Family 2011 Mini Album

Thanks to Blogger's glitches last week, we have a special treat for you today! One more guest post from Grace Tolman! This was scheduled for last Thursday but we are happy to share it today. Be sure to stop by her blog an tell Grace thanks for all the fabulous projects!

Here’s another idea for you…..Mom’s, especially grandmas always love getting photos of their grandkids/family members. So this year, why not give here a mini book that has your family’s photos in it.

Early this year, I was able to finally convince my husband to take the plunge and get a professional photographer take shots of our family. It was definitely one of my happiest days.

A fun note about this mini….for the front and back cover, I used blocks from the box/packaging that my SEI products came in. I just love finding inspiration everywhere!

I covered both cardboard pieces with pattern paper and for the front, I laid more of the lace cardstock. I then added strips of paper, some with punched border and then used my die cut machine to cut a shaped frame for my title.

The felt flowers from the Sunny Day collection added a pop of color to what could’ve been a very subtle front.

I had cut five cardstock pieces to about 5x7” as my inside pages for this minibook. I covered the inside of both cover pages with pattern paper and I made a matt for my cardstock inside pages with pattern paper.

I have a vintage typewriter that I used to type up my journaling here. Love that thing! To lead the eye to the words, I added some buttons from the “Summer brights” embellishment pack. I also inked the edges of the paper blocks.

I then used some of the very pretty White Elegance papers to create a house for my embellishments. I layered two of them for added texture and dimension. To make it, I traced some circles on one paper, cut that then adhered it to another paper then cut out a scallop edge around it.

Here’s a look of the other pages….

I had also use some die cut hearts from the With all my heart pack.

I continued the journaling on the back cover too.

And here’s the look of the back.

And a look at the side view.

So that’s for today. I can’t believe my week long post is coming to a close. Make sure you check out tomorrow for one last project and a giveaway from the generous people of SEI.
Grace

Friends Card Set

Today’s post is somewhat of a challenge. Have you ever tried to make a card set in less than an hour?

Well this is your day to get some ideas and hopefully inspire you enough to do this challenge as well.

I love making cards, but sometimes I feel like I spend as much time in one card as I do with a layout. So to simplify things a bit, I decided to challenge myself to create these four coordinating cards in one hour. How did I do it…Well here are my tips…

1. Use a paper pack. They all coordinate with each other which take the time from you putting things together over and over again to see if they all match. I used the Sunny Day 6x6 paper pad for this project. Being that it’s a smaller pack; the designs were also made to fit the size of the papers therefore perfect for small projects such as cards.

2. I also used one design. If you look closely at my cards, they all have general design. To add variety, I switched the design from horizontal to vertical plus I moved the placement of the embellishments around.

3. Limit your embellishments to a minimum. Here I used two items, which is flowers for most of them and butterfly for one. The felt flowers on the best buds card were already layered and have adhesive on the back which made for a quicker card.

4. Use only one tool. Here I used a corner round punch on two sides.

5. The card sentiment blocks are all from the Garden Variety paper in the Sunny Days collection. The paper was printed with easy tear off sides for each block. There’s no need to use your paper cutter here. Super easy stuff!

Here’s a close up of each card…

This card set would be perfect for that Mommy bestfriend you have. So what are you waiting for…..create some cards today and try to them in one hour. See how the time constraint stretches your creativity.

See you tomorrow
Grace

Mothers and Daughters Layout

Hello, we are in the second day of our week long Mother’s day inspired project share. And today I’ve decided to pay tribute to the Mothers and Daughters in my family.

We all have mothers and daughters (that soon will be mothers themselves) so why not pay tribute to them.

In this page, I’m photographed with my mom and my sister in law. I also have two sisters and although I love them dearly, they were not photographed at this time. I’m sure there will be another photo opportunity with them in the future plus a layout for them too. :)

I added the lace cardstock behind some pattern paper here. I love how it gives that elegant border around my page. To make the most of this lace cardstock, I had cut the inside of it since only the edges will show on the page. This gives me the chance to use the lace on other projects that you will see in later posts.

I’m so in love with the Couture line. The soft colors and elegant designs are perfect for feminine layouts. I used my die cut machine here to create the layered flowers. If you read my tutorial yesterday, I pretty much did the same treatment with the paper flowers in the frame as I did here. The only difference is, I used some pretty pearl brads that is in the White Elegance embellishment line.

I also added some swirl stickers that is part of the Couture line. The swirl stickers weren’t long enough to go around my flowers so I cut them in half and stuck the cut up edges underneath the flowers. This way, I was able to extend them without making it obvious to the viewer.

I also pleated some paper to create my subtle and soft border. For my journaling I wrote about how lucky I feel to be surrounded with strong feminine examples in my family. What special things do you share with your mother, sister or friends? Make sure you document those special relationships in a layout soon.

See you tomorrow.
Grace

Altered Quote Frame

Today I want to start us off with an easy yet very elegant project that you can either make for yourself or to give to the Mother/s in your life...

I love to frame quotes. It’s the next best thing to pictures and adding paper flowers to the sides just makes this frame scream Mother to me.

I used the elegant Couture line for this project. I found the quote here.

The layered flowers were scrunched up to create more texture and I also inked the edges.

The quote is tucked behind the glass which means that you can enjoy this frame and the quote for a long period of time.

But wait! There’s more….I decided to make this post a tutorial. Read on to know how I made the frame…

First I start of with collecting all my supplies.
• Couture line papers
• Printed quote on white cardstock
• Die cut machine and cartridge
• Frame to be altered
• Pearls
• Paint (white)

Plus these tools…
• Ruler
• Pencil
• Paper trimmer
• Scissors
• Border punch

*Although I usually have a game plan before I start the project, I usually end up changing things up a bit. I’ve organized this tutorial in the way where you can end up with the same final project as I have but you might notice that in the pictures I’ve jumped around a bit.

Step 2
I paint the frame white. I got the frame for 99 cents at Goodwill. Although the frame has cute things written on it already, I felt like it was lacking some color so I opted to alter it. Let the frame dry and continue on to the next step.

Step 3
Start cutting your flower shapes from your die cut machine. I wanted the layered effect so I cut the flowers in graduating sizes- large, medium and small. I love how double sided pattern paper helps with the layering, it gives you coordinating designs every time with less time cutting.

Step 4
Layer the flowers the way you want them to look. Make sure you take into consideration the paper that you will be using to cover the frame. You don’t want the flowers to blend with the background. You want them to stand out, that’s why you made them after all. I inked the edges to make them pop out more.

Step 5
I used a pencil and my hands to scrunch up the flowers and make them more dimensional. Take your time in creating the different layers of the flower; it’s worth it at the end!

Step 6
Flowers that doesn’t have any centers just doesn’t finished to me, so I added buttons with baker’s twine threaded through them as a finishing touch to each flower. Set aside your flowers.

Step 7
When your frame have dried completely, measure the length and width of it. Cut a piece of pattern paper that will cover the entire front of the card. Although we have painted it, we will still cover it with pattern paper. The white paint just gives the edges a finished look.

Step 8
Lay your cut out piece of paper onto the frame and turn it over. With pencil, draw out the opening of the frame and cut it out with either scissor or paper trimmer.

Step 9
The inside edges of the frame didn’t look so perfect to me so I added a punched border to it. I did this by punching the decorative edge on paper first and then cutting them in strips.

I then laid them the way I want them to be. I decided to only perfect two corners since I’ll be covering the other two with flowers. I made the corners perfect by aligning two strips and then cutting one edge diagonally.

I then inked the edges.

Step 10
Adhere the paper onto the frame and ink the edges.

Step 11
Trim your quote to fit the frame. I used the glass panel to make sure my quote match up perfect in the frame.

Step 12
I then added the flowers- Two on the top left and two on the bottom right. I used pop up adhesive for two of them to add more dimension to the flowers.

Step 13
I wanted to add more feminine touches to the frame so I hand drawn a swirl on both top and bottom sides of the frame and then added pearls over the swirls. After adding them, I carefully erased the lines.

And there you have it! A frame that you can be both inspired and proud of.

See you tomorrow.
Grace

Guest Blogger, Grace Tolman

Please join with us in welcoming Grace Tolman as next week's guest blogger. We are happy to have such a talented paper-crafter joining us. Look forward to loads of great project ideas throughout the week plus a special giveaway next Friday. Don't forget to stop by and say "hi" over on her blog, In Her Shoes sometime as well.

Hi, Grace Tolman here and I’m so excited to share with you what I did with some wonderful SEI products. I figured that since we have Mother’s day just around the corner that I’d share with you some ideas to bring your “craftiness” in your next Mother’s day project.

A little about me….

My life in a nutshell:
I'm a stay at home mom of a 7 year old boy and a 5 year old girl. Therefore my life is usually filled with learning, new discovery, bribery and sometimes "time outs". I have a loving and very supportive husband of 8 years. When the kids have gone to bed at night, my time is spent crafting while catching up on my favorite shows and movies. I also enjoy reading, window shopping, knitting and perusing blogs for inspirations. We recently moved to Colorado from California and we are enjoying our new environment. I feel very inspired with my new home, my new scrapbook space and the mountain views.

Although I’ve been doing some type of scrapbooking since grade school, I only started to scrapbook seriously after my son was born. When he was born I knew I will be staying at home with him but coming from a fast paced sales job I was afraid I would ran out of things to do during the day. Little did I know that with a newborn you won’t have anytime to do anything else. Anyways after going through a basic scrapbooking class I was hooked and haven’t stopped scrapping since. My style has evolved through the years but there's one thing that never changes- my quest to tell the story. That's always the first thing I think of when I want to make a scrapbook page and/or project. And lately I've been inspired by pattern paper and fun, bright colors.

Come back on Monday to start of a week full of ideas, tips and tricks. See you then.

Dig Layout & GIVEAWAY!

TGIF! Thanks for hanging out with me all week everyone! I had a blast! I hope you'll pop by my blog (www.marcypenner.com) and visit.

Today I have one more layout to share with you... my favorite out of the bunch! When we go down to Florida we plan to visit the beach at least once. But even still my boys are totally fine with playing in the condo sandbox! Ha. Go figure.

I used some more of the On the Coast line for this page. I'm in love with that grey dot paper! I'll be using it for quite a while I imagine! I'm also addicted to making little banner tags. Sigh. One of my favorite things is how subtle title works with the light blue paper. Love that! Probably one of my favorite layouts to date!

So, thanks again for having me SEI! I had a blast!
Marcy

Thanks Marcy! We have learned so much this week about you, paper-crafting, and photography. You have such a great style and fun personality.

GIVEAWAY ALERT! Would you like to win some of the paper-crafting products Marcy used this week? Ok. Just leave a comment on this post by Sunday, April 17th at midnight MST. Tell us which of Marcy's posts was your favorite this week...if you can choose just one! The winner will be announced Monday so check back then.

Nice Decor

Thanks for hanging in there with me everyone! It's been a great week so far!

I live in an old (120 year old) farmhouse. We've been renovating and decorating for over 10 years now. I love decorating. I love my house and making it a home is a big part of who I am!

I've had this project on my to do list for a long long time. I've loved random cut letters in banners and as art for a while... they're just so charming. I don't have the wall space for something large so I made some small ones instead. I planned to frame them at first (the colors worked so well for my daughter's room) but I decided to attach them to the mirror as little inspirational messages instead.

I considered “Smile” and “Go Get 'Em” among others but finally settled on “It's Nice To Be Nice”. A little funtac and the bedroom mirror is all dressed up! I totally forgot about the layered effect the mirror would have on the letters, but it's really cool!

I plan on switching this up often with different phrases and reminders! A very cool and simple addition to our home.

Marcy

Everyday Cards

I will be the first to admit that I find cards challenging. I'm not sure what it is. Maybe the small scale? Maybe the shift from a square canvas (like my 12x12 layouts) to a rectangular one? I don't know. But I needed some cards so I gave it a try. Plus, those Corinne papers were too cute to resist!

I really love how the “varnished” paper accepted ink! The pattern resists beautifully. Give it a try sometime!

Marcy