Sisters

Bright cheeriness and bursting with colour... that is what I wished to bring to mind while playing at my scrap table last night.

I believe I succeeded in that endeavour.  Using the March Week #3 sketch over at Let's Get Sketchy paired it with the vibrant March Challenge mood board over at Sassy Scrappers , I came up with this layout.

Supplies: cardstock (Canadian Scrapbooker Super stock), embossed cardstock (Core'dinations), border stamp (Kelly Panacci for SandyLion), pigment ink (Martha Stewart), molding paste (Golden), floral stencil (Mona Pendleton Designs for My Favorite Things), gelatos (Faber-Castell), chipboard letters (American Crafts), liquid glass (CTMH), baker's twine (MME), tissue paper and chunky glitter (Dollarama), punches (Stampi' Up and EK Success), marker (Fibra Color)

Such cuties and the colours just zing!

I flipped the sketch and turned the square into a diamond as I loved the diamond frame in the frames section of the mood board.

Let's Get Sketchy March Week #3

Sassy Scrappers March Mood Board

As you will see, a lot of my elements were derived from each section of the mood board and used on my page.  

Firstly, I used the gorgeous colours.. corally oranges, teal, white and silver grey.  As I have previously mentioned, I love old frames.  It was such a natural fit to frame the layout using stamped orange framing.  From the teal coloured font script "art" word and the alphabet collage, I used a piece of sanded alphabets script embossed Core'dinations cardstock.

Those tissue poms at the bottom left of the board and the flowers through out... awesome... so I used a variety of combination amounts of Tangerine, Blood Orange and Metallic Melon gelatos to colour tissue papers and created the tissue flowers with Metallic Mint teal centres and string them banner like in place of the banner strip of paper in the sketch.

The top right section of the mood board had me drawn to the different glasses.  From the milk glass stemmed bowl, I used molding paste and a floral My Favourite Things Mona Pendleton Designs stencil and from the teal bottle vase, I splattered watered diluted Metallic Mint gelato following the sketches random dots diagonal.

For the clear glass, I used Liquid Glass on the chipboard letters after applying Silver gelato and the sprinkled with thick silver glitter.

Such fabulous inspiration results in a wonderful layout! So pleased that I played along with these challenges.  Infused with colour, texture and memories, this layout makes me happy.


TTFN,

Happy Spring Handprint Shamrock Canvas Plus a Card

Loving the green on this 28"x 22" canvas as it brings cheer to my living room, especially given the very whiteness that still abounds outdoors.

Supplies: canvas (Artist's Loft, acrylic paints (Artist's Loft and Liquitex), pen (uniball)

If you can believe it, the shamrocks were made with my daughter's and my hands.  I wanted to make a canvas for St. Patrick's Day decor and I came up with the idea to make them that way.  It was very quick and easy to do.  After the hand, with fingers close together, is generously painted up like a stamp, the fingers are pointed towards the centre and the heel of the palm gets swept slightly from side to side.  Once dry, I outlined it with a Uniball black pen.  This is what it looked like initially.

After it was hung for a bit over my white mantle wall, I decided to add to it last weekend.  I mixed up a lighter, brighter shade of green and gave it a background using both a brush and paper towel.  This is were I have stopped for now.  I have an idea to possibly add more to it but I will have to wait a bit to see if the idea still grows on me because I am liking what it looks like right now.

In creating the background, I used pieces of paper towel.  When I was done, instead of disposing of them because I loved the colour of them, I wet them further to distribute the colour and let them dry.  I figured I would use them for a future project and so I did.

I made this mixed media card and gave it to my mother-in-law as a cheery touch of spring for her house.

Supplies: cardstock card base (Recollections), paer towel (President's Choice Max), cardstock (Canadian Scrapbooker Super Stock), acrylic paint (Artist's Loft and Liquitex), diamond stamp (Limited Edition), heart stamp (Inkadinkado), alphabet stamps (Studio Calico), "happy" stamp, green ink and marker, and Liquid Glass (CTMH), black inks (Ranger and Tsukinenko), gesso, molding paste and gel medium (Golden), stencil (The Crafter's Workshop), Silhouette Quatrefoil cut file (Jennifer Wambach), gelatos (Faber- Castell), Modge-Podge and black paint (Plaid), marker (Sharpie), Stardust Gelly Roll pen (Sakura), Black Glitter Glue (Hampton Arts), diamond Stickles (Ranger), flowers (Petaloo), sequins (Dollarama)

I stamped the dried paper towel and then tore it into pieces which I adhered onto a card base.  I used a glitter pen to add colour to the swirls in the diamond stamped images and covered with some watered down gesso.  Then using a clear gel medium, I stenciled a script font in three spots.
While it was drying, I stamped using green ink with a heart stamp four times on a scrap piece of leftover paper towel.  Then I added liquid glass to the stamped hearts for depth and shine.  Once dry, I cut the hearts out leaving a border to allow for a larger shamrock.

Back to my now dry card base, using gelatos in green hues, I added a bit more variety of greens, especially around the script font to allow it to show some detail.  Then I sealed the whole background with Modge Podge. Once dry, I splattered some watered down black acrylic paint on it.

Next, I assembled my cluster with a leftover Silhouette cut cardstock piece as a base that had modeling paste on it from when I used it as a background stencil on my Lexi layout. Then, I glued down the hearts to form a clover and added a stem.  A few Petaloo Flowers and a touch of gelatos.

Finishing up, I stamped "Oh Happy Day" and added black glitter glue.  Lastly, some bling... gold sequins, touch ups of the glitter pen filled areas, gold glitter glue to the flower centres and black edging.

With the addition of the bling and with all the green, I am entering it in the Off the Rails Scrapbooking's Green and Bling card challenge.

TTFN,

Crop and Create fun

I had a scraptastic scrappy weekend a few weeks ago after a new job assignment imposed break from creating. Spent two days at Scrapbook and Cards Today's Crop & Create Markham.  Loved, loved, loved it!

Loved catching up with familiar faces and friends.  Of course there is great shopping from The Memory Keeper and The Scrapping Turtle and Catherine ensures that there are plenty of other scrap goodies to buy at the registration table from the various workshop instructors.

I had fun and lots of laughs cropping with Lisa and Stacey, who I had met last year, and made many new friends this year as our table was larger.

I took Vicki Boutin's Shadow Box Techniques class and created a funky shadowbox for my sister-in-law's birthday. Her b-day is in April, so I can't show it here until then.

I can, however, show you the cards that I made with the left over Pink Paislee Heritage patterned paper scraps.

Inspired by some of the elements on the shadow box, I created this:

The bordered punch trim is actually washi tape.  That took a bit of time to figure out a technique to make it work so it looked like fabric trim.

It was adhered to the end of an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper, border punched and then inked in sections as I slowly removed it from the paper.  Then using two pointed instruments, I styled it do add dimension.  Lastly, I cue-tipped some corn starch onto the back of the raised segments so that they would not stick down in future if pressed upon.

The butterflies were stamped using one of my favourite Magenta stamps on vellum packaging liner and fussy cut.


Next up was this beauty:

The flower inspiration for this one came from Sheila's Petaloo Flower Sale Bin. When I saw these babies, an idea formed and I was off.  With the flowers and a specific card worthy friend in need of a pick-you-up in mind, this card came together really easily and quickly.

Lots of textures and dimension on this one.

Once that well of creativeness was sprung, I was raring to go and created two other layouts which I will share at another time.


TTFN,

Gelato Swatch Book Journaling of a Life Motto

My love affair with gelatos continues.  The March challenge over on the Faber-Castell Design Memory Craft blog by Mou Saha was the ideal prompt to have me complete another page in my swatch book journal.  The challenge was to create a project that shows the essence of your motto.

Supplies: gelatos and cardboard swatch book page (Faber-Castell), gesso (Golden), clear gesso (Liquitex), letter stickers (Creative Memories), quatrefoil screen stencil (Silhouette cut file by Jennifer Wambach), modeling paste (Pebeo), decoupage (DecoArt), tissue paper (Dollarama), marker (Sharpie), globe clip art(TheGraphicsFairy.com), chipboard (Maya Road), liquid glass (CTMH), wood veneer stars (Studio Calico)

This motto quote has been attributed to three different people.  I am partial to Dr. Suess but who knows which one is accurate.  All I know, is that from the first time I heard it, in a sports science lecture in university, it has resonated with me.

I started with the cardboard swatch book page that comes in the gelato starter kit.  I placed the stickers down and then gessoed.  Then I applied a first light layer of Snow Cone gelato colour and then added some modeling paste with a Silhouette cut file quatrefoil screen stencil.  Once dry, I decoupaged the tissue paper strips that I had printed the quote on.  Next came a fine layer of clear gesso and then the finishing gelato application.  I rubbed it in between the relief sections of the stencil design and along the edges to hide the tissue areas and then ran a damp cloth over to remove some colour on the top to complete the background.

Up next, I used Watermelon, Bubble gum and Metallic Melon gelatos to colour the Maya Road chipboard woman shape and topped it with liquid glass.

While the liquid glass was drying, I printed off the globe clip art image from the Graphics Fairy.com and coloured it in with a small brush and water using Lime and Green Tea gelatos along with Brown and Chocolate gelatos for the earth.  The water colour was achieved using a blend of Cotton Candy and Metallic Blueberry.  Once dry, I cut it out and decoupaged it onto the background.   Then I edged the entire page using a black Sharpie and decoupaged the whole page to seal it in.

While the decoupage was drying, I coloured a piece of scrap paper with a Red gelato and cut out the tiny heart.  I outlined it in black and decoupaged it on the dried person chipboard.  Lastly, I adhered the person and the three wood veneer stars and called it done.

Here is an angled close up...

To see my previous canvas swatch journal entry, check out this post here. 

TTFN,

Magenta ATC Swap and a Give Away

Oh it has been a very long time since I have made an ATC.  When Mariëtte
proposed doing a second ATC swap on the Magenta Blog, I was excited to get to participate. So much so that I made one just to get the mojo flowing.

Supplies: stamps and stencils (Magenta), cardstock (Canadian Scrapbooker Super Stock), inks (CTMH, Tsukinenko, Tim Holtz Distress Ink by Ranger), emboss powder (CTMH), Marker (Sharpie), paint (Plaid), ticket corner punch (Stampin' Up)

I forgot how fun and easy they are to make.  Turns out it was hard to stop at one. LoL! 

Supplies: stamps (Magenta), matte photo paper (Staples), inks (CTMH, Tsukinenko, Tim Holtz Distress Ink by Ranger), liquid glass (CTMH)

Their small size is quick to complete and the possibilities endless especially with such an open and feel good theme. 

Supplies: stamps (Magenta), matte photo paper (Staples), inks (CTMH, Tsukinenko, Tim Holtz Distress Inks by Ranger), glitter glue (Viva Décor)

The theme for the swap is Colours That Make You Happy! The criteria is to create four different ATCs stamped with inks and Magenta stamps.  Head on over to this post to get the details on how to sign up. It is already shaping up to be quite an international affair!

Now for the give away part... if you are interested in being the recipient of the ATCs that are pictured above, email me at scrapsavvycreation@gmail.com with Magenta ATCs in the subject line by April 11th and I will randomly draw one name and mail them off.

TTFN,

Be Happy!

I love how at times when inspiration strikes, you are compelled to create.  Last night was such a night.  I was checking out my blog reader feed when I saw a fabulous sketch reposted by Sue on her blog. Her take on this Scrap & Music sketch is spectacular. Even though the challenge was closed to entries, I loved the sketch and the music prompt so much, I immediate printed it off.  Then before I headed to my scrap room to begin, I saw Rachell Funnell's post in the feed and her stunning layout created for a challenge on a new DT that she has joined over at Off the Rails Scrapbooking. Well that challenge is to Bling It Up, and I do like adding a little sparkle to my projects so it was a natural fit! Lucky for me that challenge had just begun.


The Simple Stories' Vintage Bliss collection was just the thing for the Bobbie McFerrin lyrics.  A little Magenta stenciling, some gelato-ing (new word..LOL!), a few butterflies and a batch of bling... et voila...

Supplies: patterned papers, stickers and chipboard (Simple Stories), stencil (Magenta), molding paste (Golden), gelatos (Faber Castell),butterfly punch (Martha Stewart), glitter glue (Viva), twine (Iris), crochet doilie (Prima), paper doilie (Today's Kitchen), ink, pen and mini jewels (CTMH), small jewels and sequins (Dollarama)

A few close ups...

showing the texture of molding paste. First lined with black pen and gelato colour swiped along leftside and then set with wet brush.  Additional gelato splatters applied liberally over the diamond area.  The doilie was coloured to match using an ink pad and water.  A fussy cut border from another piece of patterned paper.  Lots of inking and a punched glitter glued and blinged up butterfly.  

A cluster of a variety of levels and textures with a banner through the fussy cut border.

Hop on over to these sites to check out their challenges and see the great projects by their DTs and participants. They are sure to inspire!



TTFN,

Magenta Giveaway

Magenta is having a followers giveaway to celebrate the new spring collection release.  There is a chances to win one of two pretty sweet prizes.

It is an easy one to enter, just follow the Magenta blog or FaceBook page and then link your name here to enter.

TTFN,

Magenta New Spring 2014 Catalogue

Check out the new release catalogue.  Gorgeous variety of stamps and other products for many different style of crafters can be found within its pages.

TTFN,

Bright Happy Colours with Chic Tags

Happy Ground Hog Day!  Here in Ontario, Canada... Wiarton Willie saw his shadow so ... six more weeks of winter.  Personally, given the 20 more centimetres of snow that we got yesterday, I am ready to say adios to the blustery season and bring on Spring.

With bright happy colours and warmer times in mind, today I am sharing a layout that warms me up and just makes me happy or should I say... takes me to my "Happy Place" (pun intended).

While I did not get to participate in the actual Chic Tags blog sketch challenge, I really liked this sketch and wanted to make the layout that I had in mind for it when I had a chance.  I used papers from their Happy Place collection and a freebie Circles printable from their store site.

For my take, I turned the sketch side ways, used two photos and stitched chevrons connecting many of the circles in the grid pattern.

Here is the sketch:

Supplies: patterned papers and printable pdf (Chic Tags), chipboard letters (Fancy Pants), inks, pen and wood veneers (CTMH), metal bike (Michaels), marker (Sharpie), thread


TTFN,

Magenta Christmas Mini Album

Today, I am sharing my Christmas Mini Album that I made for Magenta in January.

While I used the cute bracket December Daily Album,  my mini however is not a December Daily.  I like to look at them out in the blogosphere and kudos to those that complete the entire month; especially those who do it year after year. For me, I just have a few photos of some of those key events that surround the big day and so a mini album is just the thing. The upside too is that I have enough chipboard pages leftover to make another mini at another time.

 For the cover, I coloured the chipboard title and number that comes with the album using gelatos then added glitter glue and clustered them up with the beautiful wood veneer tree.  I also added some gesso sponging to my base paper.



Pages 1 & 2

 A little stenciling of trees on the left using gelatos, gel, gesso and glitter glue.  On the right side page, I did some ornament stamping, coloured with watercolour pencils, fussy cut them out and finished with some glitter.



Pages 3 & 4

Love this pretty tree patterned paper!  While it is a bit busier, it is subtle enough for my bright photos to pop especially with using black and red. Then I couldn't resist the bright red bling for embellishments.

Page 5 & 6

To change it up a bit, I doodle outlined around the trees in black, added glitter glue to three of them to create a visual triangle and blinged up the tops of all treetops showing with bitty jems.  I paired it with the top half of the North Pole patterned paper that I planned for the subsequent page.  I added some extra sponged-on red ink to match up with that which was already there but only in one section due to where I cut the paper.

Pages 7 & 8

These are my favourite pages for two reasons:

- The photos and the story behind the facial expressions....

and...

- I love the added glitter and sequins to the sweeps and swirls of snow on the patterned North Pole paper .  I added a few fabric snowflakes and the stars are part of the chipboard pieces that came with the bracket album.  I coloured them, added black glitter and topped them with jewels.

Pages 9 & 10

And as you can see on these next pages, she was one happy girl after finding and opening her gift. Though it is hard to see, on the bottom, I masked stamped in white ink with the "Christmas Wishes Seal" stamp and added some trim.  I also used the "Here comes Santa Claus" stamp along with the "I am in love with this day!" stamp.

Pages 11 & 12

Here I got a little more messy.  I gessoed the red mesh paper onto the chipboard before adding the striped patterned paper.

Pages 13 & 14

  

On this last double page, I used all scrap pieces of the patterned papers that I had used on the prior pages.  Cutting them into rectangular pieces, I glued and gessoed them onto the chipboard for my background.  Again, I embellished the pages with some chipboard pieces that come with the album after colouring and glittering them.

You might have noticed that I carry over the patterned paper and/or colour from one double page spread to another. I also handwrote, creating a stylized font, for most of my titles and subtitles on the pages.  This, along with the patterned papers and faux stitching brought a cohesiveness to the entire album.

Lastly is the back cover.

I used a piece of Ingrid patterned paper along with a black piece of cardstock to give it the look of book binding.

Hope you enjoyed this mini.  To learn more about the story behind the coal from Santa, check out the Part 2 on the Magenta blog.

TTFN,