Hi, Kathy here!  Seriously…I know we all say it…but it is SO darn hard to make a choice about the LOTW.  There are so many talented scrappers, and so many super cute pages, it makes it so hard to choose just one.  However, this layout just took the cake for me: 

 Kindergarten 2 by jltanner

I fell in LOVE with the comic book, whimsical feel of this page…again using Hopscotch and the School additions.  And really, that cute face and sweet smile…doesn’t it melt your heart?  I can just picture my baby boy there in a few short years…back pack and all with a little buddy by his side.  Such a great page, simple yet really bold…great job jltanner, hope you enjoy the gift certificate that Shabby Princess has emailed to you.

Well, that’s it for me today, enjoy your weekend but join us again next week for some more fun stuff.

KathyLayout of the Week, Uncategorized 10 Comments

Hey there…Kathy back with you again…yay!  It has been one heck of a summer here, and I cannot lie, I am happy for fall and all that it brings.  Yesterday was my Nalley girl’s first day of Preschool…*choking back tears*…I simply cannot believe it!  My kiddos are growing so fast and I am reminded of why I love scrapbooking so much…it is a way to preserve our memories and share them…for me, a way to hold on to the times that are slipping by far too quickly.

Today I’m bringing the last installment of my Hybrid Product Picks series to you…a more “advanced level” spotlight for some of my favorite “toys”!  I am a gadget girl, no doubt.  My husband gasped at all of my kitchen gadgets when we met, wondering what in the world one person would do with them all.  What can I say, I love tools that make a job easier.  So, it was no surprise to him when I started collecting scrapbooking gadgets.  I don’t use all of them all the time, but when I need them, I am sure thankful that they are in my craft room.

I loves me some punches!  I have LOTS of punches…and they are probably some of my most frequently used scrapbooking tools.  They are quick, easy and can pack a pretty serious punch when layered or used creatively.  I have tried several brands, but hands down my favorite are E.K. Success.  They make all of Stampin’ Up!’s shaped punches, along with Martha Stewart’s line, as well as many basic shapes that can be stacked or nested.

Another tool that I use all the time, is my Scor Pal.  I used a stylus and the groove in my mini Fiskar’s trimmer for many moons, until I got my Scor Pal, and I just LOVE it.  However, Martha Stewart has come out with her own version, called the Score Board…and I must say, I wish I had it instead.  There are a few big differences, in that the MS one has grooves at regular (and small) intervals…where the Scor Pal only has them every half inch (and a few others thrown in at commonly used measurements).  The other being the width of the scoring tool.  The MS tool is thinner and gives a more crisp score (or so I’ve seen demonstrated in a comparison).  Either way, a dedicated scoring board is a must on my list.

My go-to (small) scissors are Stampin’ Up!’s Paper Snips.  They are compact, super sharp and do a GREAT job cutting out intricate shapes that must be trimmed by hand.  I love them!  For punching holes and setting eyelets, a girl’s gotta have a Crop-A-Dile…a pink one at that!  It is something I use regularly, and does its job so well.  I also have the Making Memories eyelet setting tool, and use it when I need to punch holes or set eyelets somewhere that my Crop-A-Dile  can’t reach.  If you’re a crazy nut like some I know…you might also have the Crop-A-Dile Big Bite, which will do the job of it’s little sister, but will reach anywhere on a 12×12 piece of paper.

Another tool that I don’t use all that often, but I just LOVE, is my Bind-it-All.  It was one of the first book binding tools on the market a few years ago, and I just HAD to have it.  There are several similar products on the market, including the 7 Gypsies Binderie (drills uniform holes but doesn’t bind) and the We R Memory Keepers Cinch (haven’t used either of them) that do basically the same thing.  The Bind-it-All will punch holes in paper, chipboard, acrylic, tin, etc…and them bind all of the pages together using O-wire coils.  I have used my BIA for making minis and several other projects…and I always have fun using it and embellishing the coils with ribbon…aaahhhhhh…ribbon….

Saving the BEST for last…my die cutting machines!  What can I say other than I am obsessed.  It must have something to do with my perfectionist tendencies, but I go NUTS for the perfectly clean crisp shapes of die cuts.  Something that I just cannot achieve with my unsightly mediocre hand cutting skillz.  I bought my Big Shot a couple years back and have used it SO much.  The dies themself are an investment, but well worth it for the right ones.  I just adore that I can cut chipboard shapes with one little crank of the handle…so great!  BUT……my absolute, without-a-doubt, hands down most favorite machine of all has got to be my Cricut Expression.  Yes, I know, they have just introduced the Cricut Imagine (which prints and cuts all in one machine…for an astounding $600)…but I have found a way to use my own Cricut and some add on software to print and cut anything I want to.  Besides, I have found my “sweet spot” setttings for my beloved Epson printer…I don’t want to have to figure anything out again. 

I started using Sure Cuts a Lot software a few months back.  It is a software program that will allow the Cricut machines to cut any font or .svg file (scalable vector graphic) instead of being stuck with buying the really expensive cartridges.  I don’t like being limited to what comes on the cartridges, and I don’t like paying for lots of graphics I will never use, just to get a few that I would.  Just this past week I purchased a different software that will do the same thing, called Make the Cut.  I like it soooo much better…a more user friendly interface…more crisp and detailed cuts (not sure why that is)…and lots more functions than SCAL.  I will probably still use SCAL on occasion, or maybe not…I just might be converted.  One thing stays the same, I use my Cricut ALL THE TIME…whether I’m just tinkering or making cards, or a hybrid project, it gets a regular workout.

I know, I know…I have totally sounded like a paper scrapper, but trust me, I have only done ONE paper scrapbook, my first and last.  Digiscrapping is certainly my idea of scrapping.  But I just adore paper CRAFTING, and there is simply no denying that cutting paper is therapy…when you’re stressed out, just go punch some paper or die cut some chipboard…you’ll feel lots better…LOL!

I hope you’ve enjoyed a “look” into my craft room (thank God not literally…I’m SO not as brave as Trish) supplies, I hope you’ll use some of the these tools in your next hybrid project, they make my fun a lot MORE fun!  Join me back here tomorrow for my pick for the LOTW!

KathyHybrid Projects, Uncategorized 5 Comments

Hi guys, SP here!  It’s my first official post since we returned from the BLOG vacation…so…wanted to say HELLO and thanks for joining us again!  Also, wanted to apologize for not being in the gallery much here lately…we (Nicole and I) are just so super swamped with calendars right now…so, you won’t see much of me until after they are all finished and released :o)  I’m very much looking forward to that time, lol!

I have the pleasure of bringing you a brand new template challenge this month at the blog (this one by Beckie)!  You will have several weeks to scrap with our template and post a comment back :o)  We will announce the template challenge winner on October 16th (layouts and comments MUST be posted by the 14th, please)!  The ‘winner’ of the challenge will receive a $25 gift card to the Shabby Shoppe!  Please note that for our template challenge…we select the ‘winner’ randomly – so everyone has a great chance to win!

In order to be entered into the template challenge – you must post your layout in the Shabby Shoppe’s gallery (in the SHOPPE BLOG CHALLENGES gallery) and then post a comment HERE at our blog (on this post only) with a link to your layout in our gallery.  This will enter you into the challenge :o)  Please keep in mind that all layouts must contain at least 75% SP product (purchased or free).  And, to be eligible for the challenge – you must scrap with the easy-as-pie template (the layered template)…and not the piece-a-cake page (quick page).  Although – we would still LOVE to see your layouts with the piece-a-cake page, too!

We also have several fun ways for you to obtain ‘extra’ entries to the challenge (please note that in order to qualify for any EXTRA entries – you must first complete a layout with our easy-as-pie template and submit that to our gallery and blog) :o)

• For an extra entry, leave a SEPARATE comment letting us know that you have one of our blinkies (available by clicking on the blinkies link in the sidebar) either on your blog or in all of your forum signatures (be sure to include a link to your blog or signature in your post).
• For an extra entry, leave a SEPARATE comment letting us know that you have facebooked or twittered about our template challenge (don’t forget to include the link in your post).
• For an extra entry, leave a SEPARATE comment letting us know that you have blogged about our template challenge (again, be sure to add your blog link to your post).

You have the possibility of entering the challenge up to 4 times! Just be sure each entry is a separate comment, as we will be using a random number generator to choose the winner.  Be sure to get your entries in by MIDNIGHT (eastern time) on October 14th, and the winner will be announced the morning of October 16th!

But, that’s not all! We are also sharing the layout that I designed with the template. The Piece-A-Cake page will be included in the download of the template, so no extra steps are required to obtain it. It is just our little way of saying thank you for participating in our challenge.  Here’s the layout that I created with it:

 I also created a quick and simple tutorial on how to use our Easy-As-Pie templates in PSE and PS. You can find it HERE. We tried to cover the basics, but if you have any questions, please let us know and one of the Shabby Team Members will do their best to answer it.

Here’s your newest Easy-As-Pie Template! <–click this to download OR click the preview image at the top of this post :o)

Your download includes:

–Layered psd template with drop shadows (you can opt to turn them off or use your own)
–Layered TIFF template without drop shadows
–Piece-A-Cake Quick Page (.png file)

Now, how about some more inspiration from the girls? 

 As always, we’re so excited to see what you all come up with. I hope you enjoy the template – Happy Scrapping!!
{Remember to link up to this post only to enter the challenge}

Shabby PrincessFree (not desktops), Template Challenges, Uncategorized 64 Comments

Fall is in the air – and I’m sooooooo excited – for so many reasons!  First of all, I really dislike summer.  Honestly people.  It just gets too darn hot where I live!  I’m way more of a fall girl – I just love the cooler air and wearing long sleeves (which I’ll get to do by NOVEMBER, LOL).  I’m also a HUGE college football fan…and hubby and I just got our first football fix of the season this weekend!  And finally, my daughter’s birthday is in early October.  And every year when her birthday rolls around – I’m just so ready to CELEBRATE!

This year I’m planning a princess tea party for my soon-to-be six year old.  For the invitations,  I decided I wanted to go “back to my roots” from my paper scrapping days and resurrect my most favorite technique – watercolor!  As a paper stamper, I would hand-doodle my titles and journaling, or even accent with rubber stamps, and then color them in with watercolors (pencils and/or crayons, readily available at craft and art stores!)  And just because I love you all so much, I actually brushed the dust off my old paper supplies and whipped up a little sample for you!

Traditional Watercolor

{supplies:  Watercolor Wonder crayons, rubber stamp by Stampin’ Up.  Water brush is readily available at craft stores (can’t remember the brand of mine, sorry!)

Watercolor is imperfect, even messy if you like it that way (I obviously do, LOL!).  Perfect for the mood I’m trying to create for her whimsical tea party!

I’ve been playing with brushes in Photoshop for some time now, trying to find the best combination of settings to yield the best watercolor effect – and I found something I’m really pleased with!  I found the new brush organization in CS5 to be really helpful (I was previously using CS3), not to mention new default brushes.  But to make sure that today’s little tutorial works for EVERYONE, I stuck with a basic round brush for my project!  So everything you see here will work in PS and PSE :)

So what will we be making today?  This invitation!  Here it is, before the watercolor has been added:

First lets cover the basics of how I created the card:

• I created a blank layout at 4 in. wide x 6 in. high.  I always do my invitations at this size because it’s a cheap, easy standard size to have printed (or to even print myself!).  And I find it to be perfect for holding all of that critical information about the big event!
• I assembled the invitation by using papers and ribbon from the Occasions collection, then added {slightly re-colored} sequins from An Affair to Remember.
• Fonts are soooo important when creating an invitation!  I wanted a whimsical font that would be playful and easy to read for the  main text of the invitation, then I utilized a hand-written font for the party details.  Most importantly, I was looking for doodles I could color in to add that perfect touch of “princess” and “tea party” to my invitation!  In an earlier post I showed how to use fonts to customize your project, and in this case – I found two perfect doodle fonts, available for just a few dollars online!  (Full font credits are in the invitation posting at the Shoppe Gallery.)

I think it looks cute as-is…but I’m ready to WATERCOLOR…digi-style!!

Digital Watercolor

As I mentioned earlier, there are MANY brushes that make great watercolor brushes for our purpose today.  CS5 and Elements have dry brushes, wet brushes, chalk, pastels, etc.  So be sure to spend a little time just PLAYING with your brushes!  This is the best way to discover what you really like.  This is one technique, however, that requires a pen tablet.  I normally use the mouse pad right on my laptop for scrapping, but find that the only way to really “paint” is to use a pen.  So now would be a great time to check into the inexpensive entry level pen tablets out there!  I have a basic 4×6 tablet and find that it works great for all of these occasional use projects.

Workspace Setup

• I created a color palette that contains the “paint” colors I want to work with.  I selected the pink right from the papers with the eyedropper tool, then used a hard round brush to stamp a dot in each color.  Then I selected the coordinating green and yellow from the color picker tool and repeated the process of stamping the dots.
• Just add water.  Ok, not really!  Watercolor relies on water to dilute the concentration of the color, yielding the awesome, imperfect variations throughout the image.  To mimic this digitally, you need to reduce the opacity of your brush.  I generally keep it below 50%, because as you’ll see, I like to paint in layers.
• Know your keyboard shortcuts.  It will come in super handy with this technique! for each of these shortcuts, just hit the key on the keyboard…no alt-click-shifting required :)
  • Eraser: E
  • Brush: B
  • Increase brush/eraser size: ]
  • Decrease brush/eraser size: [

• I know its hard to read the settings in the above image, so select a basic hard round brush.  Then, in the brush presets box, you need to set the brush to “Wet Edges“.   Now is a great time to just play around, try out all the other settings in the brush presets box, maybe even try different brushes!  I also liked the results I got using “Round Point Stiff” and “Watercolor Loaded Wet Flat Tip” (both CS5 brush presets).
• With the pen tablet, the software will create different effects based on how hard you press, too!  So play with this to know how to consistently get the look you want.

Getting Started

• Zoom in so that the image you want to paint is nice and big to make it easy to work with.
• For your reference through the remaining examples, I created a sample stroke and splat with my brush at two different opacities.  The stroke and splat on the left is in my brightest pink color at 50% opacity; the pair on the right were created at 25% opacity.  Notice the difference in the size of the “splat” dots?  I used the same brush size, but with different amounts of pressure on my pen tablet when I created them, thus creating the dots at two different sizes.
• We’re going to color in the cute little princess with the tea cup, and we’ll use a 3-step process.

Start Painting!

I paint in multiple layers because its the easiest way to “undo” something I don’t like.  You can also hide and un-hide combinations of layers to get different results!  And lastly, remember that you can erase…you can create a brush for erasing similar to what you use for painting, with reduced opacity, and effectively remove color where you need to.  So let’s get started!

• BASE LAYER:  Create a new layer, and title it “princess base paint”
• Set your brush to 50% opacity.  I used a 50 pixel brush, (roughly the size of the big splat in the image above).
• Paint a base coat of color around the inside of the section you wish to paint.  Don’t be perfect! Here’s what mine looked like after this step:

• COLOR VARIATION LAYER:  Create another new layer and name it Bob.  Just kidding…name it what you like :)
• Set your brush to 25% opacity, but keep the brush at roughly the same size.
• Paint in more color!  This is where your practice with brush strokes comes in handy, as the whole point here is to create color variation in the space.  I used a combination of strokes and “splats” to create the example below.

• EDGING LAYER:  Create a final color layer and again, name it what you like :)
• Set your brush to 13% opacity and cut the brush size roughly in half (25px for me).
• Here is where you can just add in more color and finer detail where you want it.  I like to have the edges of my image darker than the center, so I add a lot more around the edges.  You’ll notice that if you paint on white that 13% opacity is barely any color – but when it is layered on top of existing color, it adds a nice subtle touch!

Make it your own

There are a million ways to take this basic technique and make it your own!  If you like less color in your watercolor pieces, just reduce the opacity of the brush in each of the steps above.  And be sure to try out all the various brushes and settings available – they do some really cool stuff.  The new preset brushes in CS5 let you control settings specific to the bristles, which produces some really cool results.  I highly recommend opening up a blank document and just coloring a bit.  The upside?  It’s nice and relaxing, too!  :)

So here’s the final invitation!  I hope this little tutorial today has inspired you to add a little paint to YOUR next project!

 Thanks for stopping by, you won’t want to miss tomorrow when we share our latest TEMPLATE CHALLENGE (five) :o)

BeckieTips and Tricks, Uncategorized 17 Comments

Hi everyone! It’s Lu here  with this week’s Product Spotlight, Studio Chic (on sale for $4.25 this week only – and keep in mind that SP plans to retire this kit next year). This is a kit that I’ve always really liked, for a number of reasons. I love kits with black (Clementine is my fav)… it just makes everything “pop” and provides so much drama. But mainly I love the “theme” of the kit… creativity! 

With word art such as “imagine”, “unique” & “create”… it certainly puts you in the mood to do just that! It also has lots of great border/corner accents and one of my favorite types of fastener. There are really so many fun embellishments in the kit, as well as bright color,  you are sure to be inspired. Here’s a little sampling from the Shabby Artists, to show you what I’m talking about:

from  Kylie:

from SP:

from Mariquita:

from Trish:

and here’s a layout I created:

We also have some hybrid fun…

from Denise:

Now, as this kit is about creativity, it gave me the idea of how to organize some of my “art collection”. Like many moms, I struggle with what to do with my little picasso’s art work. Obviously, I can’t keep it all (although I tried for awhile), lol! Finally, it just  overwhelmed me and I started placing it in a spare box. When I chose this kit to spotlight, the wheels started turning.  I felt so much better (and organized) with my little cherub’s masterpieces tucked away in an bright & cheery storage box.

Studio Chic is all about creating… and that’s just what we hope we’ve inspired you to do! Looking forward to seeing those “masterpieces” in the gallery! Don’t miss tomorrow’s post with Beckie, it is sure to be a creative treat!

LuProduct Spotlight, Uncategorized 5 Comments