Hello, everyone!  It’s me again – Amber!  Aren’t you excited?! LOL!  I know I am! :0)  I’ve got PAGES of inspiration for you today!  When I was a kid, I remember looking through old family albums, or boxes full of pictures of my ancestors.  My mom and sister are a Genealogists, and they’ve been able to find some pretty neat stories about our family, too.  I love those stories just as much as I love those pictures!  Then, when I got married, that opened several new lines of pictures and stories!  So, I thought that my last post here on the Shabby Shoppe Blog would be PERFECT to share some of my most precious heritage photos with you!  And, I got the team to play along with me! :0)

This is my Grandma when she was about 17 years old.  She was the Drum Major for her high school marching band!  She was my inspiration!  Because of her example, and this super cute picture, I learned how to play the clarinet and joined my high school marching band!  I have always loved this picture! :0)

I remember this picture hanging up on Grandma’s wall.  I LOVED to go there to see the pictures of my Mom as a little girl, and as she grew!  What a blessing it is to me to have these pictures!  This one is one of my favorites!  Sitting next to her, on the left, is my aunt- her older sister.  Aren’t they both SO cute?!

This one is pretty special to me, too.  This is my Dad when he was about 2 years old. :0)  I LOVE this picture!  Another one of my favorites!  He says he doesn’t remember anything about this picture.  He was told that a man just came around his neighborhood one day with this horse and some props and took pictures!  (That would be SO much fun!  I can think of a couple of girls at my house who would LOVE to have an opportunity like that!)

Next up is inspiration from the team!  I’m SO happy they were willing to help me with this post!  I love their layouts!  Prepare to be AMAZED!

WOW!  Huh?!  Lindsay’s page is SO elegant, perfect for that photo!  The picture is of her Grandma and Grandpa at their wedding in 1954.  And, look at the clusters!  Just BEAUTIFUL!  Aubrey said she didn’t have access to her family photos at the time, so she asked her neighbor for some of theirs – what a wonderful idea!  Love the page she made with them, too!  The stitching reminds me of a baseball diamond! Clever!  Her choice of papers and colors – oh, and that banner – they’re PERFECT for baseball photos!  Baseball was such a major event at that time, and I love to see pictures of it! :0)

Here’s more eye candy for ya, huh?!  Kylie really outdid herself here!  LOVE.  THESE.  PAGES!  What can you say about Kylie’s AMAZING clustering?  I always go back to her pages for inspiration – and she NEVER disappoints!  These are layouts of her mum.  In the first one, her mum is with her brother.  They look SO cute together!  (This picture reminds me of the one of my mom and aunt.)  In the second one, her mum is grown, and just beautiful!

And, last, but certainly not least, Kylie’s Great Grandmother!  Just GORGEOUS!  That picture is just enough to melt ya, isn’t it?  Love the layering, love the colors!  Thank you so much, ladies! :0)

To see these super cute layouts in more detail, go to the Gallery!  The girls will be uploading within the next day or two!

Do you have any pictures of your ancestors that have been passed down to you?  Do you have old family stories to write up?  I would LOVE to see how you’ve scrapped them!  Please upload to the Gallery for all of us to see! :0)

Okay, this is where I sign off…  It has been so incredibly wonderful to be a part of this team.  I have so enjoyed sharing bits of my life and knowledge with you!  While it is a bit sad for me to be signing off for the last time, I am quite proud of SP for making a decision that will be better for her and her family – family is everything!  SP is an incredibly talented and amazing woman – as you all know! :0)  I am very thankful for the opportunity to be a part of this team – and I will be sticking around the gallery.  I wouldn’t dream of leaving that!  Hope to see you all there, too!  Bye! :0)

AmberInspiration, Uncategorized 9 Comments

Hello everyone!  Kim here today with one of my favorite kind of posts… color inspiration!  It’s a new year again, so it’s time for a look at Pantone’s Color of the Year for 2013!!  In the past we’ve been inspired by Turquoise and Tangerine.  This year… say hello to Emerald!!

Now I have to say that when I saw what this year’s color was, I was really excited to scrap with it.  And I gave some thought to what might be fun to do with Emerald that would be a little different.  Here’s where my wandering thoughts led me…

The color wheel.  What is a color wheel, you ask?  The basic color wheel is made up of twelve colors.  There are the three Primary colors: red, yellow and blue, which when mixed together in different ways make up all the other colors on the wheel.  Then there are three Secondary colors: orange, violet and green.  Remember learning about those as a child?  Yellow and blue make green.  Red and yellow make orange.  Blue and red make violet.  Finally you mix a Primary and Secondary color to get the six Tertiary colors.  But really just taking a look at the color wheel makes a lot more sense!  Here is one example.

Now my whole reason for talking about the color wheel is to show you a way you can develop a color palette for a layout.  We’re going to look at color schemes that come from the color wheel and make those the inspiration for our layouts.  We’ll use blue-green as the starting point because Pantone’s Emerald is a blue-green.  Ready to see our color schemes??  Here we go!

Our first color scheme uses Complementary Colors.  These are colors that are directly opposite each other on the color wheel.  So for us today, we’re going to use blue-green and red-orange.

Complementary colors give maximum contrast.  This is because they don’t share any of the same colors.  For example, yellow and violet are complementary and violet is made up of red and blue (and not yellow).  Complementary schemes have an energetic feel.  Sometimes it can be a bit tricky to find the right balance though.  Here is what I did using Emerald and its complementary color.

Up next we’re going to look at an Analogous Color scheme.  Analogous colors are any three that are side by side on the color wheel.  Today we’ll use green, blue-green and blue.

Analogous color schemes are pleasing to the eye and are supposed to be able to create different moods.  As I read about this type of scheme, it was usually recommended to let one color be the dominant color while the other two colors add depth.  I’m not sure if I got that 100% right in this one, but here’s my analogous layout!

Our last color scheme for today uses Triadic Colors.  These colors are equidistant from each other on the color wheel (they make an equilateral triangle).  Our triadic colors are blue-green, red-violet, and yellow-orange.

Triadic colors give variety to a color palette because they aren’t close to each other on the color wheel.  Some of the color schemes could come off as a bit gaudy, but used the right way, they have interesting impact.  Here’s my take on this color scheme.

I asked the Shabby Team if they’d like to try these color schemes out themselves, and they have more inspiration to share with you!!

What I love most about this post is that we started with one color, Emerald, and the layouts that were created are all so different!  Thank you everyone for all these beautiful layouts!  If you want to see theirs in more detail, check out the gallery, where they will be uploaded soon.

Here’s where I usually say “that’s all for today”, but instead I must sign off a bit more permanently.  This is my last post before the team blog posts end, and I have so enjoyed my time here and sharing a love of scrapping with all of you.  Thanks for being such a great community of scrappers!  I’ll see you in the gallery!!  Bye bye!

KimInspiration, Uncategorized 12 Comments

Happy Tuesday!  It’s Emily here with another inspiration post!  Ever since composing my first inspiration post a few weeks back and loving Aubrey’s inspiration post, I have been keeping a keen eye out for things in my everyday life that could inspire my digital scrapbooking. Before winter break, a colleague of mine paid me the nicest compliment by telling me that I had an eye for putting outfits together and that my color and pattern choices were such an inspiration!  Well…I got to thinking….maybe some of the colors, patterns, and textures I choose to put together for fashion purposes could also be used to scrapbook!  Anyone who knows me, knows that I LOVE style and fashion.  I am a fashion blog geek (Check out the bottom of this post–I’ve snuck in a few of my faves!) and am constantly trying new looks that I see.  I think it all really comes down to my love for colors, patterns (stripes! polkadots!), and textures.  Really, I think it is those three things that are the foundation for all my creative loves! Who knew?!  I started having my hubby take pictures of outfits that had interesting color combinations (Boy do I love my pink skinny jeans!) or patterns over the last few weeks.  Check out the outfits and then the layouts I scrapped based on the color palette or pattern from the outfit.  This was such a fun challenge for me and I hope you join me and try one of your own!  Post it to the gallery please!

Fashion Color Palette #1

Fashion Color Palette #2

Fashion Color Palette #3

Fashion Color Palette #4

Here are a few of my favorite blogs!  Watch out…you can really whittle away time on these!  Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

J’s Everyday Fashion Blog

Putting Me Together 

Lilly’s Style: Pinterest

Carah Amelie

Thank you so much for stopping by today and checking out my last post for SP!  Although it has been short, this experience has been a creative and inspirational highlight that I will not soon forget!  Let’s keep supporting one another in the gallery! Love~Em

EmilyBeauty & Fashion, Inspiration, Uncategorized 5 Comments

Happy Weekend!!  It’s Emily here with an inspiration post for you!  Goodness, I am always so inspired by these posts and was feeling quite challenged to come up with my own.  I tossed about a few ideas but one kept showing itself to me OVER and OVER and I just had to go with it.  The latest and greatest crafty trend out in the world (Can you say PINTEREST?!) is chalk, chalkboards, and chalkboard paint!

Now I actually have quite an aversion to chalkboards and chalk.  In my non-scrapbooking life I am a middle school English teacher who used to have to write on chalkboards ALL. THE. TIME!  I despised the chalk dust and the screech-ey, scratch-ey noise fingernails and chalk can make on a chalkboard (I seriously just got goose bumps writing that sentence!).  I was so relieved when they replaced my chalkboard with a white board.  So obviously, when this trend of schlepping everything in sight with chalkboard paint emerged, I was less than thrilled.  I realized however that I truly did enjoy certain elements of the chalkboard look: the dark frosty background, the contrast of the white chalk against the dark background, and the way colors pop against it as well.  It dawned on me that digital scrapbooking was the perfect way to jump on the chalkboard bandwagon without getting any chalkdust on my pants! Whoo hoo!  I looked through my past layouts and found a layout that used a dark, chalkboard-like background and white text and I knew I had been subconsciously percolating this whole chalkboard idea for awhile.  Let’s do this!

SP has several papers that work perfectly for that chalkboard look and feel.  Here are direct links to the kits right in the shoppe!  Yours Truly, Wonderful, Occasions, Modish Girl, Clementine, and Brrrr.

Here are links to some of the best chalkboard fonts out on the web.  I could have listed dozens more but I had to say, “WHOA” at some point! LOL!  They are all free to download for personal use only.

The chalkboard fonts work AWESOME with the great Tips and Tricks post from lego a few weeks back!  Be doubly inspired!  Also, Lindsay shared a great blog link that shows how to get a cool chalk effect using Photoshop!  Check it out HERE!  So much chalkboard-inspiration-goodness! 

Keep scrolling to see some stellar takes on this whole chalkboard trend from our a-mazing Shabby Artists! Be patient as they load ~ I inserted them as full-size images to really make the chalkboard look visible!

 First up is the ADORABLE layout from Amber ~ She applied the trend to perfection with a school-themed layout!  It goes perfectly with her element cluster and inspired title!

Next up is a breathtaking layout from Kylie ~ Her use of the chalk effect with the floral brush work is beyond inspirational!  The button elements add so much to the overall effect too!

 Take a look at this stunning example from Kim ~ She has expertly added this trend to her title work and it brings her layout focus and undeniable style!

I cannot tell you how much I enjoy this layout from Casharina!  She was able to apply the effect to a holiday layout!  I doubly love that her picture background pulls double duty as her chalkboard look!  The font just pulls it all together!

Lego has also produced a stunner!  She went with the traditional deep green chalkboard background color and it is set off perfectly by her choice of paper strips and spot-on chalk effect fonts!  Look at those chalk snowflakes!

Finally ~ Here is my take on this whole “I can’t stand real chalk, but I sure do love the look” trend!

Look for all of these layouts from the Shabby Artists in the gallery if you would like to know credits and such.  Please make this chalkboard trend your own and post it in the gallery!  I can’t wait to take a peek!  Thanks for taking some time to be inspired here on the Shabby blog!

EmilyInspiration, Uncategorized 6 Comments

Hello and happy Saturday everyone!  Aubrey here with an inspiration post!  Hopefully this helps to get you out of scrapbooking ruts…you know, the times you sit down with pictures in front of you on the computer, but you have no idea of how to put it into a layout?  I get those once in a while and it’s usually when it has been a while since I had scrapbooked, but usually I can look around me and formulate a “plan of action” for those pictures!

I am going to warn you here and now: when I show this to people I know, they look at me like I’m nuts (including my loving and supporting husband!) so don’t be surprised if you think this is a little crazy, but this is literally how I think and see things and hopefully will help you in the future!  Ok, so when I look around I see things in lines.  I will look at a city skyline and see the lines that create it and can see a layout.  See!!! I am crazy!!  But by the end of this I hope to have you all “seeing lines” if only to help you to be inspired for your layouts!  I am going to show you a picture of the “inspiration” and then the layout that was inspired from the picture.  Here we go!

This first one is of my kitchen cabinets (please ignore the mess!).  If you look at the lines of the cabinets, countertops, and stove you will see where I got my layout!

And here is the layout:

Looks TOTALLY different, right?  But the layout was in the lines.  If you are not seeing it, here is how it looks to me:

Now does it make sense?  I find layouts in magazines, house walls, stores, and so many places!  I have been in meetings and had to draw out a layout that I see in front of me because I am afraid I will forget it (did I mention I am a bit OCD?), but this helps me out so much when I am struggling to create a layout.  Here are a couple more examples:

This was in a magazine that came to our house and here is the corresponding layout:

I even copied the shape where I put the title!

I have found many great pages on pinterest that inspire me in my scrapbooking, but I also found the layout of the actual sight as great inspiration for a layout itself!

I didn’t put all the blocks in that you see on pinterest, but that is the beauty of it: you can create the layout to be whatever you want!

This is the back of one of our kitchen chairs. Look at the lines and imagine a layout.  Here is my take on it:

I have blocks of paper across the top like the vertical rungs on the back of the chair and the title is where the seat would be.

This was the opening page of a website.  Are you starting to see the lines now?

I even put little pictures across the bottom just like in the website.  There are some really great “layouts” out there just waiting to be discovered!  I have noticed that newspapers, websites, magazines, and ads have the greatest layout ideas because they already are a layout!  They have GREAT lines!  So am I just a little less crazy?  So, I am challenging you all to “see the lines” and create a layout with something you see around you.  I am even giving you an email ad I received, for a start:

Feel free to use the one I included, or come up with one you find.  We would love to see what you come up with in the Gallery!  Trust me, once you get the hang of this, you’ll never go back!  Thanks for joining us here on the blog and I hope this inspired you!  Enjoy the rest of your weekend and we’ll see you back here on Monday with Layout of the Week!

AubreyInspiration, Uncategorized 9 Comments