Baby's First Bath

I'm very proud to say that I gave Lucas his first real tub bath all by myself when he was around 2 weeks old. Well, I learnt how to from You Tube hehe. Here's a layout dedicated to his first bath. I used the transparency to mimic the bath bubbles and further accentuated bath water with glittery bubbles floating on the page. It;s the first time I'm using transparency and tags on a layout and I'm pretty pleased with the effect.

Lucas' first bath at 2 weeks old.

Journaling in a big bubble.

A close up of the embellishments.

Materials Used:

• Blue Cardstock
• Patterned paper: Fancy Pants Happy Together
• Transparency: Teresa Collins Chic Bebe
• Craft Tag: Ranger 5" manila tags
• Felt duckies & mini tag: Making Memories' Pitter Patter
• Curio Brad
• Footprints ribbon and spongy hearts: from a gift shop in Tropicana City Mall
• Lace sticker: Momoyo
• 'Bath Time' sticker: Grace Taylor's sticker book
• Liquid Pearls: Ranger Liquid Pearls in Buttercup and Baby Blue
• Glitter: Ranger Stickles in Baby Blue and Icicles
• Alphas and circles cut from Slice.

My First Craft Tag

I'm thrilled to share my first altered tag!

 

Materials used:

• Craft Tag: Ranger 5" manila tags
• Glimmer Mist: Tattered Angles Old Lace and Red Velvet
• Glimmer Glam: Tattered Angels Rustic
• Paint: Jo Sonja's Gold
• Liquid Pearls: Ranger Liquid Pearls Buttercup and Rouge
• Glitter Glue: Range Stickles in Xmas Red and Copper
• Stamp: Maya Road Clear Stamps
• Paper Flowers: Prima flowers painted with gold and glimmer glam with a Curio brad
• Butterfly raw chipboard
• Flourishes made from cream cardstock cut from Slice Dilly Dally
• Pom Pom red ribbon, cream lace ribbon and random leftover ribbons for the top tassle

Here are some close ups:

Toe Sucker

It was so funny when Lucas discovered he could reach his toes. He was delighted that there was more of himself to suck on! These were taken in March when he was about 6 months plus.


Totally plain white background, lightly misted at the corners to accentuate the diagonal alignment of my page. First ever layout using glimmer mist. Using papers and elements from Making Memories' Pitter Patter range.



Alphas made from my Slice using Dilly Dally fonts.



These are the first ever 2 bottles of glimmer mist sprays I've bought; Hula Hoop (light green) and Artic Blue (dark indigo blue). I love the effect although I must admit I'm not so good at using them yet so the challenge is to really make the best of them.



Memories from my First Job

I found a really old picture taken way back in 1999 when I was a fresh graduate just out of college and I can't resist working on it. The layout is inspired by the latest Sketch challenge on Stuck?! So this is really important to me as it will be my very first scrapbook layout challenge too!

The sketch from Stuck?!

What I used: Pattern paper and diecut elements from MME's Life Stories range. Tim Holtz flourish mask and Distress Ink , Prima flowers and lettering, Jo Sonjya acrylic paint in Olive and TA Glimmer Mist in Hula Hoop. Plus glitter glue and random beads, pearls and ribbon.



Butterflies, flowers, flourishes and lace ribbon works well with the whole vintage feel.



I created my own tag from some lefteover paper and decorated with the stencil mask and distress ink. Used beads as 'bullet points' to add some color. In retrospect I should have used brown ink instead of black for my journaling, would have looked less harsh.

 

Love the 'stamped' effect on the diecut elements. I got the cream lace ribbon from Papier at Curve.

I really enjoyed working on this as I discovered new techniques I haven't done before; combining acrylic paint with glimmer mist on raw chipboard. I also misted the flowers but it's not very obvious in the photos. What makes this special is that this is one of the first non-baby related layout I've done ever since I started scrapping hehehe :)





Your First Swim

I was delighted to catch the latest release by Simple Stories; 100 Days of Summer. They were all so well coordinated and versatile. I knew immediately these were the perfect design for Lucas' swimming photos. I've been hunting everywhere for something suitable for ages.

These are the three papers I used for this project.



Coordinating the papers and planning my layout.


I decided to go with a collage layout incorporating the cute elements from the kit. This is the end result:

Your First Swim! The fresh summer elements complements the photos.  The flowers are Prima and the chipboard sun sticker in the centre is actually from My Mind's Eye Alphabet Soup but it matches this line prefectly!

Added some pearl beads and liquid pearls to the existing flourishes on the pattern paper. I cut a small opening on the actual paper using a craft knife and slot the photo and yellow canvas inside.

 

Love how their paper comes with ready-to-cut tags that are so well coordinated. Simply cut, sand and ink and they are ready to go!

I used my Slice for the title and underlaid an olive green ribon to make the letters pop.

Small bits of journaling to cover part of the last photo.

These were some of the stuff I used to further enhance the layout.

Loving this line? Grab them at Papier Love.



Bundle of Joy

This is one of my very first layout using the Slice for most of the page. It's one of our baby's new born photos taken by the hubs almost immediately after he was born.

Bundled Joy!


I opted for a clean horizontal alignment and used polka-dots to accentuate the swaddle on Lucas. I used My Mind's Eye Lime Twist line pattern paper named Out of the Blue with various bits of coordinating cardstock. The three beetles are made from Slice using the Dilly Dally card. Bits of the beetle stickers are from Grace Taylor's Sticker Book. Here are the close-ups.

Title made using my Slice cutter.

Beetles made from my Slice and inked.

Round ribbon slider chipboard, covered with pattern paper, sanded and inked.

These are my embellishments:

Love all the cute baby stickers here!

Love raw chipboard; so versatile! 

The Love Bandit Stole My Heart

I fell in love with the uber cute raccoons and owls on the Bo Bunny Love Bandit collection on Scrap N Crop. I bought these last month but I didn't have any inspiration on how to use them till a few days ago. I bought one 2-sided patterened paper, one diecut paper and matching stickers.

This is the end result ... *drumroll* ... taaddaaaa ... dedicated to my own lil Love Bandit Lucas who stole my heart!



You Stole My Heart! Bo Bunny's Love Bandit Layout.

Close-up of the cluster.

I was inspired by the little birdhouse on the diecut so I created a birdhouse-like frame for the photo instead of the usual mat framing. I made a small cluster using some of the matching stickers and accented with Prima flowers. Titles are Prima alphas. I glazed bits of the accents to make them pop.

My First Ever Card Challenge

Thanks for dropping by. This is my take on the Sketch 114 by CardPatterns. I love CardPatterns and have been so inspired by all their fabulous designs that I just can't resist. This is my first ever challenge project! Yay!


Sketch 114 by CardPatterns

Anyway, I plan to give this card to a girlfriend who loves all things rustic, leather and brown. I hope she will love this.

Here's a close-up of the ribbon slide which I decorated with crackle paint and a pebble embellishment.

What I used for this card:

• Patterned papers from Fancy Pants Happy Together and Kaisercraft Prairie Lane.
• Bazzil Chips Ribbon Slider
• Tim Holtz Distress Ink Pad in Pumice
• Tim Holtz Distress Crackle Paint in Walnut Stain
• Lace trim from Making Memories Pitter Patter
• Can't recall where the satin ribbon and pebble sticker came from though.

A Birthday Card for a Special Girl

Yesterday was one of my best childhood buddy's birthday. We caught up over the weekend and I gave her this lovingly hand-crafted card. It's fresh, pink and sweet with very feminine elements; perfectly suited to the sweet person she is :)

What I used: Prima flower and Prima papers from the Sparkling Spring line, glittery textured paper from My Mind's Eye Laundry Line, raw chipboard accents which I painted with acrylic paints, red gliter glue and crystal on the butterfly. I inked the paper and the yellow fabric trim with Tim Holtz's distress ink in Aged Mahagony and painted the white daisy trim with matching gold paint (Jo Sonja's acrylic paint) as per the chipboard flourishes.

Slice!

Dear hubby is such a sweetheart, he bought me the Slice (cordless digital paper shape cutter) for Mother's Day! And since it was in conjunction with national Scrapbooking Day on 7th May, I got a 15% discount off the usual price at RM950 at Papier Love. Taking advantage of the discount, I got myself an additional Slice card; the Dilly Dally collection!

Here's my new toy ... can't wait to play with it!


The Slice Elite in PINK!



Can't wait to slice slice slice!

Here's the Basic Elements design card motifs that comes with the Slice:

Basic Elements Design Card

And here are the motifs for the Dilly Dally design card which I bought separately:

Dilly Dally Design Card

My Precious

I love this photo taken by the hubs of me holding my Precious. The Happy Together range from Fancy Pants is so perfect for this!

What I used: paper and stickers from Fancy Pant's Happy Together range. Some brown ric rac, mini stick-on pearls, Prima flowers with velvet brads plus some die-cut chipboard (butterfly and florish) which I covered with matching patterned paper. I distressed with Tim Holtz's Pumice inkpad and used AC lettering.

Cute Little Tiger

Our lil prince Lucas was born in 2010 which is the year of the Tiger based on the Chinese Lunar calendar. Dear hubs bought him a really huge Tigger, which was a lame excuse for buying it for himself since he is enjoying it more than Lucas does. But I'm sure he will grow into it really soon.

I scraplifed a backdated sketch I came across in Stuck! Sketches for this theme. They have an amazing array of sketches! The main stuff used here; My Mind's Eye Alphabet Soup patterned paper and matching chipboard stickers. The background paper is by Rose Moka. TH distress ink in Pumice gives this cutesy zoo theme an edgy effect. I love distressing, it gives character to everything.

I created my little tag accents by cutting out the word ROAR from the pattern paper. While I loved the zoo animal prints I couldn't use the whole sheet as it would be quite overwhelming so this was quite a challenging project for me.

I needed the title to stand out amidst the rather busy layout so I cut out a bracket tag freehand. Have yet to invest in a Slice machine... I am so so so yearning and itching for it!

Mummy's Joy

This is a photo of me with my baby when he was a month old.  Alas I scrapped this a couple of months back so I can't remember all the materials I used here except that the flowers are Prima, the brads are Curio, the layered paper stickers are Lost & Found and some of the patterned bits are from Pink Paislee's Parisian Anthology. Oh and the alphas are AC glittery chipboard Thickers.

Boys & Toys!

I have two boys at home, one is obsessed with toy figurines and the other is too young to do anything with them other than put them in his mouth. The hubs could not resist a photo session with this adorable romper given to our lil bub. And when I saw the robot patterned paper and matching stickers by 3 Bugs in a Row I simply couldn’t resist!

I wanted to have a ‘stitched-on’ effect alas I’m not bothered to invest in a scrap sewing machine so I used a pen to draw stitch lines, I know I’m a horrible cheat but oh well.

I like being able to make my own embellishments; I did a three layer tag on the top right corner of the page and used tiny alphas on it.

Mother's Day Cards

How apt that my first post is dedicated to mothers! The wonderful people who first gave us life!

This Mother’s Day I decided to put my new hobby to good use and surprise my mum and mum-in-law with hand-crafted cards. Before I started, I browsed through endless resources online but was really thankful to stumble upon CardPatterns! They have an amazing collection of card sketches and layouts done by some really creative folks. I didn’t follow any sketch per say but they gave me a general idea on how to work with what I already have in mind. I started with the flower as the centrepiece and worked around it. Mother’s Days are all about flowers and since the real ones are over-priced and doesn’t last a day, paper flowers are perfect!

Here’s a simple card I made for mum-in-law. She is a big fan of anything Laura Ashley. So I figured a simple and structured combination of stripes and polk dots with a Prima flower will be nice.

For my own mum, I decided on something with a garden theme since she loves planting flowers in her garden, so I chose a more dainty design with a single Prima flower with a ric rac for a stalk.

Both cards are made using matching Prima flowers and Prima papers from the Sparkling Spring range (love it when they have matching papers and embellishments!) and some leftover bits of pattern scraps, cardstock and ribbons. I especially heart the pink velvet trim and tiny white daisy trims I picked up at Papier Love at The Curve. I also used Tim Holtz's Distress ink pad in Aged Mahagony for both cards.

I hope these cards will put a smile on their faces; I can't wait to give it to them both!