Stampamemory - Stampin Up Scrapbooking

Tips for Scrapbooking for more than one child

When people hear that I have FOUR children I find that I am often asked "How do you find the time to scrapbook when you have four children?"

The reality is that sometimes it is hard to find the time when life can get so busy running around after lots of kids- but in my case I try to MAKE the time.  That might mean that I try to achieve more in terms of errands and housework in the earlier part of the week so that I can have some "Me Time" one night later in the week.  When I don't MAKE the time the scrapbooking doesn't happen.   I also love making the time to scrapbook with others so might gather up some stuff and head out and it "forces" me to have that time for myself in the company of friends (rather than staying home and folding that last basket of washing!  LOL!)

TIP 1: MAKE the time to enjoy doing what you love!

The next most common question I get asked is"Are you up-to-date?"

The truth is that I don't make "getting up to date" my focus or priority. Years ago I used to try scrapbooking in chronological order and I found it a struggle to remain motivated-  Now I tend to just let inpiration take the lead. 

- If one day if I am inspired to create a layout with newborn baby photos then that's what I will do- even if the photos were taken 5 years ago!

- If I see some paper that would complement photos from 2 years then I simply pull out those photos from 2 years ago. 

- If I want to do some journalling while it is fresh in my mind- I might match it with photos I took a few days beforehand.   

I then place the layouts in my album in chronological order.  Sometimes there are huge gaps in terms of the time that passes from one layout to the next but I figure that eventually most of those gaps will be filled- even if I am still pulling out baby photos when my kids are 21 years old!  I just enjoy the process!

TIP 2: Enjoy the process- Scrapbook when you are inspired by something and don't concern yourself about "catching up"

The other thing I try to do is complete a page for each child in one sitting (where it is possible)  My older kids are at the age where they notice when I have completed a page for one child and not another.   Sometimes I might complete 4 different pages from 4 completely different occasions.  Other times I will complete layouts using photos from the same occasion.

Today I have 3 layouts to show you where I have used 'similar' photos taken of each of my oldest children jumping on the trampoline.  Rather than trying to "re-invent the wheel" and creating 3 completely different layouts I have used the same general layout for each child but used colours that matched they clothes they were wearing at the time.

TIP 3: You don't always have to re-invent the wheel everytime you create a page, Create several pages following the same 'sketch/ layout' as your inspiration but choose colours or embellishments to suit each child. Don't be afraid to "Scraplift" your own pages

Cardstock: Night of Navy

Ink: Not quite Navy, Baja Breeze, Kiwi Kiis

Patterned Paper: Strips from "Urban Garden" and "Good Morning Sunshine"

Ribbon: Kiwi Kiiss from Pigtails Ribbon Originals

Other: On Board Chipboard letters (Assortment from "Lots of Letters" andTimeless"), Crystal effects, Corduroy buttons, Build-a-brad and Buttons from Button Bouquet Designer Buttons

 

Cardstock: Real Red, Strip of Baja Breeze

Ink: Baja Breeze, Riding Hood Red, Kiwi Kiss

Patterned Paper: Strips from "Good morning sunshine" and "Holiday Treasures"

Ribbon: Chocolate Chip Double Stitched Grosgrain ribbon

Other: On- Board Chipboard letters (Assortment from "Loads of letters" and "Timeless"), Crystal effects, Coruroy Buttons, Build-a-brad, buttons from Button Bouquet Designer buttons

Cardstock: Pink Pirrouette, Strip of Riding Hood Red

Ink: Basic Grey, Pink Pirouette, Riding Hood Red

Patterned Paper: Strips from Pink Flamingo

Ribbon: Riding Hood Red Striped Grosgrain ribbon

Other: On Board Chipboard letters (Assortment from "loads of Letters" and "Timeless") Crystal effects, Corduroy buttons, Build-a-brad, Buttons from "Button Bouquet" Designer Series Buttons

Now- all that is missing is a photo of my youngest.  At the time these photos were taken he was too young to jump on the trampoline- but I have a photo of him sitting in the swing that was taken on the same day.  I might hop off this computer and see what I can come up with for him!

Cheers!

Miriam Thomas

Stamping on Ribbon

I love the fact you can use stamps on just about anything. Stamping on ribbon is just one great way.

I especially love the affect you get on our much looked over Twill Tape. It may not be much to look at but has so much potential. On this layout I thought I would show you just some basic stamping but the sky's the limit with this stuff, creating your own pattern ribbon with stamps, adhering Rub ons on to it or dying it to the colour of your choice.

Here I have used it for my title, and made it look like a bandage (as my son seems to be always having something wrong every week!)

Products used are:

Stamps: Circle Circus, Jumbo Outline Alphabet

Cardstock: Basic Black and Whisper White

Designer Series Paper: Good Morning Sunshine

Ink: Baja Breeze, Pacific Point and Basic Black

Punch: Corner

Accessoriesr: Brads, Watercolour Wonder Crayons (Earth Elements), Aqua Painter, Stampin' Write Journaler

Here's a close up

I hope that gives you an idea or two of what can be done with the stash of twill you may have laying around. Hope your having a great day and come back again for more Stampin' Up! inspiration.

Tanja Westwood

We are looking for Guest Designers (and speaking out about something close to our heart ...)

Just a short break in transmission to let you know a little more about our hopes for the direction of the site over the coming months.

The first thing I wanted to make very clear is that is a demo friendly zone! We know a lot of other demonstrators customers will be reading this blog, and we want demonstrators to know we respect the existing relationship you have with your customers. We have made clear statements in our welcome message and on our product pages encouraging customers to make their purchases from their existing demonstrator and we will be highlighting this if we ever mention product specials or offers.

Secondly we know there are some AWESOME scrapbookers out there in cyber land who love to scrapbook with Stampin' Up! products, and we want to show them off too! We would love to feature some guest designers over the coming months. Both customers and other Stampin' Up! Demonstrators (from Australia and New Zealand) are welcome to express interest. It will be a pretty casual relationship in that we will be featuring a few of your layouts, and giving the chance to tell us about your love of scrapbooking. We want all the layouts featured on the blog to be 100% Stampin' Up! product and all the products used should be currently available for purchase (no fun being inspired and not be able to buy the products - right?).

To express interest, just email me(Claire Daly) your favourite Stampin' Up! layout and tell me why you you would like to inspire others to scrapbook. Looking forward to lots of emails - OK?

Thanks for listening, now back to normal programming!

Claire

Love Birds featuring Walk in The Park Designer Series Paper

I received the Summer Love Rub On's during the week and just LOVE them. They coordinate perfectly with the Walk in The Park Designer Series Paper and both can be found in the Spring Mini Catalogue on page 5 and 6. The birds made me think immediately of love birds, so I used them on this picture of my niece who was recently engaged when this photo was taken.

I have used the Summer Love rub-ons for the birds, word 'love' and love heart. The patterned paper is all from Walk in the Park Designer Series Paper, including the blue twig which was cut from the paper. The colours in this paper coordinate perfectly with Baja Breeze, Cameo Coral and Basic Grey which are the colours I have used in the layout. There are also some additional pages in this set (we have 12 sheets 12x12 double sided papers in each pack) that have So saffron and Kiwi Kiss in it, so it's a really versatile set colour wise.

This layout also features some of my all time favourite Stampin' Up! products for scrapbooking. I have used the Jumbo Outline Alphabet for the title. This set is great because you can stamp the letters and then the outline is perfect as a cutting guide so you get patterned paper letters that perfectly co-ordinate with your layout. I have used Basic Phrases(xoxoxox) and the Round Tab Punch for the top tab. The flourish under the title is from the Stampin' Up! set Frames with a Flourish.

Hope you enjoy this layout of my lovely niece.

Claire Daly

No photo and punch art layout

Today I want to show you my creation of a no photo and punch art layout. I am keeping a 6 x 6 album of the all the "quotables" my children come out with. Currently, my eldest daughter Nikki, is full of them. Her latest only days ago was:

"Mum, I think Josh and I should make our own lunches for school and kinder... so you don't get bored!"

Certainly an interesting point from Nikki... Of course, she said it the day school holidays started. Talk about timing!

I have a smaller hamburger punched creation made using the large oval punches sitting on my desk (I was unsure which size would work so my layout so I made both). If anyone wants me to send the hamburger to them, leave a comment and I use a random number generator to select the lucky recipient. *Entries will be open for 7 days*

Materials used:

Stamp sets: Tart and Tangy, Bird on a Branch

Ink: Chocolate Chip, More Mustard, Real Red, Green Galore, Old Olive, Close to Cocoa, Versamark

Cardstock: Chocolate Chip, Whisper White, More Mustard, Real Red, Green Galore, Old Olive, Close to Cocoa

Designer Series Papers: Bella Rose

Punches: 1 1/4" circle, 1" circle, large star

Accessories: On board lots of letters chipboard, clear embossing powder, heat tool, real red ink refill, sponge dauber

Other: Calibri font, Nestabilities oval dies

Thanks for stopping by and checking out my no photo and punch art layout.

Cheers,

Ros Davidson.

Sail the High Seas

Hello Beautiful People,

Today I'd like to share a layout with you on the theme of travel. Of course, there's no doubting that my subject matter is my gorgeous boys, as always, but you get to see the back of them this time LOL! The subject of this page is our return trip from Tasmania. Timmy & Liam are watching the sunset from the deck of the 'Spirit of Tasmania'. We are about to embark on our return trip to Melbourne after a busy but fabulous 14 days in Tassie. The boys are tired and have managed to stand still for 5 minutes.

I've used a few different techniques in this layout which I will outline in my project recipe below. Hope it gives you some inspiration.

Happy Scrapping! Di

Project Recipe

Designer Series Papers: Sweet Slumber Specialty (for the background and the clouds), Haiku (for the panel behind the photo).

Card Stock: Bordering Blue (for the strips of writing at the bottom of the page), Not Quite Navy (for the SAIL THE HIGH lettering background).

Ink Colours:Not Quite Navy (for the SEAS lettering), More Mustard (for the chipboard branch), Certainly Celery (for the chipboard bird), Versa Mark (used with white embossing powder to make the SAIL THE HIGH lettering and clear embossing powder to coat the chipboard bird - this is why the Certainly Celery looks deeper in colour than normal).

Embellishments:Chipboard bird & branch (from the 'On Board So Sweet' chipboard set), chipboard large lettering (from the 'Onboard Timeless Type' chipboard set),  large white brads (from the Jumbo Brads Neutral Assortment 5/16" set), small More Mustard brads (from the 'Earth Elements' brads set), Natural Hemp Twine (for the stitching at the top right of the photo), Crystal Effects (to coat the SEAS lettering), felt flowers (from the 'Flower Fusion' set) offset with a small Not Quite Navy brad (from the 'Earth Elements' brads set), Certainly Celery Special Edition ribbon (from the September 09 Ribbon Bundle Promotion).

Spotlight on Techniques:The SEAS lettering has been done with a two step process. Firstly I have inked up the chipboard letters with Not Quite Navy ink and quickened the drying process with a heat gun. Then I have coated the letters with Crystal Effects straight from the tip of the bottle directly onto the letters. This gives a glossy raised effect that really stands out!

I have also given the chipboard bird a glossy but flatter effect by, again, inking up the bird - this time using Certainly Celery and then applying Versa Mark ink and clear embossing powder and heat setting with a heat gun. This has a really lovely finish to it as well.

So now it's your turn to have some fun trying a new technique to create a beautiful scrapbooking keepsake.

Di xox

My Favourite Things: a journaling layout all about ME.

Those that know me as a scrapbooker will know that journaling is what I love most about my scrapbook pages. I love the opportunity to record my thoughts, feeling and memories and not too many pages of mine get done without lots of journaling! Over the years I have also moved more to handwritten journaling both because it's quick and easy, but mostly because it adds an even more personal touch to my pages.

In this layout I wanted to record some of my favourite things at the moment.

I have used the Stampin' Up! Tea Party Designer Series Papers. Love the soft colours in this pack - it coordinates perfectly with So Saffron, Certainly Celery, Almost Amethyst, Pretty in Pink and even Pink Pirouette which I have used as my background linen cardstock. Here's a close up.

For the chipboard letters, I used my Watercolour Crayons to get a more opaque coverage on the chipboard (I just coloured them in!) and then covered with Crystal Effects. I have cut out some additional flowers and layered them using Dimensionals foam dots, and added an Amethyst rhinestone brad in the centre.

For my journaling I just used my handwriting and a Basic Grey Stampin' Write marker, and wrote directly onto strips of patterned paper. I do love my strip journaling as you may have noticed.The categories I have used to record are: Movies, Drinks, Time of Year, Colours, Time of Day, Quote, Food, Music, Way to spend the weekend, Places, Number, Flowers, Way to relax, TV Program. The downside of handwritten journalling is that it would take me ages to rewrite all my journaling here for you. Here's a couple of snippets of my favourites though:

Movies: Big Chill, When Harry met Sally, Joy Luck Club, Jerry McGuire, He's Just Not That Into You, St Elmos Fire, About Last Night.

Quote: What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us (Ralph Waldo Emerson 1803-1882)

Places: Home with my boys, anywhere near the beach, Whitsundays, Broome, Eyre Pininsula, Busselton Foreshore, Mornington Peninsula

Time of day: Theoretically the early morning, but I am so not a morning person so I rarely get to see it.

So what's your favourites? Imagine the delight it would bring to your family to have this recorded for years to come. Time to get scrapbooking about YOU.

Highlights Of The Year Album

Mostly I steer away from chronological scrapbooking and just scrap whatever photo has grabbed my attention on the day.  This year however I've been putting together an 8" x 8" album with two double layout spreads for each month. 

One has a 4" x 6" photo from the month, plus some journalling.  Some months I choose an event or highlight to write about, other months just a description of parts of the daily routine.  For this particular month my journalling was about our 10th wedding anniversary - how we celebrated it and some reflections on 10 years of marriage. 

The other double layout has some journalling in list form, separated by dots.  To put this together I usually have a flick through my calendar and diary, and through my photo files for that month and jot down notes.  I type it up (Century Gothic font) and print it onto Whisper White cardstock.  I put together a collage of photos from the month on the facing page - three 2" x 3" pics and six 2" x 1.5" pics. 

Over the year these photo collages will show the four of us, other family and friends and other things about our day to day lives.  I've found it is a great way to make use of those odds and ends photos - ones you like and want to look at, but might not feature in a layout of their own.

The layout designs for this album were inspired by a baby albumby Margaret Scarbrough that I saw in Simple Scrapbooks "Album Shortcuts."

I've kept the layouts super simple.  I pick a colour for the month (these layouts feature Tangerine Tango for March and Pink Pirouette for April.)  Textured cardstock, some colour coordinating designer series prints paper and usually some ribbon.  I've added a couple of jumbo eyelets, rhinestone brads or other simple embellishment to some pages. 

Keeping it nice and simple means I can put together the two double page spreads in one or two evenings of scrapping time, and makes it that bit less daunting a task to start.

I think it will be an album we'll enjoy looking through in years to come, with lots of little glimpses into our day to day lives in 2009.

Cheers,  Sue

Oh so Glittery- Using Supernova glitter on your layouts

From the time I was a child I loved using glitter when creating.  I was so rapt to see it become more prevalent in products for scrapbooking. 

Stampin' Up! has 3 different types of glitter.  There is the multipurpose "Dazzling Diamonds", "Chunky Sprinkles" (Light Pink, Light Blue, Celery and Crystal Iris) as well as "Fine Supernova" (Chocolate, Olive, Orange, Pink and Aqua)  The selection of glitters can be found on Page 145 of the catalogue. 

The glitter can be used in a variety of ways- For example, applied with a wet glue like Two way glue or Tombow mono multi, or using Heat and stick powder. 

For the layout I have created- I wanted to try out a fun product from the catalogue known as "Sticky Cuts"  For those who are familiar with the heavy duty double-sided tape known as "Sticky Strip" then you will notice that the "Sticky Cuts" are a very similar product. 

There is a top orange layer that you remove to reveal a sticky surface.  You can apply glitter to the top and then secure this to your project by removing the backing paper.  It is like a durable double-sided adhesive but it comes in shapes and letters.  You receive two sheets per pack.For my layout I wanted to use the word "Sweet" from the "Sweet Sticky Cuts"

I popped out the letters before peeling off the orange coating (I decided to keep the outline as I figured that I can use the scraps as a double-sided adhesive to attach elements to a card or scrapbook page)

You can see here where I coated the letters in chocolate coloured Supernova Glitter. 

I could have stopped at that pointed and attached the letters to my layout but whilst I was in an experimental mood I decided to coat the letters in a layer of crystal effects.  You can see in the following picture that the crystal effects appears quite cloudy when first applied but after some time it dries to a lovely clear laquer.

I actually left my letters to dry for several hours before I attached them to  my layout

and here is a close up of the title....

PATTERNED PAPER: Candy Lane Designer Series Paper

CARDSTOCK: Riding Hood Red and Chocolate Chip

TOOLS: Scallop edge punch, Mat Pack for Faux Stitching

OTHER: Bright delights Rub ons, Designer Buttons- Button Latte,

FEATURED PRODUCTS: Sweet Sticky Cuts and Chocolate Fine Supernova

 

Cheers

 

Miriam

Girl's Layout: Pink, Pink, Pink

My daughter Hannah is quite a girly girl.  She loves anything pink, dolls, dress ups, fiddling about trying hair styles.  Thought I’d use some of my favourite Stampin’ Up! pinks for a girly layout.

 

 

The base card is a 12” x 12” sheet of textured Pretty In Pink cardstock.  I so love to use our textured cardstock in my scrapbooking.

I’ve used a sheet of Pink Pirouette cardstock for the base of the photo/journaling panel.  Made use of some offcuts of Pink Pirouette Patterns Paper (pg 135), some Pretty In Pink ¼” Grosgrain Ribbon, and some Pretty In Pink Designer Brads (Flower Assortment from the Spring Mini.)

 

The title ‘bloom’ is from Bloomin’ With Beauty stamp set (pg 79) and is stamped with Pretty In Pink. 

The journaling is printed onto vellum cardstock.  I love to use this through the printer.  It is a slightly heavier weight than regular vellum and holds its shape well. 

The journaling reads:

Hey my girl. Sometimes I look at you and can’t believe how fast the time flies.  It seems like no time since you were toddling around the place and here you are getting so independent, with a definite mind of your own!

You’re starting to want to choose what you’ll wear on weekends.  I love seeing what combination you come up the stairs in.

You are such a caring, thoughtful girl and a wonderful big sister to Jack.  Of course it’s not all sweetness and roses and sometimes you squabble and annoy each other, but more often I can see your kind heart in action.

You can also be determined and strong.  Keep that up – it might come in handy!

Love you!  Mum

Journaling:  Sept ’09   Photo: July ‘09

 

 

 

 

I put this together quite quickly.  I have been trying to prioritise scrapbooking a little more lately, and I find that sometimes thinking that I have to produce a 'perfect layout' stops me getting started. On this occasion I just grabbed a photo from the latest batch I had developed, snatched up some papers and supplies and got cracking.  For the journaling I looked at the photo then just started typing whatever came to mind.  There are times when I want to plan and perfect a page, and other times when I just need to start and be happy with whatever pops out half an hour later.

 

Happy Scrapping!  Cheers, Sue Madex