JYC Christmas Day con't

As I finish up posting for Journal Your Christmas for last year I am totally psyched to get my hands busy with this years project! Join Shimelle for this really great project & at such a super price!!! Plus this year there is a daily mini video!

I did multiple pages for Christmas Day. So many photos so much fun! This page started with paper and I added photos, an embossed wood tree, a pleated piece of ribbon under one of the photos. My favorite is the bead pin that goes through the flowers.  I wrote on my photos using signo white gel pen- it is the best!

 A page about dinner prep. Of course the meal is one of the best parts of this holiday. I glued down a piece of tissue paper, added my journaling & title. Through the eyelet hangs a cool copper stocking. The Christmas wrap area is a great place to find embellishments. Printed my photos out with more journaling.  

I had 2 photos with my daughter and her Grannies so I put them on either side of a piece of acetate. I love that you can see through the page to the next- adds so much cool dimension. The acetate has snowflakes printed on it and I added some washi tape, gum drops, wood, and flowers. I duplicated this page on the other side just to keep it simple.

Here is the opposite page but you can see through the acetate-love it! Ok that is Christmas day done!!!

SDC #174

This weeks challenge over on the Stampotique Designers Blog is striped background. 

In a vain attempt to get my butt into Christmas mode I made this tag pocket for my JYC/ December Daily book. Very simple yet fun. I liken "Tangled Enthusiasm" into sort of a zombie happy Christmas type cause why can't zombies enjoy Christmas too? The light bulbs are gold & blingy. Part of my striped background is "Ribbon Border #2". Have a very happy Thanksgiving!!!!

SDC#173

I have quite a few art journals in progress & have decided to try & work to finish them. Quite a few have the backgrounds at least started. This weeks challenge over on Stampotique is to "bling it out".

With cold the order of the day, a page on the weather was in order. I took a background page that already had lots of shimmer on it with embossing and product. Sadly the photos do not show the fun! The circle is dimensional crystals-very glittery, the embossed circle stencils have gold and silver flecks. I colored my canvas letters with Glimmer Glam again very glittery. My stamps used are Carrot & Kitty-colored blue due to the cold. Haha Carrot looks like he has a snowsuit on, with that I can't move cause my suit is bulky look. I finished this page using France Papillon's barcode & barcode text. I feel very fragile when cold!! Join in the fun over at Stampotique.

JYC- Day 21-25

Oh so close and yet suddenly it is half way (so not getting it) through NOVEMBER!!! How does this happen???? Here I was like- wohoo almost done with my JYC when I realize Journal Your Christmas starts in like 2 weeks. This is the perfect time to panic. 

Day 21-Back side of the pocket pages from day 20. The bottom one I cut out a piece of a Trader Joe's bag, recycling this craft paper with cool printed snow flakes. Some alcohol inked snowflakes and a snowman brad-love when I use my stash. Top pocket just has washi & photo with journaling right on the photo.

Day 22- This page was made from a Christmas gift bag. Again card craft paper but with glittery ornaments on it. Cute pics with my kids and my SIL's pugs. Some embellies-done.

 Day 23-back side of gift bag. Very simple just picture of my SIL, some journaling & embellies. This day I was mad at myself for not taking more photos. We spent the day at Archivers cropping. It was brilliant fun and very frustrating at the same time. I had driven 15.5 drive hours, 2 days to get to Wisconsin. It was my first time cropping at an Archivers and I hadn't seen my crop buddy in over a year. We were the only 2 in the crop room, just excited as busy Mom's, to have a day to ourselves. Within the first 30 minutes our lovely crop was smashed to bits. In came this couple with their 2 little kids aged like 2 & 4. They preceded to "work" on their family album which meant the kids ran around the room & the store being disruptive. The parents just let the kids run rampid and did that constant threat thing "if you don't settle down we are leaving" x 25. We tried to stay positive and just enjoy the day but as Mom's it made us nuts that these parents just let their kids be so raucous. Thinking about it the parents were very inconsiderate & loud as well so I guess it makes sense. Good luck when they are teenagers. To add insult to injury Archivers closed with out me being able to go back!!!! We still had a great day just chatting, lovely lunch and left early to go shop. When in doubt shop.

Day 24- Another pocket page. Just used some journal cards. and did some sewing on this one-yay. Sewed a pic to the outside of a vellum bag that was distressed. Added twill and cute light bulb pieces. in the pocket is another tag with more journaling. Cute blingy snowflake clothespin on the side.

Trumpets blaring...Christmas Day- Day 25!!! Back side of page pockets. Kept it pretty simple just adding pocket cards with photos and blingy snow flakes. What is it about Christmas that I need to add bling and glitter??? Love it though. The 25 card is from Heidi Swapps digital freebies (I think). I must say this process is getting me excited to start on JYC 2013 (I work a year behind). 'Tis almost the season!

VLVS Challenge October

How is it 2 days before Halloween?????? I am still trying to figure out what happened to September & Saturday is NOVEMBER!!!!! Arggggggggggggggg.   

Ok well this is the perfect time for some spooky tag fun. I love, love tags. I use them on scrapbook pages, as fun flips in my journals, agendas, as book marks. The list is long. It is time to play with Viva Las VegaStamps in their monthly challenge. You can find the October challenge here.  

Yay for me I already had the stamps!!! VLVS has a wonderful spooky set- plate 951. Here is my take on the challenge.

Hard to see but the spider webs are heat embossed with a sparkle black & look very cool. I got the idea for the black/white stamp from VLVS design team member in a recent post. You can check it out here. 

Have a fun, safe Halloween- "make good choices"!

Guest Spot with Julie!!

I have a 2nd guest spot with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer today doing stencil resist technique. Thanks again to Julie!!! Here is a sneak peak-

 

To see the post & the tutorial you can go here to Balzer Designs. Thanks!!!

JYC 19- 20th

Oh boy I am getting close!! Here are another few days of my Journal Your Christmas Shimelle style!

For the 19th I used an envelope. One of the things I love about a cinch bound book is it is easy to add any kind of page. Just punch & go! I added some punched images under my photo mat. In the pocket is a tag with some more pictures & journal info. Today was space day at school so that is what my day is about. 

The 20th saw us enroute to Wisconsin for Christmas (never thought I would say that in a sentence). My sister-in-law moved there so we made the long 2 day drive to have a family holiday. Page left I added paper to the back of my envelope-with cool blingy red snowflakes. The great side effect to this was it gave my envelope some good reinforcement, I don't need to worry about it tearing from the binding.

For the right side I added a pocket page with a photo and project life card for the journal info. We were trying to avoid Winter Storm Draco. Another interesting twist to this day was the world was supposed to end at 3:11am for Armageddon. Luckily we dodged both the store and the destruction of Earth so it ended up being a pretty good day! I have a tag in the pocket with additional journaling. Love this project!

Balzer Post

I am honored to have been chosen as a guest blogger on Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's site. I did Project Life with stencils. My pages tend to be very inky as you can see.

Here is the layout I did. For the full post & tutorial on how I made my cards check out the post here. I will also be back at the end of October- thanks Julie!

Paper House Layout

My friend Susie Bentz is on the Paper House team & did this awesome layout of me teaching an art journal class. Check out her blog My Time To Play here with all the info on how she made this page.Thanks girl!!!

VLVS Sept. Challenge

Over on  Viva Las Vegas Stamps they are having their monthly challenge. You can check it out here. 

This is the challenge example- I love the balloon stamp & will have to get it! The challenge is to use vintage colors, steam punk, nature, trees, sky... this theme worked perfectly with my LSNED.  I have a vintage photo with my Mom when I was 3 that I wanted to use. 

After covering my composition book page with scrap paper, I added a 2nd piece of paper stamped with blowing dandelions (love this) and distressed edges. I cut out my tag and continued the dandelions onto the tag. The photo was edited with the Rhonna Designs app- great app!!!! Next I heat embossed the fairy on the moon stamp on a piece of patterned paper & cut her out. Adding the distressed quote & the whimsical  dragonfly, my page was done! 

Awesome these stamps!!

SDC #165

The challenge over on Stampotique this week was to use only 1 stamp on your project. I decided this was perfect for me to work on LSNED. Day 7 was to do a time line of your day so the photo is from Sunday but my timeline was the following day on Monday. That's ok in my kinder more flexible world, it only bothers me when I actually read it. 

I decoupaged a piece of Tim Holtz's cool new tissue paper for my background. Some washi tape on the sides. My tag was just spritzed with Dylusions, dried & stamped with archival ink. I used Janet Klein's medium sunflower stamp. I like that it stands out just by simple straight up stamping. I added my photo & stash alphabets- bam done!

SDC challenge #164

Playing in the Stampotique Designers Challenge this week & the idea was to use animals. I bought this great "Caged Bird" by Roc Nicholas & this was the perfect challenge to use it.  I took a journal page by Misc Me and added my stamps.

The caged bird was stamped on a piece of type card stock. I stamped the "Sunflower" by Janet Klein directly on the page and both were colored in using gel pens so they are fun & glittery. France Papillion's "Barcode" was stamped directly as well & the words from her "Barcode Type" cut from cardstock. Some splatter & my page is ready for some journal work. I will add this into my Project Life when I need more journal space. Come play over at Stampotique!

JYC Day 15-18

Over half way & it is only Sept!!! HAHAHA The cool thing is when I finish this and have it all uploaded I will get to cross it off my agenda/list like 20 times-how much fun is that?!!!

Here is the flip side of the bonus page- totally love this embossed acetate sheet all I did was added some journaling about us going to Wisconsin this year for Christmas.

Page 15 is a layout for my son's 15th birthday. That of course HAD to be documented. Shimelle's prompt was about the Christmas decorations in your house so I just moved that to Day 17. One of the great things about Journal Your Christmas is I can move around the prompts to fit our families holiday, but it gives me great ideas for photo taking. For this page just mainly photos and stickers plus a cute little sizzix pocket with more pics...

Inside the pocket are photos and the gift card from Potbellies where he & I went for his birthday movie-lunch. I am very naughty & quite addicted to gift cards but less good about putting them in my projects so yay!

Day 16- My eldest son gave blood today so I took a photo with him wearing the t-shirt they gave him. As giving blood is the gift of life it fit right in with the holiday! I added a cellphone gift bag to this page which gives it that transparent shiny look, some washi and embellishments. Love the blingy snowflakes!

Page 17 is an envelope. Again this was the prompt from day 15- photos are just a few of the decorations. Going back I realize I need to add some more but luckily I have the envelope so that is an easy fix. Kept it simple with random stickers (deck is glitter red) and pics. The great thing about this project is using up my stash!!!

Inside the pocket is a tag I had made for Stampotique-again using up my stash! Love the chunky glitter ribbon that is on the tag. Even though it isn't part of the color scheme it adds this wintery pop of color.

Day 18: on the back of the envelope is our Christmas movie favorites. Once again I moved a prompt around to suit my project. Day sixteenth prompt was culture & entertainment. Yes not overly traditional but... we do watch the original Grinch every year- must add that. Also might need to add some embellies...

Even though I am doing this way late in September, I have to say it is getting me totally in the mood to start working on more JYC. Hum, I am working a year behind maybe I should play some catch up?

SDC 163

Time for the weekly challenge over at Stampotique #163- this week was to use an old favorite stamp you hadn't used in awhile. I am currently working on Shimelle Lanes Learn Something New Everyday and the prompt was home. I pulled out one of my old favs- Daniel Torrente's Welcome Door. This is fun & messy. I started with some painted deli paper and went from there. The door opens & will have a photo under it. The journaling is about me needing to go through & get rid of stuff but not finding the time/energy to do it- especially when there are way more fun things to do like playing with stamps!

 

VLVS Challenge-August

Just got back from family vacay in Germany so I am getting this in under the wire!!! As Dr. Who is FINALLY starting back this month what better for an art journal page??!!

I used their suggestions of orange/black drips/ rays and swings. I basically made my Tardis swinging on a metal chain- genius I know right!!! You can't really see but the dictionary definition is swing. My rays & quote are used from plate 925. Fun! Join Viva Las Vegas Stamps for their fun challenges!!!

SDC 159

Stampotique Challenge #159: Bows. I have been in a Project Life card making mode so this challenge was great to make a fun Halloween journal card. The challenge is to use bows on your project and when I saw that my new "smitten moustache monsters" stamp friends all had bows on, I knew that was the perfect stamp to start with.

 I started with stamping the friends directly on the card in archival ink & colored them in using dylusions spray in waterpens. Mr. Stripes was also stamped in the other corner and colored with gel pens. The background was colored in using watercolor crayons. My title is a sticker. I made a mess in the lower corner trying to add another stamp so that became my journal spot. Added some glossy accents on my monsters so I could stamp the "owl tree" and the image would be behind the monsters. Voila! C'est fini.

More JYC in August!!!

Yes all forward movement continues to count. Day 11 & 12 follow! Scrap Wrap day is  one of my favorite days of the year. Usually when my Sister-In-Law & I plan it for Christmas Eve Day & we spend the day "scrap wrapping" our gifts while watching Christmas movies like Monty Python & the Holy Grail, Armageddon, Bond & the Bourne Series. We do also throw in Love Actually, Family Stone, etc so there is some Christmas involved. My husband plays role of bar back bringing us unique beverages & tasty treats.

Above is a picture of the prezzies under the tree the year 2012. We add all kinds of bling, bows, ornaments to our wrapping. Hence the title Scrap Wrap. This year we were in Wisconsin for the holidays so there were multiple days of wrapping as some packages had to be mailed.

Day 11: was basically pictures & stickers. Day 12: I made a pocket for a picture of my husband the day he was my scrap wrap partner pre-holiday.

 Sadly I didn't have a picture of my Sister-In-Law Dianna to add to the page- big photo gaf. Perhaps I will add one from the year previously! 

 Moving on- the next page I just put in the advant calendar with no info- kind of self-explanatory.

Day 13: was the first day my teenage boys had to shave. A must have to document! I took a large tag, covered it in holiday tissue paper-love that look. Added photos etc.

 

Day 14: Another page on what we did that day. This is my first year doing Shimelle's class and I am working on 1 year behind so I was going with what we did that day more than the prompts which while very cool & interesting I didn't have the photos or story for a lot of the time. Maybe next year. Took my son for his birthday movie. Conveniently The Hobbit arrived right around his birthday. We play hooky, have lunch & see the movie! Love this tradition!

JYC con't.

Yes it is Christmas in August!!! I am working on getting my Journal Your Christmas book by Shimelle done by December & am rapidly running out of time. What I am actually doing is some major cleaning procrastination but the previous excuse still applies. I only have one page -Day 10 but all forward movements count. If you are really good I will do more in the next post!

Pretty simple page- photos, mat, washi and some stickers from my stash. Done. Shimelle's prompt for this day was "making a list". I did kids with a Grandma on one side and my list on the other.

I adhered an acrylic pattern paper to make a see-through pocket which holds my list. In theory-my list tags are blank but that is where my list will go!!! As soon as we start back up with next years book so I can find my list & re-write it. Yay!

VLVS Challenge

Is it just me or is summer blasting past at the speed of light? I NEEDED to do some art as I have been busy doing other non-art type things so a challenge was the best way to go. I am a project lifer although I don't do it traditionally - at all. I basically scrap book 4x6 cards or art journal my way through so it takes forever but looks great. Currently trying to get out of Nov. 2013 and keep finding myself "touching up" June 2013. Sigh.The Viva Las Vegas Stamp challenge was nature so I made a journal card for a hike we went on. 

I love the whimsy & steam punkishness of these stamps. Starting with a blank card stock I distressed using the challenge guidelines in purple & green. My trees are water color stamped using Tim Holtz distress markers and a spritz of water. The cloud was stamped & cut out but Mr. cute bee was stamped directly to the card. Add some sticker letters & lines for my journaling, splatters & away we go!

and the winners are...

Hi Inky Friends,

First off thanks for all the great comments from Patti Tolley Parrish fans- awesome! 

2nd- here is a quick background with my current stencil fav of Patti's- Outback. The paint behind the stencil is actually a wipe-off art journal page. I stenciled using one of my most favorites for stencil work- Viva Decor Modellier Creme (yes the spelling is correct) in mother of pearl. I love this product because it is thick enough to create the perfect image but drys within 15-20min. I find using an old credit card the best way to scrape the product on.

Sadly the camera doesn't pick up the cool glitter from the glimmer glam, this page is very metallic looking in real life. Thanks to everyone who left a comment!!! I will be doing some more Patti stencil giveaways so stay tuned....

Ok finally the winners are-drumroll please.......randomly selected # 4 & #24

Dana Tatar {datatar}May 26, 2014 at 11:45 AM

Awesome tags Karen! I also love the Outback stencil, but all these designs are fantastic! :)

Janice PhillipsMay 27, 2014 at 7:44 PM

I love what you've done with the stencils! I don't remember when I first saw a video Patti made on YouTube, but I fell in love with her work and her personality. Wonderful tags!!

Congratulations!!! Please email me your addresses scrapowl@gmail.com & I will get those stencils sent out to you.

Patti Tolley Parrish i-stencils Give Away!!!

More play with the fun geometric stencil designs of Patti Tolley Parrish!! For those of you who know me I love, love stencils & can never have enough. I use them in almost everything I do. Patti's stencil are great quality & just plain awesome. You can buy them at here at i-stencils.
Ok so I have just been messing around on tags-this is a great way to play with a product and get the feel for what your products can do. Bonus is you end up with fun tags to use on other projects.

 Here I used part of the Outback 6x6 stencil negative which had glimmer mist all over it- super shimmery.

 This is Dangles 8x10- just a sliver of the over all design. I glimmer misted the back ground & stenciled with metallic paint & a foamy.

 Outback stencil again-wet tag with Dylusions spray- perfectly sketchy love the messy look.

 Dumbells 6x6 stencil- spritzed with Dylusions and moved the stencil with every new color. Very cool!

 Spritzed a tag with Dylusions & than while wet spritzed again using the Tribal Squares 8x10-again gives that water color messy look.

8

Finally Combo tag- Background of Dylusions & dabbed on paint through 2 stencils- Dumbbells & Griddot 8x10.
So Patti & istencils have given me some stencils to give-away!!!! Yay. Just leave a comment & one random person will win a couple of fun stencils!!! Good luck!