pretty paper. true stories. {and scrapbooking classes with cupcakes.}

Last month I had so much fun shopping for supplies to design the minibook crafting kit for Jenni Bowlin at JBS Mercantile. And apparently the Mercantile subscribers thought it was pretty fun too, as it sold out before I even had a chance to blog about it! (Thank you!) But today seems like pretty good timing to share my finished mini, considering most of this was created outdoors or at the very least on the road… and that’s exactly what we’re discussing on the latest episode of the Paperclipping Roundtable!

You can listen here by pressing play or you can listen via streaming or download on iTunes (it’s free to subscribe on iTunes and get each new episode as soon as it’s available). Check this post for post-show discussion in the comments.

This week Amy Tan and I were the guests of the regular crew of Noell, Izzy and Nancy to chat about scrapbooking and crafting outdoors, and there is some humour in how all of them live in much warmer climes but I will take any chance to scrapbook outside that I can! But I think that is part of living somewhere that isn’t always sunny – we all head straight out the door as soon as it’s a lovely day, just in case there isn’t another for weeks! I definitely see that attitude in our local park… it’s just that most people take a picnic or a football out for their sunny day, while I tend to bring a scrapbook page! (For the record, this still works even if The Boy and I head out together – he takes something to read and I cut and paste It works.)

In the episode, we talk about what we scrapbook outdoors, and I’ll certainly work on 12×12 pages without any trouble, but in this case it was a travel journal, filled in as we went, sitting outside in parks, at cafes, on the train and so forth. I started with this kit but if you wanted to assemble something similar, you can find almost all of those items here so you could pick and choose if you already have some elements in your stash. (By the way – I also made a few 12×12 pages from the kit in addition to the minibook.)

The base for the book is one of Amy’s Daybooks – my pick of the week on the Roundtable. (There are several styles available here.) It comes prebound with a variety of pages inside – different shapes and patterns and colours, plus an envelope and sticker sheets. The bicycle cover is my favourite because the sticker sheet is a tiny alphabet, perfect for adding titles and captions as you go.

I used my DSLR to take photos throughout this trip, and printed them on the road with a Pivi printer – a tiny little gadget that attaches by cable to a digital camera, then prints the digital image as an instant photo, like a mini Instax. (I love the Pivi but it is a real treat – they are only widely available in Japan. I bought mine from an international seller on Ebay and stock up on the film packs the same way. The film packs are different from what you would put in an Instax camera, so importing is the way to go. But it is fantastically fun!)

I love that the Daybooks are small enough to pop in my handbag or the pocket of my backpack but they can work with that same philosophy of a Smash book – just sticking in bits and pieces from daily adventures then surrounding them with writing. The wrapper at the top left was from the chocolate in our hotel room.

A sheet or pack of small journaling cards goes perfectly for writing along the way… and if you’re really crammed for space you can just keep some journaling cards with you all the time and add them to a book when you get home.

I like keeping some of the more designed pages as accents – like just adding a woodgrain sticker to the vellum page.

Page design concepts from traditional 12×12 scrapping can still come in useful on tiny little pages… like repeating a motif from one side to the other. The large camera here comes from the sticker sheet while the smaller cameras are part of a border strip. It makes it more obvious that the writing on the left corresponds to the photo on the right.

Washi tape is a great component to any travel journal kit because you can just stick anything in the book but still have the freedom to move it around later… plus it’s cute enough to use as an accent layer too. So you’ll see a lot of that turquoise striped tape showing up throughout this book, but I love how it’s both practical and a design element with continuity.

Cutting up border strips with printed phrases can create something new. For the map at the left, I cut out the words from the phrase ‘you make my world go round’ and rearranged to say ‘go round the world’. Because believe it or not, ridiculously super sweet Surinamese/Dutch soda does not make my world go round. (But it does make for a funny story I wanted to include in the book!)

The balance of page sizes and types in this book is just right, so there are pages that look great with just a photo or a phrase, but there are others that include plenty of room to write about the adventure.

And that’s that!

By the way, you can still grab one of the other kits from Mercantile for May – the main kit is here and there are a few left. I’ll be back soon with a video to show you what I’ve been making with that!

Have a fabulous weekend!

xlovesx

PS: for those of you who have listened to the episode – would you like to see what I keep in my lunchbox for outdoor crafting? I don’t always use this because I tend to just take my basics if I take page kits, but it’s what I carried for years before I committed to packing ultra light!

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Starting a new week with fresh energy and bountiful intentions. How are you this find morning? And would you fancy a scrapbook starting point, perhaps?

This starting point and resulting page comes from this month’s kits at JBS Mercantile. This includes elements from both the main kit and the minibook kit. (There are still a few of the main kits left. The mini has sold out, I’m afraid, but many of the items from that kit can be found here.)

Somewhat odd for my layouts recently, this actually requires two sheets of cardstock: one 12×12 for the background and one cut smaller to mat the two patterned paper boxes in the centre of the page. That full area in the middle pieces together to be 11.5 inches wide and 10.5 inches tall. Then a gathering of patterned paper scraps, a journaling card and some washi tape forms the start to the embellishment. But where will you go from here? Is that the space for writing, the title or more layers of pretty paper?

In this case, that spot was just right for the title, and a few more layers of paper both here and at the top left balanced things out, leaving room to add writing on the green patterned paper above the title. I’d been toying with how to write about these pictures without my album starting to have a sort of farmers’ almanac twist since the pink trees turn up in my photos every spring. Then I realise the farmers’ almanac was actually pretty nifty as it goes – so each year it will document that little bit of perspective on the weather and the seasons and so forth. This year there was very little of the pink on blue and instead pink on grey, with many of the cherry blossoms struggling through since we had one week of really warm weather followed by a cold front and freezing rain. In the end I photographed these under an umbrella in a downpour because I was afraid the rain would bring all the blossoms down, but I did manage to get a few blue sky shots the next morning when we had about two hours of sunshine. So yes, apparently I’m now so engrained in British culture that I will scrapbook the weather. Next: a page about queueing, obviously.

We’ve actually had two starting points since I last posted a round-up, so here are a few favourites from those two. Click the corresponding link to take a closer look and get to know the scrappers behind these pages: one, two, three and four.

If you use this week’s starting point to create a scrapbook page of your own, I’d love for you to share it here!

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This next challenge was so much fun for me – permission to try something new and just not worry about whether it worked or went wrong. Think you can give that a try? I promise you don’t need to be this inky necessarily – in fact what you decide to try is up to you!

One thing I absolutely love about scrapbooking is how there is room for so very much. If you like simple, you got it. If you want to be layered, no problem. If you want to spend hours, if you want to be messy and inky, if you want to stamp or sew or write or type, if you want to use a dozen photos or just one: every single style is completely welcome here. As a result, there are plenty of scrapbookers out there with very different styles to my own, but I still love what they make.

For this challenge, it’s time to choose one of them – either a specific person or a style – and mix it with your own.

For my page, I took inspiration from Dina Wakley and mixed her inky, artsy style with my own love of layers and butterflies and such. See this post for more details on my creative process learning from Dina and applying her look while remaining true to my favourite things in my own scrapbooking routine.

Now it’s your turn! Choose a style or a scrapper you admire but with a different look to your own pages. Mix something from that with your own style to create something new. Upload it to a page gallery (like Two Peas or UKScrappers) or your own blog and link to it here to enter to win this challenge. Entries should be new projects created in response to this specific challenge and entries close at the end of next weekend!

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Hello Monday! How about a new starting point for a scrapbook page this week? This week I could wait no longer to cut into my sheet of that multi-coloured chevron paper and some other goodies from the Magpie collection from Jenni Bowlin Studio.

This starting point includes a multi-coloured patterned paper cut to 4.5×11.5 inches, a single-coloured patterned paper cut to 7×11.5 inches, a border strip about 1×12 and a punched border just below that. Then a group of layers made from a 4×4 square of patterned paper, a journaling card and two labels, the smallest on pop dots for a bit of dimension.

Here’s my finished page, with one of those older photos that doesn’t have any additional pictures for a multi-photo page. Complete coincidence that the print was the same height as the two cards to its right, as I didn’t have this photo in mind when I made the starting point… maybe a sign that I work with the same sizes so often that they just fall together naturally? Who knows.

Most of what I added was more Jenni Bowlin: doily flowers, hodge-podge and quilted stickers, letter stickers and the new butterfly punch. Plus an old favourite Fontwerks stamp set for the numbers and a MME stamp set for a couple tiny additions.

Now it’s your turn!

If you want to join in this week, recreate this starting point with any supplies you like, then complete the page in your own style. Upload it to your blog or a gallery and leave a link at the bottom of this post to share your work.

Last week’s layouts were particularly gorgeous, I must say! So difficult to pick, but these are six I found noteworthy. Do take a closer look and leave them some comment love or add them to your bookmarks! Clockwise from top left, they are from Kelly, Soaphousemama, Nancy, Kelly (who cleverly made a gift bag!), Helen and Katherine.

<sub>Two quick closing notes for today:
1. If you’re a big starting points fan, consider joining us for True Scrap. See this post for details of an exclusive starting points video series available with this online event.</sub>

_{2. If you’ve been thinking of picking up some brand new scrapping goodies, the deal of the day is a particularly good one today for stocking up on papers and embellishments at 60% off, while they last.}

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Ready for things to get really photographic? Because really you want to see pictures of all these lovely new crafty things. Got it.

And we’ll start with the always-lovely Jenni Bowlin Studio.

The JBS booth features four new collections to check out: two new paper lines (Magpie and Wren), a beautiful mix of new alterable items and the recent release of JBS punches from Fiskars.

If you haven’t seen the punches, here they are! Border, squeeze and lever punches, and these have just hit shops. You can find them here.

Seriously beautiful punch layering, right? So pretty.

Magpie is the first paper release – this will ship to stores in mid February. Magpie has a beautiful palette that mixes some softer tones with red and a tiny bit of black to keep it versatile and not pastel.

The new Magpie stickers include a mixed sheet (perfect for everyday scrapping documentation!) and very cool hexagonal stickers that are a great new twist on the expected circles and rectangles. I love how Jenni always gives things a simple change – it makes all her products so very easy to use but still exciting and fun.

The accessory sheet has border strips with both handwriting and coffee labels? I promise I didn’t pay her to do that. But I love it.

Love collection packs? You’re all set. Plus more hexagon stickers – red/black and cream/black to match pretty much everything!

Onto something else: Mixed Media Bases. So many things to decorate, keep around the house, and otherwise beautify life. A chalkboard easel? Small storage box with ‘handmade’ motifs? Definitely.

Will you hang necklaces, crafty ribbons or beautiful tags from something like this hotel key holding board? I wish I had something so cute in my old office when we had a million keys to keep straight!

Here’s how they might look once you art them up. Love that idea of adding a photo and some writing of whatever is a current event in your home – so change it up for holidays, birthdays, graduations, student of the week, awesome new haircut – whatever you want to celebrate!

This line also includes new clear stamp designs, printed pockets and tags (perfect for divided page protectors!) and plain chipboard in both button and tab shapes.

And this little vignette sets the tone for the second paper collection, Wren. Wren ships to stores in April.

It mixes beautifully with the pockets and tags, with a crisp blue and red colour scheme.

I love how the collection makes me think of Sunday brunch at a favourite diner, though it could certainly be used in patriotic designs if you’re so inclined.

And one last little addition: die-cut papers in kraft and white. Can’t wait to see how these look layered and misted and painted and inked. And the repetitive designs would be great for cardmaking for events when you need a whole set to match. Perfect for a vintage-themed wedding, right? (Come on: someone wants me to make pretty things for your vintage-themed wedding. Apparently it is frowned upon to like the idea of making more wedding things once you’re already married!)

And my face may look at a little this, surrounded by all these beautiful papers and projects! (This page is by Stephanie Howell – and the projects throughout the booth are by Jenni and the JBS design team.)

Click here to shop for scrapbooking supplies by Jenni Bowlin Studio.

If you’re attending the show, find JBS at booth 1773. (And I’ll be there Tuesday from show open till around 1pm, if you want to say hello and put me to work!)

Right – start making your wish list!

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Last week I switched gears from thank you cards just temporarily to start thinking a little about all things red and make up a few Valentines. You can see more of these layered envelopes on the JBS inspiration blog.

Which begs a Monday morning question: are you planning on any special Valentine projects? Do tell!

xlovesx

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Have I finished my Christmas cards? No.

Do I have more finished than this time last year? Yes.

I’m calling that success, so far.

So here’s a little share of some cards I’ve been making. You’ll find a tutorial for the card set above here on the Jenni Bowlin Inspiration blog, and there are cards from the whole team throughout the month.

And these you’ll find on the American Crafts blog as part of their Christmas card week. These use the Hollyday collection, plus a little Christmas-themed washi tape.

So that’s at least five cards done. Perhaps I should number the list to see how many I really need?

Have you been making and sharing cards on your blog? Share a link so we can all see!

xlovesx

PS: if handmade cards are just so not your thing at this time of year but you still want to sort some pretty greetings, these letterpressed cards (including Christmas designs) are already 30% off.

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Some exciting news from Jenni Bowlin Studio this weekend, and a JBS-themed video to share with you today! I even have something special for someone feeling lucky out there!

The news from JBS is two-fold: first, Jenni is adding a brand new section to her Mercantile website just for old things: one off vintage and antique finds sourced by Ms Bowlin’s amazing eye at estate sales, auctions and markets. Starting tomorrow unique items like old cameras, books, clocks and totes will be up for grabs should you fancy something old but new to you.

And second, Jenni is teaching a brand new online crafting class too. Home for the Holidays includes beautiful holiday crafting in Jenni’s signature style, and one of you can win a place on the class plus a gift certificate to go shopping for a JBS treat! To enter, leave a comment on this post! Easy. Entries close at the end of Monday night. (By the way, winners for the Christmas Crafting Weekend will be posted on Monday!)

For more about Jenni Bowlin Studio, check out the JBS Inspiration Blog.

xlovesx

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