October Afternoon

OA Treasure Map: Real Life

Hi guys! I've got one last layout to share with you using October Afternoon's Treasure Map collection.

I totally believe in documenting real life, and that means not every story is about smiling happy children. There are many many moments where faces look like this...

Because real life is far from perfect. This card from the 12x12 cut out journaling cards...this one has my heart. So much, that I haven't worked up the courage to use it yet. But I love what it says! I love the meaning behind it, and it's the inspiration behind this layout.

If you've been following along with my posts throughout the month, you may have picked up on my love for all things woodgrain and tags!! Definitely definitely tags! I typed the quote onto a tag for this layout, which means I can hang onto that card for a while longer (yay!).

I took this opportunity to write an honest little note saying that disappointment and sadness is real, and it's okay to take a minute to feel those things. I use white cardstock for the background of most of my layouts, but the patterned papers in this collection are just so good. I especially love this map one. I needed to figure out how to get my journaling on there and not have it get lost in the pattern of the paper. So I placed a piece of vellum, kind of off kilter, over the map paper and ran the whole thing through my printer. I really like the way it turned out!

Thank you guys for your lovely comments and support this month! I hope you've found some inspiration to tell your stories and have fun doing it :) I've definitely got more stories to tell with this collection, so please feel free to stop by my blog in the coming weeks and months to see what else I've come up with.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Pam

Thursday Sketch: Four Rectangles

Hi everyone, Mou here with Alex today and sketch based on four rectangles of different sizes.

Here's my take:

On this layout, I used only the Daily Flash Girl Talk papers to create and embellish. The background blocks came from Giggle and Blah, Blah, Blah papers. After adding my photo, I embellished with pieces I cut out from Dish, Whisper and Gossip papers. Love that I didn't even need extra embellishments to make my layout except for these alpha stickers: Index Card Mini Market Stickers from Public Library and Treasure Map Sea & Sails Mini Market stickers. 

Here's a close-up of my layout.

And now, here's a fabulously fun card from Alex!

Alex says: "I am not a card maker, but the second I saw Mou's sketch I got inspired to make one. The grid design is perfect for OA's traditional cut-outs. I grabbed the Blue Skies paper from the new Summertime collection and cut out two pieces that I found fitting for a fun summery card. The yellow Daily Flash chipboard frame was a perfect match for the smaller one. I used a piece of Swimming Pool for my background. To finalize my card, I added a couple of small heart shaped Summertime stickers, an old Midway "hello friend" doo-dad and some yellow mist splatters. I have used the Grey Flannel chipboard Alpha for the "hey". Thanks Mou for the fun sketch!"

That's a lovely card! Thank you Alex!

And here's a close-up!

Hope you enjoyed today's post and will find a creative way to use this sketch to suit your unique style!

Wednesday Inspiration: Babies don't keep

Hi everyone, Mou here! Recently, I chanced upon this sweet poem that dates back to 1958

                     (Source)

and it became my inspiration for today's layout! With a six month old baby girl at home and an overwhelming amount of other responsibilities, (such as singlehandedly packing up for a move to a different state) at the moment, keeping house has been dropped from the list. And I don't regret it either...  every moment spent with my little girl is precious and best use of my time. Here's my layout...

On this layout, I used the Skull Rock paper from Treasure Map collection and embellished with Public Library Sew Fun Banners and Index Card Mini Market Stickers, Saturday Mornings Shape Stickers along with some bits and pieces from Daily Flash Girl Talk and Apple Cider Pop Drops, Flash Alpha Strawberry Ice cream and Make it Merry Label Stickers, The most fun part of creating with October Afternoon for me is that I can mix and match older and newer collections and they work together seamlessly! Here are a couple of close-ups of my layout:

Hope you enjoyed today's post! Thanks for stopping by. 

Tuesday Inspiration

Hey, everyone! Roree here with a little inspiration for you this fine Tuesday.

I found this fun image on Pinterest while surfing around the site one day:

I was totally inspired by the layout of the title and chose to create a similar kind of title on my card.

I created a fun card for summer with products from the new Summertime collection. I used the Sunshine and Green Grass patterned papers, along with Double Take Stickers. I also used the Strawberry Ice Cream Sign Board Alphas from Daily Flash and a button from the Midway collection. 

Don't you just love those gorgeous colors! Such a sweet new collection!

Mou played along with me this week and created this sweet card:

"I loved the inspiration piece Roree chose. The first things that stood out to me were the blue, the orange and the whale. I knew I'd find those colors and patterns in the Treasure Map collection. I used the wave pattern from the Hangman's Cove paper for my card base and cut a whale out of Moby Dick Isle. My card came together with a few Flash Alpha Orange Soda stickers and Apple Cider Pop Drops from Daily Flash collection and Index Card Mini Market stickers from Public Library along with a little decorative stitching."

Isn't Mou's card just adorable?!  I love it!

If today's inspiration piece inspires your next project, please share your creation by linking it on Instagram with the hashtag #octoberafternoon, along with tagging @octoberafternoon, so we can see! You can also share your projects on our OA Facebook wall or the OA Flickr gallery.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

In Memoriam

"...The thing about remembering is that you don't forget." 

                                                                     -- Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried 

On this Memorial Day, we remember those who lost their lives serving their country. Each Memorial Day, I think about my grandfather, who fought in two wars, World War II and the Korean War. Though he did not lose his life in battle, he lost so many friends, as well as a part of himself. 

In the journaling, I reflected on my memory of my grandfather, as well as on the burden of the memories that he carried home him with him from war. 

Supplies | Patterned Paper:  Milk Money Social Studies, Saturday Morning Crepes, Midway Photo Booth| Labels: Saturday Morning, Midway, Travel Girl | Letters: Daily Flash Navigate | Other: vellum 

On this Memorial Day, we remember those we lost, as well as those who cannot forget. 

Treasure Map: BIG photo on a "Pinspired" layout

Hi guys! This is Pam again and I'm so happy to be back, sharing a new layout made with the Treasure Map collection :)

This layout is 8.5 x 11 featuring a big photo of my favourite girl, journaling typed right onto the pic, and woodgrain patterned paper (love!).

Again, my project started out digitally by enlarging a recent photo to fill an 8.5 x 11 canvas in Photoshop Elements.

 

I used a free font (Travelling Typewriter) to jot down a few thoughts about how my daughter's personality is really coming to life since celebrating her second birthday last week.

If you'd like to learn how to add text to YOUR photos using Photoshop Elements, I've got an entire class that covers this topic over at Big Picture Classes called "Text Tricks".

I've had this image pinned to my Layout Inspiration board on Pinterest for at least a year now and I've always wanted to do something with it. 

It was a great fit for this project. I used the white space in the bottom left corner of the photo to bring in some patterned papers and stickers from the Treasure Map collection.

It was really easy to do with a bit of roller adhesive!

Love the way this one turned out :)

Thanks so much for stopping by today!

Thursday Sketch Challenge

Hello friends! Melanie here today to bring you a fun and simple sketch challenge.  As you can see my sketch offers a lot of white space but also a lot of possibilities. I think this is one of the reason we love working with a sketch, the base is already created for us, then it is up to us to play with pretty papers and embellishments to come up with something fabulous.

The Public Library collection was ideal for this picture of my middle daughter jumping on our bed. I really wanted to take a fun approach to the house rule concept, that is why I labeled my layout 206 as we don’t really have that many rules in our house, it was just a comical way to document this activity.

The chipboard element was ideal for this picture as it beautifully complements the colors in the photo. I really took a simple approach using white letters and minimal amount of embellishments. I added some gold accents with stitching and thread, as one can never go wrong with gold accents.

I would love to see your take on this challenge! Upload your layout to the October Afternoon Flickr gallery, post it on our Facebook page, or connect with us on Instagram via #octoberafternoon.  Happy crafting!!!

Wednesday : Create With Kraft

Create with kraft. Why don't you? I love white background and I admit I use white background a lot. It has been a while since I used other colors for my layouts background cardstock but today, let's create with kraft!

I scrapped the photo I took of my youngest just before she went to her Graduation Party last year. It was a huge deal for all Year 6 students as they end their Primary School years and move on to Secondary School. I'd never realized how difficult it is to find an age appropriate dress for a 12 year old! The dress shopping took for-e-ver :)

I started my layout with a tag and layered pieces of patterned papers here and there on top of one another to build a cluster as my photo mat. I didn't cut into any new piece of patterned papers for this layout. Everything came from my October Afternoon scraps bag. I'm still very smitten with Treasure Map and Saturday Mornings as you can see.

I also picked some bits and pieces from other collections to complete my layout. The Snap Caps from Daily Flash Snapshots and All Boy are perfect this this page. I finished my layout with some stamping with the 2010's decade stamp and Travel Roller stamp.

Creating on kraft with the beautiful colors from October Afternoon is so fun! If you haven't been scrapping on kraft for a while, or have not tried kraft at all, I strongly urge you to do so :)

Go get krafty! You can tag me @sashafarina on Instagram, when/if you upload your layout. I usually post sneaks and my layouts with #octoberafternoon in the description. You can also share your creations with us via the October Afternoon Flickr Gallery.

Have fun!

 

 

Tuesday Inspiration: Camera Collection

Hi there! Happy Tuesday! Emily here with today's inspiration piece! I usually spend a long time finding the perfect inspiration piece for the Tuesday challenge. This week, well, honestly, I opened up my Pinterest app, saw this photo, and knew it was perfect. It took about seven seconds. ;)

(Source)

I love so much about this room. The cameras on the wall, the rows of shelves, the square album storage, etc. This isn't the type of inspiration I usually choose, but so many different ideas jumped out at me! I sent this image on to the super talented Roree to see what she could come up with.  I have a bit of a crush on Roree and just about every card she makes, and I knew that she would make something fabulous. I was right! 

Roree says, "What a fun and inspiring piece! I just love the symmetry of the like items on the shelves in the photo, so I decided to create a similar symmetry on a card using the Treasure Map collection. I chose the Moaning Cavern patterned paper for my background and lined a Tin Pin and circle die cuts from the Sew Fun Banners pack to create my rows. I dressed up the die cuts with buttons from Midway and Witch Hazel, along with a chipboard star from Daily Flash and a sentiment from the Treasure Map Tidbits pack. I framed it all up with a Treasure Map Border Sticker and a little bit of machine stitching."

The first thing I noticed in the image was the camera collection. I have to be honest, while I always love all the cute camera embellishments out there, I am never quite sure how to just slap a camera on my layout and make it look natural...so I had a whole bunch of unused chipboard and sticker cameras just begging to be put on this layout!  I chose five different cameras and staggered them to the right of my photo. One might think this would be an easy task, but I think I pushed them around for about fifteen minutes before I was happy!  Because the cameras didn't fit perfectly together, I included a few hearts and other elements in the open spaces. I used foam tabs to raise some of them up to create some dimension. It's a fairly simple layout, but I felt that adding much more would make it look cluttered...well, more cluttered than it already is!

I would love to see how you are inspired by this image! Upload your layout to the October Afternoon Flickr gallery, post it on our Facebook page, or connect with us on Instagram via #octoberafternoon. Happy Tuesday, and happy scrapping!

BIG OA NEWS! IT'S SUMMERTIME!!! GIVEAWAY ALERT! #oasummertime

ETA: THE WINNER OF THE OA SUMMERTIME BLOG GIVEAWAY IS:

Amy who said this: 

"Yes, yes, yes! I have been waiting for this collection and am thrilled to see it here! It is way too hard to choose just one thing that I love about this, the papers are gorgeous, the pillow puffs are super cute and both stamp sets are a must have. Thanks so much for the chance to win it before I can buy it!

REPLY MAY 19, 2015 AT 09:11 PM"

 

Congratulations Amy!

*Please contact [email protected] with your postal address and put "OA Summertime Blog Giveaway" in the subject line so we can get your scrap goodies out to you! 

Thank you to all that played along! It was fun reading what all of your favorites were from this collection. Head on over to our OA Facebook wall to play along with another giveaway there. ;)

 

 

 

 

October Afternoon is thrilled to announce a fabulous and fresh new summer themed line just in time to scrapbook your summer memories!! SHIPPING NOW TO STORES ONLINE AND NEAR YOU!!!

 

 

Here is the full collection for your viewing enjoyment with closer looks: http://octoberafternoon.com/line.php?line=ST

To celebrate this new collection, October Afternoon is giving away to one lucky OA blog reader (random drawing) some goodies from this collection! *items included in giveaway shown below.

 

IMPORTANT GIVEAWAY INFO: To enter, leave a comment below sharing a favorite item you like from this new collection! *Note-comments are moderated so they will not show up right away.  Giveaway entries will close on Sunday, May 24, 2015 and a lucky winner will be randomly drawn and posted here on the blog on Monday, May 26, 2015!

>>>>>Also of note: Other social media giveaways will be forthcoming, so if you aren't already following us on INSTAGRAM @octoberafternoon, now would be a great time to do so!! ;) Search Instagram with the hashtag #oasummertime to find more information on it ! 

 

Don't forget OA's Facebook wall for frequent updates and information there as well. 

 

Have a beautiful week!