Tying Together the Layers

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Here is a great way to tie colors and layers together. I want to share with you another layout I completed for my Aunt to give me cousin. Here are several pictures of the friends in the neighborhood where he grew up.  Using a block E size stamp set, I was able to stamp the title “Friends & Neighbors” and stagger friends  down the left side. IThey would not fit straight down, but I think the staggered look is fun, and since this age group is fun, it worfks.

I have a mini-file folder for hidden journaling where  Shawn can add what he remembers about his friends and neighbors.  I used a border stamp to make the complete line of decoration down the center of the left page and across the right one. A creative way to tie two different colors of cardstock together as you will notice on the left side is to punch some connecting holes and thread ribbon to appear to hold the sides together. using knots instead of bows makes it a bit more masculine. The same element idea appears on the top center of the companion page. Stamping across the top strip gives it interest, but does not compete with the colorful stamped border across the center.  I will include a stamped, lined piece of cardstock incase he wants to list his friends names under the sleepover page.

 

What do you think of this layout? Leave a comment below and give me your thoughts,

Creatively, Carol

 

A Shammy Just for Stamps!

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The New Stamp Shammy!

We have seen the Close to my Heart Spritz Cleaner and the scrubbers go away, but in it’s place is the new Shammy for your stamps.  Let’s face it, a lot of you were using baby wipes anyway, and while they are disposable, this is a much better solution.  Just a little water to clean your stamps, then a dab of soap to clean the shammy and you are good to go.

One thing to remember is if you leave it in a scrunched-up little ball after washing it, it will, in fact, dry in a scrunched-up little ball!  There is a case your can get for drying your shammy, but I thought it was a bit too pricy for me. I have since found it dried in a ball, so I might have to reconsider this purchase.

The only think I am not crazy about is that it dries so quickly. When we had the spritz, I could just spray it on, it was always in a bottle, so always wet. Since it does need to be washed with soap and water, it is one extra step during the day while I am stamping since I didn’t put a sink in my office.

I hope this has helped you with how to clean your stamps. If you have any questions, leave them below and I will get them answered for you.

Creatively, Carol

Motivation for Monday with Direct-to-Paper Inking

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Good Morning!  Scrapbook page for 1 5x7 and 2 4x6 photosToday I have a scrapbook page for you to use as a sketch and the technique of direct-to-paper inking.  It features space for a 5 x 7 photo as well as 2 4 x 6 photos. You can choose whether you want to have a small 2 x 2 photo on the left and right side or an embellishment.  There is room to put smaller photos above the 4 x 6 mats if you need more space and even a 4×4 to the left of the 5 x 7 if you need it.  If you need any help in doing this layout, please reach out to me either by e-mail or text at 801-800-0884.

If you look closely at the layout, you can see I used the ink direct-to-paper technique to edge the photo mats. I will do a short video on how to do this.

 

When you have completed your interpretation of this sketch, please text me a picture of your finished layout so I can post it here, as well as enter you into the monthly drawing for a free stamp set.  If you use the technique shown in the photo, you get an extra entry into the drawing. Just a little incentive to get you to go outside your comfort zone.

Creatively, Carol

Scrapping Old School Photos

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I have been asked by someone dear to me to create a scrapbook for her son, who I also adore, so I said yes. In the box was an assortment of school photos. While I could have done a page for each year, I thought that would be just too much when I didn’t know the details of his likes and dislikes while he was in school so I opted for putting all of them on a 2-page layout.

I simply labelled the corner with the age, using all the same font and ink to keep it cohesive. Since this is all elementary school and Jr high, it leaves the ability to structure the high school years in another way.

We’ve Got Snow…Again

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Snow in Utah 4-3-2023Happy Monday!  I can’t believe that yesterday we had 60-degree weather and no snow was in sight. Today it looks like we have gotten 3″ so far and it is supposed to go on all week!  I am glad that scrapbooking is an indoor activity. Today’s sketch is based on a layout I did of my grandkids many years ago in the snow. I have decided that in order to provide you with sketches each week, and the weekly projects you receive in your e-mail each week (you are on the list, right??) I would have to sketch from some of my finished layouts and leave off the measurements. You can still totally scrap-lift the layout, but this way I can work on tomorrow’s newsletter project.

scrapbook sketch for 3 standard photosHere is the sketch:  you  have some basic  strips to make up the background, then layer the photos as desired.

Here is the finished layout:Kids playing in snow

I hope you have enjoyed this sketch. In the future you will find projects in my newsletters and only occasionally on the blog so take a moment to sign up for my newsletter in the upper right corner!

Creatively, Carol

Don’t You Hate Unfinished Projects?

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Don’t you just hate unfinished projects? I cut the pieces for this layout over a month ago, but since it required I get out the cuttlebug and cut the small papers with the Thin Cuts® I just set it aside for later. Well, later has arrived and I am calling Fridays “UNFINISHED FRIDAYS”.  Every Friday I will pull out a project that has gone unfinished and get it done. You will then see the finished project on my facebook page.

Today’s layout was from a kit called “Celebrating You.”  I had to search for the pictures which I had already had printed through Persnickety Prints which is the same company that prints your free photos if you subscribe to the Scrap with Heart Program.  They do beautiful work. Like I was saying before I got distracted, I had to find the pictures I was going to use.  If I had been smart, I would have put them in the drawers with the papers I had previously cut.

This layout took a bit more work on my part. I had to actually mark my papers to know where to put the triangles.

I thought I had found a way to save the wear and tear on the magnetic mat I use with my cuttlebug. The directions said to stack the squares, and when I cut them, it didn’t damage the mat at all, but then I had to manually cut all the cuts apart because it didn’t cut all the way through. I will try this again, with perhaps more thickness in my stack, as not damaging the magnetic mat would be an awesome savings.

I hope you will join me each Friday for “Finish It Up Friday” and work on those unfinished projects.  Send me a photo of your finished project and get entered into the monthly drawing for a free stamp set. Send it to Carol@CreativelyCarol.com and I will post it here on the blog.

Now go check out my facebook page and see the finished layout!

 

Scrapbooking is a connection word in many social circles

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Scrapbooking is a connection word in many social circles; whether you are talking to pre-teens to those of “a certain age” (sorry, I can’t wrap my head around calling myself “a senior” to everybody in between.  Usually everyone still have some printed pictures, but that has been changing over the past 30 years and how to care for their photos. In the 70’s, people used those “magnetic” albums, which were not really magnetic but has a sticky background and a clear cover you could peel back to arrange your pictures. The big problem with those is they don’t protect your photos from fading, the chemicals used were not archival quality and as many of us has learned after leaving photos in there for a couple of decades, photos are very difficult to get out!

Scrapbooking was always a social event. Scrapbook stores were everywhere and they hosted scrapbook nights. My daughter, a new mother t the time and I were first introduced to scrapbooking at a church meeting, then continued at the local scrapbook store every Thursday  night.  Now, before you start thinking, I don’t need to scrapbook with anyone, one of the benefits of these scrapbook nights, with different degrees of experience there were more opinions and suggestions on how to improve on a page when you felt something was missing. This is not like the suggestions you get from your mother-in-law, without any solicitation, but if you ask, they would have ideas. I learned a lot about scrapbooking from those wonderful women.

Now, after most brick and mortor scrapbook stores have closed, covid hits so we are isolated and all of that wonderful information has all but disappeared, along with the rows and rows of paper, embellishments and such. Yes, we still have the big three craft stores, but I don’t like the quality of some of the papers, and things don’t seem to match as well either. That is a topic for another day.

This list of twenty things every scrapbooker wants to know will help answer hopefully, most of your questions.  The posts over the next few days is intended to give anyone interested in scrapbooking a straight-forward and concise over-view of what someone new to scrapbooking needs to know. The concepts and ideas that follow come from my 25 years of scrapbooking experience and that of my scrapbooking friends.

If you have questions on this wondeful journey, please leave them below and I will try to answer your quesion.

Trip of a Lifetime Layout and Sketch

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Early this morning, I returned from a trip I took with my mother who is 82. It was just her and I. I wanted to be able to spend some one-on-one time with her while she still knew who I was.  You see, I had an experience when I visited my grandmother, in a nursing home for the last time. I knew it was going to be a good-bye visit as we didn’t live close to her anymore, and it was already breaking my heart, but when she kept patting my check and saying, “now who are you again?” it took every ounce of courage not to break down.  This was the last time I saw her, and she passed a couple months later.  I didn’t want that to be the case with my mother. So today’s layout is for a travel page. I will share more details about my trip later.

I have decided to turn things around, I am posting a layout, so you can see how the patterns and colors are put together, and under it, I have posted the sketch with measurements. Remember, you can make whatever adjustments are needed to work for your own layout. This is a page that could also use your scrap patterned paper,

Trip of a lifetime layout

 

My Stickese die cut shapes are used for the embellishments on this page, so your page stays very flat, if that is important to you. Here is the sketch:

Trip of a lifetime sketch

 

 

If you want to add more pictures to your Trip of a Lifetime page, you can use the patterened paper blocks and add two 2″ x 2″ photos in each square!

Creatively,

Carol

The Other Side of the Page

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Happy Monday!

Since today is a holiday here in the US, I hope you are doing something fun, and took lots of pictures and are here to get ideas on how to get them on the scrapbook page.  Last week I showed you the left side of the sports page for my son, Will. Today I want to share with you the companion sketch and resulting scrapbook page.  In this layout, I used a double mat to increase focus on the largest photo of the layout. I chose this picture because Will seemed to enjoy wrestling above all other sports in his school days.  He turned 40 last year and I remember him telling his nephew he could still take him on… that didn’t go so well 🙂

I chose a tag to feature the football picture from his freshman year, the only year he played high school football, and a pocket for the journaling. This is a great way to include events or stories on your pages without putting that story out there for just anyone to see.  I like to use pocket journaling when a detail might be a bit private, I still want to document the memory or thought, I just don’t need anyone else to read it, at least not at this time. Someone would have to make an effort to read the journaling, and that is not likely if someone is just flipping pages in your book.

Leave a comment below and tell me how you would use hidden journaling on your pages.

Creatively, Carol

 

Are You Tired of Sports

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Hello! Now that the Superbowl is over, are you tired of sports?  I know I am, except when it comes to my grandchildren’s events! As our kids grow up and participate in a variety of sports, how do we decide to memorialize them? When my kids were growing up we didn’t cell phones in order to snap a quick shot, at least not the older two. Thankfully, team sports usually had photos taken, and I have a few from my son Will’s sports days. Here is the sketch for today, and what I did to scrap those pictures.

While I had a few pictures of various sports, I wanted to show all the sports Will had participated in, so I chose one from each sport. You will see in the finished layout that I used metal spiral brads next to the first picture, and kept that theme going with punched spirals.  I have yet to do the journaling but will get that done by next week when I show you the companion sketch to this page. If you like sketches, click here to look at another sketch I posted. I also liked setting the title on sideways to lend extra interest to the page.

 

Remember as well, when you complete this sketch and send me a photo of your finished page before the end of the month, you will be entered into a drawing for a free stamp set. Just send your photo here.Will pl

 

Do you have problems deciding on a scrapbooking layout?

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Sometimes you just need a jump start!  You have your new scrapbooking packet, the Stamp of the Month, your inks, blocks and you just picked up pictures from the drugstore…. but you find yourself staring at a blank piece of paper and your mind goes blank!

You put the pictures out, but nothing comes to you… Don’t just put it away, I have scrapbook sketches posted every Monday Morning here at Creatively Carol. I call it my Motivational Monday Sketches feature.

We have all been there, and if we don’t infuse some new ideas into our layouts, we end up with all of our scrapbook pages looking alike. This is supposed to be fun, not work so I would like to invite you to come weekly and gather some new ideas for your pages.

Here is today’s Motivational Monday Sketch:  A single scrapbook page with 2- 4″x6″ photos.

Single page scrapbooking sketch

It is human nature to do something over and over when you find that it works for you but it does get boring. It’s okay to do the same scrapbook layout but wouldn’t you just LOVE to be like the professionals or the artists and just come up with a new design on your own?

Keep in mind, your scrapbooking doesn’t have to be perfect, it only has to reflect how you see the photos and how they make you feel.  I try not to scrapbook photos that leave me feeling blaa, but that isn’t always possible. I, too, have pages that are Dragnet journaling… (for those of you who are too young for the Dragnet reference it is… Just the facts ma’am.) If the page answers the who, what, where, when, and why, you have done your job for the next generation.  When you add how you feel about a certain photo, or even better, how the subject was feeling at the time you are helping your reader to get to know the subject a bit better.  I know I look at old photos my grandmother had and wonder what my great grandmother was thinking when she posed for a picture.

Scrapbooking is supposed to be fun and an enjoyable hobby, while at the same time telling the stories of your family and your life. If you are like I am and countless others who have become addicted to scrapbooking, you have many old photos that you need to put in your scrapbooks to preserve them and the sooner the better.

As you work with more and more different layouts and the many, many different ways of embellishing a page, you will gain more experience, more confidence and the Creative Ideas will come more naturally.

Remember, for every finished layout I receive, your name goes into the bucket for the end of the month drawing. I have lots of stamp sets to give away and you will be able to choose from them.

Now, leave a comment below with your thoughts, and then take the sketch and start creating. I will post my interpretation of the sketch later in the week.

6 Reasons To Scrapbook

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Do you need a reason to get into scrapbooking?  Here are six reasons to get you started:

  1. It’s a lot of fun.  
  2. Preserve family history for your posterity while introducing your family to future generations. This does so much more than just a family tree!
  3.  A good excuse to go shopping.  Ok, let’s be real. Do you need an excuse to go shopping?  You can shop via my website and never have to venture into the store, and shopping in your jammies is better at home! If you need informtaion on scrapbook adhesives, here is a great post for help.
  4. Get together with friends who love scrapbooking too.  We all need to get back into the world after two years of covid and becoming comfortable with being always at home.  There are other benefits to scrapbooking with friends, you bounce ideas off each other and learn more techniques and ways to look at things. You don’t have to take the advice or suggestion, but sometimes it helps.
  5. scrapbooking with the familyYou can get your children involved and make it a family activity.  My daughter actually introduced me to scrapbooking, and my grandson was very interested in what his mom was doing.I loved how the kids would describe a photo – the perfect journaling!
    6. The scrapbook albums look a lot nicer than shoe boxes full of photos and a lot safer too! Clouds are great for backing up your photos, but no one wants to sit down with you while you look though pictures on your computer together… but sitting together to look through an album…priceless!

Leave me a comment below and tell me if you scrapbook and your reasons for doing so.  I love to hear about how other people think about scrapbooking!

Creatively, Carol

I Have a Dream!

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Happy Martin Luther King Day! Today is the 60th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s famous speech. While that is still important today, I want to talk about dreams a bit closer to home. How many times have you said “I wish I could have asked ‘grandma’ (enter your person here” so many questions about their life.  The problem is as a young person, we are busy and don’t have the forethought to ask while these people are alive.  I have found in my sixties there are so many things I wished I had asked. Things like “how did you feel when you saw airline travel possible?” There are so many things.

How well do your kids know you?

How well do your kids and grandkids know you?  I have come to realize I don’t know some basic things about my parents, like their favorite colors, or favorite places to vacation, to mention a few. For this reason, I am starting a daily posting on the Creatively Carol Facebook page of questions to invoke thought, Share your memories, ideas, dreams and feelings with those in your life.  You can answer on the page, (then copy and paste your answer into an online journal or document, or write the question into a scrapbook or journal and then answer it.  While I favor this method because I think handwriting stirs feelings, however, that is not always as practical at this time in our lives.

Share These Questions With Family

My parents are not regular visitors to Facebook so I plan to e-mail them the questions they may actually answer. Some generations, (and some families) are more open about the things they will talk about. I raised my own children in a manner that told them they could ask us anything and we would answer or talk about it. My daughter has continued this with her own children. The questions may not always be comfortable, but sharing your answers could lend insight into their own lives either now, or later in life. My grandson, her youngest, asked how often her parents had sex! She asked him if he was really asking her if it was something he really wanted to know. He explained, yes, I want to know if you have a healthy sex life. She answered him and said “this is what a healthy sex life looks like. He later asked me if his grandfather and I still had sex. I was glad it was a yes or no answer as I didn’t feel as free to go into details!

Now it is your turn! Jump over to my Facebook page and answer today’s question (worry, nothing like my grandson’s questions) and begin your journey into sharing your life.  I will share a few more ideas about this in the coming days.

Creatively, Carol

 

 

Patterned Scrapbook Paper, Is it Safe For your Photos?

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Today’s scrapbook market is a plethera of choice, not as much as 15 years ago but still you have a choice when it comes to albums, tools , adhesives, cardstock and papers. If you love color and pattern, you love browsing patterns either in person or by turning catalog pages. But how do you know whether these beautiful patterns are safe for your scrapbooks? While Close to my Heart patterned paper is sold in kits, and we tell you they are acid and lignin free, most stores sell printed paper by the sheet, and only a few are labeled using tear-off strips. Unless the display is clearly marked, you usually cannot tell which company sells the paper and whether it is an acceptable quality. For the most part, scrapbookers must trust the retailer’s claims that everything on display is photo-safe.

Many reputable paper companies have a vital concern about the quality of their papers. Unfortunately, because scrapbooking is a hot market, many companies jumping on the bandwagon have less regard for quality than profit. Claims that a product is “photo-safe” or “archival” are not always based on a true understanding of what characteristics are important for safe scrapbook paper.

Fortunately, there are standards that define the characteristics of scrapbook paper. The accepted standard specifies that scrapbook paper be acid-free (pH’ between 7 and 10), buffered’ (atleast 2 % alkaline reserve), contain no more than 1 % lignin”. I once read that scrapbook paper also resist tearing. Since I use tearing as a technique in my scrapbooking, I am not sure about the resisting of tearing is actually true.
For scrapbook papers, a pH on the lower end of the specified range is preferable because of the potential effects of higher
alkaline paper on photographs.

Most companies that sell patterned paper don’t make it themselves; they buy the paper from a paper mill and have it printed and packaged. Ideally, printing inks should be colorfast, lightfast and pH -neutral, choices that often cost more money. The printing itself also affects the visual quality of the paper. Dust spots, smudges or other imperfections should be caught during press checks. Additionally, verifying that the colors stay the same from batch to batch makes it easier for consumers to match papers in their scrapbooks. You can see this evidenced by the paper packs Close to my Heart offers, colors always go together in the kits, and you can use those colors as a guide when putting pages together.

Understanding the requirements of a quality printed paper still raises the same question. How do you know which papers meet these requirements? Close to my Heart is very upfront about the quality of their paper, unfortunately, finding this information with other papers is not as easy. Start by asking the person or store owner who sold you the paper. If they cannot provide the answers, call the paper company. Ask them whether their paper stock meets the standards for permanence and how the company ensures their paper quality on an ongoing basis. The answers will help you know whether to have confidence in a particular brand .

In addition to researching paper composition, you can also take several practical steps to ensure the quality of your papers. When choosing printed paper, visually inspect it for imperfections and determine whether it is an adequate weight for your purposes. I prefer a heavier weight than I find in big box craft stores. I like a good weight as base pages, so my photos are protected. If you are going to use a die-cut machine, the weight is important. There is nothing more frustrating than cutting an element only to have it tear as you remove it from the sticky mat. Don’t pick the first piece on the stack  it’s been most exposed to the environment,  including fingerprints from other consumers” Lastly

Finally, treat paper with care.. Store papers away from excessive heat, light and humidity, and avoid unnecessary handling, which can cause wear, tear and contamination. Remembering these things will help you put together a scrapbook that will withstand the test of time.

Are We There Yet?

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Close to my Heart Jan-Mar 2023 CatalogThe newest Close To My Heart catalog was just released on the first and, from cover to cover, it is full of exciting new products and ideas to preserve the memories you’ve made in the past year and are planning for in the year to come. Today though, I want to share with you, the layouts from the cover featured paper pack “Are We There Yet?”   How many times as parents have we heard that one?

The paper pack was inspired by that wanderlust in all of us. Whether is a graduation trip, vacation or just a girl’s weekend, this paper is great. Let me show you these projects. I am listing the supplies used as well if you are interested. I will also post the full instructions at the end.

  • Scrapbook page on TravelZ4677 Are We There Yet?—Scrapbooking Stamp + Thin Cuts
  • C1966 My Acrylix® Are We There Yet—Borders Stamp Set
  • X7288S Are We There Yet? Paper Packet + Sticker Sheet
  • X6066 Honey Butter Cardstock,
  • X6063 Papaya Cardstock
  • X6044 Peach Cardstock
  • X5957 Sapphire Cardstock
  • 1385 White Daisy Cardstock,
  • Z6534 Papaya Exclusive Inks™ Stamp pad
  • Z6502 Peach Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad,
  • Z2848 Sapphire Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad
  • Z2828 Toffee Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad
  • X7288E Are We There Yet? Rubber Shapes
  • Z3726 Tags & Tabs Thin Cuts,

 

I hope you get to start travelling more now that the urgency of covid is past us (we hope) Just remember what they say ” if it isn’t in the scrapbook, it didn’t happen” really though,  think of how your family will love looking back on vacation pictures that are not just sitting on the computer.  Whatever adventures come your way, let’s not forget to document and preserve them! After all, sometimes to know where to go next, we need to remember where we’ve been. Scrapbooking is a beautiful way to journal these experiences, and it’s also a wonderful way to look back on them and share them with others.

Here is a link to the complete scrapbook workshop so you can see how you can create these layouts too!

Creatively,

Carol