Those Cheeks - WW1

Well, after a stellar July so far August has been a bit of a flop, only in scrapbooking though. All other areas of life have been go go go! I have been working weekends, we celebrated Chloes third birthday, had an impromptu trip to Victoria, Brenden has worked away 90% of the time add general life on top and there has been no room to get creative.
Until now.

Last month I took part in the White With 1 challenge (HERE) something I thought would be a serious challenge but it turned out thoroughly enjoyable and found it freeing. So I promised myself I would take part again this month. BUT I was certainly not expecting this:

White and Liquorice. White and BLACK! I thought one colour would be tricky enough but NO colour! I literally said 'oh crap' out loud when I saw the reveal.
However, I kept to my promise. And this is what I came up with:

Those Cheeks.

The photo is a quick side profile snap of Jayce taken on my phone while relaxing on the coach one day. I used to get soo many comments about his cheeks when out and about. They did look oh so squeezable. They still do!

My first instinct to tackle this challenge was to head in a more mixed media/getting messy direction, so I deliberately did the opposite!

The page began by tracing around the Hiedi Swapp stencil onto white cardstock then cutting it out with my craft knife. After that I gathered together my Bella Blvd papers which featured black and white patterns and backed all the hearts.

I used one of the hearts to journal inside and after that I simply chose a few words that described his checks, including chipboard from Words Or Whatever which have been coloured with a sharpie.

There is also a APOCD flair button and a few black epoxy dots.

With all the descriptive words spread around the hearts I decided to keep the title just as 'Those Cheeks' and have again used a sharpie to turn would-be white stickers black.
Thanks for coming around.
XoXoX Nicole

Problem Contained - Scrap The Boys

So it seems I tend to scrap about Chloe quite a bit more then Jayce. Its not a favourites thing. I just find it easier. I'm not used to scrapping for a boy. Plus she is older and does more scrap-worthy things.
Anyway. I hope to correct this beginning today.
Hence. A Jayce layout to share.

Problem Contained

Now what better way to try and scrap more boy layouts then to play along with Scrap The Boys. A challenge blog all about doing just that. This months challenge is to get 'Grungy/Messy'! Something that looks great but I don't often do due to lack of personal scrap space!

And I sure got messy!! I experimented with paint and ink and even thread.
I created the colour splats in the background using a technique I learnt watching Mr Maker with Chloe (I used to like the show because it kept her occupied for about 15 mins but now I watch it too!) Simply water down your paint a little, cut up a sponge into smaller bits, soak up paint and then whack with a spatula. Not only does it create a great look, its lots of fun and stress re-leaving!

If you have read my blog for a lil while you may recall me mentioning MANY times that I would love to stitch on my layouts. Well my super wonderful, absolutely amazing Aunty has been kind enough to let me permanently-borrow her sewing machine! YAY! Thank you, Thank you, THANK YOU!
And what better layout to experiment on! It was so much fun and adds a great touch. I think I will be doing alot more of it!

I have added a number of small embellishments around the photo but kept them to a minimum. The 'capture' flair from APOCD was perfect for this page, as were the speech bubbles cut from an old Bella Blvd Making The Team paper, plus a few wooden bits here and there.

Finally, considering the photo is of my son being put in a box, I couldn't resist finishing the page with the Bella Blvd 'p.s. i love you sticker'
Hope you like it. I sure liked getting messy! Will try to do more.
XoXoX Nicole

You & Me - SATW & ScrapFriends

Hello there!
I'm back with your regular viewing, a layout! I suppose a slight difference though, this layout has ME in it. Shock! I absolutely love this photo of Chloe and I (and some eagle eyed views may have noticed it become my profile picture all over the place back in December). It was taken by my camera crazy work friend Toan at the work Christmas party, Chloe did so well! She was super duper tired by the time this photo was taken then had to back it up with another Christmas party after.

You & Me

So because I'm pretty much a junkie for these things =P I designed my layout around the current sketch challenge over at ScrapFriends an online scrap shop that knows how to throw a sale!

I don't think I could have got more exact to the sketch! It was such an amazing design that it didn't need any twisting.

However I was inspired even more so by the current mood board at Scrap Around The World.

This truly is an amazing board and I think I took a lil' some'em some'em from every picture!
The bottom middle picture convinced me to use lots of hearts (not that I need much) and to marry this with the sketch while the top right picture of the cake moved me to make them an ombre from dark purple to light pink both with a stencil and with chipboard hearts.

The top left picture lend me straight to the background pattern paper from Websters Pages Record It collection and I decided to stay there for the rest of the papers as well. It also prompted me to get a bit messy!

I used the bottom right picture of ombre increasing size pots influence the hearts on my page. The full hearts have simply been painted while I liked the hint of bare wood from the outline hearts although they needed a something, twine to the rescue! Just wrap and staple.

The title is a Kaisercraft wood words which said all I needed to say and leaving it bare made it stand out the perfect amount.

I used a stencil/mask to paint little gold triangles around the page and even on the photo also due to the pot picture! Pretty big deal for me! To finish the page off I threw on two flair badges from APOCD.

As I feel that my own hand writing destroys a scrap page I have hidden the who what where when behind the photo.

Thanks for checking out my lastest creation. Why not leave some love in the comments, or hate, I like to hear it all!
XoXoX Nicole