Good Again

I promised another round of the good, the bad, and the ugly. Wanting to start out the year on a positive note, let’s begin with the good. Of my three first layouts of the year, this is my absolute favorite.

You all know how I love a layout that allows me to use up scraps. This was the perfect layout for me to raid my scrap box. The only paper I cut into was the orange circle. Everything else were pieces I procured from the overflowing scrap basket. If I am counting correctly, that’s seven less scraps taking up precious space.

As you can see, it didn’t come together without a hitch. My mixture of perfectionism and insistence on eyeballing everything are incompatible at times. In this case, I placed my layers down until I was happy. Once everything was exactly as I wanted it, I began gluing. And… papers shifted. Things weren’t straight. I couldn’t live with it, so I tore it all up. As a result, you will see some wrinkled papers. You know what? I rather live with a few crinkles than things going this way and that. So much for perfectionism, right?

Embellishing this page was a blast. I don’t often say that. First of all, I had a huge range of colors to choose from, so pretty much anything would work. Because of that, I headed straight for my random bits and bobs that were left over from old collections. All of the die cuts are probably a decade old. This just made my heart happy, y’all. I added a few “newer” pieces with the chipboard banners and little stacked hearts.

My favorite “embellishments” are the title and that little tag to the left of the photo. The title for this layout is big and bold. I rarely think about the title until I’ve finished the page. In this case, I knew I had quite a bit of space to fill. For once, I got to pull out an oversized alphabet and make a statement. The tag doesn’t look like much. However, it pulls out to reveal some hidden journaling. Whenever I can hide my thoughts, and handwriting, on a page, it makes me feel like I have a secret. Don’t judge… or analyze. Give me these small rays of sunshine.

I adore the final product. The bright colors just make my heart sing. My subject makes my heart melt. And the ability to let perfectionism go and really appreciate the beauty of the imperfect makes my heart heal. Yes, I would say this fits in the “good” category.