Leftovers Anyone?

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Do you keep leftover buttons and beads you find because you know they will come in handy at some point in the future? I wanted to share with you a few ways to use these found treasures in your scrapbook pages.

Using a strong adhesive, you can add buttons and beads to your scrapbook titles,Using MicroBeads as an embellishment

In this layout I used microbeads to make spirals as an embellishment.  First you cut the shape on cardstock, or use a Thin Cut or Cutting machine. Attach a strong adhesive like Liquid Glass, and press the beads into the adhesive. You can do the same things with seed beads and add buttons over the top with a pop-dot.

You can also do bead letters, where the shape doesn’t have to be precise, you can glue directly onto the page, but I prefer to add to cardstock and cut around after they are dry so I am not putting liquid on the page that could cause buckling.

I recommend doing one letter or element at a time. This will give you enough time to get your beads on before the adheasive dries. When the adhesive is dry, tip your embellishment to release all the unglued beads to use another day.

 

I love using buttons as flowers, and they work well on both cards and scrapbook pages. There are so many fun shapes. Here is a layout using buttons as flowers:

Scrapbooking Baby Pictures

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Scrapbooking baby pictures is fun. Today I am going to show you a layout done completely on the computer.  Digital scrapbooking use to be very popular, but I was always a hands on type of scrapbooker. To me it is therapy… cutting the paper, stamping the images. If I am following directions to complete the scrapbook page, then I am not thinking about whatever might be weighing my mind down. If you have lots of children and you want to scrap pictures of grandma

Scrapbooking baby pictures on the computer

that everyone will want in their album, then you can create the layout on the computer and print a copy for each of them.

Here I scanned a piece of scrapbook paper from the Scaredy Cat paper pack from a few years ago. In keepig with the stars motif, I used black stars to highlight Shawn’s name, and used a font color included in the paper. My computer program grabbed the color, but it almost looks peachy instead of golden when put on the black.  I will be creating this layout on paper to go in my cousin’s album. This way I know the colors will match. But I wanted to show you what is possible. This is a great way to scrapbook if you need lots of copies of your pages, or you just don’t have time to do it in paper.

Send me your take on this scrapbooking baby layout at [email protected] and be entered to win a free stamp set!  If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out, I would love to help.

Creativey, Carol

Where You Store Your Scrapbooks Matters!

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Keeping your Scrapbook Albums Safe

Are Your Scrapbooks Safe?

Are your grandmother’s old photos in the attic in a box? Time to get them out of there! Safe Scrapbooking doesn’t just start with quality, acid-free supplies, but it ends with where and how you store completed albums. Improper conditions can cause more damage than acidic elements.  To maximize the longevity of both your scrapbooks and the priceless memories they contain, follow these basic storage guidelines.

Choose a cool, dry storage place, which means keep them out of the attic! Heat and humidity are the two most dangerous elements in any storage environment. High heat makes photos fade faster, twice as fast for every 10 percent increase in temperature. High humidity can cause photos to become sticky, develop stains or grow fungus. Additionally, wide fluctuations in temperature and humidity can cause photos to crack, wrinkle or delaminate. Now you know it is time to get grandma’s pictures out of the attic or the garage and into a scrapbook. Excess heat and humidity can also cause scrapbook papers, inks and other materials to deteriorate.

Overexposure

To avoid exposing your albums to temperature extremes, store your scrapbooks in the coolest location in your home. The relative humidity should stay between 20% and 50 % and the temperature should not get above 77 degrees. This means you want to avoid hot attics and damp basements. A shelf or closet on the main floor is often the best location. And if you think about it, they are more likely to get looked at long after you created them if they have a special place in your home. Given the investment in photos and supplies, it may be worth it to purchase an accurate thermometer and hygrometer to track temperature and humidity in your storage area depending on where you live. If you find that the relative humidity often exceeds 65 %, think about a dehumidifier. Air conditioning during hot summer months also helps avoid extreme heat and humidity.

Storage Direction

Store your scrapbooks vertically with the spine facing out and the sides supported with slight, gentle pressure. In other words, keep the shelf tight, so each album holds up the other ones. Don’t leave scrapbook albums open and on display,  light exposure can cause photos, papers and inks to fade and yellow and dry out the adhesive.

prevent pressure problems Elements such as eyelets, brads, wire, sequins, beads and buttons must be used with care to avoid physical damage during storage. These embellishments can cause indentations or abrasions on scrap­ book pages, especially if albums are stored with excessive pressure on their sides.

If you are like me, you have used lots of dimensional elements, brads, ribbons, buttons, you get the idea, on your pages, you can use spine extenders between the pages to prevent pressure damage, think of the impression or even a hole a brad can make on your next page if it is packed too tightly.It is generally a good idea to plan your albums around 3-D ele­ments when possible. Simply do not place photos directly across from 3-D embellishments on a facing page so there is less chance for damage.

Think of things this way, you spend good money on your scrapbooking hobby, and how crushed you would be if they got damaged. While I am not an advocate of keeping all your photos only on your camera or a backup disc, I am also not one to just put all that hard work in the album and hope for the best. I photograph every scrapbook page that I create, just in case there was a flood or fire, and those are backed up to a cloud.  One less thing to worry about when keeping your scrapbooks and photographs safe.

Creatively, Carol

 

 

 

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 [email protected] 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