Documenting December

December is full of events.
We are busy catching up with family and friends, eating good foods, going to nice places and doing lovely things.
So why is it every year I struggle to scrap all this?
It's like my mojo goes off on a Christmas holiday all on it's own and comes back later in January, by which time I no longer have any interest in scrapping Christmas.
Because of this I rarely have any Christmassy LO's. As for December Dailys, forget it. I always start with good intentions and give up after just a few days.

This year I'm tackling it Project Life style and it's working for me.
Back in Feb this year I said I would attempt Project Life but in my own relaxed way and it really has worked. So I thought I would try this for December too and 'Yes', it's working!!

I have my first week completed already and I've prepped this week too.
Not bad.
There is however a lot to document in December so I thought I would add a couple of extra pages.
I will show you these today.
After all, not every page has to start with a new week number or date does it??

I haven't used PL cards for these two pages, instead I used a couple of cute 12x12 papers that were perfect for cutting up.
First is this one from Bella Blvd. I love this happy paper.

I have cut it to suit my page protector. Across the top and then the next 2 sections in to twos.

Giving me this.

 

 

You can now see how it works for me. I just rounded off the corners.

I have added some little gems for some bling. The Prima Marketing gems and pearls are my favourite for this.

I love the little packs they come in and they are such great value.

 

 

My next page was more about the story telling.

Again no week number.

I used this October Afternoon paper. Make it Merry.

 

 



Here's my page all about picking our Christmas Tree this year.

 

 

I had a silly story to tell and this paper was perfect for my story.

 

 

 

I was able to document our tradition of how we pick our tree.

And if your paper doesn't quite fit what you need it to do.....then you make it fit.

 

 

 

A pair of scissors and it's a perfect fit : )

 

I'm so happy to be getting some of my stories down on paper this year.

This to me feels so informal and there's no pressure.

Perhaps I will actually get Christmas 2013 documented after all.

 

I hope you are enjoying your December so far.

Lisa x 

 

 

 

 

  

Going round in circles

Have you ever challenged yourself by trying to stick to a certain shape when creating a layout? I adore using circles, I think there is hardly ever any layout of mine which does not sport a circle shape somewhere. There is something smooth and subtle about circles.

When I got my hands on the Root Beer Barrels paper from October Afternoon, I most probably squealed with delight...how can you not whip out your circle punch and start punching out those darling images?
There was no question that I had to go circle mad on my layout and started tracing cups and saucers on various papers and started cutting, like a woman possessed.
I also love stamping with bubble wrap on the backgrounds of my layouts, so when Papermaze got this fantastic stamp from Kaisercraft, I was all over it like a rash - it already is my favourite stamp in the world

Whilst not strictly speaking circles here, the Lemon Drops paper just called my name and the flowers were round enough for me to include them as accents for my layout.

And here is the finished project - I even made sure that I used a photo from a year which would have "rounded" numbers, i.e. '68 to keep as close to my circle theme as possible.

** click on image to enlarge **

If you fancy trying your hand at creating a layout using shapes, you can recreate the above layout with the following products from Papermaze:

1. Papers: October Afternoon - Root Beer Barrel * Lemon Drops * Rock Candy
2. Stickers: October Afternoon - Found Alpha * Sticky Keys Playtime; Jenni Bowlin - Tiny Dot
3. Stamp: Kaisercraft

Monochromatics

There is something about monochromatic projects - they are somewhat challenging, but look oh-so-delectable when finished.

** click on image to enlarge **

I always find that if you do not restrict yourself too much within the boundaries of monochromatic design, such as adding one other colour (i.e. black or white) for titles and accents it can be so much fun to create a project using varying shades of a specific hue.

For the above layout I have been playing with October Afternoon and as soon as I saw the 5 & Dime collection I knew which colour scheme would work perfectly: brown as it would suit the vitage look of the papers.

I dug deep and found a picture of my from 1974 (in those days most photographs turned out with a brownish tint, so very perfect for the look  am trying to achieve) and started spraying my background paper with a helping of Cosmic Shimmer. After this dried, I outlined some of the bigger slashes of colour with a black pen and added some pearls as accents.

 

Now I could start to shuffle layering the tags, journal cards and my picture until I was happy with the arrangement and using some adhesive such as Herma, stuck everything in place.

Have you tried your hand at monochromatic projects yet? If you want to recreate the above layout, you can purchase the product used directly from Papermaze:

• Papers: October Afternoon - Rock Candy * Root Beer Barrels
• Stickers: October Afternoon - Sticky Keys Playtime * 5 & Dime Found Alpha
• Tags: Maya Road
• Journal Card: My Minds Eye
• Pins: Maya Road
• Pearls: Dew Drops * Prima