Currently… | August 2013

31 Saturday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Art Journal, Currently...

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Art Journal, Currently...

listening: to family – we’re all at the cabin and it’s loud!

eating: lots of ice cream – it’s my daily go to lately

drinking: chocolate milk and cold white wine (with ice cubes!)

wearing: summer clothes – loving my black sandals

feeling: overwhelmed with change – Liam is leaving, Hannah and Heidi are coming, and Molly is about to start Grade 1- full days!

weather: mostly beautiful but lots of rain the past week

watching: SYTYCD, Master Chef, & The Facts of Life – summer ‘13 is all about TFOL!

reading: Big Girl Panties, a recommendation from Krista’s blog

wanting: more summer, I’m not ready for it to be over yet!

needing: more creative time that’s just for me

thinking: about how I love my weekends away from home

enjoying: Art Journaling and drawing faces – who knew?!?

wondering: how different life will be next week once school starts

wishing: my babies would stay babies – they grow too fast.

Imperfection…

28 Wednesday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Art Journal, Mixed Media

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Art Journal, Face Sketch, Mixed media

I was playing in my Art Journal this morning, trying out gelatos (fun times!) and making a watery mess. Usually, once my background is done, I’m stuck.

Not so this morning, my friends!

I went to work on a face. And she was going really well…

Then, I messed up the mouth. And in trying to erase it a little, all the paper tore off. Now, let’s be honest here; if I was the patient type (I’m not) and if I had waited for the background to dry properly (I didn’t) I would have had some nice, dry cardstock to work on and none of this would have happened.

If trying to fix the mess of the mouth and torn paper, I destroyed her nose. Sigh. Seriously world? Come on already!

So I threw up my hands, grabbed a tag I had made, and stuck it over her mouth and nose. Problem solved! 🙂

A Donna Downey stamp, a line of journaling under that, and a bit of Payne’s Grey Golden paint (totally in love) over a stencil and I called it fixed and done!

Oh, and since I ripped her face apart, I gave her a fancy hair piece to kind of make up for it – do you like her golden feather? 🙂

I had an interesting conversation with a friend the other day and she said she didn’t like colourful backgrounds behind faces – she couldn’t get past the non-flesh colour. Making this I completely realized that what I like is the unusual colours, I don’t want flesh colour – I like the interest the background work gives the face. What do you all think? Do you prefer the norm or the oddball colouring?

I did make a double background so hopefully, when I go to work on the next page, the wet factor shouldn’t be an issue!

Paper Issues: Simple Scrapper Sketches | Blog Hop and GIVEAWAY!

25 Sunday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Blog Hop, Giveaway, Simple Scrapper

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Blog Hop, Giveway, Paper Issues, Simple Scrapper

Hi everyone! A few of the Simple Scrapper girls are joining some of the Paper Issues girls in a fun blog hop for the new Paper Issues: Simple Scrapper Sketches!

If you’re hopping along or new here, welcome! You should have come from Kristine‘s blog – if not, or if you get lost along the way, go to Paper Issues for the full list.

We’re all using the same sketch and I love seeing how different our LO’s are – it’s so much fun to see all those varying interpretations of one simple template!

My LO not only uses Jennifer’s great sketch, exclusively designed for Paper Issues, but also one of the Simple Scrapper September Story Starters:

Anyone who follows me on Facebook or Twitter will already recognize this sweet girl – she went missing for almost a week a little while ago. The hidden journaling on this LO, along with a picture of Rosie the day after she came home, tells that story.

I used Jillibean Soup Alphabeans for the title, along with a Studio Calico house:

and then outlined the letters with my Faber-Castell Pitt pen.

Some layering and a Studio Calico wood veneer cat at the top to draw you in and I was done!

I love working with Jennifer’s sketches – they can be used as is so easily, but they always work when flipped or rotated as well. And when I’m stuck, they always get me creating again! Luckily for all of you, there are two giveways on this blog hop:

You can win either a free one month Premium Membership to Simple Scrapper or digital copies of Everyday Storyteller volumes 1 & 2! All you need to do is:

Like Simple Scrapper on Facebook {tell them Paper Issues sent you}
Like Paper Issues on Facebook
Leave a comment here!

To see more fabulous inspiration and get more chances to win, keep hopping! Your next stop is the Simple Scrapper blog. Enjoy!

The Premium Membership at Simple Scrapper provides skills and shortcuts to help you simplify and find more meaning in your memory keeping.

just be.

23 Friday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Art Journal

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Art Journal, Balzer Designs, Blazonry, Chevron Tiles, Dina Wakley, The Crafter's Workshop

While Dina Wakley was in town teaching in all her fabulousness last weekend we all got into a small conversation about Art Journaling – is it really Art *Journaling* if you don’t journal?

And I don’t journal – I play.

So I decided to push myself and start. I have actually added some journaling to almost all my pages and have enjoyed every second.

Then I took some of my unfinished pages and went to work on them. This is one of my faves – I love the background so much that it has taken me this long to cover it up! I always tell classes when I teach, “Don’t get attached,” and I got attached. It was time to bite the bullet and move on.

This is how it turned out:

I love that the background is still peeking through with some subtle colour:

And aren’t all those layers and doodles fun?

I especially like the pop of colour behind the Dina Wakley stamp – it really draws your eye to the figure and the start of the journaling:

I’m totally inspired to keep journaling now, and am more excited than ever to play and make a hot mess – after all, there’s always a way to turn it around!

Things on Thursday…

22 Thursday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Things on Thursday...

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techniques, Things on Thursday, Tutorials, Week in the Life

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Things on Thursday post but a couple of items caught my eye recently and I wanted to share!

1. Julie Fei-Fan Blazer showed a tutorial today on her blog about how to do this boxed letter technique:

The finished LO looks awesome so you should all check that out!

2. Summer CHA products are being launched and although I wasn’t in love with much, there are a couple of things I must have. Like these Archival ink pads by Wendy Vecchi for Ranger:

And this small Dylusions Art Journal:

And I’m looking forward to the Amy Tangerine Cut & Paste line from American crafts:

3. October Afternoon does Monday Challenges on their blog and this particular one is really fun:

Click over and play, if you want a bit of scrapping inspiration!

4. We just had an awesome weekend at the Paperie with Dina Wakley (much more on that later!) and I’m already thinking ahead to new people we can get in! 🙂 So Wendy and Janna, how about Ronda Palazzari? Love this project!

5. Finally, Ali Edwards has announced her Week in the Life dates for this year – and it’s coming up soon! I loved this project last year and I’m even more excited this year – there’s something fun coming!

Paperie Card Kit | July: Part 3

15 Thursday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Card Kit, ScrapBook, Tutorials

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Card Kit

I know, I know, I’m being super slow about posting these LO’s but I’m almost done! Here’s the last one, with a mini tutorial about how it all came together.

First of all, I smeared Silver Croco through the Chunky Chevron stencil by Balzer Designs for The Crafter’s Workshop to make a place for my photo. You can see from the picture what’s it like wet (on the left) and dry (on the right):

I love the shine and crackle! Plus, this paint can be heat set immediately and still crack – that’s an awesome quality in my impatient books! And when you overheat it you get bubbles along with the cracks, making fabulous texture:

Once that was all dry, I decided to make a fun interactive piece. I like to have one picture on my LO’s but there were a couple more I wanted to include. Also, I like to hide my journaling so I needed to figure out a way to get all those elements on the page and still only show one photo. The solution? One of the kraft envelopes in the kit! I added tape to the flap:

Then I added little patterned paper and sticker flags to the edge:

Once it was adhered to the background page, I had a spot to put my extra pics and a pocket for my journaling – you just use the flags to flip it open:

I simply made a journaling card, wrote on it, and tucked it inside the envelope:

I added my title with the Simple Stories alpha stickersin the kit, doodled around them, and finished the whole thing off with some washi tape that was in the last Card Kit:

I have one more item to show you from this kit – I pretty much used it all up! – and I’m hoping to post that for you early next week. This weekend is going to be all tied up with Dina Wakley coming to the Paperie and I. Can’t. Wait!

Sara’s Card Kit (thepaperie.wordpress.com)
Dina Wakley is coming to The Paperie! (sarathings.com)
August Card Kit Part II (thepaperie.wordpress.com)

12 on Twelve | August 2013

13 Tuesday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in 12 on Twelve

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12 on Twelve

1. Sleepy Molly

2. selfie in the porch

3. we found a ladybug on our walk!

4. flowers for Mama

5. hanging out at the playground

6. big smiles

7. buddies

8. sliding down as a train

9. walking home – you always need a stick to get you there!

10. new painted nails

11. new Legos from Nana

12. hopscotch in the driveway

Simple Scrapper | August 2013

06 Tuesday Aug 2013

Posted by Sara in Card Kit, ScrapBook, Simple Scrapper

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Card Kit, Simple Scrapper

The sketch templates from the Simple Scrapper Premium Membership this month are awesome! All 5 are large photo templates, either 12×12 or 8.5×11 – I love them! To see all the Team’s work, click their names over there on the right, or go to the new Team Gallery to see our favourites!

My template LO this month is pretty simple, though it took Lori and I forever to get it figured out on her Silhouette! 🙂

We cut the title and then I added the washi tape and wood veneer hearts. I left it at that because I didn’t feel it needed any journaling and I didn’t want to take away from the pic of Gabe at Salmon Cove Sands.

I really like the depth the cutting from the Silhouette adds – isn’t it fun?

The second LO is from the Story Starter prompts from this month and uses the scraps I had left from my Paperie July Card Kit – all I added was the 12×12 background sheet:

I’ve actually used this template before, on this LO, but love it so much I had to pull it out again!

Stitching on the circles gave me some great dimension:

And instead of having the journaling out in the open, I went with my norm and hid it on a tag:

Simple Scrapper has an awesome promo on right now – if you sign up for email updates, you get a Premium Membership Sampler with templates, Story Starters, and more! It’s definitely worth the sign up!

Aimee is planning on posting her LO’s for August today as well, so make sure you check out her blog, Aimee’s Armoire, to see what great things she made this month.

I know I’ve left you all hanging with the rest of my Card Kit samples for July, but I have that scheduled in for next week, when I’m hoping to get back to at least a couple of posts a week – we’ll have to see what the weather is like!

The Premium Membership at Simple Scrapper provides skills and shortcuts to help you simplify and find more meaning in your memory keeping.