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

I love colour on my scrapbook pages. So much. And usually I go to patterned papers for the start of all that colour, but then a page like this comes along and reminds me the colour can always start somewhere else, like paint:

It’s a page Corrie Jones shared here in an article about scrapbooking with paint absolutely ages ago, but it’s one that pops into my mind often and I always find something on that beautiful page to inspire me.

This week, I challenge you this week to paint your scrapbook page. If more specifics help you, paint the edge of your page. It’s an easy way to introduce paint of any kind without feeling you need to be Matisse or have special brushes or absolutely anything complicated. Watercolour, acrylic, or mist can all be painted on with either a brush or a sponge, and going around the edge can be bold or subtle depending on how much paint you use and what colour you pick. Everything else is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! To get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer Sheena Rowlands and guest artist Jeanna Cata.

I love it when a challenge gets me scrapping something I’d not got around to documenting up to now. When I saw the challenge was sport I was reminded of a visit my husband and I made to the Wimbledon Tennis Tournament a couple of years ago. This trip was made even more special as we used to live there many years ago and actually got married there too and we could see the church from the Tennis Club, which got us reminising together.

As my photos from the day aren’t that great I’ve printed them small and incorporated four into this grid design. To emphasise the tennis feel I’ve stitched white lines through the grid and dry brushed a white paint border around the edge. All my supplies are from the Go Now Go and Starshine ranges and they coordinate together beautifully.
- Sheena

I’m always up for a challenge, and with this week’s project I explored new techniques and stepped a bit out of my comfort zone. I’m only just now exploring mixed media, so had some acrylic paint on hand; however, I hadn’t ever considered painting the edges of my page with it. The thought was a bit terrifying once I realized that I only had one page of Pathfinder from Shimelle’s Starshine line on hand. Eek!

Since I decided to record our trip to Lincoln to watch Nebraska football play last fall, I wanted to stick to a very specific color palette and I’m grateful that the various American Craft lines, those of Shimelle and Amy Tangerine, included so much red, white and black, and that they were complimentary. Of course, the final project wasn’t what I had first envisioned, but I like how it turned out. My story can be found on the backside.
- Jeanna

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

I’ll see you tomorrow to share how I took on this challenge!

Today’s Guest Artist: Jeanna Cata loves to travel, read, and laugh. You can find more from Jeanna on Instagram, Pinterest, and her blog.

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It wouldn’t be September without a leaf challenge, right? Southern hemisphere friends, please tell me you can take some leafy inspiration for springtime and use an entirely different colour scheme than we are up here, okay? Leaves, leaves aplenty!

This week I challenge you this week to scrapbook with leaves. It is that simple! Use a leaf-printed paper or stamp some leaves or punch them or put some stickers to work, or all of the above. Leaves it is, and everything else is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! You might find this tutorial or this video from the archives inspiring for this challenge too, but to get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer Leigh Ann Odynski and guest artist Ingunn Mankiewicz.

This week’s challenge is such a great starting point to tell the story of a morning nature walk along the ocean. To enhance the organic feel of the layout, I chose to punch a couple different leaf shapes from lots of different patterns. You can create an ombre look by punching lighter tints to darker shades of the same color. Layer and glue them to a simple hand cut leaf shape, then stitch around each one. Have fun punching away, and see how many different patterns you can use! (I used patterns from True Stories, Starshine, and the new Go Now Go collections.)

Decide how to position your leaf shapes without adhesive first, then glue smaller single leaves around the page. I then machine stitched around the page in a loose circle about five times.

Now add your ombre leaves, and some new Go Now Go puffy Heart Stickers and enamel shapes.

I think the stitched wonky circles continue the organic lines in the photos, and the punched leaves. I added three photos from this peaceful walk along the shore, and attached them according to the colors in each photo.

Now you can simply add your journaling and title, and your favorite Go Now Go stickers and enamel shapes to fill in any empty spots around the circle! I really love these challenges, as they always get me thinking more about the story I want to share and how to connect it with the supplies!

Thank you for stopping by today, and I can’t wait to see what you create for this leaf motif challenge!
- Leigh Ann

One of the things I remember most vividly from this hike was how amazingly delicious the huckleberries were, and I keep going on about them in my journaling. Unfortunately I somehow failed to get a photo of those tasty little trailside snacks, so I wanted to at least honor them in embellishment form.

I had limited space due to squeezing in as many photos and words as possible, but I opened up a little half circle for them in the main photo. I cut out a couple of leaves and colored them with two shades of green ink (while congratulating myself, an incorrigible clean & simple scrapbooker, on my extreme artsiness) and used enamel dots as berries. I used the same inks for my title background to repeat the pop of green color.
- Ingunn

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

I’ll see you tomorrow to share how I took on this challenge!

Today’s Guest Artist: Ingunn Markiewicz loves hiking, scrapbooking, and eating plants (not just huckleberries). You can find more from Ingunn on Instagram and her blog.

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It was so lovely to see all your paper layering in last week’s challenge! Today I write from a window with a gloomy, grey sky, and plenty of raindrops. Is this the end of summer and the start of all things autumnal? Well, let’s have at least one more challenge with something filled with summer blossoms.

This week, I challenge you this week to scrapbook with floral motifs. It can be something quite minimal, like the single flower tucked into each embellishment cluster in the double page above, or it can be something completely filled to bursting with blossoms! Everything else is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! To get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer Meghann Andrew and guest artist Diana Rivera Torres.

One of the things I remember most about my wedding day was the morning of rain, and the feeling of dread I had before walking out in the downpour wearing a silk wedding dress. I guess that’s what you get when you get married in Scotland, right? Our wedding photographer captured several photos of the wedding party arriving at the church under umbrellas, which I had not yet documented, and it was about time to do that.

Instead of using raindrops, I decided to create a shower of flowers on my 8-1/2” 11” layout!

To create a lot of contrast from the brightly colored die-cut umbrella and fussy-cut flowers, I used black and white photos and a clean, white background.

The dreary, rainy morning turned into a beautiful, warm sunny day for our wedding reception, and this layout definitely looks on the bright and sunny side of the day!
- Meghann

Scrapbooking is the perfect way to express my feelings about these pictures. I love to challenge myself to give a whole new way to use paper collections that are supposed to be used for other topics or experiment with materials like heat transfer in paper.

Because of a mistake I don’t have many pictures of my wedding, but this is one of my favourites, and I always tell a different story or feeling about it each time I work with it. I love the flowers of Shimelle’s Starshine Collection because they remind me of the bold colors of my bridal bouquet. I made the title with Silhouette heat transfer and adhesive vinyl.
- Diana

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

Today’s Guest Artist: Diana Rivera Torres loves writing, music and stories. You can find more from Diana on Instagram, YouTube, and her blog.

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I’ve been doing a bit of organising of files on computer drives. That’s always ridiculously exciting, right? Trying to sort through some of my earliest videos and see how much of that older content is still useful and how much of it was so trend-based it would probably be best ignored today, and one of the earliest Glitter Girl videos made me sigh. Adventure 004 was my first video truly dedicated to layering, and it’s basically the most watched process video I’ve ever made. Episode FOUR! So very early indeed.

But I still love layering. My layers change with time and product but the principles remain the same. I like small angles, a mix of patterns, contrast and harmony in the colours. I love that pulling pieces of pretty paper from my scrap basket feels like bonus use of a product, so I can layer so much onto a page without feeling like it cost the earth, even if that is somewhat creative accounting. I’d love to see and hear what you love about layering too.

This week, I challenge you this week to scrapbook with lots and lots of layers. That’s as simple as challenges come, right? Everything is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! To get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer May Flaum and guest artist Laura Payne.

When it comes to lots of layers on my scrapbook pages, I really like to focus in on details in specific areas. One such example? Taking journaling cards that perhaps aren’t my style, and transforming them into embellished gems ready to top off any scrapbook or pocket page.

These days I’m recovering from a complex wrist injury that has me barely holding a pen and only able to work in small batches of time. Dressing up one or two journaling cards with scraps and layers has been just the ticket.

I started with two travel cards that I knew I’d never use. Old cars were on them, and well that doesn’t fit with anything I do. Not to worry – first some Shimelle ticket tape, then some roll-on stars, and then a few scraps of papers quickly covered the cars up as well as adding some lovely layers. The key to layering for me is to be OK with any early layers being partially, or even fully covered when done. You’ll also want to mix up size, pattern, and color for variety. Once you’ve added a few paper scraps (great way to clean the desk) – add some texture. I like tiny staples and stitching. If bulk is an issue, add drops of mist, stickers, or some sequins. Otherwise grab those wood veneer pieces, buttons, and other embellishments and add that flair!

With the cards finished and waiting, it was quick and easy to turn them into a completed 12×12 page with my next pocket of time and energy. It’s great to remember these cards can look brilliant on a more traditional page as well as in the divided page protector style.
- May

Being mama to a little boy obsessed with his toy cars made the theme of vehicles something i could totally scrap about, and his ever growing collection was something i definitely wanted to document!

My go to process when scrapping is to take several pieces of patterned paper and stack them all up behind my photos. It’s a look I truly love and I knew the papers in Shimelle’s True Stories collection would be the perfect match to the bright colours in my photos. I added a doily and a kraft tag in between to build up the layering and finished off with embellishments and a simple title created on my computer and cut out.
- Laura

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

Today’s Guest Artist: Laura Payne loves her little family, anything crafty, and copious amounts of tea. You can find more from Laura on Instagram.

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Just in case a weekend of challenges from the contributing designers is not enough to keep your fingers cutting and pasting this week, we have a weekly challenge for you as well! Time to dust off your sewing machine or your needle and thread: this week, I challenge you this week to stitch on your page. Machine or hand, a little or a lot – it’s completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! A few years ago, Marie Pierre shared a collection of stitching ideas you might find useful for reference, but let’s started on this week’s challenge with a look at these examples from contributing designer Heather Leopard and guest artist Joanne Walton-Calvert.

There’s something about stitching that pulls me in every. single. time. I absolutely HAVE to include it on all my pages. While I love the look of a hand stitched layout, I don’t do it on the regular because it’s quite time consuming. I save those for binge watching tv or road trips (when I’m a passenger). My go to stitching technique is to use a sewing machine. What I love about machine stitching is that you can go as minimal or detailed as you wish in a fraction of the time so while it does add a little more time to your creative process, the results are worth it, in my opinion. It just adds that extra finished detail that bonds the entire page together.

For this layout, I wanted to mimic the circular inner tube float in my photo so using my Silhouette software, I created a cut file and cut circles in half but with a rounded cut in the semi part of the circle. You can download my free cut file here. Then I pieced them together like a quilt and stitched over them on both the inside and outside of the perimeter. Circles are not my favorite to machine stitch but never fear, it’s really hard to see if you don’t make the perfect circle and you can cover little mistakes with an embellishment or two.
- Heather

I made this layout with an arty photo my daughter took when we were whale watching in Reykjavik at Easter. I love how Fiona has gotten interested in photography recently and wanted to document this. I like using sewing on my layouts as it adds texture – hand sewing is very therapeutic and can be prepared so that I can do it while watching tv with my family in the evenings. It is also a frugal way to make my supplies go further!

I like mixing my new supplies which inspire me, with older supplies and collections. I only have a very small amount of the True Stories and Starshine collections left so I have used them here with My Mind’s Eye By the Sea brads, Pinkfresh Felicity letters, and October Afternoon letters. The little grey envelope that holds my journaling is so, so old, bought from Two Peas on clearance, the embroidery floss is from various manufacturers and Bazzil card stock. I also detail cut the globes which is an economical way to make my embellishments.

For hand sewing I use a mix of old fashioned stencils and simple free hand shapes, just pricking the paper first with my piercing tool. For machine sewing I use a children’s sewing machine bought in post Christmas sales for £5 – I don’t worry about making it too neat and often go over it several times for effect.
- Joanne

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

Today’s Guest Artist: Joanne Walton-Calvert loves spending time with her family (including two cats), travel, and cooking. You can find more from Joanne on Instagram.

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Summer is finally here and creatively I’m thinking about… autumn. I guess my scrapbooking mind is not in sync with the calendar! But I have a certain page on my mind that you might remember, or if you don’t, you can see it all come together in this video. And it’s this page that leads to our scrapbooking challenge this week!

This week, I challenge you this week to take inspiration from this autumnal scrapbook page. You might take your inspiration from the subject matter, the colour scheme, the placement of items on the page, the product choices – it’s completely up to you! You can find the full original page in the archives here. To get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer Kirsty Smith and guest artist Tiffani Nelson.

To create my own layout inspired by Shimelle’s beautiful autumnal page, I followed Shimelle’s approach of breaking the process down into two stages: the structure of the design, and then the embellishment. For the first stage, I lifted the foundation of Shimelle’s page, in the same way I might follow a sketch, and used a large photo of a night scene in Singapore which I matted and layered with a couple of rectangular blocks. I think the key to scrapbooking with photographs taken at night is the background of the layout.

The background paper here is actually a woodgrain from the Christmas Magic collection and I love how the deep, rich colour brings out the darker tones of the photograph. It can be tricky to find a match for photographs taken at night sometimes; trying out lots of different options will help you to find a background that allows the picture to pop. Because this photo is sitting on a darker paper, it tones in with the page design and it is easier to perceive the people in the image, instead of just seeing it as a large, dark block in the middle of the page.

With my design sorted, the second and final stage was the fun part! What makes Shimelle’s design work so well is the trail of embellishments across the page which leads your eye through the story. For my embellishments, I hand cut lots of flowers from a beautiful floral sheet from the Starshine collection. The reds and pinks imitate the glowing tones of the lanterns that adorn Singapore’s Chinatown area and help to tie the photo into the page. I continued adding flowers until I was happy with the balance of embellishment, and the flow across the page, starting with larger ones, and then adding little flowers for detail. Once I was happy, I topped off the page with a hand-cut title in white, to really stand out against the photo, and a couple of little pearls for sparkle.
- Kirsty

I love simple layouts that have detailed images – after all, the art is also the photo. This layout is about the time my husband and I took a trip to Orlando for our nine year anniversary, after never being on a vacation.

I love hot air balloons and was just fascinated with this Disney balloon. Sadly we weren’t able to ride it due to weather, but it was by far one of my favourite parts of the trip. For this layout I used products from the True Stories line – I loved the colors and how well they matched the image and I though the word strips were perfect for cutting one inch circles.
- Tiffani

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

Today’s Guest Artist: Tiffani Nelson loves crafting, DIY, and gaming. You can find more from Tiffani on Instagram and her blog.

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Thank you so much for your sunny enthusiasm with The 20 Project. I can’t wait to share the results in class so soon. But not to worry: we still have a challenge for you this week!

I know some of you are reading from places where the school holidays started weeks or months ago, but here it’s pretty common for this to be the last week of classes. Yet my inbox is filled with advertising for back to school items! I’m torn: it’s definitely time to enjoy the summer, but I do love a good bit of back to school shopping. I’m always up for new themed stationery, of course.

This week, I challenge you this week to take your scrapbooking inspiration from planners. Where that very broad concept may take you is a totally open road! I started by thinking I would work in boxes with relatively even spaces between them to mimic the grid you might find on a calendar or scheduling sheet. Then added in broad brushstroke lines to write on in the style of a to-do list. But I still wanted to keep it in line with the way I would embellish most of my pages, so there’s a big embellishment cluster toward the middle of the page and a smaller one in line with the title to coordinate. Even the subject matter is quite planner-inspired: we’ve got to a point where we have a little routine we follow almost every Saturday for the morning up to lunch, so that seemed like a good way to give some context to the photo, because looking cute climbing under an elephant is not really the sort of journaling that makes me tick.

How you interpret the challenge is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like! Contributing designer Meghann Andrew also gave this challenge a go to give you some more ideas! We’ve both followed a routine and timing sort of theme, but that’s definitely just one way to take the challenge this week.

My planner and I are pretty close, so when Shimelle challenged me to use my planner as inspiration for my next layout, I grabbed my Get to Work Book and took the challenge!

I love vertical columns in my planner to list my appointments and “to-dos” for the day, so a vertical column was the first thing to go on my 8-1/2” x 11” background cardstock. I used the colorful lines on the Americano pattern from True Stories to stamp the time along the column, making the 9am time, an unusually late wake up for our household, a different size and font. At the top, I added the day of the week in cork Thickers, and at the bottom, the date using a date stamp.

The right side of my layout was treated more in my typical, layered fashion, with patterned paper topped with two black and white photos of my daughter and dog, who clearly just didn’t want to get out of bed that day.

Having such a colorful left side meant that I kept the embellishment simple, adding cork Thickers shapes from the Shimelle collection, a die-cut title from the True Stories Grey Floral pattern, and a flair badge from Starshine.

I love the idea to use time to document a memory, and I’m excited to try it in a different way again- maybe next time to document different moments in a single day!
- Meghann

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

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Thank you so, so much for all your kind responses to Go Now Go. You can watch this first look video if you’d like to see more. It will be shipping very soon, so be sure to ask your favourite scrapbooking retailer to order it if you fancy! But for now, let’s use the stash we have on hand to make way for some favourites from all the summer releases coming out right about now. I know I have a stack of papers and stamps I really, really want to use but I just haven’t got there yet. This week seems like a great time to do that.

And now, on to the challenge! This week I challenge you this week to hand cut the design elements on your next scrapbook page. That might mean cutting lettering for your title, stamping something and cutting out the design, or detail cutting motifs from patterned paper instead of turning to stickers and other pre made embellishments. Everything else is completely up to you, so you can take your inspiration in any direction you like, just get those scissors or craft knives to the ready! You might find this chunky title or this delicate lettering useful from our archived tutorials, but to get you started on this week’s challenge, take a look at these examples from contributing designer Nicole Nowosad and guest artist Jen Campbell.

I love the idea of hand cut items on my projects because it adds a fun bit of whimsy. I decided to hand cut some letters for the title on my page. Instead of using the positive letters, I trimmed blocks of patterned paper and used the negative shape of the letters to create my title. To create the letters I flipped the paper to the backside and then drew out good old bubble letters in reverse. I cut them out with a craft knife and some scissors.

Once the letters were all cut, I adhered them with foam adhesive for some dimension. They are a great (and easy!) embellishment on the page and a great focal point too.

I hope you are inspired to add a little whimsy to your projects and create your own hand cut items for your projects! The possibilities are endless.
- Nicole

As always, I started my page with photos that I love and a story to tell. These bright shots from swim team practice with all the neighbourhood kids were prefect to use with the cheerful paper and embellishments from Shimelle’s Starshine collection. I knew immediately that I wanted to use the large number five in the title of my page. I used that as a jumping off point for my colour scheme and quickly decided the stars and clouds as well as the word flags from True Stories made fantastic choices for hand-cut embellishment clusters.

I stared by cutting stars, clouds, and word phrases and setting them aside to add as I built the page. Then I layered some paper horizontally to fit behind the pictures. Although I initially planned to just use the neutral word paper as my background, once I got going I realized I needed a bolder colour to ground the page, so I matted the whole thing with a quarter-inch border of the hot pink and then inked the edges of some of the paper and embellishments to tie everything together. I finished my building two embellishment clusters along the top and building a horizontal line of embellishments below the title and pictures and around the journalling box. Final touches to the embellishment included chipboard star and hearts as well as enamel dots and stars.

My go-to title technique: I cut a thin strip of plastic packaging from some scrapbook embellishments and adhered the black chipboard letters to that. Then I used foam 3D adhesive cut into thin strips on the back of the packaging to help me layer the word “hurricanes” over the top of the “5” and overlapping the bottom edge of the “homestead” in glitter Thickers. I like how this technique helps build a cohesive title grouping while keeping all the chipboard letters at the same level.
- Jen

You have a week to complete the challenge and share a link – but of course you’re welcome to set your own time schedule. Whatever keeps you happy and creative!

Today’s Guest Artist: Jen Campbell loves coffee, summer days near the water, and everyday adventures with her three boys. You can find more from Jen on Instagram.

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