You Light Up My Life - Stitched Layout

Hi all,

Hope you had a wonderful Christmas Day and Santa brought you what you wanted! I'm now chillin' in the jammies I got in the sales today with a glass of Bailey's.
Here's my latest layout. For our photography project at uni, one aspect was portraits so I wanted to have some interesting lighting going on so I got Nathan to hold some Christmas lights, in the garage with the lights off.
The lightbulb paper from the Heidi Swapp 'September Skies' paper pad was perfect for this layout!

Lately I've been inspired by circular layouts. I always enjoy a bit of stitching too so I got my compass out and drew two circles, one a little smaller than the page and another inside that. I started by stitching around the outer circle in orange but I pulled it out because I didn't like it. Instead I stitched between the circles for part of the way around. I just pierced the paper at points along the outer circle that intersected with the edges on the lightbulbs on the backing paper. I then stitched towards the centre point. For the outside edge I did the same, finishing each stitch 1.5cm from the edge. 

A close up of the title, stamped using the Traditional Alpha stamp set from docrafts. I lined the letters up on the layout before pressing the clear stamp block onto them so they were in perfect alignment with the curve of the circle. 

We're going to the pantomime (Snow White) in Grimsby tomorrow afternoon.

We went every year when we were little, and back in October my cousin said how fun it would be to go again... the next day, my grandma rang to see how many tickets to book...

Also it'll be my first time driving on the motorway... luckily so far my dad has been a good teacher so I can't see there being any problems. I drove to the outlet today with Nathan and it all went fine and we got some things from the Next sale. Super pleased with myself :)

Until next time...!

Emily xx

Christmas Gift Tags

Hi all,

So close to Christmas now and if you're not mega-organised like me and had your presents bought and wrapped in November, there's still a little bit of time to get wrapping. Here's a couple of gift tags that can be put together in 5 minutes.

They are using the Geometric Neon collection by Docrafts, out in January. I had some bits left over from a commission and they went great with the paper straws I cut up to make the tree. 

This second one uses die cut bunting and I've turned them upside down to use as trees. 

Now, I need to get into the Christmas spirit - I passed my driving test yesterday! I've spent the past few months thinking (getting worked up!) about that. Now it's done it's a huge relief and I can be myself again! Hopefully that will include having more creative inspiration. And plenty of trips out to take lots of photographs! 

So, have a very Merry Christmas!

Emily xx

Decopatched Star Button Box!

Hi all,

For as long as I can remember, my mum has been keeping her buttons in either an old sandwich box or a takeaway box.

And I did have a set of three star shaped boxes from Docrafts...

So I decorated the largest one and it's now full of buttons!

It took a full pack of Docrafts Papier Patch papers to decorate the box with it being a funny shape and all but the end result is so pretty!

I finished it off with some decoupage from an older Docrafts collection (Sew Lovely) that had been sitting in my stash for a Long Time.. and then some painted wooden embellishments from the new Bare Basics range.

I trimmed the lid with Craft Collection Pastels trim. I love trims with little bobbles on.

Thanks for stopping by!

Emily xx

A Wild Layout!

Hi all,

Stopping by to share a new layout I made using pictures from a recent visit with my better half to the Yorkshire Wildlife Park. Nathan has never been before so a uni photography project was the perfect excuse for me to show him around, and do you know what? He really enjoyed it! Think his favourite bit was playing with the resident cat...

For this layout I used 'Now & Then' chipboard stickers by My Mind's Eye, along with layering up various papers from my stash. The postcard is from a set I got from Waterstones. 

If I'm honest I think I printed the pictures out a little too big for the page so I couldn't really do much else with it.... but here's how I printed them. (I used Photoshop but I'm sure there is other free programs to do this in. We only pay for Adobe CSS because we use it a lot for uni)

I decided I wanted the square of pictures to be the width of an A4 sheet, so 21cm square. (I'd recommend between 15 and 17cm, in retrospect) I set up a blank canvas in Photoshop. Then I opened each image and cropped it square, and pasted it onto the canvas. I resized the images so I could get three on each row with a gap between. Then I just printed on photo paper and cut out. It's a great way of displaying a lot of pictures on a layout.

Thanks for stopping by!
Emily xx

Scrap Around The World Mood Board December 2015

Hi all

Here's my entry for the last ever Scrap Around the World. There's lot of prizes on offer this month and you can play along here http://scraparoundtheworld.blogspot.co.uk/
This month's mood board:

It's very purple and gold and sparkly with folksy brush layering and gentle curves...

Here's my layout, featuring a picture I took of my boyfriend. I put it into black and white as the original colours didn't match the colour scheme of the mood board but I really wanted to scrap this picture. I echoed the black in the 'hey there handsome' sentiment and there's little bits of black in the film strip as well as the grey in the background.
The background is a steampunk stencil using gel medium and watered down spray ink rubbed over it.
I wanted to include some of the brush type lettering on this layout too so I stencilled 'love you' with tacky glue and applied glitter. It's quite subtle and I covered a wooden arrow in the same glitter and stuck it on the other side.

Thanks for stopping by!

Emily xx

Quirky Kit Unboxing! (November/December Embellishment Kit)

Hi all,
I wanted some new supplies to get my crafty mojo back and I stumbled upon Quirky Kits. I'm now a very happy subscriber!
Find out more at http://www.craftytemplates.co.uk/

(I might sound a bit funny 'cause my ear is blocked so I can't 'ear myself talk properly...!)


Here's exactly what's included:

Project Life 'High Five' 12x specialty cards
Elle's Studio 'Thankful' cork shapes
Darice Light Green Glitter
Crate Paper Maggie Holmes 'Shine' standouts
Queen & Co Snowflake Rhinestones
Basic Grey 'Typeset' chipboard stickers
(Unsure on the branding of the ribbons and snowflakes)

The extras -

Thickers - Glitter Foam Imprint
Crate Paper Maggie Holmes 'Shine' papers, 'Brilliant' & 'Dazzle'


Now, to get playing... once I've sorted out the rest of my supplies as I seem to have accumulated a ton of c**p that I don't use so... Procrastination...

Thanks for watching!
Emily xx

Conisbrough Castle layout

Hi all,

Here's a layout I made using pictures from a visit to Conisbrough Castle, a ruin just the other side of Doncaster. The first wooden castle on the site was built by the Normans but then this stone structure was built around it. We visited at the beginning of October when it was still warm out... Oh, how I miss those warm days!

I made the background by drawing vertical and horizontal lines with a biro and then colouring the spaces in between with watercolour pencils and then going over them with water to activate the paint. The rest of the layout uses the new Docrafts ranges - Bare Basics butterflies and ricrac, Creativity Essentials Alphabet and Forest stamps, and the XCut steel embossing folder and adhesive chalkboard sheets.

Thanks for stopping by!

Emily

Christmas Mixed Media

Hi all

I wanted to make a mixed media piece that can be displayed at Christmas. I printed small pictures I took of our tree last year and framed them (using the new wooden frames from docrafts, painted gold) to look like hanging decorations.

The background is from a roll of BoBunny paper painted with distress paint and then spattered with ink and watered down acrylic paint.

Until next time....
Emily xx

Decopatched Drawers!

Hi all,

Some decopatching to share using Docrafts Bare Basics and Papier Patch.

I covered a drawer set in nature themed deco papers and then finished off with some little knobs I found on a clearance hardware shop on eBay. Without them I don't think the drawers would want to come out, plus they are a lovely finishing touch.
It took a full pack of deco papers but well worth it.

Until next time...!

Emily xx