October Afternoon

Brinkley's Road Trip - Day 4

Brinkley and Travel Girl have been on an cross-country adventure for a few days now.  Be sure to check out Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3.

Yesterday, Brinkley and Travel Girl headed underground to do some spelunking in the worlds largest explored cave system - Mammoth Cave.  Don’t worry, with 400 miles of explored cave, they stayed close to their tour guide.  Even with Brinkley’s good nose it would be easy to get lost in there.  They would have liked to explore for longer, but they have more things to see.  So they hopped back on the road to make it to stop number four.  They sent us this picture today:

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Can you tell where they are?  They are getting closer and closer to their final destination!

 

Heather Leopard - It Takes a Village

Hi everyone. Heather here again and welcome to my last guest designer post for August. I am ecstatic to show you what I created this week. When October Afternoon asked me to create some everyday life pages with their new Daily Flash sleeves, I was so excited. Mind you, I typically scrap traditional 12x12 layouts with loads of layering but I was soo up for the challenge. I mean, have you seen the large 12x12 sleeves yet? They are perfect for all your Instagram photos (and any photos really).  I searched through my stash of Insta-photos and found the perfect fit.

As I was sorting through all the Daily Flash cards and bits and pieces, I realized I needed to find a way to keep all the cards and embellishments in one place so I created this camera-shaped box, using a cutting file I purchased.

I cut the box the size I needed to fit my cards, added a lens, flash, shutter button and voila!

Now I have all my Daily Flash cards and embellishments in one place! Here’s a peek into the everyday life at home with my youngest daughter, playing with all her little friends…


To create this layout, I chose my photos but before I printed them, I pulled out the cards that I thought complimented the photos the most and started laying them out. I moved them around until I felt they had the right balance of colors. I then looked to see what space was left for my
photos. I chose to do 1 large photo per page and did a mix of vertical and horizontal photos in the empty spaces, moving the cards around again and again until everything was in just the right place.

I placed the photos so that they would draw your eye around the page, in a sort of triangle, with the major emphasis on my daughter peeking in on her friends. I added the title and embellished the page with washi tape, tags, flair and a bit of stamping.


And of course, I had to journal about how much fun we had playing together.

I love printing the photos larger in these types of sleeves so you can still see the details on a larger scale while still keeping it simple. You just have to be careful and plan out where you are going to cut so you don’t accidentally cut through an important detail.

Thanks for stopping by today! I hope you enjoyed my projects this month. If you wish to see what I’m working on next, connect with me via my social networks, which can be found on my  blog.

I want to give a huge THANK YOU to the October Afternoon team for inviting me to hog your blog every Friday this month. I’ve enjoyed getting crafty with your amazing new products. Quite honestly, I am in total denial that my time here has come to an end. But of course, that doesn’t mean I won’t be scooping up all the newest collections. Heck, I already have my photos ready and waiting.  Thanks again!

Brinkley's Road Trip - Day 3

Welcome to another day of Brinkley's Road Trip!  Be sure to visit Day 1 and Day 2.

Even though they stuffed themselves at the Fair on Tuesday, Brinkley and Travel Girl couldn’t pass up some good ole barbecue as they passed through Saint Louis yesterday.  Good thing the restaurant provided some bibs, but Brinkley still got BBQ sauce all over his face.  After cleaning up a bit, they hopped back in the car to continue their trip.  We received this picture from them today: 

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Where do you think they are today?   Where do you think they might be going?

 

Thursday Sketch: Patterned Backgrounds

Hey everyone!  Roree here with today's Thursday Sketch Challenge.

I created this sketch while playing around in Photoshop:

I started with a 8 1/2 x 11" format that would also work for 4 1/4 x 5 1/2" card. I had a fun patterned background in mind for my project, so I created a lattice/diamond grid pattern for the base of the layout. Then I added a square towards the upper center—perfect for a couple of photos or some fun OA embellishments.

Here is the card I created using the sketch:

I used my Cricut Expression® 2 machine cut the diamonds for my grid (Cricut® Font & Basic Shapes cartridge) and flowers (Southwest cartridge). I used Travel Girl and Farmhouse for the papers, Daily Flash Girl Talk for the memory card, Travel Girl for the buttons and label sticker, Sasparilla for the baker's twine, and 5 & Dime for the chipboard.

Since the memory card had a sentiment that was already at the top of the card, I just rotated some of the elements from the sketch to make it work for my card.

Amy played along with my sketch this week, and here is the amazing card she created and what she had to say about it:

"When I saw Roree's sketch I knew I could easily use it for a layout or a card. Since this week my kids went back to school, I decided on making a card for my daughter, who loves (bordering on obsession), loves, LOVES dogs. Instead of the two open spaces in the sketch, I opted to use one, so that I could showcase the adorable dog illustration from All Boy and couple that with all the gorgeous papers from Girl Talk. For the lattice background in the sketch I decided to use the diagonal striped paper from Girl Talk and add strips to it going in the opposite direction giving the illusion of a similar diamond-esque texture. I then stitched along the strips to add more dimension and contrast to the background."

I just love how sketches inspire creativity. You can re-create something following the sketch exactly or just use an element or two to get you started—whatever works to get you creating.

I hope you enjoyed today's sketch and the samples Amy and I created using it. If you get a chance to play along, don't forget to post your project in the OA Flickr group.  We can't wait to see how you interpret it.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Sneak Peek Winners

I know many of you have been waiting to hear who the winners of our sneak peek give-aways are. Here they are!

Cindi Reyes - The Scrapyard in Shipshewana, IN

 

Public Library: Jen S. - Wooten's in Tusten, CA

 

Treasure Map: Kitika - A Cherry On Top

Congratulations!

Brinkley's Road Trip - Day 2

Welcome to Brinkely's Road Trip! If you missed Day 1 you can find it here.

Yesterday's first stop was a must for every Minnesotan – it was the Minnesota State Fair!  Just a short way from his home in Apple Valley, MN, Brinkley couldn’t leave without grabbing some cheese curds and taking a spin on the Space Needle.  After eating enough for a week (as one does at the fair), he and Travel Girl continued their cross-country road trip.  They sent us a picture from their next destination along the way...

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Any guesses as to where they stopped today?  And where they might be going?

Brinkley claims this is a business trip.  I must admit, many of us here at the office remain a bit skeptical...

Brinkley's Road Trip - Day 1

Those of you who follow our facebook page will already be familiar with Brinkley.  He is our fluffy friend and the official October Afternoon mascot.  Everyone enjoys his visits…. just to make sure we are doing our jobs, of course.

Today Brinkley is embarking on an exciting adventure!  While hanging out in the October Afternoon warehouse, he convinced Travel Girl to go on a cross-country road trip!  They set out today on a week-long getaway with a very specific destination in mind.  Follow along each day to try and guess where they are and where they are heading.

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Can you tell where they are today?

Tuesday Tutorial | One Daily Flash Paper 3 Ways

Happy Tuesday morning everyone! It's Amy here today with a fun little stylistic tutorial on how to use the one sheet from the new Daily Flash - Snapshots collection along with the new 12x12" page Daily Flash page protector sheet that is unlike any other on the market, three different ways!

First off let's take a look at the paper that I'm using. It's called "Compose" and it's made up of 16 3x3" squares, all with different colors, and themes. It's really a perfect piece for getting lots of use in different types of pages with it's variations in fonts and styles.

It also has a beautiful "b" side that makes it easy to set up a second side of your page.

Let's take a look at the page protector. Just as I mentioned, it's a 12x12" overall size, gridded out into 16, 3x3" sqaures. At first look you may think, well, that's a lot to fill up! And that's just what I did in my first sample. 

However, I wanted to segment the overall layout so that it was a little easier to "read" than just a ton of photos, or journaling, which to me is a little daunting. So what I did, was segment my page in to vertical columns of color. This gave me a natural placement for my colorful photos, as they then needed to fit in the "correct" color coloumn.

By segmenting my columns into colors, I was also able to then zoom in on some of the images that I was really loving about my photos, to further tell the story of our day, then interspersing those among with the images of the people in my page.  

Next up is a page that has a lot of different photos from one singular event, all of equal importance, along with a feature photo. 

I pulled out the pieces of my "Compose" paper that had the same colors in them as my photos, along with the fun aqua for a pop of contrast. I then printed my feature photo to 6" w x 9" h and then divided it into 3" squares to fit the inserts. I made that the center of my page and used the remainder of my photos, journaling and decorative inserts around the perimeter to tell the story of getting to the final middle photo. 

Last up, is a much more simple approach to using these awesome divders. 

For my beach page, I wanted to make sure that the depth of the primary photos was captured so I decided to make them my feature images. I printed them out at 6"x9" (left) and 6"x6" (right) and trimmed them into 3" squares. I used the white 3x3" squares from the "Compose" paper to create a light and airy feel to my page, and also utilized a 3"x4" journaling card that I trimmmed down to 3"x3" to complete my page and add just a touch of blue to my airy layout. Creating a page in this manner makes a clean and simple page with just enough style and page flow to make it interesting and uncomplicated, and fast to create, which we all love!

So, there you have it! Three very different ways and styles of using the new Daily Flash 12x12" page protectors and (primarily) one single sheet of paper! I hope this has inspired you to try different variations in your page protectors and gives you some ideas on how to use the new and fabulous insert sheets from October Afternoon! Thanks so much for stopping by and have a super day! ~Amy

Monday Color Challenge

Hi there, OA fans! Alex here today bringing you a pretty color scheme. With the new Daily Flash lines on their way to your local stores, I was hoping that you will play along with us. These colors are a perfect match with the Snapshots mini collection!

I took a chance to scrap this picture of me and my baby boy. I enjoy being at home with him. I just don't want my maternity leave to end... never, ever! 

I used the B-side of the beautiful Click! paper as my background, layering pieces of Compose and Focus behind my photo. I then cut out these cute speach bubbles from the Develop paper (how could I resist???) and attached some of them with 3d dots to add more dimension. I also used one of the speach bubbles as part of my title: "I totally enjoy you".

Those cute arrows are from the Snap Caps pack. I used buttons from the Midway and the Farm Girl collections. Love the Farm Girl navy buttons! ♥ They go perfectly well together with the Snapshots DF line.

I cut one of the Flash Burbs in two and used the pieces in the lower left and upper right corner to create a symmetrical feeling.

And I just can't seem to make a layout without a Tin Pin...

Joining me today is Nicole. She chose to use OA's beautiful Travel Girl collection for this challenge. I am in love with her layout! Love her layering, stamping, stitching... love it all!

This cute, layered plane made me squeal! 

Thanks Nicole for your amazing layout! I hope that you feel inspired to join us and play with these pretty colors. We would love to see your work, so don't forget to share it in OA's Flickr gallery.

Thanks for stopping by today!

♥

 

Heather Leopard shows off some Daily Flash sleeves

Hi, Heather here and I am so excited to be back here guesting on the October Afternoon blog. I’ve been having so much fun creating with the Daily Flash collections. You can see the 12x12 layout we revealed last week using the Summertime collection HERE but I’m just dying to show you some of the daily life spreads I created using the new Snapshots collection.

I have to admit that I got a little carried away with the various picture and card options and ended up created 2 complete page spreads for one event but, that’s what’s so nice about this. I was able to scrap all my favorite photos of my daughter’s first gem mining moment.


When I’m documenting a moment in time, I usually only use between 1 - 3 photo on a spread and that is what gets scrapped. With Daily Flash, I can scrap those main photos and also include the others that help tell the story.


I started  by choosing two photos that would end up getting scrapped on their own page, one each side of the paper and then matched up the right cards to the various sleeves and printed the photos to the sleeve size.


I scrapped this page like I would any other, knowing that the 1st coordinating page could hold my title and journaling. I had fun layering papers, cards, blurbs, and snap caps. I create a sort of mini title using the Daily Flash roller stamp.
 
I still had a lot of photos that help show the progression from sifting the pebbles and sand through the water to finding the gems so I created a 2nd spread.

I snapped this photo of my perfect little gem showing off her perfect little gems and added it over more layers of papers, cards and blurbs. I did all my stitching on this page and the other side before I actually adhered it to the layout so that the stitching wouldn’t show through on the
other side of the paper.


Finally, I added additional journaling cards and card sentiments that when read together almost form another title on their own. I outlined some of the cards with washi tape, as I did on the title card in the 1st spread.


I added final touches by hand-stitching over a few speech bubble cards and added my journaling.

Thanks for joining me again this week. I can’t wait to show you what I’m working on for my final guest blog post next Friday. In the meantime, stop by my blog for more inspiration.