New Release and Freebie - Sunkissed

I has a great time working with Krystal Hartley (creative team member and designer) on Sunkissed. I love the way our styles combined and think the color scheme is perfect for late summer/early fall pics.



Purchase by Friday 8/1 and you'll get the Sunkissed Abby Album free. The album is created to work with the Cosmo Cricket Abby's Blackboard Album.



Here are some fabulous layouts from our teams for inspiration.





FREE
Here is a set of desktops created by Jennilyn using the Sunkissed page set. Enjoy!

Out and About in the Digiworld

Congratulations to the following shops that have opened their doors since the last Out and About:

Mirranda Reinhardt Designs
Perfect a Dream

For aspiring designers, Funky Playground is starting a program to grow your design skills. You can read about it on their blog.

Digital Design Essentials is have a 50% off sale through July 27th. DDE offers high-quality designs and a timeless style that is easy to scrap with.

Thanks to Lena Brandenburg, I've discovered ScrapSupply fonts. I wanted just about every single one in the store. Fortunately for my pocketbook there are several free ones available like SP Holy Guacamole.



I really like the look achieved with Helena Jole's Masks and Mats at Natural Designs in Scrapbooking.



You don't see purple and red together very often in scrap kits, but Kaye Winiecki does it beautifully with her Bloomin' Brandy flowers at Pickleberrypop.



Tomorrow is new release Saturday at the Sweet Shoppe where you can pick up new releases for 20% off (Saturday only). I worked with Krystal Hartley this week on a collaborative set, Sunkissed. I really like the way our style combined. Here is a layout by way of a sneak peek.

The journaling is about my daughter's nickname, Papaya (occasionally Princess Papaya).



I didn't get around digiland much this week so all of my layout inspiration came from the Sweet Shoppe. Here are a few that landed in my 'favs'.

My love affair with wonderfully executed, clean lines pages continues with Expressions by suzyqscraps.



I like the way the photo takes center stage in robinforman's Pants. As a side note, I've asked my son the same question and he says, 'It's hot and they itch.' It's hard to reason with that logic.



I always need ideas for multiphoto pages and stayawake's Natural is a beauty. I like the combination of portrait-style photos with the nature shots. She's really captured her daughter's love for being outdoors.

Monday Morning Inspiration - Something Is Out of Place

Happy Monday! This week's challenge is to create a structured layout (interpret 'structured' however you'd like) and then move one item in your layout out of place to create a visual counterpoint to the structure.

By way of example, look the title work in Go Henry by BrandiSutherlin. The tilted 'Y' adds to the energy and sense of movement in the page.



lmccandless uses the approach for a subtle effect by tilting the left two paper squares in her beautiful layout.



I tried my hand at it by dropping an embellished square from it's proper place in the lower right of the grid to the bottom of the page and then used it as a place to add the date.


Credits: Easily Amused by Traci Reed and Date Bits 2 by Misty Cato both at Sweet Shoppe Designs

New Release - I So Pretty

This week I got the honor of working with Jennilyn Designs to put together I So Pretty, ideal for scrapping kids playing dress-up, little princesses and all things girlie.


Pick it up by this Friday and receive the Luggage Tag quick page album free.



Also this week, if you spend $10 or more at the Sweet Shoppe, you receive the He Said/She Said collaborative kit free. Read the He Said/She Said product description for details on how to get your free kit.



My son was the ring-bearer in a wedding today. Here's a look at my handsome guy.



The weekend has been so full of wedding stuff, I didn't get a chance to make up a freebie to go with this week's kit, however you can pick up a free coordinating alphabet on Jennilyn's blog for the weekend. I hope to get a freebie together for you later in the week.

Monday Morning Inspiration - Carried Away by Emotion

This week's challenge is to scrap an emotive photo and let the emotion from the photograph serve as inspiration for choosing some or all of the items you use to scrap it.

I started with a photo of my daughter during one of her seemingly spontaneous unhappy moments. Sadness was my inspiration for choosing the gray background, doodle frame and title. Then, because she is still adorable and her sadness only makes me want to cuddle her more, I surrounded her with hearts and flowers - my emotion making its way onto the page. Here is the result.


Credits: Kiss Me by Zoe Pearn (pink paper, hearts and large flower), Raggedy Annie by MandaBean, Robin Carlton and Kay Miller (tied ribbon and smaller flowers), Road Trip by Dani Mogstad (gray background), Squiggly Grunge 1 by Fee Jardine (doodles used to make frame), Big Adventure Alpha by Fee Jardine, all from Sweet Shoppe Designs, DJB Cinda font (journaling) by Darcy Baldwin, The DigiChick

New Releases - The Going Places Collection

My son loves it when is pages are full of things he recognizes, so I put together this set just for him. Many of the drawing ideas came from him.

Going Places is a collection of illustrations, word art, alphas and papers for scrapping life's everyday adventures (real and imaginary). Each pack is sold separately or pick up the entire collection as a bundle for additional savings.













I've also added a couple of my older items to the store. These can be found it the Penny Candy section for 30% off.

A Year in Review 2-Page Template



These 12x12 month frames can be used as frames or clipping masks.



Free Sample
These paper-pieced flowers coordinate with other items in the Going Places Collection.

Monday Morning Inspiration - When the batteries die

Have you ever gone off to an important event and forgotten the camera? Or remembered the camera only to have the batteries die at the worst possible moment? Perhaps you know stories or have documents about your ancestors that you'd like to preserve, but don't have any photos to go with them?

Today's Monday Morning Inspiration is a challenge to create a page capturing a moment for which you have no photos. Here are a few ideas that may be applicable:

- Scan in other mementos of the event, ticket stubs, play bills, tourist brochures, maps, etc. and create a collage.
- Use this as an opportunity to really go for it with your journaling.
- If your child was a part of it, ask him or her to draw you a picture of it and scan it in to use on your page.
- Interview a person who was part of the event or memory and use that as the focus of the composition.
-Use empty frames as page elements, or fill the frames with journaling about the event instead of photos.

If you have other ideas for scrapping moments for which there are no photos, feel free to leave them as a comment to this post.

For my page, I decided to focus on journaling and I used an empty frame artistically in my title work.

The journaling reads,

Every morning you and I snuggle together on the rocking chair and watch Super Why. We yell, “Super Readers to the rescue!”, sing the alphabet, call each other Super Mommy and Super Jamin and zap each other with our pretend highlighters. You pick out the letters on the screen and yell out the sounds each one makes. It is one of my favorite times of the day, but I have no photos of it. There is no one there to take a picture. I love when you come home from a stay with your grandparents and you run into my arms and give me a ‘big squeezy hug’. A proper big squeezy hug requires both arms, so there is no way to hold a camera at the same time. Besides grabbing the camera would mean postponing our hug for at least 30 seconds which is unacceptable. So alas, a big squeezy hug has yet to be recorded on film. Then there was the day you fell off the ‘big boy’ swings. You sat on my lap and cried and told me how scared you were. We cuddled for awhile and then I suggested it was time to head back home. You said ‘no’ you wanted to try to swing again. Scared and shaky you got back on and conquered the big boy swings. I was so proud of you - so proud, in fact, that I forgot to get out the camera. The list goes on and on of moments we were so caught up in living that we never stopped to take a picture. For every moment recorded in your scrapbook, there are hundreds more, equally as precious, for which ... I have no photos.



Credits: Urban Boy Elements by Anne De Jong, Funky Playground (retired), Summer Watercolors by Tracy Ann Digital Art, Blox Alpha Brushes by Robin Carlton, Sweet Shoppe Designs, Sponge Alpha (retired) by Paula Duncan, Highlight Brushes by Amy Wolfe, Date Bits 2 by Misty Cato, Sweet Shoppe Designs, Bead Factory by Micheline Martin, Sweet Shoppe Designs, Funky Bits by Zoe Pearn, Sweet Shoppe Designs, Journaling Font - DJB Emilys by Darcy Baldwin, The DigiChick

Cropping Photos for Odd-Sized Frames

This tutorial is inspired by a reader who asked how to crop photos for non-rectangle frames, such as heart shapes. The secret lies in using the magic wand selection tool. Here's the step-by-step run down.

Place your photo under your frame and move and/or resize the photo until the part of the photo you want is inside of the frame. For an introductory tutorial that includes moving and resizing images, see the Creating your First Page in PSE tutorial.



Click on the frame layer in the layers palette to set it as the active layer. Click on the magic wand tool in the tools palette. The magic wand tool looks like a stick with a starburst at one end.

In the options toolbar at the top of the workspace make sure the box for 'continguous' is checked. Now click once in the area inside the frame. 'Marching ants' should appear around the inner perimeter of your frame.



Click on the photo layer in the layers palette to set it as the active layer. Go to Select > Inverse or keystroke shift+ctrl+I. Hit delete. Note this will remove all portions of your photo outside of your frame, so make sure your original photo has been saved under a different file name.



Now all that is left is to incorporate it into a layout.


Credits: Everything from Melon Blossoms by Misty Cato and MandaBean except butterfly from Pomegranate Margarita by Lauren Grier and Joanne Carvalho, Doodle arrow from I Love Doodin by Fee Jardine and Color Your Own Alpha: Pencil by Zoe Pearn, journaling font is DJB Cinda by Darcy Baldwin

Out and About in the Digiworld

Congratulations to Aimee Asher on their new shop. They offer a lot of unique products including printable hybrid projects that would make wonderful gifts such as the Puzzle Fanatic Altered Paint Can kit by Sandy Osborn. The community side of the site allows you to set up your own profile, gallery, favorites and network with other friends on the site.

The new ScrapHabit Network is another digital scrapping site devoted to social networking, but without the store component.

Proceeds from the July Songbird Avenue kit, Endless Summer with guest designer Dani Mogstadt benefit the S.A.F.E. House.



It is just about time to celebrate the 4th of July here in the US. Of all the holidays, I like 4th of July kits the best as they usually contain enough versatile stuff to use for non-holiday layouts too. Additionally the traditional red, white and blue palette works well for boys and girls.

Here are a few of my picks for 4th kits.

Karah Frederick's Starry-Eyed Surprise is on sale at Blue Flombingo until July 8th.



I love the look of Dianne Rigdon's Sweet Liberty Papers. There are coordinating solids and elements available as well and you save when you purchase them all.



Redjuscrap has this incredibly generous American Kit available on her blog for free.



If you allow me to be a bit biased for a moment, I absolutely love the layouts I've seen done with my and Robin's All American Girl.



Layouts like this one by Tara ...



and this one by Jennilyn.



Here is one for our Canadian neighbors, Canada Eh? by Kristin Cronin-Barrow and Paula Duncan.



On Traci Reed's blog, Amber shares how to use digital supplies to create custom onesies. How cute are these?



Here are the backsides.



Looks like lots of stores will be having 4th of July sales. Here are some highlights.

Tracy Ann Digital Art (TADA) - 20% off
Several of the designers at Oscraps including Paint the Moon, Debra Tope, and Holliewood Studios.
E-scape and Scrap - 40% off all element packs
Scrapbook-Elements - 25% off products over $2.00
Sweet Shoppe Designs - 50% off over 200 products that will be retired after the sale

Now to Out and About in the Cato Household - kids clearly do not know how to read instructions because they never use things quite as one would expect. My mom gave Jamin a new water toy. He found some water to use it in.



And those nice bins we got him to sort out his toys? Everyday he dumps his toys out and plays with the bins.



To those here in the US and Americans abroad - Happy Fourth of July. We are heading up to my parent's place in Oak Harbor for the weekend where we will enjoy the annual parade and fireworks.