Hello Handsome...

Well, if you are one of my American friends, you have hopefully by now recovered from the food coma that is Thanksgiving!  We had a wonderfully filling, quiet day with family where we all reflected on the many blessings we are thankful for.  I hope that each of you, whether you celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday or not, had a fabulous Thursday surrounded by those you love.

CSI has another great case file for you to solve this week, featuring a really unique color scheme that I found perfect for a more masculine page featuring none other than my better half. ;-)

Here is the case file:

And here is my take on it:

The journaling strips are actually straight, but because the strips are adhered to cardboard,
they curved the paper a bit making the strips look crooked. :-/

I started this page by cutting different patterned papers into various sized strips and then inking the edges.  I laid them all over a 12x12 piece of cardboard and adhered them to the page/covered them with Mod Podge.  Then I laid some more paper strips down horizontally, covered parts with Gesso and started layering stamps, fibers and scrap paper.  Really love the way these colors compliment the grainy black and white of the photo!

CLICK HERE to see what the rest of the design team came up with for this challenge, and come and play along with us!

Enjoy the weekend, friends. xoxo

Shawna

Love and Loss

While this blog is primarily for sharing paper crafting inspiration, it is also to highlight and showcase those I love and to preserve my memories of them and with them.  Today I need to share something else, though in essence it is the same.  This past weekend, I lost someone I loved in a tragic accident that left 3 children without a mother.  And left a husband without his wife.  My dear friend, Meagen, passed away on November 24th when the car she was a passenger in was hit by another vehicle.  Meagen and her family were returning from a breakfast out, in celebration of her daughter's second birthday.  Her children, ages 2, 10 and 14, and her husband, were all seriously injured and remain hospitalized.  Meagen was an incredible wife, friend, and mother.  

This is the time of year that we all reflect on who and what we are most thankful for, and one of the things I am most thankful for this year is that I had the opportunity to know such a beautiful soul and to have her in my life.  Meagen will be missed terribly and remembered lovingly.  The fact that life goes on is a brutal reality and in addition to the overwhelming task of recovering physically and mentally from this terrible accident and loss, Meagen's family will also have to deal with the monetary burden of funeral costs, medical bills, and the day-to-day expenses of life.  

On this Thanksgiving-Eve, I am reaching out to ask anyone that is able, to consider making a donation to the fund that has been set up to help Meagen's family cover the monetary costs of this tragedy.  100% of all funds raised go directly to the family.  Please CLICK HERE to donate.  

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this post.  Please keep the Patterson family in your prayers and thoughts this holiday season.

xoxo,

Shawna

It's Friday...and you know what that means!

Time for CSI's latest case file reveal!  This was one of my favorite color schemes from the past few weeks and I had a blast putting this layout together.

Here is the case file:

And here is my take on it.

All of the colors are there, though the greens are subtle and used in embellies.  For my evidence I chose butterflies and wood, and for my journaling I used the inspiration word "fly" and included the lyrics from a song by Dave Matthews Band called "You and Me."  For me, it perfectly captures the essence of the crazy ride of life that my husband and I are on together.

My favorite part of this layout is how the gelato drips naturally fell into what, to me, looks like two people, with the taller person's head bent down as if kissing the forehead of the shorter person.  I added a couple of wooden hearts to them to hopefully make them a little easier to "see." And now that I look again, I think it kind of looks like a person being held up like she's crowd surfing in the taller drips.  LOL  I swear, I haven't had a drop of wine as I write this...

The embellishments are a mix of a bunch of stuff I had in my stash - some October Afternoon Travel Girl from a previous month's Citrus Twist Kit, some Maya Road wooden squares from a prior month's Birds of a Feather Kit Co. kit, some Yellow Bicycle canvas butterflies, and some Tim Holtz stamps.  A little bit of this, and a little bit of that! :)

Thanks for stopping by and having a look.  I hope you will come play along and solve this week's case file!

Have a fabulous weekend!

Challenge YOUrself!

I posted the other day about a great new challenge blog that provides the ultimate challenge...scrapping yourself!  Well, I've joined up with some seriously talented ladies to tackle these challenges head on and I'm proud to say that I will be on the design team for Challenge YOUrself!

Stepping out from behind the camera and into the picture is something I know many scrappers struggle with. But it's something that's so important.  Afterall, scrapbooking is all about leaving behind your story for generations to come, isn't it?  Aren't you part of that story?  Come join us and play along. Challenges come out once a month, on the 7th, and you have a whole month to get your layout ready and linked up.

Click here to go to the Challenge YOUrself blog and follow it.  And stay tuned for the reveal of the very first challenge, December 7th.  It's going to be a great one. Hope to see you all over on the blog!

xoxo

Show your face!

Are you one of those scrappers who are always behind the camera, never in the photos??  While you are documenting your family's story, who is documenting YOUR story?

Now is your chance to step in front of the camera and tell your story.  There's a great new challenge blog called Challenge YOUrself and they will be posting their first challenge on December 7th.  The whole premise of the challenges will be to scrap yourself.  Talk about a challenge, eh?  :)

Here's a link to the blog.  Bookmark it, follow it, and make a resolution to show your face and tell your story!

PS:  Challenge YOUrself is in the midst of a design team call and taking submissions until November 20th.  Details on how to apply are below.  Also, when you stop by the blog, make sure to enter for a scrappy supply giveaway!

DT call requirements:

→ Term commitment from Dec 1st, 2013 - May 31st, 2014

→ Keep an active blog and update with the new challenge on reveal day with a link back to the Challenge YOUrself blog.

→ You will be required to submit one layout a month and to comment on all submissions to the challenge.  Reveal day will be on the 7th of each month.

→ No design team experience necessary.  Everyone is welcome to apply.

How do you apply:

Send an email to scrap-challenge-yourself@hotmail.com with the following information:

→ Your name and blog address

→ A short bio that will be used on our blog if chosen

→ 3 samples of your work

We are accepting applications until November 20th, 2013.  New members will be informed by November 21th, 2013.  First reveal is scheduled for December 7th, 2013.

Citrus Twist Sunday Sketch - Selfies

Good morning!  Today I'm sharing a layout I made from Kasia's Sunday Sketch over on Citrus Twist.  For this layout I used bits and pieces of kits from past months, and threw in some great feather doodles from Leann Pearce over at ScrapFriends.

Here's the sketch:

And here's my layout:

I stayed pretty close to the sketch, with the exception of the circle clusters.  I really liked the simple design and think it was the perfect design to showcase a few mother daughter silly selfies.

Like many of my layouts these days, I started out with a couple of Heidi Swapp mists (teal and mustard) that I focused on the lower right corner and overlapped to get a minty color in the middle.  I chose some patterned paper for the base, adhered the photos to black cardstock, and stuck another piece of white cardstock between the photos and the patterned paper for contrast.

I printed out the doodled feathers on white cardstock and colored them in with red, yellow and orange gelatos.  Then I outlined them with a black sharpie to make them pop a bit and colored an American Crafts basic white frame to match.

Love this mint green paper clip arrow from last month's kit.

That's it!  Today is the last day to upload your sketch-inspired creations to the Citrus Twist gallery, but be on the lookout tomorrow, when the new Sunday sketch is revealed.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

CSI CF#98 - Our Family

Case #98 is live over on CSI and it has spectacular colors and some really great testimony prompts…check out the case file below and click here to play along!

  

And here is my take on it.  I chose wood and clock from the evidence list and for my testimony I used the inspiration word "dream" and tucked my journaling behind the photo on the right.

The background is modeling paste applied over a mask, with sections sponged yellow.  Then I spritzed some Heidi Swapp teal mist, and added some Ranger purple mist under the photos.  Then I just loaded on the embellishments and called it done. :)  Here are some close-ups:

Thank you again for visiting me! xoxo

Triple share - a "just for fun" layout and a 2-project BOAF reveal!

Good morning!  Today I have a few projects to share - the first is a "just for fun" layout I made that isn't for an design team work or challenge entry.  I snapped this awesome picture of my daughter that has just been begging to be scrapped, and the photo feels funky and artsy to me so I thought I would try to recreate a kind of impressionist background that mimicked the view she was looking at outside the window.  I came across this awesome pin on Pinterest that gave me the courage to try to make an abstract cityscape.  Here's what I came up with.

Lots of doodles added to make everything pop out against the water color background...and these white modeling paste chevrons have really gotten some mileage on my layouts lately.  I am going to have to make another batch!

I'm also up on the Birds of a Feather blog today sharing a layout and card I made using the November kit (which is packed with Heidi Swapp goodness, among other things).  Remember when crowns were all the rage in scrapbooking a few years back? (okay...so maybe it's been more than a few years...I'm getting old.) Anyway, I'm kickin' it old school for this layout! The crown here was too perfect to pass up.  And the Heidi Swapp Good Life paper plays right into my love for fussy cutting and quite a bit of cutting I did.  I pulled the crown, the camera, the silhouette and the star from the circles on the back side of the paper then layered them up over gelatos, inks and mists.  Then I used Heidi Swapp rub-on stars and added some of my own vellum punched stars and some stars made with a stencil mask and modeling paste.  I also layered the scraps from the vellum used for the stars and popped it behind the photo.  The bottom border is washi tape.  

For the card below, I used some more of the vellum star scraps, and punched out the world circle from the Heidi Swapp paper, using the scrap layered underneath.  I hole punched the main cardstock and added the royal blue card stock on the inside of the card.  The letters are October Afternoon.

Thanks so much for stopping by...your visits and comments make my day!  

Awesome giveaway over at ScrapFriends!

Who doesn't love free scrapbooking goodies??  ScrapFriends is hosting a giveaway where you can win all of these fab goodies by doing the most simple of things.  Click here to follow the ScrapFriends blog and check out the giveaway details.  (I'm totally entering, by the way...so yeah I wish you good luck...but I hope my luck is better.  Muahaha!) ;-)

Here's how to enter (Note that you don't have to have a blog - in lieu of a blog post about the giveaway you can post the deets to Facebook or Twitter!):

1. Become a Follower of our blog (if you don't have a blog, feel free use your Facebook/Twitter account)                                                                                                  
2. Leve a link to this post and photo of this candy on your blog, Facebook/Twitter or Social Network.
3. Please add your entry  with a DIRECT LINK to your blog post about this giveaway (not your blog)  via 
   button below, before 23 p.m. Brisbane  (Australia) on December 15. 
4.  Anyone can enter!

{you can also grab our button in our left sidebar} 

{Entries which fail to observe the above will be removed and will not qualify for the prize draw.}

The winners will be identified via random selection from http://random.org and announced on December 18, 2013.

Good luck!

CSI CF# 97 - The Best Cross Eyes

I don't know how she mastered it at such an early age, but man...my kid can cross-eye like no other.  ;-)

This week's case file over at CSI is full of gorgeous color and, being the 2nd week of the month, comes with a fabulous sketch by Emma Stafrace.  I had a lot of fun creating this layout, which compliments the "Memories" layout I posted last week.  Here is the case file:

And here is my layout.  I went for my modeling paste to spruce up the background a bit (I seem to be using modeling paste almost as frequently as gelatos lately!), and tried to layer up lots of texture to match the woodsy background of the to photo.  The papers are a mix of a little bit of everything I had in my scraps, and the little stitched heart, the feather and the awesome textured ribbon are from Citrus Twist kits of months past.

Thanks for stopping by - I appreciate the visits! xoxo  Have a fabulous weekend!

CF#96...and my CSI Design Team Debut!

I am still pinching myself over having made the Color Stories Inspiration design team...such an honor!  This week's case file is an awesome one, with bold colors that look amazing together.  Here is the case:

I chose to make the black my dominant color, using it as my background paper.  It has been a long time since I have created a layout against a black background and it was a refreshing change.  Here is my layout:

For evidence, I used paint and a frame.  For testimony, I journaled about the duals that are sure to come in the later years as my daughter grows into a teen.  It is written on the pull-out card and reads:

I'm not so naive that I believe our duals will always end with fits of giggles and hugs and kisses.  You are your mother's daughter, and that's a double-edged sword...you have my stubborn streak and my determination, both of which will likely cause us to butt heads often when you hit your teen years.  When that time comes, I will draw upon this memory an remember the love and lightheartedness; the prophecy of standoffs to come.  And we will get through it...and maybe even giggle, just a little.  

Here are a couple of close-ups:

These moments...

Happy Friday, everyone!  Hope you all survived Halloween and the inevitable sugar craze that hits the kiddos halfway through trick or treating. ;-)

Here's a layout I did just for fun using a fabulous photo taken by my very talented photographer friend, Heather.  This was one of those layouts where I just grabbed a little bit of everything and loaded the page up with it.  I love this quote by Thich Nhat Hanh - so incredibly true!

Thank you for stopping by.  Your visits and comments mean a lot.  Enjoy the weekend!