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

Once upon a very long time ago, I led a year-long video project called 4×6 Photo Love for an online store, with an update each month, all featuring 4×6 prints. We scrapped one 4×6 photo in January, two in February, all the way up to twelve in December. That project came from an era when I ordered all my photos printed as 4×6 prints and although the supplies were those on the market at the time, the sketches and ideas still work and some are ideas I’ve come back to dozens of times since.

Except now I split my photo sizes, with about half of my prints at the 3×4 size. It’s high time I create a library of page designs for 3×4 photos – a new reference guide with ideas that can be used time and time again over time, with different supplies, different colour schemes, and different stories.

3×4 Photo Love is a much quicker format than once a month, so you won’t have long to wait! This online class has six livestreamed lessons, each making two pages, for a total of twelve pages. The first lesson starts with one 3×4 photo, with a design for a portrait (vertical) photo and a design for a landscape (horizontal) photo. We will carry on through the lessons, adding an additional photo, until our last lesson features six portraits on one page and six landscapes on another. These page designs also shift easily to add more photos if you prefer, so you’ll have plenty of options. You’ll also see exactly how page designs can be adjusted from portraits to landscapes. I won’t be featuring pages that mix the portraits and landscapes but we will stop to talk about that with the designs where it can work easily, and we’ll look at how the pages could work side by side for stories that give you plenty of photos in both directions.

The schedule for the livestreamed lessons is:
Thursday 25 June 1:30pm
Friday 26 June 1:30pm
Thursday 2 July 1:30pm
Friday 3 July 1:30pm
Monday 6 July 10:00am
Tuesday 7 July 6:00pm
All the above are on London time, which is currently British Summer Time.

There is no requirement to watch live – all the lessons will then remain available to watch on your own schedule. With the recent Clear the Desk Live class, many participants said they rescheduled all the lessons to their own times rather than watch live and it still worked really well for them. There is a place to leave questions on the class forum during the live run, so if you have a question but can’t make it to ask in the live chat, you can leave your question there and I’ll be sure to discuss it in the next lesson’s video.

From now until through the 3rd of July, sign up for the opening week price of $15 (US dollars) by clicking here. From the 4th, the price will go to $20 and remain at that price as the standard self-paced option. All my classes remain accessible on your account permanently, so if you are planning to take this but move it to another time of year, you’re very welcome to do so and can sign up with the opening week price then come back to it when you’re ready, if that seems sensible to your scrappy calendar.

I process all class registrations by hand – the instant automated email will be your payment receipt. Then the class forum will open on Thursday and you’ll use that to access the class, including the livestreamed lessons. If you have an existing account with the same email address on your payment, the class will be added to that account. If you’re new, you’ll receive an extra email with your login details. If you sign up before class starts but don’t receive access by Thursday midday, please send me an email so I can get that fixed for you. You can also email if you know the email on your payment doesn’t’ match what’s on your account and you’d like your new class on a different account.

If you have trouble accessing your forum account, like you can’t remember your password, you can email Alice to get some help there, but please just remember, we are both humans and not robots. We’re happy to help but sometimes people assume at least one of us is a 24/7 automated response line and I’m afraid neither of us are. But don’t be afraid to email us!

Thanks so much and I can’t wait to see you in class, starting this Thursday!

Happy National Scrapbook Day!

My challenge for you this year is to scrap a photo of yourself! If you make something inspired by htis challenge, share it, and let me know, I’ll send you a bonus video next week to keep your pages going! You can post in our Facebook group, Scrapbook like a Superhero, or on your own social media accounts. Tag me on your post if you can! If you can’t tag or you post on a page gallery, you can email me a link or post in the comments here – whatever works. Be sure to mention in your caption that your page is inspired by Shimelle’s NSD 2026 challenge!

Annnnnnd the new class info! Clear the Desk is from way back in 2018 and it’s still a popular choice here and many of you asked for a sequel. That time is this month – with Clear the Desk Live! It’s 8 new lessons, following the same format as the original class but with different supplies, new ideas, and the option to watch live so you can ask questions as you go if you wish! You do not need to watch live, and all the videos will remain available to you any time after their original live airing. These live sessions are already scheduled so you can see if it will suit your schedule:
Monday 11th of May 5pm
Wednesday 13th of May 1:30pm
Friday 15th of May 2pm
Saturday 16th of May 4pm
Monday 18th of May 11am
Wednesday 20th of May 1:30pm
Friday 22nd of May 2pm
Saturday 23rd of May 4pm
These are UK time – British Summer Time.

If you watch my usual scrappy livestreams on Mondays and Fridays, you’ll know it’s a very chilled crop-like environment where we talk about all sorts of random rubbish. My classes are not the same – each of these livestreams has a lesson plan and we’ll be on topic. You’ll just have the ability to stop and query anything as we go, like we were all together in the same classroom.

Clear the Desk Live is $15 USD if you sign up by the 10th of May and $20 thereafter. When you purchase the class, you will receive a paypal receipt email immediately. The class forum will open on Saturday the 9th of May, so you will not receive anything in between the receipt and the forum opening email on the 9th. When the forum opens, you’ll see supply suggestions for all of the sessions, should you wish to make a plan on what stash you are going to clear from your desk during the class! Everything is designed to be adaptable to your stash, your style, and your stories!

Thanks so much and happy scrapping!

Comment

Hey howdy hey! It’s certainly time for an update here, as I’ve been scrapping away in class and on YouTube and trying to be almost halfway decent at Facebook, and as a result I haven’t said anything here. Let’s finally put that right, shall we? I’m actually just at the beginning of a brand new class so why don’t we start with that?

Just JOY is a six week online scrapbooking class with 20 prerecorded video lessons plus 6 livestream scrapping sessions. We’re focusing on all the happiest things about scrapbooking, from page composition to colour combinations and embellishment techniques, but it’s not a case of just copying what brings me joy. Every lesson is accompanied with a checklist of joy to help you identify the things you love most about this craft.

Click here to see more or click here to jump straight to signing up!

It will be December before you know it, and that means Christmas classes! Journal your Christmas and Share your Christmas both start on the 1st of December as usual! And there’s something new this year if you like to plan and create ahead of time – I see you, team #organised! From Monday the 3rd of November, I’ll be sharing five days of videos preparing pages so you can hit the ground running in December by adding your pictures and writing. It’s five 90 minute videos, designed so you can watch and craft a little each day for a week, save it all up for one weekend of crafting, or slow it down and do a session or two each week of November. I will be using the supplies in the shopping list below, and I’m scrapping in 6×8 as I have for many Christmas journals now. You’re welcome to use any supplies and any album size – the ideas will adapt. It’s worth knowing that as I use page protectors, I don’t need to create all of my pages in the order that they end up appearing in the book. As such, I’ll be creating a library of things that I’ll then choose from as I make my 2025 album in December, so you’ll see a mix of page and pocket sizes in these five days of crafty content, including 6×8, 4×6, 3×4, and 3×8. There are also some shaped pages and folding pages for interactive elements. You can take this class with or without Journal your Christmas, although obviously it will fit well with that project in mind. Ready for December 2025! is $15 USD and starts on the 3rd of November. Click here to sign up!

If you’re scrapping Christmas along with us this year, you are always welcome to use any supplies you like and anything you already have in your stash! Use what you buy, of course! But if you fancy some Christmas scrapbook shopping this year, I’m here for you with that too. Here’s my shopping list (contains affiliate links) and what you’ll see in my Christmas class videos this year. (There’s a Disney Christmas collection out this year that I think is really lovely if you’re having a Christmas park trip or have something Disney themed over December. I’ve added it to the end of the list because obviously not everyone will have a mouse-themed Christmas! So as with everything else, you can pick what you like and leave the rest.)

If you’ve never joined in the fun of Journal your Christmas (the scrapping and writing class) or Share your Christmas (the photo and video class), you can find out about those and sign up right here.

Please note I have not done a new stamp design for Christmas 2025. This saddens me but the variability of tariffs when I’m in the UK and most of you are in the US just makes it too unpredictable this year. I don’t want you to end up paying more than you expected and equally I don’t want to end up with an unexpected bill either. Around the time I needed to open the usual preorder, the situation was changing a great deal. I will hope that next year we have a better understanding of how those agreements will work and if so, I will bring stamps back in 2026! I do have a limited number of stamps from previous years, so email me if you’d like one of those and I’ll talk you through the options.

Hey howdy hey! After teaching one long workshop for all of 2024, I am excited to have a variety of projects coming right up now! One of those is over at Scrap and Learn where I’ll be the guest teacher at an international online event and I’d love to see you there! But then there are also three things coming up here on my own turf, including one that is just days away. Come join me and let’s scrapbook!

This Wednesday, the 12th of March, is I LOVE LAYERS day!

I Love Layers is an online scrapbooking class in event style: if you’d like to join in on the day, you can learn and scrap right along with me. If Wednesday doesn’t suit your schedule, you can watch and craft at absolutely any time you like after the day comes to a close.

Layering is my happiest part of crafting, and I have a long form class on this subject, so this is more of a blitz through all the details that can make your layering as eye-catching, creative, and enjoyable as possible! I will be covering:
*Background layering of inks, paints, or patterned papers
*Making your stash lean into layering (without buying new)
*Layers to frame a single photo
*Making layers work with multiple photos
*Layers specifically for journaling
*Clean versus messy layers
*Knowing when to stop

All of the above have pre-recorded content you’ll be able to watch on Wednesday, plus I will scrapbook live so there’s an opportunity for you to layer right along with me in real time and complete a project on the day. (It’s okay to start with the livestream and come back to watch the prerecorded later if that’s better with your time zone. It will make sense in either order.) Participants receive a list to help you gather supplies suitable for the scrap-a-long, so you won’t have to waste time going through every paper and die-cut you own while we’re all crafting together.

I Love Layers is $10 and open for registration now by clicking here!

If you have an existing class pass, I Love Layers is included so you don’t need to do a thing. (You have this and 1 2 Punch coming your way to bring the existing class pass to a close!)

Next up is The One Two Punch!

If you signed up many moons ago for Use Your Punches as a coming soon, you are already signed up for this and do not need to do a thing!

This class grew out of my original Use What You Buy process but once I got started, I had way more things I wanted to share than what fit in the short workshop format. Instead, we now have a class with twenty videos: ten are in real time with minimal speeding up (there are some quicker edits for things like letter stickers and you don’t have to wait for any paint to dry!) so all ten techniques are easy to follow, and ten take those same techniques showing the same idea with different photos and different supplies but this time in a sped up edit of roughly 20 minutes. The class uses quite ordinary punch shapes: circles (plain, pinked, and scalloped), hearts, stars, butterflies, and the like. All the techniques can be used with a variety of shapes, so the first and second video for each idea do not use the same punch. The focus is on shape punches but there are a few times I add in a border punch as an optional extra.

There is one set of videos already there on the class forum when you sign up and then new content starts Friday and moves forward from there! Class will finish right around Easter. I changed the pace on this so no one feels they have to do heaps of pages every week to keep up. So the twenty videos finish mid June instead. Thank you to those who shared their opinions on the pacing of classes. It is impossible to have one pace that is best for everyone but there were many good points made and some will be really useful for other projects later in the year!

One Two Punch is $20 and open for registration by clicking here!

Remember, if you have a current class pass, this is already included, and this brings your pass to a close.

Then a moment to talk about This Year’s Story! Over 2024, I shared absolutely everything I made to go into my family albums for the year in a class called This Year’s Story. It begins with a starter class all about my album philosophy, how I work with my photo library, and all the practical part of keeping scrapbooks that become cherished books. Then every month of 2024 has a series of videos showing how everything comes together – an entire year of process videos including 12×12 pages, 6×12 pages, and pocket pages of assorted sizes. In total, that was four filled D-ring binders and the most detailed documentation of our lives I’ve ever managed! I absolutely love it.

Some of you asked if I would continue this into 2025. Others asked if I would get back to teaching themed classes that were shorter than a year long. So I’m choosing a happy medium! I will be teaching classes that aren’t all year long, and do have a theme, but the pages I make within that class will be all those stories going into my 2025 albums, so you’ll see mostly 12×12 layouts, but also some smaller pages and pocket pages in the mix. I’m going to begin that focus with a deep dive into the papers, stickers, and embellishments I’ve managed to keep for years and years, for a class all about scrapping with old stash! We will mix old with new, I will get all my January and February stories told and into the album. You won’t need the exact same supplies – that’s never how I teach! I want to enable you to use what you have already purchased and make things you love – it’s learning, not just following directions.

I’m still working out the exact number of videos this will be, but it will be a mix of pre-recorded and live-streamed videos, and as always you can watch any live-streamed video as a replay to make it fit your schedule. You never have to be there live – it’s just an option. (And if you are mostly familiar with my ‘random rubbish’ informal YouTube scrappy livestreams, please know my class livestreams are a different agenda and we don’t just do random chat. It’s the on-topic version of me showing up to teach!)

This class, New Pages from Old Stash, is scheduled to start on the 30th of April, and is $20. Registration is open by clicking here. Registration won’t close early so you can wait for more specific details if you would like, of course. But I open it now for those who prefer to sign up now before they forget. Remember, if you had a class pass, this is the first class not covered by that and you will need to sign up for this one! (I’m not going to open a class pass at this time, so please do sign up rather than waiting for a bulk purchase option. Thanks!)

Don’t worry, I don’t even put my pumpkins out until October so I’m definitely not rushing into Christmas around here, but I do have one thing that needs to come before the season arrives every year, and that’s supplies for Christmas Journal season! This year I have a shopping list and a set of stamps. The stamps are only available here, but the shopping list is the same format I use for my monthly scrapbooking. You can use it as a literal shopping list and add one of everything to your cart and have a full set of supplies to follow along with me as closely as you’d like, you can take it to your local store if you have one and go shopping there, or you can choose similar items from your existing collection of supplies to make your own kit from the stash you’ve bought over the years. All strategies and styles welcome! Journal your Christmas is a project that encourages all styles and making things work for you, so you can follow me step by step if you want or you can go entirely out on your own and both are equally welcome.

First up, the stamps. These will be open for preorders for one week – this closes next Wednesday the 2nd of October so they can be on their way to you in time for Christmas crafting! This year’s designs have plenty of circles which are all separate stamps, plus a separate topper that lets you turn any of the circles into an ornament. There is a mix of handwritten words and a clean retro font that I’m excited to add to the supplies on this year’s shopping list!

It’s a single sheet of stamps this year and there is one difference to ordering for 2024. In previous years, the price has included worldwide shipping. But there is now a much bigger difference in postage cost for domestic and overseas mail, so there are two options. Stamps with UK shipping for £13, or stamps with worldwide shipping for $18. The stamps about 4×6 inches or A6 format, made here in the UK from high quality photo polymer, and sent directly from me to you. Please make sure your shipping address is complete and correct and if you spot a mistake or are planning to move before December, drop me an email with those details.

£13 UK ADDRESS ONLY (pounds sterling)

$18 WORLDWIDE SHIPPING (US dollars)

Then there are the other supplies I’ll be using this December! This is what you’ll see me use in my videos throughout the Journal your Christmas online class. If you are ordering through these affiliate links (thank you!) don’t forget to check the coupons page. Today there is 9 to 11 percent off your order depending on the total with code SMILE, plus a free stencil to add to your cart. Below the list you’ll find my chat through everything that’s here and why, so you can make the choices that will work best for your style. There are just a couple items still marked as Coming Soon so I’ve placed my order today and will add those once they arrive – I’ve clicked the notify button in hopes I can be quick enough!

I love the number element of my Christmas journals so I started there first to get a feel for the style I plan to create this year, and the red stencil numbers mixed with my stamp numbers are putting me in a retro but fresh vibe that I think will be really fun to create. I’m using a colour palette of traditional red and green plus turquoise, and I do have winter (but not a lot of snow) at Christmas time, so some of my supplies are winter themed. Leave those off if your Christmas is far more tropical! Always pick the things that will work for your stories – that’s why I post a shopping list rather than a specific kit.

I’ve created Christmas journals in a range of sizes – 8×8, 9×9, 12×12, 6×12, and 6×8. I’ve stuck with 6×8 for many years now because it’s a beautiful balance for me in terms of room to write, room for photos, and just enough space to embellish in a way that brings me joy in a shorter time frame than a 12×12 page. This year I’m using a red velvet 6×8 ring binder. I’ve used the same brand in pink previously. While I wish there was an album out this year that had the same supersized binder rings as the album I used last year (designed by Paige Evans), sadly they are all smaller this time around. I know I can make this size work because I have before, but I also know I shouldn’t aim to use heaps of dimensional embellishments as I like to include plenty of pages in my journal and it’s best when it will still close.

I then start with a stack of 6×8 paper pads. I’m going with three 6×8 collection pads that are patterned and artwork based, one that is just tonal polka dots in colours I will use alongside, one in woodgrains, and one pack of plain journaling line papers. I’ve listed two tonal sets here because you might prefer the darker or brighter shades. I will be using the brighter option. Then I add in a few 12×12 sheets that I’ll cut down to smaller sizes, including some woodgrains and cut apart designs for quick pockets or embellishments.

I use my Christmas journal to journal, so I lean heavily into products that help me write down those stories. That means there are several sets of letter stickers in my basket. You might prefer letter stamps or another title product to stickers, but letter stickers are my bread and butter!

Next I pick packs of embellishments and I don’t tend to go for the fanciest kinds because then I find I spend a lot on that pack and never use it! Instead I go for what I know I will use without fear, and that’s die cut packs and sticker books. I’ve put a couple of packs of Christmas florals in for me this year but there are more shapes in those same collections if Christmas flower isn’t a concept that works for you.

Nothing looks done to me until it has enamel dots and gold mist, and you might totally disagree with that one! No problem. I have lined up my reds, greens, turquoises, and gold for this final step.

Along side my stamp set and all of the above supplies for this year, I keep things to my basics really. I’ll have black dye ink plus my Distress Oxide inks in reds, greens, and blue-greens, a set of basic letter stamps, a stamping block, some simple punches like a circle and a border, and probably a roll or two of twine to put through the tops of tags. I haven’t listed those on the shopping list but if you’re just getting started and would like advice, just shout and I can help with that!

Speaking of just getting started – if you’re new to scrapbooking or you’re new to this project and you just want a really simple and affordable way to make a Christmas journal with a kit that allows you to add your photos and writing to tell everything, then this set in either red or green is your answer. It includes an album with lots of page protectors, a journaling pen, and a set of Christmas themed journal and accent cards. You can follow the writing prompts in Journal your Christmas with this and not worry about the embellishment at all! Just the writing and the photos and then drop the odd title card into a pocket here or three. And this kit is actually a bargain because the same album without all the kit and pen stuff is the same price? So might as well go for it! This is totally a way to scrapbook with limited time and budget and don’t let anyone (including me) running away with our embellishments and stamping make you feel like it’s not proper scrapbooking. It most definitely is and it will get your stories told in a book you can hold and bring out every year. It’s a brilliant plan really! Find that here in red or green.

That’s everything to get you through until our class starts as usual on the first of December! Have a wonderful autumn or spring until then and I’ll see you when it’s properly time to talk all things Christmassy!

Last year I talked about an album mindset class and it took a while for me to find a system that was really working for how I could share this ongoing process on a monthly basis. Well, halfway through 2024 and I am happy to say it’s been rolling along relatively well so it’s time I talk about it a bit more!

This Year’s Story begins with a starter class. It discusses my album philosophy, how I organise and plan for the photos I’ve taken, how everything gets filed into albums, and what my real goals are when I’m building a scrapbook, one story at a time. Remember, I’m really big on the ‘book’ element of ‘scrapbook’! I love creating individual pages, but I find it even more exciting to turn the pages of a book and see our stories develop with time! So if that sounds like something you’d enjoy learning, you can join the starter class to see all the philosophy behind it and see two months of stories in action: one from 2023 and one from 2024.

JUST the This Year’s Story Starter Class – no additional months

$22 USD

Now if that sounds perfectly up your alley and you’re ready to just dive in, you can sign up for the starter class and the full year of 2024 updates – so if you signed up now, you’d already have the stories from January to May 2024 there, and you’d see June’s stories in videos throughout this month and so on for the rest of the year. Each month I tell current stories in my regular YouTube livestreams, then I fill in all the gaps and complete storytelling over the next month, so on YouTube I scrapbooked June stories in June. In class, I’ll scrap the rest of my June stories throughout July. Which means the 2024 membership will actually include January 2025, when I’m completing the December 2024 stories. Got it? If you love that whole idea and want to jump into the full ‘members only’ content for all of 2024, you can go ahead and sign up all in one go with nothing extra to add later.

BUNDLE This Year’s Story Starter Class AND Full 2024 Membership – all months

$75.00 USD

But you might not want a full year and that’s absolutely fine too! Once you have taken the starter class, you can add on additional months individually and access just the videos for that month. Please make sure this is WITH a starter class membership. It needs the starter class to get the most of the individual months, and I’m not offering the months without the starter. (Think of it like the starter class is the main kit and the months are the add on options!)

INDIVIDUAL MONTHS – Be sure to take the Starter Class first!

What month would you like? (February – December 2024)

$15 USD per month – January 2024 is included in the Starter Class, so select your month from February to December. Repeat the process for additional months.

The additional content is all shown in video – some prerecorded and some live-streamed, but the livestream content in my classes is not informal chitchat like our random rubbish chats on YouTube! I do answer questions from the live audience but we keep things on track to both the storytelling (so topics that come up on the pages I’m making or you’re making) and the crafty elements like design, products, and techniques.

Like my other classes, registrations are processed by a real human (me) rather than being automatic, so you should have access within 48 hours. If you don’t, please drop me an email! ALSO, if you are having trouble accessing the class forum (for any of my classes) and would like some help, the lovely Alice has returned to help me keep on top of this and you can contact her directly! Click here to email Alice about your forum username or password.

Thanks so much to everyone who has stayed with this class since the early days! If you joined way back when and haven’t signed in lately, you might find there are lots of videos for you to watch, so do have a look.

We’ll talk about this in more detail in today’s livestream on YouTube!

A reminder of #advertising: all these products are linked with affiliate links. Thanks so much for your support!

Albums

I love the 6×8 format for this project and have stuck with it happily for many years, so these are all 6×8 recommendations. Of course you can choose another size if you like!

I’m using that first album from Paige’s Sugarplum Wishes collection. It has the widest spine of any of the 6×8 albums I’ve found! It comes with some page protectors but you will need more – the Vicki Boutin page protectors listed third there also fit Paige’s binder without punching new holes. Other brands will require punching holes. Vicki’s album also adds in some papers for the page protectors (Paige’s album does not) so if you opt for Vicki’s Christmas binder, you can decrease the number of papers you add. You probably won’t, because decreasing the number of papers in a scrapper’s shopping is just torture. But you can, if you so wish.

The remaining 6×8 albums here will fit the Simple Stories and Scrapbookcom page protectors listed. SS and SBcom albums and page protectors are totally compatible and I have used both together in the past. (Be careful if ordering off list that the Simple Stories Snap Flip Book is different! Those are not compatible with the ring binders.) I haven’t seen the Echo Park / Carta Bella albums in person but I believe they fit the SS and SBcom protectors. If I find this to be inaccurate, I will come back and update!

At the end of this list, there is also a kit option with album, page protectors, and pocket cards for a ready to go, quick to create option that can be your entire purchase and then just add photos and writing to document your memories. If you have tried in previous years to make something fancy and given up by day four, TRY THIS OPTION. It counts and it will feel good to get to the end and have everything documented that you want to document! Stop overdoing it in December and take the route that can make it quick and easy. You can always go back to giving fancy a try another time.

Patterned Paper

Just like you don’t need all of those albums, you don’t need all of these papers! Hear me out on the method to my madness in helping you curate the supplies that will bring you joy in your crafting.

First of all: do you have a winter Christmas or not? Decide now if you want things like snowflakes and snowmen in your album and choose your supplies to suit. Just ignore any of the collections that are wintry if you have a tropical Christmas and the snowflakes make no sense to you.

Second: what kind of Christmas colours do you want to work with this year? I prefer the bright and colourful Christmas rainbow, so I’ve listed those options first. I’m going with the picks at the beginning of this list. But I respect the traditional green and red options, so those are here too. And in the middle, there are some papers that take the traditional red and green but also add a little something extra, like some pink or baby blue.

Once you have evaluated your decision on snow or no snow AND your preferred colour palette, pick two or three 6×8 paper pads and you will be good to go! 6×6 papers work well too (the Doodlebug option only comes in 6×6 or 12×12, for example) as lots of the pages are 3×4 and 4×6 pockets, so you only need the full 6×8 page for the full size page protector. You can also go with individual 12×12 sheets rather than a paper pad, of course. I’ve also added a few cut apart papers to this list and I liked the idea of adding some Christmas florals in but I didn’t want a full kit of those papers, so I just added them individually here.

At the end of this list I have also included some papers from my Main Character Energy collection that are certainly not Christmas papers but have at least one side that will work really well in my Christmas scrapping. Bonus that if you don’t use them up in December, they will be a-okay to keep using throughout the calendar.

Embellishments

Once you have picked your papers with your weather and colours in mind, then go to this list to choose some embellishments to suit. One pack of die cuts, one or two sticker books or sticker sheets, some confetti elements (enamel dots, tiny puffy stickers, or gems), and some lettering will give you lots of options. There’s also a little section in the middle of embellishments that are just something different – wooden stickers and paperclips with charms. May or may not be your cup of tea!

Mixed Media

Basics if you want to add ink! You can skip these entirely if you don’t. Number and letter stamps can help with custom titles and dates if you’re not a fan of letter stickers. Distress Oxides are my favourite inks and these are the colours I use at Christmas. Plus some things like stencils and sparkles that you can use over and over in your stash.

Any questions, come ask them in the YouTube comments and we can chat it through!

Hey hey there Christmas fans! This year’s edition of the Journal your Christmas stamps are now available for preorder, which will remain open for two weeks – until Wednesday the 19th of July. I only get a very small number of extras, so if you would like a set please place a preorder. Any extras would be available in late October or early November.

This year’s vibe is a multitude of words you can mix and match to fit the stories you tell over the holidays and then throughout the rest of the year. For example, I have long wished for a stamp that says ‘core memory’ to go with my writing on plenty of pages. With each word as its own stamp, I can caption something in my Christmas journal with ‘core Christmas memory’ or even ‘here is my core Christmas memory’ but I’ll still have the ‘core memory’ option to use on non-Christmas pages. The words are there for a Home Alone reference – don’t mess with kids at Christmas – but they aren’t all stuck together to be just that sentiment. ‘Merry Mess’ might also be apt or ‘kids at Christmas’ might be a very useful caption. And then you can mix with your own stickers or letter stamps to add any words missing, so you could end up with ‘Don’t mess with Texas’ by adding in one extra word if that’s the story you need to tell!

The set is two 4×6 inch sheets of stamps, purchased as one bundle for $34 USD, including postage to anywhere in the world. The stamps are high quality photo polymer, made in the UK, and packed and posted by me here in London to you, wherever you are. (If you’re in Germany and want a set, send me an email at shimelle@gmail.com because that’s the only country that has been a real challenge with delivery for some reason!)

Please keep in mind the stamps may be in slightly different places on the sheets – I work with the stamp manufacturer to make the best use of the space and not leave any gaps so sometimes we just need to rearrange a bit.

If you have any questions, please send me an email (shimelle@gmail.com) any time. Keep that in mind if you move house between now and October, when your stamps will be on their way to you.