Write. Click. Scrapbook.

Fake It, 'Til You Make It.

Welcome back to my final day of this series on scrapbooking when you don't have photos. We've covered a few different approaches -- focusing on the story or journaling only in various forms and using memorabilia in place of photos. Today we have yet another idea: using stock photos. There are lots of different stock photo sites on the internet and many of them have free photos. Flickr can also be a source for photos once you check the terms of use on the photograph. Right around September 11th I was talking with some friends about what we were doing that time, 10 years ago and it prompted the following layout. I don't have any photos from that day but I was able to find one online to use on this layout.

 

Celeste uses stock photos frequently - she used stock photos to document some good things in her life right now:

 

I used photos from the Food Network website to document my family's obsession with the show Chopped:

 

Another option is to use screen captures to get images from your computer of websites. I used a utility called Gadwin PrintScreen to capture different websites that I use when reading:

 

That's it from me -- I hope this gave you a few ideas on how you can scrap those photo-less memories and stories!

Tickets and Letters and Notes, Oh My!

Yesterday I showed you different examples of layouts without photos - just journaling and a title. Today, I'm going to share another approach - using memorabilia. Memorabilia can be anything that stirs your memory of something - tickets, letters, notes, drawings. They can be a perfect substitute when scrapbooking a memory for which you don't have any photos. Take my first trip to the Boston Pops for example. I didn't take any photos that evening but I did keep our (front row!) tickets as a memento - I used them in this layout:

I recently came across a map my husband had made for me when we were first dating. It's scribbled on a post-it note but it brought back such fond memories that I thought it deserved to be scrapped:

Of course this time of year we have the perfect opportunity to scrap letters, those ones that get to Santa. I've done this several times, scanning the actual letter of course because the original gets sent to the North Pole :)

 

And I've even incorporated two letters (lists really) into one layout:

I took a different approach with some sheet music from my childhood. I scanned it and used it as the background for my layout:

But wait, there's more! Tomorrow I'll discuss another approach you can take when you don't have photos to go with your stories. See you then!

Welcome, November!

The haunting is over, now let the gratitude begin!! In honor of Thanksgiving, we wanted to take a look backwards and remember. This month's gallery is entitled, Remember When. We hope you love it.

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This month's theme can include photos taken a few weeks ago, or many many years ago, or no photo at all.

Chances are your journaling is going to be heartfelt, and perhaps a bit lengthy, but don't make it so, if a few words is all you feel inclined to write. This is a great time to be authentic in retelling your memories.

 

Did you notice a design element that appears consistently on this month's pages? We saw several of our designers grouping smaller embellishments together. What a terrific and subtle way to help further the story in continuing the theme of collected memories. What do you think?

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Please don't hesitate to leave a comment telling our teammates how much you appreciated their layouts this month! We can't thank you enough for adding us to your very busy schedules. We hope you know how grateful we are that you take the time to come visit.

Once last thing, please take a minute and click over to visit Ali, Renee, and the Magpie Club. They are terrific sponsors and we couldn't keep this place alive without them!!

my five senses | putting it all together

My senses have certainly been treated to a handful of glorious fall days here in East Tennessee, but colder weather is on its way. Brrrrr. I'm Monika Wright and I like turtlenecks and boots and polar fleece vests, so that's okay with me.

By now, I hope you've had time to make your lists, trim your papers, adhere them to your cardstock and printed your DYO Stickers and are ready to move on to your journaling. For the mini book {my five senses} I'm using the simple 5x5 square below that has a thin brown line printed onto a 6x6 piece of cardstock trimmed from a 12x12 sheet. The lighter gray line you see is your cut line.

So, let's go to our pages {you can find the sketches here} and see how they look with paper and photos and journaling. My first spread is for the sense of sight and it's rare that there's a photo of me, so I went the cheesy self-portrait-in-the-mirror route WITH my reading glasses propped on my head.

For the sense of smell, I took a photo of my cuppa joe in my Have Fun and Craft On mug...which helps with the mojo! If I had better photography skills, I would have been able to catch the steam rising from the mug, maybe next time.

What struck me first for the sense of hearing was the silence I hear all around me now that my kids are all in school and I'm home alone all day. I tried several different ideas, none conveying what I wanted to show. But, the sound of my husband playing his guitar while singing our favorite songs is definitely music to my ears. 

The soft, squishy feeling of holding hands with my children or my husband is something I treasure. The touch of their hands in mine is something so powerful that I can't even put it into words. 

To highlight the words of each of {my five senses}, I've punched a shape placed the sticker letters inside. I print my photos at home and crop my photos to the size I want before printing. If you're not able to do so, take your 4x6 photo and trim it to the 4x4 square that's called for in this page sketch. To show you, I printed my coffee mug photo as a 4x6 and trimmed to size to place on my mini book layout.

I have the day off tomorrow as Momenta hosts give.away.day. here at Write.Click.Scrapbook. We'll see each other again on Friday when we'll create our opening and closing layouts for our mini book and perhaps even get around to a layout about {my five senses} just in case you're not a mini book maker.

 

 

*a special thanks to Momenta for providing the products for this week's mini book project *

my five senses | let's get started

Happy Fall! I'm Monika Wright, your host this week, and we're going to be taking a journey together which was inspired by my 5-year old Kindergartener. You see, they were studying the five senses a few weeks ago and as Victoria was sharing with us what the class had discussed, a light bulb went off in my head. Wouldn't it be neat to record what our very own five senses mean to us?

 

I'll be documenting {my five senses} this week in mini book format using this kit from Momenta as well as several other elements, including DYO stickers.

Don't know where to begin? Just print off this download and begin filling in what comes to mind, ideas for photographs and your impressions of how you view your five senses. If you're not a mini book fan, just use this as a starting point for your next page layout. You might even include the kids and the grandkids, asking them what their five senses mean to them. And guess what, you can even do this project in digital format, click here to see the two pages of free digital designs and templates Momenta has for you.

 

 

You can either save this image to your desktop to print, click here for the file, or find it in my blog sidebar. Below, you'll see a few ideas that I've written on my worksheet so far, just to get you started.

 

 

 

Tomorrow, we'll be working out our mini book design and getting started with pulling it all together. See you then!

 

** a special thanks to Momenta for providing the products used for this week's mini book project **

My Creative Process Day 4: Scrapbooking

 Hi and welcome back for my last day of hosting!

I scrapbook chronologically and have always done so. I have thought of doing separate albums for family members, events etc. but it just doesn't feel right for me. My scrapbooks are just like our lives: this and that mixed all together. I guess it can seem odd that I have a page about when I saw my friend Linda for the last time before she passed away and a layout about our pets right next to eachother, but that is how our lives look, highs and lows and inbetweens all mixed.

I also sometimes scrap different sizes of layouts and keep them all mixed together in the same albums. Although I tend to mostly scrap 8,5x11" (actually it is A4 but it is close in size) both vertical and horizontal, I like to add a 6x12” page here and there.

 

I also do minibooks from time to time. This summer for example I did a summer mini and I love how used it looks and feels now that I am done with it. 

 

My minibooks tend to have themes like summer, December daily or birthdays. I have recently started a happy fall mini!

 

As I said on Monday, I am intrigued by seeing other peoples creative process and just because of that I am going to invite you to see how I go about to start a project.

First I almost always start with a photo/story. Not that I have a photo for every memory I want to keep, but I do tend to have my camera with me most times :) Then I pick out my background paper which is either black, white or kraft. 

After that I dig into my stash of embellishments. I pick out an assortment of things that I think will be used and just put them together with my photo + background paper.

 

My next step, if I do my journaling on my computer is to write and print that. If I do my journaling by hand I do that when I have added (adhered) the photo and embellishments.

 

My problem arises when I have almost finished a layout. When I sit there and think, what else should I add? You know when you can just see that it is not all finished?? I usually end up adding some flowers, diecuts, ink or sewing. Nowadays I can actually leave a layout sitting on my table overnight. By morning I usually see what still needs to be added. I used to have a hard time walking away from an unfinished project before, but it seems that has changed. 

  {edited: i am sorry for the wonky photo!}

 

I get my scrapbooking inspiration from different things and areas of life. Mostly though, I thrive on seeing other people's pages. Nowadays I keep my favourite layouts in my paper pinterest folder. Now and then I copy the images from there onto a Powerpoint presentation and print it as audience copies, it is super easy and leaves me with a wide collection of page inspiration that I then can keep with me when I sit down to scrap.  

Thank you so much for this week and please let me know if you have any questions! 

☺ Lisa O

Digi Scrap 102 - Day Four - Random Tips

Last day and so much more that I'd love to cover! So I figure I'd share nine completely random tips and tricks for Photoshop. What a bargain!

 

1. Eyedropper Tool

 Both digital scrapbookers and paper scrappers can use this tip. Select the Eyedropper Tool from the Tools palette. Click on any color in a photo or a digital element or paper. Papr scrappers you can call up an image of a sheet of paper or an element - just use the picture from an online store! Now you have a perfect match. I find this a great way to color text for journaling or title work. See how nicely the title matches the papers!

2. Creating a Sticker-like Alphabet

On this page, you can see I used a font to create the title then added a white outline to it to make it look like a sticker.  It's a super easy process and combined with the eye dropper tool above, it can perfectly match your papers and elements! Here I used the eye dropper tool to get the perfect green and I stroked the title text twice.

 

3. Rounded Corners

Paper scrappers use a corner rounder to create rounded corners.  Digital scrapbookers have to use other tools. I use Jessica Sprague’s Rounded Corner Brush. I know other folks like to use the shape tool. Check out the Daily Digi for a few tutorials on how to create this look on your pages. Here’s a page that I did using Jessica’s corner rounder brush.

4. Brushes

Why reinvent the wheel? I wrote an article this summer for Ella Publishing all about brushes. Head on over and check it out. There are even some free brushes to download! Here's a hybrid page I did using a brush that looks like a paint splatter. Brushes also look awesome on photos.

 

5. Align Bottom Edges

This is really simple, but I'm always amazed that seasoned scrappers don't know about this. Select the Move tool from the Toolbar (or press v on your keyboard.) In the layers palette, select the layers you would like to line up.

In Photoshop Elements, on the top toolbar, you'll see a drop down called align. You can align the bottom or top edges of the elements easily!

In Photoshop, you'll see icons along the top tool bar.

Easy peasy - but really saves time!

 

6. Another Way to Align Elements

You can turn on the grid function by selecting View > Show > Grid in Photoshop CS and View > Grid in Elements. Your screen will look like this…

Now you can use your move tool to align the layers up against the grid lines. Very helpful when you are trying to find the center of the page too!

 

7. Copying Layer Styles

So we talked about Layer Styles and shadows the other day. You can easily copy a layer style to another layer. Simply right click on the Layer and select Copy Layer Style. Select another layer (you can even select multiple layers) and right click and select Paste Layer Style.

 

8. Another Title Trick

After you have your text title the size you want. You can easily clip paper to the title to give your title a more textured or even patterned look. Highlight the layer in the Layers palette, drag a piece of paper onto your page so it covers the alpha. Then select the paper layer and right click and select Create Clipping Mask. Highlight both layers and merge layers. I clipped an orange solid paper that had some texture to the title on this page.

 

9. Keyboard Shortcuts

Nothing saves more time than learning a few keyboard shortcuts. Visit Adobe’s site for Elements or CS to learn more. A couple of my favorite shortcuts…

• v – by typing this letter, you’ll select the move tool.
• Select a layer in the Layers palette. CTRL [ will move a layer down and CTRL ] will move a layer up. If you hit CTRL Shift [, you’ll move the layer to the bottom and CTRL Shift ] will move the layer to the very top.
• To zoom in press CTRL + (plus) or to zoom out press CTRL - (minus)
• CTRL D will deselect an item and get rid of the marching ants!

 

Now the drawing for Julie Billingsley's kit - the winner is number 10....

 
Jen email me at celestefsmith AT gmail DOT com and I'll send you a code to pick up Julie Billingsley's fabulous kit! Thanks again to sweet Julie for donating the kit.

I have had such a fun week with all of you! I hate to see it end. I hope that you picked up a new technique or tip to try. Until next time!

Welcome, August!

For many of us, scrapbook pages begin with a photograph. We use it to help set the mood of the page. It is our springboard for product selection, both in color and in style. Sometimes we use it to help tell our story, and other times we let it be the whole story. Our photographs are usually the focal point of our pages. Because we like them to be. Because they are pretty, funny, purposeful, memorializing.

But what happens when the story has no photo? Do you leave it out of your scrapbook? Do you just let it stay in your journal, or (gasp!) your mind? Why do we deem these stories unworthy of our scrapbooks, just because the have no photo?

This month, we wanted to take a moment to show how layouts can be amazing without photos. Just know you might just cry, or laugh, or both, as there are some great stories this month. And there are also some artistic pages that were a chance for our artistic sides to take center stage as we played with a page with no boundaries. Be on the lookout for product taking the lead on a page, and for creative uses for product packaging. You might notice some large graphics taking the place of a photo. and as you read through the messages from the designers, you can see how their pages evolved--as none of us are used to creating without pictures. But without exception we hope you see a collection of amazing layouts that relay a message without a photograph taking center stage.

What we hope you realize at the end of the day, is that stories are important. And they can stand on their own. And they can be the reason to create a page. Because sometimes, there are No Photos Required.

Enjoy our new gallery! Enter here...

 

Scrapbook Page to Sketch and Template

Hello again! In June I shared a couple of colour schemes to work with, this month I want to share a page foundation. Sometimes I make a page that I love so much, that I find myself scraplifing the design and using it on other pages. Then it hit me that in fact I was using the page as a sketch and so I thought "Why not make it into one to share?"

If you've been reading the blog for a while you might remember this page that I shared when I hosted Baby Week last year

Awwww, this is still one of my all time favourite photos and (page)!

I used this same design later in the year when Donna wrote about scraplifting yourself

and I've used it a couple more times because it's a great way to do a quick page, plus showcase one photo!

And now here it is in sketch form!

Don't despair digi and hybrid scrappers, I thought about you too. I also made it into a layered template so everyone can play!

To download just the sketch in PDF form go here. To download a zip file of the sketch plus the layered template go here. If you have any issues with downloading do let me know in the comments.

Now if you still haven't used last month's colour scheme, maybe you can combine it with this sketch for a quick scrapping session. As always make sure to show us what you do by uploading your projects to the Flickr group.

Happy Summer Scrapping!

Making a Long Title Short

Hey people!  I hope everyone is enjoying the summer format of our blog. 

I sure am. 

Partially because I only have one night of sweaty nightmares leading up to my turn, rather than a full week of them (sweaty nightmares are not my favourite) and partially because of all the diverse talent here that we've been enjoying (diverse talent is my favourite).

So here's my offering of the day. 

Something I'm going to call:  ONE KIT: Three Ways.

My initial title was (said with feeling):  OMG. Libby Pritchett you do the cutest stuff and you say you WILL make a mini kit for me to give away on my WCS blog host day?! You're the best. I'd like to be like you one day with all the digitizing and making stuff.

Sigh. 

But I thought maybe it wasn't to the point enough. 

And as I'm confused enough for the all of us, I thought I would simplify it. 

I put together a little tutorial for one of the projects including an image to download if you are so moved to do so. 

Oh right, first, here is:

PROJECT ONE: Not Your Nana's Decorative Plate

 

And here is where I tell you, I had planned to take photos of this project from start to finish to share with you.

And then I didn't.

So, please, close your eyes and imagine, if you will, a place that looks suspiciously like my garage complete with basketballs and razor scooters strewn about willy nilly and a large flattened cardboard box in the middle of the space that is covered with the spray paint remnants of days gone by.

Nestled in a box nearby, lives a family of well loved spray paint cans. 

Let us remove the can of Kilz (which sounds much more awful and violent than it is in reality - this is our primer) and a can of Rustoleum Ultra cover gloss white (normally, I'm opposed to shiny, among other things, but I find a gloss works better for painting plates).

Spray the plates that you've lovingly chosen from the thrift store, Aunt Olga's wedding china, or wherever you have found them. 

Spray them lightly and from a distance to avoid puddling and drippings (more things I am opposed to). You might need two coats of this to cover the ducks/roses/insert ugly decorative pattern here on your plates.

When that business is dry, give it a coat of the gloss paint.

And when that business is dry, bring them in and we'll get to the photo portion of our project.

As you can see, I'm not always silly, sometimes I am VERY businesslike.

The first thing I did was use this lovely little kit (download available at the end of this post, monsters however are not).

To create this:

Downlaod May Love Always Follow You

The download should print as approximately 7.5x7.5. I don't think there will be too many dinner plates with a diameter larger than this. Mine was about 7 inches across. I left a little extra room around the edge of the patterned paper to account for this.

Then I used my cricut to cut mine.

You don't need a cricut, but I figured I may as well use it as I am not too handy at following the lines (or colouring inside them for that matter).

So...

Measure across plate and make sure you give yourself about 1/4 inch inside of the rim of the plate (if you cut it too large the circle won't lay flat on what I'll call the "meat'n'potatoes" part of the plate, ie. not the edge).

This is part of the reason my next photo shows not a little birdie circle being cut out but a lime green practice piece.

Take the practice circle, we'll call her Bob, and make sure it fits flatly (is that a word? Or only when referring to the Lord of the Dance? WCS readers are pretty clever chickens, so you get the gist) against the meat'n'potatoes of the plate.

Next I went on to cutting the actual digital print. 

To make sure I had the circle cutting exactly where I wanted it (step one was developed after the circle cutting exactly where I didn't want it too many times to count).

What I did here was keep the sheet on the cutting mat and peel up the edge where the circle had been cut from and slide in the digital print, using the negative circle as a guide to where the machine would be cutting and stick down the photo paper and only then did I remove the green sheet.

And proceed with cutting.

Now a word from our sponsor.

Not really. 

Just an aside.

I just wanted to show you what I did with one of the matching plates (I ended up making 4 more for my niece's bedroom) which I kind of wish I had of done with the larger plate that I'm sharing the instructions for. 

But I didn't. 

And sometimes you just have to forge ahead.

One thing I really dig about digital is that you can add dimension by printing and cutting out elements. 

So, see the banner and heart that I printed? I thought it would be nice to have a bit of dimension on some of the plates, so I printed them apart from the main circle and handcut them. (And hated every minute of it. I swear!)

Here I used some of my baker's twine and my trusty Zig glue pen to attach to the top of the banner.

And here is the heart, upside down, slathered with pop dots (pssst...it's the pop dots that give it the dimension).

I glued the tiny buttons on to "hang" the banner from and secured the banner with a couple more pop dots.

If I were going to redo it, I probably would have used this technique to make the bird pop on the larger plate.

But I'm not.

So that's that.

What I did do to add dimension to the larger plate was use the Zig glue pen to adhere more of the baker's twine around the perimeter of the circle. I tied a bit through a red button and added that to the centre of the circle as well (you can see this in the first photo I shared.)

Now, on to:

PROJECT TWO: Layout

(I use capital letters and italics to both catch your attention and wow you. Maybe I should have tried a different font?)

As I mentioned, I am making these plates for my niece, as I have been both blessed and cursed with stinky little pink hating boys.

Well, not so little anymore, but plenty stinky still.

So I thought I would whip up a layout that I could frame to go with the plates.

I made the layout in 8.5x11 format, but the white frame I had was a weird shape (the photo opening was 6.75x8.5) so after I saved the layout in normal size, I cropped it to the weird size.

I do this often for framing layouts - usually before cropping I group all the elements together (everything but the background paper) and using the corner dragging option I resize everything a bit smaller.

PROJECT THREE: For You

Finally, I made a digital card.

I do this almost exclusively now.

It's so fast and simple it's almost silly. (And I know silly.)

Here it is with the layout I framed:

and here it is as a download if you like:

Download For You card

And here is a final shot of everything together:

Still with me?

Thanks for sticking around, I know I get so wordy on these blog posts.

I feel like I'm all - "and this, and this and this...did I mention this?"

They say that admitting you have a problem is the first step, no?

This is the mini kit, Libby so kindly designed for us!

Supercute Free Download from Libby

The rest of the projects I made using the original kit that she made, you can find it here:

And Your Bird Can Sing

(take a look at Libby's other kits - they are awesome. And while you're browsing, don't forget to check out her titles - they are always make me laugh!)

With that, I am out of here!

I think I'll go catch some sun on the deck and clean up my mess later!

Hope you all have a most excellent summer!

Cheryl O. (I'm supposed to have a cool uploaded signature here, but I haven't done it yet. Sorry Marnie! Have I told you how beautiful you are lately?) [Dearest Cheryl, No, actually, you haven't. I haven't slept in weeks worrying that perhaps my new bio picture with my gorgeous new grey roots and awesome new wrinkles had either scared or scarred you. So tonight, finally, I can sleep knowing that you still think me foxy after all these years... xxMarnie]

Wait a minute, was that just a means of distracting me away from that missing siggy???