Monkey Business...

Wow more scrapping!  My daughter and I have just had 3 non working days at the same time and it's been great getting the photos out and working on our scrap books.  I bought this DP ages ago from Capture the Magic (a great scrapbooking store a friend told me about) and as the actual tree design is so fabulous I didn't want to cover too much of it with photos.

The photos I'm using for my Brazil album are Tesco prints so they are all the same size and quite small.  I can't print anymore as the originals were lost when the hard drive crashed on the last computer we had.  It's only when you start using the prints that you realise things like the monkeys all looking the same way and it really effects how you can position things and what you can create.

To bring some size variation to my album on this double page spread I've cut one of the photos into a circle and on the second page chopped four photos up and then repositioned them to create a larger image.  These 12" x 12" pages are quite a challenge, but I'm so enjoying myself, which is what it's all about.

Here's a close up of the first page showing the Marmoset close ups and the skeleton leaves.  Yeah, I knew the pack of 100 leaves I bought about 5 years ago would be useful at some stage - only another 98 to use now.

Thanks to blogging buddies pointing me in the right direction I've found some great Scrapbooking Challenges out there so I'm entering my Monkey Business layout for the challenge at Practical Scrappers where the theme this week is Patterned Paper.  Hope my tree background counts.

Just realised my pages are also perfect for the challenges at...

• The Crafty Calendar Challenge - The Great Outdoors
• The ABC Challenge - unused stash (the skeleton leaves)

Have a fabulous day everyone.

Ann xxx

Under the sea...

This is a card made (rather late in the day!) for the card swap on a forum I belong to.  The theme was 'Under the Sea'.  As I received the most exquisite card from my swap partner the pressure was really on to create something worthy to send on to her.

I decided to use my Clarity mermaid stamp and bravely use my Perfect Pearls and Versemark ink pad. I say bravely as I haven't used Perfect Pearls for a while and wasn't sure if what I visualised would work or not.  

I really wanted to use blues to give 'sea' like feel and gold to add richness.  I tried a few versions - at one stage doing the bubbles in blue and green but it was impossible to get the definition of the colours so in the end I went for quite a simple look with just blue and green on the fin and everything else in gold.

I love the Cuttlebug bubble embossing folder for sea effects and used that to create the two panels.  As you can see the Marianne flower die crept in on the act.  It wasn't on the original plan for this card, but I couldn't find my shell stamps so had to use it to embellish the corner.  My daughter and resident critique says the flower works as the swirls give a sea weed/wave effect and the flower is like the kind a mermaid would wear in her hair.  Sometimes daughters are lovely - sometimes the comments are so bad a card gets demolished and a lot of rethinking takes place.

This is the card I did last time using this stamp way back in July last year.  The details are here .

As well as being for the swap my card is also for the challenges at...

• Rainbow Lady's Challenge - Ocean Shades (hmmmm I really should have read Cynthia's challenge more carefully as I completely missed the bit about using initials on the card - what about if we count the bubbles as 'o's Cynthia and then it could stand for Oh (as in 'Oh can I get away with this one?)
• Stamp Something - Celebrate - sometimes we don't need a specific reason it's good just to say 'Happy Everything'.

Well have a super day everyone.  I'm returning to Slimming World after a couple of months off - ouch how much damage have I done?  May have to call at my favourite craft outlet on the way there to cheer myself up.

Ann xxx

Flowers for a friend...

and I really hope the post man has delivered this card by now and it's safe to add the card to my blog!  I can't hold the card back any longer as I used the sketch from Sweet Sketch Wednesday to create the card.  If you haven't been to their challenge blog do check it out as they do the most gorgeous sketches each week.

To create the centre piece I've used a sentiment by Pink Cat Studio and combined it with one of the fab flowers from my treasured Kanban tree sets.  The DP and plain green card is also by Kanban and matches the stamp.  As you can see now I know that you're supposed to thread ribbon through this Marianne flower die there's no stopping me!  I love these dies and I think my birthday wish list is going to be made up of quite a few of them.  A non blogging friend showed me a card she had made using the poinsetta and it was just fabulous so that is definitely on my wish list.

If you have these dies and have had problems getting the cut piece out of the die check out Top Tip Tuesday on Bah! Humbug!  I had a flash of inspiration and found this works a treat.

Hope my friend loves her card.  She is a very special person - always there to give advice and just generally a star.  Not mentioning any names, but you know who you are.

My card is also for the following challenge...

• Pollycraft Monday Challenge - summer blooms

Have a fabulous day everyone.  Sun's shining here, but how long will it last - who knows.

Ann xxx