Loot Piles {CSI Case File No. 49}

Case File No. 49 is open for investigation at CSI: Color, Stories, Inspiration. The beginning of the month is always exciting as we have new sponsors, new guest designers, and a new theme.

Clues I used to solve the case: Evidence: Numbers, stickers, punches, rhinestones, baker's twine, circle notch, snowflakes, winter/xmas stuff, hound's tooth; Testimony: doucment a holiday tradition, story inside something (sort of).

I often use a sketch to get me rolling, and I recently realized that digital templates are sort of like sketches. One of my favorite digital sites is Designer Digitals. I've bought a bunch of digital elements that I sometimes print out and use on my pages. When I was looking through their templates to use as a sketch, I came across this one, and thought it was just perfect for the feel of the page I wanted to make, and the little compartments reminded me of The Scene in the Case File:

I decided to document  a tradition of how we gather our presents into "loot piles" on Christmas Day. I thought the sketch had the feel of a loot pile. That's my mom in the picture. She has such a funny expression that I love. I used PicMonkey to do a special effect on the picture where the presents were in bright focus and the rest got more desaturated.

Here are some details. I tried to get that artsy stuff in the background, but, well, you know me...I'm just not very artsy, LOL, so here's my attempt. I stamped some dots in the aqua and then stamped some script over top and embossed with lime green embossing powder. Unfortunately, on the left side, I hadn't let the aqua dots dry enough, so they turned green. Oh, well. I hate throwing away paper, so I just went with it!

I used a Martha Stewart snowflake punch, along with some jumbo-sized rhinestones. I mounted them with pop dots. Those cool number circle elements are in the Coordinates this week. (You can find those at the bottom of the Case File reveal).

I don't own any washi tape (yet), so I just used some bits of chevron paper instead. This chevron paper is by Simple Stories. The lovely intricate border is a die by Cheery Lynn Designs.

Aren't those journaling cards cute? Michele made them for the Coordinates this week. I adore those retro Santas. I like how he looks like he's almost sticking out of a chimney. I used a combination of older and newer papers this week. I love leafing through my stash in search of just the right colors. The polka dots and chevron are by Simple Stories. The green and black hound's tooth are by October Afternoon. The yellow stripe is My Mind's Eye. I accidentally sewed over the pocket and had to take out the stitches on the yellow.  I stuffed the journaling inside all those layers to seem sort of like piles of presents in Santa's bag.

Here's another picture where you can see I piled on some word stickers to make it look like piles of presents.

Here's my journaling. Did I mention I love those retro Santas? I printed my Coordinates on photo paper this week to keep their vibrancy.

You must come play with us! We have Noel Mignon as our main sponsor. Their design team is guesting, as well as Mariaje Munoz and our awesome team of Special Investigators. Come see what the team and guest designers made here.

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog and reading about my page!