Hi everyone!  I have been feeling a little mojo-less this past week, so to get my creativity flowing again, I sat down to Photoshop Elements and created a little sketch.  I wanted to share it here, in case it might inspire someone else to be creative as well!

And here is the page I made using the sketch.  Love love love these fun and colorful Amy Tangerine papers and embellies!

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I always have about a billion little paper scraps lying around, and I recently challenged myself to come up with some creative ways to use them.  On black friday last November, I picked up this great jumbo tag punch from Michaels.  It was the perfect tool to help me transform some of my paper scraps into cute embellies for the following page!

I just punched a bunch of the tags out, and wrote my current favorite things on them (for the ones that were too dark or had a pattern, I stuck a piece of masking tape to them to write on!) and then arranged them on the page, along with even MORE paper scraps, and a few Amy Tangerine cut-outs.

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Our sweet little furry boy Ambrose is affectionately known as “Brosie” to mostly everyone in our family. He is always full of energy, and a bright spot in our home. The cheerful papers in the Heidi Swapp Serendipity collection reminded me of Brosie’s spirit, so when I found this picture of him, I got right to work!

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I just love Studio Calico.  Their color palettes and themes always seem to suit me, no matter what.  And the Snippets collection, paired with some of their trendy embellies, were no exception.

I first dripped Art Anthology Colorations on the background paper.  I then cut out small pieces of the Studio Calico Here and There Bowling Green paper to back sections of the Jillibean Soup hexigon Placemat piece.  I then layered everything together and adhered, adding embellies to the blank hexigons in the Placemat.

The title was cut using the Silhouette Cameo we have at Archiver’s in Marietta. You can come by and make your own custom Cameo cuts too! 

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I apologize for my lack of posts this past week or so, but I was literally down and out for quite a few days.  However, I am happy to report that I am finally over the flu!  Unfortunately, now my husband has it. 

I was finally feeling in good enough spirits to return to my craft room today.  I created the following layout using the Cosmo Cricket Summer Love collection.  I was really digging the bright colors and retro patterns of this collection, so I used it to scrap a pic of my son browsing through old records at a local Atlanta record store.

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Lots of messy crafting going on this week!!  I finally got a Gelli Arts gel printing plate yesterday from Blick Art Supplies in Roswell (they also sell them online!), and had tons of fun making monoprints yesterday.  Here are a few of the prints I made (sorry for the bad lighting/color – I took these pics last night):

Here’s a great video that shows how fun and easy gel monoprinting can be:

I had also been toying with the idea of making a sewn booklet out of paper scraps — reminiscent of the little sewn books in the Amy Tangerine collection.  So I took one of my favorite monoprints, added some Studio Calico papers, and some kraft cardstock, and created this little booklet:

The first page is my red monoprint!  It was exactly the effect I was looking for.

I used a couple of my edge punches to make some of the paper edges more interesting. I also used a variety of washi tapes, and some stamps to lightly decorate the booklet.

I used a paper awl to punch through the layers, and a bookbinding needle (also purchased at Blick Art Supplies) and separated cotton twine to hand-sew the binding (badly, I might add – I am not good with needle and thread!)

This project was super easy, used up paper scraps I might not have used elsewhere, and came together incredibly quickly.  I’d say in less than 30 minutes, I had the completed book!

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My daughter and her cousins don’t get to see each other much, but when they do, they have a lot of fun together, and we always try to take a few pics (though it’s pretty hard to get them to stand still long enough!)

I used my brand new filmstrip edge punch from EK Success, which I LOVE!  I can’t wait to try it on more projects.  I also used the American Crafts Dear Lizzie Lucky Charm collection, along with one of the Amy Tangerine stamps.

Products used for this project: