Tag You're It!

It's been ever such a long time since I participated in a challenge (at least, not one that I wasn't on the Design Team for, or affiliated with in some way) so it was so refreshing to be able to carve out a bit of time this weekend to play along with the Tag You're It! Challenge.

Here's what I made:

The idea of the challenge is pretty easy. Simply take some inspiration from the example tag that is posted and make your own version of it. My inspiration came from the general way the tag was assembled... some stenciling in the background, a cluster of background leaves and flourishes, and a brightly coloured focal point to catch your attention. 

I make my own tag cutouts using the Sizzix Framelits Tag Die Set by Tim Holtz, and my layered hummingbird is also a Sizzix Die Set, called 'Free Bird' (which just so happens to be on sale I noticed!)

I asked my daughter Moriah if she wanted to create alongside me and participate in a challenge too and she was so excited! This is what she made:

She made all the design and colour decisions herself, I only helped with the cutting out. She chose the Sizzix Wild Hedgerow Die for her glittery leafy branch, and the Sizzix Gerbera Set for her flower.
She was thinking of her older sister when she picked out the sentiment sticker! ;-)

Not bad for a 7 year old hey?!

Thanks for the challenge Tag You're It! Me and Moriah both loved playing along!!

The Story of Society 52

Can I have the privilege of introducing you to Society 52? Or perhaps you've heard of them already? They're a reasonably new Instagram challenge site run by Maggie Massey and Sarah Bargo and they post a new challenge every week. People are encouraged to put together their layout, card or other project after the prompt is posted each Monday. Then the fun really begins when a 'twist' criteria is announced on the Thursday and you need to try and incorporate it as well!

 

This week I'm lucky enough to be contributing as the Guest Designer and I'm pretty stoked about that! This is the page I put together after I thought long and hard about the challenge. Can you work out what it might have been? ;-)

So many possibilities right? I mean, for a start you have to try and figure out what kind of tags you're going to use - whether they be shipping tags, proper patterned paper tags (like on those cut-apart sheets) or price tags like I've used. I decided on those mainly because I've had this bundle in my stash for absolutely forever and they've rarely been used. But now I've done it! Most of them made it onto this layout :-)

Using the price tags like this was what then inspired me in my subject matter. Last year I finally invested in a dSLR which is obviously quite an expensive outlay. Whilst I'm still a very VERY long way from knowing how to use it properly, it's been such an improvement in the quality of photos I take that it's been totally worth it.

 

 Lucky for me the twist this week was something I find quite easy...

You all know how much I love my stars! So once again it came down to what kind of stars I wanted to use, because my choices there are quite vast :-) So whilst my layout was put together with the fun colours of the Penny Arcade Main Scrapbook Kit, I chose the acetate stars from the Smalls Add On (from the Sandlot release) because they were large and festive and just seemed to match a bit better. 

It's been so fun to see a few familiar faces joining in on the Society 52 challenges recently. A few more would be even better, so what do you say? Feeling inspired? :-)

Happy scrapping!
xx

The Story of the New Washing Machine

Yes folks, it just keeps on getting more and more exciting around here doesn't it? First I enthralled you with the tale of the head-lice, and now it's all about the new laundry appliances. Rivotting blogging hey?!

As any good housewife would know (not that I am one. Neither a housewife, nor a good one!) it's essential to have a functioning washing machine. And when your ol' faithful packs it in and calls it a day it's important to replace it as soon as possible!

Because washing clothes is one of those chores that really simply must get done every single day. Especially with young kids who potentially go through 2 or 3 changes of clothes a day.
Wash, rinse, spin. Repeat.
That's why I knew documenting this monotonous daily activity was going to be perfect for the My Mind's Eye Groundhog Day Challenge. In the movie he keeps repeated the same thing over and over, and so that's what I wanted to scrap about. Something that I do every day.

Firstly I thought about going to work and all the stuff I do there. Then I realised that delivering babies is really quite exciting.... and plus I don't think the photos from my point of view are really scrapbook worthy ;-) But just as important is the home-me. The me who looks after our family. Who cooks (sometimes) and cleans and bathes and feeds and cuddles and puts-ice-packs-on and screams at them and loves them whole-heartedly and ..... washes their clothes.
Every Single Day.

 

It's still supposed to be a bright and happy topic so I used my favourite MME collection - Alphabet Soup, with a good sprinkling of Lost and Found thrown in too. 

Now I know I have missed out on blogging here in a little while. But I've been around! Yesterday my first Evalicious blog post went up. It's another 8.5 x 11" page documenting Munchy losing her first tooth. Check it out here. 

And I've also got a video tutorial up on the Scrap Friends blog all about how to incorporate stamps and ink techniques into your pages. You can see it here.

Plus, I'm gearing up for the excitement that's coming by this little blog of mine on the weekend. Chooo choo!!

The Story of Jumping Hurdles

Told you it wouldn't be long before I joined in more of the fun and games for the Olympic challenges happening on the Jenni Bowlin forum!

This the layout I created inspired by "Hurdles". How you say?! Well I don't have a lot of sporty photos to scrap (my girls are too young, and lets just be honest... I'm not the athletic type!) so I had to think outside the square when it came to scrapping a page inspired by an Olympic event.

So I thought I would scrap a page about all the 'hurdles' Munchy has had to jump in her first year at school. You know, all those new things to learn, reading and writing, maths, music, art... phew! Specifically this is about the aptitude test she had at the beginning of the year so her teacher could help determine what level she was at in order to help maximise her learning.

Given I didn't have a photo of her actually sitting her test I used this photo which highlights her ability and creativeness. Can you believe she sat down one day with a sheet of butcher paper, a ball of wool and some album packaging and assembled her own guitar?! I love this! My daughter amazes me!

Lots of Jenni Bowlin goodies on this page of course. I'm so glad I actually plucked up the courage to cut into my letter stencil paper that I had been hoarding up until now! Then there's the butterflies, banners and buttons. Love my JBS :-)

You can see in this pic where I hid all my journaling. I made a little flap with the photo on top which allowed lots of space for all my thoughts, whilst hiding them away so it doesn't sound like I'm boasting. Because she passed with flying colours I have to say! LOL!

The Story of a Momentous Occasion

I'm pretty sure I didn't appreciate the Olympics nearly enough when they were on. I watched quite a number of events in bits and pieces, but I did not spend hours and hours in front of the TV (like some people I know!! LOL!)

One thing I did (and continue) to appreciate though is the Olympic challenges that are going on all month on the Jenni Bowlin forum. Last weekend was the Swim Medley Relay challenge where a new set of instructions on what to include on your layout was posted each day for 4 days.

Ultimately it came down to making a background with a messy medium (think ink, paint, gesso.... or at least I did!), including some butterflies, buttons and something tied, and then whatever else you wanted to include. I had such fun creating my background layers, and I finally managed to cut into some old-school JBS butterfly paper I had been hoarding forever :-)

I must have been still chanelling some purple vibes from my last layout as I found myself adding some splashes of lavender shades. And to fit with the theme of momentous occasions in time I finally managed to scrap about what we were doing at 11:11am on the 11th November 2011...... I'm only 9 months late!

As you can see, we weren't actually doing anything very exciting - just travelling back to Melbourne for a wedding after dropping the kids off to stay with their grandparents. Bt still.. it was a moment captured, and therefore worth documenting.

I'm planning on participating in more of the Olympic challenges which are running until the end of the month. All the details are on the JBS forum here if you're interested in joining?

I'm Feeling Krafty!

Wooooo hooooo for being on holidays!!
I managed to make it into my scrap room for long enough yesterday to whip up a page for the current challenge at Kraft it Up.

I haven't done so much Christmas scrapping in ages. In fact, I guess it's been about a year...... hmmm..... alright so I didn't think that through very well *LOL*

As per the challenge guidelines this page is about one of my favourite Christmas traditions, and that's the big Christmas lunch we have at our in-laws. Turkey, ham, cold chicken and plenty of roast vegetables, plus pavalova, cheesecake and Christmas pudding of course. All washed down with a few bubbles!

 

I took this photo at last year's Christmas lunch. It's Munchy with her great-grandparents. I just know this is going to be a treasured photo in years to come so I thought it vitally important to get it scrapped, along with the memories of the moment.

I'm just loving the non-traditional colours for my Christmas pages this year. I wanted to make this one very white and kraft because I'm really digging that combo lately, but I couldn't help but throw some pink into the mix as well. And I already had these accordian flowers sitting around from when I swiped them at my cousin's wedding last weekend. It sure made my page faster!!

As simple as 'ABC'

I like to find the positive side of life. I'm a glass-half-full kind of girl. So if there's one good thing to say about letting go of some of my DT comittments then it has to be that it allows me more time to play along with challenges, and to get through some of my accumulating stash :-)

I was instantly drawn to the current challenge on the My Mind's Eye blog this month. I'm sure you can see why. Here's the sketch.......

Look at all that room for journaling!!! Wooo hoo! I love telling the stories of life on my pages - the daily happenings, the funny quotes from my kids, my thoughts and emotions, the things I'll want to remember later on. Rather than just the date and place the photo was taken.

Along with the sketch, the journaling prompt was "Back to _______"
I pondered on that one a bit until I came up with this page which records my thoughts on Munchy needing speech therapy classes. I didn't plan any of my journaling ahead of time. When it came to adding it, I just picked up my pen and started writing.

I called it 'Back to Basics' because that's what we're really focusng on with her speech. We're practicing her pronounciation and phonetics of speech. Lots of guidance and 'repeat after me' exercises, encouraging her to shape her mouth and where to place her tongue..... that sort of thing. And it's working! She's making great gains, and is sooooo diligent for a 4 year old. She hardly ever complains about the practice, and is very proud of herself when she learns how to say a new word properly.

Of course, I used lots of My Mind's Eye products here. A mix and match jumble of some of their older lines like So Sophie and Alphabet Soup papers, with some newer brads and stickers from Stella and Rose.

Happy days :-)

These are the days

 of Miracle and Wonder for these two beautiful cherubs of mine. Where everything is new and amazing, and discoveries are made on a daily basis.

We were given a mini herb garden for Christmas and Munchy decided that she wanted to taste every herb in the pot. Moodles of course will follow wherever Munchy leads so she was all for it too.

Not sure it was quite what she was expecting. But a new adventure nonetheless.

I'm using the gorgeous Candy Shoppe kit from Studio Calico, focusing mainly on the pinks in the kit and balancing it against the whites. Why you might ask?.......

The criteria at White With One this month is to use white, bright pink and artisan shapes/products. I think there was some confusion as to what the latter actually meant. I think they meant the curly bracket type label shape which I've used to write my journaling on. But some people took it to mean the Artisan products that Pink Paislee released last year. So I included a few of those for good measure too!

Everything and the Girl

Getting some more challenges out of my system. And scrapping some photos that have been in my pile for a  while now.

The February 1,2,3 Challenge is...
the colour cream
the word "about"
and the technique of upcycling which means "the practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater use and value"

Talk about a challenging challenge :-) The kind I like best!

So I pulled out a bunch of cream embellishments I had and only a few papers (I didn't really have many of those) but I figured I could always paint them cream. And went to to town, trying to incorporate as much texture as I possible could, because in my mind that's how you tackle a monochromatic layout. If you can't create interest with colour then you need to create interest with dimension :-)

I used a few vintage items on this layout like the music paper, lace trims, old buttons etc, but I'm not sure they strictly fulfil the criteria of upcycling. For that I used a technique of 'plastic fusion' to create the sheer butterflies you see above, and the white frilly flower in the embellishment cluster out of old plastic bags.

But I'll tell you all about that next time........!!!!

May You Stay

Paper: Jenni Bowlin Studios, Basic Grey Curio, Cosmo Cricket Togetherness, Sassafras Indie Girl.

Alphas: Cosmo Cricket. Embellishments: Sassafras Indie Girl banner stickers, Scenic Route chipboard, 

clear envelope, Jenni Bowlin journaling stickers, buttons, pearls. 

Other: Mister Huey 'Calico White', Maya Mist 'silver plated'

The song "Forever Young" by Bob Dylan has some really lovely lyrics don't you think?
Don't worry, I didn't really know them before now either. But they're the challenge prompt at Get Picky this month so they were all written out for me to be inspired by.

But instead of just taking one line of the song, or the title (which would have been easy too) I just decided the whole song would make beautiful journaling so copied it en masse onto my layout! The lyrics could easily have been written by a mum to her young child and talk about all her hopes and prayers for her future. At least that's how I've interpreted them for my layout :-) 

I titled my layout "Listen to my Heart", a bit like the Roxette song "Listen to your Heart" since I was in the zone of interpreting songs for my page. It fit perfectly because this really is my heart for my Little Moodles (and plus, it also fit the criteria for the challenge at Bird is the Word!!!)

I used my favourite white and silver mists to spray some subtle stars in the background. They really are a lot more subtle than this to look at straight-on, but I was trying to capture the shimmer for you here :-) This was in response to my favourite line in the song which says "May you build a ladder to the stars And climb on every rung"