S365-7 Touch the Sky

Have you checked out the new CSI/Scrap365 collaborative case file?  CLICK HERE to check it out and to see the rest of the CSI design team's inspiration.

I was super excited to be chosen as a featured artist in the August/September issue of Scrap365 with my take on cracking the case. Scrap365 is an awesome magazine chock full of paper crafting inspiration from all over the world.  CLICK HERE to pick up your copy.  And man, I have to say, there is just nothing cooler than seeing your work displayed in the pages of a magazine. I was over the moon when I received my copy! Here is how I cracked the case.

For my evidence, I chose hot air balloons and birds. I decided to try my hand at a sort of Steampunk style for this layout, incorporating lots of vintage details and cogs and gears.  I layered up the background with a marbled mask from Prima, 7 Gypsies stamped hot air balloons, Tim Holtz birds, and a The Crafter's Workshop cog mask, which I brushed modeling paste over.  Then I stamped some more hot air balloons, colored them with Tim Holtz distress inks, and laminated them with Mod Podge, layering them over the stamped balloons with 3-D pop dots.

I had some great suitcase papers (can't remember who made them) in a little mixed media kit, and I fussy cut the pile of suitcases and used it to frame in the bottom right corner of the page.  Then I layered various flowers and a stamped and fussy cut butterfly at the base of the photo.  I wanted to give the illusion of the Little Lady literally floating above the ground (she's on the trampoline jumping her little heart out). :)

I added in a K&Co. bird embellishment, and a little metal lock I had in my stash to provide some different texture in the flowers.  The little typewriter font letters are Tim Holtz, and the sparkly letters are American Craft Thickers.

Remember, you have the entire month to play along with this case file, and the Top 5 entries will serve as CSI Guest Detectives in October.  Happy scrapping and happy Friday everyone!

xoxo,

Shawna

Baltimore

We are teaming up with Artastic for a great collaborative case file over at CSI and I had so much fun creating this layout for the collaboration!  I have been wanting to try photo transferring to paper for quite awhile and when I found this photo of the skyline of Baltimore, Maryland, I knew it was the perfect chance to try it out.  You can see full details on the case file by CLICKING HERE.

Here is the case file:

Since the photo shows my daughter looking up (in total awe) at the tall buildings in Baltimore, I wanted to find a photo that showed the skyline of Baltimore, and the waterfront as well.  I searched some google images and once I found a photo I liked, I printed it in panoramic mode onto plain 8x11 printer paper and got to work on transferring it.  I looked through Pinterest and a bunch of different blogs for guidance on how to attack this transfer, and found tons of helpful "how-to" tutorials out there.  THIS ONE from Mixed Media Artist looked the easiest so that's the one I went with.  Here's a quick step by step.  I will try to do a video tutorial now that I have the hang of it, but I didn't think to do progression photos since I was just figuring the technique out myself.

1.  Before printing your photo, be sure to reverse the image so that when it is laid down and transferred onto your paper, it doesn't come out backwards.

2.  Print the photo on plain copy paper.  I used 8x11 printer paper.

3.  Prepare the paper you are transferring onto with a layer of Mod Podge or gel medium.  I used a matte gel medium so that it wouldn't be glossy.

4.  As soon as you lay the medium down, immediately place your image onto the paper and smooth it out well using a brayer or even a credit card or something if you don't have a brayer available.

5.  Lift/peel up the paper.  QUICKLY.  It took me quite a few tries to get this part right and to manage to get my image onto the paper without pulling up the cardstock I was trying to transfer the image onto.  It still peeled in a few spots, but nothing that I couldn't deal with.  All in all, you really only want to use the brayer for about 10 seconds, and as soon as you feel that it is flattened out well, start peeling.

6.  If there is any remnants left of the transfer paper, you can gently rub them away.  Once complete, you should be left with a nice transfer image to work with.  Here is mine.

**I tried it with photo paper and did not get a good transfer. I found that the ink from the printer transferred most easily with plain old copy paper.  I would love to hear from anyone who has good luck with the photo paper technique!**

And that's it!  It really does take a little practice but what a fun technique to add to your paper crafting arsenal.  If you try it, I'd love to see what you create and hear how it goes.  Here are a few closeups.  Happy transferring!

Aside from printing on the background cardstock, I also did a transfer of the same image on a stronger mixed media paper.  Then I cut it out and popped it out to give the illusion of layers and rows of buildings in a city.

There are those great canvas Thickers again!  A good old stick pin worked out nicely to pull the red in from the case file.

I found these little metal bicycles in the bargain bins at Michael's.  $3 for 3 bronze, and 3 silver.  Good deal!

 Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you will play along with this great case file.  Be sure to upload to the galleries over at Artastic as well as CSI if you do!  Happy Scrapping!

xoxo,

Shawna

Scrap 365-6 Today...

Is it really Sunday already?  Where did the weekend go??  We had a busy, but awesome weekend filled with friends and lots of time outside, hiking, swimming, grilling, gardening...blissful early summer weekend for sure.  We also had a wee bit of drama with the Little Lady literally getting her tooth knocked out during a mishap on a rock climbing wall of a friend's play yard. Stay tuned for that story in a scrapbook page coming soon. ;-)

Now, on to the actual purpose of this post.  CSI and Scrap 365's new collaborative case file.  Fabulous colors and evidence prompts on this one.  Here's my layout featuring the Toothless Wonder back when she first started sprouting those cute little baby teeth. Hehe. :)  This is a shot from our first year family photos.  Man, time really flies.

Here's a look at the case file.  CLICK HERE to see what the rest of the design team came up with for this file.

And some closeups of the page.  I used a lot of chipboard ephemera on this one, with some spatterings of enamel dots, pearl dots, and sequins.  From the case file, I chose bows, flowers, ombre effect and frames for my evidence.  Then I chose 6-word memoir and wrote "Our little love is almost one!"

Tell me this isn't the cutest little flair button in the land of EVER.  Courtesy of October Afternoon's Daily Flash tin pins.

Loved that the evidence included bows this week.  I love the girly touch this peach colored bow gives to the page.

And there you have it!  Now, I am dragging my exhausted self off to bed.  Back to work tomorrow!  Goodnight everyone!

xoxo,

Shawna

Believe...

Happy Friday!  I hope today finds all of you well, and looking forward to a weekend of peace and relaxation!  I will be finishing up my shopping this weekend and working on some fun gift tags for my Christmas gifts.  Today, though, we have another CSI case file up and ready to solve.  Since Christmas is just days away, it seems appropriate that my page this week highlights the big guy himself, Father Christmas. Here he is, with his fancy cranberry wreath, meeting my daughter a couple of years back. (She is completely awe struck, in case you couldn't tell!)

And here is the case file that I used to create the page.  You can play along with us by CLICKING HERE!

Whatever holiday you celebrate at this time of year, I hope it is a fabulous one, filled with love, family, friends, delicious food, and peace and togetherness.  Enjoy, my friends!

xoxo,

Shawna

I'm super excited to announce...

...that I have been asked to join the CSI Design Team!!  CSI's tagline is to tell your story...and through the weekly case files I have been challenged to do a better job of recording my stories.  I truly feel the stories are just as important, if not more so, than the photos and art that accompany them so I am so grateful for the journaling prompts and suggestions each week.

Of course, CSI is also about the art (aka the meat and potatoes of the page lol), and I cannot even begin to tell you how excited I am to work with such a talented group of artists - many of whom have inspired me to think outside the box and to try so many techniques I would have shied away from a year ago.  (Was there really life before gelatos??)  To say I am honored would be the understatement of the century.

Looking forward to the next 6 months of case files and camaraderie!

Case File #94 - The Couch.

Happy Sunday! Finished up the latest CSI case file this morning and it's a fun one.  Part of the challenge was to journal from the point of view of your pet, so I chose to do a layout of our pup Beau and the (off limits) couch that he loves so much. Here is the case file:

And here's my layout.

I  got an old typewriter from work recently and am really loving being able to type directly onto my cardstsock and not always having to handwrite my journaling.  Especially for longer entries like this one.

Thanks for stopping by!!

CF# 93 - Touch the Sky

I haven't been able to do a CSI case file in a few weeks, so it felt great to work with one of Debbi's lovely schemes again!  And, being that it is the 2nd week of the month, there's a fabulous Emma Stafrace sketch as well!  (Unfortunately, while I had the best intentions to follow the sketch, the layout ended up going in a bit of a different direction).  Here's the case file and sketch.

And here's my layout.

I have gone back and forth on this one and whether I love it or hate it, but as often happens when I'm working with mixed media, getting my hands dirty and playing with the different textures and mediums trumps any discipline I have to "see" a page as complete until it's so layered up and over the top that there's no coming back...nonetheless, I love the colors, I love the quote, and this was a TON of fun to create.  (P.S.  I am going to have to order more of those metal birdie clips...I love putting them on my photos like they're my little guardian angels sitting on my shoulder.) ;-)

(I forgot to put the birdie on the pic for this one!)

Thanks so much for stopping by!

CSI Case File #89 - B is for Bright...

Man, I struggled with these pastels!!  Started with some gelatos and mists over gesso, then decided I didn't like the drippy look so gesso'd over that a bit, then decided the colors were too bold, so gesso'd over that too!  Holy moly.  How's that for an opening paragraph?  LOL

Anyway, this week's CSI Case File (which, as does every 2nd week of the month, featured a fabulous sketch by Em Stafrace) featured some muted pastels that I found incredibly challenging (ahem, see above...) but that is what I love about CSI.  The challenge to step outside your comfort zone, experiment with color combinations, but still get your journaling in so you preserve your family stories.  And despite the struggle of putting this one together, I am happy with the end result.  Afterall, how could I be anything less than happy with a smile that bright beaming up at me from the page?

Here's the case file and sketch:

And here's my layout and some close-ups:

Thanks for looking and TGIF!!!!  :-)

Case file #84...swing with me

Happy Wednesday!! Another great case file at CSI this week! (Just like every other week…Debbi never fails to deliver a fabulous color scheme and challenge!) This week had a nautical theme, which is right up my alley since I am pretty obsessed with all things nautical at the moment! Along with the awesome Scene, we have a wonderful sketch from Emma Stafrace to work from, and I stayed true to the shape, changing some elements here and there.

Here is the case file and sketch:

And here is what I came up with. I wanted to give the feel of the beach, where this photo was taken, so I used a lot of different textures on this one.

For the frames, I covered one with Liquitex molding paste to give it a textured seafoam/wavy feel, and I covered the other with Tim Holtz distressed denim ink to get the weathered navy look.

I created the background by spritzing the paper with a chartreuse mist, then layering gauze and jute over top of it. I also used the jute as a mask over a white tag and used some chartreuse mist on that. I added various trim – rope, twine, which I wove through the fussy cut anchor stamps, and this really cool floss with little green squares that I have had in my stash for years. Finished it off with various wood and chipboard embellies and a couple of stamps, and voila! Case closed. :)

As always, thank you so much for stopping by and taking a peek! If interested, a list of materials used is below. Have a great day!

Materials:

Paper:
Patterned Paper Unknown – leftover sheet from an old paper pad

Kraaft
Embellies:
White Thickers letters
American Craft white frames
K&Co. nautical chipboard embellie from many years ago
Little Yellow Bus "happy" stick pin (without the pin piece)
Michael's anchor stamp
American Craft white tag
Citrus Twist handmade embellie "Blissful"
Citrus Twist exclusive polymer stamp "Soak up the sun"
Studio Calico wood embellies
Heidi Swapp mist in chartreuse
Liquitex molding paste
Tim Holtz Distressed Denim ink
Colorbox white ink
Colorbox navy ink
Jute
Gauze
Various thread and twine

CSI Case File #83 - The Legendary Dunroamin' Gang

It is that time again!  This week's CSI case file is perfect for those summer vacation photos that you need to get scrapped and I was psyched to find that the color scheme worked well with this photo of these little goonies, captured in a rare moment of (something akin to) stillness.  Hehehe. :-)

And here is the case file I was working with:

And some close-ups.

Thanks for stopping by and having a look! xoxo