Cousin Layouts

In addition to the layouts I posted last week, I created a few about my darling nieces in January.
My brother's darling Abby meeting her Great Grandma:

This uses CTMH's La Belle Vie paper packet - now sadly retired. (The tag with the heart and the frame with the flower were a make and take at the January Crop N Time event.)

I used some retired stamps, a bit of black tulle ribbon and washi tape to embellish. This tulle gives a lot of bang for the buck. The pieces on this layout are 1/4 of the full width!




Another layout using La Belle Vie. This time I used the negative space from the hearts I cut for the make and take to create the background of a layout documenting my niece Olivia's baptism:

The negative space was fun to play with. I tried many colors behind it, and settled on the pink pattern and Colonial White.

I added some stamped and fussy-cut flowers from Hooray Bouquet with clear sparkles to embellish.

I also pulled out some more retired stamps to create the borders and the title.










And finally, a layout that actually includes cousins! Near the end of the day at the January crop I wanted to continue creating, but my table was a mess. I decided to try to use the things on my table to create another page. I found two photos of my little guy with his cousin and this was the result:

I loved the bright colors of the play mat with the papers and embellishments. The supplies are a mish-mash of manufacturers. Almost all of the CTMH materials are long retired.

I'm glad to get these girls into my scrapbooks! What have you been creating about your family lately?

Don't be afraid to crop!

I posted this layout earlier this week:

and I confessed that I was nervous to try this pattern from the Make it From Your Heart book because of the five cropped photos. I am not skittish about cropping my photos, but I was nervous about this pattern for two reasons. First, the images looked small. I wasn't sure I would be able to crop my 4X6 photos and still keep enough of the image to tell a story. Second, this pattern doesn't allow for changing the sizes of the photos without some other changes that I didn't want to calculate.

I had many photos of my daughter opening gifts on this birthday so I decided to brave it. If it didn't work, I could always use other photos from the same day.

I am not a person who measures everything to a T. In fact, I often "measure" based on photo and paper sizes and mark mostly with my fingernails. Here is my non-scientific, minimal measuring way to crop photos to this size.

Here is my original 4X6 photo. My daughter opening the gift is the focal point, but there are may extraneous details in the image - especially on the right side.

To make this photo fit in the pattern I need to take off 2 inches from one dimension and 1 1/2 inches from the other.

 When cropping to a specific size, I start with the side with the most "extra" space - in this photo the right hand side. I crop off whatever I think is the extra space without getting too close to my focal image. I can always come back and trim more closely later.










Here is my photo after my first cut. I have preserved the image of my daughter and she is now centered on the photo.






Next, I turned the photo in my trimmer and cropped off as much as I was willing to from the opposite side. Notice, so far there has been no measuring! I have been using the photo image as my guide.

After making these two cuts, I measured my photo and realized that I needed to trim a bit more so that it would fit the pattern. I decided I could take a bit more off of the right side of the photo more easily than the left. I measured the 2 1/2 inches and trimmed.

I followed the same process for the vertical dimensions of the photo. I started by trimming off the bottom with the chair legs and the bag. Then I measured and trimmed the photo to 4 inches.






And here it is. The final cropped photo. The photo now fits in the pattern. Also, because I cropped it to this size, there is nothing to distract from the focal point - my daughter and her gift.

And here is the cropped photo in the layout.
















Are you timid about cropping? Try it  - I think you may like the results! Do you have other tricks to make cropping easier? I would love to hear them - especially if they don't involve much measuring.

Paper Trail Blog Hop - Celebrating La Belle Vie!

Welcome to the paper trail blog hop. You probably arrived here from Vicki's blog. If this is your first stop, I hope you'll continue on with the hop.

I loved playing with this paper pack. I liked the classy colors that work well for my daughter and use pink without being babyish. To celebrate, I created two layouts about her birthday using patterns from the Make it From Your Heart book.

This pattern made me nervous at first because of the five small photos, but my friend Kerrie inspired me to use it. I am happy with the way it turned out. Cropping the photos smaller can help draw attention to certain elements and hide my sometimes flawed photos. (Check back Friday for some suggestions about cropping photos in this way.)

This paper seemed to call for bling and sparkle. I used the black sparkle flourishes some fussy cut flowers and Stardust Glitz.

I used a sentiment stamp intended for cards for the title and subtitle on this layout. Because I was able to include so many small photos to tell the story, my journaling could be very brief. I tucked the thoughts into the right hand flourish.

The second layout I created focuses on one gift my daughter received. This one also uses a pattern from the Make if From Your Heart book. I love using the patterns in this book because I can modify them to suit my layouts and style. Here I added two additional photos by using two 4X6 photos on the left page rather than a 5X7 and adding an additional photo cropped on the right page.

I used the same black sparkle flourishes (one pack was enough to create both layouts) and Startdust Glitz to embellish this layout. Once I find supplies that work well together I love to create multiple layouts using the same set. It saves me time making decisions!

For this layout I also used some word and definition stamps as embellishments. A variation on the rock and roll technique let me stamp the words in black and the definitions in grey so that the embellishment didn't overpower the layout.



 Thanks for stopping by! Remember to check Friday for some suggestions on cropping photos.

Your next stop is Karen's blog. I'm sure you'll love what she created.

I Remember...

Perhaps you could argue that all of my scrapbook layouts should fit the title "I Remember". After all, recording memories is one of the main reasons I create layouts. Still, when I read the challenge at ScrapFIT to create a layout with the title "I remember" it really got my creative juices flowing. I had some photos of our first trip to our favorite ice cream parlor last spring (this is an event I always photograph.)

I used CTMH's special double stamp set It's Your Day for all of the stamping and most of the embellishment on this layout.

(Contact me to find out how to get yours!)

I stamped the cardstock to create a base for the large photo mat. Created the striped border by stamping on the pink patterned paper. I even stamped and then cut or punched the text based embellishments including this circle and flag:

and this arrow and these flags:

The title, "I remember" led me to journal not just about our annual first trip to the ice cream store (as my kids call it) but also about my father and grandfather's long-time love for ice cream. This story tells more than the photos do, and I'm glad that I have it recorded so that my kids know they are not the first in this family to have a soft spot for ice cream.

Thanks for the challenge!