Scrap Everything's 30% off Sale!

Hi everyone,

Just a quick message to let you know about Scrap Everything's huge post-Christmas sale. 30% off just about  everything! Gotta love a bargain.

Happy shopping...



Heather

Gone Troppo with KaiserCraft

Hi there and welcome to the last of my KaiserCraft posts.

I've got to say, I'm so loving these new KaiserCraft Collections! Each collection has such a variety of papers that you really can use them for just about any subject. The ones I'm using this week are the Tropicana Collection. Although all the papers coordinate, some are a very vintage style while others are bright and bold. You can have a look at the range here.

I opted to go for the more subtle, vintage papers. I don't have any unscrapped pics of exotic tropical holidays (unfortunately!) but I had this lovely shot of the boats anchored in the Apollo Bay harbour. I really wanted to use some of the vintage postcards as I think they're adorable!

Here's my layout:

The page is an unusual size. It's probably around 12 x 10 inches but it's not cut to a particular measurement, just to whatever size I needed to fit in what I wanted. I don't believe that layouts should always be 12 x 12 or A4. Just make them whatever size works! Then just put them in your album as usual. All the pages in your album don't need to be the same size. I think this size works really well with the vintage theme as it helps it to look older.

The orchid flowers on the Tropicana papers are a gorgeous red but, not one to do things in a straightforward manner, I decided I wanted to use the orange, black and white bakers' twine and therefore I wanted orange orchids instead! KaiserCraft have a matching set of stamps for this range so I used the orchid stamp and stamped it onto an orange section of a KaiserCraft's Secret Admirer Collection paper.  I then cut out the orchids and they worked beautifully.

I then took the cross-KaiserCraft collection concept (try saying that fast!) one step further and used some die-cuts from KaiserCraft's Pickled Pear Collection to add some leaves to the flower cluster. The stamped leaves at the back of the cluster and in the top left hand corner are from the Tropicana range. Here's a close up of the cluster:

After I put my cluster together I finally got to put in the twine that I planned at the start. In keeping with the nautical theme, I knotted the twine as well as added a few loops to soften it a bit. I then topped it all with a gorgeous Manor House Creations orchid.

Here's my journalling:

It's important when creating a vintage layout like this to ink the edges of everything you can. Normally I would use a brown ink but the black outline behind the photo was already on the paper so I stuck with the black. To get that faded look I applied the ink with a make-up sponge that I bought at Priceline but you can also buy one made for the job from your scrapping store. They give a much softer finish than if you ink the papers directly with your ink pad. Another tip for vintage layouts is to keep the design fairly simple. Designs weren't complicated in those times so keep your layouts that way and they will look true to the theme.

I hope you've enjoyed my post and that you find some scrapping time over the Christmas break.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!

Heather

Still Dreaming of Mykonos

Hi there. I hope everyone's managing to keep sane at this busy time of year. It's pretty chaotic in the shops at the moment!

I received a fabulous pack full of KaiserCraft goodies from Katherine at Scrap Everything. These papers and embellies are hot off the press and I absolutely adore them! This set is called Secret Admirer Collection and has rich colourings of greens and hot pink with splashes of other gorgeous colours mixed in.

Here's my layout:

The summery, tropical feel of the papers made me immediately think of holidays. The last hot holiday we had was in Greece and, even though Greece isn't tropical, these papers work really well with my photos. I knew the stark white background of this pic would work with the bold papers but I wanted to use the hot pink paper and bright flowers and I hesitated to use these on a male page. The solution was to add mostly green to the pink paper plus splash some other colours around. I used Dylusions Ink Spray to create the spray and dribbles behind the photo then used the same colour in the title. I also created a more lineal feel by adding long, straight elements behind the photo. This helped to counteract the soft, feminine edges of the flowers.

Here are some close ups:

Nearly everything on this page is from the KaiserCraft Secret Admirer Collection. You can get them here. The die-cuts are sooo easy to use. Just layer them around the photo for a great coordinated background. All the KaiserCraft papers have a decorated strip on the bottom and I cut this up and used it as part of my background.

There's only one problem with scrapping my photos of Greece - I just want to go back!

Good luck with the Christmas shopping and don't forget to allow yourself some scrapping time!

Heather

I'm a Scrapbooking Memories Master!!!

Woohoo - I have such exciting news - I'm a Scrapbooking Memories Master!

The Masters have had to wait nearly 3 long months to be able to tell everyone and I'm so thrilled to be finally able to do so.

Here's a list of all the Masters for 2013:

Anita Stokes

Beck Beattie

Gail Lindner

Heather McMahon

Kaye Grieve

Kerryn Lawson

Leeann Pearce

Leonie Neal-Dawson

Sue Smith

Tarrah McLean

I'm so looking forward to the year ahead and to working with such a talented group of ladies. What an exciting time!

The Masters Edition of Scrapbooking Memories is released sometime in the next week. I can't wait to see the other Masters' projects and to pore over the Honourable Mentions!

Chat soon!

Heather

My "Long" Tutorial

Hi all. I hope you've been having a great week.

It's my turn to put up a tutorial for Scrap Everything! and I've chosen a subject close to my heart - long titles. Now this is not your standard tutorial as I'm not going to show you a new technique, rather it's a new way of looking and thinking about the design of your pages.

I often use long titles on my pages and I find they serve multiple purposes - they explain what the layout is about, they often replace journalling and they become a design element in their own right.

Here's one of the longest titles I've ever done:

Yes, it's an older layout so please forgive the papers, but the title is a good example of a VERY long one! The trick with a long title is to vary the font colours, sizes and shapes. It also must be readable and make sense. Make sure it roughly flows from top left to bottom right, as this is how we normally read text. This doesn't mean you have to physically start in the top left corner, just make sure that the general flow of the text runs that way. Note how my title is split into two sections but, because it runs in a logical way, it is still easy to read.

Here's one featuring my gorgeous nephew:

When using a long title like this, there's no need for any extra journalling, however you might like to add the date and place the photo was taken. Notice how the font sizes vary enormously. With this layout, my key word was "cutest". I wanted this to form the base under the photo. After this I really just fiddled with different letters until it looked right.

Here's one you might have seen in Scrapbooking Memories recently.

This time, I kept the title in a block rather than spread across the page. The title on this one combines with the photo to tell the story. The title tells us he couldn't blow the candles and out and the picture tells us why! (Note that his sister in the background has got the right action happening!)

And lastly, here's one that's not strictly laid out like a title but it's more than just jounalling.

I hope you've got some inspiration to try some longer titles. Go mad with your letter stickers! Try mixing chipboard letters, stickers and hand writing. I'm a strong believer that you can never have too many lettering options. I have drawers full of chipboard letters, Thickers and letter stickers. It's also really handy to have some smaller words and letters too. Mini alphas are great!

I'd love to hear if you make a layout with a long title!

Heather

ASI A4 Feature

Hi everyone,

As promised on my last blog, I have tried not to leave it so long between posts this time!

I recently had my first feature in Australian Scrapbook Ideas magazine. The brief was to use A4 papers on 12 x 12 layouts. I was also supposed to keep the A4 papers intact on as many layouts as possible which I found surprisingly hard!

By far my favourite layout of them all was the one where I cut the A4 papers up completely and made stitched circular embellishments with them. Here it is.

This is my bestie. We've been besties for so many years now I don't remember how many! We love going out together and have such a great time. This event was a 60s night and the colours of the costumes were brilliant. I wanted to capture all the psychedelic groovin' that was happening that evening!

I also made another layout of the same evening, this time of the four of us who went together. We were originally supposed to go with our hubbies but a couple of them couldn't make it so the others pulled out. More fool them  as it was such a great night! This group of girls are a blast!

Again, I tried to capture all that groovy 60s knock-your-socks off colour. It was just coincidence that we all had hired long white boots so I had to make a feature of this. The fact that I could use the words to "These boots were made for walkin'" was the icing on the cake.

For a complete change of subject I then chose to scrap about a funny thing my son said. Here's the layout:

My son has a great sense of humour. I was actually looking for a formal photo to go with this A4 paper but I found this photo when I was looking. I thought it suited perfectly! I had fun making the formal shirt on the left of the layout. I wrote my journalling on the handkerchief then tucked it in the pocket. Here's a close up:

 And last but not least is a layout of my mum and her sisters. I fussy cut the flowers in the A4 paper so they formed a floral frame around the ladies. Can anyone work out which is the famous Aunty Shirley from my last blog?

Thanks so much for looking. I hope you all have a great week.

Heather

PS - Shirley's second from the left.

My Gorgeous Aunty Shirley

I'm so sorry for the lack of action on my blog everyone! It's been so long since I blogged that I became one of those people that you check their blogs and the same picture comes up....again..... and again..... I swore I would never do that but sometimes life just gets in the way. I've had 2 kids doing exams (one did her first VCE 3/4 subject in year 11) and a sick hubby as well as a few social outings and heaps of work to do. Oh yeah - and I managed to squeeze a bit of scrapping in!

Here's one layout I made.

I love this photo! This is my Aunty Shirley at my 50th, which had a 50s theme. She came as a frazzled 50s mum, complete with an apron, curlers and a scarf over her curlers. Doesn't she look fabulous!

I used October Afternoon papers. What else would I use for a 50s theme? The papers matched her apron perfectly. I have a bit of a thing about using A4 and rounding the corners on retro pages. I kept this layout nice and simple in keeping with the theme. Those borders are fussy cut from the papers.

Here's a close-up:

That quote is so perfect for this photo!

Thanks for looking everyone - and a big hello to Aunty Shirley who will be looking at this blog for the first time! She will be feeling a bit special this week as she also appears in a layout I did for this month's Australian Scrapbook Ideas mag.

I promise I'll be back in less than a week with another update.

Heather

Ice Cream

Hi again,

I hope everyone's been enjoying some sunshine this week. It's so good for the soul!

Here's my latest page for Scrap Everything! Like last week, I'm using the new Pickled Pear collection from KaiserCraft. I adore this range - it can be used for so many themes and I find the layouts come together quickly when the paper designs and embellishments co-ordinate in such a gorgeous way.

My layout this week is very different from last week's one. Here it is:

This layout came together really easily. I used Dylusions Ink Spray to make the chocolate ice cream dribbles and the first six words of the title are from the Pickled Pear sticker sheet. It was these words that gave me the idea for the layout. I wanted the words to be "mounted" on something so I cut a couple of strips of the background paper from behind the photos, flipped them over to show the other side and placed them under some of the title. The only tricky bit on the whole page was convincing the baker's twine to stay put! A little bit of Glossy Accents works wonders.

Here's a detail:

My son was only two when these pics were taken. Awww, he was so cute!

This is one of my favourite layouts that I've done lately. I really like the simplicity of the page but it's still interesting and tells a great story. I guess there's a heavy touch of nostalgia too as these photos were taken 13 years ago!

Wishing you all many more ice-creams this summer!

Heather

Heather's Favourite Things

Hello there! As a member of Scrap Everything's design team, it's my turn to play and have I had fun this month! Katherine The Amazing has managed to get some sensational new products from KaiserCraft in advance of their release so the design team members can have layouts ready to inspire you as they're released! How cool is that! And what's more, the products are fantastic!

This range from KaiserCraft is called the Pickled Pear Collection. It's a co-ordinated range of papers and die-cuts with some beautiful metal butterflies thrown in for good measure. I absolutely adore the green colours in this range. The butterflies and flowers immediately sent me looking for girl photos but you could also easily use them for travel, general and even male layouts (butterflies and flowers optional!)

Here's this week's layout:

I can see now that I should have taken a close up of the title. It reads "These are a few of my Favourite Things." It was the die cut jounalling block with "Favourite Things" written on it that gave me the idea for the title. And of course there's no doubt my gorgeous nieces are some of my favourite things!

The circular KaiserCraft paper is beautiful and didn't need too much in the way of embellishments. I put some cream paint on my finger and ran it around the scalloped edge as well as behind the photo. I also added some black stitching for contrast.

You might have noticed the 12 x 12 paper behind the circular paper. It's another of the Pickled Pear Collection. I have left the strip that runs along the bottom on as it's beautiful. The row of butterflies matches the layout perfectly.

Here's a close up of the main cluster:

That lovely butterfly is one of the die cuts as are the flowers behind the jounalling block.

Here's butterfly number two:

I placed a metal butterfly on top of the one printed on the paper. This gave it a more dimensional effect.

And here's butterfy number three:

This is another butterfly from the die cuts pack. I made a trail using dots of Liquid Pearls. I love this product!

I hope you enjoyed the layout. If it has inspired you to take a further look at this range, it's available here.

Happy scrapping!

Heather

Scrapbooking Memories Vol 14, No 7

Gosh – sometimes time just gets away on me. I feel like I never have enough time to update my blog as often as I’d like. Life’s like that I guess!

I’m trying to get all my previously published layouts onto my blog. I think layouts often look quite different on a screen that they do on a magazine page – sometimes better and sometimes worse.

Here are some that were published in Scrapbooking Memories, Vol 14, No 7:

I enjoy throwing in a bit of humour into layouts. The words “cat in a box” reminded me so much of Dr Suess that I had to use this idea somehow. I wrote a Dr Suess-sounding poem and used this as an extended title. I fell in love with these BasicGrey papers at the time and I still adore them.

Another double layout in that mag was “The Triffid Trees”.

I told a rather lengthy story on this one about how the “Triffid Tree” that we planted tried to take over our back yard. I really liked using the colour grey in this layout, which is not a colour I use very often. Want up update on Triffid Tree number 3? It’s growing new leaves at a rapid rate in this warm, wet spring we’re having and is looking very healthy.

I also had an OTP project in this edition. It’s my “Family Keyring Album”. Here’s the front page:

You can get these clips in many colours is hardware stores. Simply take a basic tag shape, decorate it as you like and give it a coat of something to protect it from wear and tear if it’s going to be hung on a keyring or bag where it could get knocked around a bit. I used Mod Podge but you could also laminate the tags then put larger embellishments on top if you prefer.

Here are some of the pages:

And last, but not least, I was honoured to be asked to participate in SBM’s “Easy as 1,2, 3 Challenge”. I had to make a layout and a card from a sketch. Here’s what I came up with:

 

I love scrapping pics of my kids when they were little. I hadn’t discovered scrapping then and I think cute kids make the best scrapping subjects (especially when they’re your own!) I tucked journaling tags behind the backing to the photo and concertinaed the strips of paper to create a sunrays effect.

Here’s the card:

You know what I just realised? I used the same line of BasicGrey paper in four out of these five projects! It’s not obvious as there was quite a range of designs in that line. And you know what’s more amazing? The remaining layout (Triffid Trees) is also made using a line of BasicGrey papers! I know I’m a BasicGrey fan but I didn’t realise how much I use them!

Thanks for looking.

Heather

Scrapbooking Memories Update

Well I've been a bit under the pump lately and haven't updated layouts I've had published in mags for a while. At last I've got a bit of spare time so here are a few now. These are from Scrapbooking Memories Vol 14, no 6.

I had a bit of fun with this one. I used small sticks that I collected on one of my walks to create the twiggy effect. I interlaced them with string and sprays of small flowers. The photo is so rustic and I wanted something to complement it.

I also added a bit of hidden journaling. The journaling isn't personal but I didn't want it showing on the layout so I tucked it behind the photo and added a ribbon and tag.

The next layout was in a very different style. I was really shocked when our son grew to the same height as me. For 15 years I've been looking down at him and suddenly I wasn't!

I really wanted the letters in the word"tall" to be tall and the ones that fitted the best were clear acrylic ones. Clear just wasn't going to work on this page though so I painted the back of them with acrylic paint then stamped on the paint when it was dry. I then outlined the letters with a blue Sharpie pen. The background paper is actually a soft gift wrap paper with a handmade feel.

Note - my son is now 2 inches taller than me. My husband I both look up to talk to him now!

Enjoy your day!

Heather

24/7

Hi all,

Well it's back to winter here with rain, hail and a maximum of 7 degrees today. And that was without the wind chill factor! Never mind - it's great scrapping weather.

Here's another layout for Scrap Everything! I've used more of the Simple Stories range. There are a lot of fans of this product out there!

For something different, I opted for an A4 layout. I love using A4 pages in a rounded-corner, retro kind of way. Here's the layout:

I had a bit of fun with the photo. Using Photoshop Elements, I put a bit of a red tint onto it then ran a mosaic filter over it to give it that crackled look. Here's a closer look at the photo.

There are so many options for titles when using calendar pages on your layout. I went with 24/7 but there are so many more I could have used like All Year Round, Day In Day Out, Every Minute/Hour/Day etc, Until the End of Time and so on.

Here's a close up:

Hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Heather

Simple Stories

Well, my lurgy has finally gone and I'm feeling 100% again. Yay!

My kit from Scrap Everything! this month included these luscious Simple Stories papers. Simple Stories products are designed to make scrapbooking faster and easier for people with limited scrapping time. We all know what that's like! You can check out the range here.

I really liked the 12 x 12 page that looks like a calendar page, however I didn't want the whole layout to be the calendar. I therefore opted for a double page layout.

I had a lot of fun with this. I first went back through my pics until I found a month that had a good range of photos. I then went to my diary and looked up other things we did that I didn't take photos of. It would also work really well if you planned the month in advance and took photos accordingly as you went. You could even make these pages the basis for your whole year's scrapping and could just scrap special events on their own page if time is an issue.

Here's my layout:

 I printed all the photos in passport size then just trimmed them to squares. You could put a photo in each square but this would leave little room for journalling and I think it's important to get those details on paper. I also left a few squares blank so the page wasn't too busy. There's more than enough business on the this layout as it is!

Here's a close up:

The raw wooden KaiserCraft balloons suited the layout beautifully. You can get them here. Even though the background paper I used here is very busy, the words were all so appropriate that I had to use it! I did tone down the other side of the layout where the title is though or there would have been too much to look at!

I also added some banners. I'm a bit banner mad lately. I raised some flags higher than others to help give the appearance of movement. I also used a loop in the banner string to form the letter "o" in the title. With the exception of a small amount of AC cardstock, all the papers are from the Simple Stories range.

I realise that double page layouts are a bit hard to see online so here are the pages one at a time:

There are 10 photos on this layout and I could easily have put more on. I think this is a great way to get those day to day details documented.

I hope this inspires you to round up those unscrapped pics that are sitting on your computer and get them into an album. Most of our lives are taken up with non-monumentous occasions. It's great to scrap the birthdays, weddings and other milestones but don't forget what you did in between these events!

Ciao for now.

 Heather

Hambly Overlay Mini Album

Ohhh, I've been struck down with the dreaded lurgy this week. Never mind - I'm not so sick that I can't scrap!

I received a lovely bundle of goodies from Katherine at Scrap Everything! and among them were these Hambly Overlays. I loved the thought of making a mini album with them but knew their transparency would be a challenge. I thought about different ways to approach it but decided in the end that the KISS approach was the best. I simply backed each photo with exactly the same sized paper so that each page wasn't affected by the pages before or after it. I like the way the overlays still allowed a glimpse of the upcoming pages though. I thought the tree trunk pattern on them worked really well with the Picnic in the Park theme.

Here's the cover:

I just love that red rose ribbon!

My family visited my brother's family in Perth recently and I had lots of lovely photos of us all together so a mini album was perfect for these. I journalled the story inside the front cover.

I alternated pages between the brown trunk pattern overlay and the cream one for a more interesting effect. A really cool idea would be to make every page from a different overlay.

There's that gorgous rose ribbon again!

The wooden KaiserCraft balloon is from my tutorial. I decided to put it to good use!

The back page still had to be covered with the same size piece of paper to hide the work behind it, but I didn't want a photo on the outside where it would get damaged, so I chose a colourful piece of paper and used it to place "Handmade by Heather with Love". I could also have put dates here or other relevant details.

For extra impact, I chose bright, coordinating ribbons to hold the pages together. Far more interesting than plain rings!

Hope you have a great weekend.