Daily December: Before

I put together my Daily December Album so now it's ready and waiting....

I constructed the covers myself because I wanted the pages to be 6 x 12in so the covers are 6.5 x 12.5in Chipboard covered with Patterned paper.
Paper:Left BG (Basic Grey), Right and circles: MM (Making Memories) and Kaisercraft wood embellishment- inked and dimensional magic'd.

Top Paper: MM

Top Paper: BG

Top Paper: KI Memories Sheers

Top Paper: CC (Cosmo Cricket)

Top Paper:BG

Top Paper: MM?

Top Paper: Hard to see I know but it is a trading card holder cut down to 2x3

Top Paper:CC

Top Paper: BG

Top Paper:MM

Top Paper:MM

Top Paper: KI sheers

Top Paper: MM

Top Paper: Another trading card holder.

Top Paper: BG

Top Paper: KI Sheers

Top Paper: MM??

Top Paper:CC

Top Paper:MM same with the bottom.

Left paper: CC Right Paper: CC (Mr Campy) Wood embellishments Kaisercraft. Ink Staz-on and then covered with Dimensional Magic.

All papers used are double sided or folded in half and back-to-backed.

Last year I added the numbers to the pages before I started but I want a bit more flexibility this year and I'll probably switch the papers around a bit as well and I may need to add some more in. I have a little kit bag of Teresa Collins journalling spots and numbers, Kaisercraft numbers and MM Circles for embellishments like the ones on the cover. I'll add some other stuff along the way (I keep all my Christmas themed product together in one place). I also have a punching template so I can easily place the holes for the book rings in the same place on any additional pages.
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Product notes: Smooch Ink

There has been some talk recently on an internet group I belong to about Smooch Inks. I recently managed to score some of these in a Trade Me auction that I was getting for some other treasure. So I thought I'd have a play so I could show the girls.

The ink is made by Clearsnap who also do Colorbox, Fluid chalk inks, Vivid and Ancient Page among others. It comes in a nail polish like bottle and is available in 16 colours. From the original 8 I have the Azure (Blue), Gold Lame and Silver Fox- they also do a red, green, purple, orange and moonlight which I assume is cream/pearl. The colours are Pearlised so they have a really nice sheen to them. The second set of 8 colours not yet on the Clearsnap website can be seen here.

The tip of the applicator which is attached to the lid (seen below with a gel pen for comparison) is seriously fine and makes tiny 'fill' work very easy. You could also write with the tip but it is hard to maintain an even line.

Overall I think this ink is really nice to use and I did like the colours and sheen.

That said I think that I have pens that also do the same trick so I am not sure as the value of it as a colouriser.

You can also use it to apply ink to a stamp. And I guess that's where the value of this ink comes in for the serious (and patient) stamper. It does take a bit longer to dry so it would be possible to use multiple colours on one stamp allowing you to get a finely detailed multi-coloured print relatively easily. It's not the sort of painstaking task I'm into though.

The verdict at US$4.49 to buy them in or NZ$8 to get them local I think I will just stick to the three colours that I have. But if I happen upon them cheap on 'Trade Me' or in my Christmas Stocking I won't be at all disappointed! And I'll certainly be using mine to add accents, highlights and hints of sparkles to cards, pages and projects.

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Mini books for a mini boy

This is fast becoming one of my favourite formats for mini albums/books. It's so simple to add the text to the photos in Photoshop and then have them printed as 6x4's or 5x7's if there is a special.

It take so little time to put together a simple and fun little resource that references Will's world and Will's passions- (or the other kids).

Obviously I had some of the photos for the lawn mower book already and others I took intentionally. (I made these a week ago and Will has already added words like petrol, oil and throttle to his vocabulary.

The pictures in this book I already had from our airshow photos so it was super easy.
The spiral binding means I can reopen the books and add more pages as I take more photos- like the gyrocopters buzzing our house last Friday.

To construct the books I simply back to back the photos with photo splits with the exception of the cover and first page which I glue to a piece of chipboard (the sort you get for free from the photo processor). And then bind with the Bind-it-all.

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Reading Now: Collage Lost and Found

Collage Lost and Found by Giuseppina "Josie" Cirincione

Originally I was loaned this and Cirincione's second book 'Bent, Bound, and Stitched' by Miss Wendy and I wasn't far past the cover when I knew that it was a book that I wanted to own. Purely as eye candy this book is absolutely delicious!

I guess if I am being objective about it not everyone will find inspiration amongst the pages because it just may not be their style. But if you enjoy collage and want to get more artsy then I think you will really enjoy it.

There are some initial chapters about supplies and where to find them- some background type stuff for getting started. The list is fairly comprehensive and I think you could still manage to do quite a lot of cool stuff with out all of the tools she suggests.

Then there are three sections full of projects with instructions on how they were put together.
'Collage Catechism' includes Greeting cards, Tags and Business cards. 'A Formal Viewing' has books, shrines and wall art. The last chapter is 'Fashion fortissimo' which includes Home accessories, gifts and and some pretty funky jewelery. The end of the book has 4 pages of picture which you can copy and use in your own work, a resource list and an index.

Personally I think the projects in this book are stunning- seriously cool. The instructions are simple to follow and make the ideas easy to replicate in your own projects. If you are looking to get into collage, altered books or make your scrapbook pages a bit more funky then I highly recommend this book!

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Caitlins: Family Photoshoot

I'd been hanging out to play with paint for ages... and I finally did... and I was super happy with the results....

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365 Week 40

I had a super slack week with the kids away and school holidays and treating myself to some birthday laziness.... hence this is late and lacking in details!

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Biker Boy

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Will's Funny Glasses

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Caitlins: Sweet

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Caitlins: Things to do...

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Reading Now: Oh Baby!

As you may have noticed I have been doing a lot of little baby scrapping lately I'm keen to get some of Wills stuff done while he is still kind of little and I am trying to do some photos from the other two kids baby albums as well. I brought this book a while back to provide some inspiration for all that.

The book is divided into ten sections and also includes a couple of articles. The sections include; Announcements, decor, welcome cards, shadow boxes, girl pages, boy pages, milestones, mini albums, adoption, and twins. The articles look at documenting the first year, and preserving memorabilia on layouts.

Scrapbook Trends is technically a magazine so there is advertising but it is minimal (I guess that's why it costs more than your standard mag- that and each of the 150 odd pages is full colour). I have brought Scrapbook Trends in the past and enjoyed the projects in their mini albums book and I do like the relatively ad-free format.

Each page is dedicated to a specific project, as well as a clear picture, there are very basic instructions and a basic supply list.

While there are some nice/cute projects in the first 50 pages of the book there was nothing that screamed 'make me!' and there were some things where I just thought-'you have to be kidding!' For example birth announcements that were either way too expensive or too time consuming to reproduce in any great number.

As for the LO's and mini albums throughtout the magazine there really wasn't anything stand-out or remarkable. Yes they are good looking projects and high quality with a range of Easy to difficult. But nothing you couldn't find in a cheaper non baby specific magazine and no new ideas that I felt compelled to add to my idea notebook. The articles were very basic and not really much that you couldn't figure out yourself with a couple of moments of using your own brain.

My verdict; nice to look at don't pay for it though.... you can borrow mine.

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Caits and Cadbury

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KSCS

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365 Week 39

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Summer Holidays

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