Baby themed ATC's

I belong to a private group of ATC swappers called "Full Sleeve" and this month's theme was Baby.

I have used the Stars Cuttlebug embossing folder for the background and inked around the edges. The baby is a pic I sourced from the internet and then I tied him hanging from a tree branch with some blue organza ribbon. It's a "he" as blue was the only colour ribbon I had enough of in my stash ... well at least until 3 yr old hands got at it with the scissors ... so two ended up being in silver!

The branch is a real twig, carefully harvested off my hubby's topiary's while he wasn't looking ;-) and the leaves are stamped and then cut out and layered with foam dots.

TFL Star xx

Blog Hop

Last Friday night I followed along with the A2Z Scraplets Blog Hop. During the crop on Saturday at Mad About Scrappin I was able to have a go at the sketch challenge from the hop. You can see the original sketch on their blog which I have flipped on it's side. The only other criteria was that it had to be a summertime themed layout.

I dug these Cosmo papers out of my scraps to create the page .... perfect to go with pics of my little man at the pool. I also used some twine and Jenni Bowlin alphas from Mad About Scrappin.

TFL Star xx

Something a little different ....

I've had this idea for scrapping this "first" pic of our little girl for a while now so when this month's challenge came up for Show Us Your Stuff I decided to turn my ideas into reality. It's not the style of layout I would usually do (pink, girly and frilly) but with the birth of our little girl just around the corner, I guess it's something you will see a little more of from me in the not too distant future.

The challenge was based on the theme of love and you had to include a handmade heart. I made my own chipboard heart by first drawing it on some blank chipboard and then cutting out and covering in patterned paper. I added a lacy heart border to the outside and some pearl trim to the inside. I even pulled out the sewing machine and stitched around the edge of the page.

Also thought I'd share a few close-ups of the embellishing on this one ... the photo of the whole layout doesn't do it a lot of justice.

TFL Star xx

Aaaaaaarrghhhh - Negative Space ......

Okay so while I'm not a have-to-fill-every-spare-inch-of-the-page kinda gal .... this whole negative space thing is really a challenge for me. I've tried a few times and failed dismally, so I'm hoping that this time I have kinda-sorta pulled it off. Maybe not as negative as others would do, but it's about as negative as I can manage! lol Mad About Scrappin run a monthly challenge from their facebook page and this month the challenge was of course negative space with a border around the page.

This is the first time I've used my Fine and Dandy papers ... I did pull them out for a Jan challenge somewhere but never got around to it. I've used the layered diecuts from the range and also some of the "holes" from the border punch .... seemed a waste to throw them away! ;-)

TFL Star xx

Out of the Hat is back!!

We had a much needed break over the festive season but now Out of the Hat is back for 2011 with our fab February challenge.

1. Masking and misting

2. Clouds

3. A tree somewhere on the layout

I came up with this idea for my layout almost straight away and it only took me about an hour and a half to pull it all together!

Papers are October Afternoon Fly a Kite range that I got from Mad About Scrappin a while back ... just been sitting in my stash waiting for the right moment - lol

I have used some chippy clouds to mask with and misted with some Maya Mist in Hydrangea Blue and then hand stitched the outline. I also used the same mist to colour my chippy alphas.

The chipboard tree is from Meant To Be Scrapbooking which I have painted with Twinkling H2O's.

And lastly the cool striped twine which is also from Mad About Scrappin and costs a measly $1.10 for 5 metres!! At that price you grab all 7 colours ..... I did!! ;-)

I hope some of you find the time to join in at Out of the Hat this month.

TFL Star xx