Creating a Disney Scrapbook

seven months ago my family was having a blast on a week-long Disney vacation at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida. you might have noticed that i haven't shared a single thing about that vacation.

why? well, the truth is......i'm overwhelmed with how exactly to record the magical-ness of it. (if magical-ness isn't a word, it is now.)

do you ever get that way with your photos and/or memories. frozen for fear of 'messing' it up? silly, isn't it?

i took thousands of photos on that trip. eeeps! we also took advantage of the Photopass system and purchased the CD of images which gave me another 600 or so photos.

gobs and gobs of photos.

this layout is the very first layout i've made that displays photos from our trip....i hope that there are many more to follow, like, real soon!

there are SO many stories to be told from this trip.so many. i can't wait to see them all unfold in the pages of my scrapbooks.

this layout in particular was created using some new products released at CHA from Little Yellow Bicycle's Just Because and Naturals collections. i've also used quite a few Fiskars tools in the mix too!

this layout also appears today on a few other blogs.  in one place i'm talking about tips for putting the layout together and in the other talking about recording vacation memories as a whole. click on over to the Little Yellow Bicycle blog and to the Fiskateers blog for more of the story.  there are also links to products and tools at the respective blogs. 

Easy Valentine Treats for the Classroom in SRM Tubes

I am so thrilled to be sharing an idea for you and your kiddos for their Valentine’s Day classroom exchange. You should know that I am totally one of those people that like to find ways to use products in ways other than their intended purpose and today’s inspiration will be no different.

With Valentine’s Day coming up, I decided to make things easy on myself and put some of the gorgeous pieces from the Little Yellow Bicycle: Just Because: Paper Crafting Kit to use to embellish a set of lightweight clear plastic tubes from SRM Press.

These tubes are BRILLIANT for packaging small candy treats and made the job of putting together sugary sweet Valentine’s for my daughter’s classmates super simple.

 What I love most about these tubes is that you can decorate them as simple or over the top as you wish and whichever way you choose they look absolutely adorable and like you fussed for hours over them. They are about 1” in diameter leaving you with tons of options for what treat to fill them with. I’ve seen yogurt covered raisins, cinnamon hearts, tart candies, chocolate coated candies, nuts, sunflower seeds, coins, messages in a bottle, rolled up stickers, etc.

To decorate them, I started simple by adding either a vellum tape strip or a pre-scored printed cardstock strip (from the Paper Crafting Kit) along the bottom of each tube. These add a visually substantial embellishment around the base of the tube and acts to ground whatever other embellishing you’re doing. Each vellum strip &/or pre-scored printed cardstock will wrap around three tubes, so you can really stretch the mileage from the set making them perfect when creating multiples!

When using the shapes from the Paper Crafting Kit, don’t feel limited by pieces that aren’t quite the right color because you can always use the reverse side that is white. Also, don’t overlook a piece that is pre-printed with a word or image that may not convey your feelings because it can also be layered with additional pieces to cover. I did exactly that using the light blue circle piece pre-printed with the word “happy”. You’ll also notice that the banner pieces are much narrower than they come in the kit. I simply cut ¼” to ½” strip off of each side so they would look more balance for the size of my tubes.

Some other tips:

• It’s a good idea to alternate the height at which you place your layered embellishments so they don’t all get tangled together at the top.
• Glue dots work best for adhering to the plastic tube. No worrying about glue drying or sticky fingers leaving marks on the tubes.
• If you like a little extra bulk to your layers add in the small flowers and hearts from the package of Chipboard Shapes.
• Use stickers from the Fresh Verse sticker sheet to add simple phrases. You can quickly turn them into a cute banner-like sticker by cutting a triangle-shaped notch in the right edge of the sticker.
• Dust the sticky portion of any stickers that overhang with baby powder so they don’t inadvertently stick to anything else.
• Consider using a tube of a different size for teachers and school administrators. Larger tubes work rather well for using the larger bows in the crafting kit.
• Don’t have a need for classroom Valentine’s? No worries. You can adapt this idea for any theme using a Paper Crafting Kit from any of the other Little Yellow Bicycle collections.
• Don’t want to use tubes? That’s okay, you can follow the same concept using glassine bags or cellophane bags too!

Happy Crafting!

Blog Hop: May Arts + Little Yellow Bicycle

hello all my Little Yellow Bicycle fans! this week, LYB has been sharing ideas for how to use May Arts ribbons along with their Once Upon A Christmas collection. and to finish off the week with an abundance of inspiration, today, a few of the other LYB designers are treating you to a mini blog hop!

May Arts provided me with a gorgeous selection of ribbons to complete this project.  there were so many that coordinated with this collection that i had a really hard time narrowing down which ones would actually get used. do you ever have that problem?

i ended up choosing those that had a sweater-like texture to help mimic the texture of the sweater & yarn appearing in the photos. i'm completely smitten with the white lace ribbon trimmed with pompoms on one edge.  *swoon*  the new alphabet sticker from deja views have the perfect burlap texture, as well. just wait until you see what Vicki did with that same ribbon! oh my heavens, it's so cute!

anywho. for this little accent, i layered two of the fabric snowflake stickers together and tied them off with ribbon before embellishing with adhesive-backed jewel stickers and a stick pin loaded with small beads.

my daughter is hoping that Santa brings her a new Raggedy Ann baby doll like he's done every year since she was a baby.  it's her bestest friend and keeps her feeling safe and secure when her world feels unsteady. such a sweet thing to see how special this doll is to her.

okay. so are you ready to hop along? here's the hop list. now go forth, and be inspired!

Tania Willis  (you are here)

Liz Qualman

Vicki Boutin

Heather Leopard

Jen Chesnick

the bonus of this little hop is that May Arts is also treating you to the same inspiration. so, be sure to visit the Little Yellow Bicycle designers' blogs listed above and the May Arts blog for their list and leave a comment at each one for your chance to win gorgeous products to use on your own projects. (psst....LYB is giving away Once Upon a Christmas)

Once Upon A Christmas Fabric Stickers	Once Upon A Christmas Stick Pins	Once Upon a Christmas 6x6 Paper Pad	Once Upon A Christmas Chipboard Shapes
Once Upon A Christmas Clear Stickers	Once Upon A Christmas Favorite Pieces	Once Upon A Christmas Fresh Verse	Once Upon A Christmas Tags & String
Fancy Pants Home For Christmas Glittered Alphabet	Fiskars Scalloped Sentiment Border Punch	Fiskars Threading Water Border Punch	Fiskars XXXLarge Pretty Scallops
Fiskars 12" Portable Trimmer	Fiskars One Fourth Inch Circle Hand Punch	Fiskars Softouch Microtip Scissors

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never too early for making Christmas cards

yep. it's true! i'm that crazy person that is trying to be on the ball this year and already thinking Christmas and it's November 7th. getting things started early!  in fact, the mr. and i are going on a dinner date followed by some Christmas shopping this evening. :) can't wait!

anywho. those cards.....

Little Yellow Bicycle sent me a lovely supply of their current Christmas collection called Once Upon A Christmas to play around with, so that i did.

i hear many scrapbookers saying “I’m clueless when it comes to making cards.” so, today, i just want to share one idea on how you can get over that fear of how or where to start when attempting to make cards.

when i sit down to create cards, and am stuck for a starting point, i almost always find i’m happy with the result if i stick to groupings of like items, whether that be repeating colors, repeating shapes, or repeating a pattern. for example, on the green card base, i scanned my Once Upon a Christmas papers and embellishments and picked out my favorites that had lots of cream color shouting back at me. by grouping like colors together you instantly have a visually pleasing card.

once i had all those coordinating embellishments on my card base, i chose to use a small pop of color with the addition of the holly leaves and berries to help give some depth to the flat monochromatic color of the sticker embellishments. then, as a finishing touch, i added a small red rhinestone to the nose of the reindeer to bring in a small touch of playfulness.

for the other card, i chose to keep the silver foil embellishments the focus. it’s always visually pleasing to repeat elements, keeping in mind the scale as you arrange them. i’ve done that here with the larger chipboard frame, and the small and medium stickers with a similar shape. the small finishing details, like the rhinestones added to the stickers and chipboard pieces, are what bring this card to life.

also remember, any time you allow a sticky element to hang off the edge of your card, you need take the stickyness away by sprinkling baby powder over the exposed sticker.

Once Upon A Christmas Tags & String	Once Upon A Christmas Stick Pins	Once Upon A Christmas Favorite Pieces
Once Upon A Christmas Fresh Verse	Once Upon A Christmas Chipboard Shapes	Once Upon a Christmas 6x6 Paper Pad

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Xyron Create A Sticker + LYB Acorn Hollow

this week the Little Yellow Bicycle design team has been strutting their stuff after using the Xyron Create A Sticker, while the Xyron designers have been showing off their skills with Little Yellow Bicycle's Acorn Hollow collection!  a blog swap hop! such fun!

boy, oh boy, this Xyron Create A Sticker Maker they sent for me to use is slick-stuff! if you've missed the week of inspiration, you'll want to keep reading, then hop over to the Little Yellow Bicycle blog and the Xyron blog and read back a few days worth of entries to see all the possibilities.

i’ll be honest, i used to get so frustrated with the limitations i had using my Xyron 1.5” Create A Sticker—you know the ever popular “X”. why? because, well, 1.5” just felt so limiting in my little creative world.

but, when Xyron sent me the 2.5” Create A Sticker…..wowza! it instantly changed my mind when it comes to sticker making. it’s amazing how freeing that extra inch can be in the world of crafting.

the first thing i noticed was no longer did i have that crinkly plastic film over the item i was stickering. And no longer did i have exposed adhesive! no sticky fingers, no messy glue, no fussing with glue dots (i’ve lovingly nicknamed them glue boogers….ha!).

what makes it even more awesome is that now, the backing material is even a bit different and my punches could go through it like butter! no more jammed punches.

so, for this layout, i ripped a handful of pages out of my 6x6 paper pad, and then trimmed them down to 1 ¼” wide. placed two strips side by side, but not overlapping, then cranked them through the Create A Sticker machine.

then I used a 1” circle punch to punch down the length of each patterned paper. In less than 5 minutes, i had 50+ 1” circles with edge-to-edge adhesive. all i needed to do was peel off the protective backing and stick them to my page.

so while the layered circle embellishing looks super fussy, reality is this page was constructed in 20 minutes tops!

Xyron 2.5” Create A Sticker? in my opinion, a must have in every scrapboooker’s tool arsenal. get yourself one!

Don't forget to stop over to the Little Yellow Bicycle blog for details on how you can win yourself some Xyron products in today's giveaway!

Acorn Hollow Journaling Cards	Acorn Hollow Stick Pins	Acorn Hollow Chipboard Shapes
Acorn Hollow Clear Cuts	Acorn Hollow 5 Things Pocket	Acorn Hollow Favorite Pieces Stickers
Acorn Hollow Fresh Verse Stickers	Acorn Hollow 6x6 Paper Pad	Fiskars 12" Rotary with LED

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