I've been so busy traveling lately that I hadn't yet made a single layout with my August kit from Studio Calico, Summer of '69. I've actually really missed working with my kits this past month, and one day last week as May Flaum and I were chatting the subject came up, and it turned out that she'd also picked up a couple of the add-on kits and several shop items (there was a ton of October Afternoon's lovely Woodland Park collection in this round of goodies) but hadn't even had a chance to open the packages.
Over the weekend May and I both fixed that problem- the kits were opened and crafty goodness ensued! I made the layout below (and have also sorted the kits out into my tray system for more scrappy fun later this month), and May is posting her own projects today, as well.
I really, really love working with Studio Calico's kits- they've always got such a great mix of papers and embellishments, and I had no trouble putting this page together fairly quickly. I took a few photos along the way, too, to help share my scrapping process with you!
As excited as I was to use my Studio Calico kit, I actually started this page with a specific tool in mind that I wanted to use- the Happy Hexagons cover plate from Papertrey Ink. I wasn't sure exactly how I was going to use it- I was thinking maybe as a layered background with some of the hexies filled in with bits of patterned paper- but I decided to just cut a piece out of kraft cardstock and see where things went from there.
I already had two photos in mind for this page and knew I wanted a dark background so I went for a warm-ish dark gray cardstock and added the die cut piece and my pictures in about the spot I knew I wanted them.
I also had a title in mind right away and knew I wanted it to look like it was "bubbling up" out of the photo, so I got out my little army of plastic rulers and lined up all the letters just to check placement.
When I was sure that my title would fit where I wanted it, I put the rulers aside and started layering in papers. It wasn't long before I had located, chopped up, and layered in enough chunks to make me happy. I did leave a little more space for layering since I knew I was going to also include some flat embellishments like tags and journaling cards.
I haven't been very happy lately with the way my photos sometimes seem to get lost amongst all the papers on the page, so I was grateful for a tip I picked up from Jen Jockish's Pop Off The Page class at Studio Calico (unfortunately the classroom sold out) about making them stand out a bit more. Thanks to Jen's suggestion, I found myself at Michaels on Sunday afternoon in search of vellum.
Yes, vellum. It turns out that it's great for layering under photos to make them pop just a bit without completely covering up the papers underneath. I'm going to be doing this a lot in the future!
Next it was time to turn to flat-ish embellishments- a few die cuts, a bit of chipboard border, and even a piece of flair (which wasn't technically flat, but I immediately knew where I wanted it to go) made their way onto the page. I also sorted through the more dimensional items in the kit and pulled out a few bits that I might want to add later- you can see them in the small pile to the right of the layout in the photo below.
At this point I was actually ready to stick everything down and stitch it in place so I could add those dimensional items, so I adhered everything and then ran it through the sewing machine as usual.
It was a very, very few minutes later that I finished adding the dimensional items and journaling and had finished my layout!
This page documents a story of its own, but there's more story behind the reason I wanted to go ahead and make this page now. You see, over the weekend I started a new adventure...
Darren has been after me for years to get my scuba diving certification, and he even gave me lessons for my birthday earlier this year. I'm just now finding time to dig into it all, though, so over the weekend I visited the dive shop (I'll be learning from the same dive master who taught D), picked up my study package, and signed up for oodles and oodles of pool work later this month. I now have a whole big book to study, some instructional videos to watch, and test to take to ensure that I understand fun things like nitrogen narcosis and decompression. And apparently I have to be able to swim 300 yards (luckily they don't time you) and tread water for 20 minutes...all of which Darren assures me I really can do.
I'm actually quite excited to get started- at the end of the course I get to do checkout dives in Panama City, and if I finish quickly enough I can even take the annual volunteer diver test at the Tennessee Aquarium and hopefully help with things like tank maintenance and cleaning from time to time- so cool!
I'm also quite excited that you've hung with me until the end of this post, because I have a really, really fun giveaway to share! May Flaum is one of my favorite scrapbooking instructors ever, and I'm pumped to be taking her Kit-tastic class at Big Picture Classes later this month.
And, guess what? May said that I could give a pass away to one of my readers, too! I thought this was the perfect post to do it in since both May and I are playing with kits, and to enter all you have to do is leave a comment on this post (make sure your email address is somewhere on the comment form) before Midnight on Friday, September 7, 2012. I'll randomly select a winner on Saturday morning to receive free access to this class!
Good luck, and thanks for stopping by- be sure to check out the coolness that May has in store for you today, too!
Supplies (click on images for product links):