Embossing Technique Tutorial

I'm slowly but surely getting better. I feel better today than I did yesterday or he day before. That's a good thing.

While I didn't have the energy to do any scrapbooking today I was inspired with an interesting way to emboss and since Studio Calico is now selling Zing! embossing powder I figured I would share it here. It only took about 5 minutes to complete this technique.

For this technique I used: Fiskars star punch, red Zing! embossing powder by American Crafts, Versamark pen, and a few scrap papers.

First I punched a star out of the kraft scrap paper. I really just wanted the negative image.

Then I placed the negative on my cream cardstock and 'coloured it in' with the versamark marker. (You could also use the versamark embossing pad and pressing it down over the image if you were stuck).

I pulled the negative away and covered the 'coloured' image with Zing! embossing powder.



Then I tapped the excess off onto a sheet of plain paper leaving behind the image.



Then I just embossed the image with my heat gun.

You could use this technique with any of the punches in your stash! Here's another shot of a tiny heart and butterfly embossed image with the same technique.

It makes for another way to use your embossing powder and punches!

xoxo
K

This Weekend

I spent my time moving from my bed to the couch and back. Late last week I came down with some late-winter cold and have been struggling to shake it all weekend.

But, I made some new friends. Mr. Buckley's and Miss Benelyn to be precise. I discovered I have a love/hate relationship with Mr. Buckley though. What they say is true-it does taste awful, but it does indeed work! It's kind of like swallowing an entire package of Halls Menthol cough drops in liquid format all at once. Ick! Now, I'm a fickle friend, so when my friendly neighborhood pharmacist recommended I meet Miss. Benelyn I happily agreed. So today I "had a Benelyn day".

I discovered that the 'laundry gnomes'-those illusive magicians that appear and make clean underwear, socks and gym gear magically reappear in the dresser drawers-is fearful of germs. The laundry gnomes did not come around this weekend.

I discovered that my husband could moonlight as a nurse in his free time. God bless him for cooking three delicious meals (that I almost tasted) this weekend. He looked after his sick wife all weekend and for that he earned some serious brownie points.

I'll leave you with a little something I found on my camera. It's a photo of the finished layout from Wednesday night.



As you can imagine, there was very little scrapbooking this weekend but I'm hoping to finish up a layout that's been laying abandoned on my desk top since Thursday, at some point this week.

Enjoy the Oscars if you're watching tonight. I'll probably be in a Benelyn-induced state by then and on my way to bed. Lol!

xoxo

K

5 for Friday

1. I've been trying out some new hairdos lately. This is the fishtail I did last weekend. I love the way it looks in my hair.



Do you know what a 'sock bun' is? I'm currently obsessed with this technique. It actually works to create curls which last all day! I forgot to take a picture in my excitement this morning but try it! Check out the youtube video here!

2. I started a new layout last night. Here's a sneak peek.



3. We had our first outdoor run tonight. 7km later I am sore but feeling good. We start training for the half marathon in two weeks.

4. This weekend I will NOT be making cupcakes! Instead lovely, succulent lobster will be baking in my house this Saturday. I am pumped. I love lobster. I love clams and mussels. I love corn on the cob. I. am. excited!

5. I want a camera remote. I want glittered heals a la Liz Kartchner. I also want to be as cute as Liz Kartchner when I'm a mom. Alas, we may not get everything we want in life. Two out of three wouldn't be too bad!

Thanks for stopping by and checking out the blog today! I've been noticing a bit more traffic here lately and I appreciate the time you're taking to flick through my posts! Have a wonderful weekend!

xoxo
K

Scrapbooking on Wednesday

So craft night was canceled tonight. Boo for that!

I did scrapbook though. Here's a sneak peak of my layout.

This one was a little more labor intensive than last weeks layouts. Lots of misting, and punching and tiny, little letters. I used the Who's Who Studio Calico kit in case you're wondering.

The colors aren't true to the page but this is the best I've got! You know what 'night time lighting' looks like! Blah! 'll have a better picture tomorrow!

Have a happy Thursday! It's pre-Friday!

xoxo
K

Today...

...It's hump day! Happy hump day!

...I'm listening to the Paperclipping Roundtable.



The latest episode I've listened to is about the 'rules' of scrapbooking. It's worth a listen because it really does make you think about how you scrapbook. For the record, I don't think there are any rules! Do what you want and make sure YOU like it.

...I'm working on some big technology projects at school.



Is it possible to tire of technology? Well, I hit my wall today. Surrounded by 6 laptops and three desktops and 9 kids with questions about how to work this? and how to do that? If I don't have to put them on a computer until after March Break I will be oh so happy!

...I'm so happy that it's still light out and it's 5:45!!! Amazing!



Wow! That window is dirty. It was a very sunny day here in O-Town and it's still light outside! I am loving the longer days!

...I have some work to do and then I'm going to scrapbook. Look for some layouts later in the week.

xoxo
K

Right now I am...

*feeling inspired by this.


photo credit : JBS
and this...


photo credit: Two Peas in a Bucket

*working on increasing my running speed.

*digging out clothes that transition from winter to spring.

*making my shopping list for a trip to Boston and the outlets in Maine. So far this includes: black skinny jeans and grey swede pumps.

*prepping my supplies for another craft night tomorrow.

*happy that I finished two weeks of Project Life last night.

*fretting about finishing an annotated bibliography for my M. Ed course.

*dreaming of new ideas and crafting a fun and interesting plan for my creative future.

Happy Tuesday!

xoxo
K

Studio Calico: Metropolitan

So on Wednesday at Craft night I managed to put together a few layouts on the floor of Sarah's house. I promised more pictures when I had better light.

Low and behold it was LIGHT out when I got home last night so I took a few pics of those layouts with the journaling as well.

This was the first one...these two, my brother in law and our friend, are gossip queens! They are ridiculous and spent our New Year's party gossiping about everyone at the party. They were too funny!

I like these photos a lot! It's M and his brother-my brother as well. I used the Polaroid stamp and had forgotten how much I loved it! The journaling is hard to see but it's written on the top and bottom of the patterned papers.

We have a long weekend here in Ontario so I have TWO more days of my weekend. I'm hoping to get some scrapbooking done. Stay tuned! We'll see what happens!

Happy weekend!
xoxo
K

5 For Friday

1. I found a great link for some cool free online photo stuff: Big Huge Labs. Check it out here.

2. I'm making cupcakes again this weekend. We're having a group of friends over for a big night of fun on Sunday and M promised them cupcakes. So, I'm weighing my options (hehehe) and deciding on what kind I will bake. Right now options include:
-Give Me S'more Cupcakes
-Magnolia's Vanilla cupcakes with Buttercream icing
-Boston Cream Pie Cupcakes
-Black Bottom Cupcakes

3. I have a craving for french fries. I might need to eat me some of those this weekend.

(Sidenote: It sounds like this weekend may be calorie-laden and delicious!)

4. I have plans to work on Project Life this weekend. I have a stack of photos dating all the way back to February 1st and they are calling my name, "Krista! Come scrap us please!" I may have to oblige.

5. This past weekend I discovered a fabulous new restaurant. It serves pizza but weird and yummy pizzas! It's called 'ZA ZA ZA'. It is def the best pizza I've ever had in Ottawa.

Not the most exciting 5 for Friday but there you have it.

So, the all important decision-which cupcakes should I make this weekend?

Happy Weekend folks! I hope it's a great one for you!

xoxo
K

Craft Night

I was invited over to a friend's house tonight for 'Craft Night'. I was super excited and I wish I could say that I spent lots of time planning my pages and my supply list for tonight but alas I did not start organizing until a half hour before heading over there.

So I grabbed my Metropolitan kit from Studio Calico and a basket of supplies, 'Little Red Riding Hood' style, and traipsed down the street in the snow.

Everyone else was knitting, quilting, crocheting...



...and there I was making a giant mess on the floor. It was glorious! I managed to put together two layouts-without journaling of course.



Here's a sneak peak...




I'll post the finished products in the next few days. I need to add some journaling and take pictures in the day light.

Happy Hump Day!

xoxo
K

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Heart Day!

I spent the day skiing today which was, despite the rainy/snowy weather, quite lovely actually. I came home to have a yummy meal of crab cakes and sweet potato fries. It's been an ordinary night around here which is exactly how I wanted it!

But, I did make some red velvet cupcakes this weekend. They were yummy. Here's my recipe for the perfect cupcakes:

1. Compile list of rad songs to listen/dance to in the kitchen.



2. Don your favorite frilly apron.



3. Haul out your favorite cookbook!



4. Compile & combine ingredients.



5. Spoon into cupcake pans & bake. Here's a before and after...





6. Ice cupcakes with cream cheese icing, garnish with a cookies and cream Hershey kiss. Artfully place on a glass cake plate with a cover-so you have some for your friends when they come over.



Let's face facts, you would eat them if they weren't covered. That's what the ones in the kitchen are for. ;)



7. Invite friends to eat them.

Hope you have had a wonderful Valentine's Day!

xoxo
K

5 For Friday

So it's Friday again. M & I were just discussing how FAST the last 6 weeks have gone. It feels like we only just celebrated the first moments of 2011. But, here we are!

Here's this weeks 5 for Friday.

1. I found this blog: In A Creative Bubble and I LOVE it. Her layouts are inspiring. They are detailed and combine so many papers and bits-i love it. Her style reminds me of Kelly Purkey’s who I LOVE LOVE LOVE.

2. Looking around I've been very inspired by other peoples blog layouts. So this weekend I’ll be working on a little blog reconstruction, a facelift if you will, so excuse me if it all looks like a mess!

3. I plan on making red velvet cupcakes this weekend. I also want to have a cupcake party with mini-cupcakes and tea. I started this cute little project on Wednesday that I hope to add to my cupcakes! ;)





4. I DID deal with those overflowing albums. I separated 2010 into {part 1} & {part 2}. But I still have no idea what to do with layouts that I make NOW that are for 2010. There are no spaces for more layouts so do I just add them to the end of the {part 2} album and wait until the next time I reorganize the albums?! Uhhhh!







5. I’ve made a decision to submit some of my work. I have a list of calls and magazines and publishers who I want to send some of my work to. But it seems that it’s all two seasons ahead...so I guess what i’m wondering is do you use old photos with new product? Obviously, yes. But I guess I’m realizing I am usually a chronological scrapbooker and that means I’m ‘in the moment’ as opposed to two seasons ahead. I guess I’ll have to go back and dig through some old photos for inspiration.

Have a wonderful weekend! We have a busy weekend filled with friends who are visiting from out of town! Hopefully there will be lots of fun photos to scrapbook from this weekend!

xoxo
K

P.S: There will be a Project Life update at some point this week as well. Got some great shots this week and I'm looking forward to putting them all together.

I'm Overflowing

So I combined some albums this weekend but I think they're a little too full. In fact they are overflowing...So what do I do? I need to reorganize-again. I did this not too long ago.

The two on either end-brown on the left and the Making Memories album on the far right-are bursting at the seams. Ick!

I mean look at this...

This year I'm doing project life so I'm trying to confine all of this year's 'stuff' into one/two/three albums. I tried to do that with the past years layouts but I think I just need more space?! Do I just suck it up and break it into two albums?! I hate buying albums. I would rather spend the money on supplies!

How do you organize your own albums? How many layouts do you usually fit into an album?
Any tips would be greatly appreciated!

xoxo
K

Project Life

So this past weekend I pulled together some materials and pieced together the beginnings of my project life album for 2011. As I've said before, the kit and shipping costs were not worth it to me to buy Becky Higgins gear so I just gathered some of my own materials and decided to use what I have to create something wonderful to chronicle our year. Scrapbooking gets to be what you want it to be right?!

So here's my opening page. I used Studio Calico's Metropolitan kit. I love how it turned out. I added the washi taped corners as a last addition to the page and I LOVE how it looks kind of like a bulletin board or whiteboard. So cute!

I am using Project 12's sketches to create an opening layout for each month of the year. Here is January's layout which comes right after the opening page as a double layout spread.

Then I inserted a single layout about New Years and a few left over pictures I love from the same night in an American Crafts page protector with 6 slots for 4*6 photos.

I added some randoms to the other side of it with a few embellishments to dress it up.

There's also a few more single page layouts to add to this January section. The goal is to organize the year into one place-whether that turns out to be one, two, or three albums. I'm okay with that.

February's section will be a more accurate depiction of what I really want this album to look like but since I had to go back and put January together after the fact I had to use what I had. Despite that, I like the way it's turning out so far!

I'll post another update in early March to show you what February looks like.

Are you chronicling your year in some way? Are you using Project Life or the Project 12 sketches? How do you organize your scrapbooks?

xoxo
K

Weekend Update & A Mini-Album

I...

*watched 'Love & Other Drugs'-it was amazing! See it! Great movie!
*saw 'No Strings Attached'-it's a rental. Not worth the popcorn and admission fees at the theatre.
*ate too much junk food
*but hit the gym and felt a little less guilty about the said food eaten
*got lots of school work done
*watched multiple episodes of 'Mad Men'-good show!
*cleaned my house
*made chili and watched the superbowl
*scrapbooked!

I managed to finish that mini album that debuted in my 5 for Friday post. It's simple but I like the way it turned out. Here's a few quick snapshots.

Cover:



Used a transparency to introduce each day of the weekend and break the book into sections:



Different size pages and elements to jazz it all up a bit:



A little transparency pocket to hold my instax pics! I like to be able to pull these out at my leisure:



Simple. Cute. Fast. I had it all done in a few hours. Then I moved onto Project Life.

Come back to see my progress on that tomorrow!

xoxo
K

5 For Friday

It's Friday again! Here's this week's 5 for Friday.

1. This month is mini-album month at Write. Click. Scrapbook. Fittingly I started making a little 6*6 mini this week from our weekend at the cottage.

2. CHA weekend was wonderful. It's only now that all the pictures and product videos are starting to pop up on blog and company sites. I am most excited for this: Smashbooks by Ki Memories.

3. This week I received something exciting in the mail.

The Rusted Chain is a great place to buy affordable necklaces and earrings. I wanted a necklace with this years word on it-a daily reminder of my goals. I love it. It's very cute.

4. I've decided to take on Becky Higgins Project Life. I was really inspired this week after discovering a blog post and watching the video. After investigating the kit and it's contents and the shipping costs (1/3 the price of the kit itself) I decided against purchasing it. I'm going to piece it all together with whatever I can get my hands on. So I''m going to use American Crafts page protectors and an American Crafts corduroy album. I am going to open each month with my project 12 layout as a summary. I don't plan on taking a photo every day but it'll be a great place to put my random photos that don't end up in layouts. I plan on incorporating a lot of the layouts I create into each monthly section. I have a feeling it will turn into more than 1 album, probably even more than two if I'm being honest with myself, but I'm okay with that too.

5. I want to try doing some of these for the Project Life kit as well. I love what Ali did here, adding her story without putting it truly on her pages.

That's it for this week! Have a great weekend! Hopefully I'll be back with some projects to show you soon!

xoxo
K

Snow Day Scrapbooking

Yesterday was a SNOW DAY. It actually snowed quite a bit. I’m not sure what fell but we were forecast to get 15cm. Looking out the window it looks like it’s probably more.

I was very productive though. M & I went to the gym early in the morning. We walked down in the snow and it was not nice at all-very windy. I did some work for my Masters course and then I scrapbooked. I scrapbooked a lot.

Lately I've been struggling with taking photographs of my layouts. But, I solved my issues today! I figured out the perfect settings on my Canon XSi and I have a reasonable solution now in front of a window with natural light for taking pictures. So here it is.

So the layout sits on an empty Studio Calico box, propped up against the swinging door to our porch. It looks like a mess in the background but the photos turned out true to color and that's the main thing! I'll tidy up for the next round!

The above layout is about the awkward wedding we went to in October. I love this photo of M & our friend John. Too funny. I had forgotten my camera so an iphone had to do. Excuse the fuzzy photos. Here's a few close ups with more details.

I used a Jenni Bowlin sticker to print my journaling. I saw this idea on a blog recently and decided to try it for myself. I love the look.

I made this one Tuesday night-our 8 year anniversary, February 1st. Hard to believe it's been that long.

Our efforts to 'move more and eat less' are paying off. My thoughts from month 1 are in the envelope. This is another page using mostly the Metropolitan kit from Studio Calico.

I labored over this one for ages. I wanted to use the Basic Grey paper for a little scenery. I misted to make it 'sunny' and used a few punches to make a 'sun'. This one's about my love of CBC's Republic of Doyle. Watching that show each week is my little piece of home and when I went home in October I had a chance sighting of the cast and crew filming. I was a huge nerd and took pictures of the car Doyle drives. Soooo nerdy!

That's it for now. Come back tomorrow for Five for Friday!

xoxo
K