Creative Thinking with "Kelli" - Using Chipboard In Your Layouts

Hi all! Kelli here with this weeks "Creative Thinking" tutorial which is all about chipboard! Here we go!!

Chipboard Covered With Paper

MATERIALS NEEDED:

1. Adhesive sheets (a retired product from CTMH that I

purchased sooooooo many packages of when the retired) or any

adhesive of your choice.

2. Dimensional Elements from CTMH, otherwise known

as Chipboard! In letters and shapes.

3. Finishing Files by CTMH were the perfect tool to

finish the edges of my letters. You can use your

favorite sanding tools!

TRY IT YOURSELF!

* Trace your letter or shape onto your adhesive sheet

* Trace your letter face down onto the "wrong" side of the paper you're using to cover your chipboard

* Adhere the adhesive sheet to the chipboard

* Adhere the paper to the chipboard

* Use your finishing tools to file off the excess paper around the edges of the chipboard

If you are not using adhesive sheets, use the same tracing method directly onto your paper and follow the remaining steps adhering your paper to the chip board with an adhesive of your choice.

Co-ordinating 3D letters for you Project is easy and fun!

Chipboard Sprayed With Homemade Glimmer Mist

This glimmer spray paint is super shinny and glittery when light reflects one way on it.

Then you see the rich close to my heart colour when the light reflects another way.

It's very scientific!! Not! Very Simple! Yes!

Mix 50 % Create a Shade Glimmer paint by Close to My Heart and 50% alcohol (you can get it at you local $1 store) Now add as much Colour Re-inker in your Favorite Close to My Heart Shade to get your desired colour in a small spray bottle (again your local $1 store). Shake it up really well and you get a fabulous glimmer spay paint that you can use for many different projects!

Simple, Cheap, Beautiful!

 

Chipboard Sponged with Ink

This is a simple technique, take a spone dauber, or a sponge, press on ink pad to collect ink, dab on chip board until you get desired texture or colour!

Here are some examples of my work with Chipboard.

A large chipboard circle sprayed with home made CTMH glimmer mist.

Letters and a heat shape sponged with a CTMH ink pad.

Creative Thinking With Suezie - How To Make a PC Generated Text/Title

Hi there - Suezie here!  As this week's challenge is all about using computer text on your page Karen asked me to do a tutorial to share some ideas and tips.  I'm guessing most of you are reasonably familiar with computers since you're bloggin but I wonder how many of you use them in your scrap booking?  I know it's important to have some of your own handwriting in your albums so I do but I also love the fun I can have with different font styles to suit my pages so I use my computer alot!

I decided the easiest way was to share several of my own pages and talk you through how I used my computer to create them.  I have several programmes but I go back to 'MSWord' again and again unless I need something soooo fancy I just can't do it any other way.

Okay - this page uses pretty basic computer functions.  What makes it clever is HOW you choose to use these basics!  Let me show you.

Title: open up a blank word document and type letters with several spaces in between.  Use your mouse to highlight letters, select 'font' type and size to alter as desired. 

Next use 'font colour' to select your chosen colour (or more colours if what you want is not readily available) then print, cut, alter and add to your page.  I added a large chipboard 'e' for extra interest in the page title above and remember you can always make your printed text 'bold' for more depth and colour too.

Text strips:  repeat the process as for title but with complete words rather than letters and leave plenty of space to trim them to size.  If you want you can use complete sentences or even break up your sentences as in the example below.

Sentiment or journaling: I like to use a table to make sure my journaling fits perfectly.  This is especially important if I know I will be cutting my journaling with a punch or die-cut shape as in the page below.  I will often cut my die shape and measure up the size 'cell' I need.  I will also cut my die shape in acetate so I can position it over my text to ensure it's perfect.

To work in a table open a new word document, click on the 'insert' tab and then 'table - see below

Next you will be presented with an 'insert' box where you can choose the number of columns and rows etc.  To make it easy simply choose 1 row and 1 column.

Your table will appear and you will need to resize it to fit your text.  You could do this by clicking and dragging on the lines until you see the size you want indicated on the ruler around the page but I prefer to right click the table, select 'table properties' and

then adjust the column/row heights or width to my exact requirements give or take a fraction here or there.

Once you have your table (actually one row & column is a single cell) then you can type your text, highlight it and play around with fonts, colours and anything else you want until you are happy to send it to print.

A top tip is to print it on scrap paper first to make sure it is the size and style you want.  Sometimes the view on screen is a bit deceiving so it's hard to tell for sure.  Then when you know it's exactly right put in the good stuff and print again!  I always print on a high quality (slightly thicker) white, acid-free paper.  If I want it any other colour then I will print on coloured or even patterned paper or ink it up with an ink pad afterwards.  On my first sample page I used a pale blue over the top to remove the stark white and make it tone in with my page much better.

Once you have these few basics behind you - you can begin to explore and create all kinds of fabby texts and letters using your computer.

Just to wet your appetite to experiment more I'm sharing this text strip from the 'sweet dreams' page I submitted to the Scrapbook Trends magazine.  It was my first ever submission and it got almost an entire page!

I don't own a 12 x 12 printer but you can still do 12 x 12 effects.  I typed using a 'horizontal' page orientation, left spaces in between words so I could add bling, used a pretty font and made it blue to match my page.  Then I cut it into a strip, and simply 'snipped' it in two at just the right place so I could lay it across the page.  I covered the gap with a glittered page accent that I also added printed text to.  Perfect!  Who would ever know that the strip wasn't 12 x 12?  This is a super cool idea to add a text border strip anywhere on a page - even behind photos.  Try it - I guarantee you won't be disappointed.

Okay - enough time taken up on this tutorial (don't want to overkill).  I will share a few more pages using computer text and list brief details over on my blog later this week so you can check em out.

Now go try something new with your computer!  Happy Scrappin!

Creative Thinking With Melly - Creating a Layout With Simplicity

Welcome again to our second week of "Creative Thinking"!! This weeks host is Melly and shes going show you how to achieve "Simplicity" on to your layouts!

When Karen asked me to do this I was totally honored but a bit freaked out at explaining to you all how i make my layouts! But once i set my mind to it, I got there in the end!

When I start I always start with the pic or pics I'm going use and then pick my colours round about it! For simple layouts I (not everyone) think that it means solid colours or mostly white/colour background. So I chose a picture from my Wedding and matched the colours red, green and ivory.

I wanted to add a touch of something to the red background without making it fussy. So I stamped the background using my thistle stamp I used for my Wedding.

When I begin my layouts I always start by scribbling a few ideas down until i find the perfect layout for me! If you struggle with your layouts you can use some of our Sketches or even try a card layout sketch to get you started.

When I'm happy with my sketch, I lay all my pieces down before sticking just to make sure I'm happy. Once satisfied I stick it all together!

And here is the finished layout. I changed it slightly, adding extra ribbon and adding a butterfly as it was part of our Wedding theme!

I hope this wee post can help you all bring "Simplicity" into your layouts!

We can't wait to see what you all come up with and hopefully join in our Challenge! Remember this week for every friend you bring along that enters in our challenge, your name will go into a draw for some surprise candy from Nancy! So all you have to do is leave us a comment and let us know who your friend is.

Hugs Melly xxx

Creative Thinking With Pris - Stamping Your Layouts

Welcome to another new addition to Lasting Memories!! Each week we will be posting a "Creative Thinking" post which will highlight something fun and exciting that you can incorporate right into your layouts!! Our first "Creative Thinking" is hosted by Priscilla, and she is going to tell you how to incorporate stamping techniques right into your layouts!!

This was a tough assignment for me. Mentally. As a rule, I don't stamp in my scrapbooks. I am paranoid about ink rubbing off on the plastic page protectors (happened to me once!) so I usually shy away from stamping near my precious pics!

I was very surprised to find that I love Love LOVE this layout! Here is how it went:

Despite me stamping-in-my-scrapbook apprehensions, I DO own quite a number of stamps and some very lovely Close To My Heart ink-pads (which I use when I {very rarely} make cards). At first I was only going to use my giant snowflake and 'Barn-Red' ink, but I was soon enjoying stamping and needed to add 'New England Ivy' snowflakes as well. It then evolved, and I ended up stamping "a very merry Christmas to you" on a side-bar piece of paper as well.

I randomly stamped snowflakes, in varying shades (this is the famous "keep stamping till you run out of ink" technique). IMPORTANT: The biggest problem with this sort of thing, is knowing when to stop. Your page can very easily become over crowded. LESS IS MORE!

I used my Creative Memories "Tag Maker" punch on a bunch of pictures, and attached small pieces of white ribbon to each one to make them look like Christmas gift tags. I randomly stamped "a very merry Christmas to you" in black ink on this red side-bar piece of paper, and then attached some of my picture tags on top of it.

I used my handy-dandy cricut and "storybook" cartridge to spell out Christmas Eve in the same red paper, lovely!

This "Special Day" sticker is from Creative Memories, mounted on white paper, cut out, and then mounted on green paper. I also used several Creative Memories holly stickers to add a little 'something.'

And there you have it... a lovely stamped page!! I just may use stamps in my scrapbook again, who knows!!

Let me know if this "Creative Thinking" post was helpful for you and we'd love to see what you come up with!! Don't forget to link your layout with our current "Stamp Those Layouts" challenge and also have a chance to win a great giveaway, courtesy of Twyla!