Good Friends |Jackie Ashton | Recycled Elements

Hello Crafters, Jackie here with my layout using a product that not necessary a scrapbooking product.

My original plan was to use a recycled envelope, but then I found this greeting cards, so not fully recyclable but something that wasn't intended for a scrapbooking page.  

The layouts is basic, using patterned paper as my base and a 5 inch strip of patterned paper across the middle my page.

The photographs where take on my last girlie holiday in 2017 with my lifelong friends, so I used a summer theme papers, which are nice and bright and represented our holiday in Spain.  But my journalling is about how I have valued our friendship and how lockdown as brought us closer again.

We have not been together for over 18 months, so we are eager awaiting the lockdown restrictions to lifted so that we can get together for a good catch up in person.  But till then we will have to make do with our daily WhatsApp chats and FaceTime sessions.

I used the envelope as well, so I decided to decorate it and add some mini photographs inside.  

I decorated the front of the envelope with some patterned paper, stickers and stamps.

Inside the envelope, I die cut some tags using white cardstock, and added a selection of the photographs taken on our holiday, to both sides.  And also added a little word sticker to each photograph.

Then I decided that I needed a base for my photographs, so I mounted it onto a die cut tag, and adhered to the flap of the envelope.  To keep the envelope closed I added a velour dot that are normally used in sewing.

I added my journalling to the card with a few stickers, and also added one of these velour dots to the card, so that stayed flat on the page as well.

Thank you for stopping by, don’t forget to share your layout over on our Facebook page we would love to see them.

Till Next Time

Happy scrapping

 

Adventures fill your soul | Sam Ball | Recycled Elements

I love nothing better than ‘random’ things on my layouts, so when I saw this months’ theme to use recycled elements, I knew it was right up my street!

Having looked through my stash to find some recycled elements that inspired me, the most random items I could find were a 7” vinyl record and an old Mac keyboard.

 

I desperately wanted to use the record, but I wasn’t feeling it, so I moved on to the keyboard pieces and was fully intending to scrap a photo of a young child with an ABC theme.

I then got distracted by the fabulous Simple Stories Vintage Great Escapes collection, and decided to change the theme and elements completely as I was feeling so inspired!

 

I knew that I had lots of stash that would work with the ‘natural’ feel, so gathered together lots of elements including wooden buttons, hessian fabric, vintage French book paper and an old postcard, a 3D printed frame and even an actual twig, complete with moss!

Using the ‘Wild and Free’ paper from the collection as the base for the layout, it quickly came together. The left hand printed detailing was so pretty that although I toyed with cutting it out and layering it, I ended up clustering and layering on the right hand side, using the recycled elements to balance the busy left hand side.

Fresh off the tree, when I added the twig, my layout suddenly had a tiny spider crawling over it!

 

Even if you haven’t played along this month, why not share what the most random or recycled element you’ve ever used on a layout is? And if you have played along, don’t forget to share your layouts over on our Facebook page, or tag us on Instagram!

Jonah | Amy Kattenbelt | Inspired by another hobby

Good Morning UK Scrap Addicts, I am here to share with you my layout that was inspired by one of my other hobbies....Art Journalling.

For more than 10 years I avoided all things mixed media when I was scrapbooking. I discounted anything that used paint and sprays. I thought they were too scary as they were pretty unpredictable and messy.

Then, thanks to Shimelle's influence I tried finishing my layouts with a little controlled splatter of ink...and I loved how it looked. Slowly my confidence to use mixed media products grew and I learnt to embrace the curled pages and the whoops moments when something didn't turn out how I wanted.

 Last year I started down the slippery slope of Art Journalling (a hobby that involves as much stash shopping as scrapbooking!). Now I absolutely love nothing more than sitting with an empty page in my journal and some tubes of paint and just playing about...sometimes I love the results and other times not so much.

I wanted to created a layout that was heavily influenced by some of my favourite art journal products. Here is what I pulled out to create my layout...

I picked my favourite colours of Golden Acrylic paint, scraps of papers (photocopied old family documents, book paper, music manuscript and a photo from a magazine), a stencil, black pen, tim holtz ephemera and word stickers, matte medium, a date stamp, some rub one and my heat gun.

I started by using clear gesso on a piece of 12x12 card stock and printing my photo on matte paper and cutting it out.

I then created a collage base using the scraps of paper with the matte medium. My favourite tool to do this is my hands...applying the matte medium (which I use as a glue) to the back of the scraps and then also to front once they are in place. I created a very rough diamond shape design to the right of the page for my photo to sit on, and a smaller triangle shape to the top left for my title. I made sure to leave plenty of white space.

I then used a flat brush, and my fingers to layer up my acrylic paints. I added pops of teal towards the end of the process, and also used a stencil brush with one of the paints and the leaf stencil. Something I'm still having to be mindful of is that often "less is more" When I was happy with the paint layers, I added some tissue paper that had been stamped on and layered that in with the paint. The black lines on the tissue gave me something to ground my photo on to. I then doodled black squiggly lines around the painted areas trying to emphasis the diamond and triangle shapes. I added some wings to my photo and stuck it to my layout. 

I finished my layout with some very old teal rub ons, some phrase stickers, some star stickers and star enamel dots plus a couple of black heart puffy stickers.

I encourage you all to give something new a try...challenge yourself to do something you think isn't for you...it might turn out to be one of the best things you ever do!

Thanks for reading, be sure to head on over to our Facebook group where we will be sharing our new challenge at the start of June!