Final Sketch Mania Challenge

Last week was the third and final week of the Sketch Mania competition over at Scraps of Us.  I had such fun with these challenges and I'm certainly going to miss them.  If nothing else, it gave me an excuse to site down and scrap (well, digi-scrap) even during the busy holiday season.

The challenge for week 3 was to create a double page sketch to house 6-8 photos plus journaling.  Loved this! I am always looking for ways to get more photos on a single page.

Here's what I came up with.

Once the sketch was submitted, the next part of the challenge was to scrap it - with a catch:  The layout must have only 2 colours plus black or white (choose one), AND we must use buttons and ribbon.

When I saw this I was stunned since buttons for me are a big problem!  I don't tend to use them much because quite frankly, I am just never happy with the way they look.  So I was a bit concerned.

Nonetheless, here is my layout - and despite the difficulties I had with the buttons, I am pretty happy with the final result.

Unfortunately I can't give the appropriate credit right now on all of the page elements, since they are from a whole bunch of different kits (I hate it when that happens!)  I need to remember to keep track of these things as I'm creating!  Usually when I digi-scrap I choose one, maybe two kits at most and work with them exclusively on a layout, however here, because I needed some buttons and ribbons that coordinated, I couldn't find everything in one place.  If you have a specific question about an element, just holler, because I'm sure I could figure it out if I needed too.

Also, remember if you create a layout based on one of my sketches, I'd love to see it!  Just upload it somewhere, pop me an email or send me a link!  I just love to see how sketches come together as art!

More Digi Fun.

I mentioned the other day that I was participating in a Sketch Challenge over at Scraps of Us.  For week two, we had to create a sketch using circle photos and flowers.

Circle photos are a bit outside of my box, but here's the sketch I submitted.

And here's my layout!

This was done using a freebie collaborative kit that I picked up last year called Mango Tango.  I just love the cool brights colours and the floral accents!  They matched my daughter's bathing suit perfectly!

I also scrapped a sketch submitted by Tracy - one of the other girls participating in the challenge (and funnily enough, she's also my sister).

Here is her sketch and the layout I created based on it!

 You'll notice that yet again I switched things up a bit.  I just couldn't get my head around journaling in the centre section.  I tried several times, but couldn't make it work for me.  That though is the beauty of sketches in my opinion.  They are a great 'launching point' for the creative process.  You don't always have to follow them exactly in order to make them work for you!

Thanks for stopping by - until next time.

What I've Been Up To!

Wow!  The time just slips away doesn't it?

Over the last couple of weeks I've been busy busy busy to say the least but I have had some time (although not enough as usual) to get crafty.

I'm participating in the Sketch Mania challenge over at Scraps of Us which has been really fun.  It started December 1, and so far I've created two sketches, and one layout as part of that challenge.  I can only post the first sketch right now as the second hasn't been released to the group yet, but I will post it as soon as I can.

Here is my Sketch Mania Sketch #1

The directions for the challenge were pretty straightforward - create a sketch that includes 4 photos and one spot for journaling.  If you'd like to create a layout based on my sketch that would be awesome!  I would love to see it!  Just create away and then post it out there in cyberspace, but be sure to send me a link (via email or a comment).

Liz Weber, another gal in the Sketch Mania group was assigned my sketch to create a layout as part of the contest.  I have requested her permission to share her creation here, but haven't received a response yet.  Hopefully she agrees to let me share, since she did a fantastic job with it.  It is so fun to see a sketch come to life.

The layout I created as part of the Sketch Mania challenge is this one.

I decided to go all-digi on this, and used a freebie that I picked up from Studio Baers Garten @ Scrapbookgraphics called Turkey Day by Iara Gomes Baer.  I think the freebie is still available, so if you're interested in picking it up try this link to download.

The sketch I received was by Tracy Sherriff, and is below and while I admit, I did interpret this one a little creatively and incorporated lots of extra 'white' space, the layout of each element matches her sketch exactly, although in reverse.  This was a ton of fun to pull together, and I'm really looking forward to designing future Sketch Mania sketches and layouts.

Tracy's Sketch

The other thing I've been working on, although not quite so faithfully is my Jessica Sprague Holidays in Hand album.  I actually don't even have anything to share on this quite yet, but it is in process.

AND....I haven't forgotten about my KaiserCraft Advent Calendar project that I promised to post, I just haven't had a chance to take the pic.  Hopefully this will get done today and I will post my finished project tomorrow.  The kids are just loving checking out the little drawers each morning.  It's really fun!

Until next time.....

I took a bit of time to play today

As I sat with my morning coffee this a.m., I did some blog surfing. I haven't done this in a while, so I had a lot to catch up on and one of the stops I made was over to Artistic Paperie to see what April was up to ---- and there it was a really great sketch and companion Photoshop template. So of course, I just had to download it and give it a go. I have so much work to do that I really shouldn't have taken the time out to do this, but over time I've learned that when the urge to create strikes I need to answer. Otherwise I'm just distracted for the rest of the day and get little (if any) real work done. Anyhow here's April's sketch:

And this is what I came up with:

I'm really happy with the way this turned out. The sketch worked with my pictures perfectly since I didn't really have any really great shots. Most of them were taken from really far away so as prints they really didn't look that great. Being able to focus on specific parts of the photos within the small sections in April's sketch worked perfectly. I did switch it up a little bit as you can see, placing two larger pictures within the grid instead of including 12 smaller ones - but this just shows how sketches are like a launch pad. They are a great start, and while sometimes you can use them just as they are, it's okay to switch them up a bit too and modify the design to suit your needs.

Fall on the Farm - Sketch Layout

As promised, I finished up my layout this morning, adding my title and journalling. I love the way it all came together. You will notice that I eliminated the embie on the second page (see star in sketch) as my title seemed to be enough, and the tag attached to the bracket kind of does the same job visually I think. I should also mention that you can't really tell from the photo, but the letters are cut from a linen-look patterned paper, they just didn't photograph well and look quite plain. The flower/splat on page 1 is paper covered chipboard as is the bracket on page 2. The green background on the bottom half of the layout is textured cardstock, something that is again not very photogenic, but I think you get the idea. Once again, please take my sketch for a test drive and do share what you create. I would love to see it! Just leave me a comment here with a link to your blog or gallery. Have a great day!

My Sketch Challenge

Since you all know how much I love sketches, I thought it about time that I posted a sketch challenge of my own. I hope that my sketch makes sense (after all I've never done this before) and that you will find it fun to work with. The sketch was born from my desire to scrapbook some pictures of my kids from last fall that have been calling out to me. The page is in process as I write this - with only the title and finishing touches to go, and I will post it as soon as it's photo-worthy. (This will likely be sometime tomorrow as it's getting late). For now --- here's the sketch I came up with, it's for 7 photos (although 2 are quite small and could be replaced with embellishments if you like. If you do get a chance to give this a try, please be sure to post a comment to this thread and a link back to your blog or gallery so that I can have a look at what you came up with. Have fun!

Simplicity

I haven't spent much time stamping this week, but I did manage to sneak a few minutes to create this quick card using one of my new sets from Gina K Designs. The stamps actually arrived quite some time ago - but on top of being generally busy with other things, I have been plagued with an unshakeable headache for a couple of days. A headache which unfortunately doesn't allow me to concentrate and get creative. It seems to have passed now, so perhaps I can get back to the crafting table later today or this evening. For now though, I'll thought I'd post this one to freshen things up a bit. The floral stamp and sentiment are both from Gina K's "Simple Pleasures" set and the designer paper is an old one I had stashed from 7 Gypsies. The card design is simple and based yet again on Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge at Fresh and Fun (Oh how I love sketches!). In light of the fact that I was feeling generally unwell and pressed for time, I resisted the urge to mess it all up with ink and sandpaper as is normally my habit but I quite like it this way -- so all is good. Have a fantastic Wednesday -- I'm off to Splitcoast to see what today's sketch challenge is all about. Perhaps I'll post later with my response. Ciao!

Splitcoast Sketch Challenge #159

Since today is Wednesday, a new sketch challenge was posted at Splitcoast and you can find the details and sketch here. This is actually the first time I've officially responded to a SCS sketch challenge and it was a lot of fun. The gallery of responses is growing literally by the minute. As I write this, there is already more than 150 images there! And Wow -- there is some gorgeous work. It's always amazing to me how we can all look at the same base image and then come up with such varied card designs. Since in 2008 I'm on a mission to use up some stuff that has been hanging around for a while -- I opted to use these Floral Tapestry papers from CTMH. I really really liked them when I bought them (else I wouldn't have), but I gotta tell ya, they've been difficult for me to work with. I think maybe it's the pink in them that throws me off, I'm not exactly sure. I love the blues and greens definately, but the pink tends to be a wee bit bright in comparison. Over the last year or so, I have seen some gorgeous stuff made from them on blogs, in online galleries and so on, but so far I'm not overly satisfied with anything that I've managed to create with them. I just can't seem to get them to work for me. So once again I will sock them away and perhaps another day I will get the creative spark I need to use them up.

I really should tidy up more often.......

because I just couldn't resist using Figgy Pudding just one more time in response to a sketch challenge on "Am I A Scrap Addict?". I loved the sketch, but didn't want to spend a ton of time creating so again used what was on the desk. Perhaps now that I've used my 'wintery' paper for a 'wintery' project I can bring myself to put it away! (As with most projects, this looks much nicer in person....I wish that dimensional items were more obvious in photos......)

You Gotta Love a Sketch Challenge!

I was doing some blog surfing this afternoon, and within just a few clicks I came across a sketch challenge at Celebration Moments. It's funny, sometimes I see a sketch and can try for hours to come up with something that will work, and then other times -- it all seems to just to come together. This sketch was one from the latter category. I saw it, and immediately knew exactly how I wanted to work with it.

Thanks Linda (at Celebration Moments) for getting me creating this afternoon! I'll be visiting your site regularly to check out future challenges!