Altenew

Top 3 of 2023

~ dddesignz ~ Leave a comment

A belated Happy New Year to everyone!

2023 was an incredible year for us. I could sum the whole year up in one simple word – TRAVEL! With my daughter and her family currently living in Austria, we can come and go as we please, and we get to travel all over Europe. It’s the sweetest deal going! We couldn’t be thankful enough for Lindsay and Jeff’s hospitality and generosity! We spent 20 weeks in Europe last year and visited eight countries. The memories we’ve made are precious, and we loved everywhere we travelled.

The gorgeous patterned paper for this layout belongs to the Artsy Print collection from Paper Rose Studio. The Top 3 for 2023 cut file from Peartree Cutfiles was an excellent choice to summarise our past year.

Two of my three top choices centred around family trips. In June, we travelled to Venice, Italy together. Taking a ride in a gondola was at the top of my bucket list in Venice, so you can imagine my excitement at bringing my daughter and grandchildren on the ride! They all loved it as much as I did, and I’d have to say, it was one of my BEST memories for 2023. In late October, we travelled as a family to London, UK. Our focus was a visit to Warner Bros Studios to see the Making of Harry Potter. I read each of the Harry Potter books to my two oldest grandchildren before they moved overseas. Having the opportunity to tour this remarkable location with them was MAGICAL! My final highlight was the five-and-a-half-hour hike my husband and I made in Switzerland. It was a gorgeous fall day with incredible views of the Matterhorn throughout the hike. It was breathtaking every step of the way!

The creation of the title was quite simple for this project. After resizing it to fit my layout, I cut it in black textured cardstock. To back the numbers in the title, I used smooth white cardstock. Each number was ink blended using three Altenew dye inks (Rouge, Velvet and Ruby Red) and adhered to the back of the main cut file. Once completed, I set it aside to work on the journalling for the layout.

I turned to my computer and printer to add the journalling to this page. To ensure the correct placement and to protect the beautiful background paper, I placed a 12″ x 12″ piece of vellum over the patterned paper and traced out the area I wanted the journalling in. Next, I typed out my story on the computer, positioning it as close to the coordinates as possible. I then printed the text on the vellum sheet to see how close I came to my coordinates. With a few little tweaks and a second test run with the vellum, I was ready to print directly on my patterned paper. As you can see from the finished project, the text placement went beautifully!

The next stage involved adhering the title and the pictures to the layout. I then moved to stamping some travel words and images onto the page. I used travel stamps from Jennifer Edwardson Creative Inc. and Recollections.

The final step to completing my layout was adding the laser-cut leaves from 49 & Market’s Spectrum Sherbert collection. I used coorinating leaves from both the Tidal Wave and Strawberry Lemonade packages. To create dimension with these leaves, I glued the centre stems down and popped up some of the leaves with 3D foam squares to create some dimension for the final product.

Thanks for taking the time to be with me today. I hope I’ve provided some inspiration to document your favourite memories of the past year. May the coming year be good for you and yours! Until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!

Happiness Right Here

~ dddesignz ~ Leave a comment

Oh, the pure bliss of swimming! And what could be better than swimming in the South Aegean off Naxos, Greece?! My daughter, son-in-law, and family vacationed in Naxos this summer; as you can see from the picture, it was a huge hit! Madison has always been a water baby, so this vacation was right up her alley. When I saw this picture I knew it was the perfect match for the Happiness Right Here cut file from Peartree Cutfiles. Peartree is celebrating its third birthday this month, and this cut file is free for the month of August. You can find the free version here. Come play along with the birthday celebration!

After cutting the file from white cardstock, the letters in the title were inked using Altenew’s Blueberry and Winter Lake inks. The lighter shade (Blueberry) was applied to the top of each letter and the darker (Winter Lake) was applied to the bottom to mimic the colours in the sea and the differences you see as the light hits the water.

I chose the backside of the Seashore patterned paper from Paper House’s At the Beach Collection to document this special moment.

The soft jewel tones and gentle waves of the sea in the picture drew me to the Waves Border cut file to compliment this layout.

Rather than cut the file from coordinating paper with my Silhouette, I chose to stitch it. My first step was to flip the file horizontally and use a sketch pen to draw the design on the back of the patterned paper. I then used a paper piercer to hand pierce the pattern in preparation for stitching. I then gathered coordinating jew tone embroidery floss to mirror the colours of the sea in the picture and began stitching. A total of 8 colours were used to complete this design (Anchor Embroidery Floss: 130, 131, 160, 161, 185, 186, 187, 188). A chain stitch was used and I randomly changed threads as I worked my way through the design. I purposefully choose lighter tones for the top of the wave, and darker tones for those below. This process took several hours, but the results were well worth it!

The final touches to complete the layout were adding the date and the location of the picture. These were done by using the Swimming Pool Doodlebug Designs Alphabet Sout Puffy Stickers.

I’m so happy to share in the celebration of Peartree Cutfiles 3rd Birthday. Their birthday challenge was a lot of fun and made me think outside of the box. Thanks for joining me today, and until next time, stay safe, stay well, and Happy Scrapping!