Hello everyone!  Monday rolls around so quickly doesn’t it?! Jenelle here and I have the honour once again of choosing our layout of the week winner.  Yay!  So many of you have been busy posting to the gallery this week – my mind is racing with ideas and inspiration from all your layouts.

I am really loving seeing all the January Project Scrap pages so far and one in particular really caught my eye this past week.  It was called Blueberries and was created by the very talented staceyj.

Congratulations staceyj – you have been chosen as this week’s LOTW.  What a fabulous layout – I just love the colours you’ve chosen for this page, along with the beautiful photographs and goodies from the Barefoot Collection.  Such a great idea to have the strips of photos along the top and bottom of your page.  All round, you’ve created a really eye-catching layout – thank you so much for sharing with us.

You’ve been emailed a $10 gift voucher to spend at the Shoppe (please check your spam folder), so have fun ‘shoppe-ing’ and we look forward to seeing more of your layouts.  Thanks again to all who’ve posted in the gallery this week and please keep them coming.  So much talent here!

Please check in again tomorrow ~ Rosy has a fabulous inspiration post you won’t want to miss.  Until then, happy scrapping everyone!

JenelleLayout of the Week, Uncategorized 9 Comments

“There is no such thing as a worthless conversation, provided you know what to listen for.  And questions are the breath of life for a conversation.” ~ James Nathan Miller.

Hello everyone!  Jenelle here again with a little bit of journalling inspiration for you today.  I’m hoping my post will inspire you to think about the words in your life – the dialogues, conversations, quotes and funny sayings that often surround our days but can so easily be forgotten, let alone documented.

I’ve been setting myself some scrapping goals with the turn of this new year – I’m trying to become more organized and have a clearer purpose for the layouts I create and the particular memories I want to document.  I’m not usually a ‘linear’ scrapper (ok, I’m all over the place really!) but I am hoping to be more structured this year.

One of my first goals is to set myself a little scrapping tradition and every January from now on, I am going to record an interview with my two sons and turn it into a layout.  I think a gift of memories is a wonderful gift for any family member or friend, so I am hoping one day my boys enjoy reading these question and answer sessions I had with them.  I’ve started a Project Life type folder and will slip these layouts into my January section.  I will also be inserting my Project Scrap layouts for each month in my folder, like a ‘review of our month’ at the start of each section.

For the layouts I created this year, I simply grabbed my pen and paper and sat with each of my boys and asked away, scribbling down their answers!  They both thought this was pretty exciting, like they were a “movie star being interviewed or something!”  Anna had a great idea a while back that has always stuck with me and that is using the voice recorder on her i-Phone/Smart Phone to record funny sayings or conversations that she doesn’t want to forget.  I have also started doing this to document the funny things my kids say or their cute little conversations and it is so quick and easy and can be tranformed into a layout any time.  Simple. Quick. Documented.  That’s my new goal this year!

So what to ask?  Obviously your questions would be age appropriate, but here are a few of the questions I asked my boys:-

• What is your favourite colour?
• What is your favourite food?
• Who are your friends?
• What are you looking forward to this year?
• What is something you’re good at?
• What do you love most about your family members? (list individually)
• If you could be any animal, what would it be?  Why?
• What is your best memory?

Adding a current photograph is obviously a must and the boys may even like to draw a self-portrait that I could scan in or add to my scrapbook album alongside the interview layout.  The questions I ask them will obviously change as they get older, but I would like to keep some of them the same, to see how their answers change over time.

Here are the layouts I came up with for this year’s interviews.  Nick at 6 and Corey nearly 4 – their likes/dislikes/hobbies etc – all documented in interview format.  Most years I create a layout for them around their birthday where I journal about their milestones/achievements/likes/dislikes etc, so the journalling on these is now the actual interview, verbatim.

I also asked our very creative Shabby Artists if they’d like to play along and scrap some of the words/conversations/quips from their daily lives and from their family members.  Amazing what they have all come up with!  Words, words everywhere!  I love that we have all gone in different directions here.  Fabulous inspiration.

Kylie interviewed her nieces over their summer school holidays and I just love their responses alongside those fun summery elements and photos!  I hope you continue the tradition next year Kylie!

Kim has come up with a wonderful idea.  She’s documented her Grandmother’s thoughts and memories on becoming a Mother, a Grandmother and then a Great-Grandmother.  I just loved reading this journalling Kim.  What a treasure – those photos and your grandmother’s memories are so special.  Finally, Rosy has documented some of the funny sayings her two little ones come out with – kind of like a ‘toddler dictionary’ really!  I love it – how funny for them to look back on!  Thanks so much for sharing these with us ladies.  Of course, you can see the full layouts and credits in our Shabby Artist Gallery.

I hope my post today will have you noticing more and more the role that quotations and conversations play in your life and that you then make them a regular part of your memory keeping.  Maybe you could set a little scrapping tradition for yourself and follow it through every year?  I am relying on you all to keep me on top of my once-a-year interview, now that I have made it official!

Thanks for stopping by.  Be sure to check in tomorrow when Kylie shares our newest Easy-As-Pie Template Challenge with you.  Can you believe we’re up to number 20 already?!  Kylie will also be announcing the winner of Template Challenge 19, it might just be you!!  Until then, happy scrapping everyone!

JenelleInspiration, Uncategorized 8 Comments

Hello everyone, it’s Jenelle here with a big “Happy New Year” to you all!!  My first post back for this new year and I am so excited, because I get to choose our layout of the week winner!  Although this is a quite a daunting task (as there are way too many great layouts to choose from), I do so enjoy going through the gallery and admiring all the wonderful talent here and drawing inspiration from you all – our wonderful community members.

One of our members, embellishedangel, has been a very busy scrapper this week and her gallery is bursting with new layouts, mostly from a recent trip to Seattle.  I’ve chosen her layout called ‘Holly’s Fish Catch’ as our LOTW.  Check it out!

First up, I have to say that I really love the colour scheme embellishedangel has chosen for this layout and the addition of those metal stars and brown stitching really ties the whole page together beautifully.   Plus, I really loved reading the journalling from their visit to the fish market – not your usual run-of-the-mill trip to market, I must say!  Lots of fun and a great memory documented.

Congratulations embellishedangel!  You have been emailed a $10 gift voucher for the Shabby Shoppe (please check your spam folder, as it may be hiding in there) and have fun ‘shoppe’ing!!

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  We have lots of great posts coming up for you this week.  Kim will be here tomorrow hosting a ‘wonderful’ product spotlight (hint hint)… so be sure to stop by!!!  Until then, happy scrapping everyone. 

JenelleLayout of the Week, Uncategorized 3 Comments

Hello everyone!  It’s Jenelle here today with the first of two hybrid projects we have for you all to try out – it’s very simple, very economical and a pretty way to present home-made or store-bought gifts this Christmas.

 I’m one of those people that can’t bear to throw away empty canisters, containers and boxes.  I have a stockpile of them mounting up in my house and I promise myself that one day I’ll decorate them all and use them in some way or another.  They usually end up as toy storage or I put craft supplies in them.  Boring!  No, not anymore…  Today I am going to jazz up some of these containers to hold some choc chip cookies - a sweet little Christmas gift for family and friends.

  Here’s a list of what you’ll need to make some yourself:-

• Empty canisters/containers and matching lids (I’ve used Pringles canisters and a small peanut tin – you could also use empty coffee tins, oatmeal containers, formula tins, Crystal Light containers etc…)
• Printed Scrapbook Paper
• Printed Labels
• Glue
• Scissors (also some decorative scissors or punches if you’d like a scalloped edge on your labels)
• Ribbon
• Treats to fill up the decorated containers

 Directions:-

• Rinse and wash the inside of your containers and dry completely (be sure not to throw away the lid).
•  Print out some co-ordinating papers from your favourite Shabby Shoppe kit.  I’ve used papers and elements from both the Sugarplum Dreams kit and Sugarplum Additions kit.  I printed them on A4 plain white printer paper and then trimmed the white edges. 
•  Make and print your labels.  I used labels from the Sugarplum Additions kit and added them to a new Photoshop document.  I used a text layer to type my message onto the labels, using Wendy Medium font, white, set at 30 pt.  I then added some snowflake stamps from the Seasonal Sampler ~ Winter FREE kit.  I dropped and dragged the snowflakes onto the labels, reduced them in size and changed the colour overlay (in the layer style icon) to white.  Then I printed the labels out on my home printer and cut them out.   

•  Measure and cut the pieces of your scrapbook paper to fit around the canister (I allowed for a slight overlap/seam, which was at the back of my canister).  I cut out 2 larger strips of co-ordinating patterned paper and then a thinner strip of solid paper to wrap around the centre.  Make sure all seams of paper line up.
•  Glue the paper to the canister, applying the middle strip of paper last.  I was originally going to seal the papers and then use a mixture of glue, kind of like a decoupage paste, to glue the paper on.  In the end, I actually found the trusty old glue stick to work just fine!  So you do what works for you!  Mod Podge would also be suitable.
•  Glue your label onto the canister (on the opposite side of the paper seams).  If you’d like to add a scalloped backing, you could do so by using a scalloped craft punch, decorative scissors or printing our Scallops, Shapes and More designs on co-ordinating paper.  Simply glue your plain-edged label on to the decorative one and then apply to your canister.
•   Finally, tie a co-ordinating ribbon around the top of the lid, pop it back on top of the canister and you’re done!

 Add any other decorative elements you like (gift tag, sparkles, glitter etc..) and fill up your container with either home-made or store-bought goodies.  (Cookies, fudge, brownies, wrapped sweets, nuts, chocolates… any other suggestions??  I’d love to hear some … just leave a comment below).  I was even thinking I could use the canisters to hold Christmas decorations (either for my own storage or to give as a gift.  Some decorations can be awkward in shape and size, so if I wrap them in a bit of tissue paper, this canister may hold them nicely!)

 A simple, yet effective way to present gifts this holiday season.  One other little note that I’ll add is ~ please be sure to check that your recipient is not allergic to any of the products that were stored in your original container.  Just in case!

 Well, that’s all from me today.  I hope you’ve enjoyed reading along and will have a go at making these yourself.  They really are very simple and there are so many gorgeous papers you can choose from over in the Shoppe to decorate your containers.  I’d love to see what you come up with, so be sure to post your creations in our Hybrid Gallery.

In the meantime, have a lovely weekend!  Happy Scrapping everyone!

…AND, please do not miss Casharina’s fabulous blog post (also published today) directly below this one…just keep scrolling!

JenelleHybrid Projects, Uncategorized 9 Comments

Hi everyone!  It’s Jenelle here with a fun inspiration post that will have you decorating your house all year round!  Subway Art is very popular right now and lots of fun to create!  You can make Subway Art based around any theme – seasons, holidays, family, special occasions.  Today though, I’m going to ‘deck the halls’ with some Christmas art.

Subway Art uses words, a variety of fonts and sometimes pictures to create a visually appealing art work – to either frame and display in your home/office or to transfer onto scrapbook layouts, cards, hybrid projects etc.  Using brushes, stamps, fonts, word art and other digital scrapbooking supplies, you too can create your very own Christmas artwork to frame for yourself or give as a gift.

 I’ll talk you through how I made mine, but first, here’s a close up of the actual document I created in Photoshop and then printed at home on my old printer (who says you need all the fancy gear!)

•  First up, I opened a new document in Photoshop (I use CS2 on a PC) and I set the dimensions to 10×13 inches, 300dpi and set the background to white (it’s better to start off large and reduce down, so if you change your mind later, you won’t lose image quality when trying to enlarge your document).  In the end, I printed mine at 8×10 inches as I had a spare frame at home that size!
•  Next, I opened up my stash of Shabby Shoppe goodies and browsed through all the Christmas-themed kits.  I then chose some stamps and word-art from both the Sugarplum Dreams, Sugar Plum Additions and Believe kits in the Shoppe.  Here’s some word art examples that got my creativity flowing:-

• Then it was a simple process of dragging the word art onto my document and playing around with size, colour and placement of the text. 
• Next, I came up with a list of words based around a Christmas theme, typed them in as separate text layers and changed the font style, size and colour of each of these words to fit in with the word art already placed on the document.

I think most of the fonts I’ve used are free fonts I’ve found on the net, some are even doodles/dingbats.  I’ll list them all over on my page in the Shabby Artist Gallery.  Basically, I just had fun playing around with some of my favourite fonts.  I changed their size, spacing, turned them to faux bold, faux italic, added a thin stroke line or even made some words all uppercase to come up with a design that was visually appealing to me.  You might even choose to use a coloured background with white writing, or even use a favourite paper as your background.  There really are no rules and no limits to where your creativity can take you!

Quick Tip:- I found it very handy to use Guides in Photoshop when I was initially positioning my word art and text.  They gave me a neat edge for the words to line up against, kind of like a floating border.  The guide lines don’t print so you don’t have to remember to erase them either.  For more info on guides and how to set them up click here.

Turning on the Smart Guides was another trick that helped me position words so they lined up neatly on the document.  Smart Guides are a very handy tool for quickly lining up objects on a page, without having to use rulers, grids or create ruler guides.  ( To turn Smart Guides on, go to View > Show > Smart Guides and check the box. Once they are turned on, they will automatically show when you are lining up layers on your Photoshop document. Smart Guides display as pink lines when the top, middle and bottom of objects align).

•  So, when you are done playing and you’re happy with your artwork, flatten your image and save it as a jpg then print it – either at home or with your preferred print shop. (I always keep my psd file too, just incase I want to make changes later or even re-do my artwork).
• Pop your print into a frame or even glue it to a canvas for display – then you’re done!  What a great gift for any time of the year. 

I’m even thinking about making one for my son’s teacher as a thank you gift at Christmas (our end of school year here in Australia).  I’ll possibly use her name along with the children’s names in her class and some other words about being a wonderful teacher (and of course an apple and other school elements for effect…hmm… thinking I’ll need the Hopscotch School Additions for this!!) Ok, my mind is racing here, back on topic now Jenelle!

Remember, you can always reduce your image size to print your artwork on cards or other hybrid projects (t-shirts, coasters, place mats, wall plaques) or even drop and drag it over onto one of your scrapbook layouts.  So many uses for your design and you can change them up with every season!

Well, that’s all from me today.  I do hope you’ve enjoyed reading my post and it inspires you to play around with some of your favourite fonts and Shabby Shoppe stamps, brushes and word art to create your very own piece of Subway Art.  We’d love to see your creations our gallery.

Be sure to join us here again tomorrow when Anna shares a very helpful tip or two in her Shoppe Tips & Tricks post.

Happy Scrapping everyone!

JenelleHybrid Projects, Inspiration, Uncategorized 6 Comments