Grinchy | CSI Case File No. 401

Merry Day after Christmas! 

Today I'm sharing a super-fun layout I made for CSI: Color, Stories, Inspiration.

Here are the Case File and clues for this challenge. 

I used the basic color scheme of pink, red, white and two different greens. I tried to add all the Evidence clues and managed most of them: plaid, solids, geometric patterns, Christmas-themed items, bow, wreath, circle, animal, scallops, transparent elements, buttons, stamping, metal, pleats, and clothing (stockings). 

The greens in the picture made me think of this fun photo of my friend's dad dressed up as the Grinch on Christmas, and the combination of the pink, red, and greens reminded me of a super-old Ki Memories Christmas paper that's been in my stash for at least a dozen years. I made the wreath by fussy-cutting the ornaments from the paper. It's a shiny paper, a little tricky photographing. I distressed the edges to add another texture to my page.

Once I arranged all the ornaments in a circle, I stitched them down with my sewing machine and then set to finding other clues that I could add to the page. buttons, snowflakes, metal, stamping, and a few more clues found their way onto my layout and added lots of different details and textures. I added the stockings to the edge of the photo to 1) meet one of my clues and 2) I always add hearts to the layouts I give away.

I found a red cardinal puffy sticker in my stash that met the animal clue. Scallops, pleats, and transparent elements were other clues and I tucked those behind the photo. I made the pink pleated piece with a Martha Stewart scoring board. That green transparent loopy bit is an old My Mind's Eye transparent frame. I just cut a piece off of it.

The Florence alphabet by Bella Blvd is the perfect font for a playful touch. One of the clues was bows, and I found a pink plaid puffy sticker bow to go beneath my title.

This was lots of fun to make and I was so excited to finally use that old Ki Memories paper! I hope you'll come play with us for a chance to win a gift certificate or a guest designer spot. 

A Treat | CSI March Cold Case No. 315

I love CSI's Cold Case Files because they encourage me to dig deep into my stash. Here's my page for our March Cold Case, another layout I made to give to one of my students.

Here are the Case File and clues:

I used these clues: papers matching the color scheme, retro papers, jars, buttons, old metal embellishments, string, magic number 3 (the stencil), and October Afternoon papers.

Here are some details. When I saw The Scene, I knew I wanted to use these old jars cut out of  paper from the old Lucky Charm collection by Dear Lizzy. I added a button as a clue and tied an old heart charm onto the jar with string (two more clues). Those fun polka dot letters were the perfect color. I've had them in my stash forever and never opened them.

 I wanted to add some butterflies to my page and found a paper by Making Memories to cut some out. The little shelves I made for the jars to sit on is from an old October Afternoon paper, as are the giant doily patterns.

I made tags out of some papers from the Dear Lizzy collection. The stencil in the background, which I used with yellow stamp ink, was the third in my box (for the magic number clue).

I hope you'll come play with us! This is such a fun challenge and a great opportunity to dig into your stash! And who knows...you may win a prize from one of our eight generous sponsors this month!

I Believe in You {Scrap the Boys Guest Designer}

I recently played over at Scrap the Boys, and my layout was chosen as a favorite, so I was delighted to be asked to be a guest designer. This month, they have a mood board to inspire our layouts:

I made another page to give to one of my students. I obviously used the color scheme from the mood board. I wanted to draw some details from all four quadrants of the mood board:

• Inspired by the top left quadrant, I added the glasses, and the plastic necklaces inspired the use of plastic elements (epoxy stickers, puffy stickers, and the googly eyes). I also used a hounds-tooth patterned paper in the layers behind the photo, like the guy's jacket. 
• In the top right quadrant, I loved the way all those colors butted up against each other, and I decided to find a cut file that I could back with papers in all the different colors of the mood board. 
• The bottom left image inspired me to use some prints that had leafy patterns. 
• From the bottom right quadrant, I wanted to add a horse, but I just couldn't find in my stash and decided another animal would do. I found these cute puffy alligators that matched the palette so I went with those, which added the perfect bit of whimsy that the horse head added to the mood board.

Here are some details. I used all scraps, some extremely old, including some Ki Memories paper, to back a cut file by The Cut Shoppe.

That fun epoxy speech bubble is from Crate Paper's Cool Kid collection, as are the word "Believe" from the title and the black stars.

I love adding googly eyes whenever I get the chance. They add such a fun, playful touch.

I hope you'll come play along. This was a fun mood board with lots of possibilities!

You Are So Awesome {Paper Issues Scraplift Sunday Challenge}

So, I'm making pages for my students, and this is the latest layout:

I made this for Paper Issues Scraplift Sunday challenge. Here's the page we had to scraplift. I scraplifted the basic design, but put a title instead of journaling at the bottom. 

Here are some details. I love it when I can use my old stash, and I've had all these frames in my stash forEVER. That flair badge is by A Flair for Buttons.

The colors on this layout are definitely a little wild and crazy but that's because my page started with these wild and crazy monsters. (I have a thing for monsters--in scrapbooking, that is--and have to buy them whenever I see them). These monsters are by Stickety-Doo-Da. That purple chipboard frame is really old Making Memories.

These plastic slide mounts have been in my stash for probably 15 years. The little speech bubbles were cut out of a Lawn Fawn patterned paper.

And below is another monster in another in another Making Memories frame. I used all paper scraps, some really old, like that purple Ki Memories typewriter paper. The green letters are Sassafras Lass, and the rub-ons are Doodlebug--they're more than a dozen years old (I checked, and the package said 2005). Those things rubbed on like butter!

You Add Sunshine to Our Class (CSI Case File No. 251)

I made a second page for our current challenge at CSI: Color, Stories, Inspiration:

Here's the Case File. I used traditional clues (which are listed at the bottom of the reveal). I used the colors from The Scheme. and the following evidence clues: solid background, textured paper, clouds, llama, cacti, something fuzzy, rainbow, zig-zag stitching, tiny brads, flower, phrase stamp, decorative border.

Another source of inspiration came from a Paper Issues challenge in March, in honor of St. Patrick's Day, where we were asked to use shamrocks, green, the word lucky, or rainbows. I obviously chose a rainbow as my focal point.

Here are some details. I started with a solid white background, which was one of the clues, and then chose papers from my scrap drawer that matched the colors in the Case File.

The rainbow cut file came from Paper Issues. Some of the clouds were cut from patterned paper and a few were cut on my Silhouette Cameo. I found some really old textured paper to back the clouds in the rainbow cut file. Those pink letters are old Heidi Swapp plastic letters, and the word "sunshine" came from a sheet of Maggie Holmes stickers.

I cut those cacti out of a patterned paper by Recollections. That llama sticker came from a Photoplay sticker sheet (For the Love of Summer). I love that he's wearing sunglasses--perfect for my title. I popped a little enamel heart on his back. In order to use the tiny brads, I dug into my super-duper old Prima tiny paper flowers--remember those? And I found some fuzzy flower brads to meet the fuzzy clue from the Evidence list.

My blue scalloped border is an old Doodlebug frills border. Remember those? Man, I  used some oldies on this page.

I decided to sew some zig-zags onto my clouds to meet that particular clue, and at the ended added the phrase stamp onto a cloud to meet another clue.

So grab some of those trendy llamas in your stash and come play with us! We've got a huge number of sponsors this month--seventeen--the most prizes yet, I believe!

You Add Magic to Our Class {Paper Issues Free File Free-for-All Challenge}

I love a good challenge, and Paper Issues has tons of fun ones! Yesterday I had a bit of time to scrap before I had to go out for the day, and I was stuck. I've put a lot of pressure on myself by waiting so long to start making pages for my students. Anyway, like I said, I was stuck-stuck-stuck, so I headed to Paper Issues to check out the challenges. Nothing was calling my name until I looked at this challenge:

and then I saw this page that Amanda-Jane Baldwin, and I got unstuck. I shamelessly scraplifted her [more] beautiful page, and created this:

Here are some details. That unicorn is a free cut file from Paper Issues. The eyelashes are a cut file from the Silhouette store. I used some really old pink Mustard Moon paper (from 2002!) for the unicorn head, and it didn't quite show up as well as I'd hoped, so I decided to cut another head in gray cardstock and offset it. I really wanted to use that watercolor swash-y paper from Crate Paper's new Flourish collection. The floral die cuts are also from the Flourish collection.

The gold leaves are in the Flourish ephemera pack. That lace butterfly is by Martha Stewart--I've had that in my stash for eons. I tried to use enamel dots, but they just looked too modern with these papers, so I dug through my pearls drawer and found these old pretty pearl flowers by Jenni Bowlin. I think they were just what these clusters needed. I usually use white thread when I stitch on my layouts, but I decided to go for gold to match the other gold elements on my page.

The word "magic" in the title is from the same cut file set as the unicorn. That layered butterfly is by Martha Stewart, another oldie in my stash.

This was so fun to make, and I think it turned out pretty. It was fun mixing old and new stash--the products I used span 16 years! Wow!

Impossible Things Before Breakfast {CSI: Case File No. 246}

We've got a brand-new challenge live at CSI: Color, Stories, Inspiration.

Here's my page. I'm making a book for my pastor who has the cutest dogs ever. I'm in love with this dog, Buster. He looked like he did NOT want to get out of bed, like it was IMPOSSIBLE. I was looking for a Lewis Carroll quote to use for my page and came upon the one about "six impossible things before breakfast," and I thought perfect!

I used the traditional clues from the Case File, which you can find if you scroll all the way down to the bottom of the reveal. I used the color scheme ans well as the following Evidence clues, which was almost all of them: solid white background, swiss dots, stripes, floral pattern, text print, hearts, flowers, doily, teacups, crown, lace, border punch, tags, keys, clocks, script stamp, animals (in the pictures), labels, fancy letters, stick pin.

Here are some details. My starting point, once I decided on the "Impossible things before breakfast" quote, was the stack of teacups, which is a cut file from the Silhouette store. My pastor is a big coffee drinker, but I figured the teacups could double as coffee cups. Not sure if you can see it, but on the bottom cup, there's a stick pin with beads in the cluster. I was delighted to find the perfect phrase stickers for this layout!

I was so pleased to use this ginormous gold crown on this page, which has been in my stash FOREVER, one of those "what was I thinking?" purchases. Lace was one of the clues, and I was about to grab some lace from my stash when I remembered the tons of K&Co. paper lace that I have. How fun and perfect are the "I can't even" and "It's a pajama day" phrase stickers? I love when I find the prefect phrase stickers! The chipboard clocks and striped brads fulfilled some of the clues.

In addition to a ginormous gold crown, I had a ginormous gold key. Again, I have no idea whatever possessed me to buy that, but it works on this layout, and fulfills another clue in the Case File. I really love using the Case File clues because it has me digging through my stash to use things I might never have thought of using.

I hope you'll come play with us. We have 12 awesome sponsors donating prizes this month. Check them out: