Write. Click. Scrapbook.

These are a few of my favorite things...

In general, I delight in little things fairly easily (including singing along with The Sound of Music), and this hobby is no exception.  I love finding tips and tidbits and deals and discoveries that I can share with others.  So today I offer a random smattering of scrapbooking potpourri, some of which may be familiar to you, some of which may be brand new.  And when I say random, I do mean RANDOM, so please do not try to imagine any sort of reasonable flow here, because it does not exist.

• Photographing a layout is way easier (especially if it's 12x12) and often looks better (due to natural lighting and no worries about lumps & bumps) than scanning it. And that layout will look fantastic on the web if you follow Jessica Sprague's formula for saving it.

• Speaking of Jessica... she's generous, that one.  Back in November, I took an inspiring FREE class from her called Stories in Hand.  I was astounded by the amount of heart and work she put into constructing the class and designing the gorgeous and comprehensive materials, just to offer everything at no charge.  Well, she's doing it again, and this time it's a FREE instructor-led photo editing class.  I'll be there.  

• Big Lots sometimes gets in really sweet scrapbooking supplies.  Over the past few months, I have scored a bunch of American Crafts Thickers, rub-ons and chipboard shapes.  Just last night, I got these for $2 each:Ask me if I care that these aren't their newest lines.  Nope.  I love 'em all.

• Speaking of American Crafts, they have some really cute desktop wallpapers on their website.  You can download them for free.

• My favorite scrapbooking tool cost me less than two bucks.  When I want something straight, I want it straight.  My C-Thru Junior T-square makes that happen, and since it's clear, the job is even easier.  It's like another appendage.

• Do you like journaling on lined, graph, or dot paper?  You can print some here.  And while you're there, you may as well grab a few extra Yahtzee score cards.

• Pretty much daily, IKEAgoddess (who happens to live in Germany) posts her favorite digital scrapbooking finds of the day.  Word art, alphabets, embellishments, papers, page templates, entire kits... you'll find it all on her blog.

And speaking of Germany, here's the layout I told you I was going to finish. I knew as soon as I saw this storefront that it was layout fodder.

I also promised a challenge, so here it is.  Create a layout simply for the funny factor.  Tell about a quirk, a hilarious story, a direct quote from or conversation you had with one of your kids, whatever.  Just make humor the focus.  Then run on over and post it to our Write. Click. Scrapbook. Flickr group so that the rest of us can laugh along with you.  If you need inspiration, our girl Cheryl is the Queen of Funny.  Trust me.

I have thoroughly enjoyed being your hostess this week.  Thank you for your feedback, your encouragement, and for sharing your own insight along the way.  It's been a pleasure. :)

Using Your Space

Good morning!  Melissa here, glad to be back for the final installment in what has turned out to be a mini-series on creating (or re-creating) a scrap space.

Let's review, shall we? 

First, carve out a space for yourself.  Even if you live in a tiny apartment or a dorm room, it's possible to dedicate a spot for your scrapbooking supplies.  Look around, think outside the studio (ha ha), and don't let yourself believe that you need a large area in order to be creative.

Next, get those supplies under control!  Don't feel obligated to hang on to the Blade Runner just because you paid good money for it, or the cutesy car paper that you bought to use in a baby album for your son who is now 12.  Be realistic and a little tough with yourself as you decide what to keep and what to share with others.  Save what you really love and will truly use.  I detected a theme as I read through the comments: I'm more creative when I'm not surrounded by so much stuff. It doesn't have to do with the size of your space.  You can have a huge studio and not feel overwhelmed as long as your stash is under control.

Third, round up some containers and get those supplies you love organized!  Create a system that makes sense to you. I like my chipboard alphabets stored by letter rather than kept as sets, but that would drive some of you batty.  Last year, I was determined to poke all of my brads into a corkboard by color, but I eventually gave up and dumped them into the watchmaker's tins.  I know myself, and I would have been constantly compelled to fill in, even up, and organize each section on the cork every time I used a brad!

Finally, when you're all done, walk by your space several times a day and pat yourself on the back.  Open a cupboard or drawer and admire its tidy contents.  Pull out a basket and feel a surge of pride when you see those supplies that you love, all neatly arranged.  Do this, and the layouts will just start piling up.

You laugh, but that is exactly what I do!  Am I alone here?  I have a tendency to think that the purpose of organizing my scrap space is to have an organized scrap space.   But an organized scrap space should be just one more tool that helps me create.  (Wouldn't it be handy if you could just go buy that tool at your LSS?)  If I know where everything is, then my limited time is not wasted hunting for what I need, so I'm freed up to make stuff.  Fun!

And so as my final encouragement regarding your scrap space, I say USE IT! 

Believe me, I'm talking to myself here as much as I'm talking to you.  There are times I ask myself, Am I a scrapbooker or a collector of really cool scrapbooking supplies?  When it feels like the latter, I know it's time to tell my hubby that I need a few hours on Saturday to make a layout or two while he holds down the fort.  He's great about that.  But there are plenty of times when our schedule doesn't allow for it and so I have to get creative.

How do you scrapbook when you don't have a large chunk of time?  Here are some ideas that will move you toward creating a layout, albeit in small pieces:

• gather or print photos
• write your journaling
• choose your background cardstock and/or patterned papers
• sketch your layout
• choose the letters for your title
• make one or two design decisions

With an organized scrap space, you can accomplish any one of these in fifteen minutes or less!

Another idea is to do a small non-layout project to jump-start your creativity.  Make a tag or a card.  Cover a plain wooden frame with patterned paper and embellish it.  Simply tie a ribbon on a basket or jar to add some color and interest.  When I am feeling the urge to create and can't devote a couple of hours to scrapbooking, I try to do little things like these to quench that thirst.

And one last piece of advice?  Pardon me for sounding like your mother, but clean up after yourself.  There are very few people who thrive in a messy creative space.  When you can't find your favorite adhesive, it's hard to be motivated.  Of course, now that I'll be pulling out The Big Gun, I won't have to worry about that, will I?  When I finally get it out of the box, that is.

So, two assignments:

1. If you have been successful creating in small ways with brief windows of time, please share your insight with the rest of us in the comments section.
2. Make the time (you know that's what it comes down to) to use your space this weekend.  Even if you only have a half hour, that's enough.  As for me, I will be finishing a layout that I made a few months ago but didn't get to the journaling. It's very unlike me to have an unfinished page lying around, but life happened with this one.  I'll share it tomorrow.

In the meantime, since this was a pictureless post, I'm including a few pieces of eye candy here to inspire you as your create or re-create your space.  There are some great ideas out there for small areas, and others that could work in spaces of all sizes.  Each photo is a link, so click on it for more information.  Enjoy!

 

 

(You'll find several great ideas here.)

 

I also came across this example of someone with a dedicated scrap room where it is now a joy to create because she got rid of a ton of stuff and organized all the rest.  I found that my body involuntarily tensed up at the images of "before" but let out a big, contented sigh when I saw the "after" pictures.  Be sure to read the top three things she learned from her experience.  Yes!

And don't miss the other great photos of scrapbooking spaces Wendy has on her blog. 

See you tomorrow as I wrap up the week with a random sampling of scrapbooking goodness and a challenge!

and the giveaway goes to . . .

 

Congratulations to Jill who is inspired by:

     " my daughter and examples i see on the web."

Jill, please email your contact information to us at writeclickscrapbook at gmail dot com. We hope you enjoy your new Kenner Road Kit!

give.away.day. featuring KENNER ROAD

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Today's giveaway is brought to us by the incredible team at Kenner Road. I only learned of them a few weeks ago, and already I have become a stalker, I mean fan. More than just a scrapbook kit club, Kenner Road is a vintage inspired marketplace. They strive to provide creative monthly scrapbook kits, digital elements and vintage provisions that help inspire you to document the life you live, in the way you like to create. How incredible that whether it's paper or pixels, Kenner Road is inspiration found.

Kerry Lynn has outdone herself with June's kit. Remembering her grandmother making rustic apple tarts in her kitchen and inspired by vintage samplers, Kerry Lynn collected and created Kenner Road's June main kit, Home Sweet Home.

With this kit, you may be inspired to create layouts like these:

 

If you would like to receive the home Sweet Home kit, featuring the new Cosmo Cricket early bird release, an exclusive Kenner Road homestead stamp, and products from over 7 different manufacturers, you need only leave a comment telling us what inspires you to create. Do you, too, long to recreate colors and textures from your childhood? Does your sense of smell impact the colors you pick? Do you rely on the photo for color cues? You tell us, and one of you will be the proud recipient of this fabulous kit, which will be sent directly to you by Kenner Road. Comments will close at 8:00 pm PST.

**Gift recipient will be randomly selected from the comments associated with this post. IT IS THE RESPONSIBLITY OF THE COMMENTER to check back and contact us at write click scrapbook at gmail dot com to arrange delivery of this gift. Recipient must do so by Saturday, June20th, at midnight, or the gift will be forfeited. Thank you!**

Organizing Your Space

Melissa here, back for what I'm sure will be my favorite post this week. 

As I mentioned yesterday, I love to organize.  LOVE it.  Give me a chunk of free time, and organizing something-or-other will be in my top three picks of how to spend it.  Especially if we're talking about my scrapbooking supplies.  I'm sure this obsession has made repeatedly modifying my scrap area so much less painful.

If I were limited by neither space nor cost, I would use vintage items for all my storage--a card catalog (hey, I have that!), wooden tool caddies, apothecary jars, old muffin tins... think Rebecca Sower and Jenni Bowlin, and you'll get the idea.  But since those items would not work with my current space (and it would be so sad to hide them away), I settled for practical-but-cute.

The great thing is, I only spent $4 + tax on storage items for my new space, and that was for the four colored baskets.  You who are good at math may have deduced by now that I bought them at the Dollar Tree.  What a deal.  Everything else I already had on hand.

I'll break my space down bit by bit as I explain how I organized everything.  But first... I have to make a confession.

There are four major components of my stash that do not fit into the hutch. 

{gasp}

The way I have these four things set up works so well for me that I am unwilling to change them to make them fit.  Plus, two are nice to look at, so why fix something that ain't broke.

Here they are:

In the green file are 12 x 12 poly envelopes that hold my larger scraps, sorted by color.  The Cropper Hopper paper holder contains 12 x 12 cardstock.  This is not all of my cardstock.  I simply went through and collected a sampling of my colors, including multiples of ones that I use the most.  I keep these containers in a closet where they're easy to grab.

In these IKEA drawers I keep chipboard letters.  They're all mixed together, three letters per drawer (more or less), numbers and punctuation in the last one.  I love this method of storing my alphabets, as it helps to break me out of my matchy-matchy tendencies.  I don't mind keeping this out in the open since it's easy on the eyes.

And then my favorite--the antique printer's tray.  Don't hate me because I live by The Farm Chicks and find cool stuff at their shows.

Back when I read Big Picture Scrapbooking, I was inspired to organize my small embellishments by color.  I used to have them in magnetic tins, but this tray really makes me happy.  It's so me, and I can see all my little pretties at once.  This gets stored on top of the card catalog (which, by the way, is still in the corner of the nursery), far out of the way of little hands.

One more thing.  This is what it really looks like when you open the cupboard doors.

My Tonic Guillotine trimmer goes in first, followed by a portfolio of patterned paper, before the doors are closed.

Okay, confession over.  Here again is a photo of my space minus those two items in front.

Now let's break it down.

LEFT DRAWER

Here I keep all my punches, except for borders.  The end.

RIGHT DRAWER

This is where I store my border punches, Prima-type flowers (a generous sampling in a glass jar) and ribbon.

I'm a firm believer that you can't have too much ribbon, which is somewhat counter-productive when you're downsizing.  So I took a 18" length from each spool, placed the ribbons into zippered bags according to color, used a clear reinforcer over each hole for strength, and threaded the bags onto two book rings.

Now for the bottom section.  You'd be surprised how much can fit in here.

LEFT CUPBOARD

The shelves were already in here from the hutch's previous occupants, so I left them for the baskets.  Once I decided what would go into each one, I labeled and attached tags from this free download and tied them on with ribbon.  That definitely kicked the cuteness factor up a couple of notches.  Not to mention it actually helps to know what's in each basket without having to remove it. 

A few specific features to point out...

My journaling basket contains labels (including a label stamp set) and journaling spots, as well as some die-cut titles and quotes.  I use smaller baskets within the basket to keep everything organized.

By the way, I think journaling spots are one of the best scrapbooking inventions ever.

 

One of my baskets contains rub-ons, and I wanted to mention that I devised a very handy system for my American Crafts mini-marks.  I made copies of the inside of the cover where it shows all the designs that are in that pack. Then I attached each copy to a piece of black cardstock so that I have all the designs in one place for reference.  Much easier than opening each booklet.

 

This is my miscellaneous embellishments basket being attacked by my youngest who is set to defy his mommy and turn one in 13 days. (Sniff.) He couldn't resist touching, and I couldn't resist including a picture of those sweet, dimply hands.  I could eat 'em up.

Here I keep odds & ends that don't really fit in the printer's tray.  All of my patterned brads are stuck in a cork coaster.  The plastic snap pouches originally housed Autumn Leaves buttons.  One of them contains felt flowers, the other fabric flowers.

Along the left side of the shelf is my portable trimmer.  I keep it in there because it has a scalloped blade.  Well, it used to.  I misplaced it, and since I didn't find it during the changeover, I think I need to just buy a new one.

Under the shelves is a drawer from a 12 x 12 three-drawer storage container.  It holds my favorite patterned papers as well as newer items I want to use.  My brads are in there as well, stored by color in a watchmakers tin.   

RIGHT CUPBOARD

The green container holds my sheets of alphabets and stickers.  The fact that they're standing up makes it very easy to go through and choose what I want.

The three-drawer container on the right holds my 8.5 x 11 cardstock in the bottom two drawers and stamps in the top one.  I keep my acrylic stamps in CD cases so that are easy to remove (what's up with those plastic sheets they come on, anyway?) and put away when I use them.  I like to buy the little Studio G stamp sets at Michaels, and I can fit four of them into each case.

Sitting on top of the container is a tote that holds scissors, tools, pens, adhesives, erasers... lots of stuff!  It's perfect, because I can just grab it out and sit it on the table while I work.

Along the right edge, I have slid a self-healing mat.  And you may notice in the very back sits my lonely ATG gun, which I bought with birthday money two months ago but have yet to open.  I'm excited to own it, but a little intimidated.  Ask me later this week if it's out of the box yet, okay?

As I mentioned before, everything that I still don't want to part with is in storage.  We actually have our house on the market and hope to be moving in the next few months.  If I end up with a larger scrap space, then I will retrieve much of what's being stored.  If I don't, I'll check back in a few months and do some more purging of whatever I didn't touch.

Well, I think that covers it!  (At least I hope it does, since it's now 1:27 a.m. here on the left coast!)  If you have a question, please leave a comment and I will do my best to answer.  If the comments are still numbered, you will have to look for my reply "in the order it was received" rather than underneath your question. 

Tomorrow's a giveaway day, so be sure to check back and enter!  In the meantime, I hope you're motivated to do a bit of purging and organizing as you move toward a manageable and inspiring scrap space!

P.S. I realized this morning that I forgot to mention a few things.  One is that my 4th basket contains chipboard shapes.  Another is that behind the storage containers on the right (since they don't reach all the way to the back) are my Crop-A-Dile Big Bite and a plastic 8.5x11 document box holding my coluzzle mat, blade & circle templates.  See, I told you it's surprising how much can fit in there!

Managing Your Space

Welcome back! :) Melissa here again. 

First I want to thank everyone who left comments yesterday; they were so helpful in forming the direction of today’s post.  I was originally going to describe how I organized my supplies to fit into the china hutch, but I realized that I would be leaving a huge gap.  There’s the whole question of how I downsized my supplies from a dedicated scrap room to two cupboards and two drawers.  Today I’ll share that process.

 *I apologize that this post will be light on photos and heavy on text.  I really wish now that I had thought to take pictures as my scrap areas changed, but I didn’t.  Phooey.

I think the fact that the shift happened over the course of 2 ½ years made it a little more seamless than if it had been something that needed to be done immediately.  I had time to try different things and see what worked.  What’s interesting is that each time I pared down, I liked my scrap area better than I had before.  I never missed the space that was lost.

Let’s review what it looked like four years ago when I had the whole room to myself.

 

Looking back, I think I filled a lot of the space simply because it was there.  Some of my storage containers had very little in them, but it didn’t matter because I wasn’t running out of room.

When I was pregnant with our third, I knew I would have to make some changes, but I didn’t think it was necessary to move everything out of the room right away when a baby was simply going to be sleeping in there.  After consolidating, putting all the wire cubes in the basement, rearranging, and utilizing the top of the card catalog for storage, I freed up that entire windowed wall where most of my supplies were located.  I then added a room-width muslin curtain on a wooden rod suspended from the ceiling.  Behind the curtain was my daughter’s cradle (and eventually crib) and drawers of clothing.

Then when she was nine months old, we found out we were expecting again!  Another adjustment to the room was in order.  Lacking a better solution in my mind, I simply swapped spaces, moving all of my scrapbooking stuff to the area behind the curtain and leaving the larger area of the room for the nursery.

Once again, I had to go through my stash and pare it down to fit into an even smaller space.  I actually made it look pretty cute back there, knowing I wouldn’t use the space if I didn’t enjoy it.  But even though the space itself was fine, the fact that it was in the same room as my babies made it nearly impossible to use it.  I have never been one to pre-plan pages and just gather all the materials and take off to a crop or even a different room.  My creative process is very fluid, and I’m constantly changing my mind and being inspired by my supplies themselves, so I need everything at hand.

After months of frustration caused by feeling the urge to create a scrapbook page but resorting to baking cookies instead because I couldn’t work in my space, I decided something had to be done.  I walked through the house, looked, pondered, stood on my head, ruled out, and finally decided on the china cabinet.  It just made so much sense to convert the rarely-used section of it into practical storage for my supplies.

So this process begs the question:  How did you decide what to keep and what to get rid of?

I asked myself three basic questions each time I moved my supplies to a smaller area and was forced to decide their fate:

• Do I love it or at least reaalllyyyy like it?  (If I don't, chances are I won't be inspired to use it.)
• Is it versatile? (A pink chipboard alphabet adorned with blue butterflies and green polka-dots may be simply adorable, but how many times am I actually going to create a title with it?)
• Have I used it more than once on a layout or project in the past year? (This can apply to tools as well.  I finally got rid of my light box because the answer was a big fat No.)

These questions really weren't important to me when I had an entire room.  It was so easy to use the "I'd better keep it because maybe I'll use it...someday" excuse. I couldn't do that anymore, so I forced myself to be honest and ruthless as I went through my stash. In yesterday's comments, Susan mentioned how her kids always played more in the playroom after she got rid of a bunch of toys.  That happens at our house as well, and I see it as a total parallel.  Simplifying really is quite freeing.

It also helped that my LSS scheduled its first-ever scrapbooking yard sale around the time I did my first major purge.  I made over $100 selling stuff that I wasn't using. They continue to do them several times a year, so it's quite motivating to do a small purge every few months.  You could also donate to a church, hospital, or other non-profit group, or share your extras with someone who is just starting out.

Come back tomorrow for my favorite part...organization!  I love it almost as much as scrapbooking itself.  I promise there will be lots of pictures!

P.S.  Several of you asked about my card catalog.  When my husband and I were first married, he was on staff at a church.  We were going through some supplies in a storage room when I spotted this beauty stuck in the corner all by its lonesome and fell in love.  When my hubby asked the pastor if we could possibly buy it from him, he said (I kid you not), If you take out the cassettes and box them up, you can have it.  Yes, have it.  Now I'm going to duck and take my leave before the violence ensues...

Carving Out Your Space

Happy Monday, fellow scrappers! Melissa Kaiserman here, excited to serve as your hostess this week.

If I sound surprisingly chipper for a Monday, it's because it's truly my favorite day of the week.  I see it as a chance for a new start and a fresh perspective.

Sometimes I think that’s really all we need in our hobby when faced with a lack of creativity or when we haven’t made a page in so long that our tools seem only vaguely familiar.  It’s easy to think, If only I had a room devoted to scrapping or If only all my children were old enough to wipe their own noses and bottoms, then I would actually fill all those empty page protectors.

Those very thoughts have frequently crossed my mind.  I have four children who range from 8 years to 11 months.  I also homeschool my two oldest, so I don’t have chunks of time during the day when fewer little people need me.  Plus I live in a very small house and do not have a scrapbooking room.  Or even a nice-sized closet.  I don’t tell you this to gain your sympathy, but to let you know I understand. 

I’ve been chronically discouraged by how infrequently I sit down to make a layout, but I was slow in moving toward a solution.  I recently decided to stop believing that my circumstances have to be ideal in order for me to scrapbook or work on some other fun project.  I purposed to make changes that would allow for creativity even with limited space and time.  Those changes are still in process, but I wanted to share some of them with the hope that they will inspire you to make your own small adjustments and recapture the joy of making stuff.

I’m going to spend some time this week describing the steps I took a couple of months ago, starting with

Moving my supplies to an easily-accessible area.

When we first moved into our little starter home six years ago, we had two boys who shared a room, and I claimed the third bedroom as my scrap space.  Then our daughter was born and it became a scrap room/nursery.  Then it became a nursery (now with two cribs in it following the birth of our son) with a room-dividing curtain hiding my teeny little scrapbooking area.  Like most of you, the most logical time for me to scrapbook is when the kids are in bed.  But since two of them slept in the same room as my supplies, it wasn’t happening.  I knew I needed to be resourceful and come up with a plan.

In our living/dining area we have a standard oak hutch. 

There are teacups and teapots behind the glass doors, and in the bottom section I stored pie plates, my cake pedestal, and other serving pieces that were used infrequently.  I realized that if I could empty the bottom cupboards along with the two drawers, this would be the perfect spot for my supplies.  It’s centrally located, I can get into it any time of day, and it’s relatively safe from little hands.

There was no way all of my supplies would fit, so the trick was to decide what I absolutely needed in there.  Can I just tell you how freeing it was to be limited in that way?  I only chose those supplies that I love and use often.  As for the rest, I purged some of them, and others I put into storage where I can get to them easily if necessary.  If I don’t use them in the next few months?  Off to the LSS yard sale they go.

So I went from a scrap room that looked like this four years ago

 

to a scrap half-hutch.

 

Tomorrow I’ll share specifics on how I organized my supplies so that they would be both easy to work with in this small space and pleasing to the eye.  I'm all about the cuteness factor.

In the meantime, if you are in a situation where you find yourself rarely scrapbooking because you don’t have a designated “space,” start thinking of some creative ways to carve one out using what you have.  Or if you’ve already gone through a similar process, please share a comment on this post.  You never know how your creative ideas might help solve someone else’s dilemma!

The Girls

quote selection and photo from Cheryl Overton

Super Saturday Sketch!

Gooood morning y'all! Thank you so much for reading my posts this week and for sharing your thoughts in the comments! This has been really fun and not nearly as stressful as I thought it would be. In fact, I'd say it's been downright enjoyable :)

This post is just a random post about a few things I wanted to talk about but couldn't fit into any of my previous posts:

First is a tip: when I print my 4x6 pictures online, I always select the "Borders" option. That way, I can keep the border or trim it if I don't want any border. When I trim the borders, I can line up three 4x6 pictures together without them touching the edge of my 12x12 page. That's a big plus for me because I prefer that my pictures not touch the edge of the page.

Second is a favourite product that I forgot to share yesterday: the Fiskars fingertip craft knife.

Before I discovered this handy little tool, I hardly ever cut anything out of patterned papers. I'm a leftie and using scissors on intricate patterns is a little challenging. Now that I have this tool, I cut patterns out of paper all the time, like in this layout (oh look, more AC stars):

 

Finally, third is a sketch: I have a hard time scraplifting other people's layouts and I always think that my layout doesn't measure up to the original. On the other hand, I absolutely LOVE sketches. Sketches have enough detail to provide me with a starting point and at the same time allow me to add my own personal spin to the finished layout. LOVE sketches. So, here's my challenge for this week: create a layout based on the sketch below (I used this sketch to create my Swing layout, feature on Wednesday's post):

 

You can share your sketch layouts in the Write.Click.Scrapbook Flickr gallery. I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with :) Thanks again for reading this week..and until next time, keep scrapping!

Favourite products

Welcome back! Only 2 days left for me as hostess of this blog, funny how time flies! When I signed up to host, I really wondered what I could talk about to fill out an entire week. As I discovered while writing my posts, it seems I do have a lot to talk about after all :)

Today's post is about my favourite products. It's a bit of a self-indulgent post because really...who cares about what my favourite products are, right? Well, it's my hosting week and I'll write about my favourite products if I want to, nener nener nener!!! In all seriousness, products have really influenced my scrapping style and perhaps you'll discover some new products to love too! Let's start shall we?

First off...patterned paper. Of course. I couldn't scrap without patterned paper and even if I could I probably wouldn't want to! My favourite kind of paper is what might be called "background patterned paper" or in Basic Grey-speak, "designer cardstock". I reach for these before I even look at cardstock because I love the subtle texture that they add to a layout. Another reason I love them is that they are easy to journal on. I  have a heck of a time journaling on Bazzill cardstock because of the texture so using patterned paper is a lot easier for me! Here are some of my favourite "background" patterned papers:

Basic Grey Urban Prairie background papers: oh how I love every shade of the background papers in this collection. I bought the paper pack that comes with 2 of each paper and I've already used almost all of the background sheets. The colours are so perfect. Incidentally, BG is coming out with Designer Cardstock packs. Guess who's gonna rush out to buy some when they are available in stores? I only wish my budget were unlimited so I could buy one of each because right now I can't decide which ones I like best!

Another company that makes awesome background paper is Pink Paislee (yes, I design for them, no they didn't ask me to talk about their products). Their background papers are usually a bit more intrically textured than the BG ones and sometimes that's exactly what a layout needs! My Memories on Paper layout uses this awesome paper called Tender:

 

Another favourite is Full Moon, which I used in this layout:

Another favourite paper is the Scenic Route Grid paper. I find it perfect to journal on:

Finally, my last pick is the Bo-Bunny Double Dot paper. I love dots and the B side of the paper is very subtly distressed, just perfect for journaling on. I could seriously buy every single colour of this paper but by far my favourite is the Chiffon Dot. I bought an entire 25-pack of this and I have no doubt that I will use every bit of it! The picture below really does not do this paper justice...it's an awesome cream colour that goes with EVERYTHING. Cream is the new white ;)

 

Next, let's talk chipboard. You've already heard all about my love for American Crafts Playhouse chipboard stars. Unfortunately, I can't even link you because I can't find them anywhere! If you know where to find them, please email me because I only have a few left and it's causing me no small amount of distress LOL.

Another chipboard staple: the Heidi Swapp chipboard hearts. I've just ordered some more because I got tired of tracing the one heart I had saved for that purpose:

 

Moving on to tools! As I mentioned before, I don't mind spending money on tools. My favourite are border punches and these are the ones I have and love: Fiskars Threading Water, Fiskars Effervescence, Stampin' Up scallop. The SU one gets used most right now but I go through phases with my punches:

 

 

Next up, stamps! My favourite stamp is a grid stamp that I use for journaling. I love the Scenic Route grid paper but sometimes I want grids on a different colour of paper. I use this one A LOT:

 

Here's a layout that uses the stamp:

  

Hum...what else? Oh yeah, how could I forget about bling??? My favourite jewels are from Doodlebug. Each pack includes 4 different sizes and they come in all kinds of yummy colours. I really wish I had every single colour! I love these because they serve the same purpose as brads design-wise but they are much much easier to use. I'm all about peel and stick, baby!

 

Finally...my staple, the ONE tool I couldn't live with...the ATG gun. I did a lot of research before buying it and I just love how easy it is to use and how CHEAP the refills are! An unexpected bonus is that I never lose my adhesive anymore. My old tape runners used to get lost in my supplies all the time and you can imagine how frustrating it could be! I resorted to using glue sticks a lot LOL. Thankfully, those days are over because there is no way I could lose this beast:

 

Sorry this post was so long but as you can tell, I have a lot of favourite products! They are all staples in my scrapping stash and I really couldn't scrap the way I do without them. They make scrapping easier and more enjoyable!

If you have some favourite products, please link them up! I love discovering new items :) Also, please come back tomorrow for my farewell post. It's going to be a sort of random  post with tips, thoughts, and a challenge :)