Bloom & Grow...

and grow, and grow! Several of my relatives and friends are having babies in the near future, so I have been thinking about baby gifts. I created a growth chart this month using paper from My Mind's Eye Bloom & Grow Collection. It went together really quickly, using the birds from the die cut sheet. I did trim a couple of smaller birds out of the patterned paper to add a little variety. The heads of the birds are popped up to add dimension (because I never make anything just flat!). I placed the die cut journaling block at the bottom - the perfect place to add a little personalization.

A great companion to this gift would be to create a matching scrapbook to chronicle the baby's growth for the first year - one page per month so that all the new mom has to do is to print a picture and put it in place - and beyond...to cover the first 10 years. Imagine pictures taken next to the growth chart every year to include in the scrapbook (not that I was ever that organized, but some people are!).

I am actually getting very excited about this idea and am going to have to plan a class - anybody interested?

New to the Neighborhood!

Hi there!
My name is Loretta Cooper and I am one of the new members of the Scrapbook-Plus Design Team. Although I'm new to the team, I've been a compulsive Scrapbook-Plus Customer for years.

I am a storyteller and journalist by profession. So it makes sense that documenting and preserving my own family history is a personal passion.

I began scrapping just after our first child was born, but quickly realized that this was a generational undertaking. Both of my grandmothers kept scrapbooks and photo albums. My books are just the latest editions in an ongoing story.

In my grandmothers’ scrapbooks I find the minutia and details of their lives both fascinating and surprising. I try to keep this in mind as I create my own pages.
Sometimes I worry that this hobby is too self indulgent and sucks up too much of my time. And then I realized that this undertaking reaches both forward and backward in time. It provides a larger context for our understanding of ourselves and our families. I read my grandmother’s thoughts about my father as a child, and I suddenly see traces of my own children. I see my grandfather’s relentless entrepreneurial spirit, and I know where my drive comes from.

… and you thought this was just about paper and glue!

Slide Mounts & Ribbon

Some people collect page sketches - I collect techniques. This month I used a simple one I had never used before - tying a slide mount on with a ribbon. It is a great way to add depth to a layout without adding a lot of bulk. One of my first stops when I visit Scrapbooks Plus is always the ribbon rack at the front of the store. Ribbons these days come in such a wide variety of patterns that it is an easy and inexpensive way to add a bit of fun to a project. Using a slide mount is a great technique by itself. It allows you to focus attention on a small picture - or a small detail of a larger picture.

My altered item this month was a picture frame that I picked up at a craft store - one of those wooden frames with a nice flat wide edge and a small opening for a picture. My goal was to make it look like a scrapbook page, which to me meant I had to have more than one picture because I rarely do a layout with just one! I combed thru my stash and found that I had a slide mount in exactly the same rich golden tones as the Anna Griffin papers and I was ready to get started.

I traced the frame onto the back of the patterned paper and cut it out. I just used regular old Elmers glue to attach it and a brayer to get the bubbles out. I positioned the slide mount so it was overlaping the picture opening a little bit and used thumbtacks on the back of the frame to hold the ribbon in place and tied the knot. The bird in the upper left was hand cut and added so that it also overlapped the opening, and then I popped on the dimensional flower sticker. Last up was the lettering. Of course I did not have the letters I needed, but I found that it was really easy to alter the wooden letters with a pair of wire cutters. (The "l" used to be a capital "T" and the "y" started out its life as the letter "X".) I used a wood stain to get the right color, and then added them with some Memory Mount glue.

What technique have you been waiting to try?

August RAK - Exploding Box

Don't forget to leave a comment on the original post (see below) for the August RAK to be eligible for the drawing! Let me know what clear stamps are your favorites...or how you have used them in your projects.

How to use index prints...

Okay, I promised I would show you the inside of my mini-book today.

First let me say how much I love the double sided paper this month from Scenic Route. I cut the strip of surfboards out for the cover, and the flip side of the paper is this cool yellow and orange pattern where I used my Autumn Leaves journaling stamp.

I did something kind of fun with the next page, which is actually just (2) photos glued back to back. Those tiny pictures are actually from the index print I got with my picture order. Nothing fancy, just used some glue and popped them straight onto the picture. (If you want to see a larger image, just click on the picture.) I like it because it tells more of the story and I don't have to feel guilty about throwing away the index print! I have been trying to figure out for a while how to use them, so sprinkling them throughout this book made me very happy!

I used the chipboard pieces on this picture of a seagull on a pier piling. I think it looks like a signpost! This little book went together so fast because the pages were double-sided and coordinated so well. Throw in the stickers and chipboard...and it couldn't have been easier!

Tools Rule!!

I made my first mini book this month and it was a fun and easy project, thanks to having the right tools - my Scor-Pal and my Crop-o-dile. I started out with a 12" x 2.75" strip of cardstock and scored it with my Scor-Pal...every inch on the inch up to 6", then flipped it over and scored it again, every inch on the half inch up to 5.5"...does that make sense? Here's a visual to clear things up:

Using the Scor-Pal, the lines were even and exactly where I needed them to be.I made the accordian folds and then, using my Crop-o-dile, I punched holes through the first 3 folds which was (6) layers of cardstock...yes, I said S-I-X layers...and it was a piece of cake (which is why I love my Crop-O-Dile)! Using one fold as a guide to make sure all the holes were lined up properly, I punched through the next 3 accordian folds (See photo at right). As I added pages to the book, I just used the holes I had already punched in the accordian folds as guides to punch holes in the pages.

When it was finished I used brads to hold it all together. I put one brad through the front of the book and the first 3 folds. Then I put a brad through the back of the book and the last 3 folds. Finally I glued the spine together where the brads met.
Obviously, the number of pages you have in your book would be limited by the length of the "legs"(?) on the brad. I had 6 pages, plus the thickness of one layer of cardstock at the front and back.

The other limiting factor is the length of the cover. My cover was 6" long, and since I was using a 12" piece of cardstock, the maximum number of 1/2" folds I could create for the spine of the book was 6.

I don't know if the double brad thing is a new technique because I made it up as I went along...but it is new to me!! Oh, I will post the actual pages of the mini-book tomorrow.

Take a Peek at My First "Squash Book"!

I had pulled out a lot of beach pictures when I was doing my pages and projects with the kit from this month and I really loved the beach themed papers from Reminisce and wanted to play some more!

I was very excited when my Scor-pal came in and I decided to use up some of the last bits of my kit to make a squash book. This is the cover... I used the lighthouse journaling block label and added a title with a mix of the letters...and some Mrs. Grossman seagull stickers. I tried a card stock "belly band" first, but I just didn't like the look as it covered up too much, so it occured to me to try one made out of vellum. I added a seagull sticker on the belly band and loved the effect. Here is the back of the book...

...decorated with some of the paper that looked like sky and some more seagull stickers. The words on the belly band are a sticker from my stash...beach themed of course!

I decided to decorate both sides of the book with pictures and papers. They are cut to 3.75" squares... and then divided into triangles if necessary.

It was fun playing around with the pictures to see which ones worked best when cut diagonally...I succeeded in not cutting anybody's face in half!

And it was easy to title or caption the pictures by cutting some of the words out of the patterned paper...vacation, shell hunting, sand between my toes, water's edge, walking on the beach...there really was something to suit every photo.

This is a perfect project to use up bits and pieces because the dimensions of each panel are only 4" x 4". I set up plenty of panels for journaling using some of the more plain patterend paper. Some of the wilder designs (like the flip flops or the words) added a fun accent.

Thanks for looking and I hope you like it!