Making Memories

Je t'Adore Love Banner

Keisha Campbell created this gorgeous love banner decoration using Making Memories Je t’Adore Collection.  She also used the Slice Elite Digital Design Cutter and the Paper Reverie Design Card to cut the fabulous butterflies on the project. 

Thanks Keisha!

 



Year In Review

If you are like me you take lots and lot (and lots) of pictures throughout the year. The intent is to get them all in a scrapbook, but sometimes that doesn't happen. Making Memories' designer - Wendy Anderson - created this 2010 year in review layout. I love it because it has 12 photos that represent her most meaningful experiences in 2010.

Today's challenge is to create someting similar. Look through your photos to find the photos that represent 2010 for you. Maybe you want to do one photo for each month. Put those photos on a layout and add some simple embellishments.

Wendy used Making Memories' Paper Reverie collection on this layout.

AND speaking of the Making Memories' Paper Reverie collectio check out the Moxie Fab World blog for a change to win it.

Guest Designer Deb Charlesworth

We are happy to have Deb Charlesworth as Making Memories' guest designer.  Deb created an awesome travel album using Making Memories' Panorama collection.Deb explains how she created this project. 

When I saw these papers, I knew they would be perfect for a mini-book about our vacation to England last year.  We spent a lot of time in quaint seaside villages and exploring the moors and countryside in Devon and Cornwall.  Believe it or not, there are palm trees in the south west of England, so I loved that some of the papers had subtle palm trees in the background.

I love making coil bound books, but I like to also create a “cover” for the book so I can protect the coil book and create pockets for additional ephemera.  The cover is created by wrapping paper around pieces of mat board, a thicker kind of chipboard.  The pages of the coil book are chipboard covered with patterned paper.  My chipboard is from packaging that I’ve collected over the years.  Once you start making books like this, you'll never throw away cardboard again!  The cover has a pocket on the right for the coil book (so it can be slid in and out) and a pocket on the left for tags and ephemera.  I decorated my tags with the mini pictures from the index prints and wrote more journaling on them.

On the cover of the coil book, I used an image transfer technique to create the main background.  I spread gesso over the entire cover, placed the patterned paper on top (Streetmap panorama), and let dry.  After drying, wet the paper, and rub off the back of the paper to reveal the original pattern. The resulting paper is faded and aged.  Inked images will also blur a bit when stamped on transferred paper - I really like this look.  I also fell in love with the word patterns on the Exploration Words paper.  I used the clear acrylic stamps, and two of my own to recreate a mini version of the word collage on the cover.

Inside the book, I like to let the pictures tell the story, and try not to use a lot of embellishments.  The rub-ons were perfect for this.  The words helped to carry the theme I started on the cover through the book.

   

 

Some things I learned while doing this project:

· For the longer rub-ons, a little painter’s tape helped to hold the rub-on in place while I was transferring it.

·This paper is gorgeous, with several having foiling and embossing.  A picture really doesn’t capture all of those details.

·I used one round piece of scalloped paper to create an edge on several pages (including the cover) of the book.  This was a great way to stretch the use of this beautiful shaped paper.

·Distress inks coordinate really well with these papers.  I used Weathered Wood, Vintage Photo, Peeled Paint, and Fired Brick.

Thanks Deb for sharing this travel album with us. :)

Road Trip Treats! Yum Yum

In our house, summertime means lots of things - sunshine, BBQ's, the lake, popsicles, and road trips!  Yes, we spend plenty of time in the car every summer - whether it's traveling a short distance to a lake, the mountains, or the pool, or a little farther - like an all-day drive to Grandma's house.  After one or two road trips, we're looking for ways to keep the kids happy and occupied (and NOT asking us 'how much longer' every 3 minutes).  One of the best ways I've found to keep them happy is to keep the treats coming.  In an effort to keep things new & exciting, I thought it would be fun to use my scrapbooking supplies to jazz up some of our treats for our next road trip.  Pretzels are a staple for this traveling family, but if each child has his own individual bag of pretzels, well, it's much more fun!

 
Making Memories’ Panorama collection is perfect for adding a bit of fun to your road trip treats.
 
For this little pretzel bag, I pulled out my Panorama supplies and simply created a little bag wrap with the varnished street sign paper, then I embellished it with transportation paper, masking tape, ribbon, a tag, stickers, rub-ons, a flower, a couple of stacked buttons, and a cute little star brad.  It sounds like a lot of product, but by using elements from the same line, it went together quickly and turned out really cute.  I'm excited to present my kiddos with their own little decorated bag of goodies on our next road trip!
 
Now I get to challenge to you - take out your scrapbook supplies and jazz up a treat or two for your next road trip, BBQ, or picnic!

Have fun.

Wendy Anderson

 

Inspiration from an Entertainment Center

Jenny asked me to choose something I see every day and use it as inspiration for a project.  At first I thought I'd use a magazine cover or packaging from a food item or a restaurant sign, but then I decided to take the assignment a little more literally. This is what I used for my inspiration.
 

Yep - our entertainment unit.  It takes up an entire wall in our family room and I see it every single day.  I love all of the cubbies in the bottom - the baskets are perfect for a family with four little kids - they hold books, toys, video games, movies, mini scrapbook albums, and oh so much more.  I love being able to tuck away all the clutter in a pinch and have the room look nice again.  
 
So, with the entertainment unit as my inspiration piece, I created this layout.

 

Can you see the similarities?  The "cubbies" are represented by patterned paper tags, the top shelf is represented with a piece of patterned paper, and the large center portion that holds the TV is housing a photo on my layout. I used the Making Memories Panorama collection for this layout.

 

So now I challenge YOU to look around your house - what do you see every single day that might translate into your next scrapbook layout?

Wendy Sue Anderson

Scrapbook Challenge from Leah

Hello friends! Ready for a little off-the-scrapbook-page challenge? I like to make fun coffee sleeves for myself and others, and I thought maybe you'd want to give it a try. If you don't drink coffee or tea, you probably have a friend who does. I made personalized coffee sleeves like these as teacher gifts last Christmas - I just added Starbucks cards and was all set.

If you have a leftover coffee sleeve already, you can open it up and use it as a template for tracing. If not, here's a template you can print out and use. Adjust the size however you like. For my coffee sleeves, I like to use stiff felt (it's cozy and keeps the coffee warm longer) but if you don't have stiff felt, any felt or even just cardstock should work too. 

I traced the template onto the felt and on the back of patterned paper. The patterned paper I used is Making Memories' Varnished Floral from the Panorama collection. I used scalloped pinking sheers to cut along the bottom of the felt to give it a deco edge. After cutting out the paper, I trimmed 1/2" off the top and hot glued it to the felt. You can use regular glue for this, but the hot glue works so fast on felt. After that, I did a quick machine stitch but that is optional - not needed at all.

Using a hot glue gun again, I adhered one end on top of the other to create the sleeve. It helps to have a coffee paper cup handy to make sure you get the width that you want. For example, the coffee sleeve I made here was made for a smaller cup (the Starbucks "Tall") but as you can see, when I put it on a 7-Eleven large cup, it sits low on the cup. So make it however you like.

I then put a small amount of glue at the center front of the sleeve to adhere the end of a piece of ribbon to it. I wrapped the ribbon around the sleeve using just a dab of glue on the center back of the sleeve and again on the front where the ribbon ended. To embellish the back, I cut off the prongs on an Making Memories glitter deco brad and hot glued the brad to the ribbon as seen in the picture.

For accent, I made a pretty paper flower buy Slicing two 2.5" flowers using the Slice Seasons card. After curling up the edges using a pencil to wrap around, I mounted one on top of the other using foam tape. To this was added an Making Memories' metal eclectic sign, and the whole thing was glued to the front of the sleeve. That same floral accent will of course also make a pretty page embellishment. As seen in this photo, I added an Making Memories' metal frame to dress the flower up even more.

So here's the challenge: Try making one of these coffee sleeves using your favorite papers and embellishments. Or, like me, grab those scraps and use them first. I'd love to see what you create!  After you make your first one, you can whip out several in no time at all.

Leah Fung

Design Challenge by Wilna Furstenberg

Making Memories' Design Shop is all in one word: FUN. It's pretty and sweet and just the right accent to make your page go from blah to bling. I made this page using design shop! My challenge to you is to use all those little extra embellishments from already open packages and use them cluttered on one page. Sometimes when you clutter elements on a page it can work! Make sure your background is plain and your pictures are simple. Then you can make a statement with embellishments! I would really love to see what you come up with!
smiles

Wilna

Design Challenge by Wendy Anderson

One of my favorite ways to use the Slice is to create fun and unique embossed backgrounds. 

Of course, you could use the same technique to create a single element on a page, card, or other project.

Here’s what you need to get started:  A Slice, a Vintage Findings design card, an embossing mat, and an embossing tip.

 

Remove the blade and insert the embossing tip.

I want the raised side to be on the solid side of the patterned paper…so I’m going to put my paper face down on the mat.

You can do this technique with any of the cards, but if you want to do letters or numbers, you need one with the MS option.  Go ahead and choose the number (or letter), choose the size, and then switch to the mirror image.

Place the Slice on top of the paper and emboss.

Choose the next number, place the Slice wherever you want to emboss and repeat the process until you’ve embossed all of the images you want to add.

It’s likely that the patterned side of your paper will not even look like you’ve done anything…

But when you flip it over, you’ll be able to see the embossed images.

To make the images really stand out, choose a very fine grit sandpaper – I like this super fine sanding block.

Gently rub the sanding block over the raised images. 

I usually use a small circular motion – be really gentle so you don’t rip the paper.

When you’re done sanding, it will look something like this.

Now you can go ahead and create the rest of your layout!

 

 

Wendy Anderson 

 

 

Design Challenge by Keisha Campbell

Last weekend Keisha Campbell and her two daughters had a jewelry making party with the Vintage Groove jewelry collection. The Vintage Groove designer - Jill Schwartz - takes all the guesswork out of making jewelry so even your kids can join in the fun. 

Mikiela loved EVERYTHING about Vintage Groove. She would have created pieces all weekend long if Keisha would have let her. :) Mikiela picked all her pieces and arranged them to fit her style, then Keisha helped assemble them using jump rings and pliers. Her favorite pieces were the small charms. Mikiela was super excited to show her creations to her friends at school.

Amira was also excited to start creating with Vintage Groove. She enjoyed creating her own necklaces the most. She made several of them with simply charms to the strands. Both girls are excited to start creating more pieces next weekend. AND it looks like several of their friends have "volunteered" to join them.

 
 

 
 

Design Challenge by Laura Vegas

Hey everyone! I'm back, with another designer challenge for you. This time it's all about altering your Slice die-cut shapes. There are so many different things that you can do, to alter the look of your die-cut. This could involve distressing, stamping, painting, glittering, heat embossing. Anything that changes the look of your die-cut, from a plain piece of paper to something with some interest. I went with simple inks and a stamp to change the look of my die-cuts, for this layout. I am using Making Memories' Pitter Patter collection today.

Start out by slicing the shapes that you want to use on your project. I went with a simple star shape, from the Baby design card. I cut mine in the 2 inch size, and the 2 1/2 inch size.
 

 
Gather up your stamp and your inks. I chose 3 different colored inks that matched my layout colors, and a woodgrain stamp.
 


Stamp each Sliced die-cut shape. I then decided that I wanted them to stand out more on my layout. So I cut the shadow shape of each star from brown cardstock to be layered together.
 


Layer your stamped die-cuts, along with the shadow cut cardstock die-cuts. I added some pop dots, for added dimension. Add extra embellishments as desired.
 


All that's left, is to add these altered die-cut's to your final layout or project.
 

I hope you take the challenge, and find a fun and interesting way to alter your Slice die-cuts. Make sure to come back and share your creations with us. We always love to see what our fabulous readers come up with!

Laura Vegas