Challenge WM#336 - week of 28th October 2019

A short week for me here in Germany with Friday being a Bank Holiday for All Saints' Day and of course, who isn't happy with a four-day work week? That seems a good way to start the week. How are you today?

This week, I'm once again looking at the calendar with Thursday evening being Halloween. It's not such a big event here in Germany although the shops certainly seem pretty full of themed items this year. But I wanted to at least decorate a little and got my box out of the cellar to see what I had - a bit of a sort out of things that I really don't need any more and I'm left with a small selection of pretties, most of which were created using scrappy product. Good to get some Halloween products used up!

In the past, I've marked this point on the calendar in a variety of ways -

• WM#12 - be inspired by "scary"
• WM#190 - be inspired by pumpkins
• WM#309 - be inspired by a candy colour scheme 

So how to mark it in 2019? Well, how about quite traditionally but in a way that I know can be taken in a million different directions.

Let's be inspired by "Trick or Treat"

Now, I'm not going to actually give you a "million" different directions to take this prompt but you could try:

• a traditional Halloween page about costumes, decorations, a particular year, the traditions you have, the sweets your kids collect, what you did as a child, favourite memories from this time of year
• what about your favourite sweet treats that you hoped to collect from the neighbourhood when you went trick or treating
• or maybe you played a Halloween trick on someone - or worse, were the victim of a trick from the local kiddies!
• how about your favourite sweet treats at any time of the year
• or how you were tricked in a good, or maybe less good, way
• the story of a practical joker in your family
• cakes, desserts, confectionary or even drinks could be the subject this week
• you could make a "trick" on your page with something interactive or hidden or with a double meaning
• use up your sweet themed products
• record how you treat yourself when you're in need of a pick up

Not quite a million, but a few to get you thinking!

Whichever way you decide to go, I really hope you'll share. It would be great to see what you make.  You can connect with us in our Facebook group here. Tag your entry with #WMXXX (with the number of the prompt instead of the XXX) so we know exactly which inspiration you've taken.

Have a great day everyone!

Challenge #309 - week of 29th October 2018

It's Halloween week and I'm sure many of you have decorated and are getting ready for trick or treat'ers knocking on your door. Some of you might even be getting dressed up in your creepy costumes.

We used to do that too which was a lot of fun, but these days I tend to just note that the day is here and move on! Halloween was always a mini-celebration when I was a child which was fun even though we didn't go from door to door. But there would be party games at home usually involving apples or sweets which was good enough for me.

I don't think I've ever done a regular Halloween prompt here so I'm going to continue that by offering you an inspired colour scheme courtesy of Design Seeds. { candied hues } was posted on 31st October 2017 which is totally on cue. 

So, be inspired by a candy colour scheme!

{ candied hues } image via: @rotblaugelb
Design Seeds - original source here

I think this picture really has some of the main tones you might find at Halloween so if those are the photos you want to use, that should be a great combination. But the purple, pink, brown and orange would be perfect for autumn thoughts or nature walks. I really think this is a lovely range of colours that are ideal for a whole range of projects and memories - see where you go!


I hope you'll share and of course, here's a reminder that you can connect with us in our Facebook group here. Tag your entry with #WMXX so we know exactly which inspiration you've taken. 

Challenge #235 - week of 31st October 2016

Happy Halloween everyone.

I've been trying hard to come up with something that's linked to this creepy time of year without it being specifically Halloween itself. We've had inspirations from being scared and pumpkins but I think today we are going dark.

This week, I'd like you to be inspired by night time.

Ideas that spring to mind on this topic are things that go bump in the night, the dark nights at this time of year for us in the northern hemisphere, taking a moonlight walk, even the appearance of the super moon which happened in October but which we will also get on 14th November and December. Perhaps you'd like to talk about your love of night time or maybe how scared you are in the dark. A ghost story under the stars at camp or a particular Halloween memory one scary evening.  Night time photos can also be a way to take this. There's a lot of different ways to interpret the prompt.

And for inspiration, here are a couple of layouts I made some time ago from the same Counterfeit Kit Challenge kit which could fall under this category - one using a photo of a super moon a few years ago to talk about my moon inspired mood swings, one about stepping out into the black one night while we were in Canada and one featuring "dark" photos!

Obviously I didn't have photos of this particular experience so I simply used a photo
taken earlier that very evening to represent my experience.

And with that, I wish you a great week, whether or not you'll be dressing up in costumes and heading out into the dark night, or not!

We'd love you to use this prompt and hope you will share your creations - there are now two ways to do this!

You can either upload your layout into the Whimsical Musings Flickr gallery with the tag WM#235 or you can post it in our Whimsical Musings Facebook group. We've decided that we'll save albums for special occasions so just load up your photo to the group with the tag WM#235 in the write up text so that we can find it.

Challenge #190 week of 2nd November 2015

It was Halloween weekend and while it's not that heavily celebrated here in Germany, there is plenty of evidence of it around and we were even invited to dress up and go along to a mini-party.

But although Halloween isn't a German "thing", it is a must to decorate your home as the seasons change and this time of year is all about the pumpkins - mini, large, white, orange, bright yellow or knobbly and green! Of course, I like to add a bit of glitter or metallics into the mix and enjoy bringing  both traditions together with some Halloween influences.

Some years, I carve pumpkins (can't for the life of me find the photo of my crowning carving glory but maybe I can track that down for my layout!) and generally, as the layout below shows, it's all about the details.

You know that I don't just want to give you All Hallow's Eve as inspiration, but rather the more specific pumpkin or Kurbis as we say round here.

So this week, be inspired by pumpkins.

Of course, that could encourage you to scrap a page about the 31st itself ...

Or you might like to be inspired by these gorgeous decorated pumpkins I found on Pinterest - use them as a design on your page, even make you own and then feature them on a page or maybe go in the direction of colours and form.

Pinterest find here

Pinterest find here

Pinterest find here

I hope you had a wonderfully spooky Halloween and I'd love to see your shares over at our Whimsical Musings Flickr gallery here with the tag WM#190.

#41 - Inspired by Superheroes

Hello my beautiful ladies. This post was scheduled ahead of time, because I am glad to report I finally had a weekend away. I am probably eating some Maple Candy in Boston.

Anyway, let's get to the juicy part of this post - my layouts. I couldn't decide if I should go the serious or silly route so once again I created two layouts interpreting this challenge.

super pam

yes, believe it or not, that superhero is me. It was a few days before Halloween 2010 and I realized I didn't have a costume for the festivities, so I quickly pulled together this ensemble from my personal wardrobe (who else owns black leather pants but me?!?) only adding the wig, cape, mask and belt buckle. My favorite part of the story were the details in the "highlight" section. I didn't take a single worthy picture of my get up all night, but I was able to make the most of this bad iphone selfie by covering the clutter with patterned paper and washi tape, leaving just my crazy costume as the front and center part of this page. I chose bold prints and colors to emphasize the superhero feel (and let's face it, because they make me happy). Because there wasn't much story and the photo wasn't showcase worthy I took a cue from Lisa's book and made it 6x12. Overall, I am thrilled I made this page and told this funny story of how I had a wedding reception to attend before the party and so I wore this under my dress and at the end of the party changed quickly in a bathroom and exited in costume. I felt like a total super hero.

[hero]

when i sat down and thought above who the brave and courageous are in my life, my brother immediately popped into my mind. The picture doesn't really portray him as such, but I just picked one from the file and went with it. I like that he looks ordinary in it because it fits the quote I found so well. I kept the journaling, which was very personal, hidden. But i wanted to give readers a clue of the reason for the page, so I stamped the quote (which was very time consuming) and added a short line of journaling up one of the sides.

I also was inspired by the colors in the photo, so I pulled papers and products that matched those colors and I love the results.

I hope you all had a fun time creating if you played along with us this week and I look forward to seeing your creations in the gallery (tag WM#41). Lisa will be back tomorrow with another great challenge to get us started in June. 

Until next week,

xo

Pamage

#12 inspired by "scary" and Halloween

So Lisa's challenge this week instantly had me thinking... and scared. I hardly ever take on "scary" topics on my pages. I have never made a Halloween page and even when I talk about my challenges or struggles I find a happy, ironic way to portray it on a page.

But eventually I sat down at my table and made a page about what really scares me.

Now I realize this isn't very whimsical, but I just wanted to show you that it is ok {even necessary} to scrap those tough topics. It tells a more complete story. I wanted the focus to be on the topic so I used minimal product. And as I usually do when I take on a hard subject, I got super artsy and messy with some mod-podge, magazine scraps and gesso.

Don't worry. I did also create a playful layout that is more my style. I figured with this prompt I had to finally get some of those Halloween pictures scrapped.

Since I had no theme product I improvised with some punches and colorful patterned papers. Maybe not "scary" but definitely fun. Thank you Lisa for pushing me {or more like nudging me} to tell two types of stories I never tell.

Did you play along too? If you did, I hope you will add your layout to our flick'r group with the tag WM#12.

xo,
Pamage

Challenge #12 week of 31st October 2011

Pam sets the bar pretty high for the challenges and I was thinking all week about this. In fact, I'm constantly thinking about challenges for the future and noting down ideas here and there. We want to make this fun, interesting and inspirational so the prompts need to be set to get you (and me) thinking.

Today is Halloween in case you hadn't noticed ;-) I guess you guys over there in the US (and Canada?) can't really escape it. It's a pretty big celebration I hear. Over in the UK it's a smaller, quieter affair and here in Germany, it's something that's been imported and is now celebrated a bit but without really understanding what it's all about :-)

But, after all, it IS October 31st and I figure we should have a challenge that's linked to it in some way.

So, here it is:

Now, you can of course take it totally at face value and make a Halloween page. Scary, right?

I seem to remember that this is a Page Maps sketch.

Or you could take it a bit deeper and make a page about something you are scared of. Maybe something quirky that gives you the heeby jeebies or something serious like, *horror of horrors*, spiders. Gives me the chills just to think about those creepy creatures.

Or maybe you take it even deeper and write about your worries. Of course, it would be lovely if you didn't have any and I don't wish them on you. But generally, most of us have a few niggles here and there.

Where will SCARY take you this week?

You can share your projects with us at our Flickr group (Whimsical Musings), using the tag WM#12.

Hope to see you there!