A Fishy Wall Hanging

The Project

I made this framed wall hanging of my nephew, Fisher, eating fish for the first time. His reaction was a happy thumbs up. Since his name, the food and baby shower tag (orange fish) are all fish related, I chose an underwater theme. 

The Sketch

Today is my last day as a guest designer with Sketches in Thyme. I was given this 2 paged sketch to work with. A great way to design a horizontal wall hanging is to use a 2 paged sketch as the base. 

Variations on Sketch #121

• I only had 3 photos of Fisher instead of the 6 photos in the sketch. Also for a wall hanging, I wanted larger photos. As a solution, I took the larger background patterned paper block and made that the photo block.
• I took the row of photos and made that a strip of patterned papers. 
• I used a tag from his baby shower as the journaling and moved that to one corner as an embellishment cluster. 

The Details

I had a picture frame meant for a collage of pictures. I used an X-Acto knife to cut out the central portion of the mat so I ended up with just one central rectangle. The rectangular space was much wider than 12 inches across so if I used two pieces of paper in the background, there would be an obvious vertical seam. My solution was to make my own background design. I sprayed some Dylusions Ink Sprays in blues and yellow on the cardboard backing that was already in the frame. I then painted on a wavy design with some blue craft paint. 

To build upon my background, I placed the photo block on top. Then on top of the photo block, I added a row of 1" squares. Like with tiling a floor, I found the middle of space and adhered the squares starting from the center. That way the squares would end up evenly spaced on both sides of the frame. 

Here is a look at the title section. 

Here is a look at the journaling cluster. I used some clear pearls for air bubbles along with adding some smaller dots with a Pearl Pen. This set of fish is from a different company than the ones by the title, so to unify them, I later added some goggly eyes to these too.

Supplies

Frame: Columbia

Patterned Paper: Fancy Pants, Little Yellow Bicycle, My Mind’s Eye

Alphabet Stickers: Colorbok, Doodlebug Design

Felt Stickers: Sassafras, Just Brads & Eyelets

Brads: Just Brads & Eyelets

Jewels: Kaisercraft

Craft Paint: DecoArt

Ink Spray: Dylusions

Ink: Prima Marketing

Dimensional Ink: Pearl Pen by Viva Decor

I'm entering this in:

Simply Create Too: Challenge #44 For a Child

Crafts-Too Challenge You: Summer Days, Beach Colors

Five Simple Things: Inspire Me Fridays #117 Anything Goes

Thanks so much for swimmin' by,

Sweet Stamp Shop: Smash Book

The Event

This week Sweet Stamp Shop is hosting a cross promotion with Epiphany Crafts. The design team is showcasing projects featuring product from both companies. There is also a great giveaway, so be sure to visit Sweet Stamp Shop's blog everyday this week to get some design inspiration and to enter the giveaway worth over $60. 

The Reveal

Today I'm up with a double paged layout in my Smash Book. It is the larger, 11 x 13.5" album, and this is actually the first time I've worked with this album. Since it has more of a casual air, I thought it would be a great place to document my vacation and hold all the memorabilia I accumulated on the trip.

The Details

For the focal point of my layout, I wanted to create an aquarium scene which incorporated my SSS stamps and Epiphany tool. To start, I stamped images from Sweet Stamp Shop's Under the Sea collection onto a strip of white cardstock. I stamped the sea creatures in gray and the seaweed in green, coated them with clear glitter embossing powder and heated it. I wanted a raised outline so it would be easier to color in the images. 

I used Copics to color in the images. I wanted more of a precise coloring job with gradual shading. Here are the colors I used on the seahorses. 

For my water background, I wanted more of an imprecise coloring with random swirls of color. I picked a light, medium and dark blue ink pad and stamped them on my craft sheet. I sprayed the stamped ink with some water. I picked up the colors with a water brush and painted on my background.  This technique yielded a rich blend of colors and added depth to the water.

I also wanted to point out, that when I was stamping, I stamped some popcorn images from the Watchin' TV collection with a clear ink and embossed it in white to create air bubbles, which I colored in with Copics. The popcorn stamp is a long, straight strip of popcorn, so I cut out three of the smaller ones, and stamped them in a curvy pattern instead to simulate movement in the water. 

As a finishing touch, I punched out three flowers using Epiphany's Flower 25 Shape Tool. I covered two of them with Bubble Caps, so there is a glossy dimension to them. I thought the flowers looked like starfish and was the perfect addition to the aquarium. 

Here is the look at the finished page.

I wanted to tie it in to my companion page which holds my photos, journaling and title. One way was to use the same materials. I extended the background orange paper  and washi strips to both sides. Another way was to repeat a pattern. I brought the look of the vertical air bubbles to this side, by interspersing round Epiphany Bubble Caps throughout my journaling and title. 

The Prep

Prior to going on my trip this summer, I participated in the SoCal Shop Hop, so I had a chance to visit some local scrapbooking stores. I picked out my papers beforehand. I figured a blue/orange color scheme would match my eventual photos, so I picked up this summer collection from Echo Park. I also went to a local thrift store and saw this necklace that was in the same color scheme. I pulled off a few charms and added it to my layout. I forgot how much I paid, but I remember thinking it was less than a pack of scrapbooking stickers so I purchased it. So just be on the lookout, you can use lots of things around you for scrapbooking. 

At the end of my tour at Ocean Rider Seahorse Farm, visitors could briefly hold a seahorse. This was the scrappy moment of the trip, but there were some background distractions I wanted to minimize. I masked the foreground and blurred the background, then cropped the photo to let the focus stay on the seahorse. You can read a tutorial on this Photoshop process here. 

I hope you enjoyed seeing my seahorse layout. Remember to visit today's post at Sweet Stamp Shop or any day this week, to enter the giveaway for some sweet stamps and Epiphany tools. 

Thanks so much for stoppin' by, 

Sweet Stamp Shop & Other News

If you are here for Paper Made Bakery's August blog hop, please go here. 

New Design Team

I just wanted to share that starting today, I am on Sweet Stamp Shop's design team! You can read all about the new designers here. Sweet Stamp Shop makes really cute clear stamp sets. If you've seen some of my designs for Paper Made Bakery, like the Tea for Two and Cherry Blossom kits, Sweet Stamp Shop stamps were featured in those kits. Since I already love using their stamps, I'm really excited to be on the design team. I'll be sharing several stamped cards with you each month. The August release blog hops will be from August 6th - 10th, and my reveal date will be on August 9th. So please join all the fun starting next week!




ScrapStreet Magazine

I made an engagement album for my cousin, which I blogged about here and here. I submitted a few of the pages to ScrapStreet Mini Magazine and two of the pages are in the August edition which came out today. I didn't clear this with my cousin beforehand, so I hope she doesn't mind. One layout is in an article about using two photos on a page, which can be viewed here. That layout is actually part of a two paged layout. The second layout is in an article about using strips of paper, which can be viewed here. I didn't actually use paper, but used strips of ribbon instead.





July Summary
I usually post a summary of my Paper Made Bakery projects for the month. These are from PMB's July Tea for Two kit featuring Cosmo Cricket papers and Sweet Stamp Shop stamps.

Two a Tea Layout

Negative Space Teapot Card

Pouring Tea Card

Mirror Mirror Card

Strawberry Matchbook Card

More information for each project can be found on Paper Made Bakery's blog.

Thanks so much for stoppin' by, 

Paper Made Bakery: July Kit Reveal + Blog Hop + Giveaway

The Hop:
Welcome to Paper Made Bakery's July release blog hop! If you've just arrived from Ryann's site, then you've come to the right place. If you would like to start from the beginning, please hop on over to Paper Made Bakery's blog. If you are lost, this the blog hop order:

Paper Made Bakery

Stephanie

Savannah

Ryann

Michelle (←you are here)

Lisa

Ashley

The Kit:

July's Fresh Baked Kit entitled Tea for Two features an exclusive stamp set from Sweet Stamp Shop made especially for this month's kit. The kit also contains Cosmo Cricket's Tea for Two paper mini-deck and element deck, and tiny text sentiment sticker sheet. In addition to the Tea for Two elements, there are also May Arts twill, authentic baker's twine, button shaped brads plus more. This is the biggest embellishment pack that I've seen yet. 

PMB's July Kit

The Reveal:

This month I wanted to challenge myself by trying to make a double paged layout using a card kit where the largest patterned paper is 6 x 6". I added two sheets of 12 x 12" white cardstock as the base and my photos, and everything else is from the kit. The mini-deck is actually a perfect fit for a layout as two sheets fit across one page, creating a central strip from which to build your layout. 

Two a Tea Layout

The Details:
I was inspired by an Allison Davis layout that I saw 16 months ago. I knew I wanted to also create a grid of handmade mini-embellishments and have just been waiting for the perfect opportunity. And the time is now.

Tea Bag Embellishments

I stamped the tea bags using the Sweet Shop Stamps onto the Cosmo Cricket papers which I cut out. I stapled on the baker's twine to the tea bags and on the other end glued on a piece of the heart patterned paper to create a tea label. 

One of the sentiments in the set reads, "You and Me To a Tea" and the tea shop I went to was called, "Two A Tea." I took a picture of the name of the shop and made that my layout title.

Title

I stamped the "You and Me" part of the stamp and added that to the photo to recreate the whole sentiment. The stamp was actually too small so I enlarged the stamped image on my scanner and printed it out on cardstock. Don't let the size of a stamp limit you, feel free to reduce or enlarge it to fit the scale of your project. I didn't even have to use my computer to do this part, I just pressed some buttons on my all in one printer. 

I cut my 2 x 6" title photo into three 2 x 2" squares to match the 2 x 2" photos on my other page for a more cohesive look. I framed the title with two sheets from the Cosmo Cricket element deck. Since all the sheets in the pack are the same size, I cut the second sheet in half and spread it out so that it would be larger than the top piece. 

By this time I had 9 hand-made embellishments and 11 photos so I was running out of room for the journaling. I decided to go with something simple and just typed the date and location. 

Journaling

I printed out the journaling and cut it into a rectangle, and trimmed the edges to make a mini-tag which looked like a tea bag label. I connected a piece of pink baker's twine from the journaling tag to a teapot I cut out from an element deck. It was very satisfying to create my own embellishments and to try and utilize the kit to its full potential. I encourage you to create a varied assortment of projects with your kits. 

The Giveaway:

As a way to say thank you for participating in today's blog hop, Paper Made Bakery is giving a tea-rrific goodie bag to one lucky participant. You can enter by using the Rafflecopter widget below.

Good luck to all! Your next stop is Lisa's blog. Remember there are daily inspiration projects and tutorials on the PMB's blog all month long. 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I'm also entering this in The Ribbon Reel's Let's Have Tea challenge. 

Thanks for stopping by,

Engagement Album Part II

Engagement Album Part II

These are the last 11 pages in a 20 page engagement album I made for my cousin, Mina. If you would like to see the first 9 pages, please go here for part I. 

The wedding colors were Tiffany blue and salmon, so she wanted the album to utilize those colors. Luckily I found a plain album in that shade of blue. I decorated the cover a bit with ribbon, flowers, a pearl brad and chipboard letters of their first initial. 

The album has two sections, with photos from a professional photographer and candid ones from their dates. 

The Professional Photos

Mina and her fiancé, John, took some gorgeous engagement photos using a professional photographer, Anna May Lam. These photos were easy to scrap as they were from the same day and I could easily group the photos from the same setting together so they have the same color scheme. 

This is the final page in the album. I wanted to tie it in with the first page of the album so there would be closure, even though they wouldn't be displayed side by side. I used a similar layout and just changed the orientation to accommodate the picture's orientation. I used the same strips of ribbon in the background instead of patterned paper for a softer effect. 

Here are the title and final pages together, although they aren't displayed side by side in the album. 

These are two pages I grouped together to make a double paged layout. I thought the background were similar enough to be combined onto one layout.

 I brought a smaller photo from the first page's setting onto the second page to help tie it together. I used a circle punch to punch out the circular photo and adhered that onto a large paper clip. I then put Glossy Accent over the top to give it an epoxy look.

For most of the album I used a cream colored cardstock for the background to balance out all the bold blues and oranges, and the busy patterns in the papers. For this next layout, I used Kraft cardstock because the patterned papers already had a cream base and I wanted some contrast. I was wary to use the Kraft since I didn't think it would be formal enough, but it actually turned out to be my favorite layout from the professional photo section. 

I used Sketch Support sketches, Bazzill cardstock, Authentique patterned papers, May Arts and Prima ribbon and Prima flowers. I bought some alterable paper clips from Pick Your Plum. I used the small ones on this layout so Mina and John each had their own paper clips in this one. 

The Candid Photos

My cousin also emailed me an assortment of candid photos. These were much more difficult to scrap as they were from various occasions and the colors and backgrounds were totally different from each other. Also I didn't know where they were or what was the story behind some of the photos. So this is what I learned from the process. 

Tips to Scrapping a Random Assortment of Photos:

• Find a way to group them. After looking at the different batches of emails, I created my own themes which I hope was okay with my cousin. I grouped them by occasion (the actual engagement day, vacation photos) and cartoony photos. 
• Put like colors together. After grouping together the vacation photos, I placed all the ones with a blue sky or blue water background on one page, and the others with a more pink or orange tint on the other page. Then at least within one layout each page looked more cohesive even though they were of various events. 
• If the colors don't match, colorize the photos yourself. The cartoon page just had too much going on with colorful photos, dark night time ones, a studio shot...so I used an antique filter and toned down the colorful ones and boosted the colors on the dark ones so the set looked more cohesive. 

The Engagement Layout

Since they got engaged at Disneyland, I used my Disney font cartridge to create the layout. I cut out the letters onto a ticket shape and used the negative space matted on another piece of paper to create the title. 

I cut a large Micky head in silhouette and solid mode to create the background. I also cut a series of tiny Micky heads to made a border strip. 

The Travel Layout
These are the travel photos where I grouped like colored backgrounds together on one page. I didn't know what she wanted for the title or journaling and I didn't want to bother her since I figured she had enough to worry about the week before the wedding, so I eliminated the journaling and made up my own title.

I created a large cluster of flowers on each page that looked like they were in a strip to connect the two pages. 

The Cartoon Layout

I thought a lot of their pictures were really cute, where they kind of looked like comic book characters so that became a page. Since there were 7 separate occasions on this double page spread, I colorized the photos so they would look more balanced. The comic cups were on one page. 

Their cartoon drawings were the focal point of the second page, with their real life photos in supporting roles. 

I did feel overwhelmed by my assignment at first, but I managed to finish all 20 pages in three weeks, just in time for the wedding. So if you have a big pile of photos or a giant file on your computer, just group a couple photos together, print them out, work on a section at a time and you can conquer that pile in no time. It is totally possible to accomplish. 

Thanks so much for stoppin' by,

Engagement Album

The Beginning

I can't believe my lil' cousin is getting married in just a week and a half! At Christmas I received this save the date magnet from her. 

Save the Date magnet

Since it was so cute, I had to feature it on a layout using some of her engagement photos I downloaded from Facebook. I wrote about this in a former post here. 

Save the Date layout

After seeing my layout, she asked me to make a whole album of her photos which will be displayed at the wedding. Kevin, my hysband, will be playing the guitar and Vic, my sister, will be singing, so I guess I'll contribue where my talents lie. I just realized scrappy skills can be of use to others.

The Prep

I finished 19 of the 20 pages in three weeks without too much stress. Completing an entire album is usually a major ordeal for me. When completing a large project within a short period of time, organization and planning is key. Here are some of the things I did beforehand that really helped. 

• Choose a theme and stick to it. I looked at the photos and they had a soft, romantic feel to them so I wanted that to reflect in the pages. I didn't know her style so I chose a clean and simple style with straight lines that seemed neutral.
• Get some layout designs ready. I didn't want to spend time designing 20 layouts and wondering where to place photos and what size to print them. So I used sketches from one artist so they would be streamlined. I used some Allison Davis designs from Sketch Support and her books. 
• Make a kit of materials. My cousin wanted her wedding colors used, which were Tiffany blue and orange. I couldn't find one collection in those colors that matched my theme, so I assembled the papers in those colors using 4 different collections and chose matching embellishments in yet another collection. I placed all the materials on my desk and tried to mainly use those, so I wouldn't be spending time searching my stash for an elusive embellishment that would be perfect. This is what it looked like in the middle of a layout. 

Mid-process

The Results

I have 9 of the pages out to show you today, and I'll share the second half in another post. 

This is the title page, aren't they a cute couple? 

I placed their names using alpha stickers on punched circles, popped them up and used some Glossy Accent on top. I placed some twine behind the names to simulate a banner look. 

I went with a circular banner to mimic the one they had in one of the engagement photos. 

The other pages are featured below.

Three of the photos were in black in white (above), so I altered the colored photos below to match, since these two pages would be opposite each other in the album. I hope the photographer won't mind me playing with her photos. 

Since I didn't have titles or journaling for each page, I used some pre-made tags and stickers.

To make the album seem cohesive, I repeated several elements. I utilized the same color scheme, used a lot of straight lines in the design and used the similar embellishments like ribbons and flowers. But I also wanted each page to be unique so I placed at least one element that was different from the other pages. In this one I used a negative spaced heart with a dangling tag next to the title. 

I wanted to have sunflowers on these pages to match what she is holding in the picture, but I didn't have any nor wanted to go out and try to find some. My sister, Jenn, suggested making some so I did. I colored some Prima flowers with an orange ink pad and filled the center with a black Pearl Pen. 

The two layouts above actually go together as a double paged layout. 

It was really easy to scrap as the photos themselves were so lovely. If you need a photographer in the Los Angeles area, these were taken by Anna May Lam. If you want to look at just the photos of Marrina and John, you can go here. I hope you enjoyed taking a look at my cousin's engagement album. Please come back soon to see the rest after I finish the final page and photograph the layouts. I even have some of their candid photos, like the actual engagement at Disneyland.

Thanks so much for stoppin' by,