Paper Amour

Contest entries...

First off, I want to remind you that my contest remains open until tomorrow night at midnight... some of the other Memory Box blogs have closed their contests - but you have until the 31st at midnight Pacific time to enter this one!!!

Also, I wanted to let you know, we'll all be announcing our winners on April 10th.

Now - onto the fun stuff!

This week, I'll be highlighting a couple of contest entries... just to show you how versatile Memory Box papers are and how easy it is to incorporate them into your scrapbook pages. I think scrapbookers sometimes see those wonderful 6 x 6 Memory Box paper packs and assume "Those are for card makers" - or skip over 8 1/2 x 11 papers because it's too hard to incorporate them into our pages.  The entries I'll show you this week will hopefully inspire you and challenge you to dive in with these unconventional paper sizes...

Today, I'm sharing this lovely entry from Laura. She used the fabulous Biscotti papers on her layout. I'm assuming this is an 8 1/2 x 11 layout, since the papers fit so nicely here. I am generally a 12 x 12 gal, but have done a couple of albums in this smaller size and LOVE it. It obviously works for Laura too, as you can see on this great, simple layout.

Laura says: "I took a bunch of pictures of my little guy dressed in his Phillies gear right after they won the world series. I couldn't get him to look at the camera, and every time I hit the shutter he would move just a little, resulting in some blur. Still, the Phillies don't win too often so I printed one of the pics to get a layout about this in his book."

I LOVE THAT, LAURA!!! That's exactly what this challenge is all about - telling the story and creating the page - even when the pictures aren't exactly what we'd hoped for. (And 'bad' photo or not, how cute are this little guy's cheeks? Adorable!)

So - if you're still looking at a pile of pictures on your desk that you're afraid to scrapbook - make some time today to get them on a page. Laura did it!

So can you!

Embellishing your book

  Okay, so now it's time for the fun stuff!

I grabbed a handful of coordinating Memory Box solid papers, some Memory Box pearls and jewels... then I got busy punching. I used my favorite flower punch and started layering flowers. It's not rocket science, but I love me some flowers! And I especially love adding bling... the more the better, in my book!

 

I added a line of pearls down the front of the book where the two prints meet, and finished off the cover with some velvet leaves.

The pages were embellished with more flowers. It's a theme. =)

I prefer to embellish mini-books this way - with the same sort of embellishment on every page. I think it lends a cohesiveness and flow to a small book that wouldn't be there if every page had a different type of embellishment.

So there you have it. A completely custom, handmade book, just waiting for photos. Love how easy it will be to finish once I get those spring photos.

Now I just need the snow outside to melt... 

Poppyfinch covered book - the inside pages

Once the cover is complete, you'll want to cover the inside pages. I used all three of the 12 x 12 poppyfinch papers to cover the chipboard, and then an assortment of papers from the 6 x 6 pack to create photo mats.

Again, I use Beacon's 3 in 1 glue to adhere the paper to the chipboard. I haven't found a better glue for this purpose - Beacon's gives the smoothest bond and is SO nice to work with.

Here are the photos of my inside pages before embellishment. (As always, click on the photos to make them larger.)

 

 

 

 

 

The book is bound by punching a whole one inch from the top and bottom of each page's left side. You can see the binding holes in the photos. I then punched two holes in each end of the spine - again, one inch from the bottom and top. Run ribbon through the spine from the outside of the book to the inside, then go through each page and back out the second spine hole. Tie a knot, then a pretty bow on the outside of the spine and you have a bound book!

Your photo mats may (obviously) be any size you choose to make them. In most cases, it's easiest to wait until you have your photos to create mats customized to them. As I said yesterday, I made this book to hold Spring photos, and if I waited until Spring arrived to make my mats, you'd be waiting weeks to see this book! Spring in Spokane doesn't truly make it's appearance until May... I couldn't wait that long!

Tomorrow I'll show you how I embellished the book...

Poppyfinch Covered Chipboard Book

The new Poppyfinch paper collection is so lovely. It's soft, spring-y color scheme and muted designs inspired me to create a book for pictures of my Spring garden.

Everyone knows there are myriad chipboard books on the market, but for this project, I wanted to create my own. Call me crazy, but I like taking chipboard and paper and making a book that is completely custom...

I started with nice heavy book board... you can usually buy this by the sheet at your local scrapbooking or stamp store. It will be called either book board or chipboard. You want something with some heft - thin, wobbly cardboard won't cut it for this project. You want something that will make a good, stiff cover and pages for your book.

Begin by cutting the following pieces:

Two cover pieces - 7 1/2 x 8 inches

One spine - 1 x 8 inches

Inner pages: 3 x 8, 4 x 8, 5 x 8, 6 x 8 and 7 x 8 (one of each)

As you can see here, I used a mish mash of chipboards here - some white, some natural. The chipboard will be completely covered, so as long as it's all the same weight, it doesn't matter.

I began by covering the cover pieces. I cut a piece of Time for Tea paper into two 6 x 9 inch pieces.

 

Then, using Beacon's 3 in 1 glue, I glued each large chipboard piece to the back side of the Time for Tea paper so I ended up with a 1/2 inch border showing around the top, right and bottom edges of the chipboard.

When both covers are adhered, I clipped the corners at a 45 degree angle and wrapped the edges.

 

 

I use red liner tape to hold the flaps down...

 

 

Next, I adhered two 3 x 9 inch pieces of Poolside to cover the rest of the covers. Again, you need to adhere the chipboard to the back of the paper, leaving 1/2" of paper around the edges. Notice how the Poolside and the Time for Tea papers overlap by about a half inch...

Clip the corners and wrap the edges around to the back and when you're finished, each cover should look like this:

 

Now it's time to cover the spine.

Cut a piece of Poolside - 6 x 9 inches and score this piece 3/8" from each short side.

Adhere the spine piece of chipboard to the center of the back of this piece. It should sit between the two score lines. Place red liner tape along both short sides and fold the scored flap over so it covers the ends of the chipboard as shown.

 

After you've folded both the top and bottom edges over the spine, cut a piece of Time for Tea that is 1 x 8 inches. Adhere this over the chipboard spine piece.

Now, lay your two covers out on your work surface with the Poolside edges in the middle. Gently fold the side pieces of the spine up as shown. You don't want to score this, as that will weaken the paper and this is the part that holds your cover together. Once you have everything lined up, use red liner tape to adhere the spine piece to each cover, leaving about 1/8" of space between the edge of the spine chipboard and the edge of the covers.  When both cover pieces are connected to the spine, cover the rough edges on the inside of the covers with a 7 7/8 x 7 1/2" piece of Wildflower Garden paper.

Your completed spine and covers should look like this.

Tomorrow we'll cover the pages and on Wednesday we'll embellish the book!

How are you doing on your contest entry? I've started receiving entries and they look so beautiful... You have until March 31st to submit.

It's a contest!!!

Last week I pulled out some pictures that had been sitting in my 'to be scrapped' pile and finally made a page with them. Now it's your turn to jump in and make a page with some of your challenging photos. Whether you've put off scrapbooking them because they're so special and you're afraid your page won't do them justice or because they're really not very good photos, you'll want to push yourself this week and finally put them on a page.

Why, you ask?

Because here on Paper Amour, I'm hosting a contest for anyone who submits a page with difficult photos - and the prize is ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS WORTH OF MEMORY BOX PRODUCTS!!!

And the best part? This isn't one hundred dollars worth of stuff from the back of the warehouse that nobody wants to buy... this is new stuff - and you get to pick out exactly what you want! If you've been dying to get your hands on some of the new Woodland Springtime stamps, or wish you had a nice stash of the new 6 x 6 paper packs, here's your chance to score them for FREE! You get to pick whatever you want as a one-time purchase and the order will be filled by your favorite Memory Box retailer.

To be eligible to win, you need to create a scrapbook page with your 'difficult to scrap' photos using at least one Memory Box product. Upload your entry to any online gallery (or photo hosting site like Flickr), then post the link to your entry here in the comment section.

You may also email your entry to customerservice@memoryboxco.com. Please put 'Paper Amour Contest" in the subject line.

Or you may mail it snail mail to to: Memory Box, Inc. 10232 63rd Avenue South Seattle, WA 98178.

All entries must be received by 11:59 pm on March 31st, 2009.

A winner will be selected and posted here on Monday, April 6th.

Be sure to check out the other Memory Box blogs - each blogger is hosting their own contest this week - and each one will have the same amazing prize - $100 in Memory Box bucks.

And while you're at it, why not sign up for the newsletter? You'll get advanced notice of new releases from Memory Box as well as a heads up about future contests! You can sign up here!

Upcoming class alert

Just wanted to post a picture of an upcoming class at Apropos... we'll be making this adorable Easter Pocket using Memory Box paper...

If you're in Spokane, be sure to sign up for this class on March 24th. You can come at noon or 6:00 pm.

Spoiler

You might want to come back Monday morning for a big announcement about my first contest... and if you haven't  been watching the other Memory Box blogs, now would be the time to start.

Because you'll see some great contests cropping up over the next few days.

And the prizes? Well, let's just say, it will be worth your time to participate.

Here's a little hint...

 

See you Monday!

Fernbrae Layout - adding embellishment

 

I wanted to keep my title simple on the page. I decided to go with simply Savannah and Tejan's initials and the date. No sense distracting from the heart of the layout. Besides, aren't titles just the hardest thing? I've almost gotten to the point where I can leave a title off a page altogether and be okay with it. This title is about as simple as it gets.

I grabbed a couple of different alphabets (Heidi Swap and SEI for those of you who are wondering) and began by matting the green letters with Memory Box paper. I just used the scrap leftover from my journaling block... adhere the letter, then use the paper trimmer to get the nice, close mat.

 

I did the same with the numbers for the date, then added the SEI felt stickers for emphasis.

Next, I used my largest scalloped circle punch from Marvy and punched that nice big circle out of the Garden Gate paper, then I detail cut the flowers from another piece of the same paper, adhering them with foam tape to the punched circle. This piece goes in the upper left hand corner of the layout as an embellishment.

  

 

And here's the finished layout. My journaling reads:

"Savannah is the only girl I know who claims an African brother... but these two are completely, 100% siblings. From the teasing and fighting to playing together and laughing for hours - a truer brother/sister relationship is hard to find. When I went to Sierra Leone, the first thing Tejan said was "Where is Savannah?" They {heart} each other."

Fernbrae Layout - Savannah and Tejan

 

So here they are - the sweet pictures of my daughter, Savannah and Tejan, the boy from Sierra Leone who lived with us last year. I love how the pictures really captured their relationship - from their goofiness to the true affection between them.

When I lay pictures out for a layout, I try to pay attention to the faces in the photos - my goal is always to have them focused toward the center of the layout... I think it makes for a more pleasing design. This is the arrangement I finally settled on.

I decided to work with papers from the Fernbrae collection - specifically, the 12 x 12 papers Garden Gate and Satchel, and a couple of 6 x 6 papers from the small pack...

 

I cut two of the 6 x 6 sheets with the poppies on the bottom (I think they're poppies - Dave may correct me on that one...) and adhered them to the bottom of the 12" piece of Satchel. No - the pattern does not match up exactly in the center where the two pieces meet. We're okay with that, right? The focus of a scrapbook page is always the photos - so nobody is going to notice.

 

I then cut a couple of 1 x 12" strips of the Garden Gate paper. The first one, I adhered flush with the top edge of the poppy strip. See how unnoticeable that one little half-poppy is? You have to really look to see it.

 

Now I just lay the photos down to get a sense of where I need to place the second 1 x 12 strip of Garden Gate. I want there to be about 1/2" of the red peeking out from the top and bottom of the photo gathering. Once I have a sense of the placement, I can adhere the second strip to the page, then adhere the photos.

Notice that I've added a piece of the beautiful subtle stripe from the 6x6 pack in the open spot - this will be my journaling block.

 

Tomorrow we'll add a title and do some embellishing...

Have you gotten your photos out? Consider making a layout similar to this where they are all grouped together on the page - I think it's a great way to emphasize your photos as the focal point of your layout. I could almost skip the journaling altogether here because the photos themselves represent these two great kids so well...

Technical issues and tough photos. A great combination for your Monday morning!

As a scrapbooker, over the years, I've discovered something about myself.

I am a picture hoarder.

When I get pictures printed and they're just perfect - it's extremely difficult for me to commit them to a page. I am generally not perfectionistic by nature, but with great photos, I am challenged.

There's the whole issue of wanting to do them justice. Of telling the story just right. And of course, wanting the layout to be pretty and make my little creative self do the happy dance.

This week's layout highlights pictures that had all of those issues. Almost a year old - they are photos of my daughter with our African son - a boy who lived with our family for over 8 months while he was in the States for medical treatment.

These two had a VERY special relationship. And these pictures, taken during his last month here, represented that well. I just had to document their love for each other. And so in an effort to kill two birds with one stone, I thought I'd use some of David's paper to finally tackle the fear of not documenting this relationship well.

Are you struggling with a certain set of photos that need to go on a layout? I'm challenging you this week to pull them out and put them on a page. JUST DO IT!

I'll be back tomorrow with photos - Typepad doesn't like my layout apparently and won't let me post any pictures... ah technical issues...

In the meantime, go find a set of pictures you've been avoiding. You probably know some without even needing to dig very deep. If you only accomplish one creative endeavor this week, let's make it those pictures.