Life Outside the Fishbowl

Bo Bunny Projects

And here were are at the end of another month with the projects I made for ScrapbooksPlus for May. We had Bo Bunny's Vicki B line to use. I was drawn to the oranges in several of the papers and used those quite a bit.

For my two-page layout, I mixed in a paper from Bo Bunny's Ad Lib collection, a piece of a KI Memories die cut page and a bit of Basic Grey. I used a bit of stamping and Perfect Pearls (pure patina) on the large vertical stripe in the center.

And it's funny how some things come together. When I was building this layout, I thought I needed something dark to help anchor the photos. I ended up with two strips of the Bazzillion paper at each end. Then, with the edge of the KI Memories paper and the rub-ons I have a great repeition of vertical lines. Repetition is good. 

However, it didn't dawn on me until this morning that my photos also contain quite a few vertical lines - the chains of the tire swings. I love it when I find that I've unconsciously repeated elements from my photos!

This is a more neutral layout, starting with a kraft paper base. My photos were so colorful that I didn't want a colored, busy background. Here I took out my square punch and grabbed some of the more springish patterns from the Vicki B line, along with a bit of Echo Park's dotted paper.

I added some of the rub-ons over my photos to help distract from the background of my photos. No one really is interested in looking at my recycable bag area!

 

Inspired!

 

Last week I went to Inspired with Karen Bearse and Lisa Hausman. I expected to have fun and learn some new things, but was unprepared for just how awesome it was. I got to try new things - things I'd been wanting to learn. I even have supplies for some of these things -- unopened supplies. We hung out and met some super fun people. I learned that I really like mojitos.

I told Lisa on Saturday that I could easily do this for another day or two before going home. But when I finally got home I was exhausted. I can only imagine how the instructors felt.

Here's what we did:

Totes out of shopping bags? YES! This was the most fun class. Tracie Lampe is fabulous and I can't wait until her book arrives. My kids are collecting plastic all over and want one of their own -- at least one. The bag was a bit hit at our Dasiy troop meeting last night and the moms want to make some, too.

Here's the three of us after class with Tracie. Karen did an image transfer onto her bag, then used it as a pattern. The cool "poppies" - wonder tape packaging!

And one from Lolly Chessie's class - our first endeavor. Karen and I didn't follow the example (Karen made a peacock - still in progress in the photo), and I'm thinking I want to collage some dictionary paper onto my canvas - if I can get it away from Rachel. She grabbed it when I got home and it's hung on her wall now. :)

And onto another fabulous class - ENCAUSTIC WAX! taught by Patricia Baldwin Seggebruch.

Seriously, if the TA's had the supply of encaustiboards in the room I would've kept going. I *loved* this so much I took the square cardboard in our "challenge" kit and used it to make another project. And all three of us ordered kits....

 

And painting/stenciling/getting messy with canvas in Alisa Burke's class. We were given a muslin and a canvas piece to use. Alisa mentioned they had extra pieces (it was our last class) ... so I did four. I looked like the tin man from the Wizard of Oz I had so much silver paint on my hands.

We left with a supply of Jacquard paints, massive amounts of stencils from the Crafter's Workshop and stamps. I'm planning to use some of this canvas to make a cover for an art journal. The big problem is which part to use...

And the final photo I have is from Suzi Blu's class. We did her girl paintings, and to be honest I did *not* want to make a girl going into the class and really thought about leaving it off the project. But I decided to go along and really enjoyed the painting, especially using Prima stencils and punchinella.  This was the first project I showed Rachel - who immediately took it from me and RAN to her room with it.

So, it was a fabulous time and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Thanks to Donna & Bill Downey for putting it together and for Karen for pushing me to sign up - and driving.

 

So Excited!

to be able to tell you that the design team for ScraPerfect was announced. I was seriously honored when Amy asked me to help her put together a team. And these are some wildly talented designers! Really.

Here's the team:

Susie Bentz
Robyn Coburn
Becky Conley
Margie Higuchi
Einat Kessler
Michele Lourenco
Cynthia Renaud
Stacy Rodriguez

 

Shimelle's 4x6 Class

Shimelle's doing a free monthly class over at Two Peas & on her blog for 4x6 photos. Each month she's doing a post and adding a photo. January had one photo. February had two, March three.... and so on.

She recently posted April's and it really inspired me. I loved the color combinations she used. While at ScrapbooksPlus on Tuesday I picked up some of Echo Park's For the Record collection. I was thinking the black, red & dots would make great Disney layouts or maybe a home for the pile of photos I still have printed out from our Australia trip back in '09  - like a gazillion pics of kangaroos and wallabies. Until I realized I should just wait until December's 12 photo layout...

As I started, I decided to use the green as the background and mix in the florals a bit. Hmm.... and mixed with the red and black ... it would also work for Christmas... Bingo!

I pulled out my bin of Christmas stuff and found a few transparent die cuts from Little Yellow Bicyle, a piece of a Kaisercraft flourish, and some MAMBI stickers.

And lifting the flap...

This was pretty quick and easy to put together - and a good way to get some of those photos scrapped. I'm going to use this sketch again - it'd be cute with or without the flap. And I'm thinking I probably need to try out January, February and March!

Teacher Appreciation Week

Last night Rachel and I made a birdhouse for her first grade teacher. She picked out all the paper and flowers and "supervised' while I put it together. And unlike most of Rachel's outfits, these actually match! I had to talk her down from covering the roof with feathers. And she kept insisting that something should go inside the birdhouse - otherwise why have a hole?

Here's our finished project:

 The wooden birdhouse I picked up at Michaels. We used paper from Kaisercraft's Nan's Favorites paper 6x6 paper pack. The sized-down patterns are nice for smaller projects like this. The flowers are a mix of Kaisercraft and Petaloo.

 

May Projects

For the month of May, we have paper from Bo Bunny's Vicki B line for our DT kit at ScrapbooksPlus. Here's one of the layouts I made:

I had these pictures of Rachel before her recital last spring, taken in the hallway of the high school. The background - blech! And her coloring is a little off, espeically with the "stage makeup" she's wearing.  The Vicki B colors really complemented the photo - to my delight.

I used tea dye distress ink liberally on the edges and over the green leaves/flower at the bottom of my layout. The collection has a sheeet of sticker alphas and phrases and I thought it's be fun to put a few phrases under the photo like a border strip.

At the top I added a tab an a cute wooden butterfly from Kaisercraft. I chose this one because all the dots and circles on the butterfly help repeat the pattern of circles and dots in the Bo Bunny and Lily Bee Design papers (both the paper AND the border punch), the shiny dots on her dress, the dots on the feathers, and the dots on the green ribbon. Nothing like reinforcing a theme!

Behind my photo I used a piece of dictionary paper and a strip of Lily Bee Design's new stationary paper. The title alphas are Echo Park. I like how the white letters pop off the darker background.

For my large embellishment cluster, I thought I'd play off the flowers on her costume. I started with a large flower cut from the paper as a base. Underneath I added a few Prima leaves and some cool feathers I picked up at Beadazzled. The ribbon came from an Absolutely Everything order - they wrap your goodies in paper and a cute ribbon. Finally, a Prima flower for the center - very close to the flowers on her dress.

Now -- off the store to kit! Karen and I will be teaching our Techniques Galore class at the store this weekend for National Scrapbook Day. We had a great time teaching this class at the Crops Plus class in April. Hmm.. and if I get really motiviated I may even bring snacks!