Inspired by Art

  Art can provide some wonderful inspiration. From colour palette to them, the possibilities are endless. Recently, I found a wonderful challenge spot called Artastic. This will be the 2nd time I have played along with their challenge. This month's painting featured my favourite time of year...

Autumn Wonder by Debbie Adams

                                                      
and I just so happened to have some fall photos that need to be scrapped. Last Fall, We took my son to Disney's Board Walk to trick or treat with some friends. I was able to get some great shots of the kids with Mickey Mouse in front of a cute fall theme backdrop. I wanted to make a whimsical page with a fall theme, rather than use the bright colours usually associated with Disney. I also did not feel that Halloween papers would be right for the photo. I looked to my April Counterfeit kit for inspiration. The October Afternoon papers gave it just the right cozy, fall feel.

Pagemaps sketch done for Sketches4all
misc. buttons
all papers October afternoon except for red/cream( Scrap within reach)
tree trunks- cosmo cricket earth love paper
Basic Grey Alphas

I used a buttermilk cream acrylic paint over brown bazzill cardstock. I chose to dry brush a bit, so that the brown and the texture of the paper showed through. I alternated faux sticthing and real hand stitching to add to the country style Fall theme. I hand cut the trees and the clouds for the whimsical look I desired.

Sketch Inspiration #216

The hardest part of these pages were the rolled borders. Since I did not have double sided patterned paper, I adhered to pieces together back to back. This made the paper quite stiff. So as I rolled it, I used glue dots to hold it in place. I then chose to hand stitch over the rolls to ensure they would not come undone.
  As you can see, my layouts don't resemble the painting very much. Inspiration does not need to be an exact reproduction. In this case, the colours from the painting and the trees are what made their way to my pages. So next time you see a piece of artwork, consider all of the possible ways in which you can interpret it.

Such a Glorious Feeling

 That phrase really stuck out at me when I saw the movie poster featured at From Screen to Scrap's challenge blog.
                                                      
It is always a wonderful feeling to have the rain cool you off on a hot day. I make it a point of taking my son for walks during the rain so we can enjoy it( barring thunder and lightening of course). I have wonderful memories of puddle stomping with my Grandparents and I hope my son will carry on this tradition with a child of his own someday.
  Given that this is something we do often, I will admit that this is not my first page about walking in the rain. In fact, I made the companion page to the layout I will share today several months ago. So I carried the paper and colour scheme over to this page with the fancy pants papers, glimmer mist splatters and red buttons.

The title is made from some older Creative memories letter stickers with glossy accents added for a "wet look". Since this is a companion page to another, I really didn't want the title to stand out too much. The red allows it to pop out of the journaling while still being a part of it.

I'm on FIRE!

    Well, I am not literally on fire! Technically, I sort of got into a slump. Not because of creativity. More because life threw me a curvebal in the form of sick kid, sick dog, and then me, well, getting sick. See the theme here. It's not a pretty one. That being said, everyone feels better and it's a rainy lazy day here. I am having a hard time falling back into the homeschool routine today with the sound of the rain beating on the roof. I feel so cozy! So what better thing to do than scrap...and what better topic to scrap than a campfire! So I took Scrap Whispers challenge 78 and literally scrapped a campfire.

I have had this pad of Paper Pizzazz Vacation papers for what must be at least 4 years now. We all have paper like that! I think I bought it on a whim. There are some great vacation papers in it...many are just specific to certain locales. For Example, there is an ENTIRE page of labels for trips around the world to cities like Paris, Washington D.C, San Francisco...well, I could go on. I must have really been hoping that buying the paper would make tickets to these destinations materialize. LOL Anyway, I finally made use of some of the camp themed papers here on this page. There was even a tag to fussycut. I used scraps of the paper to create faux ribbons. All of the papers were inked with colorbox Chestnut roan.

If you like the handmade flowers, you can find a tutorial here. They are really easy and fun to make. You just need to monitor your microwave so you don't have a campfire in your home. Seriously. While I did not start a fire this time...let's just say, there have been many accidental campfires in my kitchen. This is why we own a fire extinguisher.  And that's all I have to say about that...

Draw Create Doodle

 For awhile now, I have wanted to document some of my son's art. I have seen collections of art photos on several scrapbook pages featured in magazines. It seems like such a great idea. My son draws so many things that it would be hard to save them all. This gives me a record of some of my favorites and I am sure I will love looking back at this page. I only wish I would have done something like this sooner. I definitely will have to go back and find a way to document the earlier years.

Right now, I am participating in Challenge Masters Project Scrapbook contest. As part of that, we were asked to create a 2 page layout, and for bonus points, that each of the pages should mirror the other.

* sorry for the photo quality. it's late at night, but I just had to share this!

I also wanted something special for my son's art work. I challenged myself to make a border that was fun and whimsical. I used paint, which is actually a challenge to me in itself. I always like the way others use it on their page, but often feel it is flat on mine. I hand drew the border with a pencil, then painted over the lines with MM meadow paint. The result did look flat, so I got out my DMC floss and stitched it by hand. I chose some older Karen Foster's stickers for the title(they have been in my stash forever) and I wanted to mirror their look on the page. To do that, I used blue chalk around some of the photos. I then stamped the words " art " and "muse" in white Colorbox ink on the chalk. I then added some hand stitching in a grid pattern for a kind of graphic feel.

 It still needed more color, so I used some Basic Grey and KI Memories brads and buttons on the grid. To maintain the mirror effect, each button or brad was placed on the grid in a location that corresponded to a brad or button on the opposite page. I varied the size and color though, so it would have more visual interest. I added brads to the title stickers as well. I placed my journaling in the same location and size space as the title. To mirror the color of the title and the title itself,I used CM stickers to emphasize the same words that were in the title.

Overall, I love the look and feel of the page. As I said, I regret not making one of these for my son's art earlier. Looks like a good project for the future!

Then and Now: One Concept, Two Takes

 Recently, I did a one hour challenge at club ck. I was very rushed. My son needed help with school, and that comes first. So after assisting him, I had about 30 minutes left to complete the challenge. I almost didn't...but then thought. What the heck, let's give it a go and see what you get. The overall result of my 25 mad dash of scrapping was not horrific. I had pulled out my Cosmo cricket earth love kit to make it easier on me. The challenge centered around showing a timeline of change. So I had quickly pulled together photos of my son highlighting 4 years of his life. I was in love with those photos. Each one depicting his sweet self at each wonderful stage of life.

There was just one problem...I was bothered by the fact that in my haste, I had covered my Sweet boy's hands in one of the photos. Not to mention the fact, that though I loved the border with the birds, as whimsical as it was ...it just wasn't working for me.


I generally come to a point in which a page is just considered done. This page, though simplistic, was important to me because it depicts my son's growth from 2001 until now. So I ended up making the page over. When I pulled the bird border off, the page was damaged. I wanted to salvage it, so I used an Martha Stewart punch to create a border on Cardstock. This, coupled with the Making memories ladybug trim from the Flutter collection, maintains the earthy feel of the paper while hiding the rips and tears. It also adds a little dimension to what was before, a very flat, basic page.

I changed the buttons from blue to yellow for a pop of color and also because the light blue just did not match the turquoise of the ladybugs. Though the page is still simplistic, I corrected what was bothering me about it and I feel, made it a little more interesting.

That being said, I will be shortly popping over to Scrapwhispers to enter this project in their "Then and Now' challenge.  I also have some future then and now projects planned. I would love to scrap about my son's change in favorite cartoons and also do a timeline for video games we have played from "then to now". So stay tuned...

It's all Vegetal!

Yes, that's a word. At least, I think it is. It's vegetal...as in vegetation. I like using the word. It sounded interesting and upon reading that it was a challenge over at Method Playground in which I need to use something plant related. I set out to find some floral paper to use up in my stash. I settled upon some MM die cut 5th avenue paper. It's black and white color matched with what I need to complete an LO about dinner at Carmine's...an Lo which I am entering over at Challenge Masters, and, as is my usual pattern, am popping around the net submitting where it may best fit into with other challenges. The challenge masters week 2 challenge requires me to use colors that match the logo of a favorite food or place to eat. Coincidentally, We had just been to a local favorite restaurant: Carmines! I had taken a photo of the sign over the door. So I fussy cut this and used 3-d adhesive along with pink paislee letters to make the title pop on a polka dot background. I went to Carmine's website to look for more photos and a menu. It was a jack pot! If you ever visit someplace and don't have a photo, their website can be a goldmine for you or for ideas on how to scrap your trip.

I used some white crochet lace ribbon from Melissa Johnson. The black crochet trim was found at my local fabric store. The buttons were an awesome find. I was cleaning out a box of craft supplies and discovered them in a box. They were my great grandmother's. I used some MM and prima flowers embellished with  some prima pearls. I felt all of these elements matched the atmosphere of the restaurant. Carmine's is a family style, Italian place decorated in a style I like to call gaudy elegance. Some of the looks are very traditional, but there are tons of photos in various eclectic frames on the walls. Some of the lamps in the bar are mismatched in both color and style. So I felt that the crochet provided the home style feel of a family meal, while the mismatched buttons provided the eclectic feel. Diamond stickles on some of the dots and flowers of the paper added to this eclectic tone.

Love my Box Babies

I am really excited to be a guest designer at Scrap Our Stash. Today, My take on their 2nd June sketch posted. it's a challenging sketch...but has wonderful results. I hope you'll stop by and check it out.
http://scrapourstash.blogspot.com/2010/06/scrap-our-stash-sketch-2.html

I used the sketch for the left page.

Summer kick off Blog hop at PPC

I love a blog hop(who doesn't) and I love a color challenge. So I decided to participate in Picture perfect creations summer blog hop. I used Sketch 204 from Scrapbook challenges.

I loved how the color palette from PPC complemented the photos of DH and DS playing at an outdoor restaurant. We often go to the Green parrot. It's a little hole in the wall place, but it has good food and the harbour views are amazing. Not to mention that the sea breezes are great on a warm summer day.

I added a green feather from an actual green parrot. Now in reality, there are no live green parrot's at this restaurant.However, there are green parrot's in the Bahamas...and that is where this feather came from. I figured it was the perfect touch. I did clean the feather before placing it in the layout by gently wiping it down with a baby wipe. One must be careful with bird feathers as they might harbour small bugs or other unpleasant germs. In cleaning the feather, you must also be quite gentle so you don't pull it apart.

I cut the title on my cricut with the CK Jolly elf font.

For My Husband

  My DS tends to dominate my lay outs. It's no secret that he is the center of the universe for DH and I. Add to that, the fact that DH is very rarely a willing subject for photos. DH will turn away or make silly faces. A few weeks ago, I issued a challenge on Club CK to take some must have summer photos. DH has a sunglasses fetish...so I figured I would do my best to capture him with them on and scrap the photos, silly or not. Well, I got those photos. Only they are not at all silly... and the more that I looked at them, The more that I realized this was not going to be an LO just about DH's love of sunglasses. So I waxed sentimental and the journaling became about my love of my wonderful husband. When I saw the 6-17 sketch on Sketchy Thursday, I felt these photos fit right onto it.
http://sketchythursdays.blogspot.com/2010/06/617-sketchy-thursdays-challenge.html

I wanted paper that made the lay out feel warm and special to me. I ended up choosing Basic grey's periphery because it was masculine, while capturing some of DH's favorite colors. I had the matching Basic grey ribbon and buttons. I cut the title on my cricut with the CK invitation font. The border is cut from a free svg file. A freind of mine made it. You can find it on her blog:
http://paperscrapsandpicturepassion.blogspot.com/2010/06/freebie-svg-file-day-5.html
I used some My Mind's Eye rub-ons on page 2.