19 Days

Hey there

It's been a while since I've shared anything even though I have been pretty busy creating so I thought I'd do a quick share tonight. I had a few extra prints of this one photo for some reason. It is a fave but no idea how I ended up printing it so many times so I decided to scrap them, with a bit of inspiration from the current Annas Craft Cupboard sketch turned on its side.

Here is the sketch:

And my layout:

Materials: Paper - Echo Park, My Minds eye; AC Thickers; Dymo labeller; Studio calico wood veneer; D-lish scraps pearl dots.

Holly :)

First Retreat Shares

Hi all

I finally had an opportunity to photograph my layouts from the Wicked Princess retreat on the weekend. It was a quick before work photo session so some of them I need to do again lol But at least I am a bit more organised.

This layout was inspired by one of the Kaiser sketches from May, sketch #2 using the pretty Madame Boutique collection from Kaiser. This has to be one of my favourite Kaiser collections. It also features some Twidleybitz chipboard, a Manor House flower and some D-lish scraps blooms. Rather than frame the picture with a border, I cut out a section of the paper and distressed and curled it back to reveal the photo and paper underneath.

This layout was actually one of the few a bit closer to my usual scrapping style. I found I was doing a lot of clean and simple on the weekend which is something I am usually intimidated by lol It was fun though!

This next layout was inspired by the May Saturday sketch #4 on the Kaiser blog.

This is one of the ones that did not photograph so well however I'm running out of May so uploading it while there is still time for the challenge lol Love this cute photo of my niece Liarna. She had the most hypo face. It was the day of her day care graduation so she was full of excitement in her pretty new dress!

Plenty more retreat shares will be coming soon. Stay tuned :)

Holly x

Big Brother Hugs

Hi there to all the lovely people in blog land,

A quick share that I finished off yesterday, which is a layout of my niece and nephew. I can't remember when the photo was taken, but the kids are always happy to hug their younger siblings. Its such a precious picture.

I created this layout based on the current sketch on Stuck on You sketches. Great inspiration sketch for this photo I had sitting on my desk ready to be scrapped.


I've managed to play along with both their May sketches, so that's good considering I haven't gotten a lot of challenges done lately. Been a very busy month!

Busy weekend ahead with hubby's birthday party tomorrow. I'm exhausted from an afternoon of baking, cleaning and gardening. Almost organised now. Going to head to bed pretty soon.

Have a fabulous weekend everyone xo

In the Mood for a Challenge?

Hello

There are some really great May challenges going on that you should definitely play along with. Over at Scrapbudz we have a sketch challenge going. Check out the gorgeous DT inspiration. Its a mother's day themed sketch, so maybe you even have a new photo from this year with your mum.

Scrapbooking Haven have also released their May sketch:

And Scrappassion is needing some participants for their fun May challenge too. What's great about this one is you have to create  your own material flowers to put on your creation. So you're entering a challenge, and learning how to make new embellishments all in one.Here's the tutorial:

So if you have a bit of free time, be sure to join in on these super fun challenges to get your mojo flowing.

Fairytale Layout

Morning everyone (or evening... depending where you are)

I thought what better way to start the day of the Royal wedding than with my own fairytale wedding layout lol Actually I only thought of that then but it seemed fitting.

Before easter I purchased 3 Kaisercraft mini paper pads from Ebay. Bubblegum hills, Nan's favourites, and Magic Happens. They arrived yesterday, along with some very fitting purple flowers to create this layout in under an hour. That's actually extremely good for me. I'm a slow scrapper.

I've added this and the card below to my Kaiser DT post, however for those of you who have already visited that post (thankyou lovelies), I wanted to post it seperately as well. I'm entering it into the current challenge at These are a few of my favourite things, which is a choose your own type challenge. My catagory for the challenge is my Favourite memory but it also fits in with my favourite manufacturer, in case you haven't already noticed haha.

Its great what you can do with the mini pads. I thought it would be tricky at first but I'm happy with the end result.

 And a quick Bubblegum Hills card with my new Maryanne creatables doily die.

No Rain On Our Parade

Hi everyone,
This month the challenge over at From Screen To Scrap is the movie poster for "Singing in the Rain". I'm not one to pull my camera out in the rain so it had me quite stumped. Originally I remembered a photo under an umbrella at Melbourne Cup a few years ago... but its such a close up, it doesn't really look like an umbrella. Then I remembered the prop we had on our wedding day... white paper parasols. So not umbrellas in the traditional sense, but still fitting for the challenge. We were also lucky enough to have absolutely perfect weather on our wedding day... despite a lead up of rainy weather... hence the title "No Rain on Our Parade". It was my only stress before the wedding since it was something I couldn't control. The final part of the challenge was to have lots of 3, so I have 3 photos, 3 patterened papers (including the background, as its a patterened paper in reverse with the edges folded back) and 3 flowers.

I also added this odd piece of bling. It was in the shape of an S which was a bit irrelevant other than being my husbands initial, so I re-shaped it into whatever this shape is, with a gemstone.

The layout was completed using the Wicked Princesses Lost and Found kit. Its the 3rd layout I have completed with this kit. I'll share the rest later.

28 & Happy New Layout

Hi everyone,
Towards the start of the week I created a new layout about 'me' for a challenge. Actually 2 challenges. The 1st challenge, for Designer Scrapbooking, was to choose a word to describe me and have at least two photos, as well as some journalling. The second was using this months Stuff 2 Scrap sketch, which is also an about me challenge. The photos I have chosen were the only recent ones of me that are nice, and were taken in January, not too long after I chopped my hair short (which I now regret). I loved it when it was that length at first but its since become a bit annoying as its gotten a bit longer.

I chose the word happy because that's the way a lot of people describe me at work. I'm always told I am cheerful and smiling. I contemplaed two other words. Focused is one I think would also describe me very well, as I always put 110% into the things I'm passionate about. Also, 'chilled' is how I am described a lot. I work in a high stress environment so a lot of people find it amazing that I can be calm and cheerful despite those circumstances. Yes, I have my bad days and love to vent, but I'm good at moving forward and focusing on the positives to come.

I included a tag with hidden journalling. On one side it has "I am told that I am:" followed by a lot of different words I'm often described of, like calm, cheerful, intellegent, etc. The other side has a more personal journalling about wanting to start a family soon, as its a big focal point for me at the moment.

I sanded the edges of the large photo to create a border effect and hand made the pin wheels. These stunning papers are by basicgrey. They were part of a blog candy I won fom the lovely Elise recently. The clock is a stamp and the reason I added that in is because I am always early everywhere I go so it seemed appropriate lol

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

A Moment In Time

I've got a lot to blog about this week so expect a lot of posts over the coming few days. Including an exciting bit of news later in the week.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, Scrapbooking Haven has just started a new challenge 'A Moment In Time" and its a fab idea. It asks you to post your first and most recent layouts. There is also a $20 prize to be won at the end of the month to spend in store.

Its such an awesome challenge, I thought I'd share my entry with you all. This is my very first scrap layout and the comments I posted on Haven:

"When I started scrapping, all my layouts were doubles. Its only this year I eally learnt that I do not have to create doubles, so I haven't created one since. My layouts were always totally flat and in blocks of paper, and symmetry. However, at least the subject of my scrapping is the same, all these years later with my boyfriend now my hubby. This layout is probably about 4 or 5 years old and is in a full album of equally boring, flat layouts.

Now below is the layout I finished about 2 hours ago and my all time favourite. I'm no longer afraid of texture and dimension. I don't just use blocks of pattern and colour, but happily work with shapes and create my own embellishments. I have come a very long way and most of that has been in the past few months since starting my blog and seeing what amazing things can be done."

The challenge is such a fab way to see how far you have come with your scrapbooking. I am looking forward to seeing many more entries, so if you aren't already a member at Haven, sign up and share your creative journey.

Have a great day! xo

Brother & Sister

Hi Everyone,
I finished a layout for the Scrapbudz Latte & Cream March challenge the other day and have only just found a spare moment to post it up. It is a wedding layout (surprise) of me with my brother and sister. My brother was our MC and my sister was my maid of honour. She is also the mother of my adorable little niece who's photo's I posted up the other day.

You will probably notice the green streak down one of the photos lol My printer ink has almost run out so once the new one arrives today, I will re-print and stick over those photos. It was just really bad timing.

Here is the inspiration sketch from Scrapbudz:

Looks pretty yummy hey? And my favourite colour so how could I resist playing along with this one.

Bridesmaid Layout

Wow, I just did the quickest layout of my life. It took about 15-20 minutes which is a record for me. I'm usually so slow!
Its for the new Scrapbookit challenge which started today.

Here's my take on the sketch and some detailed close ups:

What Better Way To Spend Friday Night Alone... Creating Layouts!

Hello everyone,
I was supposed to go to Lismore with my husband yesterday as he had a show to play with his band, however it worked out easier if he just went with his band instead. It turned out kind of annoying as there ended up being a spare bed I could have had and room in the car etc, but too late now. So I spent the night home alone in my scary house. Still a little nervous since our attempted intruder almost 2 weeks ago, but at least I made it a productive night. Look out, lots of pics in this post.. although its a bit overcast today so not brilliant ones. Need to get a better photo editing software.

This first layout is for Scrapbookit and the sketch included a really large journalling space, which generally makes me pretty uncomfortable, but I figure it's probably a good way to give myself a bit of a reminder on certain aspects of our big day by doing a reception layout for our wedding. The big photo is actually of the clay cake topper I had made. It is customised to look like us and I ordered it as a surprise for my hubby but he discovered it lol It weighs almost 700grams so ended up sitting next to the cake instead of on it.

Here is the second layout I created last night. This one I kept fairly simple, but used some lace and a handmade flower that was part of the pack I won from Screen to Scrap the other week. Very sweet. Also, as the paper had a glitter look to it, it did not need a great deal more, so I used a few simple stickers in the top corner and a Kaisercraft sentiment next to the photo. I've been having fun with sparkly paper lately. Just glams everything up a little more so its good for wedding layouts.

So this one had a bit of a joint challenge inspiration. The initial idea was to work with the Bird Is The Word current challenge, which is to create a layout with the world beautiful. The Kasiercraft sentiment was perfect for this as it states "Everything beautiful has its moment". However, I also worked from the sketch over at Wicked Princesses which had a circle background with a landscape photo.

I have this habit of putting my layouts on the spare table in our open plain dining area. My husband eats his breakfast there as the actual dining table is covered in stuff at the moment from my clean out. However, when I finish a layout, I tend to put it on that table for a few days. With my wedding layouts, they then go into the album, but the rest kind of just stay there. I think I need to start putting some away though, as he's running out of room for breakfast hehe

A couple of Mid Week Layouts

Hi everyome,
Firstly, I just want to say how much I appreciate all the lovely comments everyone leaves me. It is really nice to know there are people out there interested in what I have been up to enough to pop in and say hello. So please, keep the comments coming.

It has been a particuarly productive week for me already and its only Thursday. As I've mentioned before, I can be a really painfully slow scrapper when I'm struggling with a particular layout so it can be slow going for me to finish one. So its not uncommon for me to spend a whole day on a tricky one, trialling different positioning and embellishments. Kind of tedious lol So its pretty impressive when I finish layouts during the week and this week I have done two, as well as my dad's birthday card that was in my previous post. And it isn't even the weekend yet.

This first layout is for the current ScrapFIT challenge. The criteria was glitter and glam so of course a good time for a wedding layout. This particular layout is based on our sand ceremony. It is part of the ceremony where the bride and groom each take a container with a different coloured sand and pour it into the one vase/vessel. In this case I had lovely green and my husband had silver, so I designed this layout to suit those sand colours. The green cardstock that makes up the circle and parts of the flowers is actually a glitter card, and closely resembles the colour of the actual sand I used so I love it. Its also perfect for this challenge. I created the flowers using my cuttlebug, also in the glitter green and some silver paper. There is a small journal area about the significance of the sand ceremony. This is done on vellum. Then of course, some bling up the side.

This second layout is for How Much is Too Much, which is case of the mondays. Lately I've felt like I've had a case of the Monday's every day so I loved the concept of this challenge. The criteria were to have bright cheerful colours, a photo that makes you happy, at least 5 flowers, something sparkly and a fun happy saying. I've used some super adorable photos of my youngest niece and nephew from their brother's birthday the other night. Unfortunately we only visit after work usually so the photos are always dark of the kids. They were in their PJs after some birthday cake and gave me some cute cuddle poses for the camera. They are the sweetest pair ever! I've titled it simply 'happy' as that's how it makes me feel. The sparkle is quite subtle and hard to see but I've added some diamantes to the centre of some of the flowers. I also got a new mega order from http://www.ohmycrafts.com/ yesterday and in it my new cuttlebug buttlefly cut and emboss die. Love it, and made good use of it in this layout. To be honest, this layout kind of did my head in a bit. I struggle with the big open spaces and it took me hours of re-arranging and changing things. I'm still not loving it but its all in the sake of learning. Oh and again, sorry for the bad photos. All my scrappin time tends to be at night in poor photographing conditions. I never have time in the morning before work.