Truly Madly Deeply

Having a great background paper sometimes means you have a real simple layout on your hands.  Because I didn't want to cover the pretty background paper I simply double matted the photo, added a bit of washi tape, a pretty chipboard heart covered with washi tape, and my title.  Simple, pretty, and quick .... can't get much better than that!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Making Memories Travel Collection; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers; Embellishments: Chipboard Heart, Washi Tape, and Jillibean Sayings.

January

First off, I apologize for the graininess of the photo, with fall in full swing and winter quick on it's heels finding great light is a hard thing to do in my house. I keep using this as an excuse with the hubby to buy a new camera but so far he's not buying it!

This layout is the first page in our second Jamaica album.  I always like to do title pages because a) it gives overall details of the trip and b) most of my travel layouts tend to be two pagers cause I take so many photos!  This time I used a calendar in the background to show the dates we were in Jamaica which I thought was a neat idea.  I also added a postcard that had a map of the island with an arrow pointing to where we stayed.  And for the first time I did a trip summary with the Moments to Remember journalling spot.  I thought this was pretty cool and might star doing it on more of my title pages!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Scrap Pieces of Paper; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: Basic Grey Alphas; Embellishments: Creative Memories Calendar Kit Elelments, October Afternoon Seaside Hexagons, and Washi Tape.

34 In Jamaica

I know I did a layout already on here for my birthday that I celebrated in Jamaica but I had so many photos that it warranted another layout.  I had so many photos of the dinner that our favorite server pulled all the stops out for that I needed to use a Flip Flap in order to get all my favorite photos in!  This a a photo of the layout with the Flip Flap closed.

And this is what the layout looks like with the Flip Flap open!  I love how many more photos I can get on a layout with them.  If you have tried them, seriously get some!  You won't regret it!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Pink Paislee -  Soiree Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers:;American Crafts Thickers Embellishments:  Pink Paislee - Soiree Chipboard Elements and Penants and Flags, Washi Tape, and Bakers Twine; Tools: Fiskars Scalloped Edger Punch, Dymo Label Maker, and Creative Memories Flip Flaps.

Deep Sea Fishing

Another Jamaica layout completed using the Basic Grey Fort Lauderdale Collection!  Creating simple layouts like this one with leftover strips of patterned paper really helped to stretch the collection into even more layouts!

To give the leaf sticker a little more dimension I stuck a few foam squares under a couple of the leaves.  It almost gives it a 3D quality to it.  I was so excited when I found this little journalling spot in the collection because it has a boat on it.  I know I am a geek!  It's small things like that that tie the theme together for me.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers and Basic Grey Alphas; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Die Cut Stickers and Chipboard Elements.

Hangin' Out @ Rick's

What a popular place Rick's Cafe was! There were so many people there you could barely move! It is a really popular spot to watch the sunsets so that is why we decided to go and I am so glad we did. The views were beautiful, which was great for a little photo bug like me.

My Sister-In-Law went into the gift shop and when she came out she handed me this cute little button that said Rick's Cafe on it.  "For when you scrapbook these pictures" she said.  What a sweetheart!

When the sun started to set, I perched myself in a perfect little spot and started to take pictures.  I knew I wanted to capture the sunset at different points so that I could scrapbook them in sequence and it be just like watching the sunset ... almost!  The problem after I printed my photos was that there were several other photos I wanted to scrapbook with these photos but it was just too much.  Then it dawned on me to crop the sunset photos to a smaller size and use them like a film strip under my other photos.  I think it turned out fantastic, if I do say so myself.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Fancy Pants - Beach Bum Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers; Embellishments: Rick's Cafe Button and Fancy Pants - Beach Bum Die Cut Stickers and Journalling spot.

This is the Life

When I saw this background paper by Pink Paislee I fell in love!  I love the whimsy of it and the colour was perfect for water pictures!  I did a lot of fussy cutting on this layout.  It starts out as something as simple as cutting out the bunting at the bottom and then it moved to would a pretty  flower from another paper pattern look nice.  Next thing I knew I had spent 20 minutes fussy cutting!  I don't think it was a waste though cause it really works for this layout.

I love how manufacturers give you die cut border stickers that coordinate with their lines but sometimes I really wish they gave you two of each pattern.  Most of my layouts are horizontal in nature so unless I buy two sets, I find them difficult to use.  For this layout, I decided to step out of my usual use border strips as border strips mentality and just used them to jazz up the title area.  I think it turned out ok, just next time I think I will stagger them more.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Pink Paislee - Hometown Summer Collection and Cosmo Cricket - Clementine Collection; Alphabet Stickers: Making Memories - Felt Stickers and American Crafts - Thickers; Embellishments: Cosmo Cricket - Clementine Die Cut Stickers, Smashbook Tabs, Baker's Twine, and Pink Paislee Journalling Spot.

Happy Birthday

How lucky was I that I got to celebrate my birthday in Jamaica this year.  Well technical, my birthday was the day I left but we still celebrated it the night before.  The resort gave me a birthday card that day and I thought it was the sweetest thing.

So I brought it home with the expectation that I would use it on my layout.  Now the outside of the cards was a little plain but the inside was so pretty so I thought why not use it open.  In fact, why not make it my title!  So I cut some coordinating paper to fit on either side of it to fill the whole top of my layout and to act as an anchor on my layout.  I think it turned out pretty cute if I do say so myself!  And in order to not distract from it I kept my photos and remaining paper pieces very linear.  So cute and it was so quick to do!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Pink Paislee - Soiree Collection; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Chipboard Elements, My Minds Eye - Die Cut Ticket, Pink Paislee - Hometown Summer Die Cut Strips and Journalling Spot.

Soon Come Back Party

Because this was our second visit to Jamaica and we went back to the same resort, we got invited to the Soon Come Back Party.  It's a special party for all the returning guest where you get to dine and hang with some of the staff and are given gifts.  It was fun and was a great way to meet more of the friendly staff from behind the scenes.

When we arrived at the resort there was an invitation sitting on our bed for us and I just thought it was so cute with the sand dollar so I brought it home with me and decided it needed to be in my scrapbook.  Incorporating things like this are so easy!  Just think of items like cards, postcards, logos, pamphlets, tickets, etc. as another photo on your layout.  It's that easy!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey - Konnichiwa Collection; Alphabet Stickers: Basic Grey - Konnichiwa Die Cut Letters and October Afternoon - Mini Market Letters; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Konnichiwa Die Cuts and Build a Flower, Basic Grey - Take Note Journalling Spot, and Pearls; Sketch:Sketches for Scrapbooking ; Tools: Creative Memories Corner Rounder.

Cliff Jumpers

I love large photos! It's a great way to create a two page layout when you only have a couple of photos.  In this case, I only had five photos to use but it looked too squished with five 4x6 photos on a single page layout and when I tried to stretch it to two pages it looked a little sparse.  So I took my favourite of the five and enlarged it to 8x12. Now it looks great as a two page layout!

I had these old Basic Grey letters in my stash that I knew would be perfect for this layout but when I pulled them out they we a clashing shade of bright pink that looked so wrong on the layout.  I was disappointed!  I searched the rest of my stash for something better but I kept thinking 'Why couldn't those Pink ones work?!'.  I was frustrated.  So I did as I normally do, left the room to grab a drink and hang with the hubby for a bit and when I came back, it dawned on me, why not change the colour of the pink ones to a colour that worked better!  Eureka!  I grabbed my sanding block and roughed them up and then applied a magenta ink over the tops of each letter and then applied a coat of glossy accents to seal it all in.  Now they were perfect!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Die Cut Alphas and Old Basic Grey Chipboard Alphas; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Die Cuts and Chipboard Shapes and My Minds Eye - Brads; Inks: ColorBox Chalk Ink; Tools: Fiskars Squeeze Large Circle Punch.

World Famous

I love this layout!  I know I say that a lot but I do!  The first reason I love this layout is because it is all done using scrap pieces that were left over from other layouts.  Because this layout uses a block design it was easy to crop my pieces to work within the blocks.  It saved me tonnes of time and the cost of more patterned paper.  And best thing is I bet you wouldn't guessed it was done with scraps!

And the second reason I love this layout is that I used a post card as my focal photo.  I couldn't get a good shot of Ricks because really unless you were on a boat, it was impossible.  My Mom saw this postcard in the gift shop and bought it for me (I used to collect them and still kind of do so I was instinct for her) and I am sure glad she thought of it!  I might just have to pay more attention to postcards when I visit places from now on!

Oh and thanks Ashley H. for you tip awhile back about underlining your journalling, it really does help ground it.  See I do read your comments and take them to heart ;)

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey -  For Lauderdale Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers and Basic Grey Alphas; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Die Cut Stickers, Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Build a Flower Kit, Brads, and Buttons.

Lighthouse Tour

Sometimes it is so hard to scrapbook vacations.  There always seems to be either too many or too few (that's a rarity for me if I am honest) photos to do what I want with a layout.  This layout was a little hard for me.  I had tonnes of photos and as you can see I had a hard time narrowing down which ones to use.  I always start with my favorites but sometimes (like in this case) I had 15 photos I liked, yikes!  I managed to weed out 5 more based on which ones I could crop and fit on the page but I always feel bad about the ones I leave out.  I am curious about all of you.  How do you weed out photos?  Do you every find you take too many?  What do you do with the extras (if anything)?

Because I had so many photos, it left very little room for journalling.  I managed to find a long rectangular journalling spot and decided to tuck it in with the title.

I also managed to stick another little journalling spot on the top right with the flowers where I could put the date the Lighthouse was built.  Sneaky I know!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: Making Memories Felt Alphs and American Crafts Thickers; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Chipboard Elements, Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Brads, Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Journalling Spots, Brads and Making Memories Felt Flowers.

Snorkeling Adventure

Woah White Space!  I don't normally do a bunch of white space, it's like a blank canvas to me and always needs something.  But when I saw this sketch with the circles I knew it would be perfect for my snorkeling photos.  I decided I wanted each circle to be a different pattern of paper but that didn't seem to look good with a patterned background and coloured paper seemed to drown (no pun intended) out my photos.  So I went with white and fought the urge to add more colour!

The circles were so much fun!  I started with a 6x6 paper pad and cut out a bunch of different sized, different patterned circles for my layout using both punches and the trace something round and cut method.  Then while looking for something to accentuate my title I found the chipboard circles from the same line hidden in my stash so added those.  Now I could have an even number of different textures so I had to find something else.  I wanted something smaller but buttons were too big and sequins have been used on every water layout I had done lately so I needed something different.  That's when I remembered the glass beads I have had for years, don't they look like real bubbles.  Like I said, I had so much fun with these circles!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: Basic Grey Chipboard Alphs; Embellishments: Basic Grey - Fort Lauderdale Chipboard shapes and Glass Beads; Sketch: Sketches for Scrapbooking; Tools: Fiskars Circle Punch.

Hey Bert

So this picture is kind of an inside joke that goes back many years!  You see Steve has a laugh that sounds just like Ernie's laugh and he can also do an awesome rendition of Rubber Ducky, so when we noticed our Resort had Sesame Street characters roaming the resort, we kept our eyes peeled for Ernie.  Unfortunately, we never saw Ernie but we did find his good buddy Bert so I had to make Steve pose with him for this photo.  And because I wanted the photo and story to be the focal point of my layout I kept the rest of the layout pretty simple.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Echo Park - Splash Collection; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers and old Large Chipboard Letters; Embellishments: Echo Park - Splash Paper Diecuts and Borders, Echo Park Chipboard Elelment, and Journalling Spot.

Swim Up Pool Bar

We have always wanted to try a swim up pool bar. The concept sounded so cool but none of the resorts we had ever stayed at had one until this trip. I was excited. I'm not sure why really but it sounded fun! After now having tried it, I can't understand what I was so excited about. First off it is impossible to sit on a stool in the water. I kept falling off mine and no it was not because I had too many margaritas! When I was a kid I remember spending hours trying to sit on a floatie in the water and always kept falling off no matter how hard I tried. Well this was much the same thing.  It was definitely an experience, one I am sure I won't be so eager to try again ... I will take my margarita sitting in a beach lounger instead!

I decided to break out my circle cutter for this layout.  I haven't used it in years!  I remember when all my layouts had circle and oval photos or even squares cut out with fancy scissors.  It just seemed that it was a phase that I grew out of.  But this layout I had two photos I wanted to use but the one of Steve was mostly pool so by the time I cropped it, it was a weird size and didn't work with my layout.  Then I thought hey why not make it round and I did and it looks great!  And because it was so cropped I had space to use another Status Update post it note ... I love them!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: American Crafts - Margarita Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers:American Crafts Thickers ; Embellishments: American Crafts - Margarita Stickers, Status Update Post It Notes, Bottle Cap, Resin Flowers, and Brads.Tools: .

Floatin Down the Lazy River

Our sister resort had a really cool lazy river that wound around the entire resort.  You hopped on an inner tube and the current drifts you all around the resort.  It was so much fun!  When I saw this blue background paper I thought it matched the tile pattern of the lazy river and was perfect for this layout!

I wanted a really long title but it looked weird at the top of my layout where the sketch had it.  So I move it to the bottom right where the journalling was supposed to go and then stacked it in different font types and I think it turned out way better.  For some reason. I find long titles look way better when the fonts are mixed up.  How do you do long titles?  Do you do long titles?

Supplies: Patterned Paper: American Crafts - Margarita Collection; Cardstock: Bazzills; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers, Fancy Pants Alphas, Cosmo Cricket Tiny Type; Embellishments: Margarita Stickers, Jolee Dimensional Stickers, Making Memories Big Brads, Bella blvd Chipboard Words, and Jillibean Stickers and Journalling Spot; Sketch: Sketches for Scrapbooking; Tools: Creative Memories Reverse Corner Rounder Punch.

Group Snapshot

Awhile back I won a stamp set from Swiss Girl Designs. She has some of the cutest stamp sets! In fact, when Rahel told me I had won a set I took the opportunity to purchase a couple more to be sent with my winning set. This was my first layout I did with my new stamps and I love them. If you are interested in her sets visit her site at http://swissgirldesigns.com/.  If you have time while you are there, look through her blog, she is so inspiring and she even does some really awesome how to videos set to her hubby's music!

I also stepped it up a bit and did a little bit of fussy cutting.  I really liked the flowery background paper in this collection but I found it really over powering.  So I cut out a small section, as well as a couple of butterflies, and then tucked it behind then placed it so that it looked like it was peaking out from behind the photos.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: American Crafts - Margarita Collection; Alphabet Stickers: Old Chipboard Letters; Embellishments: Margarita Stickers, Swiss Girl Design Stamps; Inks: Colorbox; Tools: .

We Jamexican

The next several layouts you will see from me are from our second trip to Jamaica. This time around was way better cause both Steve and I managed to not get sick! It was a fantastic trip and because we had already been to Jamaica the year before, we didn't have the need to cram all kinds of sightseeing into this trip. It was way more relaxing!

We stayed at the same resort as we did the last time because it was a nice resort and we loved being able to spend time at the sister resort down the road. They had the best Mexican restaurant at the sister resort! I think we went 3 times this trip. We joked about it being not just Mexican food but Mexican food with Jamaican flair thrown in here and there so we called it Jamexican. And that is where the title we this layout came from.

This layout was so much fun!  I managed to use the left over bits after cutting out the large circle to cut out little circles to place around the rest of my layout.  Some of them were even popped up with foam dots for dimension.  And then came the heart.  I really wanted the heart to stand out but the pink felt heart I was using just seemed lost.  So I mounted it on blue cardstock but it still seemed lost.  So I broke out the washi tape and made a fun and easy ruffle.  There now it popped!  I repeated the ruffle in the middle of the layout to add some balance and more dimension and using the washi tape sure made it easy.  If you have never done it, it's simple really!  I started by tucking one end under picture and then loop up and stick down to the cardstock.  Don't be concerned about keeping everything straight and even, it looks better if it isn't.  In fact, I wanted mine to look wavy so I deliberately made it more so.  Be careful not to let you loops stick together and keep going all the way to the end where you can cut it any way you like - I did pennant style. Now go back and push all your loops down.  Tada!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: American Crafts - Magarita Collection; Cardstock: Bazills; Alphabet Stickers: American Crafts Thickers; Embellishments: Felt, Washi Tape, Glass Beads, Embroidery Thread, and Chipboard Elements; Sketch: Sketches for Scrapbooking.