October Afternoon

Sketch Thursday with Becky

Hi everyone, Becky here with the Thursday sketch. Since I am a 8.5 x 11 inch scrapper, I created the sketch using an 8.5 x 11 format..but as you can see, it's easily used for those of you who prefer 12x12  :)

I have this affinity for skinny imperfect strips of a mix of pattern papers. I also like to mix really diverse patterns and colors. No matchy, matchy for me! I do love the way OA papers from different collections work together.

Here's the sketch for this week-
 
And here is my take on it-
 
I adore Marcy's work, so I was thrilled that she was my sketch partner! I love her twist on this, literally a twist.
 
 
 
I hope you'll join us and come up with your own take on this sketch. Please share your layouts with the sketch with us on our Flickr pool here.

Can't wait to see what you come up with!  Thank-you for stopping by today.

Father's Day Inspiration

This Sunday is Father's Day...what are you giving to the special dad in your life?  The design team has been busy whipping up some fun card ideas that we are excited to share.  Masculine designs can be challenging, but don't worry, OA has plenty of fun products to make them an easy task!

First, we have a card by Lexi Bridges "I Heart My Dad".

Lexi says "This one is simple and little kid-ish :) The Campfire line can definitely have a "manly" vibe so combine it with the bear from Rocket Age and the fun quote and it makes the perfect card to come from a kiddo.  I also used the Comet Tail sprinkler against the blue background to make it pop."

Next is "You're the Man" card by Jill Sprott
Jill says "Every father deserves a "man card" for Father's Day, am I right? I brought together some manly-man odds and ends from the Rocket Age line as well as some Thrift Shop and Report Card wild cards."

"You're Out of This World" card by Marcy Penner.

Marcy embossed the little robot onto a tag.  Then she unscrewed the Tin Type sprinkler bottle, dipped her paintbrush in and painted the robot.  What a cool way to use the sprinklers!

"I Love You Dad" card by Roree Rumph.
She used 5 and Dime, Thrift Shop and Report Card to put this adorable card together.

Amy Heller's Father's Day Pillow Box "4 U Dad"

 
Amy created the main image with the B side of paper from Report Card. She used Campfire for the other papers and alpha letters. The buttons are from Schoolhouse, too.

"I Love You Man" card by Kinsey Wilson



Don't you love how Kinsey used the sticker background from the mini-markets to create a mask?  This card is full of cool techniques you gotta try!

And Danni has even created a tutorial for us today to create this ADORABLE card:









And another variation using the same technique:

If you have already finished your Father's Day creations we would love to see them!  If not, we hope we have inspired you today to break out your supplies and get busy! :)

Tutorial: Mist/Resist with Patterned Paper

Hey everyone, Kinsey here with a fun way to use your sprINKlers!  It’s really straight-forward and easy to do but the effect is almost optical illusion-like. First, let’s take a look at the finished product…

To achieve this look, I used:

• assorted patterned papers
• silhouette for title cut out (you can use alpha stickers for this instead if you don’t have a diecut machine)
• Rocket Age: Night Sky SprINKler
• Repositionable adhesive

Let’s get started! For the patterned paper banners as well as the title, “triston”, I used my silhouette. I adhered the banners to my cardstock first, and then- using repositionable adhesive- I temporarily attached the title piece. The key to this technique is using a few different patterned papers as the background for your misting technique- it’s what gives it that 3d look.

Try to mist primarily around the title so that you get a nice, crisp resist. Allow plenty of time to dry… sidenote: I’m kind of impatient when it comes to dry time so I’ve resorted to using my heat gun to nudge the process along and it works like a charm!

Once everything is dried, carefully peel up the title mask. If you’d like to add a little bit more dimension- sewing around the masked image makes it ‘pop’ that much more. Using a paper piercer, I just pierced around the title and then stitched it using contrasting thread.



To finish the layout off, I just added a few misted chipboard stars, a rubber charm and a tin pin as well as journaling strips on clean, un-misted kraft so that it stands out. I also used my title mask to cut the left edge of my photo so that it appears to be tucked behind the masked letters.

Here’s one more look at the finished layout:

Thanks so much for stopping by the October Afternoon blog today and hanging out with me!  I love browsing through the flickr gallery and checking out what everyone has been up to lately so don’t forget to upload your projects because you never know…you could be featured on the blog or even win some OA loot! Hope you all have an awesome week!

Kinsey

Challenge: It's All In the Details

Hi everyone, its Jaime here today!  So, who is up for a challenge?!  I absolutely love including lots of fun detail on my layouts - whether it's lots of fussy cutting, layering, or creating lots of dimension with pop dots.  I just love, love to use detail.  So, my challenge to you is create detail in any way you can think of.  Perhaps with some cut out flowers or some fun title work.  Make it interesting, layer it on and have fun!  
 
I used a variety of different elements on this layout - from the fabulous October Afternoon stickers to splashes of mist to fun title work.  I love pop dots, and I used a ton on this layout!  I used them on the flowers and several of the stickers.  I also played up the title work using one of the stickers as part of my title.  
 
Danni also played along with the challenge today and put together two gorgeous layouts filled with eye-catching, fun details.
 
 
 
All of the layers and repetition of the apples in different ways just bring Danni's layout to the next level.  I just love the bright colors and design of this one!
 
 
 
 
This layout is full of eye candy!  Everywhere you look are little clusters of fun details that make this playful layout just perfect.
 
So, I challenge you, the amazing October Afternoon blog readers, to create a layout, card or any project with lots of detail!  I can't wait to see what you come up with!

More from June GD Megan Klauer

Hi! Megan here again, and today I'm going to share a layout I created about the "water rocket" my husband and boys had so much fun with a few summers ago.
 
I started the base of my page with the Comet Tail Sprinkler from the Rocket Age collection. If you haven't tried these mists, do it! They are wonderful! I then used a few pages from the rocket shaped mini album to start off my design. Love how these come pre-cut!
 
I added lots of pieces from the miscellany pack and created my title with the fun alpha set.
 
Thank you for joining me today! Looking forward to being here with you all again next week when I use the Rocket Age line for a baby themed layout!

Have a wonderful weekend!
 

Sketchy Thursday with Wilna

Hello! Wilna here and today's sketch is a very simple one.

You interpret it just as you want to!  I wanted to bring in a bit of Tia's glitter costume so i glittered my title using glue.
Those adorable OA labels are perfect to add your journaling for this sketch!

Jill is also playing along with the sketch today.  As you can see, we did some very similar things: We both used the paper strip in the middle (instead of paint) and also we splattered our pages (because it's just. so. much. fun)

Jill says, "Because this sketch accommodates two small photos, it's perfect to use with photos that aren't exactly spectacular, but that are meaningful all the same. These two photos were taken months apart in 1993, the first at graduation, and the second a few months later when I moved into my college dorm room. Side by side, they remind me of how excited I was to be "free", but also how naive I was then. The page reflects on that, comparing the self I was then to the seniors I teach today (who were born the year I graduated from high school).

My first glance at the sketch made me think that I would be using paint on the layout, right up the center, but I decided to fill in that center section with a collection of OA journaling cards, tags, and ephemera, which relate in some way to learning.

The paint did appear, eventually. I used the grid paper background ("Rock Candy" from the 5 & Dime collection), split it in two, and misted over it using Robot Blue and Strawberry Creme Sprinklers. I still can't believe how evenly the Sprinklers covered the surface. I then dripped black and white spray paint over the misted sections, and built the rest of the layout over that. What says senior year and first year of college better than controlled chaos?

I just love this "Are we there yet?" stamp from the Road Map stamp set. It seems especially appropriate on this page. The apple, ever that emblem of learning and knowledge, is a die cut page from the Schoolhouse mini-album.

I also misted over a "Rocket Age" chipboard star with Robot Blue and Strawberry Creme, and then sewed over it.

As always, don't forget to share how far you "Stretch the Sketch" with us at our Flickr Gallery.

Love,
Wilna

Flickr Feature Vol. 2

Happy Wednesday! :)  First, I want to announce the winners of the sprinkler sets from last week's Sprinkler Focus giveaway:

 
 
Congratulations Suz and Melissa!  E-mail [email protected] with your address and I will get your prizes out to you! 

We have been encouraging all of you to upload your latest OA projects to our Flickr page, and boy have you all been delivering!  There is so much inspiration over there, you must check it out if you haven't!

Here are just a few projects that caught our eye this week:
123 C'est Parti! by Maniscrap


Was that a Wink? by lilkoala3 

Welcome Baby by izzybee99 

Berry Delicious by AshleyHorton1675 

Happy Birthday card by Tanya_Tahir

Your Love is Like A Circle card by OwenTyson 

Room Decor by ladybird.ladybird

Hope these projects have left you feeling inspired today!  Great job everybody.  Keep posting to our Flickr page, we absolutely love seeing what you create!

Tutorial: Misting Simple Shapes

Hi there everyone. Marcy here with a little tutorial today.  How many of you have had the chance to play with our new SprInklers yet? Aren't they lovely!? And the colors...yum!Today I wanted to show you a little bit on how I use my mists. 99.9% of the time I unscrew the cap on my mist bottle and drip the ink right onto my page. But this time I wanted to try something new on top of that....and as usually happens in my world...it did NOT go off without a hitch! ;) After a little trial and error I got the look  I wanted and got some cute moon accents for my page. 
I started with a loose plan for my page. I knew I wanted to have a banner going across the page with the different phases of the moon on it but that was about it (except that I also knew the photo I wanted to use and the topic I wanted to scrapbook). Later I decided that it'd look really cool to have them done on book paper.  I planned how I was going to make all the different moon shapes. My first trial was going to use a toilet paper roll (just mist into it  and you have your circle). That left me with very odd shaped circles however so I'm going to share my second (and successful) attempt in this tutorial. 

First you'll need to gather your supplies:

 cardstock

 circle punch

 a page from an old book

 mist (I used Comet Tail from Rocket Age)

 an old cardboard box to spray in

I started by trimming the book paper into rectangles. Plan one was to have them go across the entire page.  I laid everything out and realized that I didn't like that placement. So then Plan two was to have three of them on the top right of the page. I ended up not liking that either. So the winner was plan three.... to have them run from where I wanted to place my photo to the edge of the page. Now that I think of it, this tutorial should be titled “If At First You Don't Succeed...”  

I trimmed out three of the rectangles from the book page and notched the bottoms.
 
From there I punched a circle in a piece of cardstock  that would almost fill the width of an individual banner piece. I  placed my banner piece in my box, put the circle-punched piece in the center and sprayed it one-two times with my mist. I found the mist covered very well, and I wanted some of the text to still be legible,  so one spritz was often enough.
 
 
 
So, that was the full moon, but I still wanted to represent some of the other phases of the moon. To do this, I took the circle I punched out earlier and adhered to to my little template so that it overlapped a little bit. Then I repeated the same spritzing procedure I used earlier. 
 
 
Note: I realized that my template didn't cover all my banner when I placed it in the center so I used a scrap piece to cover the rest.  For my third banner piece I moved the circle over a tiny bit more on the template and, yup... spritzed again.  Now I had the three pieces of my banner and started assembling my layout. Once I had the majority of it down I noticed that something was missing. One of the things I love about Rocket Age is that it's comic book inspired....that the image outline is not quite lined up  correctly. I decided to mimic this with my banner and outlined each moon roughly with my pen. Much better. I continued embellishing until I was happy with everything. 
 
And a couple of other shots of my page...
 
 
There you have it. A quick little misting tutorial on making simple shapes (in this case moons). Thanks for popping in! If you're going to give this technique a try be sure to link us up in the comment section and add your work to our flickr gallery!

Challenge: Add some texture!

Hi everyone, Roree here, and today I have a challenge for you!   To me, adding texture to a project is an important part of my creative process.  Texture is not only pleasing to the touch, but to the eye as well.  Today I have a few projects to share with you that take texture to the next level. 

Here is my layout:
 
I don’t get to do boy layouts very often, but I found an adorable photo of my nephew and thought it would be fun to use with Rocket Age.
 
First, I added drips of the Robot Blue and Comet Tail Sprinklers to my patterned paper base.  This adds the look of texture without adding bulk to the page.  Next, I layered patterned paper strips, a row of tickets, and mixed in some rows of machine stitching from top to bottom.
 
For the title, I added brads to the chipboard stars.  I also popped up one of the letter stickers in the title with foam adhesive and added a cross stitch with embroidery thread.
 
I created a machine-stitched box to house a button and chipboard border.

A small detail like adding foam adhesive to the back of the layered star and brad adds more texture and dimension to the layout.

I also created a boy card using the tester paper I used to practice working with the Sprinklers.
 
I wouldn’t have normally used the same patterned paper to create a second project for a challenge, but it was on my desk and I got inspired. 
 
It has a lot of the same type of texturing as my layout did, with misting, machine sewing, and layering embellishments. 

Lexi played along with my challenge this week, and she had such a wonderful take on it.

Here is her layout:
 
Here is what Lexi had to say, “We recently took a trip to Moon Marble Co., a store where they sell lots of marbles and even demo how glass ones are made. How appropriate for the name to match Rocket Age?! I used one of their business cards on my layout as well as several circle shapes to represent the thousands of marbles we saw. All the different embellishments bring in lots of texture and went well with the memory because that place was nuts with games, toys, marbles and color!”
 
Look at all of the spectacular circles, layered with patterned paper, chipboard, buttons, and tin pins.  A texture lover’s heaven! 
 
She also added machine stitching over her title and to die-cut and cardstock sticker embellishments.  Such great details!
 
Have we inspired you to play along with this week’s texture challenge?  I hope so!  And if you do, please post it to the OA Flickr Gallery, so we can all see your take on it.  And who knows, uploading to the gallery may just get you featured on the OA blog.  *wink wink* 

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

June Guest Designer: Megan Klauer

It is that time again to announce a new guest designer here at the OA blog!  We are so happy to welcome Megan Klauer for the month of June.  In addition to her fun & fabulous scrapbooking style, Megan also is an amazing photographer and a very sweet, kind person.

Let's get to know a little more about Megan.
 
1} Tell us about yourself.
Being a mom of 3, I love to escape to the world of creating & scrapbooking as often as possible. It’s as much about relaxing and being creative as it is about capturing and sharing those stories for future generations. I strive to journal on my layouts as much as I can; even if it’s just a short sentence or two. I keep a blog {meganklauerdesign.blogspot.com} that serves as sort of my online “art journal”. When I’m not chasing my little ones around, I also do on-location photography {meganklauerphotography.blogspot.com} ; where I get to chase others little ones around with my camera in hand.

2} Tell us about your scrapbook style and how long you have been scrapbooking?
I would discribe my style as modern but eclectic. I love to use white space and lots of clusters. I began scrapbooking back in 2002 when I was pregnant with my oldest son.
 
3} Are you a layout person or a card person...or both?
Layout gal for sure! I do create cards every once in awhile, but 95% of the time, it's all about layouts! I love to do 12x12, but it's so much fun to go back to the 8.5x11 size I started with way back when.
 
4} What is on your scrap desk right now?
I'm currently creating a mini album filled with comments from past students, for a teacher who is retiring from our local high school.
 
5} What is your favorite October Afternoon line of paper?
That would definitely be Campfire. We are an outdoors/campin kind of family, so anything to do with nature is right up by alley!
 
6} What can you NOT scrapbook without?
That would be my Sharpie marker! It's my go to pen for journaling, doodling, and faux sewing when I don't have access to my actual sewing machine.
 
7} What is your favorite source for inspiration?
I am inspired everyday. I find myself looking at the design of everything from clothing to cereal boxes. I'm always making mental notes of color combinations and font styles. My go to scrapbooking inspiration is the Studio Calico members gallery. It's filled with constant inspiration from all types of designers.

8} Favorite TV show?
It's a total goofy one, but I love the show "Wipe Out". No matter how bad my day is, I laugh none stop at this show. My hubby & kids think I'm crazy for how much I love it.

9}Favorite 7th grade memory?
Oh my gosh! Lot's time with my girl friends, sleep overs, and playing on the traveling basketball team. We were always on the go and involved with something.  Loved those years!
 
10} If you you have a dinner with anyone living or dead who would it be & why?
My Grandma & Grandpa Castor. I'd just take our Saturday morning donut warmed in
their "radarange".  I grew up next door to them and wouldn't trade those memories for anything!

Here is Megan to share a layout with us today:

Hi everyone! I am so thrilled to be guest designing here at October Afternoon! When I was asked which line I'd like to work with, I knew it would be the Rocket Age line right away. I knew I'd use it with pictures of my two boys and the water rocket they created last summer, but I also had a few other photos in mind.

I started with a layout featuring my niece and her first Varsity Regional softball experience as a freshman in High School. The colors in the line went great with her uniform and the swirl of the rockets added the perfect accent to imitate her pitching wind-up.

 
"All Star" by Megan Klauer

Welcome Megan!  Be sure to stop by next Friday to see what else Megan has to share with us.  Have a wonderful weekend everybody! :)