Footloose - Paper Trail Blog Hop

Welcome to the Paper Trail Blog Hop for June! This month we are featuring the Footloose paper packet. If you've arrived here from Tracey's blog, you're on the right track. If not, don't worry. This hop is circular! I think you will really like the colors of this paper. The blues, greens and yellows lend themselves well to summer photos. I created my layouts using designs by another Close to My Heart Consultant, Tresa Black.

Megan at the beach
For the last few years we have made an annual summer trip to the beach so I have lots of beach photos. For these two layouts, I chose photos from two different years centered around two different themes. My first layout features photos of my girl and her toys at the beach in 2009.

Many of the photos were taken with a disposable camera so the quality isn't the best. I liked using them on this layout because I could include all of the cute faces in one space and crop the extra beach out of each picture.

I love getting new products like this paper, but even more I love pairing new things with items already in my stash. To Tresa's designs, I added the cork alphabet (click here to view) and metal tabs from CTMH from about two years ago (remember the Splendor paper pack?) I liked the touch of metal the tabs added and the fact that they repeated some of the colors that were in the paper.

Under the Umbrella
My second layout centers around the beach umbrella. When I have many photos from the same event or trip, I try to focus in on one aspect of the story to tell. This is especially true of our beach photos since I take more with each trip! I happened to have quite a few good umbrella shots from our last beach visit, so I told the story of what happens under the umbrella.

 

Again I used the cork alphabet for part of my title. I included the metal tabs on the journaling cards. I also pulled out a retired stamp set to create the sun and text embellishments.

You could be Footloose, too! Why not pair some of your new favorites with some old standbys to create a fun new project? Please share any creations that pair new and old products. I would love to see what you create!

Now hop on along to Vicki's blog to see what she has created with Footloose. I'm sure you'll find even more inspiration there!

Secure

Sometimes it seems all of my muses are working together with one goal in mind. Four separate inspiration pieces led me to create this layout. Recently, I found a fun photo of my daughter and I knew I wanted to do something special with it. A conversation I had with a teacher at her school made me consider a sincere wish I have for my daughter - that she be secure with herself. When I saw the current sketch at Stuck?! Sketches

I was instantly inspired and wanted to create. I received a red ribbon assortment in a goodie bag at a recent crop. On the day of that crop, these four inspiration pieces led me to create this layout:

I liked the simple color scheme since my girl is wearing red and white in both photos. The photos, by the way, were taken 6 months apart three years ago. I decided to use them to tell this story because they emphasize her face even though they are a few years old.

When my photos and journaling aren't from the same general time, I usually include both the date of the photo and the date of the journaling.

I am glad that all of my muses worked together to inspire me to share this story with my daughter.

What about you? What is inspiring you lately?

The red and white papers and the small embellishments are from Echo Park's Yours Truly collection.

Finishing things up

I've spent a lot of time over the past couple of weeks finishing up layouts that have been sitting around in progress. Some of my scrappin' girls frequently poke fun at me for the number of unfinished projects I have at any one time. Some reasons my layouts languish on my desk unfinished: I run out of time in one sitting, I don't have the supplies I need where I'm working, and very often, I run out of inspiration and/or nothing seems to be working right. Taking a break from a layout really helps me. A fresh perspective is often just what I need.  Sometimes the number of works in progress gets out of hand. The nice part is then I can sit down and "finish" lots of pages in a short amount of time. Here are a couple that I have finished recently:

This has been one of my son's favorite phrases for the last few months. It warms my heart when he says it. I used CTMH's Sonoma paper packet and a few metal accents.

I didn't plan the design with journaling in mind, so I had to add it in after the fact. Thank goodness for hidden tags!


This one has been in my head since I first saw the sketch at least three months ago at Scrapping Everyday Miracles. I knew just the photos, papers and memorabilia I wanted to use. The challenge was to gather those three items and the sketch in the same place.

The paper is very old CTMH from the Animal Cookies paper packet.

I'm glad I waited until I actually had everything I envisioned for the layout. I really like the way the map looks with the cute zoo animals on the paper and the stickers. After all of that waiting, I didn't have much to say that wasn't already evident so I took a light approach with my journaling:

Although they took a long time to complete, I think they were worth the wait.

How about you? What have you been working on lately?

Cool! Fun! Amazing!

I'm loving CTMH's Dotty for You paper pack. Here's another fun (and simple) layout using Dotty and the April SOTM.

My honey surely is a cool, fun and amazing dad.

The butterfly and flower are Garden Wooden Shapes - perfect for stamping or just sponging ink.

What cool, fun or amazing things have you been documenting lately?

Inspired by National Scrapbooking Day

My son's birthday always falls right around National Scrapbooking Day, so I usually end up spending the day taking photos, not creating with them. This year, after the festivities for his birthday, I checked out many of the challenges that were going on. Although I didn't complete my layout in time to submit to any of those, I did get it put together and the story told which is what it is about for me.

This layout started out inspired by a challenge at Big Picture Classes to create a funky frame.

It was also inspired by Courtney Walsh who is hosting a series of prompts about scrapbooking your faith. This week's prompt is: Create a page or project to serve as a word of encouragement for yourself or someone you love. I felt that my sweet husband could use some encouragement. I loved the way I could emphasize my hubby - the audience of my journaling - in these family photos using the frame.

I used the Dotty for You paper - CTMH's special for this month in honor of National Scrapbooking Day. The embellishment clusters are labels and tags cut from a piece of patterned paper. It was a fun (and easy) way to add two clusters. When my layout was almost complete, I learned that fussy cutting is ScrapFit's weekend warm up challenge right now!

What about you? Did you create anything on National Scrapbooking Day? About the day? Inspired by the day?

Project #1 - Scripture book

Check one off the list! I've finished my first project of my 36 project goal. I created this mini that focuses on inspiration verses.

I used a tutorial created by Teresa Collins to create this matchbook mini-album out of one sheet of 12X12 paper.  (I used a sheet from the Stella paper pack from CTMH.)

Once I had the album built, I printed some of my favorite verses to fit the pages.

I kept my embellishments simple - the Just for You stamp set with coordinating inks and a few sparkles.


One of my favorite things about this album is that it is small enough to carry in my purse. It is always with me when I need a pick me up - whether creative or spiritual!


What about you? What have you created lately that is inspirational?

Spring Training - Scrappy Style

I'm fortunate that I am participating in Spring Training over at Ella Publishing this year. This two week event has classes and training exercises to help get you in your top scrappy shape. I'm still working on the first three exercises about organization.

The exercises I've already completed - but want to repeat - are the photography ones. I take lots of photos, but I wouldn't call myself a photographer. It has been one of my goals for a couple of years to learn more about photography (and my camera.) I love what I learned from Erin Cobb! Here are some of the photos I took using her tips:

• Ask kids to make as many different expressions as they can - like these crazy two.

 

• Use window light - here I used front light. (Above side light.)

• She even gave suggestions about shooting in low light as I did here

I can't wait to do some more reps of these exercises. I like thinking more about my photography. I also can't wait to get some of these photos onto pages!

What about you? What have you learned lately?