Hand Crafted Memories

its been a while since I made a page for my brothers album, he gave me these photos ages ago. He had taken his boys out for a day it involved a trip to the cinema, Burger King and finished with  watching the wrestling. As usual I was struggling with the idea of getting multiple photos onto the page. then bingo I had a flash of inspiration and included a fold out booklet  the two photos on the right page are on a flap, that reveals more photos  on a concertina fold out booklet and their tickets in the back. The white panel on the left page is for the jornaling. He is very bad at writing onto the pages, he is now on his third album and hasn't written on a single page. I used the sketch from  December on Scrapbook and Cards Today 's blog.

The colder weather is  making me feel like I should be making my Christmas cards, so for these colder evenings I've stamped out a few images and I'm having some big girl colouring sessions. I've promised myself that I will not buy any more Christmas papers, I have enough to make cards and pages for the next 5 years. I must Not give in! I went through my scrap box and there is enough in there to make at least a dozen cards. It is all going to be used before I cut into a new piece of paper. Come back later this week to see what I make. As September grows nearer I have completed my August page for Project 12 over on the Scrapbook & Cards Today Blo g. The weather is definitely growing colder but I refuse to put the heating on in the house just yet, I've just pulled out a cardigan for the time being. The sketch for August was a little bit different with only three photos on it. I wanted to record a lovely day I had recently with my friend in Tropical World, but it was...

I have so enjoyed the challenges that Shimelle set for us last week at the cybercrop. The timing was great as I have this week off work, I have managed to make a page every day. Usually I manage a couple at the weekend so I have been falling behind with the challenges I like to take part in. This week I'm catching up. The Scrapbook and Cards Today Project 12 sketch for July was perfect to use for Shimelle's Grid it Up challenge. The challenge was Create a project with a grid as a design element! You can interpret that any way you wish! Get creative! I pulled out these pictures from 2008 when the cooling towers in Sheffield were demolished. They were not the best photos, as usual they were taken on my brothers phone, I so wish he'd take his camera out with him rather than relying on his flipping phone. Anyway they are just about good enough to see the story. I'm afraid you can't see them so well in the photo. Here is the sketch I used and here is my page

I'm just completing this page in the nick of time, actually its been finished a week I just haven't got around to posting it. The June sketch for Project 12 over on Scrapbook and Cards Today looked like this   I love these sketches and some of them I've used a couple of time, I know I am going to use all of them a number of times. They are helping me work my way through the holiday photos I have accumulated over the last 20 years. Also they have been a great help to the dilemma of my brothers scrap book where he likes a lot of photos to look at. I recently took part in the Scrap Whispers blog hop challenge and made a kit from my existing stash, this sketch gave me the ideal opportunity to use the kit and here is my page I have plenty left from the kit so I think a few cards will finish the supplies. I think making kits is also the method I'm going to use to do something with my stash mountain. I often craft better with limited supplies, so if I pack up my own kits I s...

What about this gorgeous weather? I love it when its like this, however, here in the UK we have to enjoy it while we've got it because it never lasts. I had a weekend with nothing planned but to come up with some projects for Craftwork Cards . They have just entered into a cross promotional partnership with Spellbinders and as part of the Craftwork Cards design team I received a box packed with candi and some nestabilities dies. So this weekend was dedicated to bouts of gardening interspersed with candi/spellbinders activity.Because I don't know how much I can divulge, here is a sneaky peek, this little work of art took me hours to complete, but I was quite pleased with the end result.I'll show the completed project once I get the go ahead. I also wanted to post this scrapbook page, regular visitors will know how much I enjoy working with sketch or page maps, whatever you call them.  One of my current favourites is the Project 12 series over on Scrapbook and Cards Today ...

Another fantastic sketch for Project 12 over on Scrapbook and Cards Today , I know its the 1st June, I'm only a day late posting it. Here was the sketch for May this time I've gone a bit off course and instead of using my travel photos I've used pictures of the dogs my brother has owned. I love how the sketch lent itself to these pictures Why the cream square on the left? It's for Robin to do the journalling, I wonder how long it will take him? I went to the Craft Box to try and get some doggy papers but there was only the blue background one here. When you get good customer service it deserves a round of applause, and a mention. I asked Gill if there was and dog themed papers when I arrived, even though she was busy tidying, organising and serving she still combed the whole shop looking for something for me. I mean she went through EVERYTHING, as you can see the blue worked fine. I still have some more photos that I need to scrap and my last words to her were if you fi...

Wow what a weekend, all started by the wedding, I know its been discussed and done to death so I'll just say two words, classy and beautiful. I think that covers everything. My scrapbooking buddy Julia has been here for the weekend and we have had another of our kitchen retreats, I can't believe how many pages we have almost finished. We usually buy one of Sarah's Cards kits and then make as many pages as we can from the kit. Back in January we bought the Fancy Pants - Happy Together kit, sorry its sold out. These papers were so delicious. We also had made a kit up using the Dovecraft - Tea House papers. I have managed five single page layouts and two doubles. I've also got the bones of a book. I still need to get the photos onto most of them and the final little touches but they are mostly done and I'm very chuffed with myself. The one that is completely finished isn't using any of the papers I've mentioned but I wanted to make it while it was all stil...

 Project 12 on Scrapbook and Cards Today Blog is really helping me with my ongoing project of scrapbooking the photos of my travels. I recently scanned 200 photos from my trip to New Zealand in 1991.  One of the things I like about Project 12 is that I can use multiple photos on a double page layout with out making the pages look too busy. It also helps me with my brother's pages for his album, he likes lots of photos on a page. The sketches are always so lovely and very inspirational. April's sketch was this I switched it around a little to come up with this   I noticed I'd spelt the title wrong after I'd photographed the pages, thankfully the letters hadn't stuck too much so I could change the letters phew!

I have really enjoyed making the pages for March's Project 12 over on Scrapbook Cards and Trends Blog . I'm using the sketches to make a hole in my massive pile of holiday photos.I loved this sketch as soon as I saw it and have kept it becasue I think its one I'll use over and again. This is my take on the page, I used another of my stock of Sarah's Cards kits, once again I am embarrased to say this was still hinging around completely untouched and is from January 2010, ooops!  I love these Bo Bunny Flutter Butter papers and guess that the reason they were not used is becasue They are so pretty I would have cried when I cut into them. As it happens I didn't.

I was so happy to find the Scrapbook and Cards Today Blog last month. They had a great sketch that inspired me twice and prodded my mojo back into action. They've done it again with this lovely sketch   and here is my take on it It was the perfect opportunity to use more of my Sarah's cards restoration kit. Believe me I've really got my mileage out of this kit . I also used my new Martha Stewart border punch , I love it so much.

You know when you find something that works, you just go with it. Why change it? That's exactly how I feel about the January sketch over on Scrapbook and Cards Today Blog . I made my Belgium layout using this sketch     I haven't suddenly developed a passion for double page layouts, its just that I've found some great sketches that immediately 'speak' to me. Regular readers will know that my brother likes pages with lots of photos on them, I struggle to make multi photo pages. After I'd used this sketch I looked through my brothers album and he pointed out where a couple of his favourite photos were 'lost' because I'd made a picture collage with them and his favourites were a bit small. So on with the challenge, I remade this page nothing wrong with it other than the pictures were a bit small, into these pages, the only thing missing is his journalling.  I must have made him happy because suddenly he has brought me more pages to redo. It looks lik...

I love working from sketches or page maps to create my scrapbook pages, sometimes I come across a sketch and you've just got to do it. Well that's exactly what happened this week. I found this sketch  over here on the Scrapbook and Cards Today Blog . It just spoke to me and was a great excuse to use up the remnants of a kit I'd bought a couple of years ago. I'm on a mission, along with many of you I'm sure, to use stash instead of just keep adding to it. Here are my pages. Everything was Pink Paislee , and I've still got some more! This sketch is for this years project 12, similar to the Document 2010 project that I've just finished. A sketch for a double page layout is released every month to record the previous months story. I'm not sure that I want to produce an album of the year, every year. The sketches are too yummy to resist, so I may just use them to try and clear some of these holiday photos.