Uni Memories

I've had these photos for a while of my youngest son when he went on the 'Bognor Beer Run' a couple of years ago whilst he was at Uni. I could never really find the right moment to scrap them,but when I received this month's DT kit,I thought the words and brads would be perfect so I've done a page which shows the two sides of his uni life ! The fun and then the serious side at the end.
I'm finding these Simple Stories so versatile and am really liking working with them

I stamped the heart on the top right but all the other items on the page are from  Simple Stories. I sneaked these from facebook - but he didn't mind !

Messy Play!

I love all the mixed media pages that are about at the moment but as much as I love them I struggle to get too messy.  Last year, I took a huge leap out of my comfort zone and had a go at a mixed media page - I did enjoy the process and also liked the result.

I thought I would have another go and as I had some white paint and some Glimmer Mists to hand decided to limit myself to these.  If the truth be told, I was tired and didn't want to go hunting through my stash for other potential messy items.

I started by painting the white paint onto a piece of black card with a 1 inch paintbrush.  I then watered some of the paint down and sprayed this over the unpainted area. 

Once that was dried I used pink and blue glimmer mists - getting quite a lot on my hands!

This needed to dry before I could continue so I took the opportunity to have a good soak in the bath to remove any evidence of ink on my hands.

The next day I layered patterned paper, journaling blocks, stickers and chipboard elements onto my page with my photos and the page was finished.

I think I am a controlled mixed media scrapbooker but who knows - this time last year I would have laughed if you had told me I would enjoy messy play so maybe this time next year I will be getting very messy - I do doubt it but you never know!

Getting ready for Summer...

So for this month's Design Team projects I got some 'I heart Summer' papers from Simple Stories. Perhaps not the easiest to work with in February and going through my old photos I realised how few Summer photos I actually have (I live in Scotland - we don't get a lot of Summer!!). Anyway - I decided that this Summer I'm going to have to get out more and take photos whenever the sun makes an appearance. So, for one of my projects I decided to get ready for those photos by creating two 12"x12" modular pages that I can add my photos to later...

 

I made sure I had plenty of space for photos plus some journaling spots. I embellished with stickers from the collection plus I put some of the stickers in place on top of the page protectors so that I could still put photos underneath them and then if I wanted to I could carefully peel them off the page protectors and put them where I want them on the photos later. I also added punched flowers and butterflies and gems.

 

Now I'm ready if/when Summer does arrive in Scotland this year!

A Splash of Colour with Simple Stories

There are some stunning new papers and ranges currently arriving in the shop - and one of them is Simple Stories - this was the kit  the Design Team were  given to design with this month. There are so many lovely colours and themes there are too many to mention but if you fancy a browse here in the shop  you won't be disappointed..they have Simple Stories, My Mind's Eye, Authentique, Teresa Collins and lots more,I'm not even going to mention the Graphic 45 because I want it !!! Anyway, here is a page I made using Simple Stories, I used one of the Acetate overlays over the photo.

There are lots of options in these Simple Stories ranges- perfect for your Project Life  and perfect for your 'normal' type layouts too. 

Hope you like it 

Give It A Punch!

For the February DT I was sent some Simple Stories papers and embellishments.  I absolutely love anything from any of the Simple Stories ranges and this month had Say Cheese and The Daily Grind to work with.   

As I do every month, I ‘pinched’ several photos from my daughter’s Facebook page to use at my crop and really liked this one of her with two of her medic friends.  Unfortunately, the title is not quite right as one of the gang is missing, Marta had gone back to Portugal, earlier than planned, as she was unwell.  I loved that they all decided to go out for tea and cake before they returned to their respective homes for Christmas and that they all wore their Christmas jumpers.  

 

Now, I always take a bucket filled with punches to my crops and nearly always bring them home again unused, this month I was determined that I would use them! I knew I had the large snowflake cut outs and gingerbread men buttons to use on the page but was at a loss as to what else to do.  I then thought – ‘get those punches out’ so I did and made a swag of flowers for the bottom of the photo.  I didn’t feel that the page had come together very well as the large snowflakes seemed at odds with the flowers.  I took it home, still unsure what to do and the next morning as I was putting my punches back in their storage box realised that I had a snowflake one.  I punched out some smaller snowflakes from white paper, dotted them in the flower swag and was very happy with the result as the extra little ‘pops’ of white brought everything together.

So are you up for a little challenge – use your punches this month and post onto our Facebook group to show what you have done.

New Year New You - January

Well, the time has come to fess up, to show and tell what you have done in January!

I decided that I really must try to do something about my weight but more importantly about my lack of exercise so I purchased some wet weather gear (what a good job I did with the rain we have been having), some new wellies, a headband with internal speakers so I could plug in my iPod and started taking Kiera out for a walk before work most days. On the occasional days I take her to work with me I walk her at lunch time. I track my walks on my phone with an App called Endomondo and used a screen shot for my photo this month.

 Over a month I have managed to knock 30 seconds per mile off my time and I am hoping that I can get it down to under 14 minute miles. Not a very exciting entry this month but one worth noting.

 I added a little flower and button from my stash to this page.

So what have you all been up to?

 You don't have to have taken the class to join in and if you would like me to upload your photo for you please email it to nyny2014@btinternet.com

Simply themed

I love Simple Stories papers and they come with loads of gorgeous embellishments to pack your pages with.  This month Mel and Jill sent me some of the Smarty Pants range and since I had some school photos unscrapped, so I thought I would start with a double page and stick to the paper theme (I'll be back on Facebook later in the month using them in a non-themed way too).

For my main page I went with a circle grid and used one of their die-cut card stock pieces with the word school cut out.  There are quite a few elements in their papers that can be cut out too - so I cut out the notebook paper for one of my layers and the apple too.

The range comes with packs of 6 by 4" and 3 by 4" cards - my photos were mostly portrait, and this didn't work out too well with the cards that I wanted to use with the photos in my pocket page!  So I trimmed my photos down to be 4 by 4" and this gave me a little section that I could add embellishments to in the 6 by 4" pockets, so I used brads, and some chipboard as well as cutting out the pencil, apples and check sheet from the papers and cards.  

My next job is to persuade the kids to do me some journalling about this year and their hopes, friends and things they like.

Katherine

February Photography Challenge Prompts

Welcome back to our next photography challenge. No prizes here just a fun challenge to get you snapping  away with purpose during the month. Get creative, think outside of the box when taking your pictures. How creative can you be?

February photo prompts
1. Progress/Achievement
2. Love
3. Technology
4. Something funny
5. The colour red
6. Tasty/Delicious
7. Smiles

Are you making 2014 the year you photograph more? Are you joining in with 365 photography challenges or project life? Why not use these prompts to help those challenges too!  If you fancy sharing leave us a link to your photos below, or pop over to the Facebook page and add your images to the gallery.

Happy snapping!

New Year New You - Reminder

Are you ready for the first New Year New You blog post?  I will set up a linky for next Sunday (9th February) and am really looking forward to seeing what interesting/new/adventurous (I had to add adventurous because Patty Buckland is participating and we all know Patty does not do ordinary)!  If you would like me to upload your photo please email me at nyny2014@btinternet.com and I will do my best.

I am really looking forward to next Sunday.