Challenge #95 week of 24th June 2013

Just popping in with a quick and easy prompt for us this week.

I know you are all busy and enjoying summer. It's quiet round here which has got me thinking... more of that soon.

In the meantime, I thought I'd find us a summery, sunny colour scheme to celebrate the summer solstice and the longest day of the year. Did you celebrate?

Source: Design Seeds here

Doesn't this scream beach, ice-cream, refreshing water, outdoor parties and lazy picnics?

And there are a lot of wonderfully pretty paper lines out there at the moment with these brighter colours - I know that I'll enjoy fishing out some of mine and showcasing it.

What will you create? Don't forget to share over at our Flickr gallery (here) with the prompt WM#95.

#94 inspired by doilies

And another week goes by. And not a lot of creative time but just enough today to make two layouts - go me! I've been alone since Friday evening for the first time for weeks and weeks and weeks which is a nice feeling and yesterday I kept myself busy painting my craft room and rearranging some furniture so you can expect a little peek of that on my blog sometime soon. So today was the christening of the new layout. Mmmm, not so sure but the room isn't finished yet so I will reserve full judgement.

But the two layouts? They made me happy. And isn't that what it's all about?

I asked you to fish out that pile of doilies that I'm sure you have in your stash. Or your doily stamps, papers, dies, tape, ribbons or anything inspired by doilies. And get creating.

I love this trend and have to stop myself using them too often. They make an appearance all over my creations and I pick them up in bulk from my bakery department. I'm not at all worried about acid free but if you were, you could just keep them away from direct contact of your photos.

I picked up a new pretty design and decided to match them up with my new June Counterfeit kit, Personality, which has been sorely neglected this month with all the chaos and little creating. But what a pretty kit so the addition of the doilies was perfect.

Personality lo#2 - please excuse the poor photo, it's late and the light is bad.

I was inspired by this Pinterest find (here) and made a border of confetti. Lots of pretty colours and hearts 

I used doilies in their normal form as edging but also as a photo mat and used doily tape too

I have used confetti a couple of times recently and Lynette asked me how I did it so I will put up a post on my blog in the next days - so simple but so much fun!

Hope you enjoyed prettying up your layouts with delicate doillies and we'd love to see your creations over at the Flickr gallery (here) with the tag WM#94

Challenge #94 week of 17th June 2013

Happy almost mid-summer's day everyone!

Hope you are enjoying the longer days before they turn again after the summer equinox on 21st and we start heading downhill to the end of the year with ever shortening days! Ha ha! Always make me smile to think that - I don't know about you, but we are just heading into the good weather here so it's always funny to think that the days are already getting shorter.

Anyway, things are pretty quiet round here and we are all busy I guess. And I know that I am still behind on some prompts so maybe this "easier" one this week will help us all out to get involved in a simpler way.

I was looking round my room when I saw my new doilies that I'd picked up recently from some foodie shop and thought how pretty they are. I now have quite a collection - much expanded by a wonderful selection from our delightful Leslie last year. They are truly treasured doilies and I try to make sure I only use them as and when they will be showcased to their best.

This is just a small number of those I have:

Don't they all look so pretty?

So this week, I'm challenging you to use up doilies on your layouts. Whether they are real, printed, die-cut or masked, find some way to incorporate pretty lacy effects into your designs. A perfect excuse for a girlie layout perhaps!

Here are a couple of examples of layouts where I've used this effect:

Have a great week everyone and don't forget to link up over at Flickr (here) with the tag WM#94.

Can't wait to see what you create.

#93 inspired by the everyday

It's busy round here and I'm beginning to feel like I run a B&B! People are coming and going all the time - or so it feels and I'm finding it hard to make the time to scrapbook. But on Friday I was looking at some Instax photos I had on my desk (and if you don't have an Instax you NEED one!) and came across a photo of my two brothers, right here in my living room, playing on the PS3.

And then I realised that this is an everyday for me, but just this summer. And how perfect that was for this week's challenge.

March Counterfeit kit, Disconnected lo#6

I added in the Studio Calico veneers to the kit and picked out just the more masculine papers from the kit to make up this layered, simple design.

How are you recording your everyday this week? Be sure to share over at our Flickr group (here) with the tag WM#93. 

Challenge # 93 - Week of June 10th, 2013

Well hello, hello.

It's you again. And I delighted you have decided to join us.

Things (and by things, I mean my life) have been all kinds of hectic recently. Adjusting to my new life has taken quite a toll on my crafting, blogging and other routines. 

In the grand scheme of things, I feel that is perfectly normal. But it certainly made me feel a bit nostalgic for my old "everyday". Which brings me to an important lesson and the prompt for this week - we need to document RIGHT NOW often. I've done "my everyday" pages in the past...

but the every day constantly changes...

and it is those changes and real bits that we are trying to capture on our pages...

 

(for example, the fact that I no longer nap every day... in fact I rarely have time).

So document your right now. Your everyday. The little things that make up your (maybe) monotonous life because it will be fascinating to look back at it. And speaking of looking back - remember to add it to our gallery with the tag WM#93.

xo,

Pamage

ps: hopefully everyone is having a great week.

Challenge #92 week of 3rd June 2013

I've been caught on the hop today and didn't have a prompt ready to go. Not that I don't know that it's my turn every second week - ha ha!

But I gave it some thought and had a peek around the internet and found something that made me smile.

On my personal blog, I have a widget that lists holidays and birthdays for each day. When you click on it, you are connected to a gift site but they give a bit of background to each of the holidays (and birthdays) listed.

Well.... today, 3rd June 2013 (and every 13th June in fact), is... Repeat Day.

I read what they had to say:

"Repeat Day is a day to do something over and over again. Just keep repeating, preferably something that you like to do. A good idea would be to choose a snack that you enjoy. Repeat eating that snack over and over again. You should avoid things that you don't like because you don't want to keep repeating something that is not enjoyable." (source here)

Why on earth we need a special day to do things we love over and over again I'll never know and the fact that they needed to warn us that we shouldn't choose something we dislike to do over and over again makes me realise that there's a lot of dross out there!

But... Repeat Day. Do what you love over and over and over.

So that's my challenge to you. Take an element of your page design, subject matter, paper choices, colour selections - whatever you love, and repeat it. At least once. Bonus points if you do it more than once!

I know that you all know I love the stacking

the clustering

 and the tying up with string.

Pam loves the doodling

the bright colours

and the quirky mixing up of papers.

If you look through the gallery you will find many many examples of these features. We repeat things all the time. It makes us happy. It makes sense to do what you love and repeat it. Let's do it!

Don't forget to share over at Flickr (here) with the prompt WM#92. Can't wait to see all that repetition!

#91 inspired by washi

I really have way too much of this stuff. And somehow anytime I see it, I find a pattern I don't yet have and need to have it.

So this was a great opportunity to use up some stash.

I have filled up a background with washi before, but I decided to make a rainbow just for fun. And I love the results. Absolutely no patterned paper on this one. And this pink, purple, teal, green color combo has to be a new favorite.

But I also wanted to try something new, so I made a bunch of strips of these washi tabs. It's hard to appreciate the texture from this view, but trust me, it is exquisite. 

So there you have it. That is how I use washi. How did you use washi this week? Can't wait to see it on the gallery (just remember to tag it WM#91).

xo,
Pamage

#91 inspired by washi tape

I decided I had far too many of my Counterfeit kits on the go and that Urban should be finished off. So, with that in mind, I fished around for all the washi tapes that would go with this more masculine colour scheme and then paired that all up with a mini instax photo of me and my brothers.

I wanted the washi to shine so just lined them up along each of the side edges and let them be the main attraction. A small pile of papers under the photo, a lot of splatting and a hint of embellishment means this layout came together really quickly.

All it needed was a simple title and a few lines of journalling before adding some bits and pieces from the bottom of my kit (including some very, very old Tinkering Ink rub-ons) and this layout was finished.

Counterfeit February Urban kit, layout #9

If I hadn't been watching TV at the same time (which I never do for exactly this reason) I would have been finished in about 45 minutes rather than the considerably longer than it actually was :-)

Hope you were inspired by washi this week and will share your creations over at our Flickr gallery (here) with the tag WM#91.

I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh prompt so we hope you will come back and check it out.

Have a great start to the week.