Introducing Lottie Loves Paper

Hello and Welcome!

Let me introduce you to Lottie Loves Paper ....

As some of you will know I used to run a bricks and mortar and online craft store.

I miss it! A lot!

So, for several months I have been thinking long and hard about starting a little Scrapbooking business again and after many, many discussions with my hubby and with some very close friends, I eventually came to realise that in life, sometimes you simply to have to follow your dreams and grab every opportunity that may come your way.

And, so earlier this year, Lottie Loves Paper became more than a dream, and things are  quickly beginning to fall into place to make it all happen!

Lottie Loves Paper will primarily focus on Embellishments and pretty accessories. You know, all those pretty, little embellies that make your scrapbook pages special.

There will be paper too, afterall I LOVE Paper but our main "Thing" is to stock embellishments. There will be Kits as well. I will be carefully selecting products from leading manufacturers as well as from smaller, lesser known companies and always on the look out for something a little bit different to give your layouts or projects that special finishing touch.

We have a Facebook Page and  Instagram, where you can also keep up to date with all our news as we prepare to launch the very first "Lottie Loves Paper" Kits.

I hope you will join me on this journey!

Sarah x

Cream Tea Layout & A Scrapbook Process Video

I am sorry for the lack of blogging lately! I have been having some internet connection problems lately.
I recently treated myself to some new scrappy goodies .... The true stories collection by Shimelle Laine.

Here's the 1st layout I made with my new stash

I made a video to show you the supplies:

And I also made a youtube video to show the process of making the layout using those supplies.

http://youtu.be/_iIgEP2Xnmc

And finally a few close ups of the layout:

I layered up patterned papers, added a doily and a journal card. I made sure I added a small snippet (a punched tag) of the polka dot blue and white paper in 3 places. You will notice they are positioned diagonally down the page to help draw the eye across and down the layout.

 

I just love using wooden words on my pages lately. This "Delicious" is from a DoCrafts pack that I have had for ages so it was good to mix in some older supplies with brand new stash!

I used another journal card above the photo and the phrase on this one was so appropriate as the scones certainly were lovely!!

Thanks for stopping by today. I hope to blog more regularly again!

Family Selfie Layout

Today, I have another layout to share with you.

 

If you saw my last layout here, you might be seeing a theme appearing!! Selfies!!

 

This photo was taken on a winter's walk - don't be deceived by the blue sky in the background but take note of the woolly hats - it was very cold!!

 

I began by layering up some patterned papers onto which I would later put my photo (which I had already matted onto white card).

 

I then cut small pieces of paper taken from a Simple Stories 6 " x 6" pad into banner shapes which I would later tuck under the left hand side.

 

Before adhering it all into place I created some faux stitching (which you can see on the black arrow paper and on the banner pieces) I used a "pokey tool" to make the holes and then joined up the holes with a white gel pen.

 

I stamped the camera and coloured it, added the clip, cork stars and a title and called it "done"!

 

Here's a few close ups:

 

 

Have you tried faux stitching or do you prefer "real" stitching?

One More Selfie Layout

If you are the parent of young teenagers or "tweens" (10-12 year olds) you will, no doubt, know all about the obsession with selfies for this age group!!

For this layout I took inspiration from this layout by Els Brige. Although I loved the banners on Els's layout, they didn't work for me as my photo was slightly larger than hers so I dcided to layer up some 6 x 6 papers from the Crate "Notes and Things" paper pad behind my photo. The diagonal thin striped paper  at the back is still a 6" x 6" sheet but I cut it in half and adhered it with a gap between the two pieces so that the paper would show on both sides of the photo mat.

 

I used a Stampin' up heart stencil to create the hearts on the background cardstock.
 

I loved this photo that my daughter took of herself on her mobile phone whilst out on a family winter walk and couldn't wait to scrap it.

It's a plainer page than I would normally make but I like it as  I think it keeps the focus on the photo.

Have you scrapped selfies that your family have taken of themselves?

Branscombe Beach Layout - a layout for NSD

Hello & a very happy National Scrapbooking Day (or weekend!) to you!

Officially NSD is tomorrow (2nd May) but as I am participating in a Cyber Crop over on a scrapbooking Facebook Group, which starts this evening and this layout is for one of the challenges on there, here I am posting today!

The challenge details:

 

 1 ) Use 3 (or more) photographs - can be any size

AND

2 ) Use a recently purchased item of stash - can be a new sheet of paper, a new tool or a new embellishment or something else .... whatever was your most recent purchase.

Here's my layout:

 

 

The photos were taken on our recent holiday in Devon.

We were blessed with wonderful weather - plenty of blue skies and sunshine.

 

I used a total mix of supplies - the papers are Simple Stories and American Crafts, the alphas are AC Thickers and some very old Jenni Bowlin stickers I've had for ages. There's some basic Grey chipboard pieces, wood veneers and enamel dots on there too. The lovely wood anchor is from Jennifer's Happy Scatter Etsy shop - the anchor embellishment was just perfect for this page as this beach is where the container ship Napoli ran aground back in 2007 and the ship's anchor now stands on the beach on display.

My recently purchased roller stamp was put to good use - I stamped "memories" on the top of the journaling card and added the arrows just above. I then added some more stamped elements (from a different set of stamps) with the date and the little hearts.

 

Here's some close ups:

 

 

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you get a chance to scrap this NSD weekend!

 

 

 

A Retreat Layout!

Hi Everyone

A few weeks ago I spent the weekend tucked away in a converted barn in the countryside with 9 other scrapbookers!

It was a wonderful few days filled with laughter, fun, yummy food and surrounded by pretty paper! Bliss! 

Over my next few posts I'll be sharing the layouts I made on that weekend with you.

Tree Adventures Layout

Taking inspiration from this layout on my Pinterest Board, I layered up some patterned papers and sticker (mainly Crate Paper Maggie Holmes collection but there may be some Flea Market in there too.

I added lots of different textures with some cork alphas for my title, a cork arrow sticker, wood veneer hearts, enamel dots, a resin flower and twine on the tag. The layout is finished off with a few droplets of pink ink.

I'll be back soon to show you another page from that weekend.

Exciting Scrapbook Kit News!!

Hi Everyone!

I have put together a couple of kits ....

These are made up with some slightly older patterned papers hence the great value price of the kits.

This is Kit 1:

Kit #1 contains:

6 sheets of 12" x 12" patterned papers (3 x Teresa Collins Daily Stories, 2 x Crate Paper Flea Market, 1 Pink Paislee Hello Sunshine)

2 sheets of cardstock (1 each of white and pink)

3 smaller pieces of patterned paper

3 doilies (1 of each colour shown)

Sheet of alpha stickers (a random selection from 2 colours)

6 Cork Die Cuts (3 each of scallop circles & butterflies)

A small selection of wood embellishments -  Each kit has a random selection but typical pieces are arrows, people, butterflies, hearts, chevrons, cameras.

1 wood word (actual word received may differ from that shown)

2 wooden buttons.

A strip of pink gems

A length of twine

** Please note actual contents may differ slightly from those shown in the photograph. **

Kit #1 Costs £12.00 which includes Postage and Packing 

Please note I do sometimes recycle good quality boxes to keep P & P costs down.

Please note - I have Very Limited number of this first kit available!

Should you wish to purchase a kit, please e mail me at sarah_sjr (at) hotmail (dot) com stating which kit you require and  your e mail address for a paypal invoice to be sent to you.

Kit will only be dispatched on receipt of payment and payment must be received within 24 hours of receipt of invoice.

As kit numbers are limited, it will be a strict "first come first served" !

Here's a layout I made using some of the kit:

Extra supplies I used which are not included in the kit: Cosmo Cricket pink label stickers, Heidi Swapp Colourshine (used to create the ink dots)

For a quite a while I have wanted to have a go at making a scrapbooking process video .... so when I was making the above layout I decided to give it a try .... you can see the video below on youtube. Please excuse the "umming" and the annoying red box .... if I do another I will definitely invest in a tripod!!

I'll be back soon to show you the second kit.

I am also looking at possibly getting in some brand new released papers and offering further kits ..... I'd love to know if this would be of interest to you.

Hope you like the first kit!

London 2014 Layout

We try to get up to London at least once a year, sometimes for a show or concert, for shopping, a museum visit or to see the sights of the city. It's something we all enjoy and a great way to spend time together as a family. 

Last year, as soon as we learned of the Tower of London poppies exhibition we all agreed we wanted to go and see it.

So, during October half term we booked our train tickets and off we went!

This layout is the first of several layouts which will record our day in London.

I made this layout for a challenge on a Facebook group I'm in that required the year to be a prominent feature of the page.

Taking inspiration from this layout on Pinterest, I layered up some strips of My Minds Eye paper (inked with blue distress ink), grey dotted washi tape and a doily and added my photograph which I had matted on white cardstock. Then I added a few stickers (tucking 1 under the photo), chipboard and some gorgeous green, glitter alphas for the title. A few ink drops, wood stars and a camera and enamel dots and I was done.

I clustered most of the embellishments in this area under the photo, placing the chipboard arrow to draw the eye towards the journal spot and the title.

A little geotag and "We are here" sticker at the top balances the heavier embellishment cluster.

Thanks for popping in to visit today!

Derry Walls Layout - Amanda's Scraplift Challenge

Very quick post from me today as time is fast running out to play along with Amanda's Scraplift challenge and I wanted to get my layout entered before I have to go to work this afternoon!

Amanada challenged us to "scraplift" her layout.

Here's my layout, which kept fairly close to the original design but I moved my title to the opposite side of the page.

The photos are from a few years ago taken on a day trip to the city of Derry.

A few close ups:

I used some gorgeous papers from the new Simple Stories "Life Documented" collection and added various stickers from my stash, cork thickers for my title and the little green arrows are from a pack of  Heidi Swapp Puffy stickers.

Thanks for a great challenge, Amanda - look forward to the next one!

"Granda's Tree" layout

Another of the layouts I made on the November Scrapbooking Retreat!

During one of our trips over to stay with my hubby's family last year we visited his Granny and as it was a beautiful Spring day we were all out in her garden when I snapped this photo of my daughter stood by this beautiful tree. Sadly his Granda had passed a few months before but he loved this tree and tended it carefully for many, many years. We all said how the tree had never looked so good and was in full bloom in his memory! My daughter loved "Great Granda's tree" saying how pretty it was.

Some close ups:

The gorgeous floral paper and the puffy heart stickers are both from Heidi Swapp's Favorite Things Collection. The "Life is Good" card is from Jennifer's "How Refreshing" collection from her "Happy Scatter" Etsy Shop. If you haven't yet had a look in her shop, do pop over as she has some lovely items.

I also added a Basic grey tag, resin flower and stamped some arrows and phrases mixed in with a few phrase stickers!

How is your 2015 crafting going?

I was at my first crop of the year last Saturday and managed to get a couple of layouts finished!!

Thanks for stopping by today.

River Photos Layout

I hope you all had a wonderful and peaceful Christmas time!

I am keen to get my 2015 scrapping off to a great start so in preparation I've been having a bit of a sort out of my craft space recently and earlier today I found myself putting away some of my recent layouts. But before I put them in my albums I took a few photos as there was a fair few I've not yet shown you.

First up is this "River Photos" layout, made at the recent scrapbook weekend!

I'm lucky enough to live near both the beach and the River Stour and so tend to have a never ending supply of both beach and river photos to scrap. 

This particular day was just another weekend stroll by the river ...  with my daughter in the mood for posing for a few photos!! She only took a little bit of persuasion!

I took inspiration from this "Explore" layout which I had pinned onto my Pinterest board quite a while ago. 

I changed the original layout to include my 3 photos rather than 2 photos + a journal card and also moved the embellishment cluster to the bottom left corner. 

I used some Echo Park papers from their "This & That" Collection which I received in my "Secret Santa" gift on the retreat. Thanks to Paula for the loan of the gorgeous border punch and to Lisa-Jane for the pink Cosmo Cricket "Tiny Text" stickers. The camera stamp is by Stampin Up and is coloured with pro marker pens. 

Here's some close ups of the details ...

Thanks so much for stopping by today .... I'll be back soon with another layout to show you!

Are you ready to kick start your 2015 crafting?

Scrapbook Retreat - Beach Layouts!

A few weekends ago I was away on a Scrapbook Retreat with some lovely ladies including my good friends Lisa-Jane and Jennifer, staying in a beautiful barn deep in the Dorset countryside. 

We spent our days chatting, eating yummy, home baked cakes, drinking tea/coffee/wine, enjoying leisurely strolls around the farm land and some of the ladies went in the swimming pool/hot tub/gym although I decided that wasn't really my "thing". There was much laughter and of course lots of playing with pretty papers!!

I managed 8 layouts in total over the weekend - fairly productive for me!

Today I'm sharing two of the layouts, both feature photos taken from the same day out at the beach last Summer. 

Beach Day Layout

Regular readers will know I live near the south coast and scrap rather a lot of beach photos. It's getting tricky coming up with different titles - hence the somewhat uninteresting and predictable title of "Beach day" for this page!

I'm afraid I didn't take note of the papers I used as most of them were out of my "Scraps" Box. 

I've been waiting for just the right layout to use this lovely Happy Scatter Sandcastle wood piece on and I think it fits perfectly with these photos.

I added a couple of stickers, a splatter of gold Heidi Swapp Colour Shine and a few enamel dots and it was another fabulous "Beach Day" recorded and in the album.

Little Surfer Girl

For this page I  used a photo of my daughter taken on the same beach trip as the first layout.

She loves to use her body board in the sea and will quite happily spend a whole afternoon splashing about and trying to "catch a wave"! This particular day she was using a brand new board purchased on the way to the beach as her old one had broken. It's a bigger board than her previous one and so she felt like a proper "Little Surfer Girl"

Papers and stickers are from Simple Stories "Good Day Sunshine" collection and I used my favourite Stampin Up Chevron punch to punch out the coloured chevrons from small scraps.

I'll be back soon with more layouts from the retreat.

Thanks for popping in today - please do leave me a comment to let me know you stopped by!

"Hello Santa" Layout

A few months ago I was asked to create a layout for Scrapbook Magazine on the theme "Hello Santa" .... it's in the current issue No: 85 on sale now so I'm now able to show you at last.

The lovely Jen at Wear Crafts sent me the Simple Stories Cozy Christmas collection kit to work with and it was just perfect for this theme. I knew I had to use the "Hey Santa" 3" X 4" journal card as soon as I saw it in the pack!

I started with a sheet of red cardstock onto which I layered white cardstock and then began to layer up some patterned papers and journal cards.

See the little red and white striped pieces just peeping out each side - I cut one of the 3" x 4" cards in half so I could tuck a piece in each side of the photo. This is something I often do with journal cards!

I added a little bit of sparkle with some American Crafts glitter tape and some My minds Eye gold stars.

The title is a mix of red chipboard alphas and white foam thickers.

The Simple Stories sticker sheet in the Collection pack has some lovely word stickers on it - I added "Wonder & Magic", "Ho Ho Ho" and "he's making a list" in 3 different areas of my page, adding a star and red gem to each making a visual triangle.

. 

The photo is one of my favourites of the many that I have of my daughter meeting Santa over the years. Even though it doesn't show her face, I love the twinkling lights and stacks of presents in Santa's grotto and I remember how she listened in earnest to him telling her to "make sure she goes straight to sleep on Christmas Eve!"

So, that's two layouts made with this kit (if you missed the other it's here!) and I'm already half way through a third page so I'll be back to show you that soon.

How are your Christmas preparations going?

Anyone got their tree up yet?

"Our Lovely Girl" Layout

Hello

Sorry for the lack of blog posts lately!

I have been scrapping and have several finished layouts to show you - it's just finding the time to photograph them in decent daylight and upload to the blog that I'm struggling with.

Anyway, here's one that I made a couple of weeks ago at the Artful Angels Crop. I always enjoy going to this crop but it was even better this month as my lovely crafty friend Jennifer Grace came along with me. It was her first visit to the crop and I think she had a fun and productive day and we had a great time scrapping, chatting and catching up. 

I used Crate Boys Rule papers for this layout. I love using collections for different themes other than the one intended by the manufacturer. For example, this collection consists of lots of  traditional "boy" colours and images but it was perfect for this photo of my daughter. Most of the time she is definitely a "Girlie Girl" but at the time this photo was taken she was going through a bit of a "Tom Boy" phase favouring denim shorts or jeans and pumps all the time and even this pose with her hands in her pockets suits the feel of the layout.

The wood arrow is also from the Boys Rule collection and I added the date using some Tim Holtz mini alphas and a sticker and the chipboard heart is by Studio Calico.

I created the title with Black Thickers and a "lovely" sticker. The "You Rock" sticker is matted onto some grey card to match the photo mat and raised up on foam pads.

A few splatters of Heidi Swapp ink to finish and to balance with the title in the opposite corner.

Another finished layout about my girl for her album and not a bit of pink in sight!!

Do you use "Boyish" papers on girl pages or "Girl" papers on boy layouts or do you tend to stick to the theme the papers were intended for?

Thanks for stopping by today!

Changes and Christmas Scrapping

Hello! How are you?

September has been a busy month in our house.  

A month that has seen a lot of changes.

I was quite sad to finally close the S J Crafts online shop although I know it is the right thing for me and my family. My daughter started the next phase of her life as she moved up to her new secondary school and has quickly settled into her new routine and enjoying the opportunities school now offers her! And Me?! I have started a new part time job! I can't believe how lucky I have been to land myself this little job which gives me all the school holidays off!! I'm very thankful for this next phase of life for me and my little family!

Recently I was lucky enough to work with the brand new Simple Stories "Cozy Christmas" collection pack from the lovely Wear Crafts for a magazine commission. Unfortunately I can't yet show you the layout for the magazine but I can show you this layout which I created with some of the left over papers.

I started off with a row of three photographs across the middle of the page. The word "Joy" and the stars in the bottom right corner were already on the paper as was the little gold strip on the top edge so I simply used these two areas as my start point to build up the design, adding the red striped border sticker (cut into small pieces), little stars, the gold "25 Dec" and word stickers (all from the sticker sheet which is included in the collection pack). I also die cut the larger red stars and the small woodgrain stars. The "Oh what fun it is" card is cut from one of the patterned papers in the kit and I added the heart sticker to match the red heart printed on the paper next to the word "joy". 

I finished off with some metallic MME arrows, date stamp and a scattering of gems.

Here's a few close ups of the details:

And here's a look at what you get in the collection pack:

A gorgeous selection of double sided papers and journal cards in traditional reds, greens,  mixed with some woodgrain and more neutral creams and golds. The two sticker sheets have lots of really useful words and festive icons which I know I will use up on more layouts very soon.

Have you started your Christmas Crafting yet? 

Scrap 365 September Sketch

I love the monthly sketches over at  the Scrap365 blog and one of the things I'm happy about since the shop closure is that I now have a little more scrappy time which means I can play along with a few of the challenges that pop up in blogland and on UK Scrappers.

This is the September Scrap 365 sketch

and here's my take on it

I kept fairly close to the sketch, layering up my papers, stickers and embellishments on the cardstock onto which I had drawn the "half circles" with a gold pen.

As on the sketch, I placed my title to the right hand side of the layout. 

I added some Studio Calico gold hearts and Heidi Swapp gold mist droplets. Then some Mister Huey green mist for good measure!

I love these American Crafts Cork arrows .... and I'm down to my last few so I'm now using them sparingly!!! 

This one helps to draw the the across the page to the journalling and the title!

I really enjoyed this sketch and look forward to the next one!

Start to Finish Challenge #1 ~ Favourites and winner!

A few weeks ago I set the first "Start to Finish" Challenge, where I showed you the very early stages of a layout with just a few pieces of paper layered up and challenged you to copy the "Start" but to add further papers, photos and embellishments in whichever way you chose to. 

Here's my Start and the Finish Layout ...

Lots of you found it a great way to jumpstart your layout and it was lovely to see how all the layouts finished up so differently!

I loved all your layouts and it was so difficult to pick out just a few favourites but here they are ...

Top left: "Aren't you lovely" By Laura

Top right: "Look at you" By Annie

Bottom left: "Soakin' up the rays" By Jackie

Bottom right: "Lovely" By Sharon

The winner picked at random using "Random.org" is No 5 which is:

Petrina!!

Congratulations Petrina - please drop me an e mail to sarah_sjr at hotmail (dot) com with your address so I can get a little prize off to you!!

Look out for another "Start to Finish" Challenge coming soon!!