Hey everyone, Denise here with my first Hybrid post. Earlier this week I did the Product Spotlight on the Shabby Princess kit Gabby. One of the things I love about the Gabby kit is the birds and how they come with and without eyes, perfect for Hybrid projects.

To create dimension on the final Sweet card, a cutout bird will be placed on top of the bird on the card. To start the Sweet card was created digitally in Photoshop using the Gabby kit and Scallops, Shapes & More.  For printing, it is placed on an 8.5 x 11″ canvas in Photoshop, add an additional bird and the sweet tag to the canvas. Print onto Double sided matte photo paper (61 lb. Staples brand is my fav.). Cut and fold the card, also cut out the extra bird (minus the legs and back wing) and sweet tag. If you’d like extra dimension, using an Xacto blade, cut along the outside edge of the birds wing and bend it slightly out. Ink the edges of card, sweet tag, cut out bird and wing with a Qtip to get in all the small spots. Using large pop dots, attach the cut out bird atop the bird on the card. Glue the 8 mm wiggle eye on the bird. Glue flowers, dots and using smaller pop dots attach sweet tag.

Here’s a close-up of the card to show the wing popping up and the dimension of the bird. Westrim Crafts makes the wiggle eyes (8mm), great for Halloween projects too.

I created another card using a similar digital base with the Gabby kit and the Scallops, Shapes & More. After printing, more traditional scrapbooking supplies were added to the card.

I hope this inspires you to create a Hybrid card. It’s so fun to see the expression of the person receiving the card. The Gabby kit was highlighted earlier this week and is still on sale for $5.21.

Have a great weekend & Happy Father’s Day to all the Dad’s out there! :)

DeniseHybrid Projects, Uncategorized 8 Comments

That’s right – we’re getting SNEAKY here at the Shabby Shoppe!

Beckie here, bringing you a brand new series called “Thursday Thievery!”…we’re going to select one unsuspecting scrapper and SCRAPLIFT (a.k.a “copy”) her layout!  Our mission is to continue to inspire your creativity – and learning to scraplift is a tremendous asset in any scrapper’s tool box!

We also thought it would be fun to showcase some of the CT members.  They’re the silent creative force working away behind the scenes with each product that comes out, and MAN are they good!  I had the honor of being the first host for Thursday Thievery, and I selected this gorgeous layout by Katrina (twentytinytoes)!

I just LOVE Katrina’s ability to put a bunch of stuff on a page and have it look perfectly imperfect – like  all those bits and pieces  just happened to land in a gorgeous arrangement themselves.  I can’t IMAGINE how many layers she has for each page, LOL!  But what I liked about this page in particular is that, while still being a beautiful collection of embellishments that make such a design statement – it looks SIMPLE enough that I thought even I could do it!

I also love Katrina’s shadows, the perfect font she used for the journaling – very dramatic like the colors of the Clementine kit.  And Katrina is a MASTER at effective use of white space!

Now is probably a good time for me to point out that I’m a TERRIBLE scraplifter, LOL!  I have such a hard time using templates and scraplifting, for some reason it’s stressful for me to see something so perfect and customized and imagine how I could do it differently.

So I started VERY basic in my attempt to replicate Katrina’s gorgeous layout – the layout design itself!  I rotated the design 90 degrees, used scallop borders instead of the decorative edge, and then added in the beautiful floral brush stamps.

I didn’t manage to replicate her use of incredibly detailed element placement, but I am REALLY happy with how mine came out.  It’s perfect for me and my album, and that’s what its all about!  I am pleased to report, however, that Shabby Princess and several of our Shabby Artists had GREAT success replicating Katrina’s layout design just beautifully, as you’ll see below!

If you haven’t seen Katrina’s work before, please be sure to see her gallery here…she has some incredibly beautiful and inspiring layouts in there!

And now to share with you all the INCREDIBLE layouts created by the team!  {Oh – and if you want to get to know any of the Shabby Artists better, or to see more of their work, check out this beautiful new team page created by Shabby Princess! }

and that wraps it up for me today! I’m going to sneak back out the way I came in… ;o)  Be sure to check back in two weeks when our latest THIEF will bring you new interpretations on another wonderful layout!

BeckieInspiration, Uncategorized 7 Comments

Hi all, Trish here with my first blog post on the Shabby Shoppe blog! I’m here to give you some tips on something that can really frustrate us scrappers at times… matching kits and pictures. Now I’m not going to tell you how to buy a kit to match what you need, but how to match your pictures to a kit.

So, if you’re like me you probably do some spontaneous kit buying. I tend to use the excuse “Well, I’m pretty sure I have something that will match this, or I will at some point have something that matches.” (lol) But I’m all about some instant gratification, comes with having  a low  attention span and little patience, so I’m  not good at waiting to use a kit. I’ll set myself up to start scrapping, and start going through my pictures to find at least a match to the kit theme, or most often, a picture I just WANT to scrap. Then, I’ll get frustrated. I’ll see a picture I just have to use, but… the colors just won’t do at all. I could just switch the picture to monochromatic, but where’s the fun in that? I live to make easy things more difficult for myself, and I rarely feel monochromatic. (lol) So instead I’ll have me a little picture editing fun. (I do so love editing pictures!)

What I’m going to give you tips on is using some pretty easy tricks on making those photos match. I’m wanting to use Shabby Princess’ beautiful Clementine and the following picture of my Belly Pie.

As you can see, they don’t really match each other all that well.

What I’m going to cover is using gradient maps and blending modes to make those pictures match.
First edit your picture so that it looks the way you want it (as in fixing lighting, blemishes, sharpness, etc) then DUPLICATE it. Just completely forget that bottom layer from now on. This is so important so that when you do further editing you don’t have to completely start over if you mess up. Unless you’ve already built your page, open the kits preview, then use your color picker to select the two colors that are either the most prominent or that you think you’ll be working the most with. I’m selecting the tan and red from the kit to work with it.


Go back to your picture then go to Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Gradient Map. (NOTE not the Fill Layer>Gradient these are two different things!) It might look right the first time you do it. What it does is create a gradient map out of the two colors you have selected and it might have the wrong color prominent. See when I fist clicked it, it looked like this:

I didn’t want red the prominent color so I clicked the gradient and went into the gradient editor and switched the colors around. It now looks like this:

Still a little funky but we aren’t done yet so don’t fret.

Make sure the gradient map layer is selected then go to your blending modes (it’s the drop down panel that should be saying Normal right now). The first one I tried out is soft light. It already helped the picture match the tones of the kit more, but it’s still not quite what I want.

I’ve found it helps a lot to also create a (lol) monochromatic layer. (We won’t leave it too noticeable though. lol) Again go to Layer>Adjustment Layer only this time select Black and White. When the menu block pops up click ok and it takes you to the Black and White menu box. Adjust it to the way you feel looks best then (optional really) click the tint box. Click the little color square and then go over to where you have your two colors selected. Click on the color you want prominent (mine’s tan) and then lower the saturation so that the color is just noticeable.

Select your black and white adjustment layer in your layers and again play with your blending modes and opacity until you get a look you want. Unfortunately I can’t just tell you what to use, because its generally going to vary from picture to picture. I can tell you I used overlay at 25%.

This isn’t a step you’ll have to do each time, but if you’re using a shabby/worn kit you also might want to go to Layer>Adjustment Layer>Hue/Saturation and lower the saturation just a tad to give the picture a slightly older worn look. Here’s the final picture I’ll use:

Here are two examples. They show the same layout with the same picture, only the one picture has the edit I did above, customizing it exactly to the kit.

See the difference? While the first one does look good, the second looks so much better because the tone of the colors in the picture matches the kit so much more. It has the same tan tint most of the kit has, and the same worn quality. While you could be happy with a good page, wouldn’t you rather have an even better page?

Well, I hope you all enjoyed this and found it helpful in your scrapping.  Be sure to come back tomorrow to check out a fun new thing we’re starting on the blog!

TrishTips and Tricks, Uncategorized 7 Comments

Hey everyone! Denise here to spotlight the Gabby kit, my favorite Shabby Princess kit. I absolutely LOVE the warm colors and the foliage. The colors are so versatile for Home and Hearth, everyday layouts and lovely vintage layouts. Those super cute birds are my favorites! I am so glad the Shabby Princess included a version of each bird without eyes, they are perfect for Hybrid cards and layouts. I’ll have some samples on how to add some fun wiggly eyes on Friday’s Hybrid post. ;)

Here are some sample layouts from the fabulous Shabby Shoppe teams-

I hope we inspired you with the versatility of the Gabby kit and for this week you can pick it up on sale for $5.21.

As summer approaches, our family has been looking for fun, inexpensive activities for the kids. Last year we borrowed Grandma’s tent and spent the night in our backyard. You can see our dog guarding the tent from skunks above right, lol.  Leave a post of your favorite summer activity, or post a layout!

Happy scrapping & enjoy those early days of summer! :)

DeniseProduct Spotlight, Uncategorized 9 Comments

Hi everyone! Beckie here!

On Mondays we try to bring you a fashion, shopping, or beauty related tip…but you’re stuck with ME this week, so we’re doing this my way!  LOL!  Last week SP brought you a free template based on an advertisement.  Today I’m going to show you ways to draw inspiration for your layouts from FASHION!

I love Banana Republic – not just the clothing itself, but the gorgeous styling of the outfits and the presentation of the brand.  That was my destination for this week’s fashion inspired post.  I desperately fought off the urge to SHOP and focused on the gorgeous apparel before me (only because I promised myself I could shop LATER!) – and immediately noticed how the styling of each outfit was complemented by the perfect accessories.

Accessories are the finishing touches, the final pieces we put on before heading out the door.  And they can TOTALLY change the mood of an outfit!

I selected this simple dress as the starting point for this week’s fashion inspired design lesson:

It’s a simple white dress (summer’s version of that versatile little BLACK dress!).  But notice how the stark contrast of the leather accessories really pull the outfit together! And the metal accents (her earrings and on the shoes) are a wonderful new texture against the softness of the dress.

So how does this apply to scrapbooking?  Let’s get started!

• A simple, neutral backdrop is the perfect foundation for creating a wonderfully “pulled together” layout.
• Limiting accessories to a few pieces that say “wow!” not only saves time, but also emphasizes the beautiful qualities – or even the theme – of the pieces you utilize.

My fashion inspiration challenge:

Use these principles to create TWO layouts in one afternoon that I’d be proud to add to my family album. The results?  I  spent less than one hour on each of these layouts but I love the way they came together!  Best of all – These are photos from the past few months that I just hadn’t taken the time to scrap yet.  So if you’re like me – you take photos at a faster rate than you can scrap them – give these designs a try!

“he is Batman” is SO DIFFERENT than my usual style!  But I just love the way it came out.  I started out with the photo, which I absolutely ADORE – and wanted to keep it clean and simple.  I kept the background neutral, in natural gray and black  and realized that the yellow paint on his face presented a way to add a tiny pop of color to the paper background for this layout.  Finally – that bow. I just love it.   To me, it sits on top of the layout like a big warm hug ;o).

It was pretty easy to do a clean and simple design for a one photo layout, but how about a THREE photo layout?  For this design, which was about my kids “fishing” in our cul-de-sac, I wanted to add a fun element that would create the theme and add a necessary touch of playfulness. Once I had my neutral background , I added the cute little pond doodle, and the fun swirly “splash”!

It took all the willpower in my being not to load my layouts up with the gorgeous patterned papers from Shabby Princess’ kits, but by challenging myself to create from a new perspective, I got new life from kits that have been in my stash for quite some time!

Each of these layouts were inspired by one simple white dress.  So the next time you’re shopping – at the store, on-line, or even browsing magazines – challenge yourself to pick an item and let it inspire YOU on your next layout!

BeckieBeauty & Fashion, Inspiration, Uncategorized 7 Comments