ScrapaGoGo

All in a Day's Work

My cat Minx is a strange one! It used to be the case that whenever I went to the bathroom she would jump in the sink and settle down for a nap. On several occasions recently though, I have found her in there on her own, curled up fast asleep.

I really love the 'work' theme of the May kit. I thought it was quite ironic that a cat doesn't do much and so I decided to scrap this photo of Minx in the sink with the journalling 'Finding somewhere cool to sleep...All in a Day's Work'.

I really love the bright colours of the kit and used them against the cream of the telephone index paper (Operator). I cut out some of the 'cubicle' panels that were nice and bright and used them with the bespoke card as a background to the photo. Going along the office theme I used a punch to create torn out book edges in the orange patterened paper (Girl Friday). The date is added to the layout with a library stamp. I love all the little bits and pieces that came with the kit. The paper clips, tag and button all add interest to the layout.

Phone Crazy.

My children are now at an age where they each have a mobile phone which rarely seems to leave their hands! So when I saw the oh so cute phone dial stamp in this months kit I knew the type of photos I wanted to use for a Lo.

Telephone Operators

I stamped the image in a repeating pattern on the reverse of the aqua cardstock with a clear embossing ink pad, then covered it with clear embossing powder & finally heated it with a heat gun.

The photos are layered on the Studio Calico cubicle papers using foam pads & the corners are embellished using the hybrids, paperclips & the tiny phone charm.

The title uses both the American Crafts Thickers plus a word snipped from the October Afternoon paper, embellished with a phone cut from the bespoke card.

We look forward to seeing your Lo's & projects using this kit either here in the gallery of over in our FB group x

Happiness Is A New Essentially GoGo Kit.

At the moment that is Essentially GoGo's May "From The Desk of ....." kit and what makes me even happier is when an idea for a LO comes to together pretty much how I pictured it.

I had in mind that I could use the Studio Calico Take Note Cubicle patterned paper labels to label my photos, photos I hadn't even decided on.

After initially thinking I could achieve this by varying the orientation of the elements I discover whilst clustering the elements together that it was easier to carefully remove the labels and then fit them back into place after arranging the papers and photos.

Once I had chosen my photos the Crate Story Teller 'Yesterday' woodgrain patterned paper seemed very apt as a background for this LO. A little careful spritzing & inking and it looked the business.

 To created the title for the LO I use 'Girl' from October Afternoon's Girl Friday manufactors strip together with the gorgeous American Craft Chipboard Thicker alphabet that's in the kit.  

Some simple journaling strip together with some hybrid elements and embellishments provided the finishing touches.

I have lots of gorgeousness left in my box so I think I need to indulge in a little more happiness.

Furry freind

Birds always remind me of my cat Milly. I'm not quite sure why since she hardly leaves the garden and is a complete coward. Maybe it's because she sits and watches them from behind the curtain each morning? The bird cages and pretty birds in the April kit were no exception to the rule and I instantly thought of a photo I took of Milly a couple of months ago!

For this layout I created two clusters of paper and embellishments. The first is the main area with the photo of Milly on it. There are a mixture of papers but into flags and the beautiful bird layered sticker from My Mind's Eye, combined with the bespoke card, some of the pretty ribbon and a charm here. I printed my journalling on to strips of cream card stock and stuck them overlapping the card and the photo.

For the cluster at the top I cut out some of the detail from the Bee Happy paper and stuck it on with some layered stickers, journalling strips and alpha letters. Finally, to finish the layout, I added some thick splatters of paint.

How has this kit inspired you?

12 in 12

For those of you wondering what 12 in 12 is, well it's the 2012 Month in Review challenge. 12 layouts in 12 months = a whole year captured. That's a manageable task, right? And each month there is a different prompt, technique or focus, just to keep it interesting.

This month the prompt was to use a large focal photo and support this photo with smaller photos to fill in the detail.

Here are some of April's pages from the gallery.

 

First off, Louise. Louise has used a template and Photoshop to make a collage of her photos. If you don't have Photoshop, you can download Picasa, free from Google and make quick collages from your photos. What I love about this layout is how Louise has taken her focal photo and repeated on her title tag. What a clever idea!

  

Next we have Janice. I love Janice's page-the  9 photos in the grid at the top of the page showing the details of the kids baking, and balanced by the focal portraits at the bottom of the page. I really love the captions under each photo too, telling the story, almost like a comic book. Isn't that great?

  

 

 

Like Janice and Louise, I am also scrapping in A4 size for my 12 in 12, but I am doing double pages. While Janice has focused on one event, I have scrapped lots of different days in April- a lovely month for me as it involved two contrasting holidays. I have to say it was very hard choosing which photos to make the focal photos, as both London and Skye have so many great photo opportunities!

It's not too late to start 12 in 12-Just whip up four layouts and you'll be all caught up and ready to join in at the end of May-or even start new from May. Even if you don't have the full year, you'll still have lots of memories scrapped!!

 

What did we do before apps were around?

There seems to be an app for virtually anything these days. As soon as the next app comes out, not only do you wonder why no-one thought of it before but also how you ever lived without it!

After being lucky enough to have the i-pad 2 for Christmas, I downloaded a couple of the photo apps including Popbooth. This takes four images in quick sucession and mounts them in a film strip photobooth style. All inhibitions seem lost with this app and I have some fantastic images of the most random things! 

I 'found' the candid images that Caitlin and her cousin Barny took of themselves after we spent a weekend at my sister-in-laws. Then as soon as I saw the panel on one of the MME papers in the kit, I knew this snap-happy series of photos would be perfect!

 

 

I used the cocktail sticks and string from the tag to chain the four images together and concentrated the clustered embellishments around to leave a large 'white' space.

 

 

The MME papers are so down my street... all the little details allow me to get out my fine cutting scissors and intricately snip to my hearts content!

 

 

Because I 'came across' the photobooth strip, I gave this layout the title 'Found'. Each letter was slightly curled to give dimension and balance the MME 3D stickers, which are simply stunning, as is the kit itself!

Different Takes..

 

Just look how different April Kit can look when reverse side of papers and careful element selection is used! The greens and yellows were perfect for a fun baby boy page and the addition of the jar with the stars once again made it feel less 'girlie'. I decided to give the jar a bit of tender loving care and cut out the stars and then re added them with foam pads. To give the jar further definition I added another lid on top of the orginal lid and finished with some thread and a tag. What other colour combinations can YOU create with April Kit?

 

Blueprint to Go

I love working from sketches, don't you? It makes scrapping so quick and easy, and if you have a lot of photos to scrap that can only be a good thing, right? That's why I love that each month at Scrapagogo there is a sketch to help  get your creative juices flowing.

Here is April's sketch:

I've stayed pretty true to the sketch, apart from flipping the shaped paper over. To make my shaped paper I just traced a piece of 6x6 shaped paper I have, and extended it to make it a bit bigger.

I've also used the music stamp that is included in the April kit. I stamped it on micropore tape (from the chemist), to make my own washi tape. Janice did a class on making your own washi tape at the GoGo getaway-and I just pinched the idea from her! Thanks Janice!

Why not give the blueprint a shot yourself this month, and don't forget to upload your layout to the clubhouse gallery, and/or the facebook group. We love to see your work!

Grade One

When I opened April's ScrapaGoGo kit, Going for a Song I was immediately reminded of a couple of photos I'd recently taken on my phone of my daughter practising her piano pieces ready to take her piano exam in the next couple of weeks. 

Grade One.

I used the exclusive stamp to produce this frilly border which now reminds me a little of piano keys. It did take a bit of cutting out but as it's not an intricate shape it didn't take very long to do & I love the effect.

The Lo was finished using some of the hybrids, MME stickers & the Dear Lizzy alpha stickers for my title mounted on the tag.

We would love to see what you make with this lovely kit so please post an image here in the gallery or over on our Facebook group.

Decorated Jars

I really liked the American Crafts Dear Lizzy Neapolitan Twinking Lights paper when I first saw it. Then when I thought about using it I freaked out a bit.  How to use them??  In the end I decided to cut out three of them and decorate them.

The first one that I chose was the jar with the heart on a rope on it. I cut out some hybrids and tucked them behind the rope so they looked like they were hanging off it with the heart. 

The jars were just begging to be filled so I used the packaging from the embellishment pack to make a plastic cover for the jar and used glossy accents to stick it all around the edge. I punched out some butterflies and filled the jar with them. The embellishment wrapping created just enough static to allow some of the butterflies to stay stacked up around the side.  I love the shaker effect.

The third jar was a plain one. I used the stamp to make a long flag and folded one side in two places. I typed my journalling on some cardstock using a font similar to the one from the hybrids.  The flower is made out of the other side of another jar.

For the background cardstock I used some string as a mask. I tied some knots for added effect and then misted over it.