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

It may be the first of April, but I promise I have no April fools planned here! It’s still a holiday here today and I’m looking forward to a day of mostly scrapping! My studio is almost all back in place, and taking all my supplies off the shelves, into boxes, and back onto the shelves again has made it so tempting to just give up on the unpacking and scrap away for hours and hours.

One thing I’m very much looking forward to diving into is the new box of goodies set aside for April’s Best of Both Worlds collection. The April selections are now available to add to your shopping cart, and you can find them right here. Of course there are a few things I hope you’ll keep in mind, as each month’s product picks have a slightly different train of thought behind them!

_{A look at the b-sides of the patterned papers.}

This month I’ve included a 6×6 paper pad and just a couple fewer 12×12 papers (there are still seven 12×12 sheets plus a 12×12 transparency). The 6×6 paper pad is on sale at a great price, and it’s a collection of papers I have really loved using. Throughout the next month’s projects, I’ll be including different tips for using 6×6 papers on 12×12 pages, plus a few thing along the way will highlight other useful spots for 6×6 papers too. If you’re already a 6×6 fan, you might already have that tablet in your collection; if you haven’t yet ventured to 6×6, this is a great way to give it a try at very little cost, and I know this particular one is very versatile and will mix and match easily with lots of other supplies.

You’ll also notice there are three sets of stamps on the list this month. I don’t expect you to order all three (unless you are a total stamp fiend, and then by all means go ahead), but much like the letter stickers last month, I’ve included three different designs so you can pick something that is most likely to fit the type of pages you do. One has a very general theme, one is more specific to daily routines or everyday documentation, another is quite quirky with a crafty vibe. They are three different prices so you can also look at what best fits your budget – they range from $7.99 to $14.99. Of course, if you prefer not to stamp at all, you can omit the stamps from the kit and take the price point down straight away.

Click here to shop for the April Best of Both Worlds scrapbooking kit.

One of the embellishment choices this month is a great pack of printed chipboard shapes. I’ve chosen the more girly colour option, though there are only a couple pieces that are really specific to little girls (there is a pink crown that says ‘princess’, for example, but there are also lots of butterflies, circles, and flowers). If you have a household of boys and don’t do any pink scrapping at all, it still may be too much. There is a boy equivalent of this same pack here, but it’s currently sold out. I would suggest this die-cut pack instead, but please note that’s not chipboard so they will be flat embellishments (that’s fine – pop dots are your friend), and I don’t have that one in my own stash so I won’t be showing examples that use that pack specifically.

For lettering this month, I have only added one option to the list – a set of woodgrain Thickers. It’s actually not the set in this picture, I’m afraid. The set in the picture is the Goodness font in woodgrain, but that’s sold out at the moment. I’ll actually be using the set that is in the list – the darker woodgrain alphabet in the Patchwork font. It’s just that those are newer and my set is still on its way! I think either would work fine, so if you have one of the two sets already, you’re all set. But I think the darker woodgrain will be easier to read on the patterned papers. The Thickers are often the first things to sell out from the list, so if that happens quickly, I will come back to this post and add some suggestions for others that would work too. But I just wanted to point out that I didn’t add the usual set of smaller letters too. Right now, I have a big stash of all sorts of half-used sheets of small letter stickers, and I’m thinking that maybe quite a few of us are in the same boat. So this month rather than add yet another sheet, I’m challenging myself – and you! – to use those sheets that are stacking up in our own collections. If you don’t fit that description in the slightest, choose a lovely new sheet of a small alphabet you will use and consider yourself a pillar of virtue when it comes to getting the most from your scrapbooking purchases!

If you’re new to the Best of Both Worlds idea, the basic premise is that it has the convenience of a scrapbooking kit, but without the subscription concept – so you can jump in on the months you like and sit out when you know your scrapping time or budget is limited or you’re just not convinced the selections are your style. Plus you can make customisations – so if I’ve selected an item you already have, you don’t need to pay for that duplicate as you can just pull it from your existing stash. Likewise, you can add more of something if you know it will suit your style best that way – add two of a patterned paper if you like double page layouts; add cardstock if you tend to use it as a base for your pages and don’t already have it to hand. Make sense? Then throughout the next few weeks, I’ll be using those supplies on my layouts here on the blog, including plenty of them in videos. That’s all free to read and watch right here.

All the order placement is done through Two Peas in a Bucket and you’re welcome to add in any other shopping you want from their wide variety of supplies (and amazing sale section). If you’re treating yourself to some lovely crafty luxury, don’t forget that Two Peas offers free US shipping for orders that include $50 of full-price goods, and that same order qualifies for a $5 discount on international shipping. You will need a coupon code for that – it can be found at the bottom of their weekly newsletter. Your Best of Both Worlds purchases count toward their loyalty program too. There is good stock of all items as this post goes live, though it is all first come, first served – leaving items in your shopping basket doesn’t reserve them, just to make that clear. (It happens to me all the time with my own orders – I tend to leave my shopping for a week or so and then I find some of the most popular items have jumped out of my cart. Such is life, I suppose.) If the items you would like are out of stock by the time you are ready to buy, you have two options – click the ‘request and notify me’ button on any sold out item, and Two Peas will send you an email as soon as that is restocked. Or take the shopping list elsewhere and collect your supplies from wherever is best for you.

Purchasing through the links from shimelle.com (and my Twitter and Facebook pages) to Two Peas helps support this blog – it makes the free videos and guest artists all possible, so if you are sharing or bookmarking this shopping list, I would love for you to link or bookmark this individual post and not the shopping list itself, as going straight to the shopping list does not support those projects here. I hope you understand and I thank you so much for making this all possible.

A couple important notes before I go for now!
…Yes, there are more videos with the March product picks! I’ve finished those now, but for as lovely as our new/old home and studio can be, fast and reliable internet is not a bonus here. That’s okay, as I have somewhere else I can do all that sort of thing – but they have been closed for the long holiday weekend while I have been scrapping and filming! So my first order of business at work tomorrow when they reopen is to get all those videos and blog posts uploaded. You’ll see them here throughout the coming week, and I hope you enjoy using up the the end of your March kit while April wings its way to you in a cardboard box!

…Thanks for all your patience while we’ve moved yet again. I won’t fib and say we’re completely organised and out of boxes just yet, but it is fabulous indeed to be back in a place we love so much, with friendly neighbours and happiness! I’m sure we’ll get everything back in its place soon.

Click here to shop for the April Best of Both Worlds scrapbooking kit.

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Please welcome the lovely Julie Kirk, who note only has a delightful sense of style in all things papercraft, she is also in the middle of a very interesting and useful series of posts on making the most of your blog! Do check that out – but after you have checked out her fabulous five ideas, of course!

If you looked closely at everything I’ve created for the fun of it [in my scrapbooking, art journaling, card making, collage and more] over the last couple of years I’m pretty sure you’d be able to spot at least one snippet cut from an old book somewhere on the vast majority of it. So much so that working with old book pages seems to have become a ‘signature style’ for me and it’s all because of the serendipity of it all, the delight in never quite knowing what inspiration I might find hidden inside a book that nobody’s opened in a long time!

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love browsing through and selecting brand new supplies, new patterned papers never fail to inspire and set me off planning which pages to make with them. But when it comes to finding that something extra, to help me tell the story of a layout, or to put a new spin on a familiar technique or to add another layer of interest then it’s my collection of old books I turn to. So here’s a few projects to tempt you to do the same.

1. Inked and die-cut flowers
This is a fun way to add several additional levels of interest to a technique often used with plain tissue-paper. Grab several sheets of very thin book paper [you can often find this inside pocket dictionaries] and spritz and splatter them with a few shades of spray ink. Once dry die-cut the sheets using various small pinked circle and flower dies [you can cut through several sheets at a time as the paper’s so thin].

For each flower stack-up around five or more layers, push a small brad through the centre then, starting with the top layer, carefully scrunch each layer up toward the centre to create a perfect papery bloom.

2. Using dictionary definitions to tell your story
Dictionary definitions occasionally make an appearance in scrapbooking ranges don’t they? But, to be sure of always finding the exact one you’re looking for … try an actual dictionary because it’s full of them! Definitions can help to support the subject matter of a page in a way that’s often easier and more subtle than seeking out a fully matching themed paper range.

For this page I used the definition of ‘Home’ as found in a 1960s children’s dictionary to fit the theme of my page which documents an everyday adventure: a walk I took from home to the Post Office last month. I’d blogged about the trip as part of the ’Simply A Moment’ meme hosted by Simply Alexa then I printed off the text from the post
and popped it inside the envelope on my layout.

3. As a background for stamping and colouring If there’s one thing on my ‘just don’t like it’ list of crafty activities it’s stamping images directly on to cold, blank, white cardstock before colouring them in … so I don’t do it! Instead, I tend to stamp onto lightly patterned, self-patterned, off white papers and book pages which offer a lovely soft and interesting base for stamped images especially those which have open areas in the design, where you can see the text beneath.

Here I stamped a super-cute Polka Doodles elephant onto a page all about Shakespeare and gave him an envelope stamped onto a book page filled with numbers (which I stock in packs as well as regular text page packs).

Once stamped I colour my images with ProMarkers or pencils depending on whether the print on the old page reacts with the pen ink or not.

*4. Hiding an image behind an aperture&
Aperture cards offer you the chance to have a focal image hiding away behind a frame or two, just waiting to be revealed in full when the card is opened. And there’s some fun images to be found on the pages of old children’s annuals, which you can find really very cheaply in charity shops and car boot sales, that are ideal for this.

For this tri-fold card I placed the image on the central panel before cutting frames from the two panels on either side. If you’d like a clearer idea of how this works, there are a few extra images of this card, taken at different angles, on my blog today.

5. Giving a title to quick wall art
If you’re anything like me you’ll have at least one empty frame sitting, lonely, on a shelf in your house. Go on, admit it! But with a few items and a snippet of text from an old book you can transform it into a sophisticated piece of wall art in under twenty minutes!

Here I used a scrap of spotted scrapbooking paper, two shells and a phrase cut from an old architecture book to create a little work of art for my bathroom wall. Alternatives could be to frame a selection of buttons, crafting embellishments, or even a brooch.

Then, when it comes to finding a phrase, there’s no need to go flicking through pages for any specific wording, or with any preconceived ideas of what you want to say. Simply leaf through with an open mind until your eyes to find something as serendipitously perfect as the one I found.

I hope my projects today have given you a few ideas of how old pages can be combined with modern styles of paper crafting and even home décor. One of the best things about introducing book pages into your crafting is that it’s cheap and plentiful meaning you’re free to experiment … and fail … and then experiment again without feeling restricted.

And, if nothing else, old pages offer so much in the way of surprises, you really never know what wonderfully inspiring image, print or phrase will leap out from between those dusty covers!

Julie Kirk documents everyday stories through her scrapbooking and shares her love of vintage paper supplies through the packs she creates for her Etsy shop. She’s a regular designer for Papercraft Inspirations magazine and contributes to the 3DJean design team blog. Meanwhile through her own blog ‘notes on paper’ and her Facebook page, she shares creative projects, hints and tips, stories, plus anything which might raise a smile. She is currently raising money for charity by swapping free blogging-advice for donations in her Push-Up Bra Blogging e-course which is open to all.

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It took me a while to jump on the washi-tape bandwagon but once I jumped on, I did it with exuberance! After I broke down and purchased my first roll of washi tape, I simply couldn’t stop! I wanted every color, every pattern, every design – they are all so fun. Now I have a large collection, and I“m always looking for new ways to incorporate the washi tape on my projects. Today I am happy to share one of my latest washi tape creations with you – a Double Washi Frame! The process is really quite simple, but so unique to each and every project.

First, gather some of your favorite rolls of washi tape from your stash. You’ll also need two sheets of cardstock. I chose kraft and off-white 8 ½” x 11” papers for my layout.
Decide which sheet you want to use for the base of your layout. Grab your washi tape and start tearing off pieces – placing them around the perimeter of your background paper. Leave a ¼ border of the background paper showing around the edges.

Complete the frame around the background.

Now trim the other sheet of cardstock to fit within the border you just created. I trimmed 1” off the side and 1” off the bottom.

Add a strip of washi tape all the way across the top of the card stock. Leave part of the washi tape hanging over the edge & wrap the edges around to the back to make the edges look finished.
Repeat this process on all four edges.

Now place the smaller frame on the background.

After the frames are complete, go ahead and add photos, journaling, and embellishments to the layout.

I challenged myself to crate this layout with NO patterned paper! Don’t worry, there are still oodles of patterns happening – but they all came in the form of washi tape, printed chipboard, and stickers!
I know I’m not the only scrapper out there with an enormous collection of washi tape, so hopefully this is an idea you can use too! If you decide to give it a whirl, I’d love to see your final project – please leave a comment with a link to your project so I can check it out!

If you ask Wendy Sue Anderson what her favorite hobby is, she’ll tell you it’s scrapbooking and paper-crafting. But if you ask her what her favorite job is, she won’t hesitate to tell you that it is being a mom to her four awesome kiddos! Although she currently works as a contributing editor for Scrapbook Trends and Create: magazines (which she thoroughly loves), her top priority is always her family; her handsome husband Brad, her two teenagers, Meagan and Josh, and her two little boys, Seth and Zach. Family is always first for her, and spending time with them and having fun together also affords many memory-making opportunities, which is why her next love is capturing and saving those memories on the pages of her scrapbooks! In addition to writing monthly articles for the magazine, Wendy is also lucky enough to design for some of her favorite manufacturers in the scrapbook industry – be sure to stop by her blog to get to know her and to see more of her work!

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Usually when I share a Sketch to Scrapbook Page video, I stay quite true to the sketch and the guests sometimes give it a bit of a twist, but today we’re swapping that around. I designed this sketch thinking of triangles cut from various patterned paper scraps, but once I had my supplies on the desk, I decided to take it in a different direction to embrace the current trend of chevrons and arrows. Maybe I will come back and give the triangles a try too, but rest assured, today’s guest has made that look ever so pretty.

I imagined this sketch with a single photo (4×6 or 5×7 would both work) so the triangles form arrows that point to that important picture. You could replace that single photo with a collection of smaller pictures, or include more photos across that central block of the page if that’s better for your style.

The supplies for this page are all from my March product picks for the Best of Both Worlds, plus some paper stars left on my desk from a project months ago and a bit of baker’s twine. The photo is of the fireworks at the end of the closing ceremony at the Olympic Stadium – taken as we were leaving the park just ahead of the crowd. Bittersweet! Although my Olympic album will have a few stories that chronologically take place after this photo, I think it will mark a sort of end to a chapter within that book as it comes together. That’s the plan, anyway!

Today’s guest, Piradee Talvanna, stayed true to the idea of all those paper triangles and I love the look of all the patterns she selected. Plus there’s a little something else with her page that may have made me smile!

I had a fun time using this awesome sketch as it gives you a lot of room to play around with; although I did pretty much keep to the sketch only switching the placement of the title and adding in some fun layering details behind the photo. In creating this layout, I used the Maggie Holmes collection by Crate Paper, which had a lot of fun colors and I wanted to be able to incorporate all the colors into the layout without overwhelming it. Hence I decided to keep the background neutral (one color) and instead played on the arrow design with the various colors and balancing it out with the colorful layering/cluster behind the photo. Also I noticed that the fabric frame from the collection had some staples (to keep the lettering in place) and therefore also added some to the arrow design along with some neutral sequins for more details. On the topic of cupcakes, well what more is there to say? Love them!

Piradee Talvanna is from Bangkok, Thailand but currently lives in Singapore with her husband. It was there that she was introduced to the wonderful world of Scrapbooking in mid 2008 and quickly became addicted to all the beautiful papers and fun embellishments. Scrapbooking not only allows her to explore and challenge her creativity but also helps her de-stress after along day at work. She is currently a design team member for Crate Paper, Maya Road and Webster’s Pages and has been part of the Creating Keepsakes Dream Team Member for 2011, 2012 and 2013. You can find more of Piradee’s work on her blog.

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Today is moving day. Yes, we are moving house (and my studio) again. Yes, that is three moves since the end of 2011. Yes, that is more packing tape and cardboard and bubble wrap than I would care to see in a lifetime, but this time we are very happy to be making this move, hassle aside. We’re actually moving back to a place we never wanted to leave, which is a long story for another day perhaps.

But in addition to moving day, it’s also Gardeners’ Digest day, so I just wanted to drop by quickly to share a few things with you from my Two Peas world and then get back to the moving van, I’m afraid! The sooner I can reconstruct my studio, the better. I may have danced with joy to return to that room today with its giant wall-sized window. Oh, natural light. I love you so.

Since we last caught up with all things Garden Girl, Glitter Girl has been on a few adventures, including the one above, wherein she made two pages with the same construction process, and an episode wherein she was very brave and scrapbooked with some of her oldest scrapbook pages. As always, you can find all my Glitter Girl pages and videos here.

New in the Garden this month is the lovely Celine Navarro, who has joined as a new Garden Girl and is part of the 213 in 2013 video series. Take a look and see what you can pick up from her beautifully artistic style! You can see even more lovely work from Celine in her gallery.

Now… usually I would share links to five products I’ve purchased (and loved!) from the Two Peas shop this month, but because I only have a moment to pause the loading-boxes-into-the-van activity, I have a little challenge for you! In Glitter Girl’s latest video, she shared some of her latest product acquisitions with you! In the comments, tell me your favourite of her new products, and I’ll pick one for something a little special.

I’m the last stop on the hop this month, so if you’re jumping in now, click over to Celine for the first stop or take a look at the Two Peas blog to catch the details.

Wishing you a very happy weekend, and if you don’t see me soon, send in a search party to make sure I’m not under a stack of cardboard boxes!

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Today I am delighted to welcome another scrapbooker close to home: Stephanie Baxter, who lives close enough to come to my neighbourhood to watch the Opening Ceremonies on the big screen at the Royal Naval College last summer! But her extensive travels have shown her things that may be far closer to your neighbourhood than mine, and I love getting a look at how she creates scrapbook pages and other projects in her own beautiful style. I’m so grateful she stepped up to share some ideas for making digital brushes easy to use on your paper (and fabric) projects, and I hope you enjoy.

Just recently I have been getting into a bit of hybrid scrapbooking and I’ve found the best and easiest way for me to do that is to use digital brushes. I love the variety that are currently available right now. There are so many amazing designs that can add such a fun element to your projects. And the best thing is about digital brushes is that you can use them over and over again… they will never run out! If you’re anything like me, you’ve got an ever-growing collection on your computer’s hard drive and sometimes overlook them because you forget they are even there. Today I’d like to share with you five ideas to get you using digital brushes.

As a Title for a Scrapbook Page
This is one of the most simple ways to use a digital brush but can make such an impact on your pages. I watched this video to help me figure out how to colour my brushes (paint splatters and a Studio Calico sentiment brush) in a way that seems to be a growing trend right now. Using Photoshop Elements, I opened the brushes on an 8.5 × 11 inch canvas and coloured them according to Shanna’s tutorial. I printed the document on a piece of white cardstock before adding Mister Huey’s mist, my photo, embellishments (sequins, Studio Calico wood veneer and die-cuts) and a date stamp.

On Photos
I am totally in love with using digital brushes directly on my photos, particularly for my Project Life style pages. For this page in my travel album, I opened my photos up in PSE and stamped on them using digital brushes from Studio Calico. Sometimes I like to use a bit of text with them, so I will add that immediately after stamping the brush. It’s also sometimes fun to play with the opacity of the brushes…if you stamp them on a new layer, you can reduce the opacity to make it so that you can still see the photo under the brush, which becomes slightly transparent, rather than a solid colour.

As a Transfer
I’ve been collecting little canvas bags that I thought would be great to re-purpose as little gift bags. Wanting to jazz them up a bit and make them look at bit more pretty, I decided to buy some inkjet transfer paper to use with my brushes. I recoloured a Studio Calico digital brush in PSE and printed directly on to the transfer paper before using an iron to adhere the transfer to the canvas bag. Do remember to let the transfer paper cool down before peeling it off, as you might peel off some of your image with it!

To Make your own Project Life Filler Cards
I am loving Project Life this year, especially because there are so many fun cards out there to use in my album! For my birthday week, however, I wanted a special card in my spread to mark the occasion. I couldn’t find any birthday themed filler cards, so I decided to make my own using a Studio Calico digital brush and some text. I love how it turned out and the fact that it’s totally unique, especially since I could choose my own background colour and font.

As a Sentiment for a Quick Postcard
This project was SO quick and easy… perfect for a time when you want to send a card to a friend but are a bit pushed for time. I stamped some brushes from Ali Edwards and Studio Calico on to a canvas sized 4.25 × 5.5 inches and printed it out on a piece of white cardstock. I trimmed the card down to size and then added a bit of washi tape for a bit of extra interest. You could definitely make something similar in under five minutes… how great is that?!

I hope that’s got you inspired to sort through those digital brushes that you’ve got sitting on your computer and put them to good use. As you can see, you can use them in so many different ways and, like I said before, you can use them time and again, so they’re great value for money too!

Have you used digital brushes on a paper project? Share it with us! Or does it seem like something too far from your comfort zone? We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Stephanie is a teacher living in Epsom, near London, England. She graduated from university back in 2008, before spending some time working as a journalist and an air hostess. She counts herself incredibly lucky to have been able to explore some of the world’s most amazing cities. She now spends her days teaching – her true calling in life. When not working, she can be found hanging out with friends, cooking, watching films, reading Jane Austen and Charles Dickens, laughing uncontrollably with her sister and, of course, scrapbooking. She has been published in Creating Keepsakes and Scrapbook Trends and had the amazing opportunity of writing her own eBook for Ella Publishing, entitled Scrapbooking Your Single Years=. She is currently on the Project Life Creative Team, as well as being a design team member for Ormolu.

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This week Glitter Girl returns to an old question that comes up now and then: all about mixing patterns. Funny that Glitter Girl likes that topic, since it’s one of my favourites too! Okay, rubbish jokes aside, the Out of the Box adventure was one of the most popular episodes in 2012, and similar questions come up on the board quite often, so with a brand new order on my desk, this was a great time to revisit the idea of mixing products from a variety of collections and manufacturers with an up-to-date look at current lines and trends.

You can find all the supplies for this project here at Two Peas, and there are plenty of new things in the shop, of course, like all those lovely new papers, overlays, and embellishments from Allison Kreft’s new lines at Webster’s Pages.

And yes, that is a Hello Kitty bandage. It turns out Glitter Girl is not immune to cardboard cuts and packing up the studio for this week’s move was a bit treacherous. I hope it wasn’t too distracting! Clearly hand models are not allowed to pack their own homes when moving. Oh well: welcome to my real world, plasters and all!

This January was the first time I had been to a Disney park since the grand opening of Epcot, so that would be long, long before I was a scrapbooker, or indeed holding a camera! Now I suddenly understand the entire Disney-related challenges brought to scrapbookers. I’ve heard about them for years but never really imagined them in full. I was only at Disneyland for a few hours really and have plenty of photos to scrapbook, but not really enough stories to fill a full separate album. And of course, I’ve now done the child-free version of Disney, and that’s a very different experience. I have come up with a few stories I want to tell that are more reflective (especially as I don’t think there are any photos from my childhood adventures at Disneyworld, so this is as good an opportunity as any to recall what memories I still have) but some are quite simple and everyday, like this particular page recounting how it was definitely worthwhile for non-morning-person me to get up and go to the park as soon as it opened, since we had very short queues and gorgeous blue skies – until around midday, when more people started to arrive and the haze of white rolled over in the sky. I’m still thinking about what I’ll do with the slightly less obvious photos from the day. Exactly what journaling might go with photos of the birds in the Enchanted Tiki Room? Yeah, I’m not quite sure either! We shall see.

Of course, Glitter Girl always challenges you to join in, and this time it’s to make your own mix of materials for your next page. Upload it to Two Peas to share it with us!

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Sometimes a sketch helps things come together so quickly on a scrapbook page, and I think this might be a design I’ll be coming back to the next time I need to scrap without a lot of time to spare. It came together quickly, yet I really like the end result – and often when I scrap quickly I am quite disappointed with the end page. Not this time, so hurrah for that.

The sketch is designed for two landscape 4×6 photos, a matted square of patterned paper in the background and one tall column down the middle. That column is the same size as the two photos – 4×12. It’s essentially an off-set plus sign, and I’m sure it could be turned and work well too because it’s just basic page geometry of all those rectangles and squares – plus three circle embellishments to balance all those straight lines.

All the supplies for this page come from my March product picks, plus black cardstock, some yellow sewing thread and stamping ink in black and hot pink.

I need to remember that word stamping idea for future pages. I am always lamenting that I have plenty of colours of ink but almost always use the same three ink pads! Definitely liked the bright colour here to change it up, but glad I stamped off that first ultra-strong layer of colour so the tones would be a better match to the patterned papers.

Of course this isn’t the only way you can interpret the page, and today’s guest, Becky Novacek, has her own unique twist – and she shares how she adapted the page from a 12×12 size to her 8.5×11 scrapping style:

It’s Becky here today, sharing my take on this very versatile sketch, that inspired me a lot. I stayed pretty true to the sketch, although it would have been easy to flip it horizontally. Since I’m an 8.5×11 designer, I found it easy to switch it up to the rectangle versus square design. As I approached this layout using the sketch, I enjoyed using many older products, mixed with new products. I find it gratifying to use favorite older and in the case, no longer available beauties. The background paper and the blue/gold pattern papers were part of one of my favorite Hambly collections. I mixed them with new Basic Grey, Amy Tan, Dear Lizzy, Crate and American Crafts, as well as a really fun Pam Garrison stamp. I switched the circle embellishments to hearts.

Becky Novacek lives in Fremont Nebraska with her husband Tom and faithful dog Scooter. Tom and Becky have 4 grown, married children and ten grandchildren. Becky has always been drawn to paper and photos. As she tried different creative endeavors and eventually discovered scrapbooking, she was hooked. It became an almost daily respite after a long day of work in the beginning, and now it has become an important part of her daily work. Creating free style, homespun layouts that speak her thoughts are what she enjoys most about scrapbooking. You can see more of Becky’s work and daily ramblings at Becky Novacek Photography. You can also follow her on Instagram and Pinterest.

And now it’s your turn! Create a page in your style with this sketch, post it online, and share it with us. You can upload to your blog or to a scrapbooking gallery like Two Peas or UKScrappers, then just follow the steps to link to your project wherever it can be found online!

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