Too Much Time and Too Many Scraps

Before all of this pandemic madness hit, I got sick.  For 2 weeks I have been cooped up at home doing nothing.  As soon as I got better, schools were closed.  So here I am, with far more time than I am used to having.  My first thought was to scrap.  (It should have been cleaning the house, but scrapping is just so much more appealing.)

As I have been cleaning up my scraproom a bit, I discovered that my scraps have once again gotten out of control.  That means one thing.  It’s time to make some cards.  I’m not a creative card maker.  I put some matching strips of paper together and then see what matching embellishments I can throw on them.  So my first job was separating out the scraps into piles of papers that would work together.  From there, I grab a pile and start creating.

For my first card, I chose that flower strip.  It’s from an October Afternoon collection called Woodland Park.  Oh, how I loved that collection.  I paired it with a scrap of berry colored cardstock.  At first I tried layering a few more paper strips, but it just didn’t look right.  Deciding simplicity was best, I chose some twine to frame the floral paper strip.  Next, I pulled out that pink flower for the bottom corner.  That made the card look a bit unbalanced.  What goes better with a flower than a butterfly?  I just happen to have quite a few of those kraft butterflies in my stash.  Then I did some digging and  found the “So Thankful” sticker in my stash.  I added a tiny brad to fancy it up a bit.

The next two cards follow similar patterns.  A few strips of paper with some twine used as an embellishment to hide where the paper comes together.  Then I find a matching embellishment.  The flower is a die-cut piece that’s been sitting in a bag for years.  The bee is a chipboard piece that I’ve had for over a decade!  Then I place the sentiment either on a sticker, or a banner that I’ve cut out.  If someone could help me with sentiments, that would be great.  It’s always the part I struggle with when card making.

The next two cards took a bit more effort on my part.  Instead of placing a pre-made embellishment, I got out my stamps.  On the left, I was trying my hand at my new alcohol markers.  I definitely have some learning to do.  My blending isn’t great.  I also had very few markers, so I didn’t have the range of colors I would have liked to have.  On the right, I was trying out my watercolor pencils.  Obviously, I am no artist.  Still, coloring is something I can certainly work to improve.

Now I have five new cards, and a few less scraps.  I was hoping it would make a noticeable dent in my scrap collection.  Sadly, it didn’t.  It looks like it’s time to put together a few layouts made completely out of scraps.  On the upside, if my scraps are getting out of control, it must mean I am cutting into paper!

Primary Colors

I was in kindergarten when I learned about primary colors.  They were red, yellow, and blue.  Mix them together, and you can create new colors.  It was like magic!  Hey, I was five.  It was pretty impressive to a five year old.  When I began picking out the papers to go with the underwater photos, I wasn’t thinking about primary colors.  I just don’t think like an artist.  (My college art teacher would not be surprised.)  I honestly just pulled some papers to see what looked good together.

My thought process for picking papers honestly began with the light blue background.  The sea turtle in the top photo appears to be a beautiful light blue.  I was trying to match that.  The yellow paper came next.  I loved the look of the bright yellow against the baby blue.  At this point, you would think I jumped straight to red to complete the primary trilogy.  Nope!  I pulled out a bunch of papers, many of them in different shades of green, until finally settling on the red.  Later, I pulled that strip of striped paper that pulled all of the colors together.  Wouldn’t it have been nice if I had just started there?

I have to admit that I cheated a bit for this layout.  I had pinned a beautiful layout that you can find here.  In this case, you will see that I wound up with something fairly close to the original.  (Her page is amazing! Go check it out!)  Even the overall color scheme and letter style ended up the same.  This was totally NOT intentional.  I think that sometimes when we see a page, we just unconsciously copy the elements.  Usually when I am using a layout as inspiration, I completely change the colors as well as other elements.  My color choices were totally based upon the photo.  The title letters were a result of not finding any light blue letters in my stash that worked.  (I am finding that I am always missing a letter that I need.  So frustrating!)  I had this multi-colored set that I have only used once before.  The colors matched my layout, and it had all of the letters that I needed.

My favorite part of this layout is how simple the embellishment is.  I used a couple of circle dies to cut some yellow and black scraps.  Then I pulled some die cuts, a couple of brads, and a puffy sticker.  How easy is that?  Only having 2 small embellishment clusters definitely sped up my scapping time on this page.

The one thing I am not happy about is the journal block.  I wish I had picked something that was a bit longer.  Right now I feel like it just sticks out there.  Since the embellishment cluster doesn’t overlap it, the block doesn’t feel grounded.  Someday I will create that perfect layout!

Disney tip:  Extra Magic Hours can be a great time to experience lower crowds.  Though parks with Extra Magic Hours often become more crowded than other parks, we found that mixing Extra Magic Hours with park hopper tickets helped us avoid huge crowds.  On the night we went to Sea Base, EPCOT was open 2 hours later for Disney resort guests.  We had Sea Base almost all to ourselves.