She

Hello Story has been one of my most favorite classes! I'm loving these story structures, and for the most part, I'm keeping up with the class. Here's a page made with last week's prompt. It's about the places I've been. 

It took awhile to build that list on the left hand side there, and it isn't even complete. I had to delete a few of the repeated places to make sure I had room for all of the cities. But I'm so glad I have at least a good start of a list all in one place!

I typed this up in PSE and printed it onto vellum before adding it to my page. I like that you can still see the cloud paper underneath it.

I was originally going to make an 8 1/2 x 11 page and so I printed the photo that wide. But then I grabbed this gorgeous paper and knew I wanted to show case as much of it as I could. So it stayed 12x12.

At the very beginning, I had this vision of a line of embellishments along one side. I dug into my stash of October Afternoon Travel Girl and Basic Grey Carte Postale embellishments to place along the line of the Freckled Fawn London Underground tape (eek, I love it a ton! but it looks like they don't have it anymore which is a total bummer)

I added my title directly to the photo using Photoshop Elements (font: Windsor Hand). It's this title that's part of the Hello Story prompt which is about 6 word stories.

I loved this totally random photo that I snapped while we were driving to Austin (note: I'm in the passenger side so definitely NOT driving!). I love the movement in the photo. I love the selfie that's not me smiling at my phone. I love the landscape. I love the reflections (I'm big on reflections!) It's a special photo that so perfectly conveys this title of adventure seeking.

This is part of a series of "She" layouts I've made. Here are two other layouts [She] [She]. They are some of my favorites. I think its the words. And really, most of them are about travel. It's my absolute favorite thing to do!

cheers & besos,

Castle Gazing

ETA: I picked the winner! Or rather random.org chose commentor No. 4. That's you Marina! Forwarding along the code now. Cheers!

I have 3 things to share today: a confession, a layout, a small giveaway.

Confession: I totally caved on my Product Free Summer challenge. I couldn't pass up the 20% off at Two Peas a few weeks back! I just couldn't. But I'm back on a spending freeze. Especially after the $1000 I just had to spend fixing my car (eeeek!!)

Layout: This page features a ton of that new product I ordered, lots from Basic Grey's new(er) Mint Julep line. I only got three things for this line: the 6x6 paper pad, the badges and the title sticker sheet. I feel like they'll get you pretty far. I like to get at least a few things from each line so that they'll coordinate with each other.

I picked this line for these photos because of all the blue in the Edinburgh photo. I loved the blue in that floral print. I also definitely wanted to use it for that "So very charming" sticker.

I made this as part of the Two Peas CHA [Four Nature Elements] Challenge. There's flowers, butterflies, birds and stars on this page.

It's also for the [Five Senses] Challenge. This page is all about the castle gazing I've been doing over the years. I hadn't realized it until this year, but every place I've visited in Europe the last few years, has included visits to local castles and palaces.

Week 1 of Hello Story was the starting point for this layout. It's a loose timeline and a series. I used those great Chic Tags for each, to include the date, the city and country and the castle.

I also added small white letter stickers to each photo, to include the place and date.

The rest is just fun details. Love those clear mint Heidi Swapp letters. Like love! The color and the texture are fabulous. Also love that they coordinated with the Mint Julep line so well.

And I had to throw in some gold for good measure. Everything these days, needs a dusting of gold. Glad I picked up the gold star paper clips as well.

So I made my confession and shared the layout. Now on to the giveaway.

Giveaway: This apparently is the summer of the classes. First Camp Scrap, then Hello Story and I also signed up for Toolbox at Studio Calico. They were running a promo and I get to give a friend the class for free. That's where all my bloggy friends come in. I thought I'd share the class with one of yall.

Just leave me a comment below, to share which of the 4 parts you're most interested in learning more about: digital elements, mixed media, stitching or mist. [ETA: Please leave an e-mail address if you don't have one linked in your profile!!]

For me, I'm sooo looking forward to Shana's digital tutorial. Her work has been so inspiring to me lately!

I'm only leaving this open until Tuesday, 30 July at 11:59pm EST. I'll announce and e-mail the winner as soon as I can on Wednesday, 31 July. Class starts Thursday, 1 August which is why this is such a short one. I want you to be able to be part of the whole class.

Off to Los Angeles tomorrow for work. It's my first visit and I'm so excited! I'll be updating as and when I can. Catch up with yall later!

cheers & besos,

First Video

My first video! I did it! And it was fun =) Not easy but still fun. Bear with me guys, this was my first ever video. I was having to learn iMovie this morning as I went along. But luckily it's pretty straight forward. And as I say in the video, apologies for the shaky cam! I'll work on it for next time.

Here's the Shimelle sketch I based my page off of:

...and some close-ups of the finished layout! 

Let me know what you think!

cheers & besos,

Know U, Love U

It's been awhile since we've baby sat Urijah. We've been so busy! And I'm still studying for the PMP Exam. But his Mama called to say they were moving to a new place and that it would be a huge help for us to have him, so I couldn't resist!

He's become such a big boy these days. We had a blast playing and hanging out at the apartment. Uncle Matt entertains him by wrapping him up in a blanket like a burrito. Or swinging him around by his ankles. I help him twirl and he thinks it's hilarious. 

Uncle Matt pretended he was a monster and Urijah would come running down the hall and throw himself into my arms, laughing and giggling. It fills my heart with joy, to see him having fun.

For this layout, I was so inspired by this design by Glitz. But the colors weren't working for these photos of Urijah. 

I loved the orange, teal and blue in his shirt and wanted to use them as the color scheme for this page. 

My Silhouette did the heavy lifting on this page. I die cut the letters (font is Langdon) in various patterned papers from one of the new Hello Boy Basic Gray paper pads I scored at Joann's. But the oranges were a bit too bright. So I cut out the letters in vellum and stapled them directly over top. It adds some depth as well as tone down the colors.

But once I was done with the page I couldn't get the design out of my head. So I created a new layout for a different scrapbook using the original design. I'm sharing it tomorrow so be sure to check back tomorrow!

cheers & besos,

It's my BIRTHDAY

It's my birthday! Today I'm 28. Late late twenties, eek!! But I'm excited! I've decided to not think about getting older, but instead focus on the privilege of reaching this new age.

I scrapped this photo of me blowing out the candle on my cake last year at dinner. It was a nice low key birthday with friends. It was also my golden birthday. You know, 27 on the 27th and all that. 

27 was a great year for me. I settled into my career, I got to reconnect with so many of my amazing friends and I traveled to some new fun places. Nothing major or life changing, but definitely lots of of good times.

For this page, I used my Studio Calico Road Show add-on along with the Central High main kit. And really just went for a primary color scheme. Nothing new or revolutionary, but I like how it turned out! I adored all of the little bits and baubs in this kit and had fun splashing them around the page.

28, I have some plans for you! Starting tomorrow first thing :) Check back to see the 28 Blog Hop!

cheers & besos,

BOYS Challenge Layouts

I've been stash busting lately and man does it feel good. The Blow out your Stash (BOYS) Challenges over on the Studio Calico message board are what's getting me through. They even helped me finish up my Japan pages.

This is for Challenge No. 6, the recipe one. I used brads, ribbons and twine, a stamped skyline (a new Kelly Purkey), letter stickers and asterisk cardboard thickers. Those asterisks were the best find, they're basically open triangles all pointing to the middle. It reminded me of the cross walk and all of the streets coming together at this one crossing.

Color color color!! This is for Challenge No. 4, the color one obviously. I cannot think of a better use of Amy Tangerine paper than for a layout about the Hirajuku district in Japan. It's definitely colorful. So happy I got to use these awesome products. They've been sitting around collecting dust!

I've been a Studio Calico subscriber off and on for 2 years now. Brooklyn Flea was one of the kits I missed out on when I cancelled my subscription. But lucky for me, the kit didn't sell out and was available for a deep discount at one of the Last Call sales. Hence, it was as yet unused.

For Challenge No. 1, I decided to get it out and cut into it. And as part of the challenge, I decided to lift a layout from Ali Edward's gallery. Her, You are so You, to be specific. I loved the look of those tags.

Finally, I tackled Challenge No. 2. I hand stitched and played with ribbon, trim, twine and fabric, all in one go!

I've always been a fan of challenges. They push to step away from my comfort zones and I always end up loving the results. Mainly because they're usually so different from my norm. What about you, do you use challenges for inspiration?

And, if you're in the market for some other fun challenges, please check out my 4 Challenges post. Two winners will each get a $10 gift voucher. Free money, new pages to add to your album or a new card to send to a friend, what's not to love?

cheers & besos,

Enoshima

Are you sick of Japan photos yet? I'm kind of getting there. But no! I must stay strong. I'm so close to being done! Bear with me if you please =)

So as not to get stale, I put the Summer of 69 kit away and just started to play. I found a few sheets of fun paper I hadn't yet bit into, this bamboo pattern from Amy Tangerine's first line and a strip of new Basic Grey. I decided to dress up the bamboo with random bits of tape to give that side of the layout some color.

It was definitely cloudy that day. We even got rained on! So I was happy to cut a bit out of the B side of the bamboo paper (then covered it up with my photos) and to bust out my ill used cloud punch.

"On a rainy day at Enoshima, Sarah, Andy and I did a bit of exploring. I tried some green tea & sweet potato ice cream and we walked up a ton of stairs to see the temple grounds. It was gloomy & we got rained on, but I'm happy I got to visit this quaint little sea side spot, only a few train stops from Zushi."

cheers & besos,

NSD: She

I went to town on some challenges this weekend. 

I love them. 

I like the parameters. 

I like trying new things. 

I like that my pages take twists & turns that I wouldn't get to on my own.

I had fun making this page. It's for the SC Sketch Challenge, Basic Grey Use a Photo taken with your Phone Challenge, 2Peas Chevron Challenge, and 2Peas Polaroid Challenge.

I had fun with the journaling. I was sitting at the bus stop a few weeks back, maybe even a month ago when I thought of this journaling. I used my phone to record it and have been waiting for the chance to stick it on a page. Figured this random bathroom shot could work.

Get ready, I have a ton more to share this week! It's good to be back at my scrapbook table =)

cheers & besos,

Sketchbook 4| No. 3

I know I'm biased when I say this, but Urijah is one cute kiddo! These photos have to be some of my favorites from this year.

MT & I went to pick Yaya Bear aka Urijah up for a play date last summer. We got to the house & he walked out to come with us to the car. BUT, not before he picked up his Aunt Amber's cat to take with us.

It was THE cutest thing I've seen all year! Even the way he was holding this real life cat was too cute. Pudgy baby arms kinda struggling to put his arms around her.

And that cat! Let me tell you, is one of the most patient and sweet animals I've ever seen. Chill doesn't even begin to describe it. She literally didn't squirm or try to get away once. Even after he kept putting her down to try to get a better angle & pick her back up again.

Even though Urijah doesn't talk, his actions speak volumes! That day he was telling us, "Ok Tia, I'll go with you but not without my cat. Let me grab her & then I'm ready to go!"

I had fun playing around with the elements of Sketch No. 3. I think I came up with something very different, but still within the parameters of the sketch.

I used the new Echo Park This & That collection that I picked up from Archiver's a few weeks back. I love love love the colors in it!

As to the tilted and off the page design, I have to credit this pin of a gorgeous quilt as my inspiration.

And just for fun, I thought I'd take a page off of soapHOUSEmama's blog & share the step by step process of creating this page.

First I gathered some products I thought might work for the page: Echo Park paper, Mister Huey, Kraft Cardstock, Basic Grey animal stamps, etc.

Then, I stamped and cut out this wee little guy. I think he's meant to be a tiger but he works as plain old tom cat too :)

I dropped some Studio Calico Mister Huey in white on the kraft background.

Then cropped my photos.

I thought they needed a bit of a border, so I ran my Adarondack Paint Dauber in Brown, along the sides.
I cut strips of patterned paper from each of the sheets and cut them down into squares & rectangles to hang off of the page.

Then I glued them down.
And then added a similar grouping on the top corner.

Next came my title + date stamp.

And then I added my journaling strips, printed on green tinted vellum.

I threw just a few embellishments onto this page, 2 buttons and that cute lil "kitten".

But the top felt a little heavy to me, so I used a border stamp & Versamark ink to help the weight balance.
And tada it's done! Thank you so much for visiting. I'm sure I'll be back with more Sketchbook 4 pages soon :)

cheers & besos,