Scraps and Paps

Happy Spring!

2010-03-20T09:02:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone! Sorry that I've been MIA. I hope you've stuck around, nonetheless. Life has just begun to get rather busy for me, but it's a very good kind of busy. :)

Happy Spring! How are you celebrating this gorgeous day? I'm hanging out with my friend outside and we are going to get pedicures. Maybe I'll even end up with some pictures to scrap---you never know.

So I wanted to show you some of the pages I've been scrapping lately.
First, is from Dylabel Designs newest kit, Spring Scrappiness. It has such beautiful spring colors, perfect for spring flowers, children, Easter, babies, and (of course if you're me) puppies (click image to go to store).

You can get this as a quick page (QP) at Dylabel Designs CT Spot.

And here's Dylabel Designs' St. Patrick's Day release (click image to go to the store):

Finally, for a speed scrap that I participated in last night, I created this using the new kit Seek Adventure by De Crow Designs and Tracy Stroud Designs:

Hope you have a wonderful Spring 2010!

Clusters How-To

2010-02-15T19:50:00.000-05:00

I'm scared to death to try doing any kind of clustering on my layouts. When I am brave enough to try it I give up pretty quickly because it is so challenging! It just looks stupid when I try.

I haven't shared any tutorials from other sites with you in a while, but did not want to pass up the chance to direct you to this one about clustering that was posted at The Daily Digi this weekend. Definitely take the time to check out this lengthy, but very useful guide to clustering. Click here to go to the tutorial. Maybe now after reading it I will be brave enough to give it another try.

Happy Scrapping!

Dipsy Doodles - New Release

2010-02-14T20:42:00.000-05:00

Dylabel Designs and Dancing Princess Designs have put together a jammed-packed huge kit. It has a beautiful combination of spring-like colors. I loved playing with this versatile whimsical kit. It's on sale this week for $5.50 at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com. I used the delicate purples to make my layout. I turned it into a quickpage that you can pick up on the Dylabel Designs CT blog. Check out the kit, layout, and quickpage preview below.

"Dipsy Doodles" by Dylabel Designs and Dancing Princess Designs; "Pea Stacy Fancy" font by kevinandamanda.com

and the preview of the quickpage (linked to blog).

Speed Scrap Layout and Freebie

2010-02-13T15:03:00.000-05:00

Kit: "Roughin' It" by SuzyQ Scraps; "Pea Ky Ky" by kevinandamanda.com

I made this page at a speed scrap at Polkadotplum.com. The speed scrap was led by Sweet Tomato Designs. It was loads of fun!

And a template from the layout in PSD file format:

Project 365 Week 6

2010-02-11T19:37:00.001-05:00

Okay, I finished my Project 365 layout for Week 6. Just jumping on to post it.

Kit: Celebrate! by SuzyQ Scraps; Template: P365 Challenge Template January 28, 2010 by BCNatty at Scrap Matters; Fonts: Traveling Typewriter, Perpetua

Project Cole & Lillie 365 - Week 6

2010-02-11T14:27:00.001-05:00

Well since I'm snowed in again (Saturday, Sunday, yesterday, and today), I thought I would catch up on my Project 365 pictures. I have them all organized again, but have only scrapped Cole and Lillie's page so far.

Instead of using one kit for all 52 layouts, I decided to switch the kit by month. Naturally I wanted something for Valentine's day, so I chose "Sweet Nothings" by Dylabel Designs.

Here's my page and there's a freebie template made from the page below.

Kit: "Sweet Nothings" by Dylabel Designs; Font: "Traveling Typewriter", "Pea Madsen" by kevinandamanda.com; "Date:" tag: "Capturing the Memories" by Maelia Designs; Date stamp: "The Only Date Stamp You'll Ever Need" by Stolen Moments Designs

Project 365 Freebie Template (click image to download):

Project 365 Weeks 4 & 5

2010-02-07T18:06:00.003-05:00

I'm getting behind on my layouts and it's only February! This already seems like a momentous task! The hardest part is that my camera is so big, I don't feel like carrying it anywhere, so all of my pictures are made at home. How fun is that?!
Anyway, here are the layouts for Project 365 and Project Cole & Lillie 365.

Week 4:

Kit - "Celebrate" by SuzyQ Scraps, Template - "Project 365 Temp. 2" by Connie Prince; Font - "Pea Madsen" by Kevinandamanda.com

Kit - "Butterfly" by Audacious Designs; Template - ?; Font - Traveling Typewriter, "Pea Madsen" by Kevinandamanda.com

Week 5:

Kit - "Celebrate!" by SuzyQ Scraps; Template - "Project 365 Template No. 6" by Scrapmuss Designs; Font: "Pea Madsen" by kevinandamanda.com, Traveling Typewrite; Date stamp: "Simply Dated v.4" by wm[squared]

Kit - "Butterfly" by Audacious Designs; Template - ?; Font - "Pea Madsen" by kevinandamanda.com, "Traveling Typewriter"

Confection Heaven Frame Freebie

2010-02-06T08:17:00.000-05:00

Just wanted to encourage you to check out Dylabel Designs' CT blog today. I am hosting a frame freebie there.
I'll share the preview, but you have to go there to get it. Have a great weekend!

The frame is made using Confection Heaven by Dylabel Designs available at goDigitalScrapbooking.com.

New Release - Confection Heaven by Dylabel Designs

2010-02-05T13:05:00.000-05:00

Dylabel Designs has a new kit out today called Confection Heaven. It's on sale for $3.50 today through next week. It's a sweet kit with wonderful warm browns and pinks. Check out the preview and my layout below.

CREDIT: Kit: "Confection Heaven" by Dylabel Designs, font: "Pea Aimee" by kevinandamanda.com

I also wanted to tell you to check out two other blogs. Dylabel Designs' blog and the CT blog. Dylabel Designs blog has the cutest freebie alpha that you can grab. And the CT blog will have new freebie goodies everyday. Yesterday's were cluster frames and today is a desktop background, both made using Confection Heaven. I'll be hosting a cluster frame there tomorrow. Here's a preview of the alpha freebie (image linked to blog):

Necklace Giveaway

2010-02-04T13:31:00.001-05:00

Dylabel Designs is having a giveaway of some fabulous necklaces. Check them out!

To have a chance to win your choice of one of these necklaces, just make a purchase from Dylabel Designs' store by Valentine's Day, February 14th and you will be entered in the drawing.
Tweet Tweet and Zoom Zoom are on sale right now for $3.50 and she'll have a new release tomorrow. Oh, and if you love the necklaces, check out the kit that these were based on:

Digi Dare 165

2010-02-02T21:19:00.004-05:00

I stayed in tonight so I could scrap a layout for Digi Dare 165. The directions were to scrap about your accomplishments, or what you wished you had accomplished, in 2009. We had to journal about that. We also had to make a big 2009, use two different alphas, and add two curly ribbons. Layout below.

Digital Template (photo layout): "365 SYTYCD" by Wild Dandelions; Alphas: "Alpha 04" by Deca Designs, and "Roughin' It" by SuzyQ Scraps; Circular Text Path: "Project 365 Essentials V.1" by [wm]squared; Recorded stamp & Circle Mat: "The Weekly Record" by Emily Powers; Background Paper: "365 SYTYCD" by Wild Dandelions; Everything Else: "Roughin' It" by SuzyQ Scraps

Journaling Reads:

My biggest goal for 2009 was to fix the house up and make it really nice and livable. I made curtains for the kitchen, bought table pads for the dining room table, cleaned the dining room chairs and made seat cushions, painted the living room and decorated it, and Bill and I grew a garden. The house looked really nice. I was very proud of all of my hard work. Unfortunately, the year did not go as I had hoped. In fact it was a really bad year. First, the best grandma in the whole world went to be with the Lord. Second, Bill and I split up in August and we are going to get a divorce. Financially things are bleak. Things may take a long time to get better. Fortunately, though for the first time in years, I had my health. This year I turned 30 and I would like to say things were looking up, but sadly not so much.

New Release - Tweet Tweet by Dylabel Designs

2010-01-29T21:24:00.000-05:00

Dylabel Designs has a new kit at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com that is full of sweet colors: red, pink, and mint green. Of course, I'm so crazy about pink, I just used some of the pinks from the kit in my layout. Check out the quickpage I made from it below. Download from 4shared.com.

Here's the preview:

Kit: "Tweet Tweet" by Dylabel Designs; Font:Pea Ky Ky by kevinandamanda.com

and the quickpage (click image to download):

Week 3 Project 365

2010-01-20T15:20:00.000-05:00

Here are my layouts for Project 365 and Project Cole & Lillie 365. I'm starting to fall off the wagon with the project 365, but going strong with the Cole & Lillie.

CREDIT: Kit: "Celebrate!" by SuzyQ Scraps; Template: Project 365 Template 17 by Sweet Tomato Designs; Fonts: "Pea Madsen" by Kevinandamanda.com, and Traveling Typewriter

CREDIT: Kit: "Butterfly" by Audacious Designs; Template: "Project 365 Week 20" by 3s Enough; Font: Traveling Typewriter

Sweet Nothings by Dylabel Designs

2010-01-17T07:40:00.001-05:00

Just wanted to share with you this really darlin' kit for Valentine's Day. I love pink so I'm totally in love with this kit. I've scrapped some pictures from my wedding and honeymoon with it.

"Sweet Nothings" Kit by Dylabel Designs; font: "joeHand2"

CREDITS: "Sweet Nothings" by Dylabel Designs; font: "Pea Madsen" by kevinandamanda.com

Didn't we have the most beautiful wedding cake ever? Those were my colors: pale pink and a fun pale taffy orange. Loved it!

Week 2 - Project 365

2010-01-16T14:18:00.002-05:00

Today I'm showing you the layouts from Week 2 for Project 365 and Project Cole & Lillie 365.

CREDITS: "Celebrate!" by SuzyQ Scraps; Fonts: Pea Madsen by Kevinandamanda.com, and Traveling Typewriter; Project 365 Template 19 by Sweet Tomato Designs; Datestamp: "The only date stamps you'll ever need" by Stolen Matters Designs

CREDITS: "Butterfly" by Audacious Designs; Font: Renaissance?

Wait

2010-01-14T19:40:00.002-05:00

I have had the word "wait" on my mind for two weeks now, thinking that would be my word of the year. They quoted a verse using the word wait in Sunday School last week and I thought, "that is the Lord speaking that word to me."

Well since that day I have had the worst week in my life, in these 30 years I've been here on earth. No exaggeration. I thought my Grandma's death was horrid this past summer, but I have now experienced worse. I mean 2009 was up-to-date the worst year of my life, and I thought 2010 had to be looking up, but we're just two weeks in and I'm wishing away this year! The age 30 has come with a lot of problems. What I'm speaking of is a personal matter not to be broadcast across the Internet.

So, anyway, in my pain, I decided to go ahead and scrap my word of the year. This idea of a word of the year comes from Ali Edwards.

There are many verses on waiting on the Lord, but I went with something raw that spoke to me in my pain. That is simply that He "heard my cry." I am clinging to that. I need to know that if nothing else changes, at least God is there and knows how hard this is for me. As I go through this I will wait on Him and His timing and trust that He will not give me anything that He can't handle through the Holy Spirit.

CREDITS: Paper--from "Spontaneous Delight" by Carrie Stephens; Alpha--Alpha 04 by Deca Designs; Font--Berlin Sans; Datestamp--Project 365 Essentials V.1 by [wm]squared; Stitching--from "Green" by Creashens

Week 1 - Project Cole & Lillie 365

2010-01-08T20:25:00.004-05:00

Yep, I'm doing 365 of my dogs, too. I thought it'd be fun and at the end I might have some neat pictures of them to remember their "terrible twos."

So here is my layout of Cole and Lillie and you can have the template if you'd like it. Download below.

CREDIT: "Butterfly' by Audacious Designs; Fonts: Traveling Typewriter & Pea Madsen

and the template--Photoshop/Photoshop Elements file included (click image to download):

Project 365 Week 1

2010-01-07T13:15:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure how faithful I will be about posting my scrapbook pages of Project 365, but here is week #1 (Friday & Saturday, January 1-2).

CREDITS: Kit-"Celebrate!" by SuzyQ Scraps; and Font-"Pea Madsen" by kevinandamanda.com

I think I'm going to make all 52 layouts from this one kit. We'll see how it goes making that much variety from one kit. But it's a good sized kit, including 22 papers and plenty of elements. I love the bold colors.

Happy scrapping!

Date Stamp for Project 365!

2010-01-01T20:22:00.000-05:00

I have to admit that I am a sucker for date stamps. I found some that are not just worth checking out, they are worth blogging about! I mean I don't just promote random material on this blog. But these are worth sharing with you, and buying if you are doing Project 365. Check them out and click the image to go to the store---it's on sale right now.

Contains:

365 numbered stamps
12 month stamps
7 day of the week stamps
"week" & "day" stamps
year stamps 2000-2015
12 month rings
7 day of the week rings
yearly rings 2000-2015
3 additional rings for 365 days, 52 weeks & 12 months

Happy New Year!

2009-12-30T23:11:00.002-05:00

Well, I leave first thing in the morning to go begin my New Year's Eve festivities. So I just wanted to wish everyone a very happy new year! :)

Project 365!

2009-12-30T21:31:00.000-05:00

Are you ready for Project 365?! I am! As ready as I'm going to be, anyway.

I'm a planner by profession and find that I have planner tendencies. So of course I've been asking myself what can I do to prepare myself? What can I do to make this event not take up a ton of time daily when I might not have the time to spare or be so sick of doing it that I want to give up? Well, I'm going to share with you one step that I did. Feel free to download and share with anybody! Copy it to your blog and share if you'd like.

Download: Here's what I put together: folders to store my photos in, dated each week of the year 2010 and separated into folders by each month. This way you can organize your folders and scrap them by week or by month. So here you go:

(Click the image to download the folders---created in Windows Vista)

So are you doing Project 365? It seems like it's the thing to do this year. I think I'm going to follow the forum at Gotta Pixel located here. There's also a thread at Jessica Sprague that is for sharing ideas about what to take pictures of during the 365 days located here.

For those of you not in the know, Project 365 is a challenge to take one picture every day for an entire year.

Why? The why is unique to each person. For some they want to capture a glimpse into their everyday life. I think my everyday life is rather boring, so I'm not hoping so much to get a picture of that, although I will scrap (and journal about) what I do take. For me, I want to do this in order to improve my photography. That's right. The goal for this year is to become a much, much better photographer. I started that goal today by taking my first photograph with the Manual setting on my camera. The exposure turned out just right and I was amazed (though it wasn't an interesting subject and that's why I'm not sharing it). Maybe by the end of the year I might be a pretty decent photographer if I take the opportunity to work on it everyday.

In order to succeed with Project 365 I'm going to focus on using my D-SLR, but I'm also going to use a point-in-shoot that I can take everywhere. That way I can provide a better picture of my everyday life (taking pictures anywhere) while otherwise trying to focus on taking "real" photos using my large SLR. We'll see how it goes. I'll post about my progress over the coming months on this blog.

Review of Shutterfly Experience for Scrapbooking

2009-12-27T21:37:00.002-05:00

I wanted to share my experience using Shutterfly with you.

I've been waiting til after Christmas to write this because the book I made was a surprise scrapbook for my husband. Of course the book has been wrapped for a while so I haven't had a good look at it in several weeks, but I think I remember the key points.

I scrapbook in 8" x 8", so I went for the 8" x 8" book. This ended up being a really good sized book. So if you scrapbook in 12" x 12" and want to go cheaper with a smaller book, I think you will be happy with the results. Just be aware of the size of your text when you shrink it. You could test this by printing it to any standard printer (b&w or color).

(click pictures for larger view)

For the front and back of the book, I just inserted regular photos into the templates. If you could do more than that, I am not aware of it. But I found some really good pictures that went with the whole theme of my album. The album I made was of our time in Arizona (hence the scrapbook pages of Arizona I've been posting lately) and I put a picture of the Arizona Welcome Center on the cover and a shot of the temperature as read by our car on the day we arrived---117*---on the back.

For all of the inside pages I chose a template that allowed me to insert a "picture" (my scrapbook page) the entire size of the page (8" x 8"). I wish I had pictures of this (I might update this later). Sorry.

The book had 20 pages. The first page is on the right, with the inside cover on the left. Shutterfly calls this the title page, but I just jumped right in there and started with my first scrapbook page. The last page (page 20) is on the left, with the inside back cover on the right. There were 9 sets of paired pages (i.e., one page on the left and one on the right) if you are a 2-page scrapper.

I found it rather easy to work with the interface. If you are all set ready to go, it probably would take about one hour or less to upload all of your photos and arrange them in the correct order in the book.

Issues

I found two issues with the book, which I didn't know about until I was holding the actual book in hand. So be forewarned.

I'm not sure what the technical term is for the inside of the book where the pages meet, but I'll just call it the gutter. Well, the biggest problem I saw was that your page gets lost in the gutter. I had at least two pages in the book where the text gets lost inside the book. So, I would recommend that you alter your scrapbook page according to where it will fall in your book. Either make sure nothing significant falls within at least 1/2 inch of the edge OR if you know if the page will fall on the left or right, make sure that the inside edge is free of elements and text that you want to make sure are visible.
The other major issue is that the text prints dark. Just as printing on card stock appears darker than photo paper when using colored ink, I found the paper that they use absorbs the color and makes it appear darker. Before I submitted my pages I printed all of them on photo paper using my laser jet and they looked great. However, the Shutterfly book seemed particularly bothersome to faces, which all came out too dark. Otherwise the colors were very vivid and looked great. So I guess I would suggest lightening any photos of people on your scrapbook page before submitting it to Shutterfly.

Otherwise I was happy with the feel and look of the book. I went with the soft cover and thought it was fine---thick enough. The pages have a soft gloss look to them, but I didn't see any finger prints making a mess of the pages. I'm not 100% on this because I was careful when handling the book.

Would I shop at Shutterfly again? Yes! Knowing what I do, I think in the future I will make the slight alterations that I suggest above. I thought the book was affordable and a wonderful gift.

February 19, 2010 Update:
Also check out this review of a Shutterfly photobook by Shaz of It's My Kraft Nook
and these photos of a Shuttefly photobook by Keyr of Dreams Inspired

Merry Christmas! ... 10 Things

2009-12-24T23:40:00.003-05:00

10 Things I Did To Make It Feel Like Christmas...

I don't have many traditions and in many ways the traditions are what makes it feel like Christmas and I think why so many people love this time of year. So I was thinking about it, and although I don't have traditions, I have ways of making it feel like Christmastime to me (maybe they will become traditions one day). Here are a few things I did:

1. Saw "A Christmas Carol"

2. Decorated a Christmas tree with my husband while listening to Christmas music

Tree and paper from "Holly Jolly" by geniaBeana and Dylabel Designs
3. Attended two work-related holiday parties and won raffles at both (I won a free hair cut at a local salon and a free lunch at a wonderful local restaurant). I'm attending a church Christmas party on the 27th

4. Helped my mom make cheese balls.

Present and paper from "Holly Jolly" by geniaBeana & Dylabel Designs
5. Bought and made presents and wrapped them.

6. Watched It's a Wonderful Life

photo by my dad

7. Shoveled snow! (14 inches)

8. Spent time with my niece

9. Made Strawberry Pretzel Salad for Christmas dinner

10. Attended Christmas Eve Service at church and sang "Angels We Have Heard On High," "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing," and "Silent Night! Holy Night."

I hope you took the time to make it a special Christmas for yourself too. Merry Christmas! :)

Melancholy - Dylabel Designs' New Release

2009-12-18T13:23:00.006-05:00

Hi everyone! Are you ready for the holidays? I am! I finished wrapping my dogs' presents (the last I had to wrap) this morning. I bought them both new Nylabones. I'm excited that it's Christmas, but there really isn't a whole lot going on. My sister isn't coming home for Christmas, so it'll just be my brother, my parents, and me.

My mom gave me her credit card and let me buy my Christmas present, so I already know what I am getting from my parents. Using their credit card I ordered a gift code for two Internet-based instructor-led classes at JessicaSprague.com. They are Type + Writer I and Type + Writer II. You can purchase them as a bundle. I'm excited about taking those classes because I love typography and do not think I am very good at it. I want to learn more secrets to type to improve my scrapbook layouts.

While I'm on the subject, I would like to recommend a great book on type. It's for beginner, non-designers and it just lays out what type is all about. It's called The Non-Designer's Type Book by Robin Williams.
Anyway, on to Dylabel Designs' newest release---Melancholy.

Here's the preview and below is my layout of my sister and her best friend Corrie."Melancholy" by Dylabel Designs; Pea Hannah fonts by kevinandamanda.com

It's supposed to snow here in the northeast tomorrow. So maybe it'll be white for Christmas. :) You can grab the freebie quickpage of this layout over at Belinda's blog.

Scrap It To Me Tuesday with Holly Jolly

2009-12-15T14:30:00.002-05:00

If you don't know what Scrap It To Me Tuesday is, click here.

This week I'm featuring my most recent scrapbook page. It's with the cutest kit---Holly Jolly by Dylabel Designs and genia Beana.

This year is the first year we could afford a real full-sized tree. The number of ornaments is lacking, but it is a beautiful tree. We had so much fun decorating it. The colors of the kit matched our tree skirt perfectly.

"Holly Jolly" Collab by Dylabel Designs and geniaBeana; font: A Red Bucket and Pea Megeletto both by kevinandamanda.com

New Background & Banner

2009-12-12T19:38:00.001-05:00

Scrap It To Me with Cowgirl Cool

2009-12-08T08:51:00.003-05:00

It's another "Scrap It To Me Tuesday" with Chanin from Chanin's Corner. I'm in an earlier time zone than Chanin so I'm posting before she gets hers up, but I'm doing it now while I have the time.

I thought I'd continue with the series I started last week, which is of our trips in Arizona. Last week I showed you Grand Canyon National Park. This week I'm showing you a trip we made the day before going to the Grand Canyon---to Meteor Crater. Meteor Crater is just that: a crater near Flagstaff, AZ where a meteor struck the earth a very very long time ago.
I used Raspberry Road Design's Cowgirl Cool Collection. Click the images of the elements and papers to be taken to the Raspberry Road store.

Credits: "Cowgirl Cool" by Raspberry Road Designs; Font: Tiza

Holiday Recipe Cards

2009-12-06T22:02:00.003-05:00

I came across the most darling holiday recipe cards. You have to check them out. Not only has Shabby Princess created such lovely cards, they are offering to you as a free download. Unbelievable!! Furthermore, on the download page are a ton of instructions on how to use the box template and tags to create gifts for the holidays. Click the image to be taken to the website and enjoy!

Harvest Blessings Release and Freebie

2009-12-04T17:02:00.003-05:00

So I got to play with another kit this week. It's called Harvest Blessings by Dylabel Designs. It's 35% off all this week! I've created a layout and a freebie using it. Check them out....and my freebie is being hosted on Dylabel Designs' website. Links to her page.

Great Tutorial on How to Use Templates

2009-12-04T09:15:00.004-05:00

The only template I've ever made. Please feel free to snag it. (click template image to download)

When I started this blog I really concentrated on helping new digi-scrappers. As I've grown in my scrapbooking skills I have gotten away from that and kind of forgotten what would be typical questions from a newbie-scrapbooker. It was a lot easier when I was one myself. Funny how scrapping over 6 months and making approximately 75 layouts has brought me this far. And I am sure to many digi-scrappers out there I am just scratching the surface! But I am working on it. I have been scrapping up a storm these last few weeks---making about two a day for a couple of weeks. But the creative juices are starting to dry up and my momentum is slowing down.

Anyway, all of that to say that I came across a great video that will help someone newer to digi-scrapping. It is how to use templates. I know there are lots of good tutorials on this, but I still learn something new when I watch them because everybody has a different way of going about scrapping. It helps me learn the ins-and-outs of the program better.

Today's tutorial is by Cathy Zielske. I love her style, personality, and her templates and if I were not cheap I probably would own all of her templates for square pages. Here's a link to her tutorial on templates: http://vimeo.com/7968334 and here's a link to her blog: http://cathyzielske.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/12/video-tutorial-working-with-layered-templates.html. What is even neater is that she turned this into a hybrid page when she was finished doing the digital part, so be sure to check out her blog.

Scrap it To Me with On The Road

2009-12-01T20:04:00.006-05:00

I've decided to join Chanin from Chanin's Corner in a blog hop. Every week people will blog about a layout they made that week and share the links to the kits they used. It's a great way to get inspiration for your scrapping and to find out about great scrapbooking kits.

My layout is of our first anniversary, when we made our first trip to Grand Canyon National Park. I just love how this layout turned out.

"On the Road" by Audacious Designs; scraplift from Cathy Zielske's 10 Things Right Now; Font: "Turtle Club" by Kevinandamanda.com

I used the following kit from Audacious Designs. Unfortunately, I don't know if it is available anymore because the store I bought it from shut down. But it's a wonderful kit if you can get your hands on it.

2 New Releases and freebies

2009-11-27T21:28:00.005-05:00

I just wanted to share some kits with you that I played with this week. They are available at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com.

First is a collaboration by Dylabel Designs and geniaBeana Scraps called Holly Jolly. Here is the kit, my layout, and a quickpage from the layout. The layout includes a picture of my mother's family when she was just 4 years old. It was a funny reddish color so I altered the photo to make it look old but more natural.

and a quickpage:
The quickpage is linked, click image to download.

This is the second kit, Happy Hanukkah, that I played with this week by Dylabel Designs. I am a Christian so I went with a snow motif instead of Hanukkah. This kit worked really well for that as well. I loved the pictures I used in the layout of the puppies playing in the snow when they were just 9 weeks old---only days after we got them.

and a freebie cluster frame that I made using Happy Hanukkah by Dylabel Designs. The frame is linked. Click the image to download.

Sweet Pea Release and Freebie

2009-11-20T15:19:00.003-05:00

Hey! I have another layout from a new release by Dylabel Designs to show you today. She has this adorable kit called Sweet Pea which has the perfect combination of pinks and greens. It is in the store at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com for 35% off all this week.Sweet Pea by Dylabel Designs

And my layout:

CREDITS: "Sweet Pea" by Dylabel Designs; font: Round Birdie by Aud Neil

and I created a quickpage for you from this layout:
Click the quickpage image to download.

Happy Friday, everyone. Have a great weekend! :)

New Release - Ode to a Starry Night and freebie

2009-11-13T13:17:00.005-05:00

I played with Dylabel Designs' newest kit this week, called Ode to a Starry Night. I decided it is about time to start scrapping some of my pictures from Arizona before I forget what we did. I mean these pictures are over three years old now! It's hard to believe it has been that long since we moved to Phoenix. Our time there was such a whirlwind---we only lived there 17 months. Fortunately while there we did take advantage of the location and got out and experienced some really cool stuff you would never see on the east coast.

I did a two page spread of our trip to Tonto National Monument via the Apache Trail. We had been in Phoenix only a few weeks when we took this trip so it was our first real exposure to desert life, the rocks, the lizards and wildlife, and the cacti. Tonto is in the Sonoran Desert and apart of Tonto National Forest.

The CT created some freebies including word art, alpha, frames, and quickpages. Check them out at Belinda's blog: Dylabel Designs.

CREDITS: "Ode to a Starry Night" by Dylabel Designs; journaling font: Round Birdie by AudNeil

Yes, I know the first picture is really dark, but it's the only picture we actually took at Tonto National Monument. And of course, it's of me resting because it was a HOT day (remember, August in the Phoenix area!) and a steep walk up to the cliffs.

Finally, since I made the word art, I wanted to share it with you on my blog, as well. Click to download.

Quickpage Freebie for Forever Heather by Dylabel Designs

2009-11-08T17:40:00.005-05:00

Today I'm sharing a quickpage with you that I created from my layout yesterday using "Forever Heather" by Dylabel Designs. The quickpage download includes a PDF tutorial describing how to create the "matted look" that I used on the page. I'm also including the tutorial below. Just click the quickpage to download.Also, check out the freebie word art on Dylabel Designs' blog. You can use it in place of the word art I used on the quickpage.

Kit Release - Forever Heather by Dylabel Designs

2009-11-07T21:16:00.004-05:00

Belinda made this kit, Forever Heather, in memory of her friend who just passed away. Keeping with this theme, I made a layout of my Grandma who passed away earlier this year.Come back tomorrow to pick up a quickpage and see my tutorial on how to create this matted look.

Digital Scrapbooking Day

2009-11-06T18:53:00.002-05:00

Fright Night Quickpage

2009-11-01T15:54:00.002-05:00

I made a quickpage freebie to share with you using Fright Night by Dylabel Designs. It's holds three pictures. I hope you like it. It's kind of dark, but the kit is inspired by Tim Burton's A Nightmare Before Christmas so it's supposed to be creepy.

Click to download

Speed Scrap Tonight

2009-10-30T14:48:00.004-04:00

I know, everyone probably has a busy weekend planned with Halloween being on Saturday night, but if you have the chance, join me at the Speed Scrap hosted by Chanin of Snowflake Beach Designs at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com:

Berry Pistachio Freebie

2009-10-23T20:41:00.003-04:00

The new CT that I am on is going to be sharing lots of freebies on our blog Dylabel Designs CT Spot. As part of Dylabel Designs' Grand Opening at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com, six kits of all different colors are and themes are being released. The freebies are made using those kits and include brag book pages, quick pages, cluster frames, and more. So be sure to check it out. I wanted to help celebrate the launch of the new site by going ahead and posting one of the freebies that I created. It is a cluster frame made from Berry Pistachio by Dylabel Designs.

Here's the cluster frame freebie:

The 4-shared link to download this cluster frame is:
http://www.4shared.com/file/143149934/1679368e/dd_bp_cluster_erinfazz.html
Please enjoy!

Grand Opening of Dylabel Designs Store

2009-10-21T22:04:00.004-04:00

I am on a CT (creative team) for a new designer---Dylabel Designs. Her grand opening is this week. She's releasing several kits at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com. I have two displayed below with a couple of layouts.

I just love, love, love the colors in this kit.

Credits: "Modern Wildflower" kit by Dylabel Designs; font: Katy Berry

...and another wonderful kit. I'll be posting a freebie from this kit in the next few days.

Credits: "Berry Pistachio" kit by Dylabel Designs

New Kit: Spooktacular

2009-10-15T13:48:00.004-04:00

I got the chance to work with a new Halloween kit and wanted to share it with you.

It's called Spooktacular, by Snowflake Beach Designs and {geniaBeana} Scraps. It's available at goDigitalScrapbooking.com.

Here's the kit and below it is my layout of my husband last Halloween using Spooktacular.

CREDITS: "Spooktacular" kit by Snowflake Beach Designs and {geniaBeana} Scraps; Font: Erinfazz by Frederique at The French Frog

Shushybye Layout

2009-09-24T16:57:00.006-04:00

Long time no see! Sorry I've been away. Just haven't been into doing much recently.

Anyway, I finally made a layout and wanted to share it with you. It's called "Sweet Dreams" and is of my Papillons when they were puppies. They used to cuddle together when they slept. I made this with a kit from Snowflake Beach Designs called "Shushybye." It's available at godigitalscrapbooking.com.

CREDITS: "Shushybye" by Snowflake Beach Designs

This is what the kit looks like:

Digital Photography Class

2009-09-10T19:54:00.002-04:00

creativetechs is offering a 10-week course on digital photography. It's in its second week. This week is about digital cameras. They offer free videos of the presentation on their site for just one week. Definitely check it out---it's worth it! I believe this is the link to the video: http://creativetechs.com/training/digital-photography-wk-2/

Freebie at GDS!

2009-09-09T19:39:00.003-04:00

Just wanted to let you know that Snowflake Beach Designs has a freebie on GoDigitalScrapbooking.com today and it's really awesome acrylic styles.

Here are some instructions on how to install layer styles in Photoshop Elements 7.0: http://www.scrappersguide.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3294

Fav Thing -- My Hammock

2009-08-29T20:13:00.005-04:00

Hi! I participated in a Speed Scrap last night at GoDigitalScrapbooking with Chanin of Snowflake Beach Designs. She gave us this template called "skewed blocks" to start our layout. She also told us to scrap about our selves, some thing about us. So I chose one of my favorite things---my hammock.

Snowflake Beach Designs' Skewed Blocks:

My layout:

Credits: Papers and string - "So Wonderful" by Snowflake Beach Designs (SBD); Wavy Borders by SBD; Glitter - "Wild Child" by SBD; Skewed Blocks by SBD; Alpha by Dylabel Designs; and font - Round Birdie by Audacious Designs

Reminder: {We Are} Storytellers is closing

2009-08-15T20:08:00.003-04:00

{We Are} Storytellers will be closed in 24 hours. 50% off everything in the store.

Fonts! Free Fonts!

2009-08-08T12:32:00.003-04:00

I downloaded some cool fonts for scrapbooking. Check them out and the link where I found these fonts.

check out: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/08/07/beautiful-new-free-fonts-for-your-designs/

Sad News -- {we are} storytellers

2009-08-06T20:11:00.004-04:00

I was very sad to hear that {we are} storytellers is closing in 10 days. But I took advantage of the sale (50% off) and my birthday money. Here's what I purchased.

And for spending over $10 I got the "Game Night" Collaboration free.

Christmas in July

2009-08-04T22:06:00.003-04:00

I just wanted to show you my most recent scrapbook pages.

First is a layout I created for a Speed Scrap at GoDigitalScrapbooking.com.
Chanin was the host and her directions were:

Pick out 1-3 Christmas pics. If you use only 1 photo, do some type of treatment to it or color it in some way or put a stroke around it or all of the above! If you use more than one, do whatever you feel needs to be done to them!
Pick out 2 papers, 1 plain and 1 patterned. Use one as the background and one some other way on your page - as a mat or border or whatever you desire!!
Use ribbon and/or stitching somewhere on your page.
Place your pics on your page in a cluster (aka overlapping) if you are using more than one. If using only one pic place it on your page angled.
Use something to clip your pic(s) to the page, such as a paper clip, staple, or pin.
Somewhere on your page do a cluster of elements! Wherever you want!
Put a title, word art, or journaling somewhere on the page and then add whatever elements or final touches you think your page needs to complete it!

Here's my layout. Bill, the hubbie, helped me out with it, so the journaling is his humor.

CREDITS: Mat shape by Lyndsay Riches from "Whisper" kit; Pin from Designs by Kristi "Easter Freebie"; Font--My Own Topher by Kevinandamanda.com; everything else "Winter Shabby" kit by Snowflake Beach Designs

The second one is of my hubbie and his grandfather. This picture was taken at Pop-Pop's 75th birthday party. It was really nice because the whole family got together to celebrate.

CREDITS: Scraplifted from "My Hands" by starxlr8 (simple scrapper) at myscrapbookart.com;
"My Favorite Guy" June Blog Train: Bkgd papers- A+ Designs, square paper- Armina Designs, rectangular stripe paper- Creative.chaos, notebook paper border-Little Miss Shazbutt, mat paper-Queen Pamedalah, photo wrap- Ilona Havenaar, & tag- Ingeborg (ikscrap);
mat shape- Amy Sumrall from "Fun Wow" Kit;
fonts: My Own Topher & Pea Joraanstad by kevinandamanda.com

This was a scraplift from the simple scrapper.

The last one is for a recipe challenge at Scrap That Idea.
Here is the recipe:

1 paper
1 photo
1 frame
2 string and/or ribbon
Stitching
1 greenery
2 flowers
2 additional elements of your choice

Frame your photo and place it in one corner on the page. Layer the greenery, flowers and string/ribbon. Garnish with stitching. Use only 1/4 of the page to place all items.

And this is what I came up with:

CREDITS: ribbon bow, string bow, leaves, lace, 2 flowers, ladybug, and red background paper -- Sweet Blossom Designs "Ladybug" kit; string frame -- Sweet Blossom Designs "Bee Happy" kit; stitching -- Digi-Designs by Nicole "Basic Beauty Add-on"

A Wonderful Birthday!

2009-08-01T19:10:00.002-04:00

30! ... it's the new 21.

or at least that's what I think.

I had a wonderful day. My parents came down and we went to the nicest restaurant in town. We also went to a nearby lake to see the baldcypress. They are just breathtaking, so serene. We had a lovely time together.

Then I got to open my birthday present from my wonderful hubbie. And in total support of my growing digital scrapbooking obsession he gave me a D-SLR camera!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now, I don't know how to use it, but I had to snap a picture of me with my camera on my 30th birthday.

Snowflake Beach Designs Creative Team

2009-07-31T11:07:00.004-04:00

It's official---I was selected to be a member of the creative team (CT) for Snowflake Beach Designs. So I get to wear this:

Yay!

It's a good week---my twin sister and I turn 30 tomorrow. Unfortunately she's in Turkey right now so we won't be able to celebrate this milestone together. I miss her. My parents are coming down to visit, and my dear hubbie is baking a strawberry cake and making chocolate ice cream. If the weather isn't too miserable---it's very hot and humid---we are going to go see the cypress trees that grow locally. My dad has never seen them. We live near the northern most stand of cypress in the United States. They are beautiful.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

So Wonderful

2009-07-27T09:37:00.003-04:00

I am trying out to be part of the creative team at Snowflake Beach Designs. To do so I had to come up with two layouts for her most recent kit. And that's what I wanted to show you. They are below.

Credits: Kit - "So Wonderful" by Snowflake Beach Designs; Photo - Morgan Taylor; Fonts - Century Gothic, & A Little Pot by kevinandamanda.com

Credits: Kit - "So Wonderful" by Snowflake Beach Designs; Photo - Morgan Taylor; Fonts - Pea Amy*Rica Script by kevinandamanda.com

India and Mom's Lineage

2009-07-25T11:14:00.003-04:00

Just jumping on briefly to post two of my recent layouts.

The first is from my sister's trip to India. She took a series of photographs at sunset on a beach that I just love. I scrapped one of the pictures in the following layout. The picture was taken March 11, 2007 in Alibaug, Maharashtra, India. I found this wonderful kit by Sweet Tomato Designs and had to use it!

CREDITS: "Darjeeling" kit by Sweet Tomato Designs; Font: The King and Queen from Dafont.com

The next is a layout of my mother's lineage. Starting with me it goes back four generations to my great-great grandparents. One neat thing is that we actually have a tintype of my Great-Great-Great Grandfather, but there wasn't enough room on this layout to display it as well. My sister has done extensive research on this side of the family's ancestry. And as a companion to that, I have been scanning my grandmother and grandfather's photos for a couple of years now. I probably have about 800 scanned (mostly dating to the early 1950s and earlier), but have a lot more to go of more recent photographs. My grandmother died in late-April and since I had taken on this project I am holding all of her pictures right now until I can scan all of her photos and distribute them to the family on DVD. I would encourage anyone who can put together a layout of their lineage to do so. It is a good record to have for future generations. And I love photos, it brings the people in the family tree to life.

CREDITS: "Antebellum Collection" by Raspberry Road Designs; Font: Pea Carol from kevinandamanda.com

We are having a party in a few weeks and I have so much work to do to get this house ready for it---including painting a room---so I will not have much time to post or for scrapbooking altogether.

Applying Drop Shadows to Many Layers

2009-07-18T22:55:00.008-04:00

So you have a layout with a lot of layers that need the same drop shadow applied as in my layout below. Do you really want to adjust each one by one? No! There is a faster way.

Today I am going to show you a quick way to apply a drop shadow layer style to as many layers as you would like.
First, apply a drop shadow to one layer as you normally would do.
1. Select the layer that you want to apply the drop shadow (DS) to.
2. Under the effects panel, choose the layer style button, and select Drop Shadows.
3. Select the drop shadow of your choosing and click "Apply."

To adjust the default drop shadow (DS), select the effects (fx) symbol on the right side of the layer in the layer panel.

Now change the default settings by adjusting the Size, Distance, and Opacity.
You can play around with this to your liking. I personally like to have small, dark drop shadows. When they are fuzzy they appear to me that the items on the page are floating in the air, so that is why I choose a low number for distance.

Click "Ok" when you are finished adjusting the drop shadow.

Next we will apply this setting (drop shadow layer style) to as many other layers as you would like. First we must copy the layer style and then paste it onto the other layers.

So, check to make sure that the layer is still selected in the Layers panel on the right.

Then go up to "Layer" in the menu along the top of the screen, select "Layer Style" and then "Copy Layer Style."

Then in the Layers panel, select all of the layers that you would like to apply the same drop shadow to. In my example, it is the other eleven squares in the grid.

Now, go back up to the "Layer" in the top menu, select "Layer Style," and this time choose "Paste Layer Style."

And you are done---the shadow is applied to all of the layers you selected.

CREDITS for layout: Page Kit "My Favorite Thing" by Jady Day Studio from SYTYCD contest.

Template and Layout from Camping Trip

2009-07-16T14:17:00.004-04:00

{free template below}

My husband and I went camping this past weekend. We had a really, really good time. The weather was perfect---and unbelievable for July. It hovered right around 80*F (26.7*C). So here's my first layout from the trip. I have more to come because, for one, I got some great pictures of the Papillons.

CREDITS: Page Kit "My Favorite Thing" by Jady Day Studio from SYTYCD contest. I altered the hotdog element to look like a sticker and rotated the striped paper. Fonts: Ravie. Pea Nicki by Kevinandamanda.com.

I also created a template for this layout and have made it available for you to download. Just click the image to download.

The neat thing about this template is that I drew it out while we were camping, and then on Tuesday Cathy Zielske did a video as a guest blogger for Ali Edwards' blog in which she showed how to do multi-photo grids for layouts using PSE 7. What a coincidence! You can check out the video on her blog by clicking here.

Creating Realistic-Looking Splatter in Photoshop Elements

2009-07-09T13:06:00.007-04:00

Today I want to show you how to create realistic-looking splatter in PSE. I did this for a recent layout and when I printed it out it looked awesome. Here's a close-up of the section of my layout.

Credits: Kit is Wild Child by Snowflake Beach Designs

I am working in PSE 7.

First, create a new layout or go to the layout you are working on where you have added splatter. Put the splatter partially going over the edge of a piece of paper or a photo. For now, keep the photo nice and square, don't tilt it any direction---just straight.

Use the Zoom Tool to zoom in on the splatter. A quick way to get the Zoom Tool is to type the letter "Z."

Next add the grid over your photo. It will help in this process.
To do this select View from the top menu, and then Grid from the drop-down menu.

Next, select the Move Tool in the left column. A quick way to access the Move Tool is by typing the letter "V." Then while holding down the Ctrl key select both the photo layer and the splatter layer by clicking on each layer in the layer panel on the right side of the screen.

Now, slide your picture and splatter over so that the photo's edge lines up with one of the grid lines. The purpose of this is to give you a guide to follow.

Now go to the left side to the tools menu and select your Brush Tool (or select it by typing the letter "B"). From the style drop down along the top choose a soft round brush. Set it to size 5 or smaller. Choose "Shadows," and set the exposure to about 50%.

Next you want to make sure you are only working on the "splatter" layer, so select it in the layer panel on the right side of the screen.

Using the brush, trace along the edge of the photo following the grid line running the brush across the splatter.

Next, still using the brush tool, change the setting to range "Highlights." Then trace along the line again. You have to do this if the splatter is glitter since there are also bright speckles in the splatter.

Now you are almost finished. You are finished with the brush tool and can zoom back out. A quick way to zoom out is to hold down the Ctrl key and press 0.

Grab the Move Tool (letter "V") again. Then select the two layers (photo and splatter) in the layers panel.

Now move the cursor over to the bounding box that outlines both the photo and splatter and move it around near the corner until a rounded double-headed arrow appears. Use this to rotate the photo and splatter the way you would like it to sit on the page.

You are finished!

Credits: Splatter by Sarah Bennett from "Feels Like Home" and photo by Elise Cole

My ABC Album

2009-07-06T22:02:00.005-04:00

I am participating in the ABC Challenge at Gotta Pixel. Every week they provide templates for two letters.

I have not been posting what I have done every week, but thought I have done enough now to post what I have so far. I am using the kit "Take My Breath Away Collection" by Sweet Digi Designs that I bought with a coupon that I won at Gotta Pixel.

Scrap Simple Challenge #2

2009-06-30T23:19:00.002-04:00

I love doing challenges. It is great inspiration to create pages you would not otherwise create, and lot of the time, use pictures that would go un-scrapped.

So I jumped in and did Simple Scrap #2 from the Simple Scrapper blog. Here are the rules:

Scrap a layout using ANY mini-kit from your stash or this freebie mini-kit [image below].
You may include fonts, stitching or alphas but no papers or elements from outside the mini kit.

I decided to stick with the freebie she offered because it instantly made me think of a photo that I took that I could scrap. My page is, again, so simple. I am not sure I am pleased with it, but the directions made what I could do with it very limiting.

CREDITS:
Kit: Circus Mini-Kit Freebie created by Pink Peacock Designs
Alpha: Alpha 04 created by Deca Designs

Journaling: "-Fourth of July, 2008- Every year Laurel hosts a big Independence Day extravaganza complete with a carnival, 5K, contests, lots of food, and fireworks. We were lucky enough to have Cody visiting and Mom, Dad, and Elise brought Cody down to enjoy the celebration. We had a lot of fun on the spinning rides, bumper cars, and slide. -Erin"

My Newest Layout

2009-06-30T11:13:00.002-04:00

I did a speed scrap on Friday night and am just getting around to posting my layout today because I was sick over the weekend and went to visit my mom to go shopping (2 hours away) yesterday. We are going to have a big housewarming party at the end of the summer and I am preparing. Yesterday we bought the materials for me to recover my dining room chairs. Thank goodness for coupons---the price of foam is out of this world! But I digress... The photo I used for my layout was taken on Father's Day. I'm finding I like the look of the simplest of layouts, but prefer paper style.

CREDITS: Page Kit: Summer Driggs' Relax
Button: Abish Allen's Sun Kissed
Alpha: Mel Hains' Showers in Spring
Font: Pea Sara Print by Kevinandamanda.com For some reason, when I scale down the size of my layouts to save for web the drop shadows get bigger and make things look like they are floating way up in the air. I don't like it, but don't have the patience to go back and fix it. Just know that the paper version doesn't look like this.

I found a really cute collaborative kit that I liked. I saw it at {we are} storytellers and thought I'd see what the price is at Little Dreamer Designs. Well it's $0.41 more expensive at Little Dreamer. I found that surprising---the price discrepancy. .

Last Photo Layout

2009-06-24T16:47:00.003-04:00

I decided to participate in Digi Dare #138 at Digidares.com.
I really jumped in there---it was a tough challenge, but very cathartic I think.

The DARE:
Life has its ups and downs, the happy moments, but also the sad ones. The ecstatic highs, and the painful lows.
My dare this week is to scrap about those lows (emotional or physical pain). Yes, you can do it.
Think about what happened, how was your reaction to it and how did it affect you? Did it make you stronger or are you still coping with it.

The FLAIR:
-You can use a picture, or not. Use a stockphoto or something that symbolizes that pain.
-I want you to use your blending techniques. The papers, the elements, the picture, just blend something.
-Use the color that you associate with that pain.

"Last Photo"

This photo represents my pain because it is the last photo of us taken together. It is a reminder that things are not permanent, that people and things in life are ephemeral, they are just moments. I used blending modes on the photo once I turned it black and white to give it a stronger contrast between black and white...a little sharper. I tried to keep it subtle. For some reason I felt that black and red really represents how I feel. Red can be such a raw color, like an open wound.

CREDITS:
Paper - from "Tiny Jewels" by Julia Makotinsky
Fonts: "Socially Awkward" and "My Nerd" both by KevinandAmanda.com

Another Speed Scrap: Stormdrain Marking

2009-06-23T13:15:00.002-04:00

I participated in another speed scrap last night. They are so addictive! I love to get a layout done in just 2 hours without having to do much thinking about it. Plus it's great practice, I learn something new each time I do it.

So, here were the directions. I will bold the main instruction because she was a bit heavy on the narrative side.

1.) Today was an interesting day! I won’t bore you with all the details, but one important thing I did was sign up for a Twitter account! Now I can say “I ‘tweet’, do you?” lol Since the default colors of Twitter are blue and white, let’s use those as our main colors…choose any paper/papers with any combination of blue and white…that’s pretty broad, I’m sure you’ll come up with something ! *Ü*

2.) Did you find some truly fantastic papers? Great! Twitter (in case you are curious) is a way to broadcast information…(similar to Facebook and MySpace)…let’s “broadcast” some photos! lol Use a photo collage or “spray” or cluster to distribute your photos. You should have at least three photos to do this…if you don’t have a frame cluster to use, here is a place to get one (or more) for free: http://www.storeide.se/gunhild/Scrapbooking.htm (she offers many choices on this page!)

how you all doing? got some lovely papers? got some photos? got a collage type thingy going on here?

3.) Did you surmise that Twitter’s symbol is a bird? I bet you did! And I’m sure you’ve already guessed this step, too! Add an animal…lucky you if one of your photos already has an animal in it! (Mine does!) Don’t forget to SAVE!!!

4.) My first post on Twitter was about this Speed Scrap…that first post, it’s the first thing you see…it’s a lot like a welcome mat, isn’t it? Add a “mat” to your layout…a bracket mat, a square, circle or other shape…any kind of “mat” – it could be paper, plastic, fencing, etc. Place it under your photos. Like your front porch, dress up your layout…embellish as desired!

5.) This is really cool…it took me a while to figure out how to do it, but I did! Twitterfeed will take whatever I post on my blog and duplicate it on my Twitter! Yay! Duplicate something in your layout! Hmmmm…wonder what you’ll duplicate?

6.) Having a blog and a tweet is a lot like having a title and a subtitle…take an alpha, make a simple title, then use a font to give it a subtitle! Hehehe….I hope you’re having as much as I am!

7.) Last step ladies…I’ll make this one easy…shadow as needed and journal if you want, and follow me on Ttwitter! http://twitter.com/merchimakesit That’s it! lol I hope you had a great time! I had a lot of making up these instructions, and I hope you had just as much following along!

And here is what I came up with:

The journaling gets messy when I downsize the resolution. It says:
"On June 13, 2009, Bill, David, and I joined a group of about 30 volunteers to help the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) mark the stormdrains in Town. The markers we placed on each drain said "No dumping! Drains to Waterways."

"Stormdrain Marking"

CREDITS:
Papers and butterflys: "Earth Wings #2" by Julie Marie Designs
Cardboard mat and soda tops: "Earth Day" by Mary Wilde, Plum Dumpling Designs
Cluster frame: "Green" by Creashens
Alpha: "Promise Collection" by Shabby Princess Designs
Fonts: Cry Kitty & Pea So Lovely both by Kevinandamanda.com

Newest Layout: Approaching 30!

2009-06-19T23:35:00.010-04:00

Just jumping on quickly to post my most recent layout.

CREDITS:
Wild Child page kit by Snowflake Beach Designs AKA Chanin Mettey
Date Stamp by WM [Squared] Designs - Simply Dated V2
Fonts - Pea Stacy Fancy & Pea So Lovely by Kevinandamanda.com

Recent Layouts of Grandma

2009-06-15T17:33:00.004-04:00

I wanted to share two recent layouts that I have created. They are both of my grandma who passed away in late April. I miss her and think about her all the time. So she is the subject of my layouts. I have a couple of more planned.

First is one I created about 10 days ago. I just had not gotten around to posting it yet. It is about Grandma missing Granddaddy after he was gone.

CREDITS: Papers, Rainbow, and String: "Rainy Afternoon" from SYTYCD by Amy Stoffel; Ray of Light: "Pretty Music" from SYTYCD Rnd 4 by Maelia Designs; Clouds: "Recycled" by Lyndsay Riches Designs; Rippled Frame: "Collab" by Manue; Frame: "Reverie" by Cocodigiscrapeuse; Postcard: "Antique Postcard Mini" by Helen Ehrenhofer; and Journal Strip: "Everyday" by Amy Sumrall.

The second I just finished this morning and it was for a scraplift challenge on ScrapThatIdea's blog. A scraplift is when you base your layout on another layout, you use it for inspiration, or as a basic sketch of how you want your layout to turn out. The layout we are scraplifting is by Vicki and looks like:

This is what I came up with:

CREDIT: "Simplicity" by A Work in Progress, Vicki Parker; Fonts: "Pea Squeaker" by Kevinandamanda.com; Tracy by ?

I won a coupon!

2009-06-12T22:00:00.002-04:00

There was a RAK given away to one person that posted in a thread on the forum at {gottapixel}. And, much to my amazement, I won a $10 coupon to Digi Sweet Designs store! I was ecstatic!

So I have spent two days trying to decide what to get. I ended up getting a bundle of mini kits. It is called "Take My Breath Away...". Aren't they beautiful?

File Organization Tool Tutorial

2009-06-12T17:00:00.006-04:00

How do you organize your files? Do you organize?!

I know I said that I would give you some more tutorials from my layout the other day, but this one is relevant to what I am working with right now and wanted to share this. This is about what I use to organize my photos and digital scrapbooking files. I am not sure if people bother to organize their files and folders very much, but I do. I do it mainly so that I can find files later and always try to think ahead at what I might use to search for something later.

The best program I have found, and have been using it for years now, is called ReNamer by den4b. It is fantastic because it is so simple. At first I used it to organize my photos, and now have found it useful for digital scrapbooking.

Photos:
I keep all of the photos from the same date or event in a folder together. I name each of them according to the date the picture is taken and then I number them sequentially in the order they were taken. If the pictures were taken at a specific location (e.g., the Grand Canyon) or event (e.g., Christmas), I will add that after the date and serial number. If I have time, I will add who is in the picture at the end. Here's an example of a typical file name: 20080803_13_Brooklyn_MarkErin.jpg. I date my pictures with the year first, then the month, and then the day. I have found by trial and error that that is the best way to organize photos in some kind of orderly fashion. As you can see in this example, if I ever use the search to find pictures of my trip to Brooklyn or of Mark, both searches will yield this photograph. Well the focus is supposed to be on digi-scrapping files, so let us move on to that.

Digi-scrapping files:
Now I am new to digi-scrapping so this is still trial and error, but I will tell you about the system I am using right now to organize any kits I purchase or freebies I find online. First I group all items for one kit into one folder and name it {Kit_DesignersInitials_KitName}. I start with "Kit" so that all of the kits will group together. Then I like to have the work of the same designer side by side because I have a habit of remembering the name of the designer instead of kit names. So if I am looking for a kit, it is more likely that I will find it under the designers name.

Once inside the folder, I try to make sure everything in the folder has the same information as the folder. So I rename everything to start with {DesignerInitials_KitName}. I do this so that if I ever do a search for a tag, I will know exactly what kit the tag I am using came from just by the file name. Then I can find the designer's TOU (terms of use) in no time. It is easy to give appropriate credit when you know the name immediately. I also try to make sure common things like buttons, ribbons, pins, staples, tags, and paper are labeled in the file name so that I can do a quick search and find whatever I am looking for.

So what I wanted to do is tell you how to do all of this file renaming efficiently.

Tutorial:
First a disclaimer. I am sure that this program offers more than I know. I am just showing you some of the things I know to do with it.

Okay, so I am going to organize a folder that I downloaded from the SYTYCD contest at digiscrapaddicts.com (no longer available).

Now the first thing I do is find the TOU and the kit preview and put a underscore ("_") in front of these file names. This is my own thing, my own pet peev. I want to be able to find these two files anytime, and by doing this, these two files will be displayed as the first two files in the folder.

Now we can start using ReNamer.

Open ReNamer. Start by selecting all of the files that need to be renamed. To quickly do this use your mouse. Select the first file, hold down shift, scroll down, and then select the last file. Now drag all of those files into the bottom window of ReNamer that says "Drag your files here."

Now your files are loaded in ReNamer.

Next, click on "Add" to add a rule to rename the files.

Below is the screen that opens. We are going to create a rule using "Insert" on the left.

Next, place your cursor in the field next to "What:". We want to add the name of the designer and the kit name. I want to put this information in the front of the file name, so I select "Prefix" and make sure that "Skip Extension" is checked.

Once you have entered this information, you can click "Add Rule." This will close the window and return you to the original screen. In the screen you can now see a preview of what the file name will be with this rule you just created.

If you are happy with the new file name then you can go ahead with the renaming by clicking "Rename."

It will tell you if your renaming is successful. Click OK.

Now that these files are renamed you can remove them. Just select them (if you click in the window you can use "Ctrl+A" to select all) and hit the "delete" key. In the picture below I have selected all of the files, just before deleting.

Now I want to change some other files. The designer has labeled the papers as "paper," which might work for you. But I like to use the search and when I search for paper I want to find notebook paper and things like that, not 1000s of papers, so I change "paper" to "ppr." It is just my way of creating it easy to search. So I drag the papers into ReNamer.

Then we need to turn off the rule we created above. Just check to turn it off. This is a cool technique because you can create several rules and work with many many files without having to rewrite rules each time you need to do something different.

Next click "Add."

This time we want to add another rule, using the Replace rule. So select "Replace." Then where it says "Find:" I will enter paper, and where it says "Replace:" I will enter ppr. Then click "Add Rule."

This will preview the new name. Select "Rename." And then click "OK".

There, we are done renaming the files.

There is a lot more I can share with you about ReNamer, but I will save that for another night.

Here is where you can find ReNamer: http://www.den4b.com/downloads.php?project=ReNamer.

and...A Class

2009-06-11T14:45:00.005-04:00

I came across an announcement for a free class about photo editing at JessicaSprague.com and thought I'd pass it along. It appears to me to be for Photoshop users, but I figure even those of us that use Photoshop Elements can learn something from it.

Speed Scrap Layout: Bill Camping 2008

2009-06-10T10:28:00.004-04:00

I participated in another speed scrap last night. This time I was at www.stufftoscrap.com.

These are the directions we were given:

Step 1: Pick 3 pictures of the same person from the same event and crop them into circles
Step 2: Pick 2 papers only. One patterned and one solid. Use the patterned as your background and the solid how ever you want
Step 3: Arrange your pictures in a straight line not touching each other
Step 4: Use at least 3 embelleshments. May be recolored as long as it is different colors
Step 5: Add some stitching to your page
Step 6: Title your LO with the name of the person in your pictures
Step7: Add at least 5 Sentences of journaling, then add dropshadows and upload to the gallery

And here is what I came up with:

(click image for larger view)
Credits:
Page Kit (papers, tent and flower elements) - "The Scouting Way Addon" {Freebie} from Raspberry Road Designs by Susan Darter;
Fire element - "My Favorite Things - National Park Fun" from Jady Day Designs by Yari Mower {SYTYCD};
Stitching element - "In This Moment" by Donna Duncombe
Alpha - Howser and Pea Sara Print from kevinandamanda.com

What do you think?

Creating Cut Outs and a Layout for a Challenge

2009-06-06T18:19:00.012-04:00

Note: tutorial further down in this post.
I created a new layout for a challenge I have entered at Scrap That Idea! The post about the challenge is here. For this challenge we were given an inspiration and had to come up with a layout.

Here is the inspiration:

My translation of that is more literal than others. Mine is posted below, but you can visit the gallery and view everyone's layouts here.

Credits:
Papers for background and butterflies - "Simplicity" by A Work in Progress & "2 Little Bots" by Stacey's Scraps

I can offer you three Photoshop Elements (PSE) tutorials based off of this layout. The first I will discuss in this post called "cut outs" or what I did to create the butterfly shapes from the paper. The other two are how to create your own mask, like I did here using butterflies as you see in the pictures of my dog above; and how to create your own shadows. I will post the latter two tutorials later.

Tutorial
How to Create Cut Outs and Make Papers/Pictures into Shapes:
Okay, are you ready? Let's go. (Note: I try to show you every single step so this is really basic.)
To do this tutorial, you will need a paper or picture that you want to cut in a shape, and the shape you are going for. I am using butterflies like in my layout.

Part 1: Create a Cut Out/Shape
1.) Start by opening PSE and creating a new blank file. Make it big enough to hold your shape.

2.) Open the file that has the shape you want to use. My page is a bunch of butterflies.

3.) Select the "Rectangular Marquee Tool".

4.) Draw a rectangle around the shape you want to use.

5.) Select Edit > Copy (or Ctrl+C) to copy the shape.

6.) Click on your "new" blank file, and then go to Edit > Paste (or Ctrl+V).

7.) Now you have the shape pasted into your new page.

8.) Now you can close the shape page and simply view your "new" blank file that now has your shape on it.

9.) Double-click on Background in the Layer Palette.

10.) Set the opacity of the background to 0%. This turns the background into a transparent layer.

11.) Select the shape layer.

12.) Select the Magic Wand Tool.

13.) Adjust the tolerance so that the Magic Wand Tool selects the entire background and none of the pixels of the shape you are trying to extract. Here I set the Tolerance to 30. Click on the the background (in this case the white area) to extract it.

14.) Click delete to get rid of the background.

15.) Right-click and choose deselect (or Ctrl+D) to get rid of the marching ants.

16.) Next, select the Eraser Tool.

17.) Use the eraser tool to erase any areas that did not delete when you used the magic wand.

Now you have created what is called a "mask" in Photoshop. This mask is the shape that we use to cut our paper or photo.

Part 2: Make a Paper/Picture into a Shape
18.) Open the paper or picture that you are going to mask using the shape you just cut out.

19.) Select the Move Tool.

20.) Click on the shape. While still holding the mouse button down, drag the shape onto the paper or picture.

21.) In this scenario, the paper is the background. We want it to be a layer, so we will change that. To do that right-click on the background layer in the layer palette.

22.) In the menu that pops up, select "Layer From Background."

23.) In the box that opens, you can give this new "layer" (the paper layer) a name and click "Ok;" or bypass the naming and just click "Ok."

24.) Now you can see that the paper is its own layer.

25.) Drag the shape layer below the paper layer.

26.) Now, select the paper layer (the top layer). Then, go to Layer > Group With Previous (or Ctrl+G).

Below I have zoomed in on the results.

27.) Next, right click on the paper layer and choose "Merge Down."

28.) You are finished. The paper or picture is now in the shape of your cut out (AKA mask).

Credit: Brown paper from "Simplicity" by A Work in Progress

I used the same technique from Part 2 to create the mat behind the pictures in my last layout, "Home Coming."

Credits:
- Mat from "My Secret Garden" by creations by Rachael at http://www.funkyplaygrounddesigns.com
- Floral Papers from "Spontaneous Delight" by Carrie Stephens (see post of layout above for credits)

Creating a Stroke in Photoshop Elements

2009-06-02T09:59:00.004-04:00

Again, my focus is to help new digi-scrappers, focusing on those also new to Photoshop Elements (and in particular, version 7.0, which is probably what you'll be using if you just bought it).

Scrapper's Guide seems to be filled with really good tips and tricks. So, once again I bring you a tutorial from them. It's on how to create a stroke. They provide directions for Photoshop Elements and Adobe Photoshop. Please visit these links to do the above.

Also note that if you want to put a stroke around a picture, this is the tool that you use.

Here's a quick tutorial to put a stroke (or border) around a picture:
1) You have your photo open in Photoshop Elements and are ready to insert a stroke around the photograph.

2) First, select the photo layer.

3) Next, go to Edit in the top menu

4) Then, select Stroke (Outline) Selection

5) In the stroke window, make your selections. In the tutorial mentioned above (the Scrapper's Guide), they chose an "inside" stroke which creates crisp corners. Here I choose an outside stroke, which creates rounded corners. You will have to use trial and error to determine what width of stroke to use. Select "OK" when you are finished.

6) The stroke is now wrapped around your picture.

7) And you are all finished (I added a drop shadow).

Trip to Arizona Layout

2009-06-01T13:07:00.004-04:00

In mid-May I went to Arizona to visit one of my closest friends, Alice. We spent much of the time up at her Flagstaff house away from the heat of Phoenix (105*). We visited a few sites, ate brownies and lots of other wonderful treats, watched a few episodes of an interesting TV show, lazed around, and caught up. It had been a year and a half since I had moved away from Phoenix, and consequently since I had seen her. Believe it or not, we have kept in touch on at least a weekly basis, if not every other day, so it was as if we had not missed a beat.

Being back where I lived for ~17 months was strange. Everything was absolutely familiar, and yet felt like something I remembered from a dream. I had forgotten how exactly hot HOT can be, and was sweltering from the heat. I had also forgotten about how easy it is to get a sun burn. ;) It was easy to remember all of the things I thought were ugly about Phoenix, and yet given a new perspective I could look back and remember the charms of Arizona and Phoenix. I have to say when we set out to Arizona we went to experience an adventure, and I am happy to say it is a chapter of my life I will not forget. And I am just super lucky to have made a wonderful friend in that time.

Please enjoy my non-conventional digi-layout.

CREDITS:
Kit - Green by Creashens & Joana Carvalho (catscraps.com)
Staple - Without End Partie 1 by cardamome (cadamomescrap.canalblog.com)
Alpha - Sweet Imagination by gypsy couture (thedigichick.com)
Photos - Alice Chen; Erin Fasano

Speed Scrap

2009-05-30T05:25:00.006-04:00

A "SS" or Speed Scrap is a ton of fun. Here is how it works. Everyone gets together on a forum online. The host gives a set of instructions, such as "pick out three related pictures," every 10 minutes up to 7 sets of instructions. Then you get the remaining 50 minutes to wrap up your scrap page and post it to the gallery and forum. This is a total of two hours to complete an entire layout. And amazingly, with the pressure of the competition (and usuallly some small reward), you get it done!

As stated in my last post, I participated in a speed scrap last night at goDigitalScrapbooking.com, but there are plenty of websites that host them on a regular basis.

I spent some time retouching my layout this morning, getting the shadows just right, etc., and am providing you a look at the speed scrap version and the retouched version below.

"Home Coming"

Credits:
- Papers from "Spontaneous Delight" by Carrie Stephens
- Mat shape from "My Secret Garden" by creations by Rachael at http://www.funkyplaygrounddesigns.com
- Tag from "Happiness" by Summer Driggs
- Journal from "Enjoy the Day" by Simply Sweet Designs by Kim
- Title Alpha from "Date Night" by Aaron Moris of Sir Scrapalot Designs
- Journal/Tag Alpha "Pea Charmaine" from KevinandAmanda.com

My First Speed Scrap!

2009-05-29T23:21:00.003-04:00

I competed in a speed scrap over at goDigitalScrapbooking.com!!!!

I'm all excited after that intense, but fun, 2 hours. I'm so pleased with my results. Who knew I could scrap that fast? So that was my 5th or 6th layout ever. I'll give you a link and post it officially tomorrow with the proper credits.

And, if you don't know what a speed scrap is, I'll explain in my next post. Promise.

http://www.godigitalscrapbooking.com/photopost/showphoto.php?photo=57690

Rule Of Thirds

2009-05-26T09:44:00.004-04:00

Cropping photos using the "Rule of Thirds" makes photographs seem more appealing, interesting, and exciting. It is a technique that can be used not only when taking photographs, but also back home when prepping photos for use in scrapbooking layouts.

There is a great tip on Scrappers Guide that describes how to simply apply a grid already available in Adobe Photoshop or Photoshop Elements to help you line up the objects in your photo to create an interesting dynamic by using the "Rule of thirds".

There are separate tutorials. One for Adobe Photoshop, available here: http://www.scrappersguide.com/tips_ps/thirds-ps/
and one for Photoshop Elements, available here: http://www.scrappersguide.com/tips_el/thirds/

****In other news, my wonderful husband bought me a 1TB external harddrive. How awesome is that?!!!****

Texture on Photographs

2009-05-24T20:38:00.008-04:00

My favorite scrapbooking designer is Summer Driggs of Summertime Design s. She does such amazing work! Back in March she offered a tutorial on how to add texture on photographs. The trouble was that she did it using Photoshop while I only have Photoshop Elements. Therefore, I decided, once I figured out how to do it, to create a tutorial of the same thing for you specifically for Photoshop Elements.

1. Start by opening your photo in Photoshop Elements.

2. Since I'm following Summer's tutorial, the next step she likes to do is adjust the levels. You can skip steps 2 and 3 if you would like. To do this make sure your picture is highlighted in the layers section to the right. Then click "Enhance" > "Adjust Lighting" > "Levels".

3. Move the tabs around to adjust the levels until you are pleased with your results. In Summer's tutorial she shows you exactly what she does. I will simply describe it. First, move the white tab on the right and move it slightly to the left. Next, move the black tab, on the left, over slightly to the right. Then move the middle gray tab to the left or right as needed. When you are done you can uncheck the "Preview" button to see the before picture to compare the changes.

4. To create a grungy look, you will need to find a texture to use to create an overlay. There are many textures available on the Internet. People also like to photograph textures themselves. For this tutorial I am using a texture that I found at http://www.deviantart.com. It is called "Forgotten Texture" by Firesign24_7 from this link: http://firesign24-7.deviantart.com/art/Forgotten-texture-117652416.

5. You should be viewing your picture on Photoshop Elements at this point. Next open the texture in Photoshop Elements. You need to be able to see both your picture and your texture at the same time. So if they are not both visible, click on the "Restore Down" in the upper-righthand corner of the viewing box, which is located to the left of the "X", it will have two small squares---one on top of the other. For the next step you need to click on the "Move Tool" on the top left of the toolbar.

6. Next you want to drag the texture onto the picture. Now that you are viewing both the texture and the picture AND have selected the "Move Tool", it is real simple to move the texture onto the picture. Just grab the texture and drag it over onto the picture. In the texture window (in my example it is on the right), click the "X" in the upper right corner of the viewing window to close the texture window. You will no longer need it.

7. Once you do this, you will just be viewing the picture window, which has both your picture and texture on it. In the layers panel you will see that the texture layer is above the picture layer.

8. Next you want to make sure that the entire texture is covering the picture. Since both of these are photographs, my texture fit perfectly over the picture. To adjust your texture, make sure that the texture layer is selected by choosing it in the layers panel. Then using the bounding boxes at the sides and corners of the texture adjust the texture so that it is the same size as the picture. After making the adjustments, you will need to select the green check mark or hit the enter key to affirm your changes. Now the texture is covering the whole background.

9. Now make sure the texture layer is selected by looking in the layer panel, and clicking on it if it is not selected. Then click the drop down blending mode, by clicking on the selection area that says "Normal" below the Layer Panel heading.

10. From the list that appears, choose "Overlay". You can also play around with the other options in this group and see what effects they create. You can select: "Soft Light," "Hard Light," "Vivid Light," "Linear Light," "Pin Light," or "Hard Mix."

11. You are almost finished.

12. Next we will remove the texture from the bodies of the people, which gives a cleaner fresher look. I only remove the texture from the people that the picture focuses on, not those in the background. Here is a close up. It helps to zoom in to make sure you are careful and stay along the edges.

13. The erasing takes place on the texture layer, revealing the picture beneath. Make sure that you have the texture layer selected in the layer panel. To erase, select the "Eraser Tool". You can adjust which brush is selected (choose a round one, for example), and the size of the brush at the top of the viewing window. A smaller size helps around details (here I am using size 23).

14. Tada! You are finished. Note: Summer uses the burn tool at the end of her tutorial, which you can do in Photoshop Elements. However, I did not use it because the texture I used created a similar effect on the edges of my picture that I was happy with.

Why We Scrapbook

2009-05-22T10:46:00.004-04:00

This blog is not going to be only links to other blogs, but when I find something good, I want to share it!

Today, on Inkin' & Thinkin', there is a great entry on a reason to scrapbook. It's lengthy, but worth the read. It really struck a chord with me---what my goal should be when I scrapbook. It also made me want to go back and improve my journaling on the couple of pages that I have scrapped so far.

Please take the time to read this: http://inkinandthinkin.typepad.com/inkin_thinkin/2009/05/vintage-chique-a-freebie.html

Brushes in Photoshop Elements

2009-05-11T14:52:00.004-04:00

As I have looked around at various blogs and digi-scrapping websites I have noticed that a lot of people's favorite device is "brushes" for altering their photographs, making pretty papers, and neat looking embellishments. And I have been asking myself, "what the heck are brushes?" for weeks now. I have read various people's descriptions of what brushes are and it has still been slow to sink in exactly what they are talking about, although along the way I have at least figured out how to find them in Photoshop Elements.

Well another problem I have run into is that I have Photoshop Elements, not Photoshop, and there are not many tutorials for Photoshop Elements. So I have not been sure when reading directions on brushes if they actually apply to Photoshop Elements or not. So, I have finally found a tutorial which actually explains what brushes ARE and not just how to use them and is specific to Photoshop Elements.

If you are wondering what brushes are too then you need to read this tutorial from ScrapGirls.com: http://www.scrapgirls.com/how_to_use_brushes_in_Photoshop_Elements_PSE.htm

Grandma and Her Girls

2009-05-09T21:16:00.006-04:00

Last week my grandma passed away. My twin sister and I were her only granddaughters and we had a special relationship with her. She was an incredible woman that we loved so very much. The pictures here are from 1985 and 2007.

It was with a heavy heart that I put together this scrapbook page. Her memory will live on.

Love you, Grandma.

"Grandma & Her Girls"
Lillian Herbrandt Stiefel
Nov. 2, 1923 - Apr. 28, 2009

Papers and Elements: Summer Driggs' Sweet Springtime Kit
Mask: Photo Mask #1 by Gunhild Storeide
Font: Pea Charmaine from KevinandAmanda.com

Top Left: Ryan and Grandma (Aug. 2005);
Right: Grandma (1940s, Miami, Fla.) (I just love this picture!);
Bottom Left: Elise and Grandma (Aug. 2005)
Frame: Mad Genius Designs (Jewel Goodwin)

First Layout Using Photoshop Elements

2009-05-09T17:08:00.003-04:00

Today, over at Simple Scrapper, there are great directions on how to create your first layout in Adobe Photoshop Elements.

Check it out: http://www.simplescrapper.com/2009/05/09/you-asked-about-getting-started/

Using Photoshop Brushes to Make Overlays and Papers

2009-05-08T15:06:00.002-04:00

Lynn Clifford posted a great introductory tutorial on using brushes in Photoshop. Check it out!

Visit Bella Scraps Magazine here:
http://bellascraps.com/?p=803

Happy National Scrapbooking Day!

2009-05-02T12:47:00.002-04:00

Happy National Scrapbooking Day!

enjoy all of the freebies and great buys!

Digi-Scrapping Blogs

2009-04-29T20:33:00.006-04:00

The above papers are from Summer Driggs' kit Apples and Almonds. The edges are by Gunhild from Edges

To help facilitate your search for digi-scrapping blogs---particularly those that offer freebies---I have set up a list of blogs in the right column of my blog called "Scrapping Blogs". Check out these wonderful blogs!

My First Digi-Scrapped Layouts

2009-04-28T13:31:00.008-04:00

Below are my first attempts at digital scrapbooking.

I started digi-scrapping in March before I found all of the wonderful sites on the web that display people's layouts and cool freebie kits, etc. So I did some of these before I had any influence from outside sources. The last in the series actually uses some papers from a kit and is based on a template, and, of course, is the best looking of the bunch, I think.

Without further ado:

Saguaro National Park:
Backgrounds: The Shabby Princess Promise Collection
Fonts: The Prime Minister of Canada and Milk & Cereal
Based on Template: #95 by Simply Yin

Google Reader is a New Digi-Scrappers Best Friend!

2009-04-26T16:34:00.007-04:00

Do you use Google Reader? If you don't you should be! Read below to learn why!

Google Reader is a way to keep up with feeds, specifically the latest blog posts. This is crucial for any "newbie" scrapper.

Why? First, as a newbie, we don't have many scrapbooking papers or elements to work with. Instead of going broke we rely on the kindness of those who offer freebies. The trouble is that most freebies expire and move to a site's store after a short period of time, so you need to be on top of them when they are still free. Likewise, as a newbie, we are still developing our skills and styles and the best way to learn is by learning from others. Studying the layouts of others will help us to grow as scrappers ourselves. But visiting various blogs that post freebies and layouts can become work if you have to click on bookmark after bookmark to find all of the blogs that you follow.

But Google Reader does all of the work for you. You simply subscribe (you will need to register for a Google account if you do not have one) to Google Reader and add subscriptions to all of the blogs that you follow. Instead of visiting each website, just go to http://reader.google.com and any new posts will show up in the viewing window. That way every day you can do a quick scroll through all of the most recent blog posts at one website. Just click on any links and Google Reader will open a new window. It's perfect for staying on top of all of the new stuff out there without taking much time. I absolutely love it and recommend you use it too.

To quickly subscribe a blog or feed look for the +Google button. I have one in the right column of my page, in the drop-down "Posts" button under the Subscribe heading. Click it and you will be able to easily view all future blogs in Google Reader. It is really worth your time. It looks like this (but make sure you click on the actual button in the right column, this is just a picture so you will recognize it):

Note -- June 8, 2009: I just found where another digi-scrapper talked about Google Reader on her blog. She gives you very specific directions on setting up Google Reader, so if you have any more questions, check out her tutorial at Digital Scrapbooking - No Glue Required, dated March 20th.

Links to Digital Scrapbooking Websites for Beginners

2009-04-24T13:09:00.008-04:00

Today I want to share links to digital scrapbooking websites that are helpful to beginners. These are some links that I have found useful. Most of them explain the basics of digi-scrapping.

About.com -- A Beginner's Reference to Digital Scrapbooking
this site explains the basic elements that make up digi-scrapping from the software programs you can use to papers, fonts, word-art and the like

Scrapbook Bytes -- New to Digital Scrapbooking?
this site offers general information on digi-scrapping and tutorials to various software programs

Digital Scrapbooking 101
you have to join this site, but it offers tutorials and all kinds of good stuff, including a forum, for beginners to learn the basics of digital scrapbooking

Digital Scrapbook Place
offers tutorials on lots of scrapbooking techniques on several different graphics programs

the DAILY Digi -- New
the column of links on the right of this page discusses some of the basic issues of digi-scrapping
the DAILY Digi -- Just for Beginners Category
a link to all of the blog posts specific to beginners (generally tutorials)

The Scrapper's Guide to Adobe Photoshop Elements and Adobe Photoshop
specific to Photoshop & Photoshop Elements---this site offers some free tips

TheShabbyShoppe.com
this site offers tutorials on using some graphics design software for common scrapping needs

Scrapping Guy
general tips and tutorials for digi-scrappers, including video tutorials for Photoshop Elements 7

Summertime Designs
is my favorite designer that I've found out there in the blogosphere, and her kits are all free; she also answers bloggers questions and gives tutorials and tips to learn how to do some of the amazing stuff she does

Scrapping with Liz
this is a blog that provides templates and designs, and is useful to the beginner scrapper because it provides tutorials on how to use the freebie kits and templates you will find on many scrapbooking blog sites

Andrea's Bits and Scraps and Little Ironies
this is another blog that offers freebie templates and designs, the great thing is she provides tutorials on how to use her templates in Photoshop Elements and Photoshop CS 2/3/4

Pineapple Plantation Designs
this is yet another blog that offers layouts and quick pages, but it also offers tutorials, tips and tricks for Photoshop and Photoshop Elements, just look under "categories" on the right

This list is by no means exhaustive and if I find any more truly useful sites I'll update the list. This should help you get started for now.

New Banner & Background

2009-04-22T23:18:00.009-04:00

Special thanks goes to three websites for use of their designs that I used to create the background and banner for this blog.

The papers, ribbon, paperclip, and flowers are by Summer Driggs from the kit Bubblegum and Licorice which I found on her website http://summertimedesigns.blogspot.com
The butterfly is from the Bee Happy kit by Sara at http://sweetblossomdesigns.blogspot.com/
The photo frame is from the Earth Day Freebie kit from the website P.Y.S.B.: www.pimpyourscrapbook.com

I'd also like to thank Nicole at Life's A Canvas for her directions on creating a banner for Blogger. And thanks goes to http://thecutestblogontheblock.com/ for directions on how to make your own background for Blogger. Their backgrounds are amazing!

Scrapbooking (digi-scrapping) Beginner

2009-04-22T17:25:00.004-04:00

Hi and welcome! I have decided to take up digi-scrapping as my new hobbie! And I thought, why not blog about it? That way I can share what I learn and anyone else that decides to take up digi-scrapping can learn from my journey and any stumbling blocks I have come across.

It is my hope to use this venue to share any cool techniques I learn either scrapping or using Photoshop Elements (since I'm a newbie with it too), any interesting links that I think may be useful to others learning to scrap, and my own creations. Let's grow together.

Please leave me comments and critiques to help me grow, as well.