October Afternoon

Pirates in January

Hi everyone! Alex here.

I don't know about you, but I needed to take a break from winter. Therefore, I am bringing you pirates and the summery Treasure Map collection today. 

I knew I had to use Treasure Map for my son's birthday layout. He is so into pirates right now, that I had to throw him a pirate party. I still can't believe that I actually made that pirate ship cake! Still kind of impressed by myself! :D

I didn't use a lot of papers for this one, only a fuzzy cut piece of Whale Bone Reef. Instead, I played with a lot of bits and pieces. I marked the upper edge with a strip of Nautical Flags washi tape. I cut off the pirate that was sitting under the palm tree sticker and stuck it under my photo. Number 3 is a Daily Flash Early Riser. 

I can't seem to be able to make a layout without Daily Flash chipboard arrows...

I have mixed three different alphas for my title: TM mini market, DF Meringue and TM alpha stickers for the year. The big anchor is TM Chip 'n Stick. Finally, I added some Eggnog pop drops and a cute little TM tin pin to the right side of the page for a more balanced design. 

I love to pull out collections that are not really right for the season to mix things up a bit. I feel so much better now :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

//Alex

Winter Wonderland + Cut File

Hi everyone! Alex here with you today, bringing you one wintry layout.

I have used OA's lovely Under the Tree collection for this one.

I also added a small touches such as a chipboard snowflake and a "joy" brad from the last year's Silent Night. That's one of the things I really love with OA: old and new collections are super easy to mix and match.

These photos are from my daughter's first "real" cross-country tour. She was awesome! That girl never stops to amaze me... "A good memory" pin was a perfect match for this page.

I have also designed this "Snowflake in a Heart" cut file to go with this layout. I would love to share it with you! You can grab it HERE. Have fun with it!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!

♥

 

Tuesday Inspiration: String Art

Hello, and Happy Holidays!  I have a couple of string art displays or projects pinned.  They are so inspiring. My favorites things to pin are window displays.  This is the inspiration for my layout today.

This is how I interpreted it with the Under the Tree collection.

I started by using the First Snow background stamp on my plain white cardstock.

Then on the bottom half, I cut different size strips from the Candlelight Pattern Paper to create the look inspired by the string art display.  I started placing them in the directions similar to the inspiration piece.  

To give my photos more focus, I layered a piece of Family Gathering Pattern Paper along the middle, and added gold stitching.  I added a few stickers, a tin pin and enamel shapes under the large red bow I made to also help bring focus to the photos, along with some black paint splatters.

I added a strip of the washi tape at the bottom and layers of pattern paper and an ephemera die cut at the top to help give the layout a little balance.  For my journaling, I used the labels to layer near the top by the photos, and added a straight stitch in gold.

Of course, the puppy adds a little more innocence to the theme of this layout, and doesn't take away from my photos.  I am always a big fan of October Afternoon's Christmas collections.  It is such a beautiful collection to work with.  Hope you are able to grab some to use for your holiday memories!

I would love to see your interpretation of the inspiration piece.  On Instagram, tag @octoberafternoon and me @Patricia_Roebuck using hashtag #octoberafternoon, upload to October Afternoon Flickr gallery, and/or post it on our Facebook page.  Happy Holidays and happy scrapping!!

Multi-photo Christmas Layout + Cut File

Hi everyone! Alex here with you today. 

I don't know about you, but I find Christmas photos a little hard to scrap. They are often pretty dark and messy with a lot of things going on on them. Therefore, I chose to keep my background light and bright and play with little details instead. I also chose to use a lot of small photos. They give a little lighter look with some white space in-between them.

I have used the lovely Under The Tree line for this layout.

Love this cute banner from the stickers sheet. 

To make my white background a little more interesting, I cut out a big Christmas Tree made of hearts (also in white). I like the "airy" look white on white creates.

The size of my tree trunk was perfect for the "Have yourself a merry little Christmas" stamp from the Under The Tree stamp set. It's all in the details, right? :-)

I would like to share the Christmas Tree cut-file I designed with you. You can download the cut-file HERE. Have fun with it!

Thanks for stopping by today! 
Have a lovely weekend!
♥

 

ETA: Thank you for letting me know that the link didn't work. It worked for me the first time I tested it. I have updated the link now, so hopefully you'll be able to grab the cut-file :-) Sorry!

 

Tuesday Inspiration: Layers upon Starry Layers

Hi there! Happy Tuesday! Emily here with today's inspiration piece! When I was searching for inspiration, I came across this fun photo of star confetti:

(source)

I was hesitant to use this for my layout because I've already used stars on a number or layouts for October Afternoon, including this one using stars cut from map paper. After searching for awhile without any luck, I decided the star confetti was meant to be!  I pulled out a few different star punches and began punching away at stars on every piece of blue, red, gray, and orange patterned piece of paper I could find. These colors matched my chosen photo, which is of my kiddos on Halloween this year. I also included a few plain black stars that I cut from cardstock. When I had a large collection of stars, I literally dumped them on my page into a giant pile and then spread them out around my paper. I wanted the layout to be very multi-dimensional and I didn't want the stars to be perfectly placed or adhered to the background. 

After sticking all the the stars down (definitely the longest part of my process) I added my photo on top of the stars and cut out a title using my die cut machine. I wanted a big, bold title, so I used black cardstock and a very simple font for my title, "Fun." The title comes from a Facebook status I included with this photo.  I had hoped I could convince my kids to have matching costumes this year like they have had for the past few years. However, they all had their own ideas, and I was a little bit sad about their mismatched costumes. After a fun night of trick-or-treating I concluded, and posted, "I have reached the point in parenthood where I realize that it doesn't matter if they all match, it only matters that they all have fun."

Finally, I added a few simple embellishments to my layout. Let's face it, it's a pretty crazy layout already, I didn't feel like I needed to add a ton more. I even opted not to include my journaling, because I couldn't find a good place to put it. Instead, I will simply write it on the back of my layout, which is something I frequently do! 

 

Here is a look at my final layout. I love good color combinations, and I can honestly say this is the first time that I have ever used red, orange and blue...it might be a new favorite!

I would love to see how you are inspired by these fun confetti stars! Upload your project 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!

Designer Challenge: Non-holiday layout featuring holiday product

Hi! Emily here with a designer challenge for you! I am loving the brand new Under the Tree collection, but I have to be honest, I'm just not quite ready to jump onto the holiday bandwagon yet!! Luckily, the papers and colors in this collection can easily be used for both holiday and non-holiday projects!  I chose a photo that included some red so that I could use the red papers that come in this collection. My six year old daughter completed her first triathlon at the end of the summer. It was her first competitive sporting evert ever and she was ecstatic at the finish line (and, I should mention, not even tired, crazy kid!). My husband snapped this photo of her right as she was coming out of "chute." I love how realistic the event organizers made the entire triathlon.

I chose red, gold, blue, and black as my color scheme, which worked well with my daughter's red shirt in the photo. I also included a lot of stars to imply that my little athlete is our own super star! I love the idea of using lots of stars without actually using the word "star" in my layout.   The little gold stars on the Merry Making patterned paper were a perfect backdrop. I also included some star paper from last year's December Story kit.  Because the background is a little busy, I decided to outline all of my elements in black to make them stand out. I found a few non-holiday elements that matched my color scheme, including a little "3" tag from the Ephemera package which was perfect for this layout! I think my favorite embellishment is the sweet little "A good memory" tin pin that also included a star!

Above the photo, I added a little flare of stars (stickers and pop drops)  as though they were confetti flying out of her hands at the end of the finish line.

I cut a bold title out of black cardstock using the Pacifico font and added a few lines of journaling near the top lefthand corner. Overall, it's a fairly simple layout that includes a few fun visuals!  

Here's a look at the final product:

How are you feeling about Christmas?  Too soon to scrap the holidays? I'd love to see your take on some non-holiday layouts using our Under the Tree collection! Upload your work to the October Afternoon Flickr gallery, post it on our Facebook page, or connect with us on Instagram via #octoberafternoon. Happy Thursday, and happy scrapping!

Thursday Sketch: Squares of Different Sizes

Hi everyone! Alex here bringing you this week's sketch. I have used a lot of squares on this one.

And here is my own take on it.

I am not really ready for Christmas yet but I do love the new Under the Tree papers, so I decided to use them for this non-Holiday layout. The red and black were a perfect match for my little fire fighter. I have used papers Carol Singing and Card Sending. 

I mixed it up with bits and pieces from DF All Boy, DF Snapshots and DF Girl Talk. 

I also added some chipboard stars and a chipboard frame. 

For my title, I used the DF Nightfall alphas.

I hope that you feel inspired by this sketch and that you want to play along. Have fun!

//Alex

 

Thursday Sketch: Photo Booth Strips

Hi everyone, Mou here with today's sketch!

Do you like photo booth prints? I feel that the photo strips help tell a story in a very fun way. Now, while there are limitations to what you can take to a photo booth, there are no restrictions to what you can do with the look. With that inspiration in mind, I created this sketch.

You could create a simple linear layout with a sketch like this or you could give it a touch of mixed media like I did.

I started this layout with a neutral grey cardstock as my photos are very colorful. Rather than just placing the pictures one below another, I created a staggered strip of photos mounted on slightly wider strips of Bonfire and Hayride  papers from Daily Flash Apple Cider collection. The papers instantly warmed up the grey background to match my Autumn photos. I cut my title out of Pumpkin Picking paper and created an embellishment by cutting out a tree from the Hayride paper.

Fall reminds me of sweaters and textures. To create that feel on my layout, I machine-stitched around the photo strips and title. I cut out leaf shapes from Bonfire paper and sprinkled them around the page like leaves falling from trees. Next I splattered paints around carefully as not to drop a lot on my photos. To add a date to the layout, I used the Daily Flash 2010's Decade Stamp. Finally, I journaled at the bottom.

Here are some close-up shots of my layout.

I hope you like my layout and find the sketch useful. So, how are you documenting fall this year?
 

Designer Challenge: Little Photos

Hi there! Emily here with a fun designer challenge for you. I recently had the privilege of visiting Camp Wandawega with two friends. This "summer camp for adults" has been in the news and social media a lot lately, and I am lucky that I only live a little over an hour away. Between the three of us, my friends and I took hundreds of photos of this perfectly curated camp. I am hoping to create mini album of our camp adventures, but in the (rather likely) event that I don't get around to it, I wanted to be sure to at least document our time in a layout!  In order to include as many photos as possible, I decided to use lots of small photos on my layout. 

My printer makes it easy for me to print small photos by offering me the option of printing 1, 4, or 8 photos on a page. I decided to make three 4x6 sheets of four, giving me 12 total photos. Once I had my photos printed and cut, I arranged (and rearranged...and rearranged) them on my page until I was happy with their placement. I decided to orientate my photos in a grid in the top righthand corner of the page, with the title underneath and some colorful strips of paper as a boarder on the left.  

I used foam adhesive to raise a few of the photos off the page, and I decided at the last minute to swap out one of the photos for a Daily Flash woodgrain chipboard heart and the perfect (and true) "Instagrammed" sticker. I like how it breaks up the grid a bit and makes it a bit more visually stimulating. 

I used a piece of patterned paper from last year's December Story kit to cut my title. I love the plaid - it is reminiscent of the blankets they leave everywhere to snuggle up in and perfect for a camp layout!!  

Along the left side, I included a bunch of different colors and patterns. I knew that I wanted to include some yellow in the layout so that it didn't have too much of a holiday vibe. The little cluster at the bottom is appropriately "vintage" - the Daily Flash Girl Talk badge features an antique phone dial, and the Sidewalks "Little Flyer" flag is truly vintage October Afternoon - it has a copyright date on the back of 2011!!

I contemplated adding journaling to this layout, but honestly, the photos tell so much of the story, that I didn't feel like it was necessary. It's a rather busy layout, and I didn't know that adding MORE to it would be the best idea!!  Here's the final product:

Tell me, when is the last time you went to summer camp?  How did you document it? I'd love to see your take on my little photo challenge or see any camp-inspired projects you may have! Upload your work to the October Afternoon Flickr gallery, post it on our Facebook page, or connect with us on Instagram via #octoberafternoon. Happy Wednesday, and happy scrapping!

Tuesday Inspiration: Frame Gallery

Hi everyone! Alex here bringing you this week's inspiration piece. I was browsing Pintereset for frame gallery inspiration, when I came across this image. I fell for the frames arranged as a heart and decided to use it for this week's layout.

I started by cutting a lot of 1.5'' x 0.75'' rectangles out of different Summertime patterns. Then I build up a heart with white cardstock strips and started to play around and arrange patterns until I was happy with how it looked. Finally, I adhered the patterned rectangles to white strips and put it all down on a lovely B-side of the Backyard Lights paper. 

Once the heart and my photos were in place, it was time to pull out all the Daily Flash goodies and start decorating.

I have used bits and pieces from DF Snapshot and DF Girl Talk. 

I also added a chipboard arrow and some Eggnog pop drop hearts. 

I hope you like this inspiration piece and that you feel like scrapping after reading this :-)

Have fun!

//Alex