LGS September Week1 – Celebrating 70.

Even though there’s a party going on around here, I’ve still got my regular commitments to honour.

Today is Monday which means there is a new sketch up over at Let’s Get Sketchy. And since it’s also the first Monday in September, it’s Team A’s turn to share our layouts with you . Here’s mine.

Here’s the sketch we were working from. Another beautiful one by our leader Brenshevia.

Since I’m talking layers today I thought I’d take you through my process somewhat. When I first saw the sketch I thought “uh oh, a shaped background!” That is my kryptonite I think. I have a lot of large die cut papers that I struggle to use on my layouts. Somehow the non-linear edges trip me up every time! Well, I was determined not to let them psyche me out this time so I picked one that I felt I could work with and dug into my scrap basket for those all important layers. I’d already picked my photo (I have a pile of ready to scrap photos on my desk) and so knew I wanted to play up the darker colours in the photo. But the first scraps I picked out were light in colour. The script one and then another from the same line that was blue with a cream doily. As you can see it didn’t make the final cut. Mostly because the cream just seems to stand out too much against the white in the green die cut.

I liked the sentiment on the handwritten paper and immediately knew I could incorporate my title into it so it stayed in my keep pile. I tried several different dark blue patterns until I remember the floral print from Dear Lizzy. The greens are not exact but a good match as well as the yellows. Not identical to the more manilla colours of the other items, but close enough to fool your eye a bit. That is a good rule of thumb to remember when you’re combining your scraps which are usually a random mix of manufacturers and collections. Close is often good enough!

The photo was floating on the cream script paper though so a quick addition of a dark brown wood grain mat solved that. So, my paper layers were chosen, their placement was easy enough to figure out because I had a sketch to work with, now it was time to embellish. I know this can sometimes trip people up but it really doesn’t have to. Having said that, I did take a bit longer than normal getting this to look ‘right’ to my eye. I won’t bore you with all my choices, second choices, rejects, and so on. Just the basics. And that started with the washi tape.

I wanted to draw attention to the title more and felt a line of washi tape would act like an underlining of sorts. Then a label for journaling, a word that fit (even the colour was ‘close enough’) and finally a couple of glittered stickers I found that were from the same line as the die cut paper. So nice when your stash helps you like that! The gems were to add a bit more sparkle, texture and also to fill out the space a bit more.

The upper cluster was where I had my biggest struggles. I wanted something curvilinear up here and since the doily hadn’t worked I looked for other circular objects in my stash. The journaling spot from Elle’s Studio was the first thing that caught my eye, then the tabbed journaling card, then the green label sticker (a super old one from Martha Stewart) and finally that little red tab from the same set as the sticker I used for my journaling. I had already applied the washi tape above the photo and more stickers from that same glittery set bridged the gap between washi tape and label cluster. Again, the gems add sparkle, texture and fill in the space a bit.

I make it sound like I put down the first thing that I pick but that’s simply not true. I pull out anything that I think might work, move it around, cut it, ink it, flip it 90 degrees … you get the idea. I play with it until it looks right to me. What looks right to me may not look right to you and that is okay! I’m okay with things not quite lining up or the colours not totally matching. I wasn’t always, but I am now. You may not be and you may never be and that is OKAY! This is just MY way of doing it. Your job is to take what you can relate to from this, reject everything else, and then make something completely your own.

Here’s another look at the completed layout.

Okay, your turn. Link up your newly created layout to the LGS blog. Can’t see what you create!

Don’t forget to visit THIS POST and leave a question for me to answer this month. Your comment PLUS signing up for my email list (GO HERE) will get your name in the draw for this Grand Prize.

 But remember, you’ve got to be on my email list AND leave a comment on THIS POST.

Have a great Labour Day Monday everyone. School starts tomorrow!! (insert happy dance here) 🙂

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