Paper Bag Mini Album for Swap

I had joined two different swaps over at Mini Album Scraps. The first one was the boxed accordion album which I posted earlier. This one was for a paper bag mini album. I learned one big lesson...no matter how much time you have to do the swap get it done early! I got promoted at work a couple of months ago and I thought things would slow down but instead it has taken forever for them to hire someone to replace my position and I've been both. And not just that I had no idea I would end up going to a conference for a week during this time either. So I've been working a lot of hours and time just completely got away from me. I completed my mini and got it in the mail by the deadline but wow...I do not want to cut it so close again. The other bad thing is that I didn't have time to video my project nor take pictures of the entire album. I did manage to take a couple while in my car stopped at a light on my way to the post office to mail it...LOL. So at least I got that much. I do want to make another one for myself though so that one I will get a video done.  I learned another thing...larger gussets!!! It was my first time doing the hidden hinge binding system by Kathy Orta and although I did make my gussets just slightly larger than what she said in her video, I should go a bit larger than that because the album was not closing completely. Definitely going to do that with my next one. Here are a couple of pics:

Be sure to check back to see the video of the next one. Hope everybody has a fanatasic weekend and happy scrapping!  :-)

Boxed Accordion Album I Received in a Swap

Last week I was at a conference for work and I was so excited to get home. First because I missed my fur babies, second because I picked up on some things I thought would be really great to implement at work, and third because I got a package and it was my swap item from over at Mini Album Scraps! YEAH! I posted earlier the one I made and sent in as well as the one I did as a sample before making the one for the swap. So here is the one I received:

It was made by TruDee Griffin and she even made flip up pages on the mats. I asked her what manufacturer the paper was from because it was so cute but I had not seen it before. She said it was Happiness is Homemade by Tilda. She also sent these cute flowers and I love flowers!

Can't wait to use them in a project!  Hope you enjoyed it and Happy Scrapping!

Way to Go! CSI 153

I have been wanting to subscribe to a scrapbooking kit for a while because I do not have a LSS anymore and as most of you know Michaels only carries some of the products. I also have a Joann's but it is very small. North and South of me there are larger Joann's and Hobby Lobbystores but it is not exactly convenient. I do go to them when I happen to be in those areas but I usually don't go an hour out of my way just to pick something up.  So I decided to try the Scraptastic Kit. I got my first one which was the January kit and it was so cute. I can't wait until the February kit arrives! And the colors of it were perfect for my CSI challenge case file. Here was the challenge for case #153:

The colors the were required to use were pale coral/pinky peachy, orangey-red, pale seafoam green, pale pale yellow, and dusty brown. I decided to do a layout of my niece who got Teacher of the Year and I am so proud of her. In the picture her mother took, my niece is wearing a top that kind of looks orangey-red. It might be a pink color but it is hard to tell but I thought it went great with the colors I had to use for the challenge.

For the evidence I used a border punch on a piece of scrap paper from my stash that I tucked under the tag at the top of the layout, I used texture paste with a Heidi Swapp stencil, and I dripped/sprinkled some Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist Aquamarine. For the testimony I used stacking journaling spots/labels/tags in a pale yellow cardstock. A lot of the products I used were from the scraptastic kit. The teal flowered paper is an exclusive for scraptastic, the paper beneath it was Amy Tangerine Stitched Collection Flora, and the journal labels was cut from pale yellow cardstock, the butterflies, vellum pieces and letters were all from the kit. The vellum pieces were a Maggie Holmes Open Book collection from Crate Paper and the letter stickers were Jillibean Soup Alphabeans in Mushroom Gray. I do not know who made the cardstock, although it looks like Bazzill, the butterflies, flair, and various tags from the kit. The wood veneer "smile" is from Heidi Swapp and I used a homemade enamel dot to dot the "i" with. The flower on the top tag was a Prima flower and I used bling from Imaginisce for the center. I also sprayed Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist Dazzling Diamonds on the layout. Here are some close-ups:

Thanks for stopping by and as always Happy Scrapping!

How to Overcome being Frozen CC-4

I did this layout for another challenge over at CSI just last night. At the last minute I decided to do it and I am surprised how fast it came together. The case was to use the following colors which you must use all of them: Aqua Blue, True Blue, Taupe, Light Gray, and Off-White. Very wintery colors which if you are going to do winter scene is very hard for me since I live in South Florida and it just gets cold here and there...not consistent like most states. But I had some pictures from several years ago when me and my sister went to West Virginia for my uncle's funeral. While we were there a snow storm hit and we couldn't leave to go home and it was the week before Christmas! But we made the most of the situation. All the roads were closed so we couldn't drive anywhere but in front of the hotel was a convenience store/liquor store. So we walked to it got stuff to make margaritas and had a good time in our hotel room. The picture is my sister with a cheesy grin on her face...we had a really good time in spite of the situation.

  

This was a very quick layout. Again I used a lot of older stuff from my stash. I used silver metal snowflakes by Making Memories and all the papers are from my stash. The black letter stickers are Label Letter by Tim Holz idea-ology and the other words I used Recollections stickers sprayed some ink over them and removed them. Kind of representing snow.

 The blue papers are some random papers I had in my stash and I inked all the edges with Prima Chalk Ink in Blue Jay, the brown/taupe colored one I've had for a long time but I thought the Memories on it was so fitting which I also inked with Prima Chalk Ink in Knotted Wood, and the gray paper above was very fitting as well because it has clocks on it (we were passing the time you know...LOL) which was also inked with Prima Chalk Ink in Tin Cup and it was from the 7 Gypsies Paddington collection.

For the ink I used Heidi Swapp Color Shine in teal and Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in Moonlight which I sprayed and dribbled over the background. Other than that I used some sequins. Hope you enjoyed it and Happy Scrapping!