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.

Scrapology - April Layout Challenge

This month on Scrapology we have taken inspiration from a lovely layout by Steph Devlin. We challenge you to also use Steph's layout for inspiration and create a layout of your own and we would like to give you an added challenge of including a verse, poem or saying on your layout. 

For my layout I used a photo taken of my daughter when she was bridesmaid a couple of years ago. I used patterned papers from Dream Street and Creative Imaginations and cardstock from Bazzill. The hexagonal background and lavender stalks were cut on the Craft Robo with cutting files from the Silhouette Studio. Would you believe the beautiful flowers all came in one packet from Poundland? I added die cuts from Melissa Frances, KaiserCraft and MME and the layout was finished off with some paper leaves, a fancy brad, resin flower and pins. My quote was found on the Internet and printed on white cardstock.

Here's Lynn's sketch..........

..... and Steph's orginal layout.

Its All in the Details

Eighteen months ago Lara was a bridesmaid at my niece's wedding. She wore the most beautiful dress and accessories and for today's layout I wanted to capture all the details of her outfit. I used photos of her dress, shoes and flowers and the layout was inspired by this layout by Jana Eubank. 

I used Core'dinations cardstock and the cream patterned paper was from Fiskars. To draw attention to the lacing down the back of the bridesmaid dress I laced two pieces of paper together using seam binding ribbon and instructions downloaded  from the Internet. (Thanks Zoe for tying the bow for me!)

I also used some paper doilies, eyelets, some adhesive gems and some alphabet stickers.

Scrapology August Layout Challenge - N is for Netting

HELLO! I'M BACK!. We returned yesterday from a 2 week break on the Isle of Wight (I'll post some photos from our trip on my photography blog over the coming days) and are now relaxed, refreshed and recharged and ready to start more Summer Holiday Craft next week.

Whilst we were away a new layout challenge was launched on Scrapology. The design team took inspiration from a gorgeous layout by Toni who goes by the online name of '2dogs'. The challenge to blog readers is to use Toni's layout (or the sketch drawn by Lynn) to create a layout and as an added challenge you are asked to include NET in your layout.

For my layout I decided to scrapbook some photos taken at my niece's wedding last October.

I used paper's from Prima's 2011 Madeline Collection and an assortment of flowers - some silk, some paper and some fussy cut from more Prima paper. The circular doilie shapes were cut from paper, punched around the edges with a border punch, inked and then these and other parts of the layout were embellished with liquid pearls. I also printed and cut out some butterflies from the Swirlydoos website. 

The net I used on my layout was Bazzill Tulle. I've used this tulle loads of times before on cards and layouts and love it! it is so soft and pliable and stays just where you put it. It makes perfect bows.

Here's Toni's original layout .......... 

..... and the sketch.

Do pop along to Scrapology and see all the design team layouts. We hope you will join the fun and enter the challenge by creating a layout using the sketch or layout as inspiration and some netting. Jill at Cardinal Colours has come up with another fabulous prize this month - A4 pieces of textured netting, 2 each yellow, orange, pink and purple and liquid pearls in rouge. royal blue, cantaloupe, majestic purple and baby blue.

Wedding Accordian Album

In October we attended the wedding of my niece. I was a lovely day and I took lots and lots of photos. I decided that as an extra Christmas present I would make her a little accordion album using a few of the photos I had taken as well as a few taken by other guests. I gave her the album when the family got together this weekend for an early Christmas and to exchange presents so now I can post photos of the album here.

I made the album from 5 no. 5" x 7" white card blanks and also created a storage box from pearlescent card stock. I didn't have a template for the box and just made it using 2 no. 12" x 12" sheets of card stock.

Throughout the album I used K & Company Elegance papers and embelishments as well as some ribbon and scatter crystals saved from the actual wedding day, various self adhesive rhinestones (bling) and on the cover of the album I used some very glittery letters from American Crafts Thickers.

I used 6 no. 4" x 6" portrait format photos of the happy couple.

The layered flower accents had clear sparkly centres but I replaced them with some of the scatter crystals to match the teal colour scheme of the wedding.

I also used some heart pins in the album which I added some beads to. The pearl bead was originally part of one of the flower arrangements on the tables at the wedding reception.

The lovely Jill at Cardinal Colours kindly helped me to get the right colour Bazzill card stock (Blue Oasis) to mat the photos on. (Thanks Jill - what a star!)

On the reverse side of the album I used 5 no. 4" x 6" landscape format photos from the wedding day.

The Words used throughout the album were K & Company Elegance Wedding Embossed Stickers.

Instead of using complete Prima bling swirls and Heidi Swapp bling frames, I cut them up into smaller pieces to make them go further.

This was the reverse.

My niece was very pleased with the album which was nice as it's the first album/mini book I've ever made and I so wanted her to like it.

My Little Flower Girl

Some of my friends who follow my blog will know that this weekend we've been to a very special wedding. On Friday my niece was married and Lara was her flower girl / bridesmaid.

I don't feel it's my place to post too many of the wedding photos online but I'm posting a few of Lara so you can see what a sweetie she looked.

This photo was taken in the church as the bride and groom were signing the register. There were 6 bridesmaids in all including two flower girls.

Here she is outside the church. It was a gloriously sunny day (really lucky for this time of the year) but in case it was a little chilly the little girls had cute little sequined cardigans to wear.

Here she is minus the cardigan waiting to shower the bride and groom in rose petal confetti. The confetti had all been hand made using rose petals collected (and dried) from family gardens and bouquets people had received over the months leading up to the wedding.

And finally, here's a photo of Lara on the double decker London bus which transported all the guests too and from the reception venue/church. I love this photo - so dreamy.