Welcome to week six, the final week, of the Scrap N Chat with T 'Embellish It' competition. Karen's challenge had you CREATE items with beads, felt and fabric;
whilst Leanne's challenge saw you using wire and the colours red, white and green to
DECORATE a gift package. Chelle's week saw you designing a fashion statement worthy
of the Melbourne Cup with BLING. With the help of previous crafts and UFOs, Kylie's
challenge saw you MIXing things up; and last week Tracey's pushed your boundaries
further (and to your recycling bin!) as she asked you to use your ingenuity to
RECYCLE items like toilet paper rolls on your project. Hooley dooley!! To those
still standing, a mighty congratulations. The work produced over the last five
weeks has been nothing short of breath-taking, at times jaw dropping, and always
inspiring.
So now its time for our ALTER IT challenge. A challenge that epitomises the essence
of Scrap N Chat with T ... a blog, a store, a gallery for paper (and other) crafters
... a source of inspiration as we admire the the many and various products in store,
browse the blog for techniques and updates, and sit down with a cuppa to admire and
be inspired by the work in the gallery. Then we sit at our PCs and wonder how we
can incorporate all that we have seen into our own projects, how we can use them
(can we use them?) in our preferred crafts, and 'can we ALTER them to suit our own
styles?'.
This week we are asking you to return to the grass roots of scrapbooking and create
a single or double page layout. You will need to use three or more photos; the
theme is 'let the love shine through'; the required colours are the 'cool shades' of
summer; your primary handmade embellishment must be made from sequin strands; and
finally you must use at least ten different techniques to ALTER the products/items
you use to create a harmonious layout where the photos remain the focus of the
layout, not the techniques.
My example layout 'Love and laughter' features photos I recently took one warm,
sunny day of Tanyah and her son Ben. A day filled with reminiscing, good times,
fun, laughter, and family love. I scrapped the layout on my return home to a cold,
grey Melbourne, with love and sunshine in my heart as I remembered fondly the many
memories of my wonderful trip north. I have used three photos ... one larger focal
photo and two smaller photos to further share the relationship between Tan and her
son. The 'cool shades' of summer I have used are blues and greens ... reminiscent
to me of Australia's famous beaches. I made a set of swirls with my sequin strands
by placing a piece of paper with hand-drawn swirls underneath a piece of acetate;
using a combination of Glossy Accents and a Xyron 150 adhering the sequin strands to
the acetate; once dry and decorated with bling I carefully cut around the swirls
leaving a boundary of acetate sufficient to give my swirls stability. I also used
the following 10 or so techniques to ALTER the products/items I have used on my
layout ...
* I hand-stitched around selected circles (or 'dots') on the Bazzill embossed
cardstock "Dots"
* I used a template (TCW Trendy Bracket) to cut a shape out of my patterned paper
(from the Prima Tropics collection)
* I doodled on various parts of the layout for definition and interest
* I used a Cuttlebug embossing folder (Swiss Dots) to emboss a piece of patterned
paper and then inked the raised image
* I sanded the edges of my photos and added Kaiser pearl bling
* I used PhotoShop to alter my photos by increasing their brightness and contrast
levels before printing
* I added layers to the Bella Journaling Tagz tag with a strip of patterned paper
and a die-cut from the Crate Paper Little Sprout Collection
* I dusted the back of the small, self-adhesive, die-cut cardstock flowers and
butterflies by Ruby Rock-It with talcum powder to remove the adhesive, moulded their
shapes by hand, added bling, and in the case of the butterflies stapled their
centres to create definition
* I free-hand cut a funky scallop border from patterned paper
* I cut a scalloped circle image out of a larger circle Bella Journaling Tagz tag
* I used a Kaiser quote rub-on to create my title within the extra journaling (the
quote) by die-cutting plain acetate, cutting the rub-on into sections, applying the
rub-on and adding Carolees Creations Adornit tiny alphas to form the words "love
and", and then using Kaiser seabreeze paint, highlighted the word 'laughter' from
the back of the acetate
The judging criteria this week are ...
* unique use of title
* journaling
* handmade embellishment
* best use of material
* overall design
* craftsmanship
* meet weekly criteria
* most inspiring
At first glance this challenge may seem fairly simple. The challenge is to use many
and varied techniques (perhaps more complicated than those I have used) and at the
same time keeping a delicate balance between what becomes the focus of your LO ...
in this instance the photos must be your focal point. Further, this week, never
have the judging criteria such as unique use of title and journaling been more
important. How can you make your title individually unique? Mine is within a quote
on a handmade journaling block. We want to see your journaling (not just a date or
name or year) ... tell us a story ... and if we cannot actually read the journaling
because you have used hidden journaling then we want to see the evidence of that
hidden journaling. As previously mentioned your handmade embellishment must be made
from sequin strands. What does best use of material mean? Have you used your
materials to their maximum potential, in more than one way, or innovatively? When
considering your overall design, ask yourself whether you have successfully created
the balance we are looking for. Craftsmanship ... is your hand-stitching even, can
we see the glue you have used to adhere an item, have you paid particular attention
to detail? Then of course you need to meet the weekly criteria, and finally, 'most
inspiring' ... well that's a personal choice.
Good luck this week girls ... I can't wait to see the no doubt spectacular layouts
you come up with and like everyone else, I wait with bated breath to find out
finally who the winner of Scrap N Craft with T's Embellish It competition's winner
is.
Alz
:)
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