And now for something on the funny side! Our youngest grandson Ben is 2 & 1/2 and at that stage where he’s outgrowing naps. Most days he does just fine and gets recharged at dinner time. But some days he just can’t hold on and needs to have a little nap to get through the rest of his day. Easter Sunday was a busy and exciting day for him. So it was no wonder that this was one of those days he needed a little nap to refuel for the rest of the day. Around 4 pm, my daughter and son-in-law were busy in the kitchen making dinner when they noticed it was suddenly very quiet. My son-in-law went to check on Ben and found him in this position. Ben was so tired he appeared to have simply “fallen over” onto the couch! The poor little guy didn’t even get his legs up there to properly stretch out.
Virginia Walker, the creative mind behind Confessions of a Paper Addict (COAPA Cutfiles), had the perfect cut file for this page. The Even Super Heroes Need Naps was exactly the title I needed to tell this story, and the whimsical font was also reflective of the mood I was looking for.
I chose the Super Kid – Burst patterned paper by Scrapbook Customs for the background of this layout. The Spider-man sticker in the top left-hand corner comes from the Spider Superhero Sticker sheet from the same company. I was still looking for more whimsical effects on this page and found them in two cut files in the Silhouette Design Store. The BAM! (Design ID #329165) and POW! (Design ID #329148) cut files were both designed by Sarah Bailey. Once these designs were cut and assembled, they were placed on fun foam to give them a bit of punch and dimension.
The final touch was adding the string of zzz’s in the top half of the layout to place added emphasis on the fact that this little cutie was fast asleep. Completed knocked out, as they say! They were created using Silhouette Studio software.
I hope I’ve given you a giggle today! And if you need a nap, by all means, take one. Just be sure no one is around with a camera! Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!
We’ve always encouraged our children to follow their passion as they grew up. It’s so rewarding to see them do it, but so tough when that passion takes them far away from home! Our son Sean followed his passion into the military and has been posted in Edmonton for several years now. And how lucky for him, and us, that he was posted out west, because this is where he met his incredible fiance, Tanis!
Late last summer we traveled out to Alberta to visit with Sean and Tanis. It was our first opportunity to meet Tanis’ family and we had an incredible trip. We were so warmly welcomed by this family from the moment we arrived. From welcome flowers and cards to multiple gatherings, game nights and wonderful meals together, this family made us feel loved and special throughout our entire stay! We can’t thank them enough for making our visit so special from beginning to end. You know when you meet people and you just know you’re going to be good friends? It’s so rare and such a gift to treasure. And the very best part of this relationship was seeing first-hand how much this family loves our son and welcomes him into their lives. The picture in this layout was taken during our last get together on that trip, and it includes Tanis’ parents, Linda and Ted. I love how it represents both sets of parents as pillars in their lives. We all know how tough this life can be and how important it is to surround ourselves with people who love and support us.
A good part of this strong connection between us all is the things we have in common. Tanis’ Grandmother Donna, definitely has a soft spot for Sean, and so did my Mother! It was so tough losing my Mom several years ago, but how lucky for Sean to now have another Grandmother in his life that cares so deeply for him. One of the most striking similarities between these two Grandmothers is that they both are/were quilters. I can’t think of a better gift to receive than a homemade quilt. Each time you wrap it around you, it’s like getting a loving hug from the woman who dedicated hours, weeks and months to stitching the quilt just for you. It is the love of these women for their families, and their passion to quilt, that inspired me to create this page. My vision was to represent two families coming together by bringing two quilts together on one page.
The top quilt in this layout is a free cut file designed by the talented Paige Evans. It is called Patchwork and is found on the Scrapbook and Cards Today (SCT) website under Bonus Files – Spring 2021. SCT offers multiple free cut files with each new edition, so be sure to check them out! I cut this file from white cardstock and backed it with coordinating papers from Cocoa Vanilla Studio’s Happiness collection. The colours in this collection were a great fit for the colours in our family picture (and it was just luck that we coordinated so well that day!).
I also wanted another background that represented quilting and the Stitched Diamonds cut file from Confessions of a Paper Addict (COAPA) was just want I was looking for. I used 8 coordinating colours of DMC floss to stitch this foundation page (DMC #500, 502, 820, 825, 991, 992, 3844, 3846). As most of the bottom page would be covered by the top quilt, I only stitched the first 3 sections from the outside in.
Before securing the top quilt to the bottom foundation page, fun foam was adhered to the backside to provide further dimension and texture to the layout. I find this product ensures a smooth and secure look for years to come. Something you can’t achieve by using foam dots.
The title was created using cut file #154615 from Silhouette Design Store entitled family saying – flea market.studio by Doodlebug Design. I created and printed the add on – Stitched together by love – using Microsoft Office Word.
Our love for our children has brought us together and we are all so excited to see them begin to build a life together. While we can’t have Sean close to home, we are certainly blessed that he has a family out west that loves him as much as we do! We left that vacation with the feeling that our family had just doubled in size. We can’t wait to make another trip out west to spend time with this loving and caring family.
Wishing you all a Happy Victoria Day! Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!
Let me introduce you to my Grandpa, Harold Russell. He was a gifted carpenter by trade, but a master gardener in his retirement. My grandparents lived in Mississauga in a house he built. They lived at the end of a dead-end street with a huge lot to the left of the house that Grandpa turned into a massive vegetable garden. I often spent a couple of weeks with my grandparents during the summer months when I was young. My memories of these times included lots of time in the garden with Grandpa and watching my Nana cooking, canning and freezing all the bounty that resulted from his hard labour. Grandpa built a large cold cellar in the house and it was always fun to get inside to see all the filled jars from Nana’s canning efforts.
My favourite memories of Grandpa’s garden were visits in June when we were allowed to pick fresh strawberries ourselves, and later in the season when we picked fresh carrots. There’s nothing quite like a freshly picked carrot washed under the garden hose! It was one of my favourite treats from his garden! I also remember baskets of fruit and vegetables begin loaded into our car before we returned to London after a visit. Grandpa was a kind and patient man, and he treated his treasured vegetable garden with as much love and tenderness that he afforded his grandchildren. You can see how proud he was of his produce in these pictures. That squash! I wish I knew how many pounds it weighed, but you can see the delight on his face with the result. Grandpa introduced us to many new vegetables that we have never experienced before. Spaghetti squash was our favourite of all.
Marcy and Milly SVG‘s #freebiefriday cut file called Garden Words Background was the perfect file to document this story. You can find all the free cut files on the Marcy Milly SVG Facebook page. Once the file was sized to my liking for the layout, I created an offset of the cut file using Silhouette Studio software. The small sections that made up the centres cutouts of all of the letters were removed to provide a solid base. Then both sections of the cut file were cut on respective green and black cardstock. I chose not to centre the cut file on the offset background, and offset it slightly to the right to provide a more dramatic effect.
Simple Stories recent Simple Vintage Farmhouse Garden collection worked beautifully to help tell this story. Not only did I love the colour graphics in The Sweet Life patterned paper, but I loved the subtle pictures of garden vegetables in the rest of the paper. I used various pieces to embellish this layout from the coordinating Bits and Pieces and Garden Bits ephemera packs. The From the Garden sticker, seen in the photo with the large squash, came from the Cardstock Stickers found in the 12×12 Collection Kit. The title – Master Gardener – was added using doodlebug designs inc my type cardstock stickers.
I had a great time working on this layout and going down memory lane! So pleased to have a cut file that fit my Grandpa’s passion perfectly! Be sure to follow the Marcy Milly SVG page on Facebook to grab this #freebiefriday cut file and many more! Also, look for the post announcing a new monthly newsletter to keep informed on new monthly cut files. Sign up is via email. For all my gardening friends out there, I wish you the best growing season yet! Until next time, stay safe, stay well and Happy Scrapping!
Thank goodness Spring has finally arrived in all its glory! Our gardens are beginning to grow and we can look forward to beautiful summer days ahead. These two beauties make me smile every day. They are my perpetual garden that just keeps blessing me day after day. The Bouquet of Roses cut file from Marcy and Milly SVG was a perfect fit for this recent photo. It is a 3 layer cut file and I found it very easy to assemble.
The pink blossoms in the photo and the peach in my granddaughter’s shirt were the inspiration for the colours in this layout. I chose the soft peach/pink combination background from the Vicki Boutin Ready-to-Use Mixed Media Paper pad entitled Enjoy Today. I love these papers, they have beautiful colour combinations and a lovely texture. They are also perfect for scrapbookers like me who remain a bit intimidated by the whole mixed media process! I matched the colours of the roses in the cut file to this pretty background paper.
To create some texture and dimension on this layout I cut the base leaf section of this cut file twice. The bottom level is sage coloured (formally the Green/Black paper) and came from the Carta Bella Flower Garden coordinating cardstock package. The top leaf level was cut from the backside of the 3×4 Journaling Cards paper found in the same collection. I liked the small flecks of white in this patterned paper. These papers were layered one over the other. To create the dimension, small foam squares were added between the leaf layers in the areas that fell outside of the centre roses.
As I create a layout I usually get all the elements ready first before committing to adhering them in place. This allows me to move things around and decide on the final positioning and determining if anything else should be added. I always find that the final layout is not exacting what I envisioned at the beginning. This process is something I love about creating, it allows me to continually grow and develop skills. When I laid out the cut file and photo on this beautiful background paper, I felt the edges of the layout were missing something. There was just too much white space on the borders for my liking. I settled on a stitched border to fill this void. I’ve stitched for many years and find it very relaxing and rewarding. It also provides another level of texture to the completed layout. To create this border I altered the Stitched Diamonds cut file from COAPA Cut Files. I removed all the cut lines from the centre of the file to leave the scalloped border. This scalloped border was stitched using DMC floss that coordinated with the background paper and roses. I used colours 605, 760, 893 and 895. I changed the colour for each singular scallop, so it did take a bit of time to complete the border. I feel this border helped pull the whole page together.
With the border completed the photo and cut file were added to the page. It was at this stage that I added the foam adhesive squares to the leaves. The final touches included adding the title and date using Thickers Happy Life foam letter stickers. These pale rose coloured stickers blended in beautifully.
I’m so glad you stopped by today and I hope I’ve inspired you to create with this gorgeous cut file! Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!
This photo of my grandson Owen just sums up everything about summer for me. Spending time at our cottage in Muskoka is our favourite summer activity! My daughter captured this image on another glorious day last summer. My grandchildren love the water and spend most of their day swimming. You can see the look of contentment on Owen’s face – a perfect day, doing the things he loves most in the place he loves most.
The Summer Vibes cut file from Cut to You was the perfect cut file to document this moment. I chose coordinating papers from the Legendary collection by Cocoa Vanilla Studio for this layout. The yellows, oranges and greens were a perfect fit with the photo. I wanted the title to pop on the page and black cardstock helped achieve this look. The letters for the word summer were offset in Silhouette software to back the file, but the yellow letters for the word vibe were cut to fit the outline perfectly. These letters were backed using Taylored Expressions Foam Sticky Strips and placed within the corresponding black letters. This provided texture and dimension to the title. I mirrored this technique in the sun portion of this cut file, backing the two main sun sections and popping up the sun rays. This helped to provide balance to both sections of the layout.
The chipboard trees in the bottom left of the layout came from Scrapaholics. They came in a set of three called Snowy Trees. They too were a perfect fit for the cottage landscape and helped pull more green into the layout. I coloured them with Tim Holtz Distress Inks – Peeled Paint and Brushed Corduroy before adhering to the page.
Some of the final touches for this layout included adding the stickers to the left of the photo and attaching the “noteworthy” tab at the top of the photo. Both of these elements came from the Legendary collection. The last element was adding the date with doodlebug design inc’s my type cardstock stickers. I feel it is really important to attach a date to a layout as the days and years fly by before we know it!
Thanks for stopping by today, I hope you’ve enjoyed our bit of heaven up north! We will open the cottage soon and we look forward to another amazing year of memories at our happy place! Until next time, stay well, stay safe, and Happy Scrapping!
Happy Mother’s Day to all you wonderful Mom’s out there!!! I am extremely lucky to be called Mom by two incredibly special people (Lindsay and Sean) and loved every stage as they grew from babies, toddlers, children, teenagers and into adults. I am extremely blessed that my children remain close and involved in our lives, even when one lives out west. And I am most fortunate that they both chose amazing life partners. Jeffrey and Tanis fit into this family perfectly. They just make our family bigger and better!
Today I am celebrating my beautiful daughter Lindsay. Lindsay was my firstborn and the first to make me a Nana. Two special reasons to celebrate today! Like so many other Mom’s out there, she has had to navigate raising a young family amidst the Covid crisis, health concerns and an ever-changing world of uncertainty. I’m so proud of her, she has more patience and grace than anyone I know. She has guided Madison and Owen through online learning all while raising a toddler. Any parent who’s in the same situation knows that’s enough stress to drive any Mom or Dad over the edge. She’s done the best she can for these 3 beauties and they are safe and secure in their loving home.
I love both the script and block versions of this cut file and quickly decided to make use of both. To start this project I cut the script version of the cut file onto HTV (Heat Transfer Vinyl) with my Silhouette Cameo and pressed it onto a t-shirt for my daughter. I thought it would be fun to have a picture of her with her children wearing the t-shirt in the layout. You can see the #MomLife t-shirt in the right-hand picture of this layout. I use a Cricut EasyPress 2 (9″ x 9″) to transfer the HTV to t-shirts. It works perfectly for my needs. Cut files are so versatile, there are so many things you can do with them. I love it when I can maximize the use of a cut file in additional ways to scrapbooking! Here are a couple more photos of the t-shirt.
Once the t-shirt was completed, I turned my attention to the layout. Using PinkFresh Studio’s Let’s Stay Home collection, I selected the Better Things are Ahead patterned paper for my background. The next step was to resize the block cut file of #MomLife and cut it out of white cardstock. I carefully matched the colours of the background paper to various pieces of coordinating cardstock. Each of the letters in the title was offset and cut using Silhouette Studio software. Once all 8 pieces were cut, they were adhered to the backside of the title to create the coordinating rainbow effect. The final stage included backing the completed file with double-sided adhesive foam to provide the title with a slight lift from the page.
The remainder of this layout fell together quite quickly. I enhanced the title with blue Puffy Alpha Stickers from the Let’s Stay Home collection. Both photos were matted with coordinating blue cardstock and adhered in place. All remaining embellishments came from the Let’s Stay Home collection including, Cardstock Stickers, Puffy Stickers, and the Ephemera Pack.
I would like to give special mention to my Son-in-Law, Jeffrey, who willingly took the beautiful photo on the left-hand side of this layout. Many, many, thanks Jeff, for helping me bring this layout vision to life!
In closing, I hope you all find special ways to celebrate today. Even though we can’t get together physically to celebrate, our families can take great pictures for us to scrapbook! And when you do, don’t forget to make use of this wonderful cut file from Marcy and Milly SVG to celebrate the Mom or Moms in your life that mean the world to you!
Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!
Do you remember the joy of turning 10 and feeling so special because you now have 2 digits to represent your age, instead of 1?! This February marked Madison’s 10 birthday, and as excited as she was to be turning 10, it also came with some sadness that she wouldn’t get to celebrate with her friends due to Covid. Thankfully, my daughter and her husband went all out in putting up decorations to celebrate this special day. You can see the joy in Maddie’s face as she took in all garlands, streamers and balloons. Take that Covid! We can still find excitement and joy in these quiet celebrations!
I wanted to create a layout for Maddie using the same papers used in creating her Tower Explosion Box. These papers came from Echo Park’s It’s Your Birthday paper collection pack. For the red background, I used Echo Park’s Party Time patterned papers. It’s difficult to see in the pictures, but this red background paper has very subtle red stars throughout each page.
Two digital cut files from Peartree Cutfiles were featured to create this double page layout. The main title, Wish, is part of the larger Wish cut file from March’s Pearscription. I utilized the other portions of this cut file in the Big Comfy Couch layout back in March. The second cut file is entitled Stack of Presents.
Both of these files have stars in them which further coordinated with the background paper. Each file was backed with coordinating patterned papers from the It’s Your Birthday paper collection. The stars were all backed with silver glitter cardstock. I also cut additional stars to add to the background to heighten the overall party effect.
One of the design elements that I wanted to pull into this layout, was the replication of the garland that Maddie is standing under in the larger picture. To accomplish this I cut multiple circles from coordinating patterned paper using the smallest die in Lawn Fawn’s Large Stitched Circle Stackables. Before adhering them to the page, I ran a dark black line with a Sharpie to connect them. The upper portions of each page were filled with various pieces of confetti that came from two Silhouette Design Store cut files. Both cut files were designed by Sophie Gallo. One is called Confetti – Design ID 17667 – and the other is called Cute Confetti – Design ID 42203. A third Silhouette cut file called Elegant Alpha – Numbers were used to create the number 10. Kolette Hall is the designer and you will find it under Design ID 35756. I removed the scrolls found on each number before cutting. The following two pictures provide a closer look at the garland, confetti and the number 10.
The final touches on the layout included adding 3 die cut cardstock pieces from the It’s Your Birthday Ephemera pack, and scattering the additional stars throughout the layout. And that’s a wrap on Birthday #10 for this sweet girl! I hope her next 10 years are as much fun as the first!
I hope you have all found creative ways to celebrate birthdays during this global pandemic. I know we will come through this to better days when we can celebrate in person with family and friends! In the meantime, stay safe, stay well and Happy Scrapping!
Do you remember the game Twister? Did you ever think of playing it with shaving cream….on a water trampoline? Well, these crazy cousins thought it would be a lot of fun, and they were right! These beauties, and several more, got together on a perfect summer day in Muskoka to celebrate family and friendship. The pictures speak for themselves, a great time was had by all!
My second Design Team layout for Marcy Milly SVG is designed around the Great Idea cut file. When I first saw this cut file, so many ideas and possibilities went through my head. I love the light bulbs in this title and knew instantly that I could turn them into shaker boxes. As I pondered different ideas I was drawn back to this fun day in July 2018 when these cousins got together for some fun. Of all the games they played that day, the Shaving Cream Twister, on top of a floating trampoline, was the best!
My process to create this layout began in Silhouette Studio where I imported the Great Idea cut file and the photos I planned on using. By resizing these elements in the software program first, I can create a page map to complete the layout before anything is cut or printed. Once I settled on the design of the page, the selected pictures were printed and put aside while I focused on the cut file.
I chose colours for the title that matched the coloured circles on the Twister mat – red, blue, yellow and green. The offset tool in Silhouette was used to cut and back these letters. To create the light bulb shaker boxes, the knife tool in Silhouette Studio was used to separate the light bulb from each of the words. I also used this tool to cut away the filament to ensure the inside shaker had more room for sequins and movement. Once completed, this allowed me to cut 5 more copies of each light bulb from black cardstock without having to cut the full title out multiple times. These multiple layers of bulbs created the pockets required to turn the bulbs into shaker elements. I then traced the bulb section onto clear transparency film and cut two copies for each bulb. The transparency sections were glued to the bottom and top levels. The bottom parts of the bulbs were backed with shiny silver cardstock on the top light bulbs only. Next, all layers of the bulbs – except the tops – were glued together to create the pockets to hold the gold sequin mix. Once the gold sequin mix was in place, the top and final layer was glued in place. Here are some closeups of the completed light bulbs.
The background paper for this layout is called Box of Crayons from Shimelle. The bold repetitive circles were a perfect fit for the game Twister. To play up the whimsy of this layout, I expanded on the title using small white Thickers to complete the “It seemed like a GREAT IDEA at the time!” phrase. A large circular die was used from Lawn Fawn’s Large Stitched Circle Stackables to create a space for hand journaling. All of the cardstock embellishments came from the Hello Friend – Silver Holographic Chipboard Stickers that coordinate with the Vicki Boutin StoryTeller collection. The small colourful directional arrows complemented the spinner board within the Twister game. The hello Summer sticker came from a collection with the same name by Lori Whitlock and was added to the top right of the large photo. The sticker helps draw your eyes towards the action in the picture.
Are you tempted to pull out that old Twister game now?! Thanks for stopping by to share the fun today, and be sure to stop by MarcyMillySVG to pick up this fun cut file. I’d love to see what you do with it! Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!
DDDesignz 