Monday, October 20, 2014

Got scraps? Make mats!

Calling all paper crafters! You've got scraps! I know you do!

I'd like to share with you an idea I saw in a youtube video some time ago: Scrap Mat Tutorial. This person made what she calls Scrap Mats from the scraps of a leftover project. What a great idea! You know the papers go together and you know you already like that combination. Why not collage it together? (To see more of her lovely creations, you can check out her blog!)

So, I finally tried it out but I did it a little differently. She uses tape on the back to hold the mat together before adhering it to her project. I ran a mat piece through my Xyron 5-inch Creation Station. Then, I layered my strips on to the sticky mat and then trimmed the edges. I don't sew, but some paper crafters do. I think a stitched edge on these mats would be a great finishing touch!

I made these three cards.
On the first one, I used a stinkin' cute sentiment from Your Next Stamp and bat die cuts that I designed myself for my electronic die cutter.

Then I got the idea to cut the mat into a shape. So, I used my Victorian background die on the next card. The stamps are from Close to My Heart and I watercolour painted the bear with Tombow Markers.


On the last one, I used a Santa Claus stamp from Your Next Stamp. I didn't mat the scrap mat, since I liked the white and red contrast.  I used Copic Markers to colour Santa and a Copic Green glitter pen to colour the sentiment. It took a long time to colour such a tiny image! But I do love the result.


I used a thin cardstock as my mat base, but you could use ugly patterned paper. (You know it. We all buy paper stacks that have a least one ugly design!) If you use a patterned paper as the base, then it won't be as heavy when you layer the mat on a card.

Other ideas for scraps include:
  • Quilt blocks, instead of strips
  • Paper piecing. Stamp on your scraps and cut them out to piece on to the stamped image
  • Ribbon flags (like on this robot card for a boy)
  • Mini buntings
What are your ideas?

Monday, October 13, 2014

Tutorial: Journaling Lines for Scrapbooking

Happy Thanksgiving! I had the urge to make a mini album. So, I went ahead and did it. It's not yet done, but I've made the mats and tags for it. I haven't decided if I will further embellish them. The smallest tags however, are meant for journaling. They are too small for pictures but just right for a small snippet of a story: a place, time, date, title or quote.

I needed a way to make lines on them and I read about masking the sides and drawing across them. So, I pulled out some graph paper to help me line it up and I really liked how it turned out.  I made a (silent) video tutorial of how I drew the lines on my scrapbook tags, including masking off some stamping on them.

You can find it on my Vimeo channel:
Tutorial: Journaling Lines for Scrapbooking