Trick or ReTreat Class 2 with Mel

 Hello everyone and welcome to my first class of the weekend. I'm so disappointed not to be able to see you all in person and share lots of laughs, scrappy inspiration and general fun with you all but it can't be helped and we will just keep on making lemonade from lemons as we enjoy a weekend packed full of online fun.

My first class uses the gorgeous Cocoa Vanilla Studios Daydream products and I've created three layouts with it, It's early in the weekend and this is what I like to call the Pat Bailey class - For those that don't know her Pat is a long time retreat go-er who requests some fairly straight forward cut and stick classes for early on the Friday as a warm up before heading in to anything more technical, complicated or messy!

I hope you enjoy these three easy going layouts - the instructions can be found here.

Do join us over on the ATDML # Create page for chat and fun throughout the weekend

August Virtual crop Class with Tricia

 

Good morning campers!

Today I'll be working with Cocoa Vanilla's 'Make a wish range, full of pinks and blues they make a perfect pastel mix to match your sugary sweet cake photos. 

With lockdown now covering a few months there's the opportunity to record a different type of birthday or why not take this opportunity to pull out some older photos and give them the justice they deserve.  The papers come with a great mix of texts which is not only good for birthdays but can sneak onto pages that celebrate other occasions or just brilliant days.

So grab your kit or choice of papers and click here to download the instructions.

March Virtual Crop Class 3 with Mel

Hello and welcome to the last of our March Virtual Crop classes. I hope you have enjoyed the two classes earlier from Ann and Tricia.

For this class I worked with the beautiful Cocoa Vanilla Wild at Heart. I made three layouts with the kit and thoroughly enjoyed using this range to show case some fun summery photos.

For instructions for all three layouts click here.

Do come over to the ATDML # Create Facebook page to share what you have been working on.

Next month we will have a very special bumper Virtual Crop with SIX classes and kits will be on sale earlier than usual so please do keep an eye on our facebook page for info on that.

November Layouts on a rainbow....

Hello everyone, Katherine here with a selection of rainbow pages for you!  Here is where it started, using a beautiful rainbow paper from Cocoa Vanilla's Happiness collection called Good Vibes.  I started using cutting different sized circles from it (using a 6" strip so I could fit it through my die-cut machine!).  Once I had the circles I used my watercolours to try and match the colours and painted strips down the page, adding some flicks of colour.  I then used one of the new Vicki Boutin stencils I picked up at the retreat and added some hexagons.  Next I added my circles and to add a little more interest to some I used a BoBunny circle set of texture stamps.  Final bits were to add some Vicki Boutin mixed media ephemera in co-ordinating colours, and also some of her watercolour stickers which went perfectly!

Obviously I had some circle punched waste left over from the page, so I put it to good use.

I backed the paper with lots of punched strips from white cardstock, then added it to the woodgrain paper from Cocoa Vanilla's Unforgettable collection - love a woodgrain!  Again I used the Vicki Boutin ephemera pack to mix in with my page - these are photos we had in a photo booth at a friend's wedding and I loved the speech bubbles in the ephemera pack as it brought out all the fun!

 If you want a really quick and easy rainbow page, then this paper by Pink Fresh called Just a little Lovely.  The ink drips and banner are all done for you.

I added a little texture paste and distress ink, layered up some more ephemera and stuck in some hidden journalling behind the photo....as well as another Vicki Boutin water colour sticker too.

I hope you've enjoyed a quick look at these colourful papers and do share any of your creations over in our Facebook group ATDML # Create.

Class 9 - Slinky Dog

Welcome to your next Toy Story themed cybercrop class - the wonderful Slinky Dog.

Slinky Dog is one of the toys from the films and is one of the most lovable characters. He often stretches his coiled centre to reach and rescue and this class has two pages inspired by him. The first layout stretches elements from one side of the page to the other and the second features lots of coils (ok circles!) layered up Slink style!

If you have one of the lovely Cocoa Vanilla Hello Summer kits you can download the instructions for the class or feel free to follow along with your own choice of papers and scraplift away! We do have a classes gallery over on Facebook if you are inclined to share your pages and if you use social media do tag us with #atdml

We will welcome you back at 7pm with another challenge before Katherine is up at 8pm with the last class of the day.

Class 5 - Sid the kid next door

Good morning Campers

Hope you enjoyed the Mr & Mrs Potato head class,

Let's go from one of the lovable characters to one of the baddies - Sid the kid next door!  He is known for his scruffy grungy teenage clothing and the Cocoa Vanilla 'Totally Rad' range is great for that look.

The range has a great range of patterns and motifs that are reminiscent of skater wear, gaming motifs as well as extreme sports.  Grab your favourite teen photo or make use of the bold symbols to accent your quirkiest photos.

Earlier in the year, I was lucky to be able to travel to Japan and Thailand, we stopped off at a gaming cafe for lunch and these photos were perfect for them.

We'll be doing 2 layouts in this class - here's a sneak peek of the 2nd - pop across to the main page to download the class and instructions in full.

Join us back at Noon for Mel's Prospector class - YeEEhaAA!!!

Ready Made Backgrounds with Cocoa Vanilla

When I get a sheet of paper like the background above I am loathed to cut into it, and then spend time trying to find a photo (as I don't want to cover it up too much) and a little bit of paper so I can show as much as the paper as I can!  I know it should be about the story and the photo and not the background!  When I really love a background I tend to create lots of little layers of papers, so here you can see some strips and little stickers, and also use something that is transparent - so vellum or in this case a torn glassine envelope, so you get layers, but can see the paper behind.  

Sticking with the minimalist page I used a beautiful title from the Midnight chipboard, and also one of the hearts that co-ordinates - to add a little more bling, but again coverage you can see through I used a circle of silver thread and then also wrapped some around the heart.  The final step was a few drips of silver mist.

So you can still see plenty of that beautiful background paper but I've also managed to use it too!  The papers are Cocoa Vanilla's Midnight collection and you can find them in the shop.

This is one of those papers where I would have to buy 2 sheets!  I hope this has inspired you to choose and use one of your favourite papers, one that you've been saving!

Multi-photos and messy backgrounds with Cocoa Vanilla

We were sent a mixture of Cocoa Vanilla lines this month to play with and I've used a mixture of More than Words and Midnight - both of which are gorgeous and go really well together.  I have lots of pictures of Palma Cathedral from our holiday last year - it was beautiful - it has a mixture of traditional Cathedral beauty but also an arts and crafts sort of vibe with a little section done by Gaudi too.  In an ideal world the photos should have been black and white to go with the paler colours...but then the beauty would be hidden, so I went with full on colour and pastels.

I took inspiration for the background from the papers and used a mix of distress oxides and distress inks in pale blues, yellows, pinks and greys.  I then used a Kaisercraft called Fading Dots and imitated the dots that are on some of the papers too in black ink.  Lots of fussy cutting of flowers - though fortunately as these flowers are roughly drawn you can get away with rough cutting.

Then it was just a case of arranging them all together along with a few butterflies and some of the little type written words from the sticker sheets.

I used a pale cream alpha and to make it stand out had a go a mimicking the hand drawn flowers in pencil - still a skill I need to perfect but it was good fun to have a go with.

Another similar arrangement for some more of the photos - I just trimmed the photos to focus on the areas that I wanted, then mounted them on white card.  I added some torn strips of paper behind them...but being that I dug out some of my mists and created an inky pink and silver background.

The photos show the main sanctuary - it had a beautiful chandelier packed with candles, carefully handcrafted, then in the centre is the chapel designed by Gaudi.

There are some beautiful chipboard flowers and hearts in the Midnight ephemera collection and these were great to add as embellishments to my pages.

A whole paper full of butterflies to cut up from More than Words, layered on Midnight stickers - normally scrapping boys it was fun to use up a little bit of pink!

A bit of a tour around my holiday - I hope you've enjoyed the pages and it's given you some inspiration.

Getting Big with You Rock

Hello everyone, this month we got to choose some lines from the store at the retreat....and I went for an older line, but one of my favourites - You Rock by Cocoa Vanilla.  I love the stars and the bright colours, perfect for the boys in your life!

I had cut several stars from Starshine and then used the rest as the top part of my page - I used Galatic as the base and then added a strip from Plus One in too.  I added some of the stars using foam pads and just had the rest tumbling down my page.  O used some of the stickers for embellishments - again adding some of those on foam pads and a mixed stamp/sticker title, plus a few nuevo enamel dots.

I layered up some of my stars on the main paper.

Here you can see a little cluster of embellishments - there are some really nice type-written phrases in the stickers.

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!

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.