Baby Display Frame - Scrapmatts DT

We received our professional photographs by Rachael Wilson Photography from the newborn shoot we did when Harrison was ten days old recently and I just had to create a display for them. Scrapmatts chipboard made the perfect accent pieces for this. It's strange to see him looking this small, he's grown so much in just three months!

 

 

Scrapmatts used: CB6095 Assorted Words 18; CB1129 Australian Federation Corners 07; CB6093 Ornate Frames 21; CB1209 Scrap Words 12; CB6055 Prams 01; CB5035 Hot Air Balloons 01.

 

The current theme over at Southern Girls Challenge is Let's Hear It For the Boys, so I'm entering this frame in their competition too.

Valentines Day Card - Scrapmatts DT

I completed the card on time, I'm just very late posting it to share with you. You've probably already seen this one quickly as part of my Couture Creations DT application, it's also one of my Scrapmatts DT pieces for this month. The chipboard heart I have had hanging around for the longest time, after using the main design piece of the heart frame on a LO probably a year ago. I thought the metal arrow charm was just the perfect addition, along with some kindyglitz and glitter for a bit of sparkle.

Ben and I had a lovely relaxed Valentines Day, just going out from brunch and enjoying spending the day together before catching up with some friends for dinner. I hope you enjoyed the day too, however you chose the spend it.

Given the heart is from my stash, I'm going to enter the card into the current Use Your Stuff challenge: #123 Hearts.

Because of the bling in the corners and the glitter on the heart, I'll also enter the card into the Southern Girls Challenge: Bling It.

Live Laugh Love

This is the first LO I completed at the retreat and I had already fussy-cut most of the blossoms prior to leaving. The young girl is my mother with the photo taken in the mid 1960's by her aunt for a photography course. Something about these photos just lent themselves to creating very girlie layouts.

 

 

This LO was primarily inspired by the Kaisercraft Saturday Sketch #1 for October. The sample LO was just so lovely and I immediately thought of using the blossoms from the English Rose collection which even though it's now an older range I still love. Plus, it matched so perfecting with the background paper and title strips from the brand new Periwinkle collection.

 

 

The weekend warm-up at ScrapFIT requires you to use either bows or buttons (or both) on your LO. I have a small pink bow on top of the white fabric bow. The white bow is actually a Kaisercraft rossette which I have unpicked and tied up to ensure it matched the rosette on the LO perfectly. 

 

Finally, the Southern Girls challenge this week is to 'Tie a ribbon around it'. Looks like I'll be using those flower ribbons again. :)

U2

Once again I was trying out a differing style. I think this one has a bit of a Louise Nelson feel too it, with the smaller picture, the paint splatters and the short title. I found the little photo sitting on my desk and I must have printed it out intending to use it for something else. Anyway, I knew I wanted to create an orange monochrome LO for The Lollipop Ladies so dad's shirt made this the perfect photo. Photo is my mum and dad on the last vacation we took as a family backin 2006.

 

 

Here is a close-up of the stunning Scrapmatts chipboard frame. I've used a technique I learnt from Linda Eggleton's blog in which she mixes sand with the paint to get a textured effect. You can also see the ribbon woven in, the Brown Sugar ribbons slide, a Chip Chop Shop doily and a very cute Lil' Red Rocket robot button that I had to buy even though I never thought I'd get to use it.

 

 

So as I was saying, this LO was created for The Lollipop Ladies. Their inspiration for this fortnight was gobstoppers with an additional challenge of monochromatic. I've gone with orange because it's my favourite colour. I tried to use a lot of circular elements to reflect that shape of the gobstoppers and went with the white title with black outline.

 

 

 

This LO also fits the criteria for the Southern Girls challenge which this month is 'blingy'. I have a heap of rhinestones scattered over the LO in amounst all the buttons and paint splatters.

Rosser Park

It's been a while since I've sat down and created a LO but the weather this long weekend is miserable so it was perfect for staying in and creating in my PJs. :) The photos were just some random snaps during one of our multiple picnics at Rosser Park. This park's entry is located on a fairly busy road and doesn't look much when you're just driving past but if you actually going inside it's so lovely. I always try to talk Ben into going for picnics there and take my Mum and Dad each time they come to visit as well.

I also wanted to share a couple of detail shots to show all the different layers. I've used some masking tape which I've stamped on to create my own faux-washi tape. :) Doilies from The Chip Chop Shop, journal spot from Lil' Red Rocket, chipboard from Scrapmatts, most of the paper is from Kaisercraft.

On to the challenges which inspired this LO. ScrapFriends have another stunning sketch up this month that I simply couldn't pass up. I used the journal tag and chipboard tree instead of the third photo and moved the jouralling but otherwise I stayed pretty close to the design.

Frosted Designs fabulous Friday challenge was to incorporate stitching on the LO. I have stitching on the top and bottom of the LO and also on the photo mats. I left the edges rugged on the mats to make it look a bit more rustic.

Southern Girls Challenge has a 'Things with wings' theme for this fortnight. I've included two birds and a butterfly on this LO.

Smile

So this is actually my third LO for this weekend but the other two were created for The Lollipop Ladies as they have asked me to come back as a guest designer for May so you'll have to wait until later on the month to see those. On to the info about this layout, your eyes are not decieving you, I actually have purchased and scrapped with a new release paper range! The beautiful purple paper and the flower paper is from Basic Grey's Plumeria range and the yellow is from their PB&J range. I originally purchased the purple paper for the orange octagon print on the reverse but it didn't suit my LO in the end. There is some Kaisercraft paper and rubons too because my work just wouldn't be complete without them. Chipboard birdcage is from Kaisercraft, beautiful florish is from Imaginarium Designs (I'm slowly working my way through the incredible prize pack they sent me a few months ago).

I think I'm slowly getting the hang of these busy cluster designs. Basically, I just pull out everything in my stash that colour co-ordinates and then try to stick it down, walk away for a short time to get fresh eyes them come back and repeat x 3! :) If anyone has tips/advice or wants to share how they make their clusters I would love to hear from you. The beautiful hand-made flower is from Lil' Red Rocket, there is a crochet doily from The Chip Chop Shop cut in half and hidden under the cluster. I think the problem might be that I don't like covering up my supplies. Here is a close-up of my cluster:

This LO was created for the May challenge over at Once Upon A... Sketch. This is truly one of my favourite challenge sites and is very popular. They have a fantastic design team. The theme this month is 'Mum': We would like you to create a layout and interpret the theme "Mum" however you like based on the following sketch. You can journal as little or as much as you like, but your layout must incorporate this theme and the sketch. My journalling is hidden on a tag under the photo.

I'm also entering this LO in three other challenges this month. The Paper Variety's May challenge is to include a handmade flower. I also stumbled across a new challenge blog called Southern Girls Challenge for Australian and New Zealand crafters (internationals are still welcome to participate). Their challenge for this month is to create something girls. With all the flowers on this LO I think it fits the bill. Finally, Bird is the Word has 'smile' as their word this month.