Be Brave

ABOUT THE PHOTO(S):
This was the best part of our visit from our friends - watching our girls in the inflatable pool! Natalie LOVED when she slipped in and it happened to be nice, cozy, warm water instead of hose water - she just sat back and chilled out, I'd never seen her do that before! Her friend on the other hand, LOVED the bottom of the pool that was bouncy and inflatable and she was bouncing on her little coolie the whole time!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
The layout was sort of guided by the 3 photos that I had printed 4x3 that I definitely wanted to include in some sort of progression as Natalie is sinking into the water.

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
Originally I started with a busy background piece of paper and tried to add those three diecut titles (from the More Bright Ideas class from Studio Calico with Nicole Samuels, created by Geralyn Sy for In A Creative Bubble). The titles got lost on the busy paper so I die cut a black border to go around them, but it still looked a bit too crazy. Then this morning I read the latest article in Spark Magazine from the Simple Scrapper premium membership about white space and decided my page was looking too crazy and busy. I made white space by changing up my background paper to black card stock and allowing it to breathe! Ahhh! The titles now stood out great, so I just added minimal embellishments and some journaling. The paper to cut the titles was from the Printshop collection and the striped piece is from the Brighton Pier collection.

One and Done

ABOUT THE PHOTO:
A few days before Natalie's 1st birthday, I had her sitting outside and gave her a rice cake to try! She nibbled it, mostly sucked on it till it became soggy and gross and I think I tossed it. Later I gave her another one and she bit off a chunk that was too big for her and threw up. ANYWAY, I used this photo for her little birthday message on Facebook and joked how for her birthday she could have a piece of cake... a rice cake that is!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
I was reading Cathy Zielske's blog and she reminded "us" that her digital downloads were on sale for one more day at DesignerDigitals.com. Since I've been meaning to try and follow along with her layouts and buy one of her layered templates for a hybrid page for awhile, I went for it... and bought 6! So this one I chose for this layout is older but perfect for a page about Natalie's 1 year old stats!

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
I had already printed out my photo 5x7 so I adjusted the template a bit to make room for the wider photo. This was a page for 8.5x11, but since this is going in Natalie's album and I don't like mixing page sizes, I adhered to a sheet of paper from the Brighton Pier collection from Studio Calico. I also used a piece from that collection to cut out the strip with the numbers on it. I used a few wood veneer pieces from the Lemon Lush collection also by Studio Calico. This layout was fun and easy to make, but very unlike my usual style with a lot more embellishments! I like this page though, because I really wanted to include all the stats in the journaling and have that stand out! I was very pleased with the templates I purchased, Cathy includes a wonderful pdf with each template that explains the fonts she used (and links when available), and other information and tips for the template! Can't wait to try the next one!

You + Me

ABOUT THE PHOTO:
Chris and Natalie on 4th of July, awww...

LAYOUT DESIGN:
After my long, unintentional hiatus from scrapbooking, I took the 30 minutes this evening while Chris took Natalie for a walk to speed scrap this layout, making today a 2 layout day, wow!! In order to do quick and easy, I basically copied this layout by Allison Waken for Studio Calico!

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
I used the Brighton Pier collection for this 8.5x11 page because it will go across from the last page I made for Chris' album with the same collection by Studio Calico, and it was the collection that Allison used in her video! I used the XO stamp from Amy Tangerine's Plus One collection and stamped over the photo with Jet Black Staz On ink.

XO

ABOUT THE PHOTO(S):
I decided to put these "mismatched" photos together into one layout for Chris' album since they were all random moments from July of Chris and Natalie that I wanted to scrap but couldn't make out of a full 12x12 layout!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
I used a sketch template from the SimpleScrapper.com that was based on a 2 page layout by Jamie Leija! I thought the 8.5x11 format would work perfectly for these photos, and ended up printing them 3x3.66 (since I had 3 photos to fit in 11 inches of height).

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
It was very hard to cut into that awesome piece of paper from the Brighton Pier collection, designed by Kal Barteski for Studio Calico! But if I like that paper so much I'm bound to like it even better on a layout, so I went to town! I added some wood veneer pieces from the same collection. The paper fringe by Crate Paper came in last month's Penny Arcade kit and the gray tag was the packaging for the Knot & Bow ribbon from this month's Sandlot kit by Studio Calico that had JUST arrived on my doorstep! So yes, it was very hard to not dig into that kit right away instead, but Brighton Pier is still so awesome it had to be used :)

#Staycation2014

ABOUT THE PHOTO(S):
We cancelled our planned trip to Florida last minute in June and ended up on a Staycation instead! It ended up being a good break for our family, even though Natalie was teething the first half of it!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
I basically copied this layout by Paige Evans, because... well look at how awesome it is!!

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
First I cut the world map using my Silhouette Cameo with this world map shape I purchased in the Silhouette online store! I used the paper and wood veneer numbers from this month's Penny Arcade kit from Studio Calico, but then used a combination of the Printables by In A Creative Bubble by Geralyn Sy and the free printables by Hello Forever by Marcy Penner that went with the Brighton Pier collection this month to layer around the photos! I just love how the photos are us staying home and the page shows a map of the world and that "Jetsetter" embellishment :)

Love

ABOUT THE PHOTO:
Natalie and her little buddy from church who is 3 weeks older than her just really seem to get along great whenever we have a play date! They are so cute together!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
For this layout I used an older sketch template from January 2012 from the SimpleScrapper.com (the premium membership gives you access to all the past archives)!

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED:
I dug right into the newest collection from Studio Calico, Brighton Pier! I just love those papers! I also mixed in a few items from the Penny Arcade SC kit this month. I kept it simple, so I will probably add the date and some journaling to the back before it goes into Natalie's 2nd completed album!

Baptism & Picnic

ABOUT THE PHOTO(S):
Got some random pics from our church's baptism & picnic last month, but of course a couple of Natalie in there!

LAYOUT DESIGN:
I used a sketch template from this month from the Simple Scrapper membership and loved how unique this layout turned out with the long skinny photos (I think they are about 1.75"x5").

MY PROCESS/PRODUCTS USED: I used papers from this month's Studio Calico kit, Penny Arcade but got stuck when I went to do the title. I had taken out about 5 different sets of alphas to potentially use, none that looked quite right, until my delivery came today of SC's latest collection, Brighton Pier! I used the silver alphas and the silver star rub-ons to finish the page!