layout

Snow Monsters Go Fast – A Layout

Posted by Happy Life, Crafty Wife on March 9, 2013 11 Comments

*waves* Here I am as promised.. showing you all what I made with the product featured in my ‘What I’m Working With Wednesday’ video! I feel all sorts of accomplished now, lol! There was a moment there when I thought I was going to scrap this layout.. but, I think I pulled it together pretty well.

For this layout I REALLY wanted to push myself to use those darn mists and the mask. I practiced a bit for the look I wanted on some scrap paper.. and to my amazement, I got it ‘right’ on my actual layout! Mist is a bit tricky.. I am learning that different brands spray differently. Some come out clean and spray very well.. some spray more ‘scattered’ (even with clean nozzles). I think I am getting it though.. and I like the look. Not for everything, but I felt the misted arrow mask worked well with this layout. I also knew I wanted a white background with pops of color and chunky rectangles or squares of paper. I am not 100% sold on the placement of the photo, but I had already sewn down the chat bubble and moving the photo anywhere else would look odd.

The title comes right from my little dudes mouth! I was printing his photo and he was talking about his snow monster hat.. He said it makes him go faster on the sled. Then he said, “Snow monsters go fast, huh mama?”... *high five* to the boy for helping his title challenged mama!

So, if you haven’t viewed the video of all the yummy product from the Studio Calico ‘Here & There’ collection, you can view it HERE. I also show some other random bits that coordinate with the collection.

OK, on to the layout!

I just love that picture of my little man! He just got done sledding down a big hill (right in our front yard!) and landed pretty much at my feet.. I was trying to make sure I stopped him from flying through a tree into the neighbors yard, lol.

Used the Studio Calico roller stamp here. Perfect! Added some stitching to a few parts of the layout.

Some scattered embellishments… fun, fun!… or, like the chat bubble says, “SO FUN!”

That’s it! I really hope you all are enjoying the layouts! I definitely feel more ‘at peace’ with making them now.. not so much like a beginner. It’s not as scary as it once was. Now I feel like a more well rounded designer; layouts, cards, altered stuff, etc. ya me! *smiles*

OK, friends.. off with ya! Have a good one…

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Filed Under: Blog, studio calico, What I'm Working With Wednesday | Tagged: Tagged With: here & there, layout, snow monster, winter

Echo Park Design Team BLOG HOP!

Posted by Happy Life, Crafty Wife on February 18, 2013 178 Comments

*HAPPY DANCE*

Wow.. I swear it seems like we JUST did this, lol.. So fun! I guess my month just flew by fast and here we are again! Another inspiring Echo Park Paper DT blog hop!

You know the drill.. hop through the blogs.. leave your sweet comments.. and you’ll be entered for a chance to win a kit.

But in case you need it.. here’s the ‘formal’ intro and deets:

Welcome to the Echo Park Paper Design Team Blog Hop! Today the Echo Park Paper Design Team is showcasing projects from our latest collections. Be sure to follow the blog hop list below as you hop from one blog to the next. Return to the Echo Park Paper blog at any time for the next blogger on the list in case you get lost or confused! ONE winner will be selected from each blog to receive an Echo Park Paper collection kit of their choosing. To qualify for the kit, comments will be due by midnight EST, Sunday, February 24th to qualify for the drawing. The winner will be announced on each blog Monday, February 25th so be sure to check back to see if you’ve won!

OK.. now for the fun stuff.. projects! I have four things to share today! Two Photo Freedom pages and two simple ‘quick cards’. Oh, yeah.. things are gettin’ exciting now!

First up, the Photo Freedom Volume 1 pages. I REALLY like this PF collection! The colors are very easy to work with.

This one shows one of our many fun outdoor summer evenings! We love hanging out grillings and letting the kids run through the sprinklers!

The next Photo Freedom page is a simple page all about DISNEY! This was our Disney trip last spring! Awww.. makes me want to go back! I used the tall 6×12 pocket to show off several mini photos. (MINNIE photos?.. lol)

Next up are two very simple cards! One with the gorgeous Sweet Girl collection and the other is with All About A Boy! Both are FABULOUS to work with! I made some AWESOME projects with these collections (if I do say so myself..) that you’ll all see soon in upcoming blog posts, PDF project downloads and idea books for Echo Park! So here’s the cute cards!

The first one is an ‘I Love You Sweet Girl’ card. A quick card for a special little girl!

This one is a ‘fun’ yo-yo card. I cut the yo-yos out and adhered them with adhesive foam for dimension. Then just added some strip with a loop on the end.

That’ll be it from me!! Next you’ll head over to Olga’s Blog

In case you’re lost or happen to just stop by my blog, here’s the complete hop list:

Echo Park Paper: http://www.echoparkpaper.typepad.com/

Laurel Seabrook: http://want2scrap.blogspot.com/

Susan Stringfellow: http://creativelysavvy.blogspot.com/

Linda Auclair:http://elendae.wordpress.com/

Wendy Sue Anderson: http://www.wendysueanderson.blogspot.com/

Tamara Tripodi: http://happylifecraftywife.com/ <—- YOU ARE HERE!

Olga Vasilieva: http://www.olgavasilieva.blogspot.com/

Lowri McNabb: http://www.papervinenz.com/

Nancy Damiano:http://www.thepaperorchard.blogspot.com/

Kandis Smith: http://www.mycreativetreasury.blogspot.com/

See ya next time! Have a great week!

Filed Under: Blog, Cards, Echo Park Paper | Tagged: Tagged With: all about a boy, cards, layout, photo freedom, project life, sweet girl, volume 1

EP’s Photo Freedom ‘Dear, Santa’ kit!

Posted by Happy Life, Crafty Wife on December 13, 2012 1 Comment

Hey, hey! Are you all staying warm? I am sitting here with some coffee and my little space heater TRYING to stay warm. We got some snow last night and while I just LOVE the snow, I hate being cold when I can’t cuddle up by a fire or in my warm cozy bed. But, I have a few things to share and thought I better get to blogging! So.. here I am. Freezing just for you guys.

So, I am sure you’ve all seen me mention a billion times that I am not a ‘scrapbooker’. I am not exactly sure WHY I don’t scrapbook. I have three beautiful monsters and a fantastic camera that I know how to use properly.. We do plenty of fun stuff to make memories of.. but yet, I leave folders and folders of photos on my computer and don’t print them. I have TONS of paper.. I just don’t ‘get it’. I have tried several times to create a layout and 1 ou of 5 times ends up in something worth sharing. I see all these AMAZING scrapbookers who’s style I love and I love what THEY do. But when it comes to my pages.. I don’t want tons of journaling.. ink splatters.. giant flowers, etc. I just want it ‘clean’. Then I stare at it forever saying to myself, “Is it done?.. It doesn’t look done.. I am pretty sure I am sitting on my cat’s tail right now…” Poor kitty. Really though. I just need to find a ‘flow’ and a style for ME and have at it. But, until then.. I have Echo Park’s PHOTO FREEDOM!

I am FREEEEEEE… That’s how I felt when I started playing with the Dear, Santa kit. I was SO stressed at first. I even contemplated asking our DT coordinator to be skipped for this DT assignment. Nope.. I sucked it up and found some cute photos to print. I laid them all out on the table with my Dear, Santa kit, took a deep breath, and jumped in!….. And I survived! Really, people. If you’re like me and not much of a scrapbooker THIS is for you. No joke. I think my issue is trying to ‘fill up’ that big ‘ol 12×12 page (I know you can do smaller pages, but I like the look of the larger pages). With the Photo Freedom kits that ‘scary big page’ issue is broken up into this little ‘you can handle this’ sections. Once I stopped looking at it as a big scary 12×12 sheet I had to fill up, it all came together.. a little section at a time.

I did choose to keep my pages simple and clean and focus on the pretty pictures. I absolutely HATE my writing (AKA: chicken-scratch) so I avoid journaling (Santa needs to being mama a typewriter!). I also wanted to show the collection nicely, so I didn’t mix in much from other companies as far as stamps, alphas, and embellishments go.

So, here they are! My five Photo Freedom Dear, Santa pages! YAY!

My first page focuses on Christmas morning. (Gah! Seeing this makes me so excited for Christmas!! 12 days, peeps.. TWELEVE DAYS!!!!)

I love these die-cut numbers from Lori Whitlock! They were the perfect little added touch to my page.

The second page shows my youngest daughter getting her most wanted gift, a Nintendo DSi XL. She was THRILLED! Again, I added in some die-cuts and then a bit of some American Crafts white glittery alphas.

This page is all about gingerbread fun! I printed a 6×8 photo to split, which I think was a great idea! It’s such a yummy photo and just needed to be BIGGER! For the ‘JOY” card, I used my craft knife to cut out the middle of the circle to use as a frame. CUTE!

This one is my favorite, I think! I just love the aqua blue and teal! This page shows when our elf ‘Snowflake’ came and brought some Polar Express fun!

I printed the main photo onto textured Carta Bella cardstock.. came out GREAT! It’s just a tad small for this section of the page protector, but it doesn’t look bad. As you can see I die-cut some vellum snowflakes, added some stamping, etc. I really just love this little section!

This one.. to be honest.. is kinda ‘eh’ for me. For one.. it’s a 12×12 full page (you know.. the scary 12×12 pages I mentioned earlier? lol). I just added a photo of one of my trees, some ‘negative’ snowflakes with vellum behind them, and some rub-ons. Nothing crazy exciting.

What do ya think? I was pretty excited to share this with you all! The whole ‘pocket’ scrapbooking is so crazy popular right now! So what about you?.. If you’re a scrapbooker have you given this ‘style’ a try? And if you’re like me and don’t really scrapbook, have you thought about giving this Photo Freedom stuff a go? It really does make things so much easier!

You can see all the current and upcoming Echo Park Photo Freedom kits HERE. For a little how to on one of my pages (4×6 horizontal) you can get the free PDF download RIGHT HERE.

And before I let ya go, have you heard about the AMAZING giveaways happening over at SVG Cuts? You MUST check it out! A spectacular 12 days of Christmas giveaway packed full of amazing prizes such as; Sizzix eclips, Silhouette Cameo, Unity stamps, giftcards, paper and embellishments, a pile of buttons from Paper Play Studio (That’s me!) etc. It really is amazing! Day 2 is under way so be sure to check it out! Yes, it’s all happening RIGHT NOW! Good luck to all who enter!

I’m off! See ya again soon!