Do you choose photos or paper first?

This question was asked on a Studio Calico message board over the weekend and I immediately thought of this layout that I recently created.  I had the photo printed in 2008 and I never made a layout with it until I saw this MME paper that came in the May 2012 Studio Calico kit, 35mm.

The photo is of a Christmas tree that we saw in the Cayman  Islands while we were on a cruise there.  The tree was made of driftwood and had a ocean creature theme.  The paper was perfect for the photo and the layout came together really easily after that.  The kit had just the right embellishments and pops of orange and turquoise.

I used a lot new Heidi Swapp on this layout - the banner, the mistable letters and I used part of a memory file.  I wasn't convinced about the memory file at first, but I loved using three of the pages from it to add some dimension and extra room for photos and journaling.  Here's one of the interior pages.

I printed some journaling on patterned paper for the next interior page.  

I also was really surprised that I loved the black and white dotted Bazzill paper that was in the kit.  It is a really thin paper, not like other patterned papers thickness at all.  I discovered that is is perfect to pleat and crumble and I decided that I liked it so much, I bought a few more sheets of it at my LSS.

I find that most of the time, I try to find photos that fit the kit since I am most often times working with the most current kit.  If I have a photo that I want to scrap, I'll look through the photos of kits first and find a kit that fits the photo.  

How do you choose?  Photos or paper first?

Have a great week everyone!

April 2012 Studio Calico - City of Lights

Every month this year, I have been sharing all of the layouts and/or cards that I create with my Studio Calico kit from the time the kit arrives until the time the new kit arrives.  I love seeing them all together!  I'm a little late this month, but here are my projects from the April 2012 kit, City of Lights.

I always claim not to be a huge washi user, but as I posted the first four projects from the April 2012 kit, I noticed that I used washi on all four of them.  I LOVE the yellow chevron washi from the kit!  In this layout, "this is the life,"  I used it to cover the wooden sun embellishment.

I love the Prairie Hill collection from Pink Paislee and as soon as I saw the yellow dotted paper in the kit, I knew I was going to scrap this photo of me on my first birthday.  The color and the vintage feel of the papers were perfect.

I used the Pink Paislee mask that was included in the kit on this layout.  The nozzle on my Sunshine Mr. Huey wasn't working quite right and was more blotchy than I wanted it to be.  I almost decided to start over, but I decided just to go with it, and I love the way that the layout turned out.

I created a card for my husband's 43rd birthday with the kit.  It turned out so cute, I decided to submit it to Cards magazine and it was picked up to be published in the October 2012 issue.  Woot!

I was inspired to create this layout when I saw this bicycle silhouette in the Silhouette design store.  I knew I had a vintage photo of a little girl on a bike.  The photo is of my dad's cousin, Lorraine, from 1945.  I used bits and pieces from older kits in this layout.

This is my favorite layout that I created from the kit.  I created this layout for the May Crate color challenge and the SC triangle challenge on NSD.  I have always loved this photo that I took of my husband on a walk we took on the beach on a fall day.  The color combination from the challenge seemed perfect for the layout.  I wasn't the winner of the challenge, but my layout was featured on the Crate blog (see sidebar.)

I've opened the May 2012 Studio Calico kit, 35mm, but I've only created one layout with it so far.  I better get going if I am going to feature my layouts from the kit next month!

Have a great week everyone!

Happy Mother's Day!

I wanted to share this Mother's Day layout today that I created about a year and a half ago.  I had submitted the layout to Scrapbook Trends and it appeared in the May 2011 issue, so I haven't shared it here before.   The call was for Mother's Day layouts and at first I thought - I haven't spent a Mother's Day with my mom in the past twenty years or so, I don't have anything for this call.  That made me think that maybe I should create a Mother's Day layout about just that - that just because I'm not with my mom on Mother's Day, that doesn't mean that I'm not thinking about her and that I still love her very much.  

The photo of my mom is probably from about 1968, so before I was even born.  I love the photo because it reminds me how much I look like her!

I used mostly Crate Paper's Restoration line on this layout (my favorite line, EVER!)  I made hand-rolled flowers that were perfect for this page.  I created a hidden journaling tag, as I wanted the note to be more private.

I'm having the layout framed for her for Mother's Day.  I hope she loves it!

Happy Mother's Day, everyone!

May Crate Color Challenge

I was able to spend most of the evening on Saturday scrapbooking for National Scrapbooking Day.  I decided to combine the May Crate Color Challenge with a Studio Calico challenge - triangles.  Two birds with one stone!  

I loved the color combination that Crate chose.

I had hoped to get more than one layout done on Saturday, but this one took quite a bit of time!  I ended up with 65 triangles on my page that had to be individually cut, adhered, and then sewed down.  I love the way it turned out though.

I used all Crate papers from three different lines:  Pretty Party, Paper Heart, and Farmhouse.  The wood frame was from Story Teller.  The orange button, die cut butterfly and the journaling label were all from Pretty Party.  I love how all of Crate's collections mix so well together.

I didn't add Mr. Huey to the layout until the very end and it terrified me a bit!  I almost didn't do it, thinking I could easily ruin hours of work, but I think it turned out great.  I used "sunshine" Mr. Huey - one of my favorite colors.

Have a great week everyone!