New mixed-media art scrapbook page and plans for July

I apologise fior the poor quality photo but even on such a poorly lit rainy day, I had to show this layout. I've been really enjoying Donna Downey's Inspiration Wednesdays and decided to make own page using paints and inks. It was such fun. I painted the background with watercolour, which is why the corners are curled, and stamped over the top. It was a great way to use two rather ordinary little photos that had been in a fridge magnet frame and turn it into a story. I added some handmade paper for the mat, journalling strips made on the computer and printed out, my new watercolour pen to paint in the brown butterflies and a lunchbox lid to make tiny circle patterns. And i've been using acrylic stamps again, since the great recent re-organisation!

Materials: plain white cardstock, Faber-Castell watecolour pencils, Mont Marte watercolour paint, Tim Holtz and Versacolor distress ink, Fancy Pants Desgins, Inkadinkado and Stamp-it stamps, handmade paper from local craft market

Ah yes and plans for July. It's been driving me crazy for years that my sister and I have these fabulous collections of photos from our childhood and they are in boxes, and various albums, some with her, some with me, and none of it in any sort of order. And they're starting to fade. Some have already been damaged from years in a humid climate (Darwin) and non acid-free photo albums.So....I am going to scan them all in, put them in order, then house them in albums. My sister will keep the originals and I'll keep the copies. And a whole month should be plenty of time, right? Stay tuned.

Grandma's legacy

I realised the other day that I still have these yellow handled scissors. My dear Grandma, God bless her, sent me these as a present when I was about 10. It's remarkable that I still have them, seeing as I've moved about 15 times since then, don't you think? It's also remarkable, because I also recognise that she, too, was a scrapbooker, and now I am too. She didn't have any fancy papers or embellishments, but would make holiday books for my sister and I, with authentic bits and pieces like tickets and drawings and maps, and of course lots of photos, journalling and even her own diagrams. She did this in the 70's and 80's and I guess stopped after that as we were too old. Thanks so much Grandma for showing me the way. And if you could see my work, I'm sure you'd be proud xxx

digital scrapbooking

I'm experimenting with digital scrapbooking. This is an Ali Edwards designed page which really tickles my fancy. Cute huh?


I went and bought some more scrapbook albums today. I am planning to create some 12x12 inch scrapbook pages all digitally for the 2007/2008/2009 albums. I want to do a monthly page for each month of these years and thinking about how I might do it. The rest of the albums will be filled with scrapbook pages - the lumpy and bumpy kind. I may end up getting them printed locally, otherwise Shutterfly will cost me about $6 per page. I'm shopping around for digital templates at the moment. Or should I just create my own template? I want to be able to drop a photo into a pre-set frame without cropping or trimming.

New look for Rock Paper Scissors

It's been time for a new look for poor old rock paper scissors scrap. I've been having a bit of fun mucking around with some digital scrapbooking. It's actually more fun than I thought.


...bye bye to the old header. .. I decided to keep the fonts (1942 report, CK Ali) and typewriter image, though. It's a real typewriter which sits on my desk (it's tiny!) and works as a real pencil sharpener. The blog wouldn't look right without it.

Scrapbooking layout - baby's first Christmas

I've always loved this photo taken of we three: Tassie's first Christmas. She was only about five months old. There's another version of this photo that I also love, which I plan to scrapbook for the christmas album. I like to try different techniques when I do scrapbook pages, so this time I added a book page, which I haven't done before, and a crochet doily. Love 'em.


Materials: Cardstock: Kaisercraft, Paper: Fancy Pants designs, coffee filter, chipboard: Five Kids and a Dog, feather, Scallop border punch: Fiskars, ribbon: Francheville, ink: Versacolor, StazOn, stamps: Sugar Shoppe, Inkadinkado.

Now that I'm organising my acrylic stamp collection, I'm looking foward to doing a lot more stamping. They're being organised into CD cases, which is such a clever idea. Simple. Will upload photo when finished.

finally - a scrapbook layout

This is the only layout I have managed in the past few weeks. When I returned from the Melbourne trip, I sort of decided to prioritise sleep. I know! Pretty kooky. But my husband is right about how important it is. I'm feeling quite reenergised, so hope to get a few more done, starting today. Will keep you posted!

Journalling reads: You runs straight over to the play equipment and go for it. You don't want any one holding your hand and you are very decisive and confident about what you want. You love to indroduce yorself "I'm Tasmin amanda Smith".

portrait project

My sister, cousin and I were lucky enough to visit the National Gallery in Victoria last Monday when we flew down for my cousin Noni's wedding. I was so enthralled to be able to see a portrait exhibition called 'Timelines' (see poster, top left corner, picture below).

By a weird coincidence (I love weird coincidences) one of the subjects in the portraits was a girl my sister went to school with in little ol' Darwin. I think her name is Anna Phillips. She's in many ads on TV. But I digress.

I was so inspired I decided to give portraits a go and started with my Mum.


While I was surprised to find she was a difficult subject to capture (she wasn't able to be expressionless for me) I was so delighted when I accidentally saw the images together in a collection, see above. My sister tells me it's the best work I've ever done.!!! Wow, that's quite a compliment.

Anyway, I scribbled some notes, since there was a gruff looking security guard woman sitting on a chair and glaring at me (I was carrying my camera around with its enormous lens sticking out)
and I was too chicken to take any pictures. The main ideas I wanted to remember are:

• the effectiveness of a gnarly wooden fence for a background
• doing a 'then and now' portrait years apart, in exactly the same spot (black and white, then contrasted with colour to show 'now')
• scapturing the subject without smiling but looking directly at the camera
• framing an interesting portrait then handwriting below the subject directly on to the mat
• closeups of hands especially two pairs of hands eg. grandma and child, or hand holding an object (teapot, wedding ring)
• portraits of elderly ladies really dressed up
• an eye (closeup)
• from the floor, capturing a Daddy holding his baby's hands as he walks (showing their legs from the knees down)
• before and after (pregnant woman, then woman with baby)
• a reclining portrait where the subject stretches from the bottom left hand corner to the top right corner
• black and white photos printed on to cardstock then coloured with pencils in all the colours of the rainbow using a cross-hatch technique
  

What was so affirming at this exhibition, was a black and white photograph of a mother, nude, with her little four year old boy, taken by a very accomplished photographer. He was the Daddy and the note said he had been taking their photos, particularly the mother's, almost daily for 20 years.

Hello! And they say 'obsessed' like it's a bad thing???????????

the letters to Jessie project

i was so fortuante to be able to borrow the letters that my grandfather, Frank Middleton Risk, sent to my Grandmother Jessie, during the second World War. The letters had been kept for years in a little photo envelope but some had started to come apart at the edges and were in need of TLC. The best thing to do, I decided, was to place individually inside page protectors in a scrapbook album - I plenty of those on hand! - and sew down the seams to keep the letter in place. If you see above, the seam leaves a little pocket on the right hand side.

Frank Middleton was my Dad's father. They look so alike. The letters in Frank's voice were surprisingly warm, loving and caring, referring to Jess as 'Sweetheart' often. I guess it was easier to be lovey dovey in a letter than face-to-face. When my own Dad wrote letters to me as a child - so glad Grandma kept them in the holiday scrapbooks she made me - he used a similar loving voice.

The letters have all been lovingly and carefully scanned so sometime in the next few months I plan to make a photo book from the scans and try and recreate a bit of the intimacy of personal letters - something I didn't quite achieve with the enormous album.

But at least they're safe now.

Simplest photo book ever

I wanted to make a mini-book out of a stack of photos I had, a little more than 40 I think. I've been wanting to try this for ages. I just used my Bind-it-all to punch holes straight into the photos and used a bit of leftover cardboard as the front cover. For the cover design, I printed the first photo directly onto patterned paper in my printer and I'm so pleased with the result! I inked the edges and it was finished.

And my Auntie Shirl, who I made the book for, loved it and took it to show her friends at the bowls club. She has bought a new house and will be moving soon. These are photos of her house and garden.

You can see the layouts I made from the photos here.