Hybrid Project ~ “BADGE album” notebooks

Friday, May 20, 2011

HAPPY FRIDAY!! :o) It’s Kylie and I’m here to share a little hybrid inspiration with you today!

Okay, so here’s the deal! I wanted to create gifts that were super quick and easy, still had tonnes of detail, and something that didn’t look like it had just been slapped together. And, as I was making not one gift but multiples – the quicker each one was to put together the better!

My starting point > > > The piece-a-cake BADGE albums available at the Shabby Shoppe. Aren’t they sweet!

There are lots of beautiful little BADGE album sets and each one uses a favorite Shabby Princess kit. There’s Carousel, Twirl, Bounce, Gabby, Wild Love, Barefoot and Blossom. And I picked out Sandbox and Yours Truly for my hybrid projects! But, I think I want them ALL anyway!!!

My nieces and nephews are at an age where they love to doodle – anywhere and everywhere! So, I thought it’d be a great idea to jazz up a few boring notebooks with some Shabby Princess flair! Then, they could scribble away to their hearts’ content on something a bit more special than a scrap of paper or a blank school book. Here is what I made for them by putting a creative twist to the piece-a-cake badge albums:

Let’s start simple. I purchased a few packs of cheap pocket sized lined notepads from a local department store. After measuring the dimensions of the front cover (112 x 77mm) I went to work in Photoshop. (Please note that although the size of pocket notepads will not be universal, the idea is to get close to the badge album size of 2.5×3.25 inches (or 63.5 x 82.5mm)). The badge album pngs were slightly smaller so I enlarged them to fit the cover. This adjustment in size was very small and I was okay with loosing a tiny bit of resolution as a result. I layered some lined paper underneath the badge album image and added some text to show through the “photo” spaces. I repeated this for all the covers I required. I then printed the new covers on some semi-gloss photo paper, trimmed each one and used double-sided tape to adhere the photo paper to the notepad. Hey presto – pretty notepads in no time at all!!! I ended up putting together three notepads for each child. And, as a simple gift card to go with my gifts I took another badge album image (as the front side to my card) and added to it “a little gift for you” text. So that I could fold the card and both front and back would look nice, I added a new layer (exactly the same size as the ‘front’ side) and placed it to the left of the ‘front’ badge album image. I then clipped a coordinating paper over the new layer. All that was left to do was print, trim and fold. Oh, and write in the card!

If you feel like being a little more crafty - well, you’ll enjoy making these little hybrid notebooks! You can be as creative as you want! This time I decorated different style of notebook – blank pages for drawing – C7 in size (114 x 81mm or approx 4.5 x 3inches). In Photoshop I added my four different badge album images and added another layer of coordinating paper (same size as badge album image) underneath to fill the “photo” space. Printed and trimmed each piece. I opened another work area in Photoshop and this time I created a layer the size of the notebook cover. I clipped my chosen paper over this newly created layer. I repeated this so that I ended up with 8 separate layers – one for the front cover and one for the inside of the front cover – for all four notebooks. Printed and trimmed each piece. I took the front covers off and painted the edges and sides (allowed to dry).  Used double sided tape to adhere the paper layers to each cover and then used 3D squares to adhere the badge album image to the ‘paper layer’ to give it some height/interest.  I then re-attached the cover to the notebook spiral binding. This is the foundation of the project – now you can decorate however you like! I raided my craft supplies and added glitter to some sponge letters, tied ribbon to the binding, added a key-ring pen (sourced from here), a few printed elements from the coordinating digital kits Sandbox and Yours Truly, a few more 3D adhesive dots, a button or two and some bling.

In terms of hybrid project equipment - you only need the basics. Color printer, paper (photo paper or cardstock – your choice!), scissors, glue and/or double-sided tape, 3D dots or mounting tape (optional) and whatever decorations you’d like to use.

And, last but not least, it’s always nice to use your piece-a-cake products to help build a layout.

Hope you enjoyed today’s little hybrid post. Be sure to check-in on MONDAY for our Layout of the Week. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend! HAPPY SCRAPPING (and/or hybrid project crafting!! ) :o)

KylieHybrid Projects, Inspiration, Uncategorized 7 Comments