August Light: Layout for Scrap Africa DT

Hello! Here's my layout for the mid-month mood board challenge at Scrap Africa!



And here's what the mood board looks like:



I was inspired by the abundance of flowers and the colours, and also the combination of different typographies in the heart, which suggested using two different sort of alphabet in my title. One word is written by hand and and another with alphabet that I cut from corrugated cardboard.

Another inspiration to my layout was the mood board at Scrap Around the World:



Here I was inspired by the combination of pink and natural colours, the handwriting and the twine. I didn't feel like using dark brown this time, but the dark green handmade paper that I used to mat my photo sort of reminded me of the worn out leather covers of the old book in the mood board.



With this layout, I'm also joining the Archi-Scraps challenge, with the theme of Layers and/or corrugated cardboard!

I had wanted to use corrugated cardboard alphabet since I saw them in a layout by Terhi Koskinen recently. Do check out her work if you haven't already done so, she's one of Finland's best known scrapbookers and for a good reason!









Thanks for your visit! I hope to see you in the Scrap Africa challenge, open for participation until the end of September!

Leaving Los Angeles: A Clean & Simple Layout

Clean and simple is not my typical scrapbooking style. On the contrary! "More is more" describes my usual style better. That said, I feel very drawn to more minimalistic approaches at times, and want to learn to make that style work for me as well.



For this layout, I wanted to use a longish text from a novel, and I wanted to have it handwritten in the background, not necessarily fully visible for reading but as a pattern. Before that, I gessoed the background paper to tone down a strong pattern, and made another layer of patterns taking the gesso off with baby wipes through a stencil. That's the hippyish sunbeam pattern you can see here and there.





The handwritten text is my main decoration this time. I added just a little watercolour and clear Stickles, and very few embellishments. I'm quite happy with how it turned out!

I was inspired by the July challenge at Scrap Around the World, and their gorgeous colourful mood board you can see here! I was particularly inspired by the journey theme, the sunset, the pink and all the other bright colours.



I was also inspired by the colour challenge palette at Tando Creative and the monthly sketch from C'est Magnifique kits.





I'll have to say bye for now to put my little one to bed, but I'm thinking I'll be back tomorrow to add my inspiration text into this post, and a few words about it, in case someone'd like to read it!

Anyway, it's from one of the Weetzie Bat books by Francesca Lia Block. Before travelling to Los Angeles this spring I looked up stories that are set in that city, and the Weetzie Bat series came up in many recommendations. I'm not through with all the books yet, but in my opinion they do seem to capture the spirit and essence of L.A. really well!

Do you like to read books where the story takes place in your travel destination - or where you live?

Edit: Trouble with mobile uploading - the post went up without pictures first but that's fixed now!

Brave at the Dentist's - CSI 119 & Scrap Around the World

My son is very proud of having lost his first few baby teeth, but he’s also needed a couple of extra checks at the dentist’s. What I’ve journaled on the tags here are little events regarding his teeth: from when he lost the first one to his last visit at the dentist’s. We gave him a favourite cd the following morning as a thank you for being so brave, and the title of this layout and the smiley are recycled from my writing on that wrapping paper. I´m always happy if I manage to include real life paper scraps like this, things I would love to keep but just don't know where!

Ensimmäisten hampaiden irtoaminen on pojalleni suuri ylpeydenaihe, mutta samaan aikaan hän on joutunut jokusen kerran käymään hammashoitolassa, mikä aina hiukkasen jännittää. Tämän leiskan tarinat ovat pieniä muistelmia hampaisiin liittyvistä tärkeistä tapahtumista. Otsikko "Reipas hammaspotilas" ja hymynaama on leikattu lahjapaperista, jossa hän sai viime hammashoitolakäynnin jälkeen suosikkilaulajan cd:n rohkeuslahjaksi. Minusta on aina kivaa, jos saa skräppisivuille sopimaan joitain tällaisia aitoja muistolappusia, joita tekisi muutenkin mieli säästää, mutta ei tiedä minne!



With this layout, I’m participating in two challenges: CSI – Color, Stories, Inspiration #119 and Scrap Around the World (SATW) April. This is what the CSI prompt looked like this week. From the Evidence department, I chose the following elements: wood, leaves (stamped) and tags. And regarding the journaling (Testimony), I used tags for journaling.

Osallistun tällä leiskalla kahteen haasteeseen: CSI – Color, Stories, Inspiration numero 119 ja huhtikuun Scrap Around the World (SATW). Alla CSI:n tehtävänanto, josta valitsin kohdat puu, lehdet (leimatut), ja tagit, eli nuo pakettikorttimaiset pienet, joihin muistiinpanot kirjoitin.


In Scrap Around the World, the prompt was this bright and spacious board by Riikka Kovasin. I was inspired by the colours, the clean and simple style of the mood board in general, and also its “Don´t worry” attitude that is very necessary when you’re taking a child to a doctor or a dentist!

Scrap Around the World -haastessa inspiraation lähteenä oli Riikan laatima raikas graafinen mood board, jossa minua innoitti etenkin värit, tyylin selkeys ja mietelauseen huoleton asenne, josta on iloa muun muassa silloin kun lasta vie lääkäriin tai hammaslääkäriin!



Thank you for visiting my blog! / Kiitos kun kävit!

Swan Lake Layout

Entering the challenges at:
Scrap Around the World
Let's Get Trendy 3
Inkido

The summer is here and I just realized this is my first summer themed layout of the year! Can't believe I've been scrapping wintery pictures long into May. Maybe it's because we did have a very long winter in Finland. The ground was still covered with snow in April!

This photo is from a summer trip of 2008 to our neighbouring Estonia's capital Tallinn. There's this beautiful park Kadriorg with a swan pond, which is definitely worth seeing if you ever visit this charming medieval city. The swans even have their own little built island with a lovely boathouse-styled hut for them to nest! See end of post for pictures.



Tallinnan joutsenlampi

Halusin tälle sivulle valokuvausaiheisen kesäkuvan, ja kiva kuva löytyi viiden vuoden takaiselta kesämatkalta Tallinnaan. Ihana Kadriorgin puisto, suosittelen. Lammessa on pieni saari ihan joutsenia varten, ja siellä sievä pikkuinen venevaja niiden kodiksi. Puistoon on nyttemmin tullut myös japanilainen puutarha, jonne täytyy ehdottomasti päästä käymään seuraavalla reissulla!

This is my first time joining the new Scrap Around the World challenge. Inspired by their mood board, I looked for a photography themed picture. I'm the one taking the most photos in my family, but I also like to be in them. When I noticed I was being photographed, I did this funny pose inspired by Swan Lake the ballet!

Here are the mood board and the sketch. The colours don't have to be those of the mood board, and although I too wanted summery colours, I left out my favourite turquoise which I use often enough as it is.

I chose instead the lavender, pink and green from my photo. I turned the sketch once to the left and took the film and camera theme as my main inspiration from the mood board.



Valokuvateeman valitsin Scrap Around the World -haasteen inspiraatiokuvista, ns. mood boardista. Mikähän tuo olisi suomeksi?

Värejä ei tarvitse tässä haasteessa ottaa mallista, mutta kesäiset värit minäkin halusin. Yritin valita jotain itselleni vähemmän tyypillistä, ja kuvan pinkki, vaaleanvioletti ja vihreä sopivat siksi hyvin.

Minä olen perheessäni useimmiten kameran käyttäjänä, ja kuvia on laatikkokaupalla myös matkoilta ennen perhettä ja digikameraa. Tykkään kuitenkin olla myös itse kuvissa mukana, ja välillä innostun poseeraamaan hassutellen, kuten tässä Joutsenlampi-baletin innoittamana!

I printed a mini photo of one of the swans to put in the die cut film frames, and did some stamping with a small camera stamp.







Tulostin yhden pikkuriikkisen joutsenkuvan Big Shotilla leikattuun filminauhaan sopivaksi ja leimasin leiskan laitaan muutaman pienen kameran.

I'm also entering this for Let's Get Trendy Now 3, which is not a regular challenge site but a free one week workshop. There were altogether five challenges posted and they all run till the end of June, with a giveaway in each one. You'll need to sign up in their main page Linky to qualify, though!

The Let's Get Trendy Now 3 prompt was to use sequins. I had this sequin velvet ribbon that had not suited my recent pages but now the colour was great for this. I also used sequin waste aka punchinella below the photo.



Let's Get Trendy 3 on viime viikolla julkaistu maksuton verkko-workshop, jossa tuli viisi haastetta peräkkäin, mutta niihin voi osallistua koko kesäkuun. Arvontoihin osallistuminen edellyttää ilmoittautumista tapahtumaan, mutta senkin voi tehdä koko kuun ajan! Tuolla päivän tehtävä oli käyttää paljetteja. Violetti paljettinauha sopi väriltään hyvin ja lisäksi laitoin kuvan alapuolelle paljettien jäännösmateriaalia eli punchinellaa.

At Inkido, this month's theme was scallops. I repeated them in the mount of the photo, stenciled some paint with a doily and finally also found a scalloped tape I added at the top border of the layout.

A great final touch was the deli paper feather I did last week with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's tutorial. Do take a look, it was really quite easy! (Never mind the black wire that still sticks out of the feather. It was too heavy for scissors and I have yet to find the tool to cut it!)



Piparireunat olivat Inkidon haasteen aiheena ja niitä edustavat kuvan kehystys, sabluunamaalaus kakkupaperilla sekä viimeistelyvaiheessa sopivasti löytynyt vihreä teippi, jota käytin sivun reunoilla.

Viimeistelin leiskan leivinpaperisulalla, jonka olin tehnyt Julie Fei-Fan Balzerin ohjeiden mukaan. Kannattaa kokeilla! Rautalangan pätkä oli liian paksua saksille, joten sehän jäi sitten odottelemaan paremman työkalun löytymistä.



While always looking forward to new travels, I really enjoy spending time with the memories from the previous trips! Happy travels to all of you this summer.

Tulevia matkoja odotellessa on antoisaa ajanvietettä uppoutua muistelemaan aiempia. Hyviä reissuja kaikille tänäkin kesänä!