Design Your Life...

I don't think I have mentioned this before on here, but since it's starting this week and I'm really excited...

I have signed up for Cathy Zielske's BPS class called "Design Your Life". I read about it ages ago, like way, way before it went on sale and it made me really excited. It just sounded like a really nice class to take. But I knew already back then that it would be expensive. Far more than I would normally want to pay for a class. Still it's a long class (12 weeks) and it IS Cathy Zielske. I love learning about design principles and...well, in the end I persuaded myself to treat myself LOL! So there I was refreshing the site as the class went online one Friday afternoon quite a few weeks back and signed up straight away.

We got some pre-assignments which I have already done, binder is prepared and some photo enlargements (which we were warned about) have been ordered and received. I can't believe how fast it's gone since I signed up (and the class was like weeks and weeks away) and now it's starting this week. This Thursday! I can't wait :)

...anyone else doing it with me? :)

Some News x 2...

Got some news for you today...

Firstly, my on-line layout class for September is up at A Trip Down Memory Lane. I have been playing with some yummy Prima papers and other goodies. As usual it's free to take, so if you like the look of it and have a few minutes spare, please pop over to take a look at the class. Thank you :)

Then I got some other unexpected news at the weekend. Apparently I'd been lucky enough to win a place for a class called "Sweet Treats Fall". Yay! Exciting :) Something a little different for me, so I'm really looking forward to learning a bit more what it's about and have a play. Anyone else signed up for this class?

Another hybrid card...

We're having a pretty nice day today here so I'm not going to stay and blog too long (sorry!) Instead I just wanted to come and show one of my latest hybrid cards that I have done as part of my monthly assignments at Sweet Shoppe Designs.

I used a really yummy kit by Zoe Pearn called "Cheeky Boy" along with a doodled border by Fee Jardine. So much fun to make :)

[Supplies: "Cheeky Boy" Zoe Pearn, "Check It" Fee Jardine (SSD)]

A Little Behind...

...or rather a lot behind. I know I probably shouldn't have decided to do the "Learn Something New" class from Shimelle again this year. I have far too much on at the moment. But then you can't resist, can you? And especially when it was free since I have taken it before. So I signed up, got my supplies together and a little notebook to scribble the day's discovery. And then I got behind, very behind. I'm keeping up with my notebook and taking photos, so I have the base for what I need to do. But a page a day? Well, there hasn't really been the time for it. So once or twice a week I make myself catch up on a few pages...only to fall behind again LOL!

Anyway, I am getting there, I think. As long as I keep up with my notebook and my photos, I can work whenever it suits me. Again, I'm keeping my pages very simple on purpose. Otherwise I'd have to give up - and I don't like doing that :)

Here are my next two pages. And yes, I know that they are no masterpieces LOL!

How Cute...

How cute are these digital kits by Mindy Terasawa? Just perfect for some hybrid work.

I love anything to do with animals and this is just too cute :) So of course I couldn't resist and I have been playing a bit with it. I decided to go for a plain card with no greeting on it. But most likely it will end up becoming a child's birthday card. Nothing wrong with writing the greeting inside instead though.

[Supplies: "Little Safari" Mindy Terasawa, "Little Safari Icons" Mindy Terasawa, "Monkey Do" Mindy Terasawa, "Karissa Solids" Mindy Terasawa (Designer Digitals), "Beaded Staples" Amy Martin (the Lilypad)]

It's Friday - yay!! Hope you'll all have a great weekend :)

Hybrid Card & Some Questions...

I've been working on some hybrid cards yesterday afternoon and this morning. This one is another Halloween card using stuff by Kate Hadfield and Amy Wolff at the Lilypad:

[Supplies: "Mega Mix Up" Amy Wolff, "Thrift Store Remnants - Argyles" Amy Wolff, "Halloween Wordy Bits" Kate Hadfield & Tiff Brady, "The Witching Hour" Kate Hadfield (all from the Lilypad)]

Oh and I have been getting some questions that you have left in the "comments" section, so time to reply:

Lynette: the canvas that I used for my cupcake project is 20x20 cm (8x8 inches). I know the class required a rectangular format canvas, but I could only find the square ones in a decent size so I just adapted my project.

Elizabeth: you asked about the Maya Road cupcake stamps. I'm sorry but I have just checked and the shop that I bought them at have sold out (and once they sell out, they don't often re-stock items). However I have just looked at the back of my stamp tin and the code for the item is: SMP017. So hopefully that information might make them easier to find. Hope so! Good luck :)

Cupcake Canvas...

I really loved the first mini book project for the "Cupcakes & Coffee" class. Our second project was an even smaller (super cute) mini book which I have not yet had the chance to sit down and make (but it's on my list, trust me, too cute to miss!). The third project we got just before the weekend - a canvas project.

I didn't get the chance to start on this until yesterday, but it's now finished and hanging on the wall in my little craft room, making me smile as I look at it - so "bright & happy" :)

Creativity...

I'm continuing to catch up on the "My Freedom" class from July/August. Feels like I'm getting there now. Yay! Not too many prompts left to go through and make layouts for now. I'm so pleased I didn't give up on this project. :) It's going to be a very cool album to have once it's finished.

This is the 7th topic - creativity. It was suggested to us that, as one option, we could focus our photos on one recent project. Fit me perfectly as I'd recently re-painted and covered a mini chest of drawers with pretty papers. So I used "before" and "after" photos of that.

More Cards...

I've got another hybrid card to show you today. I really like the "Tiki Weekend" kit by Mindy Terasawa and knew I wanted to make something hybrid with it, but what... I don't really have anything to do with Hawaii as such...

But as I was looking at the kit picture on my hard drive, my eyes fell on how Mindy had chosen to display the alphabet that come with the kit. "Aloha". A greeting! So the thought formed to use this concept and just make a fun "general" greeting card :)

[Supplies: "Tiki Weekend", "Tiki Weekend: Hula Girls" and "Tiki Weekend: Tropical Icons" by Mindy Terasawa (Designer Digitals)]

Making Halloween cards...

If you love/celebrate Halloween & want to make your own cards and not do it last minute - now is the time! Yes time files. Scary! Don't even mention making Christmas cards (don't get me wrong, I looove Christmas and making Christmas cards....I just have too much to do to start them yet LOL! *stress*)

So anyway, if you're into Halloween cards, Kate has the greatest doodles for you to use at the Lilypad which were released yesterday. There are two cool "fancy dress" type kits and then this which has to be my favourite:

I got the chance to play with it a bit before it was released and came up with this hybrid card:

[Supplies: "The Witching Hour" Kate Hadfield (the Lilypad)]

Done...

And my cupcakes album is done. At least as far as making the cover and pages from scratch and binding it together. I still need to add some photos and journaling etc. But that's for another day. As far as assembling the album goes - I'm done :)

Some photos showing the binding of the pages to the album. I have never sewn pages into a handmade album before, but I really, really enjoyed it and I'm sure I will try it again :)

And this is what the spine (sewing/binding) looks like on the outside of the album...

The finished album. Made from cardstock, chipboard, old book pages and pretty scrapbooking papers...


And a little look at the pages inside...

Cupcakes album...

I have been doing some more work on my "Cupcakes" album today. :) The next step was to make and decorate the cover...

The white cardstock that you can see below is the cover - with a reinforced chipboard spine covered by pretty star paper. I have also made chipboard copies of the front and back and covered them with the same paper. They will go on the inside to make it sturdier.

I turned my cover over and decided to start by covering it in old book pages. This would follow the look of some of the inside pages. I went with the same cupcake stamps as before and a "Smile" stamp by Heidi Swapp.


Time to play with my Twinkling H2Os. I'm so glad I remembered that I had these when I was looking for something to colour my pages with :)

The next step is to add a button/ribbon to close the book and to bind the pages inside. So that's what I'm off to do now :)

Edited to add: forgot to say that the cupcake stamps are by Maya Road.

Cupcakes & Coffee...

A few days ago I signed up for the Cupcakes & Coffee class. As I said then, coffee isn't for me at all, so I'm going to adapt anything to do with "coffee" to suit me instead :) After all, that's what art and being creative is all about - adapting it to suit you.

So anyway, yesterday was the first day and the start of the first project. A cute little album. So excited about this!! This is what my desk looked like this morning when I printed out some of the great pages that Wilna had created for us...

Time to do something about the pages that was just shouting "coffee". First solution was to cover them with white paint. Only the paint made my printed pages (the ink) bleed and it still showed through. Not a perfect solution...

I left it overnight and did some thinking. This morning my eyes fell on my new, super cute, cupcake stamps that I only just got. And the cheap second hand book that I bought at the weekend to use for this class (it was part of the supply list). A bit of ripping, gluing and stamping and the pages now looked like this:

I was definitely getting somewhere. Then I wanted to colour in the images a little but still keep to the same kinda look as Wilna had used on the other pages. My first thought was my watercolour pencils. But then I had the idea of my Twinkling H2O paints - and that's what I used. I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the finished result which is now lying on the window sill drying...

Replies...

I have been left a few questions the last few days, so here we go...

MyEbella - you asked what I thought of Ali Edwards' new book. I haven't read it 100% yet, but...I love it! Only get it if you like minibooks (which I do!) though and please don't expect it all to be Ali's own work (which I kinda did). It's lots of work by other people too. But it's a really nice book with lots and lots of inspiration :)

Jen - thanks for the recommendation on where to find 8x10 canvas. I'm going on a hunt :)

Lutingobelin - You wanted to know about the stamps etc on these two pages. As you might have read, I bought a kit (in NOT my colours - to challenge myself LOL! And a challenge it is!) so I'm not sure about the papers and cardstock shades. The "today" stamp on the first page is by October Afternoon, so is the date stamp which I keep using on every page. The journaling block on the second page is from a Making Memories "Noteworthy" glitter die-cut set. Hope that helps :)

Sharing a little card that I made. I love making "general" cards that you can just grab when you need them. Makes notes so much cuter. :)

[Supplies: "Sweet Owl Collection" by Mindy Terasawa (Designer Digitals)]

Having Fun...

Another layout for the "My Freedom" class. All about having fun. I guess you could make a whole album about this...things you love, things you love to do, things that make you smile etc. Instead of trying to pick too much, I just used a few photos that I already had that symbolise "fun" in some way or other to me.

Sorry that the photo is a bit poor, the lighting isn't great here at all today so it was nearly impossible to take a shot without the flash. I managed, but instead I got funny lighting at the top of the layout from the lamp that I had to use...oh well LOL!

Multitasking...

I'm kinda multitasking - doing two different classes by Shimelle at the moment. Firstly I'm trying to catch up on the "My Freedom" class from July. Then I'm also doing the "Learn Something Different Every Day" class. It's a class that she runs every September. 31 days. Once you have taken it the first time, every year after that is free. I have done it 2 years already and really enjoyed it. It's basically to record a little snippet every day about something simple that you observe or learn.

I decided to do this year's a bit differently. Firstly I'm trying to do very simple pages. I'm sure "my style" probably come through in some of them anyway. But I'm trying to stick to the sketches we get and keep them pretty simple. Also I wanted to challenge myself so I bought a kit which was a bit out of my comfort zone. Purples and pinks (mixed with a bit of aqua and white). I never scrap in purple...so that's been a bit of a challenge to say the least...LOL!

My first two very simple pages are below...something fun to look back on in a year's time :)

Goodbye "Love Elsie"...

I did manage a lot yesterday though not quite all that I'd hoped (but it wasn't really realistic anyway). Two A4 layouts, 2 6x6 layouts and 4 cards ain't bad :) One of the cards was using some new Lilypad goodies that were released this morning:

[Supplies: "Good-Bye Summer" Jenna Desai, "Mega Mix Up" Amy Wolff (the Lilypad)]

I was very disappointed when I did my usual blog surfing this morning. Goodbye "Love Elsie". If you haven't seen it already, Elsie is doing no more work for KI Memories :( So sad. I really loved the lines she came out with. I'd really been looking forward to the new autumn lines that weren't ready for summer CHA...now I guess they won't ever be released...

Getting Things Done...

Got up this morning and decided that I wanted to get some assignments done to stay ahead of things a bit. Writing them down made it pretty obvious that it was a LOT. So I'm getting busy here...

I've locked myself in my scraproom (well not literally LOL!) and getting through one thing at a time. It's lunchtime and I have done two layouts plus two 6x6 layouts. I'd love to get 4 cards done this afternoon if I can. And maybe another 1-3 layouts...but I guess that's very doubtful LOL!

Leaving you with the latest double layout for "My Freedom" class...

Signed Up For a New Class...

There's nothing as good for your creativity and inspiration than to take a class I think...especially if it's a little bit out of your normal comfort zone. So I have signed up for a new class...

There will be canvases and all sorts being made. Exciting and also a little scary LOL!

I'm hoping it's mainly cupcakes and not so much coffee though...as I'm not a coffee girl *giggle*

Can anyone help please: where can I get canvas at 8x10 inches in size to a decent price please? I need three of them. Please leave a comment if you have seen any around - thanks soooo much :)

Scrapping In The Rain...

Yuck! The weather is horrible here. Really, really dark (I feel like I have not seen any daylight today!) and raining non-stop. I was hoping for a walk this afternoon but it's not something that seems very tempting at the moment...

Instead I'm working some more on the "My Freedom" class. I'm slowly getting there and I have got to the point now where I feel that I WILL indeed finish all the prompts and complete my album. It feels great :)

I have got past the "oh I'm so behind, this feels like too much to catch up on, maybe I'm better giving up"-hopeless feeling and instead I have found some new inspiration and motivation for the class and I start each prompt/layout with excitement - such a great feeling :)

My latest double-spread (wow it's weird scrapping DOUBLE layouts again!) for the "My Freedom" album:

Books...

A few weeks back I posted about books...scrapping books. I shared my favourites and got some great tips back from you. I love to hear which scrapping books people like and which ones were maybe a bit of a let down once you got reading. So if anyone has any more opinions (good and/or bad!) on scrapping books I'd love to hear them please.

I finally got my hands on the much awaited new book by Ali Edwards the other day:

And another book. This one has been out for a while and has always been on my "wants list", but...well, I have never bought it until now. There's always been something else that I have been wanting more, so it's stayed and stayed on my "wants list" ...like forever it seems:

Continuing The Catch Up...

I have been working even more on the "My Freedom" album (for those who haven't followed it, you can read more about it here). The next stage...well, actually I'm not sure it was the next stage, I kinda did it out of order as I wanted to add the first page into my album before I continued. Anyway I did the intro page...

This was fun, I used some cute stamps by October Afternoon which I have been dying to use (don't you just love that little jumping rabbit?) and I feel really happy doing this album. I know I was close to giving up, because of being so "behind", but I really feel so excited about it now. I hope I don't lose that feeling as I really want to finish this project.

Busy Weekend...

Something totally off topic as far as scrapbooking is concerned...

We'll have a very busy weekend this week - by choice. Now I'm not really into Xbox 360 games in general (they just don't really appeal to me - I'm more of a puzzle-game-type-person) but there is one game which we have been waiting for and waiting for ever since the last version of it was released...

Yep ---> "Viva Pinata - Trouble In Paradise". We played the previous version for hours and hours and hours...and a bit more. This one will be just the same I'm sure. It was released yesterday (Friday the 5th). We'd pre-ordered it on-line and were soooo lucky - it turned up in the post already on Thursday (yep the day before it was released). We spent Thursday and Friday evening (minus the Big brother final of course!) playing it and I can see this being a very busy weekend in front of the TV. I'm guessing I'll have square eyes on Monday... LOL! :)

Still Not Great...

My migraine was so bad last night that I had to give up and go to bed. Felt OK-ish (considering!!) when I woke up this morning but it's quickly come back and my head feels soooo heavy, achy and I won't even mention the nausea. Yuck! I think I need to have a very slow day with no monitor and lots of rest with shut eyes today. Bleugh! I was hoping it would be gone today (though I kinda knew yesterday from how bad it was that it would last a few days).

Anyway, enough of complaining. I have been working on the new Shimelle class ("Learn Something Different Every Day") It's a class that is being run every September and I have done it the previous two years. Shimelle kindly lets anyone who's taken it before, do it again for free - so I thought why not? I have done my first three pages so far but no photos yet I'm afraid. The weather here today is terrible: extreme fog (I can't see far out of the window, only a few metres) rain, rain and more rain (they are warning for flooding) and soooo dark. So no light to take photos in yet :(

[Supplies: Blank notebook + "Prehistoric" and "Gidget" by Dani Mogstad (SSD)]

Maya Road Chipboard Album...

Sorry my post won't be very long today (migraine - which makes me feel sick just looking at the monitor so I'm giving up & having a lie down after this). Just wanted to share a Maya Road accordion album which I have been working on. I used a digital kit and created hybrid pages to add to the album. The photos of my finished item are not great, but hey... This one is a gift and I will be making a second one, identical, but definitely not today...

[Supplies: Maya Road Accordion Album & "Giggles Album" by Kristin Cronin-Barrow (SSD)]

Catching Up...

In early July I signed up for the "My Freedom" class by Shimelle. I knew back then that I would get very behind due to being abroad most of the time while the class was running. We all know what travel leaves you when you get home...mountains of washing and lots of things to catch up on. So I just felt more and more behind...

But I really don't like giving up, so last week I finally sat down and read through all the prompts, worked out what photos I needed and sent off to have them printed. They turned up the other day and I could really get started on planning my album - finally!!

I managed two double layout assignments before we left and this is the third one (on the topic of Inspiration) which I have just worked my way through. I really don't want to admit defeat and give up on this class - so hopefully *fingers crossed* over the next few days you might see me having done some more :)