Hello Selfie - WW1

I have finally completed a piece of scrappery after what is my usual start of the month lull. 

I am hoping to keep at it and create a large number of pages this month. Also my usual but it will happen this time... I hope...

Anyway. First up is a layout feature a new favourite photo of Jayce and myself.

This page was created along with the WW1 November challenge which is 'freesia' or yellow.

I created the background using paint swatch samples of varying yellows collected from Bunnings. Even managed to find ones with appropriate colour names which were underlined/circled before stitching them onto white cardstock.

I matted the photo with both black and white cardstock to make it pop. Behind that I chopped up two sentiments from a Elle's Studio Cameron paper and layered them vertically with a few punched star boarder bits.

Isn't that the cutest little square! The arrow points to Jayce btw.

I scattered a few of the punched stars around for some added interest.

When stitching the colour swatches, one was missed to create a pocket for the tag which pulls out and has the journalling on it.

I had planned on the 'a favorite photo of Jayce & Mummy' to be the title but felt it left a void in the middle of the polaroid frames, so added the another title too.

 Back to share again. Soon.
XoXoX Nicole

Winter...?

Hey Hi Hello.
This year it seems that Mother Nature has been away with the fairies a lil bit. The weather has been all over the place! For a few weeks, in the middle of winter there was glorious sunshine!! The kids and I took advantage of it as much as possible! And that is what this page is about.

The layout of this page was inspired by the August Sketch at My Creative Sketches. I altered the sketch to suit better, for example just the one large photo, but I believe you can still see the it.

I used the top semi circle to re-create the sun shine and lined it up with the glare in the photo itself.

I thought about many different titles for this page. Originally I was going to scrap it just cause I liked it, but decided to create more of a story about the weather to add meaning, then the title was going to be "Summer (in blue letters) or Winter (in red letters)" hinting at the switch of weather, however I made a mistake and stuck down the WIN in blue first. So decided to let the colour of the letters do more talking then the words.

The page is 90% American Crafts Amy Tangerine, with just a sticker and piece for paper from the another AC brand Dear Lizzy.

Another close up shots of the AC embellishments and fussy cutting and...

post done.
I am now heading to bed for a very early night to try and kick this flu which has began to creep up the day before our first ever, just for fun no real plans, holiday.
Thanks for coming by.
XoXoX Nicole.

(heart) you - Sassy Scrappers & Flutterby Designs

So I did a very quick inventory of my scrapbooks the other day and was completely blown away to discovered that I have created over 100 pages!!! WOW!
But then a kinda sad thought pop into my head. In ALL of these pages there was not a single layout of just Brenden and I... So I set about fixing that.

{heart} you

This has to be one of my most favourite photos of us, we look just like us, our everyday selves. It was taken October 2009 at Octoberfest in Tempe NSW, an event we promise to attend every year but haven't made it since having the kids.

I turned to some scrappy challenges to get this page done. First up I used the sketch challenge for Flutterby Designs 1st Birthday celebrations. The photo was a bit big to use this sketch to its full potential but unfortunately this is the only quality print I have of it =( My digital version has been lost, so this is actually a photocopy of picture I have had in a frame which has now been damaged.

I also took inspiration from the July Moodboard at Sassy Scrappers. As much as I absolutely love the white black and teal colour combo in the board, it was the black and sparkly gold that stuck with me.

The page uses only two pieces of pattern paper, both from the 'Sprinkled with Love' collection from Websters Pages. The repeated squares are gold foiled vellum which I hand cut super easily on my craft mat by simply following the lines I could see through the vellum.

The background has been given a little spray with both black and white dylusions mist to mix it up a bit with two WOW altaMATZ that I have then outlined in a white pen. I've also used texture paste and put a bunch of hearts all around the two focus areas of the page.

I loved the design of the (heart)you so much I decided to make it my title by hand stitching in the middle of the design with gold and white thread. I even used a matching piece of chipboard that I painted gold too.

Two other WOW chipboard piece make an appearance also painted gold at the top of the photo.

Thanks for dropping by. I'm still not done for the month of July so stop by again soon!
XoXoX Nicole.

Australia Day - My Creative Sketches

Welcome.

Another scrap page which features myself but this time also the much cuter daughter of mine Chloe. The photo is a selfie taken on Australia day this year. I'm a proud Aussie so had to scrap it!

If you haven't noticed before one of my favourite scrappy companies is Bella Blvd and so last year I brought one of their warehouse boxes which was full of awesome goodies!!! But I couldn't deny that I was a little (very little) bit disappointed when the largest proportion was American related. Nothing against America but I wondered if I would ever be able to use it (I don't even have a passport let alone travel plans). Then it drawn on me, although our countrys supportive colours are green and gold our flag is also red blue and white. 

The layout design was inspired by the April Sketch at My Creative Sketches. I love this sketch bog not only do they have AWESOME sketches and AWESOME prizes but they finish mid-month which that is perfect for a scrapper like me that doesn't get as much time to scrap as they'd like and tends to fiddle with the page for AGES before it sees any glue!

The pattern paper is from the Bella Blvd 'All American' range, which complimented the Australia flag clothing we are both wearing. While the 'love this place' card is from the recent 'Family Forever' collection, I was super excited to use it on this page because I DO love this country and anywhere with my kiddies!

Along with the Bella Blvd goodies I have used a number of chipboard pieces. The strip of stars has simply been painted also the title (but about 50 million times because I kept changing my mind which colour I wanted it, I think it has double in height). I began with the banner by painting the 'string' edge in grey then I stuck down a very old Ruby Rock-it pattern paper of Aussie flags and trimmed it to size.

And you can't have something Australia without an "Aussie" "OI!" which I has been stamped. By then end of the day I nearly had Chloe shouting this with me, we will perfect it ready for next year!

Thanks for dropping by.

XoXoX Nicole

My Intentions - MME

HELLO!
I'm finally back again. April just threw by! Busy, busy it was.
I bring to you today a scrap page that was a looooong time in the making! Please tell me I'm not the only one who prints the photo and gathers the supplies and writes out the journalling, maybe even draws a quick diagram of the to-be page and then files it away with the best INTENTION of creating it some future free time. FREE time, ha, yeah right!! And hence the layout never gets done. Are there others like me...?
This is one of THOSE pages!

My Intentions 2014

This page began way back in January. When much of the scrappy world were creating the 'one-word' (still not even sure what that means) and new years resolutions pages. My Minds Eye had a 14 things for 2014 challenge and I intended (there's that word again) on playing along. So I printed the photo, wrote out my list and gathered the supplies. And. Yep. Filed it away for another day...
Fast forward to now and the month of May and MME have done it again. This months challenge is to 'use enamel dots in a creative way' which immediately reminded me of dot points and that list I had written many months ago.

The original list was a bit longer (14 things to be exact) and was a mix of a new years resolution/ideas/to-do list. I decided to narrow it down into what I would really like to improve on and knowing that no one is perfect I decided they were my intentions, not an exact goal that could be ticked off.

They are:

• Eat better - I'm a grazer. I tend to slowly pick at what ever is readily available over the day then sit down to a defined meal. Not something I want my kids to learn.
• Stay off my mobile phone - I think we are all guilty of quickly having a flick through social media in a spare minute but when 30 mins later your still staring at the screen, its not cool.
• Make memories - do stuff, try things, love it, hate it, find out. 
• No wasting - in all areas. Time is a big one! I'm a procrastinator at the gold medal level. Also food, plan meals ahead of time to use what we have.
• Be outdoors - we have a great back yard now and I don't think we use it enough. With Jayce still being young sometimes its just easier to set up fort inside. No more. Fresh air, cool breeze, dirt. Get out there!
• Scrap more - so I can remember more of this year and the kids at this age.

I want to do these things each day, every day, TODAY! And I used the word 'today' as much as possible in this layout and outlined/drew over it whenever it appeared to really emphasis it. Like I said, I'm a procrastinator from way back, so if I'm going to do it, do it TODAY. NOW!

Anyway. There they are. My intentions for 2014. Hopeful I can stick to them with only a few lapses hey I'm only human. 

I have to say a huge thank you to MME for the two times inspiration to get this page day!! THANK YOU! This page would not have happened without them and these goals would be long forgotten by now (heck I would of forgotten about them the moment the new years hangover kicked in)

And I suppose I can't sign off without the revelation that this is my first page EVER to not feature any of my kiddies. Shock. Horror. *falls of chair* Bye.

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