Let's Celebrate - WM#100 Guest Designer Sherrie

It's Friday which means it's time to present Sherrie.

Sherrie is a prolific scrapper when she is on a roll and can easily create dozens and dozens of pages in a very short period. Always impressive. And she is so much fun, making me smile with her pages and her comments. She also provides me with tangs of envy as she's lucky enough to live in Canada - my dream destination in case you didn't know! I am secretly planning to descend on her one day for a weekend of scrapping and chatting in her scrap space which is big enough for the two of us as well as a few more of our WM friends!

She dragged herself out of the garden where she spends most of those long, long days to create a page just for us so let me hand you over to her.

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Slouching Towards 100! part 1

Hello friends, and welcome to day 5 commemorating Whimsical Musings' 100 weeks of prompts.

My name is Sherrie Breese and I have been seriously scrapping since 2006. I love the paper, the ribbons, buttons, bits and bobs. The pleasure of playing with tactile products is what pulls me in and can hold my attention to the exclusion of all else. Sometimes I get so immersed in the design process, it surprises me when I look up from the desk to see that the afternoon has turned to evening or even night. I wonder how that can happen, yet it only feels like I have been working for an hour or two.

Lisa and Pam became a part of my life when I joined  up for LOAD1011. Their design sensibilities had a major influence on me and I can say with certainty that they have had a huge impact on my scrapping style.  From Pam, I learned to use white cardstock and to (sometimes) allow some negative space. From Lisa, I learned to turn my random collages into clusters with focus. Through them I have also learned many fun tricks, like doodled borders, wrapping pages with string and twine, using paper doilies, tiny slivers of curled paper, photo collages with picasa, and I am sure a few more.

In celebration of their 100 weeks of prompts, I created a layout that is a retrospective of my first 50 years on my way to 100. I used my June Counterfeit Kit, Country Cousins Mel & Sam. The photos are representative of each decade. The idea came from the lineage of longevity afforded to me by the women in my family.  Hopefully I will be able to complement this layout  with part 2 in another 50 years or so.



 

Don't you just love the idea of using a whole "lifetime" of photos on one layout. And the idea that this is just part 1 is such a great take on the idea of a full and happy life as well as paying homage to the older women in her family.

Typical Sherrie to combine so many different elements, colours and patterns - it all works so well

Love the green dymo labels - that's the second layout this week to remind me to get my dymo out !

In the meantime, the WM party continues at my blog (here), where we will peruse the BBC's "must read" list of 100 Books. How many have you read?

Scrap "sis-stars" Lisa and Pam, thank you for all the work you do bringing us inspiration and challenges for the past, (almost) two years.

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So, Sherrie is expecting to reach 100 which is certainly something I suspect many of us can hope for too. So think of a life full of living and... 

Be inspired by... heading to 100 years of age. 

Whether you are half way there or even just 25% of the way to 100, think about heading to that wonderful number and make a page about some aspect of it. Please share your ideas and creations over at the Flickr Gallery (here) with the tag WM#100-5 - we'd love to see where you go with this today.

When Sherrie isn't out enjoying her garden and grandchildren, she can be found on her blog (here), as well as over at the Whimsical Musings Flickr group (here) or the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog (here).

ETA: Congratulations to Lynette who was the first to share her WM#100 layout over at Flickr. A little extra surprise will be winging its way across the ocean to you for being the first to join in :-)

Let's Celebrate - WM#100 Guest Designer Lynette

Today it’s time to introduce someone who is sweet and kind and thoughtful. Lynette. I just know we’d be really great friends in real life just as we are in the virtual world.

Another fellow LOADster and now a member of the Counterfeit Kit Challenge team as well as a more than regular contributor to the Whimsical Musings prompt, Lynette is always there to offer supportive comments or to impress with her perfectly executed layouts.

And if you want some giggles, you just have to check out her Counterfeit kit reveal blog posts every month – she wins the prize for best kit presentation each and every month. I never fail to laugh out loud when reading her reveals.

Here's Lynette.

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Happy 100th Prompt Whimsical Musings! One hundred is certainly a monumental milestone. Back in my elementary school teaching days, we would always celebrate the 100th Day of School with counting, writing, singing and movement activities all based around the number 100. To a child, that number may as well have been one billion! My young students always felt such a great sense of accomplishment to reach that day mid-way through the school year.

Even as followers of the Whimsical Musings Challenge blog, we should feel a great sense of accomplishment for reaching the 100th Prompt. Whether you’ve followed from the very beginning or just started…whether you’ve created one or 100 layouts…whether Pam and Lisa’s inspiration even just made you think differently about life, 100 thought-provoking, artistic-inspiring prompts is worth celebrating!

Now, for my celebratory prompt, I’d like for you to think of your life in terms of a timeline. Are you familiar with the Five for Fighting song, “100 Years”? It’s a poignant journey of a man throughout his different stages of life. The events stream by faster and faster and while 100 years seems like a long time, life often moves along quickly “when you only have 100 years to live”. Most scrapbook to hold onto to those moments that seem to race by us. 

Having children certainly has sped up the pace of our lives. Seems like just yesterday when my son was born and now he just turned 12 last week! Take a look at the timeline layout I created focusing on the evolution of our family starting with my marriage to my husband to the birth of our 2 children.  I decided to print the photos of our past in black and white and our current family photo in color. This helps to cut down on the distracting colors and draw the focus on the present. I used my “old school” Dymo label maker to highlight the important details, just as you would see in a timeline in a history book and anchored all of the photos on a thick black strip of paper creating the actual line. Certainly, this is not necessary, but felt it drove home the timeline feel. It brings a smile to my face to see that young couple getting married, to having children, to the present day. We’ve come a long way and it’s interesting to see our growth on this page.

  

The use of black and white photos for the supporting photos really helps the main photo stand out. And the use of frames and elements really directs your eye down the page to the different elements to take in. A happy, but totally meaningful page.

Lots of dimension and small details to take in 

Love the multi-coloured title. It catches your eye and is a fun element on the page

This makes me want to get my Dymo out and get stamping!

Think about a period of time in your life and create a layout showing a timeline. It doesn’t have to be from birth until now. It can even be “A Day in the Life” type memory documenting the everyday events. Whatever you decide, I hope it helps you slow down your life for just a bit and take stock in all of the changes and blessings in your life.

About Lynnette…

I met and became inspired by Lisa and Pam through the Layout A Day scrapbook challenge. Both women were so encouraging to a scrapper just trying to find her style and groove. After completing a LOAD challenge and feeling like I needed something else to keep my mojo going, I decided to check out Whimsical Musings. I was immediately hooked by their approachable style that alternated between story-based and technique-based prompts. I enjoy the small, grassroots community here and the encouraging environment that carries no ulterior motives. I certainly will always have more to learn and room to grow as a memory keeper, but Whimsical Musings has helped me flourish and become a confident scrapbooker.  

Thank you for your encouragement and dedication, Pam and Lisa.

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And there you have our second Whimsical Musings prompt of the week:

Be inspired by... the song “100 Years”.

For those of you (like me) unfamiliar with the song, you can find the song lyrics here (or on YouTube here).

Where will you take this prompt today? We’d love you to share at the Flickr Gallery (here) with the tag WM#100-4.

Lynette can be found keeping us smiling and happy over at her blog (here), at our very own Flickr group (here) where she is helping to moderate the message board, and as part of the Counterfeit Kit Challenge design team (here). Don't forget to check out her kit reveal posts every month. Guaranteed to make you smile.

Let's Celebrate - WM#100 Guest Designer Michelle

Today I'm thrilled to introduce another of our WM friends, Michelle. We initially connected through LOAD and then Michelle was the second to join in on our prompts over at Flickr. Her first prompt was WM#13 which is a very long time ago! She has been a regular ever since and I'm so happy she agreed to contribute to this week's celebration with her very own 100 prompt. 

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Hello, Michelle here.

Excited to be a “behind the scenes” part of WM for a change! I have been scrapbooking since about 1994 - was introduced to it by a co-worker. Loved the idea of creativity AND photos combined. One of my first layouts was in a spiral album about a trip my husband and I took to Arizona – lots of stickers, die cuts, and colored marker journaling back then! 

Michelle must be so happy to have the story and photos in this album, even if her style has changed "a bit" since then.

During one of the LOAD challenges, Lisa mentioned the Whimsical Musings blog she and Pam had with the weekly challenges. I thought it sounded fun, and had admired Pam and Lisa's work during LOAD. So I started following it. I'm not sure if this was the first challenge I actually tackled, but the “triad color scheme” inspired a whole mini-album of my oldest daughter and her stuffed bison, Buddy, during our Yellowstone trip. My favorite part is that the “triad” jumping-off point was just the spark I needed to start AND complete the album. I loved that about WM.

I remember when Michelle first shared this album with us over at Flickr - we all loved it. You need to go back to the beginning of the gallery entries to find it, but it's worth it. Such a cute album.

When Lisa asked me to contribute to the 100 celebration, I was thrilled. I always have to think for a bit about the challenge. But this one came to me pretty quickly, as it was something my daughter mentioned a couple weeks back. 

When she was little she LOVED the book Barbie 1 2 3. We would read through it many nights, looking to answer the questions on each page. But her favorite part was the last page, number 100. It had a collage of different items that combined together to represent 100 items. She had a little box with her “collection” of some of those items, and would get the box out and lay the items on top of the similar ones in the book. In fact, in 3^rd grade she even brought the book and her collection to our Brownie Girl Scout meeting about Hobbies & Collections. She (now 12 years old) grumbled to me a couple weeks back that she can't believe I talked her into giving up that book. When I started looking at this layout, she was reminiscing with me. I love that we have a permanent memory now of her childhood personality.

A perfect colour combination for this girlie, Barbie page. 

Michelle sprayed this background paper herself. The colour scheme is so well carried through across both sides of this layout.

Pink was chosen to represent the girliness of Barbie and green because it's one of Michelle's daughter's favourite colour. A perfect combination. I especially love how she has used strong black accents with the title and washi tape. It works so well as a contrast.

Michelle told me how it was pure coincidence that she came across this green bling which had been hanging around in her craft room for YEARS to dress up her chipboard flower. Not planned in any way,  you would think that the flower came ready blinged. What a lovely surprise.

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So our next prompt for this week is:

Be inspired by... 100 items. 

Can you find a way to include 100 items on your page? Michelle did this by referring to it in her journalling and making the simple but eye-catching 100 title. She has also included misted number background paper that she made herself (don't you just love that!) as well as washi tape with numbers and even the photos are full of numbers. Extra brownie points to Michelle for all those great ways to get numbers on her layout and the clever way to make a layout that really is about 100 things! And I have to admit to being ever so slightly in love with that bold "100" title. 

Don't forget to post your creations over at the Flickr Gallery (here) with the tag WM#100-3

Be sure to check out the Whimsical Musings Flickr Gallery (here) for more of Michelle's creations. She is a regular contributor and you have to make sure you look at the rest of the Buddy at Yellowstone mini-album!

Let's Celebrate - WM#100 Guest Designer Cathy

I'd like you to join me in extending a very warm welcome to the lovely Cathy.  

Cathy was the first visitor to post a layout in response to our blog prompt and it is always great to see her beautiful layouts - always perfectly designed and full of lovely photos and gentle journalling. 

I've "known" Cathy the longest of all my WM friends, having attended many Big Picture Classes together over the years. I think our beginnings go back to 2006 or 2007 when I first started my 12on12 project and she was also a part of the group. Her sense of scrapbooking style caught my eye immediately and we've stayed in touch ever since. 

I was delighted that she agreed to come back to help us celebrate. 

Over to you Cathy. 

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I live in San Anselmo, CA with my husband Michael and my cat Lucky. It is a quiet community called Sleepy Hollow. It's not really a scary place - the streets are named after characters and places from Washington Irving's books, though it is in a hollow. When I'm not swimming or hiking the hills around my home, you will find me creating in my craft room.

I felt very honored when Lisa asked me to contribute to the 100th Whimsical Musings challenge week. Honestly, I have not been doing much scrapbooking lately. I’ve been card making, taking artsy fartsy type classes and enjoying the summer with a trip home to Minnesota and camping in the wine country. This gave me lots of material for scrapbooking and so Lisa gave me the push to get me started. 



Lately, I have loved Nichol Magouirk's work. I love the layers and little scenes she creates. She uses one of my favorite tools - The Silhouette. I also love how she stamps and stitches to add to the layers.

I decided it was time to try to create a scene of my own and I love the results. 

So, my challenge to you is to create a page about (or using) your Top 100. Or like me, just your Top 1!



Look at all the detail Cathy has added to this page using her Silhouette. Personally, I'm totally knocked out by all the tiny elements that fit and support her design so perfectly. This is such a typical Cathy page - perfectly designed, full of carefully thought out elements and just overall gorgeous.

The journalling on the clouds here is really perfect - what a great idea.

Cathy feels that the title gets a little lost but I love how it's all mixed up and each of fonts fits the page so well.

Keeping with the 100th challenge, I would bet that there are at least 100 pieces on this page - if not more. I had almost finished when I realized I hadn’t saved a space for my journaling. I thought “Why not add it to the clouds?” I am thrilled with how the journaling is now part of the scene. The only thing I am not entirely happy about is the title. I feel it gets a little lost. 



I am so happy to be part of this celebration. Thank you Lisa for thinking of me. I am a big fan of yours and Pam's work. You two amaze and inspire me.


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And there you have our second Whimsical Musings prompt of the week:

Be inspired by... your top 100.

We'd love to see how you take this prompt and whether you decide to list a full 100 faves or just the top one. Don't forget to share over at the Flickr Gallery (here) with the tag WM#100-2

Cathy can be found in many a Big Picture Classes group - just look out for something pretty and perfectly designed in the gallery, and you are sure to be on the right track, as well as over at the Whimsical Musings Flickr Gallery (here) when she's not caught up with cards and artsy paint :-)

Let's Celebrate - Whimsical Musings #100!

We are in the mood to celebrate and I'm thrilled that you are here to join in on the fun.

And the reason for all this festivity? It's the 

Whimsical Musings 100th prompt 

and we want to mark this milestone with a whole lot of celebrating.

Welcome to all of you, whether this is the 100th time you've visited or the first. Whether you are a regular scrapper of Whimsical Musings challenges or if you have responded to Lynette's promotional campaign :-)  (thanks Lynette!). We are happy to see you here and hope that you find something to appeal and inspire.

First of all, I'd like to tell you what you can expect this week as for the first time ever, we will be posting every day and hope that you will find a whole lot of inspiration and ways to join in.

I'm going to kick it all off today with the first (yes, I said first) 100 based prompt and an example layout I've made for it.

Then there will be five (yes, I said five!) Whimsical Musings friends who graciously agreed to be Guest Designers presenting their own prompts based on the magic number 100. They've all made layouts too - so we are already up to 6 prompts and 6 layouts for you. Not bad, right?

Then I'll be back on Sunday for a round up and some ways for you to take these prompts and make them your own.

And how can you join in? Well, you can drop by every day and cheer on our Guest Designers. You can go over to our Flickr group and let us know your thoughts on each of the prompts or share your own ideas. You can comment right here on each of the blog posts (and you KNOW how we love comments!). You can create your own 100 prompt layouts and link them up in our Flickr Gallery. And best of all, you can have two (yes, I said TWO) chances to win some rather lovely scrappy goodies.

If you create a layout (or in fact any project) based on one of our "100" prompts and link them up to the Flickr Gallery (here) using the magic tag WM#100, you will be put in a draw for the following luscious selection of Maggie Holmes for Crate Paper:

And if you are inspired to go back over our previous 99 prompts and create a project, you can link that up in our Flickr Gallery (here) using the tag WM#XX (XX being whichever prompt you are following). You will then be entered into a draw for this delightful groupings of MME Collectable items:

Now I know that summer is a busy time for all of us so I'm going to give us all 4 weeks to create and link up - so be sure to link up before 16th September to be in with a chance to win.

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Now that I've given you the full low down on the week ahead, let me officially kick off the fun by presenting the first 100 prompt.

Be inspired by... centenary celebrations.

I knew right away, as soon as I thought about prompts around the number 100, that I wanted to have one about a centenary celebration. A few years ago, my old grammar school held an open day to all "old" girls to celebrate the centenary of moving into the gorgeous building that I was always in love with - even when I wasn't in love with school. I met up with some of my class friends and we gossiped and laughed all day. As if the last 25 years had never happened. I was thrilled to get the photo that I've used on the layout.

The funniest thing was that we all associated ourselves with our class letter, "S" and our little class clique was immediately there again - even after all those years.

WM#100 - Be inspired by... Centenary celebrations
I used my Counterfeit Kit Challenge kit, Escape for this happy memories page. Loved all those bright colours and whimsical elements. 

So, have you got a centenary celebration that needs to be recorded at all? Now is the time to get that story down, link up over at Flickr (here) and use the tag WM#100-1 for the chance to win those Maggie Holmes items.

Please let us know you dropped by, have a glass of bubbles on us and come back again tomorrow for the first of our Whimsical Musings Guest Designers.

Want to know what's coming up next week?

We will be celebrating all week long... so don't forget to come back every day to see what the inspiration is.

There might even be some giveaways along the way :-)

In the meantime, let me tempt you with a few sneak peeks of what's to come...

The fun starts on Monday 19th August so don't be late!

Challenge #99 week of 22nd July 2013

ETA: Whimsical Musings prompt #100 will be posting week commencing 19th August 2013. Things are taking a little longer than planned to organise! Hope to see you back here next Monday!

Happy Monday everyone.

First of all, a little announcement.  See that number at the top, in the subject line? You know that #99? Well, what does that mean?

.... YES! It means that our next prompt will be a full

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles  /  FreeDigitalPhotos.net

And you know me well enough to know that I intend to celebrate!

I want to really shout from the rooftops that we have 100 fabulous, inspiring prompts to share with you all and that this marks almost 2 years of Whimsical Musings!

So, I'm going to take a short break after this prompt in order to get everything straight and organised for a fun WEEK of inspiration and a surprise or two that may or may not include a giveaway. And I know how much you all love surprises... I mean giveaways!

That means that prompt #100 will be scheduled for the week commencing August 12th so you better mark that on your calendar with a big exclamation mark.

But in the meantime, here is our prompt for this week.

It's hot round here. Now it may not be unusual for it to be hot where you are, but here in (relatively) northern Europe, a heatwave is something to get excited about. Or in my case, annoyed with after the first day and a half! I hate being too hot. It makes me grumpy. And it's been hot round here for days and days and days. It feels like forever but of course, it's only been a couple of weeks :-)

Now, we've had prompts about ice-cream, summer memories, beaches, seasonal food. What's left?

Summer drinks.

I'm sat here with a cold, cold glass of Schweppes Bitter Lemon and it's so refreshing. I might even break out an ice cold beer later. And hopefully before R departs for even hotter climes on his monthly trip out East, I'm hoping for a cocktail or two to keep me going. Over the years, I've done a few layouts featuring "the cocktail" and that might be the direction I take. Or maybe good old German beer. Or just a refreshing glass of water.

Of course now I want to find one I can only find this layout! It's old but you get the idea.

Wimbledon Martinis

Maybe you want to take the colour scheme from a drink or label from a bottle. Maybe you want to talk about your drinking habits or your drink of choice. What about taking inspiration from a drink advert or the flavours or traditions? There is a myriad of ways to take this and I'd LOVE to see where you go with it.

Strawberry Bowle (Strawberry beer)

My favourite Weizen beer.

And if this prompt seems a little beer heavy, I live in Germany - the land of the best beer in the world so it can only be expected!

Go on, treat us to some creative inspiration from your very own summer drink fave.

Challenge #98 week of 15th July 2013

Morning everyone.

So, it would appear that I can get a prompt up but not much else right now!

I managed to fulfill my new DT kit commitments recently, but no other scrapping has been possible. The list of catch up prompts is getting longer! But all the more fun for when I DO have time but need some inspiration. He he!

I'm thinking that everyone is busy. It's summer and I certainly notice the difference in my mail box, the galleries, the DTs, pretty much everything.

Not that life is any different for me in the summer - no time off or holidays planned for us :-( !

What has been different for me is the constant trail of (welcome) visitors to my door the last three months! There has hardly been a weekend when there hasn't been an international visitor (or three) or a returned loved one needing my attention for as long as I can remember. It's been amazing to see everyone and we've had such fun just hanging out, not doing a lot except eating, and just catching up. There are a few photos and many memories.

So this week, that's what I'd like to inspire you... visitors, house guests, sleepover friends or pj party mates... however you want to take it is fine by me!

I have a BIG family (for current times) and now the next generation has started, it's getting bigger. And every member (but one) has been to visit at least once in recent past. And hopefully, the last sister, BIL and gorgeous nieces and nephew will pop in next month for a few days. So that means I have SO much inspiration for this one. Let's see how I manage.

I wanted to include a photo for this post but can't find one suitable! Let me just add a happy snap of a visitor to my balcony last summer..

Challenge #97 week of 8th July 2013

What a weekend it's been round here.

We are by no means big sport fans but it's been nothing but since Thursday.

Being British, no summer is complete without Wimbledon and first there was a lovely, young, fresh German girl who had knocked out one of the Williams sisters and then went on to win her semi-final with great pazazz making her the first German in the finals of Wimbledon since the heroine of German tennis and everyone's darling, Steffi Graf.

And then, with the hopes of the nation on his shoulders to make British sporting history, Andy Murray won his semi-final game to get to the final for a second year in a row. So we were all set up for a possible German ladies' tennis win on Saturday and a possible British men's win on Sunday.

And if that wasn't enough, it was the German Formula 1 with Sebastian Vettel (German) in pole position hoping for the first European race win for two years. Phew. It was enough to make you tired just thinking about it.

In the end, young Sabine Lisicki was outplayed by French Marion Bartoli but charmed the crowds all the more with her emotional fight to the end.

And Andy Murray? The boy did good! He won the Wimbledon Men's crown for the first time in 77 years! Not since Fred Perry won in 1936, if you can believe it, has the home crowd had its win. (Just for info, the last ladies' winner for Britain was 1977 which is still an awful long time ago!!)

And Seb Vettel won his race too so there was really something for everyone round here and we all felt very emotional and patriotic.

For a non sporty househouse, that's not all bad.

So, with a nod to this monumental weekend, I'd like to challenge you to be inspired by sport!

Make a sporty page, make a page about your love for a particular team, be inspired by team colours, the layout of the court/pitch/place even.

Take this inspiration to the winning line!

Don't forget to share over at Flickr in the gallery with the tag WM#97.

Challenge #96 week of 1st July 2013

Happy July!

Are you all ready for the 2nd half of the year and for this week's prompt?

This is the fourth blog post I've written today so I'm keeping this one short and to the point.

I was busy preparing my July Counterfeit Kit over this weekend and I decided to include a whole batch of printables for Project Life style journalling cards and filler notes (I used these notes from Pinterest here and these from this blog here - they are gorgeous - all of them!). And the inspiration kit we were given had two sheets of cut apart papers - a bingo card sheet by Simple Stories paper and a bits and pieces sheet by Glitz.

So many scrapbook paper manufacturers are following this trend at the moment with cut apart sheets forming major parts of many collections. Simple Stories have been doing this right from the beginning with Echo Park, Dear Lizzy, Amy Tangerine, Authentique and in fact, almost all the main players joining in to some degree. I'm a sucker for them and when I flip through my stash I have page after page after page of them. Most of them uncut :-(

Now, I have a full set of Project Life products to start my very own album but so far, I haven't got around to it! I'm a bit hopeless with actually starting something new. And it's the middle of the year - I find myself thinking that I should wait for January. But that isn't what this prompt is all about.

What I'd like you to do this week is to use cut apart elements on your projects. On any project except a Project Life spread. A scrapbook layout, a mini-book or even a card. Get creative with incorporating journalling notes, bingo cards, cut out polaroids or just decorative blocks.

Don't forget to share your creations with us over at the Flickr gallery with the tag WM#96.

See you there.