from patterned paper. Remember to number them, it makes the sticking down order much easier. Before they were stuck down on a off-cut piece of cardstock the balloon pieces were inked with black soot distress ink.

Photo 3: The balloon almost done. After glueing the pieces on the cardstock cut the balloon out and ink the outline with black soot distress ink. Use some of the leftover dot stamped paper to cut the balloon detail and ink. The basket was cut from white cardstock and inked with black soot distress ink.

Photo 4: After adding some buttons, this is how the completed hot air balloon looks on the lay out.

The right top corner of the layout shows two other hot air balloons. Using the Farm House - Fair Skies Stamps Dusk, stamp the two hot air balloons on left over pattern paper in weathered wood distress ink. Cut them out and ink with black soot distress ink and use as embellishments.

A close-up of the saying on the left page of the lay-out. This is such a sweet saying I just love it.

The heading and the chevrons were cut with the Silhouette cutter and some buttons were randomly sewn to the layout. To finish the layout a 1" frame was attached with purple turtle foam tape to create a shadow box effect. It was also done to hide a red water stain on the edge of the lay-out after I managed to tip paint water over my work area. Note to self - remove water when done.!! Many ways to skin a cat and hide little messes!!

Thank you Lee!  We can't wait to see what you have for us next!  Please leave us a comment to let us kno if you enjoyed this tutorial and to let us know what you would like to see featured on our Blog!

Happy Scrapping!