SPRING- Scrap That May Sketch Challenge

This is the May sketch at Scrap That . 

This is my take on the sketch.

Aptly titled spring for a spring challenge! I used the Prima Divine line of papers and embellishments for this project as they matched perfectly. Last October my brother gave me about 160 bulbs to plant in my garden the results this spring were gorgeous. Every morning I go out with my coffee and do a walk through of my garden and every morning there is a new addition of color!

I used Prima Alphas for the title and the frame is from the Divine collection as well.

A close-up of all the gorgeous Prima flowers that go with this line!

 Rather than use a doily I took a piece of yellow cardstock cut out a circle and the went around the circle with one of my corner punches. I then added pink Liquid Pearls for added dimension. I love the Washi tape that comes with this line just gorgeous!

Last close-up shot. I used Prima bling as well most definitely a Prima page. Ironically two day after I took this photo which was Mother's Day it snowed! Unbelievable! I stood at my French doors and watched in despair as the snow fell covering all my beautiful flowers and all the new buds and plants that had just broken ground. My hubby and I ran out and brought my Oleander trees back in (one may not survive). I pray they make it as they were my mom's and I brought them home when she passed.

Crazy isn't it? And yet they are calling for mid 20's in two days. Talk about extreme weather!  Well I'm off to assess the damage in my garden and start getting the house ready for the influx of children coming my way on the May long weekend. All of my daughters, their spouses and children are coming home for the weekend! Did I mention that I have five daughters?! Lord help me :) Be well and TFL!

Gentleman Farmer-Scrapthat Design Team Challenge-Graphic 45

This month the Design Team Challenge at ScrapThat was to include a banner in your layout. I chose to do this layout about my Opa (grandfather) Lange who was a Gentleman Farmer. Originally he was born to a wealthy family in Germany, they were landowners/farmers with money. When his mother (my great grandmother) passed away his father, my great grandftather remarried. Sadly he married a woman with daughters of her own and no great love for my grandfather. As soon as my greatgrandfather passed away she threw my grandfather out of the house with nothing to his name. He moved to
Berlin and started his life over. I never had the chance to meet my Opa Lange. He was drafted into the war late in 1945 (3 weeks before the war ended) and was shot down by a sniper in Russia. All that was returned to my grandmother were his uniform and his helmet with a bullet hole through it. :( Just think how different things would be today had my greatgrandmother survived! My Opa might have led a full life and not been drafted (he was in his 40's). He could have taken over the farm after his father passed and when he passed my father would have taken it over. My life would have been so completely different. Then again my father may have never met my mother and I wouldn't be here. Hmm

Fritz Lange-May 1927 nineteen years old

I used the French Country paper from Graphic 45 for this layout in keeping with the farm theme. I did alot of fussy cutting to tuck all the fruit along both sides of the page. I didn't want the page to frou frou but I wanted to show that he was both a classy gentleman and a hardworking farmer.

I used Graphic 45's cutout pieces and made the banner with twine and gold thread. I popped the banner up with foam squares to make it stand out more.

Petaloo flowers worked really well with this paper!

Last shot just showing the title. The Alphas are from Prima. Hope you like! Stay tuned as in the very near future I will be posting my Blog give away in celebration of my new craft room. You don't want to miss out it's going to be chocked full of goodies!! TFL and be well!

Girls Just Want to Have Fun-My Creative Sketches

This is the sketch at My Creative Sketches this month:

And this is my interpretation of the sketch

I used the April Main Kit from MCS with the Maggie Holmes collection from Crate Paper. The colors in this kit are bold and bright and were the perfect match for this picture of my youngest daughter and two of my grandaughters. The little ones adore their Auntie Jessie this is apparent in the glee on their faces when she arrived for Lilly's 6th Birthday party. It warms my heart to see how incredibly close my family is, especially since I lost both my parents and my siblings and I don't see each other often anymore.

I used a Kaisercraft rub-on for the title Girls Just Want to Have Fun and the flowers are a mix of Petaloo (large) and Prima (small). I needed a paper that would help balance the bold patterned ones so I used a sheet from the kit painted it white and then pulled various colors from the kit, matched them in paint and spritzed them across the sheet. You can see it behind the title.

This is the last close-up of my banner and again you can see more of my home made sheet to the left. It's an absolutely gorgeous day outside so I am off to garden. Hope all is well with you. And today I want to give a special mention to my mother who passed away two years ago today. I miss you so much mom there are no words. I love you. For everyone else take care be well! :)

Love: April Layout Challenge Bo Bunny

 This is the April sketch for the Bo Bunny sketch challenge this month.

 And this is my interpretation of it. A layout simply called Love. Again this is Kelly and Dave posing for their engagement photos. A novel concept wish they had that around when I was young! I used the Ces't La Vie line from Bo Bunny. I love this soft palette of colors!I used a stencil and some moulding paste and did a border around the picture and then went over it with pink smooch. This helped bring more of the pink from Kelly's shirt into the page.

 This is from the new Dusty Attic. It's called Swirly Vines #3 DA0751. I painted it with an off white paint then inked it with various inks from tim Holtz and color box. The flowers are a mix of Prima and Petaloo.

Another Dusty Attic piece called Leafy Scroll DA0764. Same technique painted then inked.

I really liked this little embellishment so I used it for the title. It's from the Paperie.

Last close-up of the DA at the bottom. I have to keep the pages for this album flatter than usual so that the album closes properly seeing as it is a gift when all the pages are done. Hence the smaller flower clusters and more DA. That's it for today. I am suffering from some horrible stomach bug which has kept me up for days so I think I might try a nap before I begin again. Hope all is well! TFL :)

save the date -ScrapThat Sketch Challenge

This is the April Sketch at Scrap That done by Amarylis Doria]

and this is my interpretation

I am doing an engagement album for my daughter's best friend as a wedding gift from my daughter! Get that? I make the gift my daughter gets to give it :) This came about after Kelly the lovely lady in the picture saw my work on fb and said how much she would love an album so busy busy. I am a little tired of doilies lately so I used a stencil and some gesso and painted a patterned "doily" of my own design as the background. This is the April kit Within Nature using GCD papers.

For my purposes the Alphas in the kit were off just a bit so I decided to sand off the top of each letter with some find sandpaper and then inked the bare area with Tim Holtz's Weathered Wood ink pad. Once the ink dried I simply went over it all with stickles. Now the alphas match perfectly!

Just a closeup of my little flower bundle. The big once is Petaloo and the pink and silverish one are Prima as is the watch trinket. The brad is Bo Bunny.

I just used a few small pieces from Dusty Attic to bring out the page more. Grass Clusters DA0660. The Birdhouse is of course a Prima Resin. And one last closeup of another piece of DA I used.

Well that's it for today. I am totally wiped from cleaning out the garden and the pond these past two days and have some catching up with to do with my scrapping so I will TTYL! Be Well!

 

The Finished Product!

After nine days of actual renovations, two days to empty the room and so far four days putting it back and still in the process of doing this! Here is the finished product. .

This is my gorgeous wallunit buit by using closet organizers from Home Depot. We then customized them by buying additional sheets of melamie and had them cut to the corrresponding size of the four shelves that came with the unit. This gave me all the extra shelving space I wanted. I also wanted to leave room for bins and some of my stacks of paper are quite large. I store my paper by company so the big piles are Bo Bunny, Graphic 45, Websters, and Basic Grey.

My seat at my double L shaped desk. Two desk from Ikea placed in an L formation. The right side of the desk is my computer, printer and general workspace where I can print pictures or pay bills :( The left side is for scrapping! :) The chair was my husbands it was specially made for his back and neck issues and suit me perfectly so comfy!

The tall tupperware trays are full of mostly Basic Grey and Crate Paper. The Bins in the closet hold my Christmas papers, embellishments to match and my Dusty Attic chipboard.

The infamous slate wall my husband insisted I needed to "see what I have"! I have to admit I love being able to look over and see my choices. Everyone always teases me that I have enough stuff to open a store (total exaggeration) but it sort of looks like one! Over time I will be adding the little touches. An extra shelf of the wall. Hang my shadow box frames and moving things around until I've found the perfect balance but for now I am totally happy with the way it all came together! Thanks for following along and stay tuned as in the very near future I will be holding a contest to help me find a solution for all my ribbon! I promise the prize will be nice!!TFL! Be well!

Moving in the Funriture

 One of the most important things to me about my new space was that I have two work stations. One for my computer and to continue with household bills, correspondence as well as picture printing and paper cutting. The other space of course was to scrap. So I bought two desks from Ikea with their corresponding under shelving units and made an L shape. My room is relatively small 9 by 11 and I had to think this out really well to make it work for me. I must have walked around with Creating Keepsakes' "Creative Spaces" magazine for months as well as scouring the web for other scraprooms for comparison.

Next up was paper storage. I am a paper hoarder I admit and proud of it. I believe you can never have enough! I already had three towers in my room that I had bought at Home Depot. They were actually closet organizers so I bought the towers then bought extra pieces of melamie board and had the store cut additional shelves to fill up the tower. It looks something like this..

Starting with tower one

Even with the five towers I had to keep my stackable tupperware containers to hold all my Basic Grey paper that I had collected over the years. (not shown here) This is hubby with one of our dogs flash. Taking a moment after putting it all together.

This is my slate wall that I bought at Home Depot for al my embellishments. My husband constantly argued with me about the fact that I didn't even know what I had in stock because I couldn't see it so this was his idea and I have to admit I love it!!

Even with all the new storage I still need this bin on wheels to keep extra punches, paints, chipboard embellishments and stamps. What I love is that the room now has hardwood floors and everything is on wheels so I can just swing it around use what I need then just roll it back. I bought a floor protector to put under my chair which also helps me move around the space easier.

Me at the end of the day realizing that now I had to move everything back into the room and just the thought exhausted me! :) Stay tuned for final reveal of the room with everything in it! TFL! Be well!