Monday Challenge: Mix and Match

Happy Monday! Vivian here with this week’s Monday challenge. Today we’re keeping it simple with a challenge that asks you to create something using three or more October Afternoon product lines. If you haven’t already noticed, one of the great features of October Afternoon products is that the colors coordinate across lines, making it easy to mix and match products with success.

Becky played along with the challenge this week and came up with a fantastic and fun layout that combines products from several different lines, including Sidewalks, 5 & Dime, Modern Homemaker, Fly a Kite, and Thrift Shop. Note how the yellows, pinks, and aquas combine across the paper lines.

After declaring this a simple challenge I went in a more challenging direction, as I decided to see whether I could use something from every October Afternoon line ever created, from County Fair (the first October Afternoon line ever) through to Sidewalks (in stores now). It was hard, but I did it! Note how the greens, reds, yellows, oranges, and aquas combine across lines and how the alphas coordinate.

I started with a strip of paper from County Fair (the aqua at the bottom) and then cut ¾” wide strips of patterned paper, choosing one paper from each line and gluing the strips to a 12” wide scrap of cardstock to form my own striped paper. I cut the striped paper in half once I was done and used a strip both above and below my photos. Product lines not represented in patterned paper include Schoolhouse (scalloped border sticker), Modern Homemaker (apple punched from patterned paper), Boarding Pass (taller letter stickers), 5 & Dime (Red Wagon sprINKler), Rocket Age (Comet Tail sprINKler), and Sidewalks (label sticker).

If you are an October Afternoon blog reader but don’t visit the website, I encourage you to check out the products section. You can click on each line to look at thumbnails of each product and can click on those thumbnails to get a closer look at products, including the A and B sides of the patterned papers. I’ll let you in on a little secret – I use this section of the website often to help plan my projects. It’s quicker and easier (and less messy!) than pulling out all my papers and embellishments, especially when I’m looking for certain colors, patterns, types of stickers, etc.

Hope you’ll participate in this simple (or not so simple, depending upon how you interpret it!) challenge that’s also a good stash-buster. If you do participate, please link up your work in our October Afternoon Flickr gallery so we can see your creations!

Happy mixing and matching!

Comments

[Mel J]

Loving this challenge and the layouts. I have totally scraplifted Becky's layout. It is the top one in my post.

[Sue Althouse]

Loved this challenge! My two-page layout is in the Flickr gallery:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52797044@N04/6254560229/in/pool-770617@N25

[Denise Price]

Awesome LO's, ladies! I love the bright colors. Vivian, my stash of OA supplies is not as extensive as yours, but I did manage to do a little mixing and matching with embellishments from different lines. The result, a layout called "Apple Days," is posted in the OA Flickr gallery for your perusal (http://www.flickr.com/photos/denisemprice/6239358713/in/pool-770617@N25)

[Debbie Olson]

This is a fun challenge--played along!

[Keri]

LOVE the examples here, and have definitely had fun doing this mix-n-match thing with OA many times...love the result & how well so many of these collections coordinate through the years! :)