Friends?

Our puppy is a social butterfly. This is a conundrum for me and for Matt because we aren't the most social people. She forces us into all kinds of random interactions. But I guess there's nothing wrong with that. Although the introvert in my screams "dangit puppy!" every time...

She loves people and she especially loves other dogs. She whines and cries if we don't let her play (read: jump) on other dogs we encounter on our walks. Cadie, my parents dog, doesn’t take too kindly to other dogs she can’t control. And Dixie is too young and naive to realize that Cadie doesn’t like her very much. Dixie’s pretty sure they’re best friends!

I knew I wanted to scrapbook this story and feature a lot of butterflies! I purchased this design from the Silhouette Online store and cut out three patterned paper butterflies. I liked the cut for its simple lines and the fact that the negatives would have been easy to back with different patterned papers. Although I didn’t go that route on this page.

Green was my challenge. I don’t scrapbook with green often enough! Don’t get me wrong, I like green. But given the option, it’s the easiest to drop from my repertoire. I chose a shade darker than my photos (with less yellow in it) to make these photos pop off of it. I also added a white cardstock mat to make sure the photos differentiated themselves. It helped balance Cadie’s white fur and is also why I decided to back the butterflies with white cardstock.

I love contrast. I try to use it as much as possible on every page. So the black thicker title, black label, black journaling, black heart stamping and black ink splatters helped add contrast to the white matted photos, Cadie’s white fur, the white backed butterflies, white threads and white outlined swirls.

The finishing touches were all about adding texture. I had some white thread cut offs in my sewing box that I added behind a few of the butterflies. I’ve seen this trend on a few other pages and think it’s such a simple way to add really great texture.

cheers & besos,

5 Favorites

I was in Nashville for work last week so I fell behind with my blogging. So sorry about that! But here's a page I made last month for Scrapbook Circle.

I don't often make no photo pages but I thought it'd be fun to make a list of my 5 favorites right now.

The Basic Grey banners were the jumping off point for the page. They reminded me of something you'd hang on your gallery wall. So I made my own little gallery wall on a piece of white cardstock.

cheers & besos,

Love List

I decided it was time to scrapbook my love list. What's a love list? A list of people I love the most! So basically, my immediate family. I did something similar in 2014 and am happy to repeat this again in 2016, especially since my family has changed a bit since then (lost a cat, gained a dog).

I loved this sheet of hearts from Crate Paper's Hello Love collection. I loved the high contrast and the imperfect hearts. I knew it'd be perfect for this list of my loves.

I made the page whimsical by cutting out my photos using a circle punch. And to keep with the high contrast, I printed them in black and white.

The rest of the embellishing was very minimal. The paper really did most of the work for me. And I have to add that these American Crafts gold dipped Thickers are some of my most favorite ever!

cheers & besos,

Me + You

My grandma is one of my most favorite people in the world. She's the sweetest, kindest little lady. Exactly how you'd picture or want a grandma to be: loving, patient, fun! 

One of my favorite memories with Nana is the time she took me, my brother and my cousin to the waterpark. They have these really high water slides that can be scary for an 8 year old. My brother and my cousin teased me mercilessly about how scary it would be, so I chickened out and left them to ride. 

I walked back to Nana and told her about it. And she assured me that they weren't that scary and said we would ride on it together. So there was tiny young me and my grandma, climbing up the several flights of stairs and riding the ride together. 

She didn't want me to miss out because I was scared. And by doing it with me, she helped me get over that fear. I spent the rest of that summer flying down the "scariest" of water slides and having so much fun!

I didn't really realize until know, that that lesson has helped me my whole life. Conquer your fear Jamie, because what's waiting on the other side of that fear might be a lot of fun.

I used the February Scrapbook Circle kit and the Circle Round up challenge to make this page. The products reminded me so much of my Nonie. She loves flowers and rarely passes on anything leopard print. So the second I saw the pink leopard print I knew I wanted to scrapbook about her. And lucky me, we took a few cute photos together at Thanksgiving last year.

The page was created for the Circle Round up challenge which is basically a recipe challenge, take a bit of this a little of that, add some sprinkles and you’re done.

But I think what I was most inspired by was the challenge image, it's a few circles layered on top of each other. I'm such a big fan of all things circles that I used it as the starting point for the page, hand cutting three large patterned paper circles to serve as the foundation for the design.

Journaling reads: 

"People say I'm like her. If that's even a little bit sure, I'll take it. She's the sweetest person I know; so very loving, generous and kind. You can't help but love Nonie!"

I photographed this page using the newly launched Shotbox. I'm still trying to figure out if I like it or not. Anyone else have one? I'd love to hear what you think and am planning to write a review in the coming weeks!

cheers & besos,