Water Dog

I finally finished the 2nd page I made using my [2016 NSD Kit]! I know, it's been nearly two whole months. But I'm not going be too hard on myself. It's done and I like it :)

The colors are my favorite part! I'm loving this combo: teal, orange, yellow, gray, brown, white! I lined all of the paper along the side to create a color block.

The title is a [cut file] from [The Cut Shoppe]. I love how versatile it is! I backed it with cardstock in the color scheme.

We were at the pool just last weekend and Dixie had a blast retrieving the ball all over again. Except this time she was twice as big!

cheers & besos,

SaveSaveSaveSave

Play Outdoors

This was the 2nd page I made during the [InkieQuill] [ScrapStream]! I challenged myself a bit with this one. I have one box of embellishments that I rarely open up. It has all of my 3-dimensional and miscellaneous embellishments, lots of flowers but also things like the kite, leaves and oversize wood veneer. I decided that I wanted to try to use some stuff from that box on this page.

After working on a [page with a very clear direction], I was happy to just play around with some fun embellishments to figure out something that would work.

I started by trimming 1/4 in. strips of an old Studio Calico patterned paper and framing my photo with them. Then I dipped the photos edges in brown paint, something [Nicole Harper] use to do. Next, I decided to mat my photo with white cardstock, but didn't have the right size so I improvised with two scraps. They're intentionally jaunty.

When I printed this photo at 6x8, I envisioned writing my journaling directly on the photo in the grass. But I decided my title would look better there. I thought it needed something though, so I used some roller stamps and white and gold ink to stamp directly onto the photo. It's subtle, but you can see it much better IRL.

For the title, I decided to use these [whimsical letters] I purchased from [Just Nick.] No better font to cut out the word "play" from! I layered up all of the embellishments I pulled from my embellishment box in the bottom right hand corner of the photo and added my few lines of journaling just below.

Of all the pages I made, I think this one is least like my usual style. But I still really really like it! Tomorrow I'll share the heart page, so check back for more details about it!

cheers & besos,

Dixon

Hiya folks! Coming to you live from a flooded Houston. Our household is safe and reasonably dry, we have to venture out with the dog from time to time.  The rain has stopped at the moment but they're predicting more over the next few days. Which is a bit scary as we desperately need the water to recede. It's currently 6pm and they're still rescuing people from flooded areas! Here's hoping for safety!

But on to the scrapbooking portion of today's blog post. This was the first page I made while watching InkieQuill's ScrapStream.  That oh-so-fun event I participated in this weekend!

I had a flash in my brain the other day, an idea for a layout. I saw a word repeated over and over again in different colors on the right side of the page and photos in a column on the left. So that's what I made!

I used the Museo Slab font for the title. In the Silhouette software I repeated "dixon" in five different sizes. I placed them on the canvas where I wanted them to be and then outlined the whole thing. This, I cut out of white cardstock.

I pulled five different patterned papers in some of the colors of that stripe on the left side (an old Crate Paper) and cut out the individual "dixon"s. I tried to mix up the patterns and used a grid, a chevron (of sorts), a floral, a triangle pattern and a polka dot. Everything came out of my scrap drawer!

For embellishing, I stuck with arrows and hearts. Arrows because the character on the Walking Dead, Daryl Dixon, who our Dixon was named after, uses a crossbow. I pulled wood veneer and puffy stickers and then I hand stitched a few arrows using gray crochet thread.

I like how the page come together. Though it isn't as good as the idea had in my head. Either way I'm happy to see it in real life! Tomorrow, I'm sharing the "Play Outdoors" layout. Stop by for that!

cheers & besos,

ScrapStream

I had so much freakin fun participating in Adele aka InkieQuill's ScrapStream No. 3! It was like cropping with a friend. I got up to my own scrapbook mischief and made five pages. I created with no rhyme or reason. Just went through some of my latest photos, printed them in sizes I thought would work (some didn't) and made pages without kits or parameters. Like I said, so much fun! 

If you're interested in watching the not live ScrapStream you can see it here [Part 1] [Part 2] I'm definitely planning to re-watch the parts I was asleep for.

I think I'll blog about one of these each day this week! So check back to find out more :)

cheers & besos,

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,

Battle for the Chair

This was one of the first pages I made with the new Elle's Studio Little Moments collection. Which is rapidly becoming my most favorite ever! It's so perfect for so many stories, big and small. 

The page captures a truly tiny moment, one where my nephew and my puppy are doing battle for their favorite chair in our apartment. It's a tiny silly story that makes me smile :)

You can read more about how the page came together over on the Elle's Studio blog!

Journaling Reads:

I don't know what it is about this chair but beasts and children alike seem to love it. Mac claimed it when she first came to live with us. It's in taters thanks to her claws. Urijah loves to hang out on it whenever he comes to visit. There are orange cheeto stains that can attest to that. And Dixie has now taken a liking to it. I don't know if it is because it's close to the window or just comfy, but there was a puppy nephew battle for chair supremacy when Urijah was last over. Dixie was even more interested in it than she usually is! She'd sneak over to sniff Urijah, then she'd place her paws on a corner until finally making the leap up to try to edge him out. He fell out of it once or twice as they were both struggling to gain control. I'm not sure who won in the end but it was funny to watch them duke it out. February 13, 2016

cheers & besos,

Uber Puppy

The other day, I was inspired to tell the story of how we came home with Dixie. She just happens to be an Uber puppy. Uber was running a puppy promo: request a puppy driver and they'll show up with puppies! Leah (my boss) thought it would be fun so she spent most of the 3 hour window trying to get them to come. There was a lot of demand and finally she confirmed one of the last visits!

Our office is notoriously pet friendly and everyone was so excited for them to show up. We got 3 tiny visitors who were so cute and a little tired. I sent Matt a photo of one of the dogs and was so surprised to hear he thought one was cute and would consider adopting her. I left the decision with him. In the end, we came home with the sister of the puppy I met. But man do they look similar!

For whatever reason I decided to scrap this 9x12 size in a pocket page. I think I went in this direction because of the number of photos I wanted to include. (I'm thinking I should assess this 9x12 album. Right now it has 3 really random stories in it from 2 different years...)

I had a ton of journaling for this. It's her gotcha story after all! I filled 3-3x4 journaling cards front and back so decided to tape them together into a flip book. The top one is sticking out over the plastic page protector.

And the decorated card is made up of stuff from my scrap drawer and way deep in my stash. This rainbow paper was in a Studio Calico kit from 2010 I think. The heart is old Freckled Fawn and the "Heart You" is from an Ali Edwards Story Stamp.

I used my favorite white ink to stamp directly of my favorite photo of Dixie. Just look at her sweet smiling face!

cheers & besos,

Inspiration Inventoried: Dear Dixie

So I had an idea for a new video series. I'm calling it Inspiration Inventoried. It's not a process video. It's me chatting about a finished page, going through the story, the design, the products. Basically a blog post but in video form. You get to see my mug as I wanted the chance to introduce myself. 

I'm not the most eloquent speaker but I think I'll get the hang of it. I didn't realize until recently that I really just love to talk about scrapbooking! I'm hoping to do these once or twice a month so let me know what you think.

cheers & besos,

Simple Scrapper-January 2016

Hiya! I have an equally exciting but possibly less surprising announcement. 

I've signed up for another year on the Simple Scrapper creative team!

I love being a part of Simple Scrapper. Jennifer's resources and toolkits are just perfect for this nerdy planner girl who likes to take time to think through what I want to accomplish, plan it out and then do it! 

I love the sketches. I like the story starters. I adore Spark Magazine! Some of my favorite layouts have come from these resources and some of my best planning comes from events like Refresh, when I stop to take a minute to think about where my focus should be. 

Here are the January pages I submitted for the 25th issue of Spark! 

I had fun with this cheeky page about my "puppy daddy". Really it was just an excuse to scrapbook cute puppy photos. She was so tiny! I don't even remember her being that small and it was just a short time ago.

I used two different Studio Calico lines and Elle's Studio stamps for the page. I think the color combo is my favorite part of it!

The second page was all about my daily personal hygiene. Which the older I get, seems to become more involved! I took a photo of all of the products I use (or should use) on a daily basis. It's a lot!

The Simple Scrapper sketch I based the page off of called for circles of patterned paper. But I decided to use photos instead. I event staged my own little photo shoot to get the images. I also have more journaling tucked underneath the main photos.

These two ended up being some of my latest favorite pages! And this last one was definitely not something I would have documented, were it not for the Story Starters for the month.

I'm excited to spend another year on the Simple Scrapper team. Next week is the first Refresh of the year. Click over to read more about the fun (planner nerd fun) we'll be having!

cheers & besos,

Golden Hour

This was such a fun page to make! The technique was super simple and thanks to this particular cut, it had a huge impact! I blogged this "technique" over on the Scrapbook Circle blog. Head over there for more on it and this page.

cheers & besos,

Cat in the Window

Happy Saturday darling readers! I'm so excited to have nothing to do this weekend. Therefore, I get to do whatever I want! Muahahahaha!!! The power has gone to my head. I intend to scrapbook and clean and organize, maybe get a foot massage. The possibilities are endless.

I'm going to relish these next few weeks because come September, I'll be back on my travel wagon. It's 2-3 different cities/countries a month for me. I both love and loath that kind of schedule. Either way I see a very tired Jamie at the end of it.

But enough about me, just wanted to share that I blogged over on the Scrapbook Circle blog today. Head that ways for more about this page.

cheers & besos,

Two Pet Household

We just got back from a weekend with my parents in San Anotnio. It was Dixie's first road trip and I think it was a success. I have a super sleepy puppy passed out on the floor as a result. That's saying something. She got to run around in a huge backyard, jump in and out of a kiddy pool, play with another little dog. Yeah, I'd say it was a success.

Meanwhile, Mac was home alone for the night. I'm sure she relished the quiet and the peace, if only for a little while. It's weird to now be at this place, thinking about two creatures instead of just one. Making sure both are healthy and happy, considering each's specific needs. It's exhausting! At least for now. I'm certain it will get better as Dixie ages. And as she and Mac continue to figure each other out.

Since scrapbooking is my therapy, I made this page talking a little bit about what life is like in a two pet household.

I used a Simple Scrapper sketch and some of the Seven Paper Baxter collection. I love the fun bright colors paired with black and white.

The border ended up being a happy accident. I "finished" the page and then place it on top of a pile of patterned paper. Not perfectly, so you could still see the pile underneath. On top was this cream and black diagonal stripe from Crate Paper (I ordered 4 sheets of it bc I thought it was so awesome). Seeing just the ends of it peaking out like that made the page look more complete somehow. So I glued it on top and cut off the excess.

I loved all of the positive messages from the Hey Girl stamp set by Mama Elephant. I thought they would work so well on this page, since we're needing a big dose of positivity up in here. These two girls are exhausting! But totally worth it.

cheers & besos,