CTMH Australasian SOTM Blog Hop – This Moment

 

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Hello and welcome aboard our Stamp of the Month Australasian Close to My Heart Blog Hop. If you have arrived here from Doris Taylor’s blog Creative Inspirations,  then you are in the right place. If you landed here by accident, no problem, please join in by following the link at the end of this post.

I apologise if this is a repeat post for you.  I had accidentally pressed publish for my first draft and of course once that happens you can’t take it back, unfortunately.   Gotta love technology sometimes!

Today I would like to share with you some cards which features the January SOTM This Moment which is  available exclusively throughout January for $33 or for just $5 when you spend $75.

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This stamp set would be perfect for  wedding and Valentine Day layouts but I didn’t have any suitable photos so I made some cards instead using the Heartstrings papers as they were a good match with this stamp set.  The Heartstrings papers are from the Seasonal Expressions catalogue which is available until the end of March.  I have also kept the cards simple by sticking to the papers, stamps and coordinating cardstocks and inks.

For the first card I have matched up the Cranberry and Lagoon cardstocks with the patterned papers from the Heartstrings paper.  For the target I have cut the outer two shapes with the Art Philosophy cartridge and then stamped the same image on scrap White Daisy cardstock – twice with Cranberry and once with Whisper ink. I then fussy cut out the circles and layered them on to create the striped effect.  The arrow and the sentiment have been stamped and fussy cut out and placed on the card.

CTMH This Moment

I was searching for some inspiration and went to the tried and true Make it From Your Heart Volume 1 and found pattern number 27.  I have mixed the patterned paper with the script paper and later realised that I had the script the wrong way but I was looking at the flourishes!  Anyway, I have stamped the images with a mix of Whisper and Cranberry ink and the main image has been matted with Cranberry and Whisper cardstock.

CTMH This Moment SOTM

Finally here is a very quick and easy card utilising the gorgeous Heartstrings papers.  I have place a matted trim of coordinating paper across in order to place the simple stamped Hello that has been matted on Cranberry cardstock  and then finished with a bow from the retired Ariana Assortments.

CTMH SOTM This Moment 1

Materials used:

Cardstock – Cranberry, White Daisy, Whisper, Lagoon

Paper – Heartstrings B&Ts

Inks – Cranberry, Whisper, Lagoon

Ariana Assortments (retired)

Cricut Cartridges – Art Philosophy

This Moment is only available until 31st January  from your CTMH consultant here.  I’d love you to leave a comment before heading off to the next stop,  Anne Patterson’s Blog Mummy you made this?

Happy Crafting

Patricia

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Image representing Flickr as depicted in Crunc...
Image via CrunchBase

 

 

My photo of the day. I have been exploring my camera and started using the A setting on the camera and discovered the optical digital zoom which gave me a lot more grunt for macro photography. Here I managed to get a brief ray of sunshine to back light the flower and because I was able to zoom in I got a much better bokeh effect without manipulating the environment. I am looking forward to learning more about macro photography at the camera club. But sometimes there is nothing better than getting out and practicing. At least with digital cameras you can view the photos and delete them as necessary before printing them off.
I would also like to add that my Memory Manager 4.0 has been an excellent tool to help me sort all my photos easily and I do all my editing and journalling in it before I upload to Flickr. It is so much easier doing this than doing it online. Plus I can also rate my photos as well so I know which ones to use when I am doing my digital and/or traditional scrapbooking. MM also has a feature where you can put the photos into an album to help you plan for doing an album which is great for oganizing in advance. I have started to also use more touch up tools as well, but that is also a work in progress and another topic for a future post.
Have a great day everyone.
Patricia

 

Autumn is coming

Hello there

Autumn is finally here and the leaves are starting to change colour and to celebrate some rain and cooler weather at last, I have created an autumn layout on my StoryBook Creator 4.0.  I have used the Fall Appreciation 2012 kit as the colours are very autumnal.

Autumn Time

 

The layout was a sketch from an Artful Crafts competition and I inserted photo boxes to create the background layers.  Other than that this layout was a matter of clicking and dragging the embellishments onto the page and resizing them as required.  I got an honorable mention for this in the competition – I don’t think they had had a digital layout entered before.

Happy Autumn everyone in the Southern Hemisphere and Happy spring for the Northern Hemisphere.

Happy crafting

Patricia

 

More digital shabby chic

Hi there

I have been further developing my theme of digital shabby chic and using my wedding photos in a layout using shabby chic embellishments from a range of sources.  I have also used black and white photos to good effect (I think) in the second layout.

Two things I love about digital scrapbooking or art is 1) there is no mess and 2) there is an undo and redo button and you can change to your heart’s content.  I do have to watch that I stop before too much is definitely too much though.

These layouts would look lovely on the new photo panels or in the Everyday Display from Creative Memories.

As usual I will put the instructions on how I have made these layouts on my Digital Creations page.  I try to remember what I have done, but if you are unsure of any steps please feel free to contact me.

Digital Shabby Chic wedding layout

Wedding chic layout

Happy crafting.

Patricia

Digital Shabby Chic

Welcome

Unfortunately health issues have slowed me down a little, but I can still play with my StoryBook Creator 4.0.  I have been really inspired by the gorgeous shabby chic cards and tags on Pinterest and have tried to replicate the same effects on the computer.  I have used some free images that I got from a CD in a book on Vintage Images from the library, but I could see that an old photo or one that has been made sepia or black and white would work just as well.  The other images have been digital freebies through CM. This image would look great on the new panels that Creative Memories have just released.  I will put instructions on my digital page for your information.

Created using #Creative Memories StoryBook Creator 4.0
Created using #Creative Memories StoryBook Creator 4.0

Happy Scrapping

Patricia Manhire

Flower power photo cards

Welcome

I have now got my handcrafted cards for sale at The Wool Shop NZ in Avalon, Lower Hutt, so I have been playing around with using my StoryBook Creator 4.0 to make use some of my flower photos and the Enchanted Digital Kit.  I have had these printed out and then using my tape runner I then mounted them on plain card stock to make the cards.  They have come out well I think. These are so easy to do and very economical to make individualised cards.  I have used flower photos as they are going to be sold, but any photo or image could be used.

I will put the instructions on my Digital Creations Page for your information.Flower card 2 Flower card 3 Flower card 4 Flower card 5 - Copy Flower card 6 - Copy Flower card 7 Flower card 8 - Copy Flower card 9 Flower card 10 Flower card

I hope this inspires you to think outside the box and use your StoryBook Creator 4.0 in different and inventive ways.  Feel free to leave comments about what you have created on this post.  I would love to see what other people are doing.

Happy Scrapping

Patricia

Reflections of flowers

Welcome

I have been having a break from digital scrapbooking and have gone back to traditional scrapbooking.  I have been working on putting my old flower photos in an album and for this I have been using the Reflections range from Creative Memories.  The colours from this palette (along with the green apple and cloud cardstock)  work really well with my flower photos –  especially as I tend towards pink flowers and the greens and blues complement this colour so well.  I use colour in the form of matting and background papers/cardstock to help highlight my photos.

Some of my photos were not great so I trimmed them down and I was then able to put 11 photos onto one page – see the second image down.  I love using the circle and oval cutters as well to create a different shape for my layout.    Scrapbook page of aquilegias Scrapbook page using 11 photos Scrapbook page Scrapbook pages of rose

Materials used:

Reflections Tone on Tone paper Pack

Reflections Paper Flowers

Reflections Storybox Photo Mats

Reflections Paper Ribbon

Enchanted Epoxy Stickers

Green apple card stock

Cloud card stock

Title Stickers – Simply Beautiful

12″ Rotary Trimmer – straight and wavy blades

Custom Cutting System – ovals

Precision Point Adhesive

Tape Runner

Jumbo Fancy Frame (unfortunately no longer available).

Border Maker – Twinkle Chain cartridge (unfortunately this cartridge is no longer available).

Happy Scrapping

Patricia

My calendar

Hello again.

Today I was thrilled to receive my calendar in the post and it has turned out beautiful.  It did not take long from order to delivery either, especially at this time of the year as well.  This month Creative Memories has a sale on calendars with 20% off so it is a great time to get them completed.

It is really important to not only organise, protect and save your photos, but actually bring your photos out into your life and share them with family and friends.  There are so many different options now from printing them off to put into quick albums, traditional scrapbook albums or in Everyday Displays to doing photo books, page prints, posters and calendars.  So make it your New Years resolution to get your photos sorted and start bringing them to life!

Here is a couple of examples of my pages:

My calendar My calendarHappy Scrapping.

Patricia