Scrapology Card Challenge - July

Over on Scrapology, the lovely SJ of Little Musings set the Card Challenge of 'Anything but square' & the design team used her digital stamps. I was Guest Designer again and used a mix of digital stamps in Photoshop Elements to get the picture I wanted, before setting it out on A4 so I could print it and use it for decoupage.

I created a picture for myself rather than a card to give away. I like the picture too much :)


I used Tree Carving, Layered Liam & Layered Lillie. SJ includes a coloured version of the stamps as well as a blank version. I used the coloured version, just changing the girls top to blue. I added text to the heart 'A-squared' for me & Andy. The joy of being able to use PSE :)

Oops, I realized after I'd stuck everything together that as the heart is carved 'into' the tree, maybe I should've inverted the heart by creating more background layers instead & cutting the heart out!


Oh well, c'est la vie! I still like it & most things I make usually have an error somewhere, just to prove I'm not perfect!!! LOL

July - Scrapology Guest Designer

That would be me!!! :)

I was over the moon when I was asked to be guest designer at Scrapology for July :) This month, M is for Masks and this sketch from Liz Qualman.

I flipped the sketch because in the photo, Kyle was looking slightly to the left so it looked better for him to be looking towards the centre of the page.
So without further ado, here is my LO...

I'm sure I'm not alone in this, but I'll buy a mask, have lots of ideas how to use them, but then rarely use them because I forget about them - obviously I have too much stash!!!

I used a hexagon mask that I bought back in March, from 'That Special Touch' and sprayed it with Lemonade Mister Huey's. I also used the mist with a sponge at the bottom and with the mask again in the top right corner, cutting out the hexagons and backing with paper. I like this - may do this again soon!


The eagle-eyed amongst you may have spotted the green paper with the red dots - this was from using the Swiss Cheese punch on scrap paper then using Red Brick Distress Ink. I like this too - can see me using more of my border punches as a mask! :)

And another close up... So what do you think, I'd love to hear from you. And don't forget to pop over to Scrapology & take a look at the Design Teams creations - you could even take part in the challenge & get those masks out of storage!!!

Scrap Factor entries

I was having a sort out of my photos of layouts & looking back on here to see what I've posted when I realized I haven't shown off any of my digital LOs... I hadn't done many before when I decided to enter the Scrap Factor competition over on UK Scrappers - using digital LO's! So without further ado...

Entry requirements were for 5 layouts with criteria given for three of them...

First up... A LO about ME - Yikes!!! I used the Smitten kit which was available from a Scrapbookgraphics blog hop & kept the LO very simple. Those that know me will know that I don't 'do' pink yet there's a LOT of pink on here for me!!!

This is Me

Second... a Double LO - I've done a few DLO's in real life but doing it digitally completely took me out of my comfort zone - but I'm pleased with it! I used Sir Scrapalot's kit 'Snow Much Fun' - which was beautiful but not the traditional colours you'd expect to see on a wintery LO.

The End of the Snowman

Third... a LO without photos! Easy! I wanted to do a LO with all the nicknames Madison has already acquired... Took me a long time but when I look back at it now, I can see why - its too busy!

What's Your Name?

Then 2 more LOs - any size, any theme...

So firstly... whizzed together using Sir Stampalot's Spookilicious kit & Echo Park's digital Halloween Alpha.

Candy

and lastly, my favourite... 'a Model ?' using a kit from Dawn Inskip called Snapshots, which was just perfect for this LO.

A Model?

I didn't get through the 'auditions' for the competition but I enjoyed doing them & I certainly learnt a lot more about Photoshop Elements. I've done some more digital LO's since but I'll save those for another post. I also think I need to be a bit bolder on my shadowing - maybe I'll go back to my very first digital LO's and practice on those!!!

WOYWW 104 - Woohoo!!!

Happy Anniversary Julia!

Congratulations to Julia for keeping this fantastic idea blog idea going - for TWO whole years!!! (Not that I've been participating that long) - check out Julia's extremely tidy desk here!!!

In preparation for this special WOYWW, I had all good intentions to get my workdesk clean & tidy and not just the small scrapping space I usually have - the whole desk, the shelf above it and the units beneath that were slowly becoming hidden by the stash mountain! Hmmph!!! Its that thing called TIME again that always seems to be against me!!!

Anyhow, I think maybe a better title for this week would be...

WHERE IS MY WORKDESK WEDNESDAY???

See what I mean??? Yikes - thats bad - but to be fair, I'm at the sorting out stage so it doesn't always look like that! Honest!!! LOL

I'd also tidied our utility room at the weekend and unearthed the metal garden bench (a miniature bench!) that you can see below - see the dark green - thats it! (not that it looks like a garden bench but trust me, it is) - it's now sitting behind my Expression with my cartridges, notepads & ATG - the best part is that the cutting mat for the Cricut will slide nicely underneath it - so no more having to move stuff from behind the machine to be able to cut!!! Result!!!

I thought I'd try this little storage unit below for all those part-used bits & bobs from various kits - so far so good - I just need to decide where I'm going to put it on my desk now!
Another reason why I decided to have a sort out was my new addition - another Cropper Hopper storage unit (indicated by the arrow) - I already have one for all my cardstock - you can store sooooooo much in there!!! Now I'm left wondering whether to get another one for my Patterned Paper!Anyway, it looks like I'll be spending any free time on Thursday finishing off - I will be taking a photo - to remind me how organized I like my desk which will hopefully mean it'll stay that way!!! Yeah, right... whom I kidding!!!

But I need it to be sorted so I can pack on Friday evening for the monthly crop on Saturday I go to - the one day each month that I can claim 6 hours of pure crafting, chatting & laughing!!!

I'm back in the Land of Technology!

Thank goodness!!!

Connection achieved at approximately 14.30 yesterday & I feel like I've been reunited with an old friend!!!

Don't you just love technology (apart from when it all goes wrong, of course!!!)

I'M SO HAPPY!!!
(& yes, I'm so sad too!!!) LOL LOL LOL

WOYWW 102 - with NO Internet :-(

All of a sudden its Wednesday again!

Last week I didn't blog, because I couldn't! NO INTERNET!!! After deciding to move providers, Plusnet were keeping us connected till the 20th, Sky are connecting us on the 19th (tomorrow thank goodness!) so we weren't going to be without!!! Hmmph - that was until BT stuck their oar in and cut us off on the 5th - 2 weeks without - I truly feel like I've lost a limb! How soon we get used to having all this fabulous technology at our fingertips!!! So this post goes out from a quick visit to my parents to use their connection!!!

Anyway, back to WOYWW... you'll see the start on my latest LO for the GoGo Chinese Whispers - I'm using the back of one of the die-cut sheets from the April kit and have sprayed/misted it with Bonny Blue & Lemonade Mr Huey Mists from Studio Calico. Just waiting for it to dry before I crack on with it… whenever that will be!!! It may still be there next week - who knows!!! LOL

Head over to the Julia's, creator of WOYWW to see what its all about!

WOYWW 100 - on Thursday!!!

It did it again didn't it? It came round too fast again! Maybe now these bank holidays are out of the way & Kyle is back at school, we can get back to normal again - at least until the end of the month!!!

WOYWW has reached the Century mark - very close to the 2 year anniversary now - for more info, visit Julia's Stamping Ground.

So I forgot to take a photo & then when I did remember, it was too dark to get a decent shot! So here is my WOYWT instead!!!

Everytime I get a new border punch, I put a punched piece of paper on this green card which usually hangs above my desk - as my punches are stored in a drawer, this means that I can see what I have and I find that since I've done this, I use them more!

There are some American Crafts Thickers on there too from the Studio Calico kit I got in April - the one's that Suzy & I received were both damaged and replaced by SC along with other items that were damaged. You can also see a pack of Studio Calico wood veneer butterflies which Suzy bought for me as they were rapidly becoming a rare item in shops over here - Thank you Suzy!

Just showing on the bottom left corner is the A4 sketchbook I bought yesterday to use for my Soul Restoration 1 class I signed up for with Brave Girls Club. How on earth I think I'm going to find time for it... it's taken me all week to finish the LO that was on my desk last Wed!!!