Sketches: Creatively Yours - a new sketch and layout

Here's my last layout for Sketches:  Creatively Yours.  I have really enjoyed my time with Ali and all the DT at S: CY, Ali always has great sketches for us to use and some of my favorite layouts have been from her sketches, thank you Ali!!

Here is sketch #6-12

And here is my interpretation.  It's a photo of my Dad taken in Vietnam, I love this picture of him, his smile is justo great!  I used the February kit from the Flying Unicorn for this layout.  Its such a versatile kit because I was  able to do both Valentine type LOs and things like this!  The March kit will go on sale March 3 at  12:01am, you are going to want to be in the store then because they go really fast!!  I also did this layout for the American Idol challenge that we have going on at Flying Unicorn, be sure to check it out!

Sketches: Creatively Yours - Flying Unicorn February KOM

Here's a new sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours, its basic design is simple but lends itself to embellishing as much or as little as you like.  Well you know me, I kind went wild with it and I used the February kit from the Flying Unicorn .  I added a sheet of Fabscraps Shabby Chic paper to the kit papers, the Dusty Attic chippies & foliage and large lace, everything on the page is in the February kit.   I misted the Prima Alabaster Abbey white flowers with Pearl Glimmer mist and then lightly inked with Distress Ripe Persimmon.  I built the border at the bottom by starting with a wide piece of lace, I layered on a border strip from the Kaisercraft Sweet Nothings collection, then another piece of lace that was included in the kit and finally another Kaisercraft border strip.  I really love the layered effect.

Here's my layout:

And here's the sketch I used, I chose to use a round element rather than rectangular.  I hope you'll give this sketch a try and if you do, be sure to link it up to Sketches: Creatively Yours so that we can see your work!

Sketches: Creatively Yours - a new sketch and layout

I'm a little late with this post as I was out of town all weekend at a fabulous crop with some of my bestest scrapping friends!!   We had sooo much fun scrappy shopping, sipping a little wine and eating, laughing and just having girl fun!  Thank you so much Kathy for hosting us!

But enough about that, here's another great sketch from my good friend Ali at Sketches: Creatively Yours.  It's a great sketch, be sure to go over and check out all the DT examples and then use the sketch and link up yours to the site!

I did this layout using the sketch for one of my bff's dating back to our college days.  The occasion is when her father retired from Eastern Airlines.

I used some Dusty Attic wings and corner chippies that I sprayed with Lindy's Starburst Mist (yellow rose of Texas).  I accented the corner chippies with Liquid Pearls for the raised effect.  Prima Printery and Bo Bunny Et Ceteral papers. 

Thanks for visiting!

Papa a Paris - Sketches: Creatively Yours

Ali at Sketches:  Creatively Yours has designed a great  new sketch up to start off the new year!  I t was the perfect sketcch for the Kaisercraft Bonjour papers that I chose to use with my vintage picture of my Dad taken, where else, but in Paris at the Sacré-Cœur Basilica.  The photo was taken shortly after the end of WW II and is signed by my Dad simply, Love, Carl.  He must have sent it home to my Mother.



The picture frame does most of the embellishment work for me with its beautiful image of the Eiffel tower.  I just added a few blooms to add some dimension.  I also added Dusty Attic baroque corners to the picture and a name plate.  I used Tim Holtz glassine paper to make a paper lace frame around the photo and added green and blue Perfect Pearls to give it a touch of color.  I painted the outside of the bookplate and the baroque corners with Shimmerz mossy stone.  I painted the inside of the bookplate with Perfect Pearls in biscotti.  Then I added a ZVA pearl swirl to finish it off.

At the Flying Unicorn this month, we've got some GREAT challenges and I will also post this layout as inspiration for Tammy's distressing and lace challenge.  My "lace" is paper, hope it counts!

Did you know that Flying Unicorn has 10 GREAT challenges every month AND we have great RAKS every month too!!  I'm hosting a round robin this month and we have 7 teams!  We're having a blast and you know what, I need one more player to fill the Jan 30th spot on team 7, it could be YOU.  Come on over to the Flying Unicorn forums and join in the fun!!

Where have I been??

Wow, this month has FLOWN by, I just realized that I have several things thatI haven't shared with you yet and they are some of my faves!!

I did this LO a while ago using a great sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours.  We've been on vacation at S:CY but we'll be back the first week of January!  Here's the great sketch I used:

And here is my LO that I did using the wonderful Pion Christmas papers, I so love these papers that came from the Flying Unicorn store.  The images came from the Once Upon a Picture group at Flying Unicorn, we have lots of great vintage images that you can download there.

Here's another favorite LO that I've done lately.  This was a Winter Wonderland layout posted in Enchanting Creations magazine.  I love this picture of Nika that I took the day after Christmas, 2010, when we had an unheard of 12" of snow here in eastern NC.  Everything on the LO is a shade of "white" with the addition of some silver Glimmer Mist and platinum stickles.

Thanks for stopping by, I will be sharing the January Flying Unicorn kit on New Year's Day, you don't want to miss that!  Here's a few sneak peeks to get you interested!

You don't want to miss this great kit!!





Flying Unicorn and Sketches: Creatively Yours

I did this LO using the beautiful Riddersholm papers made in Denmark.  They are a nice heavyweight and so very pretty!  You can get these papers at the Flying Unicorn store.   There are two Christmas lines and several other lines that are great for vintage and shabby chic projects, really good for ANY project!

I used this week's sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours.   There are lots of great interpretations of this sketch posted at S:CY, be sure to check them out.  We'd love to see your interpretations of this sketch so give it a try and leave us a link to your LO. 

Here's my interpretation.  I made the ginormous poinsettia using a Sizzix die, kind of over powers the photo  but it was fun to make.  The picture is of NIka, Christmas 2010 when she was 8 months old.  The snowflakes are Dusty Attic covered with Stickles crystal and icicles.  The letters are Pink Paislee sugared with Diamond Dust. 

Thanks for visiting, I really appreciate it!

Sketches: Creatively Yours

Here's another great handdrawn sketch from Ali at Sketches:  Creatively Yours.  My good friend Jennifer aka Jrabs visited with  us recently along with some other scrappy gals and took these pictures for me.  My sweet sweet Chena and Nika, my girls, my loves!  I love both pictures but I am especially  crazy about the photo with Chena (the black poodle) because I have so few pictures of her that are good.

I used G45 Botanicabella along with a sheet of Romantique (stripes) and a sheet of Domestic Goddess (polka dots) for this layout.  Yep, older G45 papers but they are so gorgeous, I confess to hoarding them.  I so love G45 papers.  I think they were designed with me in mind 'cause I just love the blacks, reds, and ivories so often predominant in G45 pps.  I made the sunflowers using a Spellbinders diecut and Heartfelt Creations stamps.  I used Distress Stickles in Vintage photo for the centers.  The leaves are cut out stamped Heartfelt Creations stamps colored with a little glimmer mist.

Thanks for visiting!!!!

New sketch at Sketches: Creatively Yours

It's sketchy Friday at Sketches: Creatively Yours!  Do go over and check out this great card sketch.  We'd love to see your interpretation of this sketch so be sure to leave us a link to your creation.

Ann drew this sketch, and here's her really great card that she did using this sketch.  This is such a cute Christmas card!

Weekly Sketch from Sketches Creatively Yours # 18-11

Here's the great sketch #18-11 I used from Sketches Creatively Yours drawn by Ali McDonald.  It was a challenge for me to get the three photos onto this layout, probably would have been easier if the photos had been smaller!

I used the Kaisercraft Chapter One papers  and Kaisercraft Gypsy Sisters.  The blues/blacks are from the Chapter One collection and are so pretty.  You can get these at the Flying Unicorn store.  Gorgeous papers!!

And here's my LO:

Hyder is a really interesting little place.  Here's my journal:

Hyder, Alaska sits at the head of the Portland Canal and although it is in Alaska, it identifies more with Canada as Stewart, BC (pop. 700) is just across the border. Hyder has no connection to the USA, you can only get to Hyder by driving through Canada, by air or sea. It is notable for being the only place in Alaska not to use the statewide 907 area code, instead using the area code of 250 allocated for British Columbia. Tourists will also find that Hyder uses Pacific Time Zone, the common currency is Canadian (with the exception of the US Post Office, which only accepts American currency), they observe Canadian holidays, send their children to Canadian schools, and when there is trouble, the famed Canadian Mounties step in. (From Wikipedia)

We traveled to Hyder for one reason and that was for bear viewing at the US Forest Service Fish Creek Wildlife Viewing Area. We watched a brown bear and her spring cub fish for salmon in the creek. She didn’t seem to be at all disturbed by the people on the viewing platform but she did keep a watchful eye out for other bears, particularly males, as they will kill cubs so that the females will mate with them.
There’s not much in Hyder, the streets are gravel, many of the buildings are rather derelict in appearance and many are closed.

Thanks for stopping by, I really appreciate it!



Flying Unicorn and Sketches: Creatively Yours

Yay, its Friday reveal day at Sketches" Creatively Yours!  I used the gorgeous FabScraps papers available at the Flying Unicorn store to do this LO.  FabScraps papers are special, well because they are beautiful and because they come all the way from Africa! 
I am sad because today is my last day as the guest September Creative team member for Flying Unicorn!  :-(   I've had a great time there and if you haven't visited Flying Unicorn, then you are missing out!  The store carries awesome products, including those much coveted Pion papers, as well as everything else in the latest and greatest category!  Each month there are great challenges put on by the CT with AWESOME RAKS from the Flying Unicorn store.  Hope to see you over there!

Here's the great sketch I used from Sketches:  Creatively Yours designed by Ann Seleshanko.  While the sketch itself is simple in its design, it lends itself to so many wonderful creations.  Take a look at what the DT did with this sketch. 

Here is my design:

I really love how this came together. I cut both sides of a strip of paper with the Martha Stewart scrolled hearts punch, its one of my faves, and then painted it with Glimmer Glam in Tutu Pink just for some extra sparkle. The swirly leaves are cut with a Spellbinders die made for Heartfelt Creations and I inked it with Distress Forest Moss and Bundled Sage. Then I added some Peeled Paint Distress Stickles. The flowers at the right are Petaloos that I sprayed with Creme de Rouge Glimmer Mist and inked the edges with Timmy's new Distress ink, Gathered Twigs. The flower on the left is a flower I made from a Lisa Gregory tut. The wonderful numerals are Pink Paislee Mist-a-bles, also from the store.

Do give this sketch a try and leave us a link to your design here.

As always, I really appreciate you visiting my blog and thanks for your comments!

Steam Punk and Sketches: Creatively Yours

I did this layout about 10 days ago for Sketches:  Creatively Yours and have been anxious to share it with you.  The fun part about this Steampunk layout is that the picture shows a REAL steampowered shovel.  Isn't that cool!?  I worked this LO for 2 days before it came together. 

Here 's the great sketch drawn by Ali MacDonald:

And here is my interpretation:

I took the pictures at Pioneer Park in Fairbanks, Alaska where they have several old pieces of equipment around that were used during the gold rush.  This piece of machinery helped build the Panama Canal before it came to work in Alaska!

I used Core'dinations G45 Timeless Collection for the base page .  The rest of the papers are from Graphic 45 Steampunk Collection.  The frame is a Dusty Attic piece popped up for dimension that I stained with Distress stain in picket fence.  Then I used a tiny script stamp to stamp over it using coffee archival ink.  The various metal pieces are either Tim Holtz or 7 Gypsies.  The brown flowers were made using the Alterations Tattered Floral die and were cut from Kraft Glassine paper.  I added some pewter Perfect Pearls to give them a nice shimmer.  The sunflower is made from a Spellbinders die with vintage photo distress stickles in the center.  Oh yes, there's also some brown lace underneath the edge punched paper.  I covered the letters with Crackle Accents and popped them up. 

Thanks for visiting my blog, I really appreciate it.  I hope you'll give this sketch a try and post a link at Sketches:  Creatively Yours so that we can see your interpretation of the sketch!

Sketchs: Creatively Yours and Swirlydoos July Kit

Really, here is it past the midpoint of August and what do I have to show for it?  Not much.  What the heck have I been doing, not much scrapping, unfortunately!!  I did manage to get this one done last week for the Friday Sketches: Creatively Yours sketch.  Here's sketch 13-11 created by Ali MacDonald.  Be sure to check out the Sketches Creatively Yours to see all the great LOs created from this sketch. 

And my layout, I flipped the sketch as I thought it worked better this way with my photos.

I used my July Swirlydoos kit that features the Pink Paislee Butterfly Garden and G45 Once Upon a Springtime collections.  I added the Dusty Attic gate, heart doily and letters (from an earlier SDs kit).  I used distress ink to color the flowers on the top picture - it worked amazingly well.  I was just feeling lazy and didn't want to take the time to learn how to do that in PSE.

Another Chena and Escape Kitty escapade! Sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours

Wow, its been a long time since I posted.  Right after I got back from CHA, I came down with a nasty case of bronchitis that totally took the wind out of my sail and I'm just back on my feet!  I spent the better part of the last two weeks sleeping and reading.  I haven't counted, but I bet I read somewhere between 8 - 10 books.  It's just so easy to order another book on my Nook, yikes my credit card is yelling at me!

So here we go again....That dog and That cat are out traipsing the world again and now they're in Morocco!!!  And how did they get there you ask, obviously they didn't drive the motorhome!!   Well if you can believe it, they found a Magic Carpet and off they flew.  Yeah, right you say, well we have pictures and you can see them here, in jrabs gallery.  Jennifer (jrabs) is Kitty's Mom.  Take a trip through her gallery and you'll find out all about Kitty and Chena.  In a nutshell, poor Kitty has to stay indoors because a coyote has moved into her neighborhood and Jennifer fears for dear Kitty's life.  Now Kitty is not too happy about this so she has been trying to escape ever since.  Now Chena, being a particularly resourceful and smart dog, learned of Kitty's plight (pet ESP I guess) and took our motorhome to New York, rescued Kitty, and the two of them headed for a grand vacation in Alaska.  After a couple of months of frolicing there, Chena finally brought the RV home and took off again for Niagara Falls where she and Kitty took a barrel over the falls!!  That little adventure got them arrested but oh don't you know, they were resting on a little carpet in their jail cell that turned out to be magical and now they are in Morocco riding camels and who knows what else!!  And I might add that Chena still has my credit card!!!!!  Ha-ha, I am going to cancel that sucker and hopefully that will force Chena and EK to hop that magic carpet and come home!!

So Chena, being the loving dog that she is and not wanting her dear parents to worry, pee-mails home frequently and sent us this photo.  Can you believe it?  Yeah, EK's up there on the camel with her, she is sitting right behind Chena.

I used this week's great sketch drawn by Ali at Sketches: Creatively Yours to create this layout.  Please check out the other layouts from the rest of the design team, they are great!!  And if you decide to try the sketch, be sure to link it so we can all see and admire your work!

Thanks to Jennifer for allowing me to play along with the Escape Kitty adventures! 

Sketches Creatively Yours - What will you be?

And here's another great sketch at Sketches:  Creatively Yours.  We have a guest Sketch Artist over at the Sketches: Creatively Yours Blog this month!  Her name is Charlotte AKA Suepup and she creates beautiful Sketches! This is a wonderful sketch  and could be used with so many photos!  Why don't you give it a try?  and be sure to leave us a  link at the S:CY blog so we can admire your work.



Here's my interpretation of the sketch.  I also did this layout for two challenges at Flying Unicorn.  The first challenge is hosted by my good friend Denise and is an "Out of the Box" challenge to use a photo in a different way.  I chose to add a mosaic tile effect to my photo to signify the varying components of our personalities that eventually combine to make us the adults that we turn out to be.  I was 19 or 20 when this photo was taken and very much conflicted about what I wanted to be "when I grow up".  I used older papers from Graphic 45, Fashionista, Domestic Goddess and Curtain Call.  Oh do I ever love these papers!!  They are my colors, reds, blacks, ivories.  You may have noticed a recurring theme of red in my LOs!!  I used some Magical Micas from Lindy's stamp gang to color the gown of the fussy cut lady.  Those vines are Petaloo and I wish I had a couple dozen paks of them!!

The other challenge was to used polka dots and I've got that covered with the dotted base paper and the red dotted doily cutout.

 Thanks for stopping by, I love reading you comments and thank you so much for leaving them.  I hope everyone has a great weekend and has a chance to scrap.  No scrapping for me this w/e, company coming to spend Saturday night with us.  AND you know what that means?  Time to clean house, YUCK!!

Red Fox - Sketches Creatively Yours

Here's another great sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours.  chose to flip the sketch on its side and it really works well with that orientation.  Charlotte, aka Suepup, is the guest designer at S: CY this month and her sketches are a treat.   Please check them out!

Here's my take on the sketch. I flipped the sketch to the side.  I took these pictures last summer in Alaska at Denali National Park.

I recently bought some molding paste and have been playing around with it.  On this layout I took a piece of screening and adhered to my layout using just a little hot glue.  Then I smeared on some molding paste and used a popsickle stick to smooth it out over the screen.  Then I stamped my brick wall stamp into the molding pasted creating a brick pattern.  After it dried I sprayed with Moonshadow mist in Bucket O'Blood Red..  You can speed up the drying process with your heat gun but be aware that the top drys but underneath it will still be pliable.

Next, I prepared the 2 piece Dusty Attic Scroll #1.  I used Distress Stain in Peeled Paint to cover the chippy and then heavily inked the edges with Distress Walnut Stain.  The top piece I painted with acrylic antique white paint.  After that dried I randomly brushed some bronze ink along the edges and top to give it an aged appearance and then coated with Crackle accents.  After that was dried, I rubbed distress ink into the cracks .

While the chippies were drying, I started assembling my LO.  I cut one 5" circle and two 3.75" circles from the BasicGrey Curio collection, General Store, and adhered them to my base pp, which is also BasicGrey Curio, Needle Lace.

I cut my letters from cork paper and inked the edges with Distress walnut stain.  Next I adhered the bottom Dusty Attic piece, that is the one stained green. Then I attached the two smaller photos.   Next I added the white Dusty Attic chippie placing part of it over top the center photo, and part underneath the center photo.   Next to the top photo  I placed a piece of Dusty Attic chicken wire.  I mean, afterall, you have to have chicken wire when you've got a fox on the loose! 

I made the gingham ribbon loops by cutting a 6" length of ribbon and folding then and adhering each fold with a sticky dot.  I love ribbon loops, they just add a sweet feminine touch.  It was a female fox, I'm betting she was out hunting to feed her kits.  Then the branches are felt which I brushed with a little bronze ink and the flowers are some layered Primas.  Finally I added a small journal tag and that's all there is to it!

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you're having a great holiday weekend.

Puppy Love

I made this Puppy Love tag over a year ago and haven't had the right LO to use it with.  Ah, but the papers and the tag came together perfectly for the LO that I did for the DT sketch at   Sketches: Creatively Yours where Ali hand draws these great sketches.

Here's this week's  sketch, why don't you give it a try?  Be sure to post a link to your LO at S: CY.

And here's my take on the sketch.  Yeah, I went wild, I just can't seem to stop until all the usable space is crammed full!! 

These are K & Co papers designed by Susan Winget, I love the bright floral colors.  Just perfect for scrappy my girly poodles!!

My good scrapping buddy, Jennifer (jrrabs) hosts a Friends  and Family Showcase challenge at Scrapbook.com every month and I'm going to enter this LO in the challenge.  Well really, Escape Kitty is the host, Jennifer is Kitty's admin assistant and thus handles all of Kitty's correspondence and postings.  If you don't know who Escape Kitty is, well you are missing out on a great story!  Click on the Escape Kitty and Chena label to find out more about this dynamic duo.

Life Lessons - Sketches: Creatively Yours

Yesterday was a bust!  My wireless went wonky so I spent the day without the internet, GASP!!  You have no idea how hard that was! Thankfully, everything is again functional.

I wanted to share this layout with you that I made using the May Swirlydoos kit, Grandmas's Garden, and a sketch from Ali at Sketches: Creatively Yours.

The May kit is so awesome, it features Glitz Laced with Grace as well as papers from Crafters Workshop and K & Co Ancestry.  I've done everything from heritage LOs to nature LOs. On this layout I've used paper from all three lines as well as some Bazzill cardstock.  There are PRima flowers and a couple handmade flowers too.

But on to Ali's sketch.  I must admit that when I first looked at it, I thought, eek, 5 pictures?  But then I said, oh I can do that and off I went and found this great series of photos of bison that we saw along the road on our drive to Alaska last summer.  I love the resulting LO and thank you Ali for the great sketch!!

Sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours

Here's the great new sketch from Sketches: Creatively Yours hand drawn by Ali McDonald.  I used groups of pictures for the horizontal photos in the sketch and placed my journaling underneath the photo rather than beside.

I used the G45 A Proper Gentleman collection for this LO.  I don't really love the blue papers in this collection but thought they worked well for the older vintage photos and with the ocean in the color photos.  That is a very skinny me in the top right photo at about 23 I'd guess.  Sigh, I wouldn't mind being that size again!!

Rocky Mtn High - new sketch at Sketches: Creatively Yours

This was a quick and easy page and I used Ali's great sketch 06-11 from Sketches: Creatively Yours.  The floral pp from GCD STudios Artsy Urban collection just matched so nicely with this sketch that all I did was fussy cut the interior of the page out, added another paper behind the floral, some journaling, a title, some Prima flowers, lace, and bam!  All done!

I diecut the letters using the Alterations die, Vintage Market.   I struggle with titles, I'll find some letters I want to use from my stash and of course, there aren't enough vowels to make the title, nothing else "goes with" the chosen font...this drives me crazy.  And I hate cranking up the Cricket in the middle of a project - I don't know why, that's just me.  SO to solve this problem, one day I got out a pack of border cardstock I bot years ago and I diecut a lot of letters!!  The precut borders are just the right width for the Alterations Vintage Market die.  I also had puchased a plastic divided storage container that had 32 little compartments, just perfect for sorting my letters!   Mostly I cut the letters in common colors like black, brown, beige, greens, white (easy to change the color of these!) etc.  Now when I need letters, I just reach for my box and this  works well for me.  Cuts out a layer of frustration, KWIM?

Thanks for your visit!!

Mother & Daughter

It's reveal day at Sketches: Creatively Yours and it was so fun to see my layout as I did this layout several weeks ago and had just about forgotten what it looked like!  I hope you'll take a minute and check out what the rest of the DT did with Ali's great sketch!  AND I hope you'll use the sketch and post a link at Sketches: Creatively Yours as Ali is going to have a ribbon PAK for some lucky person!!   Go check it out!!

I did this LO using some of my favorite G45 papers from the Domestic Goddess, Fashionista, Playtimes Past, and Le Cirque collections. These colors are so bold and rich!  Oh and that beautiful chipboard dress form is from Dusty Attic, isn't it awesome?  I don't usually roll my Mom's hair but her hairdresser was gone for some reason so she asked me to do it.  Yikes, I really don't do hair but I managed to get the job done.  Dick snapped this photo when we weren't looking, he's sneaky like that.