At Long Last - A Few Cruise Layouts

At long last I am finally ready to begin sharing some of the layouts from my cruise scrapbook. I still have eight or ten pages more to scrap but I have 18 pages that are ready to share. I will share a few layouts today and then more next week.

I am not sharing the opening page as I did not use the Cricut on page one. I ordered a custom die-cut ship with custom wording from Scrap Your Trip for the first page. After page one, I tried to present an over view of each aspect of the cruise: The ship, our stateroom, activities on board, food, night life, and ports of call.

The photograph at the top of the post is pages two and three in the scrapbook.  I used gray-blue cardstock as a base.  I cut a postage stamp trimmed sheet of decorative cardstock in half and used it as base mats for my four photographs.  Each photo is double matted with a white matting in addition to the decorative layer. 

Pages three and four offer an overview of the ship and includes our sail and sign cards which we reserved to use as memorabilia.  These two pages began with printed cardstock.  I added lime green mats and navy blue border stamps to add to the page.  The Welcome Aboard die cut was ordered from Scrap Your Trip.  These two pages also feature border stamping.

Pages four and five are an overview of our cabin and includes photos of our towel animals.  I used blue and yellow mats, as well as fun trim at the top of the page.  I added the multi colored stripes and the yellow ribbon to finish the page.  As on previous pages, I printed my journaling on vellum and added it to the page.

Pages six and seven are the first of two double page spreads featuring on-board dining.  In the photo on the left page we are celebrating our anniversary.  The other photos were foods or beverages that we actually consumed.  Each of the other nights on the cruise we sat with other couples.  Each time I photographed one of our plates I had to explain that I am a major scrapbooker and that food photos were a must!  They seemed indulgently amused though I could tell that they did not get it.  However, I am equally sure that each of you understands my need to photograph everything.

I will be back on Monday with another BBTB2 project to share and next week I will share more of the cruise layouts.  I hope you each have a wonderful weekend.

Simple Pages in a Flash for a Multi Scrap Page Event

Today I want to share the idea of using simple layouts to help you deal with a multi-page scrapping event.  As part of my 50th birthday celebration last year we went to the Aiken Spring Steeplechase on my actual birthday.  After the Steeplechase we had friends over for a party picnic/party with games.  It was a wonderful birthday!  But scrapping the day took many pages.  I had the elements of the Steeplechase as well as outdoor and inside photos from the evening.   I had previously scrapped four pages of of the evening party, but I had not yet attempted to scrap the Steeplechase.

I began by dividing the photos and memorabilia into categories:  Intro, family and friends, carriage parade, and Steeplechasing.  I combined the memorabilia with two photobooth looking photo strips and a photo of a single horse and rider.  I used two coordinating pieces of black and white print cardstock, white cardstock matting, and a white pen for doodling and created the first two pages. 

Above, I had saved an extra copy of the invitations we sent to family and friends to join us at the Steeplechase, matted it on white cardstock, and combined with the photo strips to create an intro page.

Page two includes my admission badge from the event, the actual event program, a single rider photo, and bit of ribbon and a cardstock sticker.  Easy peasy yet nice looking.  The print cardstock was a great touch.

Pages three and four contain five of my favorite photos from the many taken during the carriage parade.  HINT:  Do not feel like you MUST use every photo.  You can select photos to represent the event/location (I chose my favorite of the Grand Canyon too, and did not scrap all 70+ photos).  The largest of the photos is a 5x7, three are 4x6's, and the smaller photo is 2.5x6 inches.

I chose a simple black cardstock background and cut a single sheet of traditional equestrian looking plaid paper in half to decorate the page.  I chose a pale yellow color from the plaid and matted the five photos on yellow.  I added chipboard brackets and a chipboard sticker, along with layered flowers.  Again, simple and easy - let the focus be on the photos.

Pages five and six were the easiest.  I had enlarges some of my photos to show details of the event.  I had four photos - an 8x10, a 5x7, a 10x4, and a 4x6.    I matted the photos on white and light blue cardstock.  The 8x10 and a title fill the first page - with a "take the jump" sticker. 

Page six is a bit crowded, but I did not want to spread the "Chasing" photos over another two pages... So I squeezed it all in.  I have very few embellishments, again, because the photos are the focal point.  I felt that too many embellies distracted from the photos.

Pages seven and eight are the final two Steeplechase pages - family and friends.  And while I added a little detail to these pages, again they were quite simple.  The pages were created with a speckled navy blue cardstock base, a sheet of blue and green print cut in half, and a blue and white print.  I picked up on the green in the print to use as base matting. 

The letters were cut from the M.S. Seasonal Art cartridge.  And the final embellishments were the layered flowers, in blues and whites. 

And that is how you make eight quick pages of the same event using a limited number of photos to represent the overall event.  I broke the event down into phases - and scrapped two simple pages for each of the four phases. 

A few more pages of the Disney Scrapbook

Posing with Nemo

I am going to share a few more pages from the Garland's Disney album.  I gave the album to Ruth yesterday and she seemed to really, really like it.  In fact, she said it made her want to go back again - soon!  I shouldn't admit it, but it had the same effect on me!!  :-)

Smooching at Epcot and posing with Pooh and company.

I am not sure if you can see what the Garlands are wearing - they each have on a Disney hockey sweater.  Bill is wearing the Grumpy Miners.... Hence the cute saying in the lower left corner, "I'm Grumpy... What's your excuse?"

The weather was all over the place during our week in Orlando.  The first half of the week was cold and windy, but the last two days were hot.  It was fun, but crazy. 

This is my favorite layout in the book:  Nice Ears!  The last day Bill and Ruth finally bought the required Disney ears, complete with names.  They were very cute!  

Tomorrow we will officially leave the happiest place on earth and head back to seasonal scrapping!

Guess What I finished? Disney for the Garlands

 Title Page

One of my biggest accomplishments over the weekend (when I was away at the lake for a girls scrapping weekend) was I managed to complete the Disney album on which I have been working. Our friends the Garlands went to Disney with our family FOUR YEARS ago and had not done a thing with their photos.  I decided for their birthday gifts to scrap some of their Disney photos.

MGM Studios

Mr. Garland smuggled the Disney DVD to me and I printed photos.  Since then I have been chugging along on Disney.  The final book contains 24 pages, but really it could have been much larger.  But at least they will have a nice overview of their trip.  (Click on any photo to see the image larger).

@MGM for the evening with Mrs. Incredible and the dancing Christmas light show

Since I have already shared some parts of the album with you I will not share all of the pages.  However, I will share a few layouts over the next few days.

Aerosmith Rockin' Roller Coaster

Last of the Weekend Layouts

This is the last of layouts that I will be sharing from last weekend's crop at Lake Murray (thank you Sally & Beth)!! Let me see... We featured Aaron, then Bethany... So it must be time for Ian. I must tell you that my photo stash of Ian has declined significantly since he went away to college. I am going to have to speak to him about being IN the photos he takes and posts.

The photos in this layout were from January 2009 when the Carolina Panthers were in the playoffs. I was excited that I had a reason to use the Carolina-Like Panther cut that I designed a couple of years ago.  Sadly they were destroyed by the Cardinals.... and it rained… And the quarterback threw a zillion interceptions…. OUCH. My poor guys - there they were in the rain watching their team loose. My husband assured me that except for the game the guys enjoyed their trip to Charlotte. That is one of those "huh" statements. They only went to Charlotte for the game!!! Yes they did spend the night and have dinner, etc. But they went to see the game!!!

I think the look on Aaron’s and Ian’s faces in this photo says it all - they look so annoyed with the game. I will add that Ian was better trained as a scrapper child - I not only got photos, he also brought me his game ticket to go on his page. Alas, now I would be happy to just have photos!!

Preparing for the Annual Trip to Camp Crop A Lot

Each year I make a pilgrimage to Temple, GA with 15 other women to a place called Camp Crop A Lot. Now, before you gag on the name, or worse yet, get a mental picture of cabins and campfires, let me assure you that camp crop a lot is not really a camp! The woman who owns the house (Yes, I said HOUSE) is named Camp. Camp crop a lot is a residential home converted to be a weekend crop retreat center. This will be our third year at CCAL.... Which means it was almost exactly two years ago that I met and fell in love with Cricut!!! I had my first cricut experience at CCAL. I had just purchased an electronic cutting system by a different company, came home and sold it to dh's admin assistant, and ran out and purchased my first cricut!!!

Each year a different friend is in charge making the arrangement and communicating with everyone. This year that blessed woman is my friend Kathy. Kathy got this hot idea after attending a recipe swap class that we should each bring 6 x 6 pages to share. But not recipes... ON NO! She made us do that one thing that no true scrapper likes.... Scrap pages featuring ourselves! That's right, I had to make 16 - 6 x 6 pages of me. Yikes.

I decided to use my cricut to ease my pain. I cut 6 x 6 squares, then 5.25 x 5.25 squares, 4" -ish circles, flowers, swirls, etc..... all using my cricut. I printed my information on the card stock, using text boxes. And then I assembled and blinged my pages. Not too bad for one evening's work.