Showing posts with label Layouts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Layouts. Show all posts

Tuesday 13 May 2014

April Challenge Favourites and A Winner!

Hello everyone! Jennifer here to show you a few of our favourites from the April Mood Board Challenge entries... and to tell you the winner of the prize too of course!

Thank you so much to everyone who entered, there were so many beautiful pages that have been giving us lots of ideas, and showing us how many different ways the mood board could be interpreted! You guys rock!

At the end of the post I'll tell you the randomly picked winner, but now here are our favourites...



Trina uploaded her layout to our Facebook Page, it captures the springtime spirit of the moodboard so well with beautiful pinks and greens, flowers and butterflies!



Marie put the March Kit to great use on her layout, we love the different textures she's created!



Laura incorporated lots of ideas from the moodboard, including the composition and the glitter stripes! 

And the winner of the Spring Themed Prize is...

That's Laura! Congratulations Laura! Please contact us at sarah(at)sjpapercrafts(dot)co(dot)uk so we can get your prize out to you!

Thank you again to everyone who entered. The May Challenge is Bingo! You have until the 31st of May to enter, and there will be another mystery prize to one winner!

Bye for now, Jennifer x

Saturday 10 May 2014

A "Grid" Layout with Hello Sunshine

Recently I ran a workshop at the Wilton Crop. 
We used the lovely Pink Paislee "Hello Sunshine" Papers and a selection of journal cards from Pink Paislee and Simple Stories with a focus on a grid design to create a quick layout for multiple photos.

Here's the layout and instructions should you wish to make a similar page.




Start off by "gutting" the sheet of "Hello Sunshine" paper and saving the middle piece for use on another layout. Of course, you can use a different patterned paper if you wish. Next, trim half an inch off two sides of the white cardstock so that there is a small border of stripes showing when the cardstock is adhered centrally on top of the paper.





Decide which 3" x 4" journal cards to use and crop the photos to size (if you've not already printed them to the size you want) and work out where they will all go in your grid design before starting to stick anything down. 

On my layout I had two rows of 4" high but the top row was only 3" high - this allows for a small border around the layout. You could put a 3" high row in the middle instead but it worked better for my photos and cards to have this arrangement.


You will see from the above photo that I opted to use a 6" x 4" photograph instead of two small photos or you could have 1 small photo and 1 journal card in that space instead. You can choose which ever arrangement suits your photos and the cards you wish to use.

Before sticking everything in place I rounded the corners using a Project Life Corner Rounder and also popped a doilie (cut in half) under the photos/cards each side to add some extra interest.


Add your title - this doesn't have to be in the top centre space - originally I was going to put it in the centre spot but then decided to swap it with the photo.

I chose the title "Whatever the Weather" as my layout is about how my daughter loves to go to the beach no matter what the weather is like .... even on chilly days she will go in the water and happily play on the beach.

I will add some handwritten journalling to that card with the umbrellas and rainbows on over on the right hand side before putting it away in my album.

All that is left to do is add some embellishments. I used some "Hello Sunshine" chipboard, Simple Stories DIY Boutique Brad, Studio Calico Wood heart and arrow and cut the black banner and little black arrow from scraps of paper using the Project Life Nesting die set.

Add embellishments on top of the doilies and overlapping the edge of the photos to help draw the eye towards your main photo(s)



If you do have a go at making a grid layout, please do leave a link in the comments so I can pop over and see or post your "grid" layout to the S J Crafts facebook Page.

Before I go ... don't forget there's FREE Postage and Packing over at the shop all this weekend when you spend £15 or more!! Offer ends 10am Monday 12 May!

Sarah x

Thursday 8 May 2014

Your Undivided Attention - Part 2

Hello, Lisa-Jane here again!

Welcome back for Part 2 of the series where I'm using Simple Stories Homespun collection, which includes lots of cards to cut apart and use in divided page protectors, to make standard layouts and more. If you missed Part One check it out HERE!

This lovely subtle 12x12 paper has little bits of printed embellishment that do lots of the hard work for you. I used several of the 6x4 cards here to create a messy stack without trying to make the pieces bigger and needing to cover joins and gaps. I made sure that each layer was a good contrast to the previous one and covered up any wording that wasn't relevant etc, so aside from the journaling block the pieces act just like sections of patterned paper and not specific 6x4 cards for 6x4 pockets:


Sometimes the sentiments on the cards go right to the edge like with this journaling block which was fine for my purposes but often there is just a some wording or a printed element that can easily be disguised if it doesn't fit your theme. My title was from the chipboard elements and I added some stickers and brads from the collection, a little doily from my stash and some gorgeous enamel dots and that was all it needed:


This next layout is another example of using the larger panels in their original form and incorporating it as part of the title. This time I added an ampersand and a couple of alpha stickers to add more meaning:


I used the long ruler sticker as a border strip and the little chipboard "Let's Stick Together" was absolutely perfect for this page about my 2 great nephews. In the Homespun collection there are bigger sections as well as the 3x4 and 4x6 cards and I used these to layer up the photograph here. 

There was a cute little border on one which was ideal to use leaving it showing even though the rest of the piece is hidden. It would also have been a great place to add some stitching over the printed stitching if you like that look. If you look for colours and patterns that you want to use instead of looking at the cards as they stand alone, then you can get a lot more versatility out of them!


I punched another pinked circle from a scrap card and added it to a paperclip with a coordinating brad. With the colourful heart paper as a background it didn't need a great deal more than a couple of items from the stickers and chipboard sheets:


Some branding strips and offcuts from other cards that were tucked behind other elements, a couple more stickers and pop dots and we have a fun and cheerful page about 2 funny little chaps.


I hope you've enjoyed these ideas for using the various sections in pieces and as whole elements and there is still not a divided page protector in sight!  

I'll see you soon for the final part of the series for a couple of "off the page" projects.

If you want to get hold of some Simple Stories items in the meantime then check out the selection at SJ Crafts HERE!

Lisa-Jane x

Lisa-Jane regularly allows us a glimpse into her life and her craft room over at her fun blog Inside My Head. Go pay her a visit!


Friday 2 May 2014

May Challenge - Bingo!

Hello and welcome to our May challenge! 

Did you know it's (Inter)National Scrapbooking Day (otherwise known as NSD!) tomorrow on the 3rd of May? Happy National Scrapbooking Day to you, we hope this challenge will give you some inspiration if you are crafting this weekend, and there's a chance to win a small prize if you enter!

Thank you to everyone who took part in our April Challenge, we loved looking at the entries, and we'll announce a few of our favourites and a winner here on the blog soon!

If you haven't seen our challenges so far this year, then here's how it works. Each month throughout 2014 we will set a challenge and we'd love it if you would play along. Each month the challenge will vary - sometimes we'll have a sketch, sometimes a colour palette, a photo inspiration or a "recipe" of stash to use or maybe a technique.

At the end of this post there is "linky tool" for you to link up your challenge entry so we can pop along and see and we will feature a few of our favourite projects next month. 

This time it's a BINGO Challenge!

Here's how to play ...

Select 3 boxes from the grid in a line (horizontal/vertical or diagonal) and include the items or technique in those 3 boxes on your project!

Eg: you may choose Ink, Metal, Bow (diagonal line) .... OR .... Transparent, Metal, Stamp (horizontal) but you couldn't select Transparent, Metal, Torn Paper as they are not next to each other in a line!


Here's some inspiration from the Design Team:

Louise:


 Louise was inspired by the top row of the bingo grid. She used Mr Huey Mist, a border punch across the bottom and a 1" circle punch. All supplies are from the March kit which included lots of the 7 Dots Studio "Illumination" Collection, with the addition of a blue cardstock, file tab, cotton and badge. 




Jenny also used the top row from the bingo grid: ink /mist, border punch, and circles. Her products include Kraft cardDistress ink (Weathered Wood), Glossy Accents, and Stickles.




Lisa-Jane selected the middle row: Transparent - Metal - Stamping 
Her supplies include stamps by Hero Arts, papers, stars, vellum and ephemera pack by Crate Paper Boyz Rule, enamel dots by Studio Calico and kraft cardstock.



Jimjams - for S J Crafts - March Illumination Kit & Insta Word Stickers

Jemma's page features holiday snaps of her daughter playing in the "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids" playground at Disney! She also chose the middle row:
Transparent stickers from a pack of Simple Stories Insta Clear Word StickersMetal word by Prima, and Stamps from her stash.  

The rest of the supplies are 7 Dots Studio products




Annie went for the middle vertical row and used a border punch, metal embellishment (staples), and torn paper - but in fact she ended up using mixed alphas and circles too, so it could just as well be the diagonal row bottom left to top right!

Her supplies include patterned papers, stickers and diecuts from the 7 Dots Illuminations collection, Studio Calico wood veneersSimple Stories DIY Typeset stickers and Burlap StickersPrima Alphas in black and one of the Prima stitched diecuts from the March kit.   




Jennifer chose a diagonal line from top left to bottom right on the bingo grid (Mist, a Metal Embellishment, a Knot). Her products include Heidi Swapp's Navy Color Shine Mist, Crate Paper's Boys Rule collection Zap & Top Score paper and some Wood Embellishments and Ephemera pieces, and some Studio Calico Cork Stars. Her metal embellies are an old key and some metal rimmed brads, and she has two knots - one in string under the title and one in bakers twine on the key.


We'll have a little mystery prize this month for one entry picked at random from all those who link up! The winner will be announced after the challenge has closed along with a few of our favourites! 

So, will you take up our challenge this month?

Use the linky tool below to add a link to the blog post (or your gallery) with your layout or card and a link back to this post is much appreciated.

You will need to ensure your link is added by the 31st of May (11.59pm).

Enjoy!

Friday 18 April 2014

Your Undivided Attention - Part One

Hello everyone, Lisa-Jane here today!

Lots of manufacturers now are making wonderful collections aimed at people using pocket page protectors, as well as the various designs of divided page protectors themselves. Previously paper collections might have had one sheet that was designed to be cut apart but the reverse of that sheet was often a solid colour so you got the best of both worlds.  

Now though, with so many people using these divided page protectors, the reverse of the pre-designed sheets are often intended to be cut apart too. That's fine if you have that particular design of protector but what if you don't? Or, what if, like me, you love a collection but you just want to use it on standard 12x12 pages? Do we end up missing out because we don't want to use undivided protectors? I don't think so! 


In the next 3 posts I'm going to show you some designs I've made using the Simple Stories Homespun Collection which coordinates with the Simple Stories albums and protectors. However my projects in the first 2 posts fit my normal American Crafts D rings albums and protectors and the final 2 projects are "off the page" style.

Firstly I went through and cut all the sheets into their relevant sections. As I was cutting, some of the items were jumping out at me as needing to be used at their intended size and others I knew I would be happy to use in another way. This second pile that I set aside could be used for die cutting, fussy cutting, punching shapes, layering edges etc. I also took off all the branding strips and cut off the information so I was left with just the usable pieces. Making these decisions early and assembling a "kit" in this way meant that I knew exactly what I had available and also that I didn't wobble when I wanted to cut a small piece of something!

Family:


For this first layout I used one of the pieces of 12x6 as a panel just in from the left hand side. These large panels often have something you can choose to use as a title too so an alternative could have been cutting the panel along the second "plank" from the bottom. I wanted to use it in its entirety here though as I think it makes a natural home for the photo above right.

I also cut one of the 6x4 cards to make a second mat for my photo... 




I really liked the pattern and I knew I wasn't going to use the sentiment but my photo was already matted onto another 6x4 piece so I needed to do some creative patchwork!

 I cut an L shape and then adhered the piece with a small gap, then adhered the photo on top. I chose a 3x4 card from the pile I had set aside for cutting up and punched a couple of pinked circles for layering.



 The branding strips make great banners and are perfect for disguising small gaps and joins. I added some texture with stickers, chipboards and brads from the collection.  


I added the coordinating banner sticker on pop dots and I love the way it mirrors the banner on the wood grain panel.



My second layout was completed on a piece of A4 cardstock. I use the standard office page protectors for this size as they still perfectly fit the AC ring binders and add a bit of variety to the album.

Elliot:


Here I've cut down a photo to 3x4 and made a grid from 3 other 3x4 cards that I really liked. Two of the cards are decorative and the third is for journaling. I adhered them to a piece of the cardstock that I cut from the centre of the background to make a narrow frame for the grid. This helps the eye to see the grid as one whole piece and also lifts it slightly from the busier background.

I added texture and dimension with buttons, twine, bobble trim and a couple of branding strips. I also added to the printed embellishments using chipboard stickers:


The little label area on this card was a perfect home for my great nephew's name and the red alphas in the set worked perfectly with the reds I was bringing out in my colour scheme.

So lets recap - so far we've used a 6x12 panel as it is, incorporated it as a title, made photo mats with 6x4 cards, made a grid with 3x4 cards, used a 3x4 card for a journalling block and used "spare" cards and branding strips for punching shapes and making embellishments. 

Wow! Who said you could only use this collection with divided page protectors? 

And there are still 2 posts to go in this series! Join me again soon!

Lisa-Jane x

P.S. Are you loving Simple Stories right now? Check out the other Simple Stories collections in stock at SJ Crafts HERE!

Lisa-Jane shares lots of crafty creations and regularly joins in with 'What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday' over on her blog 'Inside My Head'!

Monday 14 April 2014

Using Stickers For Starting Points!

Hello, it's Louise here today. Welcome to SJ Crafts.

Last month I used Amy Tangerines Plus One collection to create these layouts. Today I'm here to share with you another two layouts and some greeting cards using the same collection. This time my focus is on the Amy Tangerine's sticker sheet.


How many of us are guilty of buying collection kits that include a 12x12 sticker sheet? You know the sheets I mean, the ones that usually include an alpha set and word stickers.

I am definitely guilty of this, even when I purchase a few sheets of 12x12 paper or a small 6x6 paper pad I check to see if there is a sticker sheet to accompany them! 

It's safe to say that I have quite a selection of these 12x12 sticker sheets and most of them look very similar to this one.....


.....half used with stickers cut out, where I have placed them onto a project to see what they look like without sticking them down straight away.

Instead of putting this half used sticker sheet away with all the others I challenged myself to create a couple more layouts using a sticker as a starting point. Well, Amy Tangerine has designed a fun collection, it would be a shame not use all those stickers, wouldn't it?!

On the right hand side of the used sticker sheet I shared with you above, you will see where a long pink sticker sat. When I decided to use a sticker as a starting point I adhered this sticker to a sheet of 12x12 cardstock before I thought to take a photograph. From the whole sheet this is the one sticker that jumped out a me shouting "use me, use me", so after placing it on the cardstock I put it to one side knowing I would need to locate the photo I wanted to use.


In the meantime I selected a few more stickers that I knew would work with the second photo I'd chosen to scrap. I mixed the 12x12 sticker sheet with some of Amy Tangerine's puffy stickers. The large sticker "an everyday kind of adventure" was the sticker I'd chosen to base my layout around:


I started out with a sheet of white cardstock (it seems to be my "go to" supply at the moment), my photo and my adventure sticker. Placing the stickers and some Amy Tangerine cards from the 6x6 pad I started to build up my page:


This photo of me was taken on top of an open air bus on a tour of Liverpool city. There I was, in my element, taking lots of photos and in true British Style, the heavens opened. We had to move downstairs and as it continued to pour with rain, more people squeezed onto the bus, the windows steamed up and bang went my sightseeing photo taking tour :). This fun sticker collection included an Umbrella too. Just perfect.

Not only did I use a sticker to base my layout around, I used the alpha stickers and Amy Tangerine's Cards from the 6x6 paper pad to create my title....

My happy place is behind this camera.
 
Sunday Morning Routine

Remember the big long pink sticker from above....by now I'd located the photo that I'd had in mind to scrap with this sticker. A rugby photo no less. One where the funky socks would work well with the funky stickers, and one where this sticker would record our Sunday Morning Routine.

Really, this sticker I could have used again and again. It's a perfect sticker to use to record so many everyday things.

The sticker was used to create the title for my layout.


More Amy Tangerine stickers from the above sheet were used along with an Amy Tangerine badge and bradstudio calico stars and Mister Huey Mists.

As I went to photograph my layouts I moved my corner rounder across my desk and done something I haven't done in a long while. I corner rounded my layouts. I'd forgotten how much I like the look.

Cards

After completing the layouts I took another look at what was left on my sticker sheet and decided to make some cards using papers from Amy Tangerine's 6x6 paper pad and some of the remaining stickers.


First up is the Typewriter sticker. I trimmed down a sheet of 6x6 patterned paper from Amy Tangerine's pad and inserted side panels. The patterned paper is rather busy so the plain grey side panels tone it down a little. 


To add some texture I ran the paper through my sewing machine. It is a good idea to sew your paper before you stick it to your card. That way the stitching will not show on the inside of your card.


Adding a little stamped text, a badge and the typewriter sticker, there is a little card on it's way to a lovely recipient.

The world globe was the next sticker left on the sheet that I wanted to use. I took three patterned papers from the paper pad to layer and stitch.
The small grey hello sticker and alphas together made a greeting.  I added the globe, a few stars and twine and I have a card that I love.


Did you spot the teeny cloud on the above sticker sheet? Half way up on the right hand side under the orange umbrella! I wanted to use it and noticed that Amy Tangerines puffy stickers also had a teeny puffy cloud. Picking out three patterned papers again, I went for the house paper and layered and stitched along the top of the layered papers to add design and texture. With a few gems and the puffy house sticker I finished my card.


It feels good to have used up most of my sticker sheet. Amy Tangerine's stickers are inspiring and fun to use. I enjoyed using them so much that I'm now going to pop across to SJ Crafts shop to see what collection and sticker sheet I will purchase next.

So...   
  •  are any of you are going to admit to having lots of these half used sticker sheets? 
  • how many of you are now thinking you could use these stickers on your next project?
  • are you thinking about including a sticker sheet next time you shop for supplies? 

Please do leave us a comment and let us know.
Thank you for stopping by, have a lovely day! 

Louise x

To see more of Louise's inspiring craft projects check out her blog Boys, Bugs and Beautiful Buttons!