Away We Go (or TTA PeopleMover)

I'm back with another layout created with Scraptastic's August kit, The Story Begins. Here I used some of the more muted papers from Echo Park's Everyday Eclectic collection, focusing on the soft green and pink to compliment the colors in my photo. I love the hot air balloon stickers and direction arrow, as they fall in well with my theme, our family riding the Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover. This easy-going ride at Walt Disney World remains one of my favorites and I journaled my fondness for it on the kraft cardstock bordering my page. 

 

Check out the title! That overly wordy title was only made possible by a well-stocked Alphabean letter sticker sheet by Jillibean Soup. These are becoming some of my favorite letters (right behind Thickers) for the sheer number of letters on each sheet. How often can you pick up a pack of letter stickers and find that many T's or O's, etc? Upper and lower case letters are included all on one sheet. I loved finding a sheet of these in the kit!

Here's a closer look at a favorite page detail. The balloon and cloud stickers were backed with cardstock to give them dimension and enable easier layering on the page. A length of twine wrapped around one of the balloons is drawn through one of the kraft tags and tied into a pretty bow. Away we go! 

World Of Wheels

Recently, Kevin was invited to attend World of Wheels with his best friend, and he jumped at the chance. Not too long ago, whenever the two boys got together, they would pull out the bucket full of matchbox cars passed down from my older boys, and have the best time. Video games have taken the place of matchbox cars during playtime but it won't be long 'til their interest in cars peaks once again...as they prepare to drive. Scary! 

In a photo taken at the World of Wheels, the boys pose with a mime who was decked out head to toe in silver...silver shirt, silver pants, silver hat, silver bugle, silver skin.

Don't look now, but I actually stamped AND stitched on my page! Uh-oh...I see the tension needs adjusting.

There are papers or bits of papers from at least six different manufacturers on here: 7-Gypsies, BasicGrey, Melissa Frances, My Mind's Eye, Echo Park, and KI Memories. It's a real mix of supplies!

Celebrate Good Times

Creating starbursts out of patterned paper is a popular trend right now, one that I wanted to try myself. I had the perfect opportunity with the layout below. It seemed like such a great way to use the long patterned paper scraps left over from previous pages created with the kit. At first I set the page up with the starburst design at the top,

but it seemed too orderly, and I didn't know where to put my title. The thin white lettering that I planned to use would be lost over the colorful patterned paper rays. Turning the page sideways would leave me with a better place to put the title as well as more room for embellishments along the bottom...

especially after adding a rectangle of patterned paper and large doily. 

Finally my photo would have somewhere to rest:

It comes together little by little:

And eventually ends up like this:

I added chipboard letters, flowers and an envelope from my stash to complete this page. All of the patterned papers, stickers, chipboard banners, tags, and baker's twine are from Scraptastic's August kit, The Story Begins.

This is one of my favorite parts of the page:

Two of the chipboard banner pieces, covered with patterned paper, layered for a very dimensional looking addition to my title. It's a small detail but I love how it appears as if the banner is wrapping itself around the two hearts. 

Next Sunday I'll have another page with these pretty papers from Echo Park's Everyday Eclectic, and it's a Disney layout! 

Photo Friday: A Day in the Quarter

When my youngest sister is in town, my four sisters and I always seem to do something fun, and often delicious. A few days ago, we went to lunch in the French Quarter with my mom. Here we are, all six of us, (I'm the short one), at the Gumbo Pot restaurant. 

The three youngest cousins were with us. My son has obviously inherited my short genes. At 12 he's the oldest of the three. My niece will be passing her mom up in height very soon!

While in the Quarter, we did some shopping. Well...more like browsing. This shop had the most colorful dolls and art prints:

Kevin does some window shopping. I love Terrence Osborne's colorful depictions of New Orleans:

More walking brought us to this row of shotgun doubles:

And this house so full of "gingerbread" trim:

Of course, we had to check out this rather creepy VooDoo shop on Bourbon Street. Lots to see...hanging on the walls and standing behind the counter. I don't think I was supposed to take this picture. Ooops.

We snapped photos everywhere, trying to capture the iconic:

The boys didn't even complain when we asked them to stand in front of this door... or that wall. They just hammed it up and complied!

This might be my favorite picture of the day, treated to look like a postcard:

But  there were a few pretty odd sights as well. Walking down the street with her dainty little umbrella, like nothing was out of the norm, was a bronzed lady with not a whole lot on. Where she was heading from or to is indeed a mystery.

You can't say New Orleans isn't a scenic city!

Give It A Whirl!

When creating scrapbook layouts, are you ever stumped for a title? I am...quite often. Sometimes I just end up restating the obvious. Other times I take a clue or a phrase from a sticker set, journaling block or other scrappy embellishment. They often have good ideas just waiting to be borrowed. And then there are those times that I am completely lost. The photos on this page (Kevin riding a spinning contraption at a local amusement park) had me completely stumped. Then I found a website called The Perfect Title. A menu on the left side of the main page lists oodles of categories with each opening up onto a list of titles and quotes appropriate for the chosen theme. That is where I found my title for this page:

Everything on the page is from Scraptastic's August kit, The Story Begins. The wonderful colors of Echo Park's Everyday Eclectic papers seem to be taken right from the design on front of the "Scrambler" car. 

To embellish this page I made my own repeating diamond cut file and used it to create a border near the top and bottom of the white cardstock. The negative spaces were backed with strips of patterned paper, creating a pretty striped design in each of the diamond shapes. First, the colorful strips were cut and adhered to a larger piece of cardstock. Then the two strips were placed behind the main page, with the top cardstock layer popped up a bit for a more dimensional look. Pop dots were placed at the top and bottom of each diamond. Additional dots were cut in half to fit between the diamonds, keeping that top layer suspended.

Have a great day, and the next time you are stumped for a title, remember to check out the ideas posted on  The Perfect Title. 

Subway Art

Subway Art is all the rage and this Pinterest Board has a boatload of examples. The art on this board is so colorful! If you look around, you can even find a few tutorials for creating your own versions to print and frame for your home. It's a cool trend. Recently, a friend of mine used this premise to create a subway art inspired title for her scrapbook page and it looked fabulous. I wanted to try this myself.

First, I needed a title for my page. Two or three words just weren't going to do, so I googled quotes about "play" and came across one with enough words to work. You generally want a few lines, with more than one word on some. The quote "It is a happy talent to know how to play" was perfect for my photos of Kevin and his scooter!

Next, I sorted through my letter stickers. I had tons of colors from which to choose, but finding packs with two Ts or two Ps or several Os made for an intensive search. It also looks best to vary the fonts and/or letter sizes, so the hunt was on.

Finally, success as evidenced below:




And here's my full page:




I think the colorful title is a nice compliment to these Simple Stories papers, all of which can be found in Scraptastic's July Summer Picnic kit. Every Thursday a new challenge is posted on the Scraptastic blog. At the end of the month, everyone who has completed each of the challenges is put into a drawing for a free kit! This week's challenge is to create a scrapbook page, using a subway art title. Try it; it's fun!

One of these days I'd love to create a huge subway art canvas or print for my home. But first I need to choose a quote. Off to search...

Hello Summer!

School let out at the end of May, but the hot and humid temperatures of the area were signaling summer even earlier. Still, it wasn't until our week at the beach that it really felt like summer was here. And hello summer! This little boy can't get enough of the water. Boogie boarding in the gulf or goofing off at the pool; it's all good. Back home we had a few more weeks of swim team, but things are beginning to wind down...too quickly. I just wish it didn't have to end. School starts back up in the middle of August. Boo. Hiss. He will not be a happy camper.

I simply love these Paradise Beach papers by Echo Park...the perfect papers to scrap Kevin's perfect day at the beach. The surfboard silhouette on the fussy cut paper and "postcard" remind me so much of the boy and HIS board...inseparable.

Did you know that you can change the color of foam Thickers with ink? The letters that spell "summer" were originally a brighter blue. By using a bit of distress ink on my blending tool (with most of the ink rubbed off on a scrap sheet of paper), they were dulled sufficiently to match my papers.

I love the tropical feel these hibiscus flowers add to my page. I used my die-cutting machine with Susan Stringfellow's cut file found on her SketchSavvy Blog HERE. After cutting out the flowers, I inked the edges and rolled the petals slightly up and under. Their centers were handcut, inked and pop-dotted for even more dimension. Leaves were also cut randomly and folded with ink applied to the edges and to define the center vein. 

It would be nice to scrap more of my beach vacation photos, but I've had them printed TWICE at Sam's Photo Center and every single one that has a bit of blue sky has vertical streaks from the machine. Seriously? I'm going to try one more time and hope they get it right. The photo department manager asked me to call her before I send my pictures and she'll make sure the machine is cleaned just prior to my order. Shouldn't it always be cleaned sufficiently for streak-free pictures?!