Wedding layouts

In March 2018, my lovely sister got married.  It was a beautiful wedding and I have lots of amazing photos to put in pocket pages in my 2018 scrapbook.  But I wanted to do some special pages with single photos, so it has taken me some time to come up with an idea I was happy with.  The first page is the happy couple and the second is the complete family - my sister, new brother in law and my nieces and nephew.

Both are loosely based on a couple of Pinterest sketches, here and here.  The titles were die-cut, the heart circle was cut on the Silhouette in two different cardstocks, the border under the photo on layout 1 was punched, the flowers and the cogs were die-cut.  Flowers.....?  Me...? Well, I love my sister, she can have flowers for her wedding day .... LOL. 
I am so pleased with these, I wanted the pages to really do the photos justice and I think they do :-)

A couple of layouts

I recently spent the weekend at the Littlegreen retreat near Arundel.  I managed 8 completed pages and 2 mostly done, so I am very pleased :-)  The two below are my favourites.

Papers  Kaisercraft "Wonderland".  Title is cut on the Silhouette.

Papers from Bo Bunny Winter Wishes.  Corners and title cut on the Silhouette, the title is cut in white and black for a shadow effect.  We had a tic-tac-toe challenge, so I got rounded corners, two or more alphas and stamping on this layout!

Cocktail Hour

This is a layout done at the Littlegreen retreat in Arundel at the end of January.  A whole page started and finished at one retreat, imagine that!!  Actually I managed to complete 10 pages and work on 7 partial ones, a good total for me.

This page is about our friends coming to visit and deciding to make cocktails.  To save on trips to refill glasses, Gary and John decided on Pina Colada by the pint :-)
Papers are from stash, although I think the woodgrain background is probably Kaisercraft.  I cut the title twice on the Silhouette, using the darker orange as a 'shadow' under the lighter one.  The leafy swirls and the pennants are die-cut, Cheery Lynn and Die'sire respectively, with the pennants also cut twice for a shadow effect.  The journalling lines are done with an SU stamp.
I wanted a beachy tropical feel, but didn't have any suitable papers, so I think this has done quite well LOL.

Layout - #selfie

It's not often I get a good photo of myself........ but this one of DH and I at Wakehurst Place came out rather well and the title was obvious LOL.  I originally made this page with just the photo, a little stamping and splattering and the title.  But it seemed a little too plain, so I added the die cut frame.

Made the world of difference!
The paper is from stash and already had most of the random mottling on it, I added the splatters and cog stamps, which are a little more subtle than I intended, but never mind :-) 
The title is cut on the Silhouette, the font is Segoe script which comes with Windows and welds together really nicely.

50th birthday card

I made this for a work colleague, we presented it yesterday so now I can share :-)

The blank card was cut on the Silhouette, I used this file from Craftsuprint.  It has the card base, a mat and the numbers, all can be cut from a sheet of A4 - I cut the base twice in purple and the mat and numbers in white.
I cut one base in half and embossed it with a folder - I could have just embossed half the main base, but a lot of people had to sign the inside, which would have been difficult on a debossed surface!  Then the embossed half-base was attached to the main one.
The numbers were also embossed and then inked with distress inks in purple, teal and pink.  I attached them to the white mat and then the whole topper to the card.
Then I was a bit stuck - part of the brief was butterflies, but I couldn't find a butterfly die which looked right, perched on the 50.  But whilst looking through the box, I came across the champagne glass and pearly trail, which were perfect.  They were die cut in Bazzill Diamond Bling and the small butterflies were punched to match.  A few pearls and it was done.
I am very pleased with this - she couldn't open all her cards at the party so I hope she is pleased too .... I'll find out tomorrow :-)

DS2

Another layout to share!  This is the last one from the retreat, or at least the last one that I am happy with, there is one more which I need to re-scrap as it didn't really work LOL.

This one is a photo of DS2, smartly dressed for a day out in London.  Not an 'occasion' as such, so no obvious title .... I decided to just use his name instead.
The background paper is from Kaisercraft and I have used sheets from a 6" paper pad for the panels, which may also be Kaisercraft or possibly Bo Bunny??  The strips of paper are manufacturer strips from the base of some Studio Light papers and the ornate rivets are definitely Bo Bunny, though I can't remember from which collection.
I cut the title on the Silhouette (font: Monster Paparazzi).

Three Wise Men

I am not able to do any crafting at the moment due to an inner ear infection - I have actually been officially signed off work, for the first time in my life!!  I have been given tablets to treat the constant dizziness and they seem to be working thank goodness, so that just leaves me feeling completely wiped out :-(  So I am using the opportunity to slowly catch up with blogging everything I finished at the retreat ...... then going back to bed!

This is a photo of DH with DS1 & DS2, taken just before they left after Christmas.  It was mostly done, just needed title and journaling, but I was really stuck for the title!  A few days before the retreat, I fell asleep thinking of page kits to pack - as you do! - and it just came to me, luckily I remembered it when I woke up the next day LOL.
The background paper is quite an old one from stash, I think it may be Prima, the journaling and image panels are Marion Smith.  I made the lines for the journaling using a Stampin' Up line stamp.  The title was cut on the Silhouette, I used the 'weld' function to join the letters.
Pleased with this one :-)

On the Beach

Another 'finished off' page - it only needed journaling, but for a long time I had been stuck on quite how to add it.  At the retreat, I was looking through some papers and found one with a square pattern ..... so I cut out the squares and used those to write on!

The photos are of a very windy day at Eastbourne, I had managed to leave my camera in the car, so we used DS2's phone to get some pictures!
The papers are from Studio Light and the title is cut on the Silhouette.
Quite a simple page, but effective, I think :-)

Space Oddity

Another layout started and finished at the ATDML retreat! 
I am finding that I don't take so many photos nowadays, apart from holidays when we take hundreds, so I am short of material for non-holiday layouts.  Krafty Karen suggested that I try scrapping older photos, or old favourites which may have been scrapped before, but deserve another look.  I found this concept a bit daunting, since I scrap strictly chronologically!  One year, one album.  But I have embraced the step out of the comfort zone and now have an album for a Miscellany of Incidental Pages ...... LOL.
This is the first incidental layout, it's an old favourite photo of mine from 2002, DS2 dressed as an alien for the Scout carnival float.  We sprayed some old clothes and a swimming hat silver, made him a sign and constructed a rocket back pack from sprayed fizzy drink bottles and duct tape!

It's quite a simple page, I have let the background paper (Maja Designs) do all the work and used another of their papers for the central panel carrying the photo and journaling.  The title was cut on the Silhouette, I wanted a font which I had previously seen in passing and thought might be called Bellbottom, but wasn't sure .... happily I found it on one of the free font sites, downloaded it and was ready to go!
I really like the way it has all come together :-)

The Great Outdoors

A month and a half since the last post... oops....  time to catch up a bit :-)
Last weekend, I went to the ATDML retreat in Suffolk.  I got back late Sunday and we flew off to Paris very early on Monday, so this is the first chance I have had to share the pages I got done!
This one is done using the current sketch from My Creative Sketches:



and here is my take on it:

 I didn't like the sketch at first look, I felt that the large block on the right was just too... well, large and blocky!  But I thought about it and decided it could be a lattice to reduce the in-your-face-ness of it.  So I cut a lattice on the Silhouette and packed it into the kit when I was preparing the papers etc.  When I actually came to make the page, I thought I would also try flipping the sketch and I like it much better this way :-)
The papers are from Maja Design, apart from the plain blue from Craft Creations.  I cut the title with an alpha die, from either Memory Box or Dienamics, not sure which.  It just fit across the page!!  The title comes from the fact that we never go outside at a retreat, too busy!  But we were tempted out by a photo opportunity LOL.
This is my second attempt at scrapping this photo and I am much happier with it than previously :-)

Bear Necessities

I finished off this layout at the Littlegreen retreat a couple of weekends ago.  All it needed was the small journalling banner at the top .... LOL.

The photo was taken outside the Berlin Olympic stadium in April last year.  The papers are a mix from stash, I think there may be Prima and Kaisercraft amongst them!
The title was done on the Silhouette, in black and green and layered to give a shadow effect.  I actually had to cut it twice, the first time I cut each letter far too big to be able to fit such a long title on the page, so had to scale it down :-)

Middle Farm Cider Barn

It's not very often I re-do layouts, but I was very unhappy with the original treatment I gave these photos, so decided to start again.  I used a sketch - I think it was from My Creative Sketches - and some papers from Maja Design.

I love the layered effect on this, one slight niggle is the mistake in the journalling, but hey that's just part of the charm isn't it??  The title is cut on the Silhouette and the journalling stamp is an old one, from Stamps Away I think.
I am much better pleased with this version :-)

Three Happy Scrappers

A few years ago, Karen, Sy and I scrapped the same photo of the three of us and we thought it would be a nice idea to do the same thing for Blogtober and post it on the same day.  Karen's layout is here and Sy's is here.

The background paper is, I think, from Studio Light and I found two journalling cards and some toning patterned papers from an old class kit.  The large doily is Silhouette cut and the clock, gears, borders, butterfly and title are all die-cut.
This page is probably unique, since it deliberately includes a flower, something I never do ...... LOL.  That's because the gears are for me, the butterfly is for Karen and the flower is for Sy :-)

San Marco 7 am

We went to Venice for our 30th wedding anniversary, back in March.  On the last day, we got up super early, so we could try and get some photos without too many crowds.  An ideal opportunity to make use of the selfie stick I had bought DH for Christmas :-)

The papers are Basic Grey 'Little Black Dress' and I cut the title on my Silhouette (font: Bernstein).

Snow 2013

I have a terrible habit of leaving things half finished .... you may have noticed :-)  With scrapbooking, I will usually start off a layout at a crop, then decided to finish at home - mostly it's the title and journalling which causes this procrastination.  I have dozens of such half-finished pages, so I need to make a bit of an effort and what better excuse than Blogtoberfest???

It seems strange to post another snowy page so soon after the Throwback Thursday one, but this was a quick one to finish, the title was actually already cut (hangs head in shame).  So all I needed to do was to die-cut the banner for the letters to sit upon and then punch the three little banners at the lower side, it doesn't really need any journalling.  Yes, that was it.  Really.

Luckily there was a piece of the paper with the manufacturer's strip still attached, so I am able to tell you that it is My Minds Eye "Lost & Found 3".  The fancy squares are done with an old Creative Memories punch, the large banner with a Die-namics die and the small banners with a Stampin Up punch.  The letters are silhouette-cut, I think the font is Polo.

One down ..... goodness know how many to go!

Deco 'celebrate' birthday card

I needed to make a card for a 50th birthday, but was in a quandary as to whether to use the number 50 on the card, or not.  DH agreed that it was a dilemma, then suggested that I could do something with a champagne glass and the word 'celebrate'.  Well, that was just an inspired idea and here it is :-)

The deco fan is a Silhouette cutting file, reduced to 30p from 59p, what a bargain.  The champagne glass is made with a Britannia die, the sentiment tag is a Nestie.  The word is spelt out with individual 5mm peel off letters, from Craft Creations.  I added a couple of crystals onto the tag, and then a few tiny ones for 'bubbles'.
It was a little fiddly, not to mention more time consuming than you would think, assembling all the pieces.  But I really like it, I think having two glasses on an anniversary card would look good too.  Incidentally, the card and fan are ivory, rather than white as they look in the photo, it looks a lot warmer in real life :-)

BtCR May

Beat the Christmas Rush for May .... I made four cards, difficult to get into one photo!

The postage stamp circle mat is a Silhouette cutting file.  I stamped /embossed the Christmas image (Just Rite) and punched into a circle with my huge 4" Woodware punch.  Then I inked it with Antique Linen and Tea Dye distress inks.  I used 1mm foam tape to attach it to the mat, so it's not completely flat, but still "post-able"!

Sapphire Wedding Anniversary card

One of my work colleagues asked me to make 45th wedding anniversary card - she made the request last Wednesday and needed it for the following day!!! 
A 45th anniversary is represented by Sapphire, so I went with that :-)  I embossed some Diamond Bazzill Bling with a roses embossing folder, then die cut a pearlescent blue mat using a new Sue Wilson die - one of the Spanish ones, bought at the recent Make It show.  The mesh heart is done on the Silhouette, as are the numbers.  I added a dark blue rose and pearls.  The sentiment is done with tiny peel-off letters - not my original plan, but my printer refused to co-operate with printing out onto card, so I had to improvise!
My colleague was very happy with it!  She has also asked for a 65th wedding anniversary card, but has given me a few weeks to do that ...... LOL.