May Counterfeit Kit, "Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow"

Hello and welcome!

The inspiration over at The Counterfeit Kit Club this month is something a little older . . .

A Jenni Bowlin kit from 2011, accompanied by a more recent Jenny Bowlin add-on . . .

 This month for my Counterfeit Kit, I did something I've never done before . . . I bought some new product!  I know, right?  That's not what the whole Counterfeiting thing is about, is it?  And it's certainly not what I'm about! 
But you see, I've been wistfully browsing the websites of the various Kit Clubs again recently, and yet again come away saying, I just can't afford it!  The overseas ones work out over $50 a month by the time they're posted, and that's without thinking about all those lovely add-ons!  The local ones don't work out that much cheaper, and aren't my favourites.  Then there's the fact that kits tend to be a bit "embellishment heavy" for me, and what about the things you end up with you don't like . . . you know how it goes.
So I figured, maybe what I'm really craving is a regular injection of "newness" into my supplies.  So  while I can't justify $50+ every month, I can do that every 2 or 3 months, with a smaller purchase squeezed in every now and then.  And I also figured, as I usually buy paper, paper and more paper, that I'd experiment with buying a little bit more embellishment fun, and see how that goes for a while.

But enough chatter, let's have a look at the kit that I put together, which I'm calling "Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow" . . .

Ok, let's take a closer look.  Like last month, I didn't try and follow the kit too closely. I just came away with a list of characteristics I had noticed.  It looked a bit like this:

• vintage
• orange, green and brown
• labels and bingo cards
• doilies and flowers.

I started with some 6" papers that came in my parcel (Basic Grey "Fact" and Studio Calico "Memoir")  and added some more from my stash . . .

Lots of orange, green and brown! I decided to use that patchwork paper as the colour scheme of my kit, so I added a bit of blue and red as well.  12" papers next . . .

Yikes, this is turning into a big kit again!  But sometimes it's easier to go with that than waste time paring it back . . .


Now I know you're waiting to see what I bought to put in the kit, aren't you?

OK, so obviously when I'm talking about an injection of "newness" I mean new to me, not necessarily products new to the stores! Not one item did I pay full price for.  In there you'll spot some "tiny type" stickers, label stickers and other journalling spots, Amy Tangerine embellishment pack, flags and bingo cards from Jenni herself.  My one regret?  Somehow I didn't realise that I was paying $2.99 for one flower. Three dollars.  For ONE flower.  Imagine if I paid full price of $7.99!!  Admittedly it is a big flower.  Possibly too big for me to use.  But I've put it in the kit and I figure if I haven't used it by the end of the month, I'll put it on a hair clip for my daughter.

 After last month's stamp-and-emboss style of lettering, I'm ready for some quick and easy titles.  Rather than pull out  a couple of alphas, I've divided my entire letter sticker stash (suprisingly large for someone who doesn't buy them that often) into ones that might potentially work with this kit and ones that won't.  I've also rifled through my growing stash of cut-apart tags and journalling spots and pulled out any that might potentially work.  Here's a sample . . .

I've also pulled out this little box of layering goodness, mostly won as a prize a little while back . . .

My kit is finished off with some doilies, and a Kaisercraft "Vintage Timeless" paper pad I bought a while back but haven't touched yet.  I love that Kaisercraft make their pads 6 and a half inches, meaning you can matt a standard 6x4 photo without trimming it down.

I might also pull out some doily stamps, and some lace or ribbon.  If I have the time, I'd love to try my hand at some of the "shabby chic" flower tutorials I've been watching lately, also.

I can smell the sausages sizzling, which must mean it's time to finish up.  Happy Mothers Day to everyone for tomorrow, I hope you get spoilt rotten, and maybe find some crafty time, too!

Gold Fever!!!!

 Do you remember your first love?  Your paper crafting first love, that is!  What got you started on this hobby? For me, it would have to be heat embossing.  Stamping an image, pouring the powder on, and then . . . the magic!  Heating that powder and watching it melt and transform into a beautiful shiny, raised surface.  Those of us who didn't have heat tools used our toasters . . . powder side up, of course!

So I'm so pleased that the gold thickers of the April Counterfeit Kit Challenge inspiration kit, "Messy Kit" reminded me of this love. And a bit of gold ink might have found it's way to some edges, as well. . .


After I'd made a couple of pages with my April kit, I decided I needed to focus on the black-and-white papers that I had included, and, with a bit of help from my February kit, ended up with 11 "starter page kits" scattered on my floor.

I didn't really think I'd get very far with those page kits, but a day off work during The Big Storm gave me some extra time.  (Mind you I did have a whole title ready to emboss before I realised it's a bit hard to use a heat gun with no power!)

I gave myself until the end of this weekend to finish as many as I could and I'm pretty pleased with how much I got done . . .


A little story about a giant pizza . . .

Our family loved the second of "The Voice" Australia.  If you haven't seen Harrison Craig's blind audition, it's totally worth a look. Maddy and I went to see him when he came to our local Westfield . . .

Loving the pink, gold and black/white stripe combo on this page . . . .

Working the green frame paper as a patterned paper as well as an embellishment  . . . 

After I scrapped this page about Rohan's presentation day last year we both realised there wasn't actually much to say . . . 

I'm loving those vellum hearts, and the bright colours on this page of Maddy painting a rock on the Port Macquarie breakwall . . . 

Rohan took some awesome photos of my niece and nephew with my brand new DSLR.  I love scrapping these guys, and not just because of the "you've scrapbooked my children more than I have" comments I get from my sister (check the comments below to see if she's been!)

Just a coffee break at our local shopping centre, but an Instagram competition (which I never entered) encouraged me to take this cute picture . . . 

Terrible photos but a memory I wanted to record . . .

It never would have occurred to me to put gold on a teenage boy page, but I'm loving how it looks . . .

There's two page kits left which I've set aside for now, mostly to see if there might be some other photos to include.

Thanks for stopping by. . . I hope you've had some crafty time this weekend, too!

April Scrapbook Boutique Challenge

So today's been all about the post-blackout cleanup.  I've hung out 3 loads of washing, finished cooking up the meat from the freezer and spent endless hours trying to clean out what seems like a tree's worth of leaves the storm dumped into our pool.  Still, better than an actual tree, like a friend found in their pool the next morning!
High time to catch up on some blogging, I say! (By the way, if you're here for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog hop, keep scrolling down to the next post).

I fell in love with this month's challenge at Scrapbook Boutique the minute I saw it!

With my renewed love of metallic embossing, revived by this month's Counterfeit Kit, I knew I was going to have fun with this one!

 

The photos from Maddy's first aerobics challenge - with their black and silver uniforms - were perfect, and I thought this would be a brilliant opportunity to play with my gelatos!

I white-embossed some big swirls onto some watercolour paper, then went to town with 3 shades of gelato.  Some finger smudging, some water, and voila!

For the title, I pulled out some super-old chipboard letters. I peeled the top coat of patterned paper off, created an "r" out of an "n" and an "o" out of a "d", and embossed with silver.  Love it!

The wood veneer butterflies are my token nod to the chocolate icing on the inspiration piece.

Thanks for dropping by, I hope you're finding time to get inspired and get crafty this weekend, too.

Counterfeit Kit Challenge April Members Blog hop

Hi crafty friends, I'm madly typing this after 3 and a half days without power or internet due to a huge storm, in order to get this post live on time for the April members blog hop from the Counterfeit Kit Challenge.

This is the page I made using my Counterfeit Kit for challenge #2, the sketch challenge.

Everything is from this month's kit, except I added the navy cardstock, and some left-over white fronds from my February kit, which I coloured with gelatos.  Yay!

I'll be back soon with more crafty adventures from my time without power, but in the meantime, why don't you hop on over to Tina at http://tinasscrapcorner.blogspot.com/

Or if you get lost  or started here and want to go back to the beginning, jump on over to the  http://counterfeitkitchallenge.blogspot.com.au/

Tasmania album update

Time for another update on my Tasmania album.  I've gone through and created all the title cards and journaling cards for the pocketed pages.  First I went through and did the ones that will face a traditional page, so that the papers and die cuts matched.
 All the title cards are cut on my Silhouette and backed with cardstock or some of the more solid patterned papers left over from the traditional pages.

Then I went back and did the rest.  At this point I figured it was time to focus on using my manufacturer strips and other thin strips and smaller pieces.  After all, if I can't use them on a project like this, what's the point in keeping them?

If you've visited an earlier post about my Tasmania album, you might remember that each "traditional" page contained the same elements for continuity: a little bit of the striped paper, tickets, cameras, white fronds and cardstock "sequins".  I decided that putting all of those elements onto a 4x6 card along with journaling or a title would be way too much, so each card has one or more of those elements, but not all of them.

I've also finished the titles on my traditional pages.  For some I used the letters cut out of the title cards,

 some I've cut out in black (same font and size),

 and others I decided don't need a title at all.

What's left? Title page and journaling. Yikes!  I don't normally leave journaling until last (especially on such a big project) so let's hope I'll see it through!

"Pick a Challenge" with the Counterfeit Kit Challenge and ColourQ

Challenge #1 at the Counterfeit Kit Challenge is to "pick a challenge" and use your kit.  It didn't take long to find an old favourite of mine that I haven't played for ages - ColourQ.

Ok, so before we go any further, I have a confession to make - my printer is a bit low on ink at the moment, so after I decided my kit had all the necessary colours for this challenge, printed this picture out and came back to it later . . . and decided that "Dusty Durango" was the pink I had in my kit, when it should have been the orange.  Ooops!
You'll forgive me, won't you? 

This page tells the story about the day, about this time last year, when we went to Ikea to buy furniture for my new office/craft room.  We had been in Sydney for a couple of days, going to the Easter show and seeing family. I was pretty excited about it - I love Ikea and of course loved the idea of my new craft area.  My kids, on the other hand, often tell the story of the time, a few years earlier, when we had gone to Sydney solely to go to Ikea and back, and rated it as "the worst day of their lives".  I originally took these photos on my phone to show that huge pile of flat-packs that we had to fit into the car along with all our bags, but of course everyone notices the expression on my children's faces instead . . .

April Counterfeit Kit, "This Messy Life"

Okay, Okay, so I haven't finished my holiday album using my February kit yet, but it's a rainy Easter long weekend and I wanted a break from decorating journaling cards, so I decided to join in the fun with the Counterfeit Kit Challenge again this month!

The April inspiration is the March "Messy Box" from a Beautiful Mess:

Well, I almost gave up then and there . . . there was no way I was going to come up with anything remotely close to that . . . but then I decided to just take note of the main elements of the kit and start from there.
The elements I identified were:

• black and white papers
• hand-drawn feel
• mix of patterns
• graphic pocketed page-style cards
• vellum circles and hearts
• white brads
• black-and-white washi tape
• Gold thickers

There. That doesn't sound so hard after all! So I went to my stash and pulled anything that I thought matched those key elements, rather than the originals.  Here's what I found . . .
Papers that were black and white (I've also added grey and white):

Papers with a hand-drawn feel as well as a mix of patterns:

Graphic pocketed page cards:

 

I may secretly have a little crush on that "days of the week" Washi, but that's Okay, I'm working with what I've got, and added two rolls from my stash.  I've pulled white and gold brads from the stash and we'll see how we go.  The vellum shapes were easy, too.  I found the perfect cut file in my Silhouette library, so I cut a whole sheet of wonky hearts, wonky circles, and wonky hearts in wonky circles!  I've inked up a few to see what they look like, and left the rest plain until I decide how I want to use them.

 

That just leaves the gold thickers.  I don't own any and buying any new product is not on the agenda right now, so that leaves the DIY option.  I wasn't sure how my Silhouette would go cutting the very thick gold cardstock I have in the stash, but that's alright when a girl has a range of letter stamps and embossing powders in her stash, pining away from lack of use!

I had a quick play with two different stamp sets and two different powders and (apart from the rookie embossing attempt) I'm happy with the results.  Hopefully when I post a finished page I'll have better lighting so you can see just how pretty it really looks. 
Appropriately enough, the set I used the stamp the word "love" is an old "Love Elsie" set, so although I can't use Elsie's handwriting on the washi tape, I might get to use it here instead!



So that's my kit, which I've named "This Messy Life" (in honour of the inspiration kit, and the chance to get messy with ink and embossing powder, nothing to do with the state of my house, of course!)

It's a pretty big kit, because once I pulled all those papers out I was too lazy to put them back  I figure those papers may as well be in a kit as loose in my stash.
Thanks for visiting with me on this wet Easter weekend.  We're heading up to visit my parents for a few days after church tomorrow, so enjoy your Easter and I hope to catch up with you again soon!