Happy Monday!  Hope everyone had a great weekend and are are now ready for another week.  This is Kim here to start it off with a fabulous Layout of the Week.  There were many fun layouts in the gallery as I was looking through.  You are all rocking the template challenge… I always love seeing the way each person comes up with their own unique layout even though they start with the same template.  So many great layouts, yet I have to pick one!  And this week’s honor goes to chocochoco with her “When I was 2” layout!

I have always been a fan of chocochoco‘s layouts and her unique shadowing style.  I also love that so many of her layouts focus on the importance of capturing family heritage.  She has amazed me again with this layout of her as a sweet toddler.  Not only is this inspiring me to go back and create some layouts from my own childhood, but I keep coming back to this layout again and again and noticing another great detail.  The layers of circles, the chevrons, the Clementine doodle frame peeking in from each side of the layout… I could go on and on!

Congratulation, chocochoco!  We hope you enjoy your $10 gift card to the Shabby Shoppe!  (Please check your spam folder if you don’t find it in your inbox.)  And to all of you, I look forward to seeing your layouts in the gallery this week!

Bye for today, but be sure and stop by tomorrow as Jenelle has a Product Spotlight to share.

KimLayout of the Week, Uncategorized 1 Comment

Happy Friday everyone!  This is Kim here today to share with you a little hybrid project I’ve been working on with my children.  You see, my oldest son is heading to Kindergarten when school starts again, and his preschool teachers have done such a great job of getting him excited about it.  He loves school and anything involving learning and I am definitely one to encourage a love of learning.  So when he saw that a friend of his had a “school” calendar at home, he decided he needed one for his own room.  He actually created his own calendar with construction paper and markers – it was too cute!  But… it wasn’t quite as functional as he had hoped!  It was then and there that I promised him we would make one together this summer.  Which brings us to this hybrid project post today!  Here is our creation.

I wanted to keep this project as simple as possible, as I knew I would have some not-so-patient helpers!  And the first thing I needed was a blank calendar grid that could be used to build each month.  Instead of trying to create one from scratch, I used a page from an SP two-page calendar.  (Note that the two-page calendars have a top and bottom page, but I used only the bottom for this project.)  I made only a few modifications to it.  One was to add a place for the day’s weather (because this was a big deal to my son).  I also tweaked the design to make it into a 14″ x 11″ size.  I wanted to do this so my calendar would be just a little bit bigger and print out as a standard size photo.  Since I was going to frame this calendar, I wanted a standard size so I could find a frame.  I printed the calendar at a photo lab, and it was ready for my project.  And wasn’t this SP design perfect for my project?

The next thing I needed to do was create the squares that would be put on the calendar each month for the numbers, special dates, and weather.  I wanted to be able to print these at a photo lab too, so I made 6″ x 4″ files to print.  I realize that if you were going to print these at home, this wouldn’t be necessary.  But here is what I did.  To be sure the squares I designed were the right size, I opened up the calendar base and drew a square shape in one of the calendar squares.

Then I copied this square into my 6″ x 4″ file that I would later print.  This made sure the size of my squares would be right.

I repeated the same process to make the month names.  I was able to fit 4 months on a 7″ x 5″ image.  So what I sent to the lab to print were 6″ x 4″ files with the number squares and 7″ x 5″ files with the month names.

Not only did I create numbers, but I made a list of all the special dates I wanted to have a special square for (birthdays, holidays, the list would be different for each family).  I also made the weather squares that my son requested and I left a few squares blank in case I wanted to write in something that came up later.  SP has a lot of great elements in her kits that helped me design these squares, and I will give all the credits when I post this project to the gallery.  Here is a sampling of my squares.

Once I had designed and printed the calendar, squares, and names, the rest was pretty easy to put together.  This was the part the kids enjoyed the most too!

The supplies I used were:

• My printed 14″ x 11″ blank calendar
• A frame for the calendar (with glass)
• My printed calendar squares and month names
• Paper cutter (or scissors)
• Laminating machine and laminating pages (if you don’t have a machine available, they do make self-sealing laminating pages)
• Velcro circles (mine came with adhesive on the back).  You will need enough for all of the month names and squares you are making, so count them up before you go to purchase the velcro.

This is how to put the calendar together:

• Frame the blank calendar.
• Cut out all the squares and month names and laminate them.  A tip if you haven’t done much laminating: It’s best to cut out each piece, then laminate them separately, then cut them out again.  If you laminate the whole sheet of squares together, then cut them out, you don’t leave a rim of the laminating sheet around each piece to hold it together firmly.
• Attach one side of the velcro to the blank calendar in the places you will want to attach month names and squares.  I debated on whether I would leave the glass in the frame or not at this point.  I decided to leave the glass in and adhere the velcro directly to the glass.  I was afraid that if I left the calendar in the frame without the glass, the repeated process of taking the squares off the calendar (by not-so-gentle hands) would eventually rip the calendar.  With the glass there, I avoid that problem.
• Attach the other side of the velcro to the backs of the month names and squares.
• Get started using the calendar by putting the squares on for your first month!

That’s it!  Pretty simple, but something that is a big hit at my house.  My son doesn’t actually put the whole month on the calendar at once.  Each day he adds the square for that day and changes the weather.  I think this is how they did the calendar at preschool.  I have enjoyed watching him… he is quite proud of his calendar!

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing our little project too.  Have a great weekend and stop back by the blog on Monday as Casharina reveals our next Layout of the Week!  Bye!

KimHybrid Projects, Uncategorized 6 Comments

Happy Friday everyone!  This is Kim and I’m here with another ad inspiration post!  It’s been a while since we’ve shared one of these – I hope you enjoy it!  While I was looking around at ads for potential scrapping inspiration (you can google “print advertising” and find all kinds of things!), I found several fun ideas.  But what ended up really sticking with me was this ad.

Wow, I am not even old enough to remember the days when you could get a Coca-Cola for 5 cents!  But I love this ad because of all the Coca-Cola bottles in line.  They give the ad depth and movement.  And I wondered if I could somehow recreate this idea and make it work for a scrapbook layout.  I even had a certain picture in mind with lots of movement of its own that I thought might work.  So after working and reworking for a while, here is my layout inspired by the ad.

The elements inspired by the ad may be obvious, but here is what I was focusing on the most:

• The row of frames getting larger as they moved across the page.  To me this draws my eye to the main picture.
• The circle for journaling.  I don’t think I would have thought to put a circle at all in this layout with all the other rectangular frames, but it was an idea incorporated from the ad.
• The sketch in the background.  I absolutely love seeing the sketches Rosy often includes in her layouts.  I just don’t think to work them into mine much.  But looking at the background of this ad made me think “sketch”, and I had to give this a try.  It’s one of my favorite parts of this layout!  (And if you would like to try your own sketch from a photo, check out Rosy’s post explaining how to do it.)
• One thing that wasn’t intentionally inspired by the post is the word “trust” in the title.  I wanted to find a saying to use in this layout, and trust is what I was thinking of because I love that my husband can throw my youngest in the air really high and he never has any fear or doubt that Daddy will catch him.  Funny that trust is also what the ad was talking about!

We’re also sharing a treat with you today – a layered template inspired by the ad that you can download for free!  You can CLICK HERE or click the image below to download the template.  Happy scrapping!  And we would love to see your layouts in our gallery!

That’s all for this week, but Rosy will be here with you on Monday to announce our next Layout of the Week.  Bye bye!

KimFree (not desktops), Inspiration, Uncategorized 10 Comments

Hello everyone!  Kim here to share with you our next Product Spotlight.  Sometimes I think I have given all of SP’s kits a try, but then I find another treasure in the Shoppe that I haven’t used yet.  The Painted Summer kit is one I have eyed for a while and not given a try…until now!  I must admit I was excited to see what I could do with it.

So what had caught my eye about the Painted Summer kit?  Well, the part that gives it it’s name!  I LOVE the hand-painted alphas and swirls!  I would buy this kit for those elements alone, but they come with some unique papers and other goodies too.  And right now this kit is ON SALE for a limited time for only $3.25!

The first thing I did when I got my hands on the kit was to create a summer-y layout with lots of those painted elements.

As with all of SP’s kits, this one coordinates well with so many others.  The notebook paper made me think of school and I happen to have a new proud preschool grad.  So I added in a few elements from the Hopscotch School Additions, and I got a bit of a different look.

And, here is a brand new layout from Shabby Princess herself!  Such a treasure of a photo and the page is FULL of painted summer scrapping inspiration…and more!! - BEAUTIFUL!!

Rosy did a great job too of adding in bits and pieces from some other kits and creating this very cool tractor layout.  I love the work she did on the title and how she clipped the notebook paper to the alpha.  It was also a great idea to overlay the dots on part of the blue paper – really like that idea!

Kylie shared two lovely layouts with us.  The first showcases one of her cutie-pie nieces.  It also gives you a great look at how you can cluster the flowers, buttons and swirls from this kit!

Kylie’s second layout is completely fun and creative!  I love how she’s clipped the swirls to the papers so they look like they are a part of the papers.  And what cool journaling with the large title running through the lines of the story.  PERFECT way to use this particular kit!

We’ll all be uploading these layouts to the gallery, so check there for more details.  I hope they inspire you to give Painted Summer a try if you haven’t before!

That’s all for today, but you won’t want to miss stopping by the blog tomorrow as Kylie introduces you to our next Gallery Girl.  Can’t wait to find out who it is and see all the inspiration!  Bye!

KimProduct Spotlight, Uncategorized 2 Comments

Hello everyone!  This is Kim here to announce another Layout of the Week.  I’ve especially enjoyed browsing through the gallery over the last few weeks.  There have been new faces that have shared some really great layouts.  And there have been some fun ideas shared that have inspired others to scrap.  I love that!  That is one of the things that drew me to this week’s layout of the week.  Congratulations to pqtn and “The Joy of Sharing” layout!

You may recognize that this layout was inspired by Rosy‘s “This Memory”, which was recently featured in a Thursday Thievery post.  pqtn amazed me with the way she took the inspiration from Rosy’s layout and created this one.  (She actually created two layouts, and you can check out the other one here.)  I think it is a talent to see inspiration and then make it your own, which is definitely the case in this layout.  And it’s dripping with sweetness too.  How cute are the two girls sharing a toy in the picture?  Beautiful layout, beautiful sentiment… I had to choose it as our layout of the week!

Congratualtions, pqtn!  You have been emailed a $10 gift card to the Shabby Shoppe (be sure and check your spam folder if you don’t see it).  Hope you have fun shoppe-ing!  And thank you for being a part of our gallery!

Have a great day everyone, and be sure to stop by tomorrow as Jenelle spotlights a kit that I think is an SP favorite.  You won’t want to miss the inspiration and the sale!  Bye bye!

KimLayout of the Week, Uncategorized 2 Comments