Rocking the gold - Rawr

There are times I have trouble working with gold

while others just plunk it down and go on.

Well....

When I saw this photo, the gold word title that came

in the kit was perfect.

And shazam there was the perfect paper too.

Love these three photos of the faces of Sam

who is now five.

He does love his super heroes.

Nothing special going on.

Backed the photos with tissue paper and a frame.

Studio Calico, Tim Hotz words.

Rockin' another birthday boy

Had a lot of fun making this page.

Love the colors.

And what about those bats you might ask.

 Well.

 The birthday boy is Sam, a batman loving boy

and that was the theme of his party.

You may remember his impersonation of batman here in

case you missed my awesome handstitched 

bat mask.

Hence, the bats.

So Sam is the big 5.

It brings on lots of responsibility like

Kindergarten and everything.

Studio Calico, Hero Arts stamp, Quikuts die.

One for the books

I loved books when I was a kid and it

followed me into adulthood so

when I got this from Studio Calico couldn't 

help but use it.

Love switching off to the 6x12 size.

(I wanna try 9x12 but need to find page protectors)

 Of course I cut the big tag into the books and title.

I love the owl peekin' out.

Wise ole owl.

 When I was in HL the other day Tim Holtz had these

bottlecaps. I KNOW! 

I love bottlecaps and you'll be seeing a lot of them.

ALOT.

What does it have to do with books?

It matches LOL.

But of course Sam loves books.

His mom is a librarian.

Studio Calico, Tim Holtz

Batman handsewn & but not handdrawn

The owl is about the only claim to any artistic talent

I can brag about LOL.

But when I saw this photo of Sam I knew

I had to do another page with handstitched article

and I was torn between the bat signal

and the bat mask.

 The bat mask was easier to find and I downloaded it

from the internet and actually did much better on the poking

holes and stitching this time.

 Love how fun it turned out to be.

You just can't be serious with a fun, cool photo of

Sam posing. LOL. 

I added the milk bottle cap A. because I love them

and Tim Holtz has an entire package of them and B. because

the colors worked and Batman drank his milk

and C. you're going to see a lot more of them.

Studio Calico on the rest.

Shine! A Christmas Page

Photoplay papers from my LSS didn't come easy

as they are all "heavy" papers.

Therefore, I rolled with white and that seems to tame 

it down. 

The mists that are in the background using

the packaging technique look closer in real life.

 Sort of.

Love the banners and the puffy embellishments

scattered about.

And Sam, the youngest grandkidlet enjoying

his Christmas presents and a snack.

Can't go wrong with that.

Everyday Adventure

Love this paper with the star cutouts, so I decided

to roll with gold stars.

I especially love the Buttons galore, they come

with those neat sequins and itty bitty red things.

So cool.

 Oh after I glued the sides of the stars back I stitched the stars down.

I even stitched around the page.

 I left the thread wild because its a wild page.

There is Spidey on the loose with his trusty scooter

on the streets of Brooklyn.

Does Sam not rock the look?

Very fun!

Studio Calico, Buttons Galore.

Love grows here-Studio Calico Stamp

Love this paper and went a bit old school here with

the gold topping the paper as a layer.

It was plain so I did some gold stamping over it

with a circle background stamp

to give it a bit of dimension.

Love the heart die cut (however annoying to punchout)

It's just cool.

 Spread some butterflies around with some

little flowers and enamel dots.

 Had fun with the stamping and used some

navy blue to tie it all together.

Sam being dapper in his cool hat and Easter outfit.

Love this page - may be a bit 'girly' 

but Sam can handle it.

Studio Calico, Tim Holtz die cut.

Really big letters for a title

So the oversized title works really well 

with the blue bird and heart. 

 Also used a black & white and color photo of Sam

with his adorable smile and cute hair 'do.

I reused the paper from his brother's page.

Did some background stuff with a rolling stamp and some mists
which still challenges me for some reason.

Love the big title.

Everyday photo

Using Studio Calico again and those adorable buttons galore.

And of course, the Heidi shine went berserk.

Sigh.

Used up a little piece of vellum with hearts too.

 AND bonus round, the square with "home" on it

 with its thick chipboard got on the page.

And that camera is sooooo adorable.

 So here's Sam either ready to leave

doesn't want to leave

or doesn't want someone to come in. 

LOL.

He's totally adorable in his winter coat and hat.

Tried something a bit different for me design wise.

I like it.
I tend to really overthink things.

Big Sigh over the splats when I first splattered

but they look quite good now.

Love to stamp

 Although I'm not very good at it - I soldier on.

And I have ALOT of stamps that for some reason get

used once or twice and then maybe never.

I think its because I don't want my pages to look alike 

- well doh- they do eventually look alike anyway because

of the style one tends to fall into.

So.............more stamps, hopefully.

 So rolling with using every stamp in the pack technique

so none feel left out I clustered them around the page.

I even cut out those pins because I never really know what to do with them.

Yes you are seeing a lot of circles and doodling around the borders
 on my pages because

for some reason they're working too.

I also basically have two titles - one more for

maybe stating the obvious and I didn't want it to feel left out

with all the other stamps being used 

and then there was that Pink Fresh title that just

had to be used too.

Rolling with Studio Calico - hoping to use up this kit before

the next one comes.

And there's Sam rocking the legos.

This page gave me fits....

The entire weekend was utterly fits in

the scrapbooking world.

The mojo - has left the building......

Anyway I fussy cut this heart out because I wanted 

some dimension.

So I decided on white and managed to

get all the watercolors wrong.....

 I had this page laying around and the

watercolors still came out wrong.

I'm like seriously.......

You'd think I'd figure it out by now lol.

 But the navy blue was yummy - 

After I went so far as to splat some

white enamel on it (that came out with

some blue-green on it because I didn't change the water 😐 

I remembered that I wanted to use this with

another photo on another page.

Sigh.

All that turmoil, I decided that I really liked this "green'

which had been on the radar too and

 it turned out was the best pick.

Used my sissix die to make that ribbon...

and that adorable little bow came from the stash and

those two itty bitty banners were snips from

trimming off those strips I used on the ribbon.

So I kept this simple because frankly

it was making me nuts.

Studio Calico, Michael's wood title and Sissix.

Hearts and graph paper - win

 I have a bunch of Pink Fresh papers so I decided

I needed to use some because I'm

really trying to keep supplies down to a mild roar.

Bwahahahaha!!!

Right.

Anyhoo, I did use the 6x6 pads to layer and they

did have that cool clipboard stamp that

is totally fun and has nothing to do whatsoever with the page.

And that Bugs Bunny peeking out - thanks to Holli

I punched a bunch out and love it.

Did splash some watercolors about using the packaging

technique (since I've sworn off mists for awhile) and love 

how it turned out. It kind of brought both sides of

the paper together and grounded the photo.

Had a really hard time picking out a photo but I went with B&W

because I felt it just worked.

So Pink Fresh everything except the title and chipboard pieces

that came from Studio Calico kits.

4x4 photo on a 6x6 page

Love the look - they are perfect sizes for each other.

It all started out wanting to use this paper that I whacked down

for something else. I also love that I purchased

two of each papers and I think I'll do that going forward.

Anyhoo, I really liked both sides of this paper and ended up

using the same side of this paper twice.

 Love the clusters going on at the top and bottom.

 And the "notebook" paper looks gives it lots of texture.

I also went crazy with different colors of green.

Also the white splatters - I have given up on white mists

and now just use white enamel paint watered down a smidge.

And it stays white and not a goofy grey.

Sweet photo of Sam.

Since I can't do a cutfile

But I love the results, I try to "create" my own.

These are nesting dies/cookie cutter from Quikutz

and I rearranged them in the background for

 a faux "cutfile."

 Is that own not adorable?

Picked them up at WM for 97 cents.

 Love how it made a fun background, and

I tend to do something similar

with circles.

 Very fun photo and the kidlets are always going for the ears.

LOL.

All Pink Fresh except for the hearts-bella blvd, owl-WM and tassel.

Scattered stuff

This page just sort of evolved without a plan really.

It started out with another photo sequence

that needed grounding so I used my Sissix die for a border strip.

And when the dots fell out all over the page,

well I just glued them.

And then added more in a different color.

And then there was a big blank space where only

the title could go.

 Love the little bird and I did him in blue that totally matches
and rocks the page and then

there's the strip that started it all.

 Of course the whole dot thing is repeated at the bottom of the page.

And didn't I use up a bunch of stuff.

 The touch of red was kind of an after thought.

I like it.

It's kinda wild and really different.

So Sam - looks like a 'lion' with the yellow balloon

around his head 'growling.'

Work with me here.

Different font alphas and a mix of colors

 I used watercolors on this mixed media page

and didn't use any gesso because

it sometimes leaves an outline that annoys me.

I pulled the colors from Sam's shirt

and also used watercolor to make a border around the page

because when I roll on something you see it a 

couple of times. 

And it needed it to not be so bare.

 Instead of journaling I decided to make the title

swing both ways.

And I love how it turned out.

Then there's that cluster which is totally adorable

moved around the page a few million times.

 I love the simplicity that focuses on the

photo and his intense concentration.

I'm so glad to see Thomas the Tank Engine is still around

they were fun books and did you know that 

George Carlin played the conductor in the Saturday series?

It was also my favorite youngest son's books and TV show when

he was that age and I still have his favorite book "Catch Me Catch Me" memorized. 

LOL.

Big tag and fussy cut

I love big tags and I really don't use them

often enough. This one was

homemade - because the ones I had just weren't

the right color.

The tag works both as a "sort of mat" and for journaling.

 I love the paper issues "I have issues cards" and

this one had a fox on it which works so well here that

I just fussy cut it out.

I'd love to use with the "I have issues" sentiment
but I'm afraid people may not take it the right way. LOL.

 That itty bitty fussy cut fox in the corner there

was tricky - but it worked out.

 I added a bit of stamping here there for background and layers.

This turned out adorable.

Sam is adorable.

Basic Grey.

Rockin' still with the old & new Studio Calico kits

I love that their papers are so interchangeable

from one kit to the next.

I have a bad habit of hoarding and then binging

trying to use up older kits before the new one comes.

  I didn't do that here.

I sort of jumped into that new kit - mostly

because that gorgeous paper was yapping at me.

I can dig it.

Of course I popped into the box of scraps

to find the bits and pieces

that make the layers that make

you peek into to see what's there - and you'll

note I used a glassine envelope - 

woohooo!!! 

 So way in the back feeling quite like the big boy

is Sam. Sam is almost two now.

Seriously - some slowing down needs to be happening.

I really love the color combo - especially that pops of "yellow/gold".

I sort of mixed them.

I'm trying to be more whimsical

so I'm not going to hold two different golds against me.