daddy & me

I chose to leave this one without a title, but I'm calling it "daddy & me". I started with white cardstock, and then placed the black strip on the right side, and used die-cut black paper for the center border strip. The flourish paper was trimmed from DCWV Alphabet Stack, and was very pale, so I used charcoal colored chalk by Pebbles Inc. to deepen the outer/inner portions of the flourishes and did some outlining and shading with a Zig Photo Signature Black Pen. The journaling was done in MS Word with a downloaded font and printed on Grafix InkJet Adhesive-Backed Paper. The I placed a lot of embellishments on the right side of the photo...I used chip board shapes, flowers, rub ons, stickers and some of my own doodling with my Signo pen. I use a lot of rub-ons from Basic Grey, these are called Urban Calligraphy, and sometimes the size/shape isnt exactly right for the space I need, I trim them very carefully to the exact size i need, ( I do this mainly with the larger or odd shaped flourishes.) and then I use my Signo to lightly add anything that may have been trimmed off. I started with "naked" chipboard (on most of the pieces) and colored the pieces black & white just using a marker, Deco Color markers are fantastic for this because they are so opaque, dry shiny, and is a quicker solution than using acrylic paints.

snow angel

I got to play with a few new things in this layout, YAY! The paper is by DCWV, called The Luxury Stack, and has the most beautiful pearly/metallic papers in it. I used blue/teal/green chalks on the outer corners and edges, and after it dried i applied ink (Holtz distressing ink in Antique Linen) to the corners only using my fingers. I also used an ink pad called Brilliance, Platinum Planet and kind of just smudged that color all over the page, I really love how that one works over chalks, it makes them super shimmery and soft looking. the title is chipboard, and the flousihes were cut from another sheet of paper from the DCWV stack, i just inked and chalked them to match the rest of the colors, and then outlined them with my Signo White Uni Ball Pen. the left border, and the border around the photo are stickers, and the flowers are actually from Joann's, they have their own brand of some items, including these flowers which i must say i was pleasantly surprised at how lovely they were, plus they were quite inexpensive compared with other brands. I used rub ons from Bo Bunny for the snowflakes, some rub on doodles/leaves/accents, and bling from Martha Stewart and Heidi Swapp. The sparkes you see on the flowers and flourishes are Stickles, in Icicle & Crystal. The photo is a 5x7 that i altered to sepia tones.

precious butterfly

well, i have a lot going on here, so i'll do my best, lol... the paper is basic grey, and the title thickers by american crafts. i used a hambly transparency over the photo that had the white edging on it already, but added a ton of basic grey rub on flourishes around it, as well as a black border rub on. the journaling here is from the song Butterfly Kisses by Bob Carlisle, and was printed on transparency inkjet-film. the large butterfly at the bottom is a mosaic, done by cutting tiny squares of glittered paper and applied with tweezers, as well as beads, rhinestones and chipboard flourishes. i chalked and inked the butterfly and most of the background paper, adding the blue-grey tone to it. i used an opaque gold marker to accent the flowers and some of the doodles (some doodles are hand drawn, some are rub ons) and added little doodled polka dots to the butterfly and flourishes. the right border strip was cut from a DCWV paper. there is gold print vellum paper that i crinkled and adhered with GLOO around some of the edges, and the rest of the embellies around the photo are chipboard and beads. i cut the wing and added it to the photo, decorating it with a gold marker and some mosaic tiles, and finished it with the GLOO to make it shiny and adhere everything.

smiley girl

i started this one with plain white cardstock, and then glued down the white floral die cut paper after i trimmed it to my liking. there are 2 separate scallop edge borders under the photo, which were also white to begin with. i chalked them a deep blue on the edges, and then green and very pale blue toward the center. i used blue and green colored pencils to color in the small areas of the floral cardstock, and then used blue/green chalks over them. i extended the chalking to the outer area of the flowers, applying it in a sweeping motion, keeping the lightest color to the outer areas. after the chalk had set overnight, i used a pearescent platinum colored ink and applied it all over the outer chalked areas with my fingers in the same motion as the chalks. Inks work very well with chalks, and there are multiple ways you can use them together, this method creates a luminous effect on the paper. the embellishments are sparkly foam butterflies, rhinestones (indvid. and flourishes) chipboard,flowers, brads, rub ons, also flourishes that i created using a doodle genie template and chalk.

pumpkin princess

i started this one with black cardstock for the base, and then layerd an orange trimmed paper across the middle, which i chalked and inked to alter the color tone slightly.the chalking was done using a bright orange, a pale orange and bright yellow chalk. i applied darker to the outside, and blended toward the center, adding the lighter colors as i went, using my fingers to blend them together.the border trim around the center is from DCWV's Alphabet Stack with Glitter, one of my absolute favorite new purchases. I trimmed some 2 inch strips and laid them horizontally across the page. The torn paper on the bottom of the center is from Me & My Big Ideas, a Black and White metallic paper, which i tore by hand.All the white strips along the borders were done with a Deco-Color Opaque white Marker (Broad Tipped).the embellishments along the left side of the photo are flowers, which i inked and chalked, felt fusion (a very cool ream of felt swirls that you can trim to your liking), ribbon, stickles glitter glue gel in Gun Metal, Hambly Screen Prints journaling bits, and Glitz Design Icing Dots.The large orange flower was folded in half, and i applied some metallic gold ink to it using my fingers, and secured it with a black and white brad. i also applied distressing ink and chalk to it. I peeled some little pieces of metallic paper and wrapped them around a q-tip to create a ribbon curl, and used a dot of glue to secure them around the large orange flower.finally, i downloaded a font to create the title using MS Word, and printed it on a self-adhesive ink jet transparency film, available at any office supply or craft store.

you shine

here is a layout that i used a few different distressing techniques. First, i used a background cardstock of plain cream color, then mounted 3 small photos overlapping each other in the center of the page. the paper on the left side with the blue snowflakes is by Basic Grey, a collection called Figgy Pudding. the other borders are from DCWV.i trimmed the papers with a Fiskars mini trimmer, and tore the edges by hand. when doing this, it works best (for me) to tear toward you, in a slight upward motion very slowly so you keep it somewhat straight.the title is chipboard, which i coated in crystal Stickles to make it pop a bit more, and the flourishes are stamped/hand drawn and outlined with my white Signo pen, and also a very fine tipped brown marker.i distressed the papers by using a Holtz ink pad called Tea Dye, and another called Weathered Wood, which is a deep blue. I used deeper tones on the outer parts, and blended inwards with my fingers. After it dried, i chalked all over with gold and white shimmery chalks by Pebbles, Inc. I also chalked the flowers, and used just a bit of ink on some of them to deepen the colors. finally, i used the crystal stickles to trace the snowflakes on the paper, which i think really made a huge difference in making them stand out more against the distressing.