After All These Years

My Baby Turned One!

Well, it's all over now. My baby is a big one year old and her party was fantastic. She was showered with attention and gifts and is one loved baby! Here's the card I made for her.

 

Of course I have to share just a few photos! This first one is of her on her brand new swing set that her Opa made for her. She absolutely loves it .

 

Here she is on her birthday in her new dress and headband.

 

And of course . . . cake! I found a great recipe for dairy and wheat free chocolate cakes for the allergic birthday girl! You can see that she enjoyed them. They actually taste rather nice.

 

 

I think it's going to take a few days for us all to recover - we had over 40 people and kids at the party. It was hard work but soooo worth it!

I can't wait to put photos in her first birthday mini album.

Party Projects

We are so lucky as scrapbookers as whenever there's a party or occassion, we have the ability to personalise it and put our own little stamp of  handmade goodness on it.

That is exactly what I did recently for my grandparents-in-law's 60th wedding anniversary dinner. There's nothing to buy them so instead I used my talents (and stash) to create a couple of things.

 

This banner was easy to create. Here's a couple of tips:

• Cut your backing card out of cereal boxes. It's sturdy enough and I saw Heidi Swapp doing this. If it's good enough for Heidi . . .

• If you have or have access to a die cut machine, use it to cut out your letters. I used the Slice.

• For different shapes, trace around die cut journaling spots. I always keep a trace of a these in my stash so I can use the shape with any pattern I want.

I also created decorated clear pillow boxes (from Blossie's) to put chocolates in. I simply wrapped a piece of patterned paper around and tied a tag on with silver cord.

Printed serviettes are awesome. They dress up any place settings. I found these black and white ones at Target.

I enjoy doing this sort of thing so much. I think it's because of my obsessive organisational habits. I love to have everything coordinating.

Busy, Busy

That's what I am right now. I've been working on getting ahead in my class preparations so I could focus on Amelia's party and all the projects I want to complete by her first birthday on Sunday.

Here's a little sneak peek at the album I'm creating for birthday photos and snippets. So far I love it but it still needs a little work.

 

I also wanted to finish off her first year mini album (see this post on the Blossie's blog). I've been keeping up to date throughout the year, only have the last couple of months to do.

AND a long time ago I started a mini album (do you see a trend here?) all about her birth and entrance into our family.  I decided that I didn't want to put all the birth photos in her normal album. Still need to finish it.

Before I sign off to get to work, I'll leave you with a photo of my cheeky (almost) one year old girl! This is another one of her cheesy, show off grins.

 

Favourite Things

I have a 'favourite things' layout to share with you for (hopefully) a bit of weekend inspiration!

 

 

Here are a few of my favourite things right now:

• Krylon Leafing Pens 

- This was a BIG tip from Heidi Swapp, to use these pens to colour your chipboard! Ha! Never thought of that. You can get gold, silver and copper and you simply colour in your chipboard. On this layout, I've used the silver pen to colour my flourishes.

 

• Bazzill Swiss Dotted Cardstock 

- This has quickly shot to be one of my favourites. Perfect to add dimension to any layout but I've found it especially good to use when you want to keep a layout quite simple but still interesting.

 

• Fancy brads 

- an oldie but something I'm re-discovering as there are so many more affordable ones out there now (thanks to Kaisercraft mainly). Epoxy brads, flocked brads, glitter brads - I love them all and have got quite a stash now. Why do I love them so? For centres of flowers of course! A quick and easy way to add a classy touch to your projects.

 

 

Want to hear the best thing of all? Blossie's is having a 20% off sale today and all weekend! So you can stock up on your Swiss Dotted Bazzill, fancy brads, Krylon pens and in fact . . . everything!

I'm working Sunday so pop in and say hello!

Lots of Links

Juuust in case you have some spare time over the weekend, I though I'd share a few cool links with you. They aren't neccessarily scrapbooking sites, just cool sites that might inspire. Sometimes I just like looking at pretty stuff.

Vintage Glam Weddings - I loove looking at ideas for weddings. This site is all about vintage weddings to boot.  

Domestic Fashionista - again, just lots of pretties for your home mostly.

The Scrap Review - a site dedictated to reviewing scrapbooking products and tools and answering some questions. 

Inspirational Craft Blogs - as the name suggest, they find the inspiring blogs for you!   

Enjoy!

Stamping Technique

I just wanted to share with you this little technique that's oh so simple but looks really effective, double stamping.

 

As a little accent on my title block, I stamped the dandelions first using Versamagic Key Lime ink then right over the top using Brilliance Starlite Black ink.

The trick to getting the placement right? When stamping your image for the second time, if you roughly line up your stamp right over the top of the first image, I find that it's offset just the right amount.  

So next time you go to stamp an image, why not double stamp it instead! It would work for butterflies, titles or words, swirls or flourishes . . . well almost any stamp really.

The Early Years Part 2

Well, I found it. The first page I ever created. Made while I was staying with my cousin and his wife in Hawaii. Make with her supplies and inspired by a layout I saw in the April 1999 Creating Keepsakes.

 

 

There are a few main reasons why I instantly loved and was hooked on scrapbooking.

• I have always loved photos and looking through my albums. Now I could show my scrapbook albums to people and they could read the details themselves rather than me having to repeat details over and over.

• I have always kept little souvenirs and things and I loved the fact that I could include these things in my album (see the ticket on the first page).

• I love, love, love paper! Now I had an excuse to hoard it!

 

Here's another of my first ones. Do you think oval shaped photos and silhouetting will ever make a comeback?

The Early Years Part 1

This month it is TEN YEARS since I discovered and started scrapbooking! Wow that's a long time! I thought that I'd share with you all some of my early scrapbooking layouts. It's good to see how products and trends change.

To start with, my first four albums are all in A4 as there was NO 12 x 12 inch papers to be found ANYWHERE (I soon discovered Internet shopping and then scrapbook shops started popping up)!

 

Back in the early days there was a lot of 're-creating' things in your photos on your layouts, hence the paper pieced Pearl Harbour memorial.

 

Check out those waves made with the old spiral punch! I also used to be obsessed with vellum - it was my 'thing'.

 

And everything from colours to patterns to fonts had to reflect the theme. Love the Sticko disco ball!

 

I made lots of pocket pages to store in all my crap. Tickets, brochures, serviettes, you name it! Mickey Mouse up there is my own design!

 

I made from scratch the hat, arrow and esky accents! I love the trail of ant stickers and check out that woven background!

I'm not going to redo any of my old layouts. I love them just the way they are. They tell a very important story and that's what it's all about after all.

How long has it been since you've looked at some of your early work?

Page Titles

I'm always on the lookout for interesting page titles. I scrapbook (and I'm sure most of us do) a lot of everyday photos and I'm always wanting a different title so that I don't end up with a whole album of photos titled "Amelia" or "Precious".

Know what I mean?

Here's my latest list - slightly 'love' themed (due to lots of Valentine's day inspiration) but I think they're versatile anyway.

• Wonderful You

• You Are So Loved

• Perfectly You

• What Matters Most

• Everyday You

• A Little Birdie Told Me

• Grateful For You

• Contagious Joy

• This Is It

• Holy Cute!

You may even be inspired to create a page based upon one of those titles.

 

I have a couple of photos to share. The first is of Amelia's new smile. She now squints her eyes when she smiles - it cracks me up! She's eating vegemite in this photo by the way.

 

In fact, she cracks me up every single day with her antics. In this next photo, Daddy was giving her lunch while I was down the hallway folding washing. Our little rubbernecky had to know what I was doing!

 

Have a great weekend!

My Mind's Eye Layout

I have another layout to share today, this one using my all-time favourite paper from My Mind's Eye. I was saving this pink & glittery damask patterned paper for just the right layout.

 

And you know when I bought that jumpsuit from Pumpkin Patch, I couldn't wait to scrapbook using those colours!

 

• Ooh - there's that pom pom trim again! And butterflies again! But if you like something, who says you can't use it again and again?

• I've stamped on my photos using white Staz On ink, just to add another detail. Also ensures the letters stand out.

• And it's yet another page title inspired by a song title! I even googled some of the words to this song and used them as my journaling!

Come back tomorrow as I have some page title ideas to share!