Snow Day - Shimelle

WINTER is coming. Yep, I said it, and now it's full on here. We have been so lucky in our city as it hasn't really been cold. If you didn't know, I am from Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada.  We are known across the country for our cold winters. We are known as Winterpeg. HA!

As I type this, it is snowing big fluffy flakes outside, and really, it is about time.  As much as I don't like the snow, I really don't mind it either. It is just here so darn long!

Because it gets do darn cold, we don't actually venture outside enough to take photos most of the time. Winter photos are pretty rare here, which is pretty strange.

I managed to have one of my daughter on a "warmer" winter day last winter and decided to use it for a challenge on the Shimelle blog on "snowflakes"

I used the Frozen Windowpanes cut file from my digital cut file store - JustNick studio for this page. I like the modern rounded snowflake look and wanted to use that with some non traditional winter colors on my page.

 

You can see that I backed most of the cut file with various pink and blue toned papers, along with some vellum in spots too. I like leaving some empty spaces on cut files like this one, so that background pops through a little.

I added some tags and smaller diecuts along the top of my page, adding a title and some glittery asterisks from a Thicker set. They seemed to remind me of small snowflakes.

I really love how it all came together. Filling a background like this one is a little time consuming, but I love the result in the end.

I really must try to remember to get outside more this winter on the days that I am able ! Snow is quite pretty and I need to take advantage of that more!

What we love about Lucas - Shimelle

Hello! Anyone out there? I took a bit of a break from blogging and only posted my projects on Instagram or Facebook, but wonder if that works for people? It's a tricky slope for me, wondering if people do read blogs anymore.. or are we saturating our social media "feeds" too much with scrappy stuff? I don't know.. what do you think?

At any rate, I have a project to share with you today as part of my catch up that I made for the as one of the contributing designers for the Shimelle blog. Our topic was all about embossing... and this is what I came up with!

I used one of the papers in the True Stories collection for most of this layout. Well, I ended up with more, but the intention was to use that one sheet - it's a multi color thicker striped paper  green/blue - and that  was it. In the end, I usually add more! HA!

As you can see, I trimmed that paper up into strips and then embossed the different colors with two different embossing folders - both polka dots to they work well together, but different sizes to make it a little more interesting. I added in some polka dot papers with other colors in there, to bring in a little of that red from my photo. I added some simple journaling strips to each of my embossed strips and then added some small embellishments throughout.

I added a really simple title along the top of my strips and LOVE those black thickers. Foam thickers are my favorite alpha by far. Chipboard is nice, but always falls off :(

That's it for me today! I hope you are a little inspired to add a little embossing to your next project !

Shimelle- Outdoor Travel theme

Let's talk outdoors. Over on the Shimelle blog, we were challenged all about using those outdoor photos. For me, quite the challenge.

Truth is, those photos can be sometimes quite busy and not super attractive to scrapbook right? But the memories are still what they are and deserve to be captured! I tried to come up with a different way to do just that... and so this is the result:

I diecut some large letters on my Silhouette Cameo and then backed them with photos instead of paper! The result is something unique and kind of fun. 

I wanted to include little bits of journaling so I typed some up and then added it below several fussy cut polaroid frames from and earlier Shimelle collection.

Here is how it all came together:

That's it for me! Thanks as always for popping by!

Shimelle Back to School theme

Good Morning!

I had a project up over on the Shimelle blog for a back to school theme and thought I would share it with you now!

I really love the idea of using comparison photos of the first day/last day of school for a base for the back to school theme. It is a great way to show the entire school year in a few snapshots for your album. I also love the idea of using 2 colors to contrast on the page to highlight each part of the school year, like I did on my page.

I kept everything similar on both sides of the page, swapping out blue for green, etc. It's a pretty clean and simple design for this page but allows me to fit in both photos and even a little bullet journaling from my boys' perspective on grade 5.

Overall, I really like the simple look that came together on this page! Super easy and a great way to really show how big he has gotten this past year... now he is off to middle school and totally ready for it!

Thanks for stopping in today!

Shimelle inspiration weekend!

This past weekend we hosted a ton of inspiration based challenges over at Shimelle.com! Each contributor had to choose one layout from the Shimelle Scrapbook like a Hero group on Facebook and lift it!

I chose this layout by Cathy Martin

I chose to lift the basic background design for this page. I loved the graphic quality of the background and it is really simple to create! I switched up the colors and patterns, using lots of papers by Shimelle for the background.

I chose to add my title right under my photos to focus everything to the center of the page, rather than go on an angle like Cathy did on her piece.

Then, I simply added a bunch of Shimelle and Amy Tangerine embellies around my layered photo grouping to finish off the page!

I really like how this one turned out and quite quickly too!

Thanks Cathy for letting me use your page and my inspiration and have a scrappy day!

Hello + some Shimelle!

Hello hello! It has been a while since I posted on my blog. It seems summer has started and I just haven't made my blog a priority lately. Sorry for those that are regular readers, I hope to rectify that!


I am popping in to share a page that hit the Shimelle blog yesterday. This week's challenge is all about using hand cut elements. I love the hand cut title look, so here is my take on this challenge:

I have used hand cut letters before, but this time I decided to use the empty space for my title instead of the positive letters one would normally create! I love the large impact it makes on the page.. and quite simply too. A great way to add in lots of color.

I used some foam adhesive to pop the letters off the page slightly for a more dimensional look, and before I did that, I added a tiny bit of stitching to each letter.

Stop by the Shimelle blog and check out this week's challenge and play along!

Make sure you link up so we can see how you took on this challenge.

Shimelle - Boy week

This week's challenge on the Shimelle blog is all about BOYS!

Unfortunately, scrapping by boys takes a back seat, for a few reasons. Mainly, they don't have the patience with me to take their photos right now at their age. Those tween/teen years are tough on a photo taking mama! So, I am mainly left with a lot of action type of photos, which isn't in my normal style to scrapbook.  I took this as a challenge for this project to get some of those things to paper so to speak.

I started with this series of photos of my sporty son fooling around on his skateboard in our front driveway. I printed them off to 3x4 size each  and added foam adhesive to the back of the one photo of him looking directly at the camera.

I used a few different cut files for this page from my digital cut file store JustNick. First, the Graphic Chevron background, that I altered slightly to be more repetitive and also the Sk8er cut file because, well, it is totally appropriate for these photos!

Scrapping boys doesn't have to be difficult, I chose more graphic designs for my page that took a lot of the "prettiness" away, but the soft yellow and minor pops of pink that I snuck in there soothe my girly side :)

I finished off the page with some harder embellishments that feel more masculine - metal clips and wood enamel dot buttons, along with diecut star shapes from my All Boy cut file

I really like how this one came together! It isn't overly boyish, and that cut file background is one of my new favorites!

Shimelle - Precious Posessions

This week over on the Shimelle blog, we are taking about precious possessions. For my post on the blog today, I decided not to scrap about something that has a monetary value as my precious possession, rather a way to capture a collection of special items you may have kicking around your home too!

I chose to scrap about a project that I found in the collection of MANY projects my daughter has in her crafting area. A cute little about me book, with her own thoughts on herself (she is 7) and a few photos that she snagged from my extras pile.

I started by taking some photos of the project to use for my page, I did have to take the book apart, but put it all back when I was done :)

I chose to use each page of hers as a photo on mine. I printed them pretty small, but will include the actual words on the backside of my layout for easier reading.

Quite simply, I left the design of the page pretty simple - adding a grid of photos and large alpha letters for my design, using a quote from her little book as the title of the page. I suck at titles, so this was a good idea to me! lol

All in all, I like how this turned out! I was able to capture some journaling too (gasp) as I rarely do, but I managed to get everything I wanted on the page because of the simple grid pattern.

That's it for me today! I hope you are inspired to get some of those kids projects documented... I will likely do this more often, and toss out those that are piling up around my house. It is like honouring their artwork by making a page all about them!

Shimelle - Let's talk vellum!

Hello hello! Today's theme over at Shimelle is all about working with vellum. I love using vellum, it adds such a soft feeling to projects and so mixing with baby photos was a perfect combo for me on this page.

I used some yellow vellum in replacement of patterned paper, layered it over other paper and even cut some apart and popped it up, using buttons and glitter hearts to hide my adhesive!

I love how a simple circle of vellum looks layered over this doily with a chipboard piece added to cover the adhesive.

Are you ready to take on this week's challenge and use some vellum from your stash??? Check out all the challenge details at Shimelle.com today and play along.

Shimelle - phone photos!

I had a project up over on the Shimelle blog last week and thought I would take an opportunity to share it with you today, in case you haven't seen it!

The topic was all about using phone photos. Truth is for me, I use my phone ALL THE TIME. Rarely do I pull out my big girl camera (which is not even that big) to take photos, and usually it is just to take pictures of layouts :)

The great thing about using your phone is that it is totally accessible. If you are like me, it is always with you and I catch a lot more candid shots than I would have if I was using my actual camera.

We also touch on the subject of using apps for our photos - resizing and filters and all that. I use a few, but mainly I use the app PicFX for both. I wouldn't say I edit every photo that I print, but I often use this app to simply resize the photos for printing if I know that I am going to want something smaller than 4x6.

That's it for me today! Thanks so kick for stopping by! 

Shimelle weekly challenge - Monochromatic!

This week on the Shimelle blog, the challenge is to use a monochromatic colour scheme. 

This is what I came up with using some of the new Shimelle Starshine collection:

I find a lot of inspiration from mixing different colours and so the thought of just using one was a bit of a challenge for me until I broke it down into being just all about shading! Once I wrapped my head around the idea of using a monochromatic colour scheme, it was really just about shades of pink/red and not so much about using "one colour" anymore.

I used several different colours and patterns of pink/red in the Starshine collection and kept the lines clean by using small 1" squares of the different patterns and colours and arranging in a quilt like pattern to help mix up the various shades of pink/red in the collection!

That's it for me! Thanks for popping in :)