Challenge #32 week of 26th March 2012

Happy Spring! And from our corner of the world, Happy Summer (daylight saving) time! We turned our clocks forward on Saturday evening here in Europe and wow, that extra hour of evening light makes such a different - pity about the darker mornings! I can feel the improved mood of everyone around me as summer starts to look more likely!

I'm actually writing this prompt early on Sunday morning as I'm going to be ever so slightly busy the next 48 hours as I have a visitor coming to see me. Someone I haven't seen for coming up to 14 years. My best friend from my time in the Philippines is touring Europe at the moment and is taking a detour to drop in to me in Germany (!) for two days. I think we are both really excited as this could be the last time we ever see each other. I think the chances of me getting over to the Philippines again is remote - it's a REALLY long way away! LOL.

But her visit got me thinking that I've never scrapped her or our relationship before. I have a small collection of pages from back then but mostly "me" focussed, and that's sad don't you think?

Which got me thinking about our next prompt. So this week, I'm challenging you to scrap about a relationship from the past that hasn't reached your pages yet. You can bet that I'll be featuring Alice on my layout this week but it doesn't necessarily have to be a friend, or even a person if you want to take the idea a little wider.

As well as recording my friendship with sweet Alice, I'm thinking that I could record my relationship on a wider level with the country itself:

Just realised that I have a wonky horizon! Will have to correct that. 

The weather there - hot and dry or hot and wet. And I didn't do anything with the colours of this photo! This is really a storm rolling in - it was intense!

I could talk about the company I worked for, my relationship to the work I did and of course, the wonderful colleagues/friends I had there

I had a pretty big hate/hate relationship to the traffic!

And I fell in love with the culture and made some amazing short trips around with friends I made there:

None of these ideas have yet been scrapped and now I have a whole list!

I hope you'll join in and think about someone or something that might have been neglected on your pages. Don't forget to upload your creation to our Flickr gallery with the prompt WM#32.

#31 Inspired by Spring

I was worried that this week I would experience the same creative block I seemed to be under last week. Even though I supply the prompts, sometimes I struggle finding the direction I want to go in and often I struggle to be inspired!

So it is extra-refreshing when it happens. And this week it happened. I started off easy on myself by finding a layout I loved and scrap-lifting it. I feel that picking up a starting off point like that allows me to focus on adding the little elements that make a page my own, while taking the guess work out of the design elements.

Since I knew all the elements I needed I just focused on finding papers and patterns that reminded me of spring. I also added some butterflies and buttons in those shades. Overall, this page helped me feel inspired to create more. So I did!

 For this page I used a color combination provided by Lain for the Scrap Happy inspiration for March. It was the perfect color combo for this Julie FFB crayon-watercolor resist technique {here}.

 I also wanted to show you the drawbacks of journaling right on top of your carefully painted background - you can mess it up! But luckily I am the type of girl that embraces imperfection. {see those almost invisible little strips of paper that allow me to re-write the words i fudged. yeah, I spelled girls as GILRS.)

And since my first two pages weren't really Spring related, I felt I had one more story left in me. This time I used a pretty simple sketch, provided by Lain for Scrap Happy. The simple sketch allowed me to use creative license on the items I use in filling up the designated spots.

 One of the new techniques I tried this week was this gesso+stencil+paint technique. I rather like how it turned out even with all it's imperfections.

I hope you had some time to be outdoors this week and enjoy the simple pleasures of spring. If you had some time to play, we would love to see what you came up with, just add the tag WM#31. Lisa will be back tomorrow with surely a fun challenge for the upcoming week. And just remember we will be at the discussion boards all week to help you along with finding inspiration. So we will see you there!

xo,
Pamage

#31 Inspired by Spring

Longer, warmer days with blue skies, chirping birds and an abundance of flowers are guaranteed to brighten up those winter blues so it was lovely for Pam to give us this prompt this week. 

I thought I was going to go deeper into the meaning of the prompt and had all sorts of ideas about rebirth or birth or new life (I have four siblings after all as well as two adorable nieces and a gorgeous nephew) but in the end I realised I just wanted to take some pretty pictures of my work on the balcony and go for something a bit more traditional.

Somehow, last year I missed spring altogether and our balcony never got the uplift it needed after one of the longest coldest winters ever, and it was very sad and drab all year long. I was determined to put in the effort this year and brighten up our outside living room.

Hard work and back ache was worth it and now we can be very German and spend the next months outside, relaxing and barbecuing!

Another great prompt Pam! I love my pretty layout and an excuse to use up half a dozen of my pretty photos :-)

As ever, I have several ideas from this prompt, stored for a rainy day. You never know, I might actually get around to making one or two of them :-)

Have a great Sunday everyone. The new prompt will be up tomorrow morning and I'll be back in a few days due to house guests!


Happy Spring!

Challenge #31 - Week of March 19th 2012

Well, in celebration of the upcoming Equinox {March 21st - read more about it here} and the wonderful little surprises that have been sprouting and blooming around here, I couldn't resist.

I have recently been inspired to take more pictures of nature and in doing so I have gained a new appreciation for it.

pictures I took around my neighborhood

Who could resist being inspired by this? Weather (get it?) Spring has arrived in your part of the world (and how I hope it has) or even if it is a few weeks away, I hope you will indulge me in celebrating this season.

Now, I have always been a Summer girl. And living in South Florida for a long time I never really noticed much of a change in the seasons. Living in a place with four seasons has given me a renewed appreciation for change, and re-birth and newness.

So choose to take Spring literally and pepper your layout with pretty blooms or choose to take it in a more metaphorical sense and talk about the abstract concept of Spring - your challenge this week is to be Inspired by Spring.


I so look forward to seeing how you interpret this and what Spring means in your life. I know Lisa will have a great take on this as her layouts often remind me of Spring. Happy Vernal Equinox to all.


If you are so inspired, I would love to see your creation in our ever-growing little gallery with the tag WM#31.

xo,
Pamage

#30 Inspired by current trends

Well, Lisa really inspired us by sharing her patchwork. I especially love quilting and the mismatch of fabrics is right up my alley.

Something Leslie said in the discussion boards this week solidified my design and off I went.

Funny that I also added stitching to my little hexagons, but i kept mine to just a few of the shapes. I loved diving into my scrap pile to find little pieces of papers I love which were the perfect size for the hexagons. The best part? My geometric background was made to match my style and my picture.

There is still a page or two left for me to explore with this challenge. I think this prompt showed us all how easy it is to recreate some of the trends we see in all the magazines and the new products. With just a little ingenuity we can all use what we have on hand to be on trend. And I love that.

Thank you Lisa for another great week.

xo,
Pamage

#30 - inspired by geometrics

This week I asked you to consider using the current trend of using geometric shapes.

Hexagons, diamonds, diagonals etc can be seen everywhere right now and while I've jumped on the chevron bandwagon, I was interested to see how I'd get on with one or two of the other shapes.

As I mentioned, my shape of choice in my patchworking days was the trusty hexagon so this was my first choice. I had a clear picture in my mind of how I wanted my layout to look like, which doesn't happen so often.

Then I thought that I'd never pull off the patchwork look I wanted to replicate and wondered if I should try something different. Something a bit more daring perhaps. I let my mind mull over this all week and in the end went with my original idea and I'm so pleased I did!

I had a vision of the white on white stitching and then was a little unsure about whether to mist the inside space or to use paper and decided on paper. I'd just made a super pretty and pink minibook for my niece so I picked up the scraps from that and went with the same super pretty, pink look for this layout. The white on white of the stitching was the perfect background for it.

I don't normally make the time to do stitching which is quite funny seeing as though my layouts take hours, but it never takes as much time as I anticipate. Even though this design was a bit more time and effort intensive than usual, I am so happy that I did it and the layout really has turned out almost exactly what I'd had in mind at the very beginning.

Pam should be here soon to share this week's creation with us and then don't forget to tune in again tomorrow to see what she has in store for us with the new prompt.

Have a great start to the week :-)

Challenge #30 week of 12th March 2010

I've just realised that I'm back on trend! ;-) No, really! Although even I find that hard to believe. But I've been looking around and keeping my eyes open and it's true. Even shapes have their time. And mine is back, or rather has been back for some time but I've only just realised.

Now you might be wondering what on earth I'm talking about but I want you to take a look at this rather ugly piece of patchwork here:

Would you be surprised to learn that this is about 35 years old? Well, the very centre of it is anyway. I learnt to patchwork by hand when I was about 8 with my grandmother. I couldn't make enough. And hexagons were my shape of choice. I never got into the more regular square shape, even though I'm sure it's quicker and easier. I started this piece here when I was about 9 and when I look at that very first circle right in the middle, I can tell it was stitched by a child! Let me tell you, it's not pretty! But anyway, to cut a long story short, this "quilt" has never been finished. I would pick it up and go crazy adding a ring or some flowers and then put it away for literally years. Now when I look at it, it's UGLY. But this wasn't the only thing I created at that time - anything that could be made from fabric got its own Laura Ashley patchwork version. Remember, it was the 70s after all :-)


So, what's this got to do with anything anyway? Well, you might have noticed that hexagons became very popular in scrapbooking about a year ago. I'm not really sure who brought it out on paper first (maybe SC?) and then came the chevrons (one of my faves right now) and just yesterday on Pinterest I noticed diamonds too - and I know that our very own Leslie created a diamond focused layout a for challenge #27 so she's right on trend too!

Celine Navarro for SC (here) 

A Pinterest find that links to a blog "Apriltwoeighty" which looks just gorgeous and appealed to my hexagon patchworking side although she's far more talented and up to date than I ever was :-)

A page by Waleska for JBS (here) and there are some other gorgeous layouts on the same page including a lovely hexagon based one. 

And here's a selection of products that follow the same trend.

Studio Calico

Studio Calico

My Mind's Eye

Core'dinations

Crafter's workshop

Echo Park

So the challenge this week is to incorporate this trend for geometrics into your scrapping in some way - paper, design, technique etc. 


Can't wait to see what you create over at our Flickr group (here) with the tag WM#10.


Have a great week everyone!

#29 Inspired by Dr Seuss

Those of you who have been reading the Flickr thread Pam started off over in our group know that I found this one hard! In fact, the prompt isn't hard at all. I just made it hard for myself and took myself round in circles concentrating on all the wrong things.

This isn't what scrapbooking is supposed to be like ladies! It's a hobby. It's fun. It's an escape. If you experience what I did, then you need to step away from the scissors and go and have some chocolate (or a gin and tonic - whatever does it for you!) and calm down.

I realised I was getting all whiny on the message board because I was caught up with the idea of scrapping my own personal experience of Dr Seuss but couldn't really come up with an example of something specific. I never owned any of the books though I read them with a passion while I was at the library and just loved them to bits. But even my mum couldn't come up with a specific memory of me and the books. I drove myself crazy trying to pin down a memory - ANY memory.

And then I stopped, had some said chocolate and relaxed. I imagined Pam sitting next to me, laughing at me getting all het up over nothing and smiled at myself. I could do this. What was I getting worried about!

First off, I decided to spend some time on the site that Pam had directed us to for inspiration and went through some of the titles, the book covers, the characters etc and decided to pick up the colour scheme for The Cat In The Hat - red, white and blue/aqua. And also to pick up on the quirkiness of the characters and his books. And I was off.

Except, scrapping at night under electric light can distort colours and my "blue" was way too green! I only saw this when I scanned it.

So I took off the green and searched around for something a bit more blue. And added that.

Next day, I took some photos and realised that it was still off, but better. The quirkiness was still there though with my splats, the slant to everything, the silly title, the odd selection of items and the original 1970's (scanned) photobooth photos.

In the end, I LOVE this layout! I think it's such fun. I rarely use red and I love the wow factor it brings to this white base.

The blue paint splats were actually the perfect colour - who knew!

And this is the original I made with all that gorgeous green! Still lovely but WRONG!

While I had been browsing the site, I came across the most perfect quote that got me thinking about the photos of us at the Northwest Territories border. The photos have been used before (what a surprise!) but this as another angle to the story.

The quote is, "I'm a North-Going Zax and I always go north. Get out of my way, now, and let me go forth." If that isn't perfect for the fact that we have been working our way further and further north through the holidays we've taken over the last years, I don't know what is!

I've made this using my CKC March kit, Soothe and while not a total favourite, I still like it. The photos are fun and I can remember standing there as if it were yesterday, when in fact it was August 2007!

So the moral of this story is - never forget to have fun, don't worry if you make a mistake - it's only paper! - and beware of taking it all too seriously!

I still have several other ideas from my brainstorming Dr Seuss session and only one directly relates to the books themselves :-)

Thanks Pam for really stretching me this week and for sitting here beside me when I got a little out of control!

#29 Inspired by Dr. Seuss

Well, I have to say that I have been blown away this week by the response from you, our readers. I have browsed our gallery and loved the projects you have come up with this week. They have exceeded my expectations of where I thought this inspiration could lead us... And as such I have been inspired to create as well.

I have to say I had to narrow down my choices of story. I really felt there was a lot of material I could explore with this. Ultimately the three stories I told feel real to me and go right along with my style and have a home in a albums.

I Do Not Like
This layout was inspired by "Green Eggs and Ham" - something I posted in the Discussion board on flick'r sparked this idea, since my name - Pam, rhymes with "Sam, I am" and "Ham". We often do pages about our faves, but I thought how fun it would be to also make one about our dislikes.

 I chose to use quirky whimsical shapes to replicate the Seussical feeling. And I added other little lines from the book to reinforce it.

 The stamped flowers were from a technique I picked up this week from Studio Calico Blog {here} of embossing an image and then coloring it in with markers.

 Oh The Places*
This layout was born of a strong memory I have attached to this book and the boy in this picture. I had never told this story and I really wanted to remember it. I recently received a care package from him {don't you love snail mail...?} So I thought it was perfect to document him/us/this memory while the feelings were fresh on my mind.

 I tried to use color, shapes and patterns that resonated with the theme of going places. The book is filled with graphics of flowing mountains and these travel papers were perfect for it. I started with the bottom paper and then worked myself up from there choosing coordinating papers.

 I have been focusing less on embellishments these days, so it was hard for me to come up with something to add to this corner, but I found a little flair button with a seuss-like creature and the ever present butterfly and buttons to round things off.

 A&P
Not a lot of journaling on this one. it doesn't need it. This one is all about fun. In looking for quotes to use, I found the one below and immediately I knew which pictures to use. This friend brings out the child in me. The layout I featured on the Challenge post was also about her. She is like a big child and when I am with her, I am too. This quote was perfect for us.

 Again I used colors that reminded me of the books and with the quirky stamped letters mixed in with my handwriting, I think I achieve the playful and whimsical look of a children's book. Simple page under 20 minutes straight out of my scrap bin. Just the way I like things.

Thank you so so much for playing along this week. If you haven't already, please upload your Seussical creation to our gallery with the tag WM#29. {which is coincidentally my favorite number}.

Have another great week and see you soon on the message boards.

xo,
Pamage

Challenge # 29 Week of March 5th, 2012

Hello there and Happy Monday. 

We are delighted that you are joining us again for another week of fun. Believe it or not, this is Whimsical Musing's challenge number 29 {and curiously my favorite number}.

As I roam the internet and read blogs and browse sites I am constantly awed by all the opportunities to find inspiration. Such inspiration came to me this week on March 2nd. As you may have become aware, it was the anniversary of Theodore Seuss Geisel's birth. It was also opening day for the new movie {Lorax} here in the States. 

It seemed the internet was a-buzz with the commemoration of his 108th birthday. And as I read more quotes and saw more images and remembered more stories I couldn't help but associate it with scrapping.

Consider these points of layout inspiration:

- use a quote from one of his books for title or journaling 

- Be inspired by a color scheme from seussville.com. His books were filled with happy, bright color combinations. Get in touch with your childlike side and play with these colors.

- Or browse the {characters section} for inspirational characters and compare these characters to characters in your life. Characters such as "The Grinch" or "Thing 1 & Thing 2" can lead to some great stories.

- Mimic the whimsical patterns and objects with your elements and design (my layouts often look seussical) . Don't be afraid to doodle free-hand. 

- Lastly, you could tell a story about your favorite (or your child's favorite) Dr. Seuss story or movie.

I want to see where inspiration takes you this week. There is plenty here to choose from. 

Lisa and I will be back with our layouts next week. I am looking forward to keeping my mind open to where this inspiration will lead me. If you are inspired and create something, please share it with us on our Flick'r site with the tag (WM#29). We love to see your work. 

xo,

Pamage

#28 Inspired by Longing

Well ladies, Lisa had a great challenge for us this week - create a layout about what we long for.

As a girl that was born on a Caribbean Island and spent most of her life in Sunny Florida, the winter months are not my favorite. There are a lot of things I long for. I could have taken this inspiration in many directions. But I decided to keep it airy and light.

I went 8.5x11" which is not really my style and was further inspired by this page {here} as the base for my layout.

"chancletas" is the spanish word I use for flip-flops. As soon as the weather is nice (and I mean above 50 degrees) my feet are permanently housing one of these. It may seem like a lot, but I have an obsession with them. I dislike socks, boots and closed toe shoes. 

I rarely take photos specifically for prompts. I usually just go with what I have, but this week was special. Thank you Lisa for inspiring me to create a page about this story I had never documented before.

Did Lisa inspire you to create a page about your longings? I do hope you will share with us over at our Flick'r gallery with the tag WM#28.

xo,

Pamage