Spring Break Adventures 2024

This layout was inspired by Ali Edwards' Adventure Story Stamp. Once it was in progress, I used a challenge from Simple Scrappers' Refresh Retreat in May to complete it. The challenge was to use 9 photos to tell the story and to use a product based class for a technique or starting point. I decided to use Shimelle's Use What You Buy Stencil Edition for my technique.

 

Shimelle's UWYB lesson that I used was to emboss and ink a panel. I found a stencil and ink blended a white panel with 3 inks that coordinated with the papers I had chosen from a SCT Sampler Kit. I hadn't ink blended over a stencil before so I started there instead of the embossing. I was unaware that the stencil I had chosen was larger than my die cut platform so I wouldn't be able to emboss with my Sizzix machine. Instead I got out a stylus and did the embossing by hand. I do not recommend. I was committed and didn't want to re-ink so I just finished the job. 

I used the Adventure Story stamp set to embellish the tags and used the enamel dots and die cuts from the same SCT Sampler kit to finish it off. 

For the journaling, I used the Daily Story Stamp for the days of the week and printed my journaling on clear sticker paper and placed it after stamping. Use the "adventure memories" from the Adventure Story Stamp. Wood veneer are from my stash.

Created a fun title treatment using 3 different stamps. The "adventures" did not come from the Story Stamp but from an old Technique Tuesday set. The tiles came from a Stamping Up! set that I had a coordinating square punch for. Added the string to bring the string from the tags at the top of the page in a third spot. Thought it also brought more attention to the title.

I created a companion page of sorts to go with this one. I had Spring Break Adventures for my other daughter the week after. Will share that one soon!

Rosie at 12 months

 

When finishing up the monthly layouts for my daughter's baby album, I came across this rainbow paper from Cocoa Vanilla's Happy Days collection and wanted to use it to feature the last month. Simple Scrapper had a sketch this journey that also featured a rainbow background so I thought it a sign to share it now.

It is a rather simple layout with a few layers and flowers around the photo. I didn't want to detract from the background too much so I went light on the embellishments on this one. It felt like cheating that the layout came together so quickly, but I loved it too much to add anymore.

For the associated journaling pages, I went all out on the rainbow theme and love how it ties to the title page.

The titles on both are the same as the other months in the album, using a cut files some that are digital word art from Ali Edwards.

Exploring our Senses at the Color Factory

The layout I am sharing today was inspired by Ali Edwards Story Stamp on the theme of Senses. 

After visiting the Color Factory in Chicago, I thought there would be no better way to capture the adventure than through the senses! 

I also started with a sketch in the Simple Scrapper membership, as I work on the Square One class immersion, that I highly altered. Altering a sketch this much was way outside my comfort zone! It has a grid of photos and a title above it and that was what I took from it.

The Color Factory was full of color so I found a colorful pattern paper from Paige Evans that was a quilt of squares. I paired that with Shimelle’s Box of Crayons collection for more multicolored patterns plus cutting the letters for the title.

To utilize many of the stamps I used the half circle words as subtitles for the journaling as well as the big word for the title. I also pulled a circle phrase stamp from the Explore Story Stamp at add another layer. 

 Love how it came together! A fun page for a fun adventure!

My Type of Fun

 

I had these photos of my son next to the letters outside Disneyland California Adventure printed quite a while ago. I wasn't sure if I was going to frame them and hang them in his wall, or create a layout or another crafty project with them. 

When I was going through Ali Edwards' Story Class for the theme of Type, these pictures came to mind, so I wrote the story behind them. 

I struggled selecting products for this layout, because while the photos are somewhat Christmas holiday related, the story wasn't. I decided after finding the "Make the Letter" pattern in my stash, that I would lean into the red and green with a mix of blue to pull out my son's blue shirt in the photos.

I had too many 4x6 photos to make this a one page layout, so I went to my Christmas stash and tried finding two papers to use as a background. There I found two old pieces of Basic Grey patterns that would work well together even though they were not the same pattern. This also happened to work for the first supply for a Simple Scrapper Stash Bash challenge.

The title I created was from a mix of stickers from my stash: puffy's from Felicity Jane, Thickers and a glitter word sticker from a SCT Sampler kit I was happy to use. The word sticker also met the "larger than 2 inches" supply requirement for the Stash Bash challenge. The letters in the photos could also work!

I have been trying to use up my SCT Sampler kits so after selecting the background papers, I found coordinating papers and scraps that worked with my color scheme from some SCT Sampler kits and cut circles and leaves to use as embellishments. 

I ended up using three stamps from the Type Story Stamp set: the happy, "so thankful for this type of day" and oh, yeah, sentiments.

To finish it off I used gold staples from my stash to complete the Stash Bash challenge of using an "attacher" on the layout. I had gold foiled accents on other pieces of my layout, so I went with the gold staples match.

So happy to have these photos documented! Thanks for stopping by!

Seasons

The layout I am sharing today was inspired by many people. The story was Inspired Scrapbooking from Stacy Julian, a class from Big Picture Classes many years ago. I found the journaling when Ali Edwards Story Stamp for the theme of seasons came out in 2018. 

It finally bubbled to the top as a layout to create when I was working through Shimelle’s Use What You Buy class on Stamping. 

Shimelle’s lesson was to use a quadrant foundation with tone on tone stamping for each quadrant. 

I used a worksheet my son had made in school when they were learning about the seasons. I thought it would be fun to have a mat behind the season that coordinated with color and season of stamps from the Season Story Stamp.

It was a challenge to fit the oversized worksheet, the journaling and have the stamping show, but I am happy with it in the end. 

Finally have this story told and it feel great to have in my album!

Thanks for stopping by!
 

Rosie at 10 Months

The layout I am sharing today is another of my youngest’s baby album, for ten months.

The folded circles to squares was a technique I saw Paige Evans use a decided it would be a fun way to create a page. It also satisfied Simple Scrappers challenge this month with paper piecing.

It took a while to figure out how big the circles needed to be and how much to gold each edge to make a square, but one I had created a template, it was easy going after that.

The papers I used are from an old SEI collection I have had in my stash. 

Used the same title work as the other monthly pages in this album using Ali Edwards digitals to cut on my Silhouette machine.

For the accompanying journal pages, I carried the same technique to tie it all together.

I love how this all came together. Glad to have tried this technique for something new and a chance to play with paper in a new way.

Thanks for looking!

 

Best Friends with Dorthy

 

The layout I am sharing today was inspired by Ali Edwards Friend Story Stamp. 

In the Simple Scrapper community we had a challenge to find a video of a technique I wanted to try and use that technique as the starting point for a layout. 

Knowing I wanted to use stamps, I knew a stamping video would be best. I found this YouTube video from Scrap Happy about stamping backgrounds. 

If you look closely at my layout, you will notice that the background paper was stamped. I used a  purple Vicki Boutin, Color Study paper and used the Story Stamps to create a pattern.

This is definitely a technique I will use again!

I wanted to use some new 49 and Market Stamp and die set of butterflies on this layout to make my own embellishments. It was fun to play with layering 2 different inks and adding a bit of water to the process to play with the look of them. Super versatile and fun set to use!

Love that I had the butterfly branding strip from a Vicki paper to use as well!

When collecting supplies for this layout, I realized I had quite a bit of friend themed supplies: thicker phrases, acrylic words, stickers, stamps and more! I thought these Heidi Swapp title stickers were the perfect color and sparkle for this layout!

I enjoyed making this layout, using some neglected things from my stash and telling this story! 

Thanks for stopping by!