modern vintage...

The final week of the Aussie Scrap Source Style Lounge series used the beautiful work of Louise Williams as inspiration for a Modern Vintage theme.

This was definitely not a style I am use to doing but I guess that's the point of the challenge and I was surprised to see how many products I actually had to work with the theme :)

I used an old photo from Austria (that's me on the right) with my mum and my sister and made myself a few vintage inspired flowers to dress up the page

I've really enjoyed playing along with the Style Lounge challenges and am super excited to have won two of them! Here's a bit of a re-cap of what I created for all the other styles in the series

as you can see the styles are all quite different, and I'm happy to have picked up a few bits and pieces from each of them that I can incorporate into my own style of scrapping - which I am yet to define.. any ideas of what you'd call it?

Tweet

detailed layers...

Week 9 of the Aussie Scrap Source Reader's Style Lounge Challenge was inspired by the beautifully layered, detailed style of Suzanne Tonga. Here's what I came up with...

This style is all about the details, so I tried to incorporate plenty of layers as well as some pretty finishing touches

like these gorgeous spotted Guinea fowl feathers I picked up recently 

I could really see myself using more of this style in the future and I got an awesome surprise tonight to find out that my layout was chosen as the winner of the challenge!!! OMG I'm very excited and think this was just the confidence boost I needed at the moment...check it out here :)
Thanks for stopping by

Tweet

Polly!

There's a new kit club in town... Polly! Scrap Kits is launching their very first kit on 10th August, and Kayla Renee is holding a giveaway to celebrate! You can help to spread the word and find all the details here :)

Tweet

white...

I've been playing over at ScrapzBiz again and got a couple done for last week's challneges inspired by the use of  'white'. The layout was for the sketch challenge using 'white' space

and a white on white card for the monochromatic challenge

Hope you're having a great weekend :)

Tweet

simple arty...

Week 8 of the Aussie Scrap Source Readers Style Lounge Challenge, had me reaching for my mists and paint because the inspiration came from the superb talent of Louise Nelson.

I have always loved Lou's unique arty style and had a lot of fun trying to recreate a little bit of Lou magic of my very own... not sure I did her style justice but did enjoy the process :)

Tweet

Hand made with love...

I'm a bit excited to say that I have finally learnt how to crochet :) it's always been one of those things that I have wanted to do but just never got around to - but thanks to the help of YouTube and several practice runs, here is my very first project!

I probably should have started with something easier but couldn't resit giving it a go after spotting a pattern for this adorable owl ear flap beanie over here, and here's my not so co-operative model wearing his new hat

I finally got a decent pic a few days later lol

I've also been making a lots of crochet flowers, and since I don't really need that many flowers for my projects (I have 3 boys) I thought it would be good to share... so stay tuned while I get a few more together and organise a giveaway :)

Aga xx

Tweet

Patchwork Inspired...

A couple of weeks ago I spent the weekend doing some challenges for the Scrapz Biz Life is a Patchwork Virtual Crop filled with loads of great patchwork inspired creativity.

First up was a fun virtual class held by the lovely Sheree Forcier. I loved that there was lots of hand and machine stitching in the class, and a great excuse to dig out my sewing machine there was lots of

next up was a What's Cooking challenge where the ingredients were fabric, buttons and stitching

the Scrap it Blind challenges have quickly become one of my favourites, and I was very happy to finally use up some old papers that I've never really knew what to do with before

and finally the Noteworthy challenge had me creating this very patchwork inspired card

I didn't manage to get all the challenges completed, but it was fun to spent the weekend scrapping and an added bonus to win some great prizes along the way :) ... Scrapz Biz also holds awesome weekly challenges, so if you're in the need of some inspiration from a fabulous and friendly team you should definitely join in!

Thanks for stopping by

Aga xx

Tweet

style lounge continues...

I'm a bit behind with getting my layouts up, but what can I say... there just aren't enough hours in the day!!! Anyway week 6 of the Style Lounge Reader's challenge at Aussie Scrap Source blog, the theme was Detailed Whimsy and the inspiration came from the beautiful work of Iris Babao Uy and this is what I came up with...

 

I was inspired by Iris' use of misting, pretty details and bright happy colours

Suzan Doyle was the inspiration for week 7's challenge with her wonderfully Graphic Colour Blocked style.

I focused on using nice clean lines and tried to recreate Suzan's sense of everything being in it's place

I've got plenty more uploads to catch up on, so I hope you'll be back soon :)

Aga xx

Tweet

Customer pick...

Just letting you know that you can pick up this customer-pick bundle of warm neutral papers paired with a pack of craft tags that was part of my recent order at Blue Bazaar for just $2.47!

If you follow the Blue Bazaar blog then you would have seen that Louise puts together some fun little bundles of products based on what customers are ordering and offers these at 15% off the normal price. Blue Bazaar always has loads of awesome products at fabulous prices, and as an added incentive to shop if some of the products you order get selected for a bundle you'll get a $5.00 credit to your account... thanks Lou :)

Tweet

Clean and simple...

that was the theme for the last Style Lounge Readers Challenge over at the Aussie Scrap Source blog. The inspiration came from Caroline McLachlan and the brief was to use clean lines, minimal embellishments with a focus on the photo and journalling. Here's what I came up with...

Journalling reads: I never want to forget the time that little Cameron, who was about 3 years old at the time freaked out while he was on the toilet, screaming at the top of his lungs that there was an animal in there!!! I ran in to find him looking terrified and practically standing on the bowl pointing at the ground... I started laughing so much because the animal that had frightened him so much turned out to be a little ant crawling along the bathroom tiles. For some reason ants were a bit scary for him and he would do his best to avoid them, so who would have thought that the little boy who was terrified of ants would grow up loving to catch lizards and play with all sorts of weird and wonderful creatures.

I have to admit that I don't normally add a lot of journalling to my pages, so it was nice to scrap a page using this style so I could record some of the memories that might otherwise be forgotten, and I am very excited to say that my layout won the clean and simple challenge :)

Have a fabulous week
Aga xx

Tweet

Freestyle whimsy...

I'm still playing along with the Style Lounge challenges on the Aussie Scrap Source blog, and absolutely loved last week's 'freestyle whimsy' style. The inspiration came from the very talented Danielle Quarmby and the brief was to use some of the key elements that Danielle uses when creating her signature style.

I focused on using colour to set the mood, hand cut embellishments, book paper and whimsical elements, using song lyrics for my title as well as adding a small floral background.

What do you think?

Tweet

Do you Pinterest?

I am absolutely loving this site, and have to admit that lately I have been spending most of my computer time on Pinterest! ... incase you haven't been there before it's basically an online pin board where you can create collections of all the things you love and then share them with friends and follow the boards of other people with great taste.

What I like most about Pinterest is how easy it is to access all the great finds you have pinned along the way, because I don't know about you but normally when I found something I liked online I would either save a pic of it or add the page to my favourites folder, but then always struggle to find the source when I wanted to go back to it - but on Pinterest you have not only a picture of what it is you like but also a link straight to the site where you found it all in one. Brilliant!

There are so many inspiring ideas and awesome tutorials, and here's just a small sample of some of the things I've been pinning...

here's a link to my boards, feel free to have a browse or add anything you like...or if you are already on board leave me a link, because as they say - it's more fun with friends :)
Aga xx

Tweet

Catching up with layouts...

I've been doing a bit of scrapping... but because of my slight obsession with Pinterest I haven't had time to update my blog for a while ;) So first up is another layout for the Style Lounge challenges at Aussie Scrap Source blog. The challenge was to create a layout based on the awesome 'Artsy Grunge' style of Leanne Pearce. I really liked playing with this style and am thinking that it will definitely be something I want to try again!

I also completed a few pages for the Desperate Housewives theme over at ScrapzBiz. This page is about just some of the things I would rather be doing than housework, because let's face it... it will still be there in the morning!

and the next one is about my least favourite chore - the dreaded ironing and my recent revelation that sometimes it is OK to go out into the world with a few wrinkles ;)

I had also planned to complete 30 layouts for Blue Bazaar's Crop Bootcamp, but I left it a bit late to get started and in the end only managed to upload 2 layouts.... a long way off I know, but hey it is better than none, and I did manage to organise a lot of my paper into mini kits in the process!

*also just realised that I totally forgot to add my journalling for this one...oops

Thanks for stopping by
Aga xx

Tweet

Playful fun...

I'm a bit late in getting this up, but here is my layout for week 2 of the Style Lounge reader's challenges over at Aussie Scrap Source blog. This time we were challenged to get 'Playful' with the gorgeous style of Kathie Link. I'm already a big fan of Kathie's work and love her great use of colour and the whimsical backdrops she pieces together and really enjoyed having a go at her playful style.

Tweet

Not too shabby...

I thought it would be fun to try something new and have joined in on the Style Lounge reader's challenges over at the Aussie Scrap Source blog. The first style in the challenge was Shabby Chic inspired by the beautiful work of Janine Koczwara. This is often the type of style that I love to ohh and ahh over but hardly ever try - mainly due to the fact that I have 3 boys, so it was nice to play with some flowers and try something pretty :)

I still used soft shades of blue, but teamed these up with warm and creamy creamy neuatrals, along with a touch of green, and if you look close you might notice that I snuck in a little pink.

I tried to build up some interesting layers and focused on adding a few shabby details and was very happy to have this gorgeous selection of goodies to play with, which I was wrapped to win a few months ago from this lovely lady.

Overall I am really happy with how this page turned out and look forward to trying out this week's 'Playful' style!

Thanks for stopping by...please don't be shy and let me know you were here ;)
Aga xx 

Tweet

Super cutie ♥

I was creating the page for a challenge but just realised that it was infact due in yesterday o.0
Oh well, I've been wanting to scrap these pics of Cayden in his superman outfit for a while and so I used the theme of his outfit as my inspiration and created a superhero scene to match.

I wanted the page to have a bit of a comic book feel and love the way the blue Crate Paper border works as a backdrop to my cityscape which was made from simple layered shapes of black and grey cardstock. I also created my own sunburst sky using a few different shades of yellow.

and because I didn't want the photos to get lost on the busy background, I decided to keep the colour palette pretty simple and drew inspiration from the outfit and used just a few pops of red and yellow to accent the page.

Thanks for stopping by
Aga xx

Tweet