Sunday, July 11, 2010

Ballet camp surprise

I am lucky to have befriended my friend's teenage daughter.  She is the cutest little thing and is very serious about her dancing.  She was actually asked to take part in a month-long camp and is amongst the youngest (if not THE youngest) members in the camp.

Her mom told me she journals her dance training experiences.  I assumed it was about the actual experience of it all, but I soon learned that it was about the technique.  She jots down what she's learned, what she was told to do differently, and any routines that she wants to remember.

This beautiful girl is only 13 and already has incredibly disciplined, great study habits.

So I wanted to send her a little something to jot down the fun moments.  I decided to make her a min-album from supplies I have in my workroom (I've vowed not to buy a single scrapbooking supply this month except tape as needed).  So far so good on that goal!

Here is my quick little book for my little dancer, Emma....







I had to split her name into the two syllables for the front and back cover because my pre-cut letters were too big for the cover.  I hope she gets it!  LOL!

Can't wait to send this out tomorrow.

How to scrapbook photobooth guestbooks

A while ago now, a friend of mine asked me to make a scrapbook/guestbook for a photobooth at her daughter's Bat Mitzvah party.  I wasn't quite sure how I was going to do this as the size of the photostrips and their layout can be pretty limiting.  On top of that, I had to add a journalling block for guests to leave notes.

After playing around for quite some time, I've learned how to plan out the layouts so that each two page spread is different than the others.  Here are some examples from a wedding album I just did.  The color scheme was orange and white and the look was to be a modern/clean finish.

I honestly was perplexed at how I could justify the invoice when I thought I was going to be limited to flat orange and flat white papers because nothing could be too girly.

After searching through multiple stores and playing with embossing folders and die cuts, I was able to create some pretty options.

This is what started with:

I didn't use everything here, but it was good to see that I had collected some fun options.  The specific color of the orange was difficult to match and I found myself layering oranges to add a little depth and texture at times.

Here are some of my favorite layouts from the album.  These layouts are pre-made and I assemble the album on-site (hence no photos or notes).  Long strips mat the photo strips and the square strips mat the guests' notes.

I loved this leaf die cute....It was perfect for a clean, non-girly embellishment!

I have to learn how to take better photos, but I found this really cool textured orange background paper.  It has embossed orange swirls that matched the burnt orange embossing powder I had for the kissing couple stamp.

I can't even begin to take credit for this background.  A friend of mine once helped me with a large album and we were running out of fun layout options until she came up with this!  Each of the orange stripes are actual cut out strips of different colored orange paper and then glued to a flat white page.  It really helps to add a little texture to the page and the look is super cool.

I reused the super cool orange embossed swirly paper in a new way.  Using a nesting die cut of circles, I created new white swirls.  Makes it look like bubbles!


Even though I wasn't asked to help preserve the invitations, programs or menus, I knew they would start and finish up the album beautifully.  The invites had these pretty orange branches with leaves (much like the die cut used in the image above).  I'm pretty sure this pretty full leaf die cut will be used for future projects!