Everyday Obsession....

I have been spending a bit of time in my craft room lately while I have become a netflix widow (thank you weeds), and I managed to make a quick layout one evening, quite a feat for me seeing how long it has been since I have been in that room.

Both my husband and I work within the coffee industry and these little paper cups of caffeinated goodness are a daily must, they are a huge part of our everyday life

I have been enjoying making layouts without the traditional 12x12 sized sheets of pattern paper and using paper from smaller sized stacks and project life cards, also how great is that thickers font?  I was not sure how I would ever use it but it was perfect for this layout, I love when things like that come together.

Beach babes....

Well, well, well, guess who finally got around to finishing off a layout.  Yep that's right I finally have finished off a UFO project. 

A few months back when these photos were taken I knew that I had to get them scrapped right away.  This is my daughter and the daughter of one of my best friends, we both knew each other as kids and our mums were friends in high school so these girls are third generation friends, very special really.




The layout....I am really loving the look of framing or matting the whole layout and one of the best ways to use up pattern paper that you no longer have a use for or isn't quite your style is to use it as a frame.  Pretty sure I would have trouble using a red watercolour with floral print but as a mat, perfect.

Another great trick to stretch your stash is to use those project life cards up by using them for layering.  I only used two sheets of pattern paper in behind the photo one was that gorgeous feather Sassafraslass and some very vintage KI Memories, the others however were MAMBI pocket pages.  I am not a project lifer but I still have quite a few packs of them around so this is a great way to use them up.

I am in love with these small Prima alphas and those Pink Paislee Luxe Arrows.  I have used the arrows a few times lately and find the colour combination though rather neutral works really well with a variety of different colour combinations.

Finally those extra photos that you don't have room for on your scrap pages or maybe don't want to include on your layout........put them into a pocket page or project life style album insert.

I don't do double page spreads but sometimes I would like to add in a few more photos.  This is a great compromise to that as you don't have to scrapbook them but they are included with the whole story that you are telling. 

CHA Summer loves....

So it is that time again when the end of year scrappy releases start hitting the shelves, yay.

I knew that it must be getting close as Spotlight have been having some pretty decent sales on scrapbooking goods and recently started putting clearance prices on a lot of lines.

Now for the releases.....

Honestly I don't need anything much these days as I have not been scrapbooking but I can still have a look and lust after some of the new lines making there way onto the shelves, here is my favorite picks.

Authentique Infused

Ohhhh how I love this line.  It is pink and girly and filled with all the things that I love in life like cakes and doileys and cutlery and tea cups and pots.  I will be buying this line.

Bella Blvd Family Frenzy

I am not too keen on the rest of this line but there is no way I am going to get away with not buying a sheet of this double sided paper....Hello Doughnut pattern, get in my paper stash.

Authentique Trick or Treat
Ohhh man, this is the line that has finally made me sad that we don't celebrate Halloween in Australia.  Probably wont be buying any of this line but it is a beautiful collection and I would love to be able to use it.

Echo Park Dots and Stripes, Valentines Collection.

Another line that I will be buying.  I am a huge fan of polka dot paper and I use pink polka dots the most, nothing too fancy but an essential in my scrapbooking.

Echo Park, The Story of Christmas.

I LOVE this paper so much.  What I love about it is that it is quite obviously Rudolph from my childhood favorite Rudolph the red nosed reindeer.  I will be buying a sheet or two of this but seeing as I didn't use the Christmas lines that I bought last year this will be the only sheet  from this line that I buy.

Lawn Fawn Winter Scripty Sayings 
Ohhhhh I love this stamp set.  As far as stamps go I have fallen into the "practical" only category, how many times can I use this stamp, is this something that I can use multiple times, will this show it's age.......you get the idea and well this stamp is one that I could use every year.

Well that is that for the 2015 mid year picks.  Nothing really blew my mind with these releases but there is still quite enough things that I would love to spend my cash on.  What have you liked from these new releases?

Ohh Long neglected blogger..... Laying the honesty card down right now, I have been a very bad scrapbooker and have become a collector of paper craft supplies rather than an avid user of said products. Part of the problem that I have is with the house that we are currently living in and the space that my scrapbooking area is housed, I will make a post on that a bit later but at the moment I am in between behaving as a sane normal person who has serious reservations about the storage of her precious hobby goods and the flactuating weather and insect colonies and of being a princess about the whole situation and downing tools. Anyways just a little post of some of the goodies that I have picked up in the last few months to get me back in the hang of this blogger thing.

Pretty little card for a special little ones first birthday, used ctmh and maya road stamps #ctmh #closetomyheart #mayaroad #tsukineko #papercraft #cardmaking #birthdaycard #watercolourpencil #stamps #clearstamps #acrylicstamps #stamping

A photo posted by @erinjoffe1 on Mar 21, 2015 at 12:45am PDT

$8 craft haul for the win, thank you Big W. #fiskars #fiskarsaustralia #washi #washitape #brads #cardkit #ladedah #ladedahcraft #merci #bigw #grantstudios #grantaustralia #gracetaylor #scrapbooking #papercrafts #haul #scrapbookhaul #craft

A photo posted by @erinjoffe1 on May 6, 2015 at 8:04pm PDT

Thank you spotlight with your 40% off deals and I finally got the gold Heidi Swapp color shine. #scrapbooking #spotlight #spotlightstores #spotlightaustralia #americancrafts #amytangerine #heidiswapp #colorshine #kaisercraft #bella #patternpaper #scrapsupplies #scrapbookhaul #crafthaul #papercraft

A photo posted by @erinjoffe1 on Jun 5, 2015 at 2:48am PDT

Finally took the plunge and got some Gelatos, looking forward to some messy experiments #gelatos #fabercastell #fabercastellgelatos #fabercastellaustralia

A photo posted by @erinjoffe1 on Jun 10, 2015 at 9:30pm PDT

Bargain basement scrapbooking goodies. I have been finding amazing bargains at riot art and craft lately...all these goodies, only $9 😄 #scrapbooking #scrapbook #scrapbookbargain #scrapbookhaul #makingmemories #mambi #americancrafts #glitzdesign #glittertape #riotartandcraft #riotartandcraftaustralia

A photo posted by @erinjoffe1 on Jun 27, 2015 at 2:33pm PDT

Morning Coffee, Purple Lips....

How much fun I had making this layout.....
This was a real pleasure to make and a real lesson in make do and use what is already in your stash.

 Messy and sticky and drippy and painty and fun, lots of fun.
And Purple, how I have a hard time working with purple but this was a breeze.

All of the pattern paper is off cuts and pocket page cards on this layout, I was so inspired from the Love this city layout that I decided to get messy again and I loved the idea of actually using up and cutting into all those scraps I keep.

The purple water coloured bits behind the photo are just watered down acrylic paint mixed into three different shades of purple and the stencil that I used with texture paste was just a piece of scrap cardstock punched with a hole punch and then thrown away when I was finished.  

The misted droplet bits....just leftover from the painted section and I made a splatter ink in grey to go along too. 

How awesome is that Studio Calico font in the alphas...I am in awe of these ones.

It amazes me that most of the time I am wanting all the new stuff and I sometimes get bothered by the fact that I don't get to buy all the scrappy things I would like to have and then I can make a layout that is so different from my usual style and get so creative with nothing but what I already have and a bit of creativity....mind boggling stuff that.

And Spent

You know how sometimes you have an amazing idea for a layout and it just does not translate well in real life and the layout looks nothing like what you first envisioned and you kinda like but you kind of don't as well.....Yeah that is this layout.

No matter what I did nothing much of the original idea became a reality except maybe where the photo went.  Ohh and please excuse the funny dark patches on the layout.....I may have left it next to the window with some card making stuff laying on top.....note to self so not leave layouts out always put them away when finished.

I think part of the issue here was that one I was making a layout for submission which I have not done in years and secondly they are gorgeous papers (Bo Bunny, Happy Tails) they are in a colour scheme that I usually stay well away from. 

A back story.....Those alphas have seen some action in my craft room, they have been painted and inked and glittered and now misted.  They are a set released by Heidi Grace many, many, many years ago and were the first non raw chipboard alphas I ever bought.  This layout just did not suit any of the styles or colours that I had in my alphas so rather than resorting to getting out the cricut I got these old faithfuls out, ripped off the pattern top and mixed up a custom glimmer mist that was just perfect for this layout.

Long lost layouts....part two

Part two, another couple of layouts that have skipped getting photographed.
I am not the photographer in the house and nor does editing photos appeal to me in the whole scheme of things so I will just use that as my excuse shall I.

These layouts are both from the same day when my brother in law and his girlfriend came over and stayed with us, so we took them out on a bit of a tiki tour as we call it and showed them some of our city.

I decided to try a different approach with this one as most of my layouts are layered and I went with a blocked design instead, I really liked the way it turned out but the only thing that frustrated me was that I still could not get anything straight.  I have no idea how I always muck my measurements up but even with my fancy cutterpillar pro I still get slightly off lines.

Again, Thickers love.....I adore this style.  The other alphas are from Prima and those gorgeous blue enamel dot things, well they are a million years old and are from a company called cloud nine which was owned by Fiskars, lucky I have tons of them as I use them all the time.  

Mixed and layered goodness.  This is a real mix of the old and new, the heart is actually two pieces, a fiskars stamp and a handcut heart stamped with a stampin up stamp, a Kaisercraft diecut, Lil Davis design chipboard heart and a echo park sticker.
Also how amazing is that chevron pattern paper, will be a sad old day in my house when that one runs out.

   
Please excuse the wonky photo angle....
Paint and ink and splattery stuff, it was nice to get all the messy stuff and have a play around.
This is a super, super plain and simple layout but again these were photos that I didn't want to take the focus away from, they are what makes this layout and everything else needs to compliment them. 

I didn't use any pattern paper on this layout just cardstock and some MAMBI (me and my big ideas) Pocket Pages, I bought them with the full intentions of doing project life but it is not for me and this is a great way to get rid of some of those cards.

CITY....would you believe that I have had those sticker for possibly the better part of 8 to ten years and they could very well be the very sheet of alphas that I ever bought.  All these years and I held onto them in the hopes that I would a use for them and what do you know.....perfect.  This goes way back in time to the days when alphas were not all that common, we didn't use chipboard and Thickers were not even a thing, yep that old.  

Long lost layouts....part one

Well it has been a while since my last post here but never fear I have been doing some scrapbooking here and there I just have been a bit slack getting them posted up, so slack in fact these two quite possibly were startedsometime last year....yep, sigh.

These are both from out first camping trip away of which we have had many adventures since but I really want to have an album dedicated to all of our little and big trips away.

 This is a pretty simple layout which makes it all the more frustrating considering I went back and forth with it for months, in saying that though this a photo that doesn't need to be over embellished or dressed up, simple is best.  

Those Thickers.......I love them, great slim line size and the colour goes with so much.

Now for those stars..... Not wood, nope just kraft cardstock, a star punch double layered and glued.  I would love to have  some of those Studio Calico wooden shapes  that everyone seems to use but at the time of making this layout they were super hard to find in Australia and they were damn expensive so I made do with a much cheaper alternative, will so so this again.

 

This layout was also one that drove me insane trying to get it to work.  It looks 100% different to what I had originally envisioned and I just could not get any of the layers straight.  Again nice and simple and also sticking to a certain colour palette.

 

I used quite a few pieces from the Echo Park mini kit The Great Outdoors and from one of their first collections A Walk In The Park, I love how easy you can mix and match within the lines the release.

Haul

So the last scrapbook haul that I posted was totally supposed to be it for the year until I made major dents in my stash....I hang my head in shame because I outrageously failed my spending freeze in spectacular fashion over not one or two trips out and about but on five separate occasions including four to spotlight.  I am ashamed and have subsequently banned myself from travelling anywhere near that side of town so I can avoid the place where my husbands money enters and never returns i.e. SPOTLIGHT.

Stationary is kind of a big deal to me, big deal.  I love it but that's kind of where it ends as I am one of the most disorganised people I know.  My cupboards are immaculate and organised to an inch of there lives but everything else is a mess and all that gorgeous stationary is used for a week and then shoved in the draw of no return until one of the kids needs something to draw in.  No way they are getting there hands on these goodies, I have a thing for floral and bright colours and anything cupcake related....big kid at heart always.

Oh my goodness I am dying from the cuteness...look at those adorable stickers and little plastic envelopes, tooooo cute. 

Fabric goodies.  I love fabric especially printed quilting cotton the trouble is I have grand ideas, limited sewing skills, even less patience and I am fairly lazy when it comes to actually pulling out my sewing machine so I just keep adding to my already sizable stash and I don't make a dent in it.  In my defence I actually do have plans for all of these fabrics and I didn't just buy them because they are pretty *cough cough* all other fabric purchases I have made in the last two years.  I am going to make pretty ruffled edges and trim some white tea towels with the pink kitchen print fabric, I am going to make an apron and a cricut cover out of the cupcakes and I am making a skirt and an apron for my daughter out of the dog print....wish me luck.  

Maggi Holmes Love Notes was all on major clearance and I picked these up for half off the sale price, so the $4 stack was only $2....what these prices are too insane for me not buy them.

 

 

Just a few things that I did pick up throughout my trips back and forth.  The thickers were both on sale and there was no way I was leaving without that map print set.  The Heidi Swapp stuff was on 30% off, Kaiser was 40% off except for the collection pack and the carousel stickers were just too adorable for me to leave behind.  

 

American Crafts goodies.  I bought these on my first trip out to Spotlight when they first started reducing all the older stock, I realise that these are all older stock but I didn't buy into the whole Amy Tan/Dear Lizzy stuff bandwagon when it first came out and at $3 a piece I was happy to pop these into my basket.

Assorted bits and pieces I have picked up from my LSS and from Big W.
I have many photos from our trip years and years ago at the Auckland Zoo and I  have never scrapbooked them but I also have never really found a line of paper or embellishments that I liked enough but this echo park line is perfect.

Albums.   I have been waiting for AGES for a good album sale and finally Spotlight had 50% off so I had to go and buy some.  On the day that I was there I bought two buuutttt when I went back a few days later they had the brown Amy Tan albums at $1 each WHAT THE ACTUAL......seriously $1.  I bought three, I could have bought more but I can't be too greedy, actually I should  have bought them just for the refills which I have already put to good use. 

I seriously need more crafting and less shopping in my life.  Life has been stressful sick and busy lately and my craft space inhabited by a family member staying with us so there hasn't been anything actually happening in the scrapping department.  Bring on the end of the week when my house is actually clean and empty and the kids are not sick and at school.

Arrrr....

Pirate and princess day at kindy and what better way for a little boy to celebrate but to dress up in his finest pilage and plundering finery.

 This was another one of those layouts that was almost done for a long time but just needed to have the finishing touched added (titles and journaling seems to be my scrapbooking kryptonite).

I finally busted out my cricut and cut the title as I just could not find anything in my stash that would work, I seriously had nothing at all.  One of the best things is that I used paper that is well into its double digits with that orange weave print paper, nothing beats being able to mix vintage and new products.  Another highlight is being able to use that treasure chest sticker, my mum bought me a bucket load of sticker a while back from a cheapie shop and I seriously wondered with these what I could use them for, I am not a huge fan of this style of silhouette stickers but it worked perfectly for this layout.

Well that took a while....

I am not going to lie....I am a slow scrapper but these have been a long time in making.

I started both of these layouts in September.....2012.

When I started these layouts I was house sitting for a friend and took a scrapbook kit I made from my stash but then I kind of got stumped on the both of them, one was finding the right alpha stickers and the other was more of an embellishment issue.

 

Nosey Norah.
I Just loved this American Crafts paper when I first laid eyes on it but it has proven to be very difficult to actually use, finally I found the perfect photo but the busy pattern made it hard to work with and then place any kind of title but time was my friend and then finally Thickers to the rescue, once I found the bigger of the fonts it was easy to match something else in and that was the black typewriter alpha that is an early 2000's Pebbles, how I love finding uses for my vintage stash.  Another notable old stash appearance is from those glorious Sassafras Lass corner stickers and that green leaf which I believe is Green Tara from the pre 2005.

Make a note of this moment.
This one proved the most difficult to finish off as I just could not find the right embellishments to finish, and as much as I love the papers that I used they are very different from the colour palette that I would normally use.  The best part of this layouts though is that gold dot vellum peeking out from behind the photos, I totally missed out on that most coveted Dear Lizzy vellum when it made its rounds in the scrapbooking world but I figured that with a stamp I already owned and some gold embossing powder I too could have a comparable product....winnning.