Pink Paislee Paige Evans Bloom Street - Beautiful Bright Brollies

This layout uses Paige Evan's latest collection ' Bloom Street' for Pink Paislee and was created for the Papermaze blog.

My inspiration for today's layout was the sheet of the #16 paper - but in the end I didn't use it! The paper is covered in multi coloured umbrellas and reminded me of a photograph I took last year whilst on holiday in Wales, We visited Caernarfon Castle one sunny day and whilst there, we stumbled across a street in the town with hundreds of brightly coloured umbrellas hung above it. I don't think the rest of the family were so excited about this discovery but being a scrapbooker I thought it was amazing and just had to photograph it!

I started my layout with a 12x12 sheet of smooth white cardstock from Craft UK. I smooshed some Aqua Lagoon Cosmic Shimmer Mist onto the cardstock using the packaging technique and them rubbed a little white Gesso on top to tone the colour done a little. Some splatters of watered down white acrylic paint were also added. I doodled round the edge of the layout with a black gel pen and added some torn pieces of washi tape. The cardstock did warp a little as result of the mixed media products, but once the layout is put into an album I think it will flatten out.

I backed an umbrella cut file, which I had cut from white cardstock, with pieces of the #7 paper and positioned this on the left side of the layout with foam underneath for dimension. I used the black gel pen again to outline the umbrellas.

My 6x4 photo was matted with white cardstock and then with the #5 paper. I tucked pieces of the branding strip from the #14 paper underneath the top and bottom of the photo and placed the photo on the bottom right side of the layout. I backed a single umbrella cut file with more patterned paper and used this to embellish the photo. The date was added with some Pinkfresh Studio letter stickers from my stash.

I cut some word strips from the #13 paper and put these on top of some of the umbrellas.

I printed my journalling onto white cardstock strips outlined in gel pen and added these to the layout. Clear Dew Drops were also dotted between the umbrellas.

Finally I die cut my title from some scraps of coordinating cardstock and glued this to the layout.

Simple Stories Simple Vintage Garden District - Banner Stickers

Today I have another layout using the Simple Vintage Garden District Collection from Simple Stories on the Papermaze blog.

I started (as I often do!) with a sheet of white cardstock which I trimmed to 11.75" x 11.75" before placing in the centre of a gutted sheet of teal coloured cardstock. Using white thread I zig-zag stitched round the edges of the cardstock on my sewing machine.

I took four of the banner stickers from the sheet of banner stickers and stuck these horizontally across the page. By carefully positioning my two photos, which I had matted with the teal cardstock, on top of the banners I was able to hide the gap where two of the banner stickers didn't meet. I added staples to the ends of the banners.

I cut some butterflies from left over pieces of the 3x4 elements paper and used these to embellish the banners and photos. Only the bodies of the butterflies were glued to allow the wings to be folded upwards for dimension.

Some Prima flowers, sequins, heart stickers and punched paper hearts were added as finishing touches.

Simple Stories Simple Vintage Garden District - Beauty Everywhere

Today I have another layout using the Simple Vintage Garden District Collection from Simple Stories. The collection is full of images of flowers and butterflies and so I decided to create a layout using some photos of my garden.

This layout is very simple and uses a sheet of the Never Stop Dreaming paper.

Using some outline alphabet stamps from my stash, I stamped the quote "If you truly love nature you will find beauty everywhere" onto the layout using some black Memento Ink. This ink is water resistant so it allowed me to go back and roughly colour in the stamped letters using some pink watercolour paint.

Two photos were then stuck to the right hand side of the layout and I carefully cut round one of the butterflies printed on the background paper so I could tuck my photo underneath it.

On the left hand side of the layout I placed a piece of neutral ribbon and I again cut round some of the butterflies so I could 'thread' the ribbon beneath the images. Another small piece of ribbon was tied on for extra interest.

Five natural wooden buttons were added to the left hand side of the layout.

The layout was completed with the addition of a beautiful Tim Holtz Idea-ology Adornments Butterfly .

Simple Stories Simple Vintage Garden District - Beautiful You

Today I have another layout using the Simple Vintage Garden District collection from Simple Stories. This collection is so versatile and today's layout is a wedding layout using a photo of Lara when she was a bridesmaid.

I trimmed a centimetre off of each edge of a sheet of the Love More paper and stuck this to the middle of a sheet of peach coloured Bazzill cardstock.

I machine stitched round the edge of the paper which white thread and then roughed up the edges with my finger nails..

My 7x5 photo was printed with a narrow white border and was attached at an angle in the bottom right corner of the layout.

In my stash I found some very old Prima Flowers. The flowers were an off white colour so I used some peach coloured watercolour paint to alter the flowers to fit my colour scheme. Prima flowers are generally made from paper or fabric so they can easily be altered if you can't find ones in the precise colour for your project. The flowers were glued onto the layout to embellish the printed wreath.

For the title I used some Pink Paislee Paige Evans Bloom Street Flutter Puffy Phrase Stickers and some Pink Fresh Studio Puffy Alpha Stickers.

I finished off the layout with some stickles to highlight to some of the flowers, a scattering of sequins and some tiny word stickers.

Simple Stories Simple Vintage Garden District

Today I'm sharing another layout using the Simple Vintage Garden District collection from Simple Stories.

I used just one sheet of patterned paper for the layout plus various embelishments.

I took a sheet of the 2x2 elements and cut this into the 36 individual squares. The page was then reassembled on a sheet of white cardstock and every other square was raised up on some 3D foam to give them dimension. I replaced six of the squares with my 6x4 photograph which was raised up on two layers of foam for even more dimension.

I cut around the wings of the majority of the butterflies and added extra foam beneath the wings.

 Some squares were embelished with pieces of white cotton ribbon.

Squares that included faux word strips were cut out and also raised with foam.

A small pink satin ribbon bow was added to one of the squares.

A few sequins were dotted about the layout and the whole layout was given a glittery finish with some Diamond Stickles. Unfortunately the photos don't show just how glittery and sparkly this layout is.

Simple Stories Simple Vintage Garden District - Fly

This month on the Papermaze blog I am playing with the very pretty new collection 'Simple Vintage Garden District' from Simple Stories. It is described by Simple Stories as a collection full of ".... the scent and sounds of nature with fluttering butterflies, twittering birds, buzzing bees and bouquets of blooms." It's perfect for spring, mothers day and easter projects and I am loving working with it.

For my first layout I started with a sheet of the You Can Fly paper and a sheet of Blossom Bazzill cardstock.

I trimmed a quarter of an inch off of each side of the You Can Fly paper and matted this onto the Blossom cardstock which I had gutted. I then machine stitched round the edges of the paper using gold thread and a zig-zag stitch.

I carefully cut around part of the butterfly and one of the flowers printed on the paper and after matting my photo on some pink tissue paper I tucked it underneath the images.

The wings of the butterfly were raised up slightly with some foam squares.

I die cut the word Fly from some gold mirror card and stuck this on top of the photo.

I made two tags from two of the 3x4 elements paper. I added some brown Bakers Twine and some gold foil to the tags before attaching them to the layout with foam squares underneath for added dimension.

I embellished the bottom left corner of the layout with Prima Flowers and Butterfly.

#The layout was completed with a scattering of gold sequins and the date was added using mini letter stickers from Pinkfresh Studio.

Simple Stories Hey Crafty Girl - Create

Today on the Papermaze blog I have one final layout using the Hey Crafty Girl Collection from Simple Stories.

I started with a sheet of white Bazzill cardstock and in the centre I painted a rough square with some aqua coloured acrylic paint.

I then cut a piece of the Crafty & Happy paper into strips and used various paper punches to punch the edges. The punched strips were then layered horizontally in the centre of the layout on top of the painted square.

My 6x4 photo was stuck to the right side of the layout with foam underneath to add dimension.

I made a tag using one of the 4x4 elements and some pink Bakers Twine and attached this to the left side of the layout overlapping the corner of the photo.

I fussy cut some flowers from the B side of the 4x4 elements paper and used these and one of the 2x2 elements to embellish the layout.

A few sequins and sparkly star shaped enamel dots were scattered around the layout.

To finish the layout I doodled with a black gel pen around the edge of the layout and on some of the embelishments and added some small punched paper strips at the top and bottom of the page. The date was die cut from coordinating card stock.

Quick Cards using Simple Stories Hey Crafty Girl collection

Today I have some quick cards on the Papermaze blog using the Simple Stories Hey Crafty Girl collection. Simple Stories always include in their collections a paper with 2x2 elements and often other 'grid type' papers too. These are perfect for making quick greetings cards.

The cards I made were all based on a sheet of the Happy Place paper.

I loved this sheet of paper but was struggling to figure out how to use it on a scrapbook page so I decided to cut it into squares of four images and make some cards from it.

The squares were mounted on 6" square white card blanks with foam underneath to give some dimension.

I added some stickers from the Combo Sticker Sheet, fussy cut some images from the rest of the Happy Place paper and the 2x2 Elements paper, punched a heart from a scrap of paper and made some tiny bunting for one of the cards.

These cards are very simple but I think they would be fun to send to crafty friends.