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

Hey creative friends! It’s my turn to share a design team page on Paige Taylor Evans’ blog, and this time I went with her Makers Gonna Make cut file.

You can find the full write up at http://www.paigetaylorevans.com/2020/04/makers-gonna-make-layout-by-shimelle.html, plus here’s a very quick behind the scenes look at how it all came together!

You can find Bloom Street to order through that dandy affiliate link (thanks!) and find the cut file here or by searching for it on the Silhouette Design Store.

Can you spot what ‘making’ is featuring in those photos? It’s one of our favourite quiet breaks to take on an Animal Kingdom day, because we just have a need to do some making of some sort, pretty much every day!

Happy Easter! I’m celebrating with… a rainbow-themed scrapbook page. Ha! It just happens to be my turn to share a project on Paige Evans’ blog today, so rainbows it is.

I used Paige’s Bloom Street collection (affiliate link) for this pastel rainbow, and you can find a full write up of the steps on Paige’s blog.

Wishing you a wonderful, if quite unique, Easter Sunday!

I use the word ‘technique’ pretty loosely around here: it doesn’t need to have lots of steps that need explanation, nor lots of technical supplies and tools, nor lots of patience. If that last page’s technique was to create a rainbow of boxes in a grid, this time the technique is to find a rainbow of paper scraps and line them up to make a border for your scrapbook page. Totally a technique. Totally counts.

I would love to see the rainbow pages you’re creating! Please add the hashtag #scrapbookrainbows to any rainbow pages you post to social media so we can see a beautiful gallery of paper rainbow inspiration!

Supplies for this page – with affiliate links (if you purchase through these links, I receive a commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you as ever for your support!)
Yellow background paper from Sparkle City, red patterned paper from Field Trip, orange patterned paper by Simple Stories, yellow journaling card from Never Grow Up, green patterned paper from Sparkle City, blue ledger patterned paper from Field Trip, indigo (navy) rocket patterned paper from Field Trip, violet patterned paper from Never Grow Up, honeycomb stencil by Vicki Boutin (used with a wall paint sample from a local DIY shop), Mickey Mouse confetti punch, phrase thickers by Pebbles, multicoloured letter Thickers are from Little by Little and no longer available at scrapbook.com but you might have them in your stash! I also used assorted stickers and die cuts from older collections by just filtering through and looking for items in each colour of the spectrum.

No really. For as long as we are locked down, I’m just going to scrapbook with rainbows. Rainbows on my desk bring me great joy and I am all for the little things that bring us joy right now!

Also, once someone gave me product feedback that there are too many rainbows in the industry right now.

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO MANY RAINBOWS.

I just want to make my opinions clear on that.

If you also enjoy scrapbooking with rainbows and happen to share what you make on social media, add the #scrapbookrainbows hashtag, so we can have an amazing gallery of rainbow scrapbook pages!

Hello and RAWR to you today, friends! It’s my turn to share a page on “Paige’s blog”: and today I’m scrapbooking with Bloom Street’s pastel colours and some dinosaurs. What could be a better way to spend the day? Pretty sure RAWR is dinosaur for ‘stay home and scrapbook’ and I’m on board.

I’ve had the Geometric Dinosaur cut file bookmarked in my mind for a while, but someone recently asked which papers I would use specifically from Bloom Street to bring this dino to life, so it had to be done! And it appears the answer is all the greens and purples, plus a cheeky pair of chipmunks.

You can watch it all from start to finish in this process video.

Thanks so much for braving this fearsome T-Rex and I wish you much pastel fun in your own creating this week!

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Hey howdy hey friends! It’s my turn on Paige Evans’ blog and I’m excited to share with you a new layout using plenty of purple from Bloom Street along with this fab Star Wreath cut file and a photo from Disneyland!

The top I’m wearing in this photo has a space ranger badge on the front and says ‘to infinity and beyond!’ on the back, so I knew from the start I wanted to pair it with purple and green to play up the Buzz Lightyear memories, plus plenty of stars seem apt for a space ranger in Tomorrowland. I couldn’t decide between a star background or a star wreath, so put it to a vote on social media and the star wreath was the winner! I started the whole process by cutting that at the full page size from white cardstock on my Silhouette Cameo. You can watch the whole process from start to finish in this process video.

Thanks so much for taking a look, and please do let me know if you make something with purple, green, and stars any time soon.

Don’t panic, but I have a small plan.

Almost every week, I broadcast two Facebook Live videos – Mondays at 1:30pm and Fridays at 9:30am – both UK time and both approximate times. And you don’t need to be a Facebook member to watch – only to comment. It’s all lovely fun and there’s a regular crowd who come by to heckle while I scrap and all is good.

Except Facebook’s ability to let you search through an archive is really not good. It’s nothing like YouTube in that respect and basically, a video is easy to watch for about a week and then it pretty much gets lost in a sea of stuff on Facebook. No one likes to trawl through the sea of stuff on Facebook.

(And also I tried a couple times taking the live video style to YouTube and the feedback made it abundantly clear that This Style Is Not Loved There and I get that. Each space for its own style – YouTube for edited and educational, Facebook for live chatting with me at my inevitably messy desk where I will lose the foam squares probably three times before I finish the layout.)

Here’s the small plan: I’ll keep on top of updating here with those videos and then that will add up to an archive that’s way easier to search. And when I get it suitably updated, I’ll even compile a pin board with all the layouts so you can see the page and go straight to the video, but that’s a step ahead of where I am today. Today, have one layout with at least something from all twelve collections I have made with American Crafts!

We’ll see if I can stay on top of it all. Send strength, wish me luck, whatever seems right.

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One of my favourite things to come out of the start of 2020 is the chance to work in a new way with an old friend: as part of the cut file design team from none other than Paige Evans. Today I’m sharing the first page I’ve made as part of that team with her Love Love Love cut file and her beautiful new Bloom Street collection.

Here’s a look at how it all came together, with one photo taken just outside It’s a Small World at Disneyland Paris, and one patterned paper per word of the cut file. Plus a little thread to finish it all!

I cut my files like this with the Silhouette Cameo 3 and smooth white cardstock, then adhere with the same adhesive I use for almost everything: the Kokuyo dot roller.

You can find Paige’s paper collections here at scrapbook.com and find her cut files on Etsy and the Silhouette Design Store.

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