December Pagemap

Here's my version of this month's pagemap. It's always fun to discover that you have double-sided patterned paper, like this month's selections from SEI. Right off the bat you've got two designs that work well together! I used a couple of the "b" sides for this layout. The pattern on the light blue is subtle enough to work as a background paper without being distracting.

For embellishments, I used a Fancy Pants Glitter Cut that I picked up at the store. Don't recognize it? I cut it into three sections. Here's the entire transparency:


I also picked up some of these fabulous Kaisercraft wooden snowflake tags. On this layout I left them unaltered, but you can use paint, ink, glitter and more to decorate them.

A little design trick: using lines. Graphic design principles talk about movement -- how a person's eye moves through a page. Ideally you want a "Z" -- where your eye moves across then down to the next line, like you're reading a page. You can add elements in your layout that help a viewer move through your piece. For example, the top left of my layout uses the lines running straight down to the ornaments, which are connected to the top of my photos. Then, at the end of my two photos, the title draws the eye down and the transparency flourish will lead the eye right to the second grouping.

Let me show you visually:


Want to read a bit more about design? Here's a good reference.