April Virtual Crop with Katherine

Welcome to the Virtual Crop, here are my 2 pages...yes there is a bit of fussy cutting - not too much and you will probably want a craft knife to cut the centre circle on my first page.  Then lots of layering.

Just a small amount of mess for my second page using watercolours and flicking bits of paint onto the paper which is not as messy as you might think!

I hope you enjoy the classes, you can find the link here.

April Virtual Crop with Karen

Hello, hello - Karen here with the first class of the Day.

For this class I have used Portrait of a Lady by Graphic 45.

This is a two page class with the first using two 6 x 4 portrait orientated photos.  My lovely friend Eileen cut the centres of the frames out for me as she is such a whiz with a scalpel.

The second uses just one 7 x 5 landscape photo. 

If you didn't manage to get a kit you are still most welcome to join in using your own stash.

Instructions from my class can be found here.


Please share your pages on our Facebook page and pop back at 12 for the next class.

April Virtual Crop challenge

Welcome back to another Mood Board inspiration challenge ahead of our monthly virtual Crop day tomorrow, which starts right here at 10am.

This month the mood board colours are so deliciously contrasting - doesn't it just make you want to bust out your holiday photos? Bright sunny yellow contrasted with turquoise there are a tonne of textures featured on the mood board this month that I am thinking inks, and paints and splats and layering? Or is that just me. What do you see when you look at this? Where do you get inspired and how will it translate to a layout?  You could stick with the 9 grid format of the board itself, the images, the colours... plenty to take your inspiration from.

I used this board to inspire the following page which ended up with no inks and splats after my initial thought!

I hope the mood board or my layout above encourage you to join in this challenge. Take a look here at our Facebook gallery here for the Mood boards so far this year and the pages inspired by them - it is really interesting to see where the same board takes different people and we had a few who joined in with these challenges at our retreat last weekend.

If you take part this month we would love for you to share your pages in our Facebook group Mood Board gallery adding the month and your name so we can give credit where due and share our favourites ahead of next month's virtual crop.

See you back here tomorrow at 10am for your first April Virtual crop class.

April Virtual Crop Photo Requirements

Hi, Here are the photo requirements for this months Virtual Crop.  Remember that it all starts on Friday night, here, with the challenge and then the classes start at 10am on Saturday.  Come and join in the chatter in our Facebook group ATDML #Create and share your pages.  If you didn't manage to get the kits then play along with your own papers.

Class 1 with Karen

Layout 1 - two 6 by 4" portrait
Layout 2 - one 5 by 7" landscape

Class 2 with Katherine

Layout 1 - one 6 by 4" landscape
Layout 2 - one 4 by 4"


Class 3 with Tricia

Layout 1 - 6 by 4" landscape
Layout 2 - two 6 by 4" portrait



All the chatter and challenges will start here on Friday night, and all the classes are posted here and will be up on the shop website for you to use too.

Feeling Fringey!

At the retreat I taught a class with the lovely Vicki Boutin "All The Good Things" papers, I had an plan for what I wanted to do for the first layout and then I planned to use strips of the paper in the second layout to create a stripey background.

When I came to assemble the second layout I just couldn't make it work how I wanted and I got a little frustrated - it just seemed really plain and uninspiring. I decided to get out my fringing scissors and have a play - the fringed edges added a lot more texture and created interest and suddenly my page came together quite quickly.

Usually at the retreat I spend most of the day time setting up classrooms, teaching, answering questions about shop items and liaising with the hotel staff about meals, refreshments etc... but in the evening I usually get chance to spend a little time playing with paper myself. To try and make the most of that time I made a few sketches, packed a few bags of product I wanted to use together on a project and matched it up with photos. This time I knew I wanted to make use of those fringing scissors to indulge myself in a little scraplift.

I love this layout by Paige Evans and wanted to make my own version. I precut the LOVE YOU out of a sheet of kraft cardstock using my Silhouette and decided I would use the Pink Paislee range Pick Me Up (designed by Paige Evans) for my version. On hers she cut the letters, added the fringed strips then adhered those to a background, I wanted an easier option so instead I used the negative from the cut words as a top layer on a sheet of white cardstock. This allowed me to add simple strips of fringed paper onto the white and then add the kraft so that the fringing showed through only in the cut areas.

To finish I outlined the letters, added the words Sweet and Heart either side of the photo and a few co-ordinating embellishments.

 Don't forget to share your latest creations with us over on the ATDML # Create Facebook page - we love to see what you have been making.

Strips of Paper

I have been enjoying having a browse of Paige Taylor Evans' blog recently and it has encouraged me to get my paints out and have a play in every white space! Ok I didn't need that much encouragement but she has huge amounts of painty inspiration!  I started this page with strips of papers in the colours from Cocoa Vanilla's Hello Sunshine collection - as I couldn't cut up the star burst paper you saw in my last post I was forced to delve through my stash for some yellow - so there is some Crate Paper, Studio Calico and Cosmo Cricket in there too!  I layered up the strips, distressing the edges and worked from yellows through to blues with a bit of multi-colouredness in the mild.  I then added stickers from the sticker pack in this collection and the odd star and strip of paper from You Rock too.

At the base of the page I dug out my distress oxides and use fossilised amber, lemonade, broken china  and coral, adding layers and drying the layers in-between to keep the colours crips.  I then just added a few stickers and the journalling.  I love how colourful this page ended up....lots of paper and a bit of mess!

Here you can see the distress oxides at work.

I love all the layers of colour and pretty papers!

Starbursts and a quick page

I did deliberate a long time about how to preserve the background piece of paper - did I cut it up, did I make a double page and use portions of it.....then I finally settled with this!  The page itself was fairly quick to put together.  The colour palettes of Hello Sunshine and You Rock by Cocoa Vanilla are really similar and I had a few bits left over from a class with Ann at the retreat....so the Camera and stars are all from there.  

For the background I drew around a plate 3 time - that rule of threes still seems to work and disguise any wonky lines and then I used some watercolour paints in 2 different oranges and some yellow around the circle.  Then just a few photo mounts, some hand cut stars and stickers and it was done and not too messy!

Wonder with Washi

Are you a collector (hoarder!) of washi tape and ready to use some of it up on a quick page?

For this page I wanted to use the lovely 3x4 phrase from the Cocoa Vanilla Bohemian Dreams paper which was super colourful! I picked another 3x4 card from the same paper to back my photo and then picked my washi tapes which went with the colours and added strips from the bottom on the page to just under the photos, and another collection of strips at the top of the page.

I then made a washi banner which I saw as a technique on another scrapping page and thought was so simple yet effective!. You simply wrap pieces of wash over the twine sticking them to the back of itself and then cut the bottom into a banner piece. Two butterflies at the end of my banners on twine piece and a few other elements completed my page but I then decided to add a little stamping in some coordinating colours to finish it off.

A very quick and easy page great for using up washi and you can mix in strips of pattern paper too to make a page using up left overs from other kits and projects. This page and many more can be found in the March ATDML gallery where you can see more fun with the Cocoa Vanilla papers.

A Few Cards

I am a terrible hoarder.

There I've said it! I am frugal with paper, anyone who has been to one of my classes is likely to have at some point sighed with the realisation that I have asked them to gut paper from behind to make the most out of the supplies.

My craft room is filled with 12x12 baggies with the bits and pieces from left over ktis and then there is the huge box of scraps.

Well as I finished the last Virtual Crop class I decided that enough was enough and challenged myself to use up the remains of the kit making some cards rather than adding to the pile of left overs.

I rarely make cards. Mainly because I don't get as much crafting time as I would like and so I rather selfishly like to spend it making things for me to keep!!! However I decided to make some cards and remembered how much I enjoy it, it didn't take very long and I managed to use up most of the paper that I had left from the class kit. I actually made three cards but sent the third one to my uncle without photographing it first!

So none of them will win cardmaker of the year and that's not the point, I had fun making them, used up some paper that otherwise would be cluttering my craft room and not get used AND when I had a couple of birthdays I was able to send a handmade card.

Over on the ATDML # Create Facebook page we love to see your creations and if you have any cards then do upload and share, if you are one of our Virtual Crop customers do look at the leftovers in your kits and see if you can whip up a card or two with the remainder of the kit, it is remarkably satisfying!

Mixed Media - make your own background

I have been playing a lot more with my messy scrapbooking products including my inks, stamps and infusion stains. I see so many wonderful layouts where designers are making their own backgrounds and I wanted to have a play. What this meant was that instead of my usual three or four layouts for the ATDML gallery, which I make from the kits sent by Mel & Jill, I did six for March! It certainly makes your supplies stretch further that's for sure!

My adventure layout was the first I made where using a sheet of white cardstock and some watercolour paints and distress stains I made soft sweeps of blues, greens and greys across the page. What I learned from this is that I should have primed my paper first with a wash of Gesso to prevent the colours from seeping in to the cardstock and causing it to warp! (nothing however that a night with a album on top didn't flatten out for me!)

Once my page was dry I drew on my circles using plates, and cups and lids of different sizes. Next came some stamping of leaves using similar coloured inks so they didn't stand out too much but blended into the background. I then flicked some splats of ink and finally added some sprinkles of infusion stains for the darker, inkier patches.

This was my background completed and I then built up the rest of the page with my layered photo on tissue paper and then off-cuts of coordinating cardstock, held together with some tiny attacher staples for more interest. Small elements from the papers including words, anchors and envelopes and lots of doodling completed the page.

Journaling Prompts - April

Welcome back to the next instalment of our Journaling Prompts. I hope you have been enjoying them and that they are proving to be a useful and interesting way to change up your scrapbooking habits.

Don't forget that each month you can add your layouts in response to the prompts in the Journaling Prompts Gallery over on the ATDML # Create Facebook page.

This month's prompt is:

Choose and use a single word title and use the shape of the word as the main design feature on your layout. If desired add journaling in the white space around the word.

The word JOY served as the main title for the layout and the O offered me the perfect place to display my photo!

This Paige Evans die cut word AWESOME worked beautifully for photos of Izzy on a rollercoaster and was back filled with assorted papers and accented with a brightly coloured washi strip along the bottom.