Write. Click. Scrapbook.

Favorite Quotes Calendar

Hi there, it's Celeste sporting a new 'do! Calendars make great gifts for friends and family. This year I put together a printable calendar base for you that you can display in an empty CD case. Please download the file at this link. The file includes blank printable PDFs for each month of 2012. As well, I’ve included digital templates so you can make a calendar like the one I did or use them as a starting point for your own creation. I also created a PNG file of digital stamps for each month. You can use these and create any size calendar you’d like!

For my calendar, I decided to collect some of my favorite quotes and share them with my friends and family. I chose the Quatrefoil #2 Paper Pack and Spring/Summer Labels element pack from our dear friend Crystal Wilkerson. Lucky for me Crystal included 12 different colors in the pack, perfect for my calendar! I simply added paper to the tops of my bases and then a label. Using the font Rockwell, I added my quote on top of the label. Easy peasy!

By creating my calendar digitally, I can print out a slew of them to give to relatives and friends. Here's my calendar in its CD holder. If you wish to display your calendar like I did, you'll need to find an old CD case you no longer need or buy some new empty ones. Follow these directions to create the CD case holder for your calendar. You could also purchase magnetic clips from Staples so that the calendar can hang on the fridge.

I shared my calendar templates with Monika Wright. She created these fabulous 4x6 calendars and is sharing three amazing display options.

January shows the calendar embellished with some baker's twine from The Twinery and attached with cute mini clothespins. February has the calendar inserted into an inexpensive frame, this one from IKEA and embellished with ribbon...and you know you have plenty of ribbon in your stash to change out the ribbon to match each month's featured color! And for March, shop your paper scraps, adhere a bit to the top of the calendar and display on a small easel, this one from the Dollar Tree. In the extra space, jot down any important dates that you don't want to forget.

If you'd like to use these free downloads for your own office space or craft room, Monika has made them available on her blog, and will have the next quarter's calendar downloads available mid-March.

 

Cheryl Overton made a calendar using the digital template. I love how she used the artisan shapes as spaces for her photos. Her calendar is amazing!

Marnie Flores made a wall calendar incorporating all twelve months onto one poster. She created 12 boxes for photographs from each month of this past year. Marnie created her poster in a 16x20 size for her kitchen, and then had two extra printed in 8x10 as a little Christmas extra for the grandmas!!

If you make a calendar, be sure to share it with us in the Flickr gallery. Happy Holidays!

Hipstamatic Photos - cards and a Mini-Book

Hello Dear Friends! This is alexandra and today we're looking at cards and a mini book all showcasing Hipstamatic shots.

 

 

 

 

Here is a first card I made using two Hipstamatic pictures:

and this one with an off-centered glittered frame...

and to finish off this week of posts on the magic of Hipstamatic shots, here is a crazy mini. The idea behind it is a portrait of each member of the family (minus DD#1 who is away at University) coupled with a manuscript journaling of their favorite things in life! I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Avital for providing the journaling cards used in this mini-album.

Thank you for your visits and comments! I've enjoyed being your host this week. Happy Scrapping everyone!

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!

Digi Scrap 102: Day Three - Actions

Hey there! I'm back and today we are going to take action! Well, okay we are really only going to talk a bit about Photoshop Actions. Photoshop Actions are basically just a recorded set of steps that you can run when you want to perform a task. (Don't you wish there was a action that would do the laundry?) Most scrappers use Photoshop Actions on their photos to convert to black and white or add a cool effect. There are other actions as well though. For instance, there are actions that resize and sharpen pages to put on the web. Text actions can change text into cool looking epoxies or chipboard. There are even actions that will literally scrap a page for you step by step!

Do you have a task that you perform repetitively in Photoshop CS? You can record custom actions. For instance, I recorded an Unsharp Mask action that uses Scott Kelby's recommended settings (Amount: 85% Radius: 1 Threshold: 4) and I use it on almost every photo I edit, quite a time saver. Unfortunately, Photoshop Elements does not have the custom actions feature.

However, you can run actions in either Photoshop CS or Elements. You just have to be sure that the action you are downloading is compatible with the program you have. I'm going to share a few of my favorite free actions here with you. Give them a whirl!

 

Actions for Photography

Pioneer Woman Actions (PS & PSE) - we've mentioned these actions time and time again here because they are truly amazing!

TIP: When the action is finished running, you can select the layer the action is on and use the drop down next to the word Opacity to lessen the effect. I find I run the Pioneer Woman's Boost at about 60% when I use it. The same with Seventies - one of my favorite actions in her sets!

 

Coffee Shop (PS & PSE) - Rita at the Coffee Shop offers a wide array of actions in both PSE and PS formats. I simply adore her Butterscotch Vintage action. It's just stunning! Be sure to check out her black and whites too!

Texas Chicks (PSE) - this site offers a few great Photoshop tools in action form. I use the Defog action and the Noise Reduced all the time. Worth signing up for the newsletter to get access!

Instagram (PS) -  I live in the dark ages and don't have an iPhone or even a smart phone. I have this really old flip phone with no keyboard or anything. So I can't take photos with my phone and use the app Instagram. Well now I can simulate that! This set of actions will take your photo and create similar effects to Instagram! Fun!

Rob Carr's Black & White Action (PS) - This was hard to find. I downloaded this action years ago and it is my favorite black and white conversion method. It really creates crisp, stunning black and white conversions. The action stops you in places and let's you tweak the conversion. Really cool!


Digital Scrapbooking Tools

Resize & Sharpen for Web - when posting layouts or photographs online it's important to sharpen them correctly. As well, using this action will easily resize your image to the size you wish.

Polaroid Frames - Polaroid frames are so retro and add interest too. This action set easily converts your image to have a Polaroid frame!

Installing Actions

Now you are probably wondering, I've downloaded all these actions now what do I do? You'll need to install them. I could go on and on for pages and pages here, but it's probably better to send you over to Wendy Zines' tutorial to get you started! Once you have the action loaded. You can open the Actions palette and click on it to run it.

I'll be back on Friday with some random tips and tricks. Be sure to stop by tomorrow for an awesome giveaway!

 

Digi Scrap 102: Day Two - Shadows

Today we are going to talk about shadows. Shadows are really important on digital scrapbook pages. Shadows give a layout dimension and depth. They are really essential if you want your pages to look realistic.

On this first page, I didn't use any shadowing. The page looks flat and there is no definition between the border strips at the bottom of the page. 

Perhaps you can see it a little more clearly in the close up. The border part almost looks like one piece of patterned paper. There is no separation between the layers.

 

 

By adding shadows, you can see the layers and elements begin to pop. There is dimension to the page and the layers of borders are clearly defined.

So how do you do it? Well shadowing is truly an art and I will admit it's an art that I far from excel at. Enter Shadow Layer Styles. Shadow Layer Styles are basically settings that have been saved for you. A set of them might include different styles for paper, buttons, stitching, and other parts of a page.

You can pick up a basic set of styles for free. This is a great way to get started shadowing and see if styles are for you!

1. Flergs has a free set of shadow styles and a quick tutorial on how they work. A great beginning set.

2. Megan Turnidge not only imparts a good deal of information about shadowing. Her free set of styles is top notch.

3. Krystal Hartley offers another free set. This set is what I started with. Krystal has a light hand with shadows and I used these almost exclusively until I bought a couple sets.

For minimal cost, you can pick up a set or two that have more options. Peppermint Granberg and Jenn Barrette offer amazing shadow style sets. These sets include many different styles for different elements on your pages. The two sets work together really well as both sets have the light hitting at the same 45 degree angle. I use these styles on almost all of my pages.

Installing layer styles is a fairly easy process. Check out the resources below for how to's.

• Photoshop Elements 9
• Photoshop Elements 7 & 8
• Photoshop Elements 6
• Photoshop CS

Using the layer styles is even easier, simply click on the layer you want to shadow in the Layers Palette, then click on the style in the styles palette. Simple!

More advanced digital scrapbookers create their own custom shadows for each element on a page.  If you'd like to learn how to create your own custom shadows I would suggest the following resources.

• The Daily Digi's post on shadows
• Peppermint Granberg's post on shadows
• Designer Digitals forum on shadows in PSE
• Scrappers Workshop Shadow tutorial
• Peppermint Granberg's class at Big Picture
• Divian's Tutorial for PSCS
• Something Blue Cast Shadow Tutorial (PSCS)

I hope you'll give Shadow Styles a spin! Come back tomorrow for a little discussion about Photoshop actions! Until then...

 

Digi Scrap 102: Day One - Templates

Hi there! It's Celeste back hosting this week. A few months ago the lovely Rebecca Cooper hosted a week that introduced us to digital scrapbooking. This week, I'm going to focus on some next steps, kind of a Digi Scrap 102. I'll share some tips and tricks to help you easily add punch to your digital pages. Some of the tips I'll share will also help paper scrappers - so hey you, over there with the scissors, don't tune out! And everyone be sure to read the postscript below!

Today we are going to focus on Templates. Back in February, Rebecca shared downloadable instructions on how to use a template and Crystal Wilkerson provided a fabulous video on how to get started as well. If you are just starting out, take a moment and check out those resources!

To start, I created this template for all of you to play with. As you can see, you can use the large block for a photo and the smaller blocks could be papers or photos. The choice is yours. To download the template, click on the image.

I filled in the blocks and added my title and journaling much in the same way Crystal discusses in the video to create this page about my niece and her dog, Sadie. I added some digital stitching, a couple extra buttons, and a clip to personalize the template.

 

Digital templates are great starting points for pages. You can use them as is, like I did above or you can change them up a bit for different looks.

Above Francine Clouden rotated the template 90 degrees clockwise. Then pulled the journaling back to the bottom of the page. To accomplish this in Photoshop Elements or Photoshop CS, simply go to Image > Image Rotation and select 90° CW. Then in the Layers Palette, click on the Journaling layer and go to Edit > Transform > Rotate 90° CW. Using the Move tool on the Tools palette (this looks like an arrow with a plus), click on the Journaling layer and drag it to the bottom of the page.

 
Another easy way to change up a template is to shrink or stretch the template. In the Layers palette, select all of the layers except the background layer. You can use the CTRL key and a click of your mouse to select multiple layers. Then go to Edit > Free Transform and while holding down the shift key, use your mouse to resize the layers either bigger or smaller. As you can see, Ann Costen stretched the template to fill more of the page. Then using the same process for rotating the journaling; she rotated the title and placed it on the left edge to balance out the page. I love how she filled the template with photos!

Other template changes include resizing from 12x12 to 8.5x11, using blocks for photos instead of papers, and only using parts of the template to create your page. Paper scrappers, this same technique can be used with sketches. It's a great way to get more than one look out of a sketch!

To close the day, I thought I'd share some places you can go and download free digital scrapbooking templates. Paper scrappers check out these sites and use the templates as sketches!

• Get It Scrapped
• Simple Scrapper
• Free Digital Scrapbooking Templates
• Jessicasprague.com 

If you create a page with the template, I'd love to see it! Post it in our Flickr gallery and link me up here! I'll be back tomorrow with more digi tips. Stay tuned!

P.S. I made the banner using Julie Billingsley's kit Rule the School available at Sweet Shoppe Designs! And keep this on the down low (i.e. don't tell the boss lady) shhhhh! Julie is a sweetheart and offered up a little giveaway to one lucky commenter. You'll get a copy of Rule the School for free! Leave a comment on this thread (you have until Thursday Midnight EST) and I'll pull a winner and post on Friday. 

 

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???

Organizing My Thoughts (Stop Laughing.)

This is me getting organized.

I have a heap of different projects to share today and as per my usual M.O. they are kind of all over the place. 

But I'm okay with it, if you are.

I figure you're getting used to me.

Let's get to it, shall we?

I thought we could start in the Mudroom.

I'm going to call this montage "The Dumping Ground":

Also, Bella's stomping grounds.

Bella is our pooch. 

She's kinda sheddy, not all that smart, and totally neurotic. 

But we still love her.

This is usually what I have to work around in my scrapbook room:

And you people with cats think you have it tough when kitty wants to sit on your keyboard.

Here's a layout I did a while ago of Bella wearing J's clothes:

Instead of college funds in our house we have "Future Therapy Funds" (and a swear jar).

Anyway, back to the mudroom, remember, this is me being organized in my thoughts.

I hate things on my counters and things that don't have a place to live.

I didn't want a big bag of dogfood (the forest green bag completely clashes with our house decor) just laying around crappin' up the place.

So I used a big empty dog treat container (Costco).  Bella was very happy to help me empty the container.

She likes food quite a lot. 

Something else she and the husband have in common.

So I decorated the front and top with some patterned paper and punched a couple of holes in the lid and threaded some ribbon through to act as a handle.

The other idea I had (after someone (husband) put wet boots in the cabinets we have and ruined the bottom of the slide out drawers) was to use patterned paper to frouf up the place (frouf: meaning to spiff).

I just took 2 pieces of 12x12 paper, pieced them together and taped the seams on the backside. I have since found a large roll of clear sticky vinyl at the Walmart that I'm going to try and laminate the pieces of paper with (I'll let you know how that goes.  Me + large sticky anything = fiasco written all over it).

I still had some thrift store scores left over so I used this shadow box (I shared the before photo in the previous post), painted it black and made the inside using some little scrapbook tokens that I've had probably since the early 2000's).

It's hard to see, but the tokens have a fire hydrant on them (though I've never seen a dog in real life use a fire hydrant as a bathroom.  Weird.) a bone and the word "woof".

You can see them better here:

And the quote I chose was because of the previous photo of Bella on her back in my scrapbook room. 

She is a shameless hussy. 

My friend tells me it's all learned in the home, but I plead the fifth.

I hung her leash and the poop bags from it. 

That way my kids will ALWAYS know where the poop bags are and can't plead ignorance (all learned in the home...I'm starting to see what she means).

The quote I printed on photo paper and adhered it to a piece of wood that I had painted black and I put the hooks on afterwards.  I also used a bit of black craft paint to touch up the screws as they were silver instead of black.  Dollar store screws, I tell ya.

..............................................................

Chapter Two:  Bathrooms and Laundry Rooms: No One is Going to Get Punched in the Face

I made these pieces a couple of years ago using an AMAZING tutorial that Linda Barber had online.  It showed you how to iron on freezer paper to the back of muslin type fabric and then run it through your printer.  Or something like that.  I kind of forget.  But it was brilliant!  Linda is awesome.

I wrapped them around a couple of dollar store canvases I had laying around:

My wrapping technique leaves quite a bit to be desired. 

I don't know if any of you eagle eyes noticed, but that is a remote control on that stack of towels and yes we do have a tv in the bathroom.

If it were up to cable-guy, we'd have one in every room of the house, and I fought him like crazy (crazy being the operative word, a TV in the bathroom? Really?) but I have to admit, I really like to take baths and now I can totally get my reality on while soaking in a big soapy tub of water. Sometimes crazy is as crazy does.

And this is the other stuff I have in my laundry room.

And by stuff I mean thing:

I downloaded a font that had the laundry symbols and put it on a digital paper in PSE and printed.  Another cheapo frame jazzed up with Heirloom white.  I found (pilfered) a piece of velcro from the garage and hung the frame on the old washboard.

...........................................

Chapter Three:  Short and Sweet.  Well, short.

Here is the other piece of the metal tiered cake rack I promised I would share today:

Way better for my necessities and bedtime stuff. 

And yes, that's dental floss. 

And yes, I floss my teeth in bed. 

And yes, I know many people think that's gross.

But my dental hygienist thinks it's awesome.

Well, I didn't tell her about the "in bed part" but I know she's proud that I'm getting the job done at all.

...........................................

Chapter Four: Some Random Stuff (Organized-schmorganized)

The reason I like spray paint so much is that I don't have to clean (let dry by accident and then throw away) brushes.  Imagine my delight when I found chalkboard paint in spray form. 

Back to my 50 centsing ways, little plate at the thrift store, what?  You guessed it.  50 cents.

I used my gluegun (who I hate because she burns me and makes a mess on my floor, but sometimes I have to take the whole no pain, no gain thing to heart and plug her in) to glue the little Making Memories clip on and then wrapped a piece of chalk with patterned paper (I scalloped the edge first), strung it up with twine and capped it off with a decorative brad that I used my good (why do I do that?) scissors to nip the prongs off of.

Wheeeeeeeeeee!

That's me jumping on the Keep Calm bandwagon.

This is for our trailer.

I adhered it to a piece of chipboard and used some Tim Holz clips on a canvas, so I can remove it when the next bossy trend comes along telling me what to do.

I know I tease my family and joke about them, but they're okay.

I'm pretty sure I'll keep them.

I made this one in a similar way to the butterfly one I shared earlier this week. 

MDF.

Patterned paper.

Cardstock.

The only difference is I glued these little knobs (heh heh) to it and then strung the baker's twiner across them and used little clothespins (dollar store) to attach some photos, a tag and a metal flower.

Bob. 

Dad. 

You know the story.

...............................................

Chapter Five: Recycling Bags and Stuff

Three things that have brought me a small amount of joy:

1. Starbucks sugar free vanilla syrup (with a free kraft bag!)

2. The most awesome of watches from the most awesome of husbands who really DOES read all those "if you're looking for a present to buy me, check this out" links that I email him (with a free kraft box!)

3. Scrapbook paper.  KI Orange Peel White mostly (can you guess what goes here?  Free bag!)

All these free bags go into a big tub in my room for future use. 

Here's what I did today (also I had a lot of free butterflies from the murder flutter I cut earlier this week):

The butterfly garland was super easy:

Fold over and punch small hole through back butterfly:

Adhere butterflies together with pop dots between their wings (no adhesive on the body part).

String them together (I used more of the baker's twine.  It's my binge today.)

Add to bag in whatever way pleases you.

Just a note - on the large bag, I folded the top over, pushed a large brad through a punched brown circle and then through the top layer of the folded part.  Then I glued a tiny magnet under the folded part and this holds the top shut.

Here's my free box.

I used more of the old book that I made the nest stuff out of and used this tutorial to make the bow:

And here's another idea for gift bags - I made these for Valentine's day for my boys.  I have about 400 lunchbags (remember when paper bag mini books were trending?  Yah.  Me too.)

 And, now I shall close the curtain on this week.

Thank you for joining me, I hope you got inspired to make something.  Or at the very least gather up some of your 50 centses and hit a thrift store to see what kind of treasures you can find.

Overton out.

If you thought I was all over the place before...

Friday is here! 

Did you miss me? 

I missed you.

Can I get a rousing round of applause for that darling digital book that Marnie designed and shared with us yesterday?  (I'm more of a whistler and catcaller, but let's try to keep this dignified, folks, this isn't a Rock and Roll show).

I am in a slow burning panic about all the stuff I have to say and I only have TWO MORE DAYS to say it!

What was the last thing I said? 

Something about kids' rooms, right?

How about we start off on the right foot (just a quick aside, when they say "start off on the right foot, do they mean the correct foot?  or not the left foot?) with this lovely little collection that Angie sent me?

Sigh.

I long for a precious little sweet smelling girl who doesn't make up words to my favourite songs while in the car and sing over me. 

Who doesn't wait almost a month to tell me that they only have two pairs of underwear that fit them and they've just been wearing them for a few days in a row to make them last.

Who doesn't smell like feet, shoot me with nerf bullets and dress the dog in their dad's clothes (okay, that last one was me, but in my defense, it was hilarious.)

Angie used a vinyl letter "K" thicker on some patterned paper for that little monogram (see how awesome simple is? I love simple.)

She picked up the ladybug print on Etsy and the vintage shelf at local consignment store. 

Thanks Angie!

Here's a little something I made the other day. 

First, some background (because, clearly, I don't have the ability to not be longwinded and carry on about how many 50 centses I spend at the thrift store), I bought a tiered metal serving thingie (50 cents) a couple of months ago with the thought that I would paint it and use it in my scrapbook room for something. 

It looked a bit like this:

 

I took it all apart, scrubbed it down and promptly misplaced the middle part that holds it all together.

I figured the missing pieces would turn up eventually, in the safe spot that I obviously had lovingly placed them.  So I went ahead and painted them while I was waiting...

I started with red:

I love red. 

It's my favourite. 

But this wasn't working for me. 

So being a creature of habit, I tried my old stand-by and with a couple of little chipboard elephants and heart turned it into a little piece of wall art for my (other) niece's room:

(if you come back tomorrow, I'll show you what I did with the larger bottom piece! Oh and if you were wondering, I found the middle pieces, in the kitchen cutlery drawer, but they missed the boat on this project, so too bad for them.)

Now to carry on with simple but I think effective projects, let's switch gears and talk digital.

I am here to tell you, that while fancy complete Photoshop is swell and may have a lot of bells and whistles, it is not necessary for making home decor.

No.  It's true.

I have  Photoshop Elements 5.0 (2006 I think, Costco, I want to say around $70? I can't imagine myself shelling out much more than that.)

I made this piece with the thought that I would send it to my niece for her bedroom.

 

Then I found out she hates pink.

I never liked her much anyway. 

(I kid, I KID!  I love that girl and I,too, am not overly fond of pink.)

So I opened it up, and with 2 clicks of a button, changed it to purple.

(digital paper by Crystal Wilkerson)

And Bob's your uncle (remember, he's my dad). 

Can I have a golf clap for old, cheap PSE please? 

(I'm sensing a trend, maybe this post is going to be all about applause?  Let's see what happens, shall we?)

Music really speaks to me (and not usually in a "I hear voices" way) and I find myself drawn to lyrics when I make stuff. 

You are my sunshine was the youngest boy's and my song.  I loved it when he was little. Until the day came where he would scream if I sang any other song (I tried to slip the Itsy, Bitsy Spider in there one time and I thought the kid's head was going to explode). 

Now I love it again (he's almost 11 and I only sing it to him very occasionally).

(digital elements by Crystal Wilkerson)

I made these for my husband's office (but then I kept them.) 

Both are SNL quotes. 

If you haven't seen the Will Ferrell/Christopher Walken Cowbell skit, you must

GO. GOOGLE. NOW.

I'll wait.

These are printed on photo paper and then adhered (using the ATG gun, I love that thing, I'd marry it if it vacuumed and could change a tire) it to a small piece of MDF that my current human husband cut for me.

After I glued it I realized that either my cutting was crooked (unlikely) or the husband's cutting was crooked (more likely).  So I grabbed my sanding block and sanded all the edges - the beauty of using photo paper on stuff like this is that when you sand it, the colour comes off and leaves a nice faded white edge that looks like you meant to do that in the first place. 

See how I work?

(Just another aside, I actually got an cowbell in my stocking for Christmas.  That crafty Mr. Claus must really want me to cheer the husband on during his triathlons this summer.  I am a lucky girl.  Especially since my kids learned "Don't Fear the Reaper" and Lucas now has the opportunity to play MORE COWBELL for reals.)

Okay. 

I can see why you might not think this of me, but I am not really all that super in to puns. 

I know. 

Hard to believe. 

That said, if a pun just falls magically out of the sky and into ones lap, what's a girl to do?

(digital paper and elements, Libby Pritchett)

And I do love the Beatles.

And cartoon owls.

(I have to confess real owls, like most birds, freak me out a bit.  What with the hooing and turning their necks all around.  Somethings not right there. If you like birds, I apologize, I was traumatized by a chicken while a was a child.  But that's a story for another day.)

So my older boy is almost a teenager.

And is sadly outgrowing the Star Wars/Lego theme we did in his room last time I hosted here. 

On our agenda for tomorrow is cleaning out his room and putting up some new decor. 

He's super stoked about the cleaning part, I'm sure. 

I made him a couple of pieces digitally for his room. I love that I buy frames once and we can change the art out as he changes.

I initially had this one framed, but then the other day I picked up all of these

from VV Boutique and thought it would look kind of cool like this:

 
(notice, clock is sans paint, I'm not sure about that yet...perhaps a nice coat of black?)

And I made him this:

Here's a better idea of what it looks like, man, it's hard to get a good picture of a frame with glass.  Glass is one of my nemesises (nemesi?) in that respect.

(The tape image is actually from a free font called CKAS, fun, huh?)

And here's an 8x10 download for you, if you so desire:

Download Rocking the suburbs

(PS is it ironic (and/or bad parenting) that I made this for my kid's room but he's not allowed to listen to the actual song because there are bad words in it?)

Okay, I need to stop before I wear us both out.

I'm starting to make spelling mistakes.

And type two spaces after my periods. (old habits and all.)

So, clap me out folks (but not too heartily, let's avoid the encore.)

(Tomorrow:  bathrooms, laundry rooms, mudrooms and more!)

Hey Look! A Squirrel: Blog Hosting Without Focus

 
Hey all!

My name is Cheryl and I would like to apologize in advance for the disorganization and eclecticness (eclectnicity?) of the coming week.

As usual I have a slew of excuses and reasons for my behaviour and here they are:

 

1. It's Spring! In addition to real life, project making and blogging I have begun the arduous task of spring cleaning. In my house spring cleaning is also known as “dump everything in the middle of the room, start chucking stuff out then move to another room to put something away and repeat, THEN when all rooms have large piles, panic a little, drink a lot of coffee and eventually get back to it”. This process usually takes me at least a couple of weeks and usually causes my husband to quietly consider a trial two week separation.
   (*interesting factoid #1: I am the only member of my family that considers spring cleaning to be quality family time.)

2. That's it. Usually my excuse for things is I'm cheap and lazy (and/or easy), which only half fits here, so I'm going with “it's Spring!”

3. I realize that one and one half excuses could not really be considered a slew, so I added this one. Plus I like when my Word program adds the indented numbers for me. Slick.

I'm going to try not to be too wordy, but I'm also smart enough to not make any promises on that front.

I will include lots of pictures and I will hope that most of them will be relevant. In a way, I guess I'm just suggesting that you buckle up, grab a coffee and hang on for the ride.

Two weeks ago I had an itemized list of things that I was going to write about and share.

It was a lovely list.

Written with purple pen (not that I'm partial to purple pens, but it was the closest pen and in retrospect seems slightly more fancy than your standard blue or black).

Little flower doodles in the corners.

Tiny hearts separating each thought (I'm totally lying about the hearts, but I wish I had of done that).

And then I lost the list.

So like I said:

1. coffee (or your beverage of choice)

2. buckle up

I know this is primarily a scrapbooking site, but I find as my kids get older, I seem to scrapbook less and do more home decor type projects. And since it's been almost 2 years since I hosted here I thought I would more or less redo the theme I did last time which was making stuff from junk I find at thrift stores.

Or if you're in a purple pen kind of mood we can call it “Scrapbooking in Today's Green World: ReUse, ReInvent, ReCreate”.

I hope that's okay.

Okay, time for slightly less talk and a little more action.

The last time I hosted I had started a photo wall in our basement.

I'm almost finished.

I know that was almost two years ago, but sometimes I get distracted. Plus, our basement is where our boys hang out. It smells like pre-teen boys (which is similar to feet, but worse) and sounds like angry drumming, electric guitar and nerf gun-wars, so I'm sure you can understand why I don't make it habit of going down there.

One of the things that I did before starting on my photo wall was hit the internets. I googled my way through a plethora of images before settling on the first one I saw (hello, Pottery Barn, my pretty)

These were the two that I finally printed off: 

 
Then I took these sheets shopping with me and picked out a couple of frames with oval mats (to go with the 393 square and rectangular frames that I have unused and hidden around my house).

I decided that the photo ledge was the way to go, because, frankly, having to hang two things levelly sounded much better than a) trying to hang a bunch of photos myself, all those excess nail holes are hard to hide or b) spending an afternoon with my husband hanging them, (see above: 2 week trial separation - after many years together we know which sports not to participate as a team in).

This is what our downstairs photo wall looks like so far:

 I used a little piece on the ledge that I shared during the last time I hosted the blog:

I think I will add another ledge underneath the middle one - it looks weirdly empty to me.

Here is more of the room:

And here is a close-up of the top of the trunk that my mom painted for me.

(the trunk was my mom and dad's when they were first married):

Then, as I am accustomed to doing, I began to binge a bit on photo ledges.

I purchased them at a store here called Jysk (pronounced Yisk for some strange Scandanavian reason, I think I heard that it's the same reason that we Canadians feel the need to add the letter u to many words).  But I'm pretty sure you can pick them up just about anywhere shelves are sold.

I did these ones in our bedroom:

(somewhat interesting factoid #2: the distressed frames were found at the dollar store a few years ago for $5 each, no spraypaint was harmed in the making of this photo wall)

And here is a close up of the little digital art I made to break up all the black frames: 

And here is a 5x7 PDF download of the pieces shown above for you to use if you like:

Download Love you more

And I used a couple in our living room here:

The vase was a shiny beige flower vase I've had kicking around for about 20 years, I painted it with black spraypaint and cut the four out of dollar store vinyl with my Cricut and then when the black paint was dry, put the vinyl on and used a matte white spraypaint overtop.  When I peeled the vinyl off, the edges of the number 4 weren't super clean so when it dried I just sanded it a bit in a "I totally meant to do that" sort of way. 

Funny, a lot of my projects seem to end that way.

The two framed pieces are digital art that I made in PSE using lyrics from a Maroon 5 song and printed on canvas paper that I purchased last year at the art store (it comes in rolls and when it works it looks really cool, but when it doesn't it makes me say bad words to my printer and canvas paper in general).

 

Do you want to know the one thing that I haven't been able to find at the second hand stores?

Is the suspense killing you?

Printer trays.

I long for a printer tray. 

But mostly I long for finding a printer tray in a thrift store for $1.99.

It could happen.

But while I long and wait patiently for that day, please peruse some of my fellow WCS girls' gorgeous printer trays, which to me seem like a condensed version of a photo/art wall.

Lisa  & Keshet sent me these to share:

So, now, not only do I want to find a printer tray real cheap, but I want to get married again and hire a proper photographer for GORGEOUS wedding photos, and I might as well throw some time travel in there (you know, where I know what I know NOW but get to go back in time to have a do-over of some sort with all this knowledge). 

Thanks ladies.

Lisa made two more that she graciously shared as well:

(*note to self:  take self portrait with family lying on our backs)

Thanks again, Ladies.  I have just mentally doubled my efforts to find a cheap printer tray.

So that's today. 

I hope it wasn't too long.

I'm sure it was so I hope that many of you are skimmers and stayed with me to get to the photos.

Stick around after the break, coming up next, I've Got Wood! Paint, Stamping and Other Applications.