Sunday 27 May 2007

Rome.

I have always wanted to visit Rome and throw a coin into the Trevi fountain.
Rome is beautiful even though there was so much graffiti.
I really enjoyed the tour bus which stopped at all the major sites.
Later we found it would have been cheaper to buy a bunch of bus tickets which cost 1 euro each. These can be bought in advance and then validated when you ride on the bus. We tried to visit St. Peters on the Saturday but the queue was 4 hours so we tried agaon on the Tuesday and got straight in. It was free entry and was breathtaking. We went to the Sistene Chapel which was expensive at 13 euros as you got sent around the whole building up and down stairs into rooms with only a few things in and it took over an hour to get to the chapel even though we went at a quiet time.

Florence.

This is pont bridge which was full of shops selling gold jewellry.
I found Florence very expensive for example the tour bus was 16 euros in Rome but 55 euros in Florence. We got fed up of Italian food and ended up going to a Chines restaurant for a meal and had the best chinese food I had ever eaten. It was also very reasonably priced. There are a lot of churches to visit and you can attend mass at some of them.

Venice.

I loved Venice and went on a gondola even though it was very expensive. It was 100 euros for half an hour for 6 people. It would still have been 100 euros for 2 people.
I read before I went it would be about 40 euros so it was a bit of a shock but at least it is something I may not be able to do again.

Friday 25 May 2007

Fort William - a little taste of the Highlands




I thought I’d the opportunity to share with you the lovely area I live in. Fort William recently has, like most town centres, gone down hill, with lots of local business’s closing there doors due to high rates and low customer numbers, this, could be due to any number of reasons, none of which I’m here to talk about today. Today I’d like to share with you some of the more positive things about our area.

Fort William is the home of Ben Nevis, Britain’s largest mountain. Anoch Mhor is Ben Nevis’s neighbour and also where you’d head to if you fancy an “easy” trip up the mountains. Take the scenic gondola 2150ft up Anoch Mhor where you can ski, snowboard or just relax at the restaurant and enjoy the view. At the summit they have a fantastic Boardwise Terrain Park for the snowboarders, there is also a Ski school, and very excellent Ski patrol staff to look out for you.
The Scottish Six days trials has been running since 1909, although not based in Fort William as it now is. This is a famous motorbike trials event. Entrants travel from all corners of the world to take part in this endurance trial of rider and machine over six days of gruelling terrain. More recently Fort William has hosted the World Mountain Bike World Cup, and hosting the UCI Mountain bike championships, again they can be found at Anoch Mhor, where you can follow the paths and support the riders.

We have had hundreds of famous guest staying in our luxurious Inverlochy Castle. Sean Connery, Robert De Niro, Mel Gibson, Jerry Hall, Elton John, Barbara Streisand, Naomi Campbell, as well as HRH King Hussein of Jordan and HRH Queen Noor - regular visitors who describe Inverlochy as their Scottish Home.

The Hollywood blockbuster Braveheart was filmed in Glen Nevis, at the foot of Ben Nevis. Mel Gibson, was often spotted in the Town Centre when not filming. Wizard fans will also know that a lot of Harry Potter has been filmed around here too, with the famous the Hogworts Express, on our West Highland line from Fort William to Mallaig. Dozens of excited school children got to be part of the first film, although I think it wasn’t what they were expecting, with lots of hanging around and chugging back and forth on the same piece of railway line for hours!!

This is just a little taste of what goes on in my area – I hope you enjoy it.

Wednesday 23 May 2007

Look after those breasts!

Last week I altered a bra. Not one that didn’t fit me any more, of course, but I have a friend, Sian, who took part in the London Moon Walk to raise money for research into something dear to every woman’s heart, breast cancer. This was a 26 mile walk through the London night that began at Hyde Park and finished, for Sian, 8 hours and 32minutes later, to raise awareness of this awful disease. Thousands of women (and some men too I’m pleased to say) took part and the majority proudly sported a bra, on show, to anyone who cared to look!

A group of us had been out for the evening a few days previously and the wine was flowing as usual, when the conversation got around to Sian’s Moon Walk. I got to thinking, ‘Well, I have all that stash at home, I’m sure I could come up with something,’ and heard myself volunteering to decorate her, as yet, plain bra. Somehow I also apparently offered my house as the venue for an Anne Summers party, but that’s another story!

She dropped the bra off on Thursday evening and I got to work straight away. I pulled out an old scarf I’d been saving for that 'certain' layout, some tasselled edging a friend had given me, a length of pretty pink fibre from a swap, a huge silk rose and some Prima flowers. By the end of the evening it wasn’t looking too bad and by Friday it was complete with the finishing touch – four strategically placed flowers on the cups. Just to stop it looking too bare, you understand! I handstitched everything - well, it's one thing to pin items to a layout but brads pinning your bra to your skin? I don't think so. ( Sorry for the poor photo by the way - it was taken in haste. )


Here is Sian modelling it on the Saturday morning of the walk. She told me afterwards that she braved the first few hours without the t-shirt but by midnight it grew too cold and she was glad to put on something warmer. I don’t blame her.

There is a more serious side to this blog entry as well. One of my best friends died of undetected breast cancer nearly 3 years ago now. One minute we were happily celebrating her 50th birthday and two months later she was disabled because it had spread to the base of her brain. Paula died 5 long years later and I was privileged to be with her on the night she died. I wouldn’t wish her end on anyone. She was a funny, loud, vibrant lady and we, her friends, miss her dearly. Please remember to check yourself regularly and, please, give our link on here a click every day. You’ll find it on the right hand side of this page, it won't take more than a couple of seconds, it won’t cost you a penny and it may well help to save someone’s life – just as Sian hopes her walk in her underwear has done.

Toot, Toot - A Class Act

Way back in the mists of time a lady called Gillian posted on a thread on UK Scrappers and asked if there were any more Gillians out there in the ether. Several mad women replied and we got chatting and we formed a UKS team called The Gogs. Mind you not all of the team were Gillians, we had a fair sprinkling of other names too. People would come in and chat and wander off again and generally we had a good laugh about every subject you could imagine.

Then disaster struck, UKS crashed and our thread was lost forever. But the Gogs kept in touch and we have become firm friends through the last few years.

We have shared each others joy, pain, achievements, sadness and the trials and tribulations of everyday life, supporting each other wherever we can.
.
We, like many others, had been affected by Cancer, personally, relations, friends, workmates and acquaintances. Like Cath, who ran the Race for Life in memory of her brother, we also lost loved ones and we wondered what we could do to contribute, albeit in a small way, to funding research into this devastating disease.

It was suggested that we do our best to contribute what we could each month, by selling handmade cards, selling unwanted items, sponsorship etc.

We started working toward this end in May 2005 and in March 2006 we had collected through our efforts £405. We were elated that we had managed that amount - but the following year in February 2007 we sent our second donation, a staggering £1000.

What an achievement for 13 ordinary women!!!

This year we have made £300 and look forward to sending our next donation.

Here are just some of these wonderful, totally insane women that I am proud to call my friends

Tuesday 22 May 2007

Visual Balance

Continuing on with the "science" of achieving balance on a scrapbooking page, we are delving further this week into the different types of balance that can be achieved.

The term “Balance” refers to some equal distribution of visual weight, so that everything works in harmony. However, visual Imbalance is used purposefully by designers to grab attention and to create more energetic impact.

The use of “white space” (irrespective of colour) on a layout represents creating visual balance through the absence of elements. Not only can we achieve horizontal balance (using the left and right hand sides of the page), but also consider vertical balance, where the axis is divided into top and bottom. With our sense of gravity, we are accustomed to seeing more weight toward the bottom. When the main distribution of weight is higher, the image becomes more unstable and dynamic, as can be seen in "Laughter" below.



A lot depends on whether you want a symmetrical or asymmetrical design to your page. In brief – a symmetrical design is evenly distributed across the page – by folding the page in half from left to right, a mirror image could also be formed. This is good for formal layouts – "The Four Seasons of Grace" to follow is an example of a scrapbooking page with symmetrical design elements, with a bit of a twist, where I have balanced the die-cut flowers with the embroidered ones, but put the paint chips on the top right and bottom left to avoid a feeling of "top heaviness".






















Asymmetrical balance occurs when several smaller items on one side are balanced by a large item on the other side, or smaller items are placed further away from the centre of the screen than larger items. One darker item may need to be balanced by several lighter items. An asymmetrical design may be more dynamic, because it appears casual and less planned. Very careful planning is required here, because it is often harder to achieve overall balance. "Annie Walters" is a clear example of this type of asymmetrical balance.



There are more interesting examples of achieving asymmetrical balance in art here, represented in classical paintings:

With the increased popularity of circles on pages, radial balance must also be considered, where all the elements have a common central focus point. In this following case, "Katrina's 40th", the photo.


This type of balance is typically associated with circles, but I have used the heart shapes here as well.





Crystallographic balance is defined by having the same visual weight over the whole page – probably a bit harder to achieve with scrapbook pages, because our intention is for the photo to form the focus on the layout. However, I guess the following example is about the closest we could achieve in scrapbooking:

(I shall replace the dodgy scan later!) All these layouts are not recent, so it just goes to prove that we are often employing design principles even when completely unaware!

Now, if it were only as easy to achieve some life balance – but that’s a different topic altogether! Why not have a go and produce something completely different from your normal style - all it takes is a little research and planning - or else - just go for it! Till next week, when we talk about the "Z" principle, and the rule of thirds.

Happy scrapping!
Ali :)

Monday 21 May 2007

Spotlight on Karen

Karen Leahy (aka Scrapdolly)

I live in Poole with Nigel, my husband of 19 years, and with our three cats …. Well two cats and a Fiki monster! I am the head-teacher of a local school for 3 – 11 year olds, which keeps me fairly busy, but I still find plenty of time to scrap since discovering this all consuming hobby almost three years ago.
I love scrapping – it is a real creative outlet and there is no better way to wind down after a stressful day at work than putting layouts together. It has filled a real gap in my life and brings together my love of photography, my love of nature and my love of all things creative. Besides which – I am a teacher …… we LOVE cutting and sticking!
Discovering scrap-booking has opened my eyes to so many new things and I love trying out new products and techniques, although my layouts tend to be very simple. I tend to stick to scrapping rather than altered art and I have recently been scrapping 8 x 8 and 11 ½ x 8 as well as my normal 12 x 12. I love to scrap anything and everything, from the small, inconsequential daily events to recording family history and creating layouts about all things in nature. To me it is the perfect hobby.
Nigel is very supportive of my hobby, offering lots of useful advice as he is very artistic, and he always allows himself to be the butt of my jokes in humorous layouts. He has even completed a few pages himself – digital though … I am not letting him loose on my stash! As we don’t have children, the cats really are our fur babies and are such characters, especially Kira and Fiki, our two Bengals. The cats feature quite heavily in my layouts and I love trying to make ‘different’ pet pages.
Scrap-booking has enabled me to make some really special keepsake gifts and albums for family and friends. It has also opened opportunities for me to extend the enjoyment of my hobby by teaching at local crops and thus making even more scrapping friends than I have made on line. I have been proud to have been on several design teams for magazines and on the design team for the UK's largest scrapbooking forum. I have recently joined with other British Scrapbookers to form the design Collective, offering on line scrapbooking classes. I am proud to be a member of Jillybeans design team, working with the gorgeous kits she sends out and having my work showcased on her site. I also have a scrapping blog where you can see my work and read my general daily ramblings http://dollysdreamings.typepad.com/
Scrapbooking is such a wonderful and all consuming hobby and I would go so far as to say that, for me, it is more than a hobby – it is a way of life.
the page I have included is an older one but it seems to sum up me, my style and my love of scrapping. It is a picture of me looking at albums of me and my parents with a lot of smaller pictures of us at various stages in my growing up. Scrapping for me is about recording those memories we all have and about remembering the love.





















Get your hankies out

Tuna and Water Chestnut Hankies.

Another cheats starter for dinner parties, 2 per guest, or if you prefer to make larger ones they make a nice supper meal.












To make 16 you will need:

2 packets of ready rolled puff pastry
1 small tin of Water Chestnuts (my Tesco have stopped doing them so I got them from Sainsbury)
1 medium tin tuna (I prefer in brine but oil is OK)
1 small chilli (optional)
1/4 pt thick white sauce
Make approx 1/4 pt of thick white sauce and allow to cool.
Drain the tuna and roughly flake
Drain and chop the water chestnuts. Roughly chopped will give a crunchier texture than finely chopped.
Finely chop the chilli
Mix these with the white sauce
Cut the pastry into 3" squares. Put a spoonful of the mix into the centre of each square and dampen all round the edges with water. Draw up opposite corners to make a parcel and press the edges together to seal.
Brush with egg yolk and bake in a hot oven 180C till golden, about 20 mins .
Serve hot

Sunday 20 May 2007

Curves in all the right places.

Digital cameras are amongst the great wonders of our time. I feel so lucky to have benefited from this amazing technology but can't help feeling sad that it came so late in my life. All you young parents are able to capture every small change in your children's lives. All the milestones. Every happy moment.

When my children were born times were harder and money tighter. Cheap cameras were plentiful but not good. Getting films developed was relatively expensive when every penny counted, and the prints were very small. They faded quickly, even out of the light. There's an old joke about rolls of film that developers enjoyed - every roll of film they saw had christmas trees at both ends and a holiday in the middle! How very true. Even now it's possible to find an old roll-film camera at a carboot sale with a film still inside it with a few frames used up but nothing else. Now, we can just click away happily away.

One thing that has changed with having this freedom is the fact that we are now the ones in control of how our pictures look and not the developer. Our cameras have very good auto-exposure metering but, just as with film cameras, can sometimes under-perform in tricky lighting situations. For the techno-challenged - exposure metering is how cameras work out how long to keep the shutter open in any given situation when switched to auto settings - the way most people use their cameras. Put simply - a bright day will need only a short exposure and dark conditions mean the shutter stays open longer.






Unfortunately I see a lot of potentially good digital photos that are underexposed, over-exposed or with lack-lustre colour. Mostly - just dark! We all make them, even top photographers can turn them out. The trick is to recognise them and either delete them or correct them. Most digi-cameras come with editing software of some sort because the manufacturers know that taking a photo is only the first step towards a quality image. Photoshop is probably the best known software - it's an awesome piece of kit but very expensive. Photoshop Elements is the simplified, cheaper version. Somewhere in-between comes Paint Shop Pro, the software that I've come to know and love over the years. It's as powerful as the full Photoshop imo but very much cheaper. There are lots of different packages out there - it's just a case of using them and getting to know them, without fear.

I use the word fear because I know that some people really are scared of editing their photos. Please don't be scared - it's fun! Your image won't self-destruct - neither will your PC. You've taken a great shot - why not give it that finishing touch? Just open your image file in the programme and play.

Here are some screen-shots where I've been brightening up a photo in Paint Shop Pro, using Curves. This is a standard tool in Photoshop too. A small tweak in Curves can brighten an image and improve the contrast in amazing ways but with good control. I could have just shown the use of Brighten/Contrast but although that's simple to use it's like using a sledge-hammer to crack a nut - no subtlety at all!


Go to Adjust > Brighten and Contrast > Curves.


Opening screen ^

Don't be put off by the fact it looks lke a mathematical graph - just think of that diagonal line as if it was a length of stretchy elastic. You just click and drag your mouse on the line, pushing and pulling it. Most tweaks will result in an S-shape to give good results. Towards the top of the line will be the brighter end, and at the bottom, the darker end. To start with you could try big movements - just to see how it works. Simply click on that curved arrow at the top of the screen to undo. Eventually you will see that just small changes in that line will greatly improve brightness, colour-saturation and contrast. I touched the line in 3 separate places to produce a subtle arc. Hopefully you can see the difference.



I just pushed the line in 3 places ^






So, I hope you can see that basic photo-editing is not difficult - or scary. You may have invested a lot of money in your camera - invest some time in your images too.

To finish, here are a couple of links. The first one is Picnik (link) - a new on-line photo-editing website. Anyone who doesn't have software might like to try it out. I can't vouch for it, and this is the beta version but it's a great idea.

The 2nd link is Photojojo (link) a really fun site that I've just discovered and subscribed to. It's full of fun things to do with our digital images and shows new ways to display them too. There's also a shop. Check out the archives if you have an hour to spare!

Saturday 19 May 2007

Keeping Diaries

I've kept diaries all of my life, ever since I was a child. I've always found it a really great way to express yourself and release emotions. Keeping diaries has really helped me to gain a better understanding of myself and how my feelings work, and I've learned a lot about myself this way. I have many different types of diaries, not only the one where I write my inner most thoughts. Some of the diaries I have go way back to my childhood and some are from my teenage years. I have diaries that my best friend and I kept together, where we would each write a little bit about what we did that day, sort of like an on-going story of our teenage life. Sometimes we just wrote down song lyrics that we related to at that time and sometimes we made up silly poems or just drew silly pictures, but I love to read this diary now that I am older. It never fails to shock me or have me in fits of laughter at the memories. I look back and can't believe how much I have changed and how different my life is now.

Other diaries I have are holiday diaries that I kept as a child. They are very basic, but I love and treasure them dearly. One of my favourite diaries is the one I kept when my family and I went on holiday to Cairns, in Queensland, Australia in 1990. We emigrated to Australia, from England, in December 1988 and had been living in Australia for one year when my mother won the holiday on a radio competition, it was for a 2 adults and 2 children to go on holiday to Cairns for one week. It was the best holiday I ever had. I collected leaflets, tickets, napkins, postcards, maps, photos and many other things and stuck them all in the diary. I am so glad I kept that diary, because now I can look back and remember all of the things we did, people we met, see all of the places we went and remember the things we saw there, some of which I would have otherwise forgotten.

I still keep diaries like this, and am in the process of finishing one from my most recent holiday to Hastings, along the East Sussex coastline of England. I also keep a personal diary and I know that in another 20 years, I will look back and see how much my life has changed and will be shocked at how far I've come. I think keeping a diary is a lovely way to put your life into perspective and to treasure all of the experiences you have in your life, good or bad. I love to pull out my old diaries when I'm having a bad day and laugh at all the funny things that have happened to me throughout my life, or see how much better my life is now than it was, which never fails to cheer me up a little.

As well as keeping diaries, I also love to read books in the style of diaries. A favourite of mine was one I read a little while ago called 'Diary of an Ordinary Woman' by Margaret Forster. It was a brilliant read and I would definately recommend it to anyone who likes to keep diaries, or enjoys this sort of book.

Friday 18 May 2007

My day at Race for Life.

Now to "My" day. My local "Race" was Inverness and heres how it felt for me on the day:

We arrived in good time, infact an hour and a half before the warm up was due to start, but we are very glad we did as not long after we arrived it started getting really busy. It was, as I had been told, an amazing atmosphere, as everyone there is there for the same reason with the same goals, raising as much cash for Cancer Research UK as possible.

When I stepped out of the car to get my bag out I had a wonderful suprise, my niece and her husband had travelled all the way up from the Borders to support me, so I had plenty of support including my Mum my Sister in law and a friend of my mum's, it was lovely to have familiar faces there.(For those of you who don't know me, I did this race this year in memory of my brother who died of cancer at the end of October last year).

After an short hold up, we began the warm up, the biggest aerobics class I've been in with over 3000 people. We were then separated into "Runners" and "Walkers", I had to go with the runners which felt very strange considering I couldn't jog for more that 1 minute 9 weeks ago, and we headed for the start line. The tape went up and we were off, the sun was now shining and the heat, for me, was terrible and I thought at that time I wouldn't make it, but just calmed myself down and took it easy when I needed too. We are very lucky where we are and the whole run was beautiful, running along the side of the River Ness. (I'm the one adjusting my headphones!)

I was amazed at the amount of children and young girls taking part in the race and they all were amazing, running alongside there mums/aunties/friends, and whizzing past me I may add! Reading the back signs on everyones t-shirts is very emotional, I liked the ones that simply said "I race for life for..... those who can't"

Anyway back to the race, we had so many lovely spectators clapping and cheering us on, it was a real boost to the system, it felt strange, but good. Coming down that last 1/2 mile or so seemed to take forever, you can see the finish line but its far away, but we carried on heading for the "sacred" blue inflatable finish line, my family were there cheering for me as I crossed it in 35 mins and 32 seconds! Unbelievable (for me), I had hoped for around 40 mins, so I was well below that, so the 9 weeks of training paid off.
Would I do it again? too right I would, and I am looking forward to next year where my daughter is coming with me - although my niece is trying to persuade me to do a 10k with her next October - we'll see.

In the end, my friend and I raised over £1600 - and feel very VERY proud. Now...what are you waiting for? click those links in the post below and do something special for yourself and others. Remember you can walk if you want or sprint in with the front runners, its your day to enjoy as you wish.

Race for Life?

Race for Life. What is it?

The Race for Life is the country's biggest woman only charity event with 280 separate events taking place from May to August. Its run in aid of Cancer Research UK, and has raised over £100,000,000 since it started in 1994. This year they are hoping that 800,000 women will pop on there running shoes and walk, jog or run the 5K course (3.1 miles - its longer than it sounds!!) raising as much money as they can.

There will be a race near you, so if you fancy joining in the fun and helping raise funds to try to beat this dreadful disease click here and sign up today. If you can't manage yourself and see a "I race for life" or similar in someones signature line click on there link and donate today you'll be glad you did.

If you want to, take a digital watch and time yourself, although, with huge crowds and varying ways of getting to the end you wont be setting yourself a new personal best! Just walk, jog run and enjoy the atmosphere and the day.

Remember these frightening stats: 1 in 3 of us will get Cancer in our lifetime and 3 in 4 familes will care for a loved one with Cancer. Its a scarey thought and one that affects all of us!

Introduction to Cath

Hello. I'm Cath, and I live in the Highlands of Scotland. I've been crafting all my life really, and have tried most crafts. I knit (although not since I started scrapbooking), do cake decorating, paint, make cards, scrapbook, but don't crochet, never could do that.

I have been part of the Suprise Supplies DT, an occasional entrant in Altered Treasures DT and work on the Pencil Lines sketch blog.

I'm married 16 years this year, and have a teenage daughter, nearly teenage son and a re-homed westie dog called Rosie (she's a handful in herself!).

I'm thrilled to be involved in the Jelly Journals and love the way its taking shape.

Thursday 17 May 2007

Layout Balance - Fixing the Mistakes!

When writing articles for this blog, I’ve chosen to research things that I would like to know more about. This is why I have decided to write a series of articles on achieving balance in your layouts. When trying to design new and innovative layouts using eclectic materials, I sometimes struggle to achieve what I consider to be pleasing design elements and balance. I therefore thought it might be an interesting topic for others who may also struggle with the same things.

I will often look at a layout and think – “Ok, I’ve finished!” yet when I go to upload my layout on-line, I look at it onscreen from a different perspective and think “oh no – there is something missing!” You ask your friends “what’s wrong with this?” and they will appreciate it as it is, because it is something you have hand made – and they like it! However, this is not always helpful when trying to gain an honest critique when something niggles – and I usually have to sit there for a while, or maybe come back to the layout after a significant break, and have another fiddle, in order to see just what the layout might have been missing.

I wanted to delve into more of the science and the principles of graphic design, in relation to scrapbooking. However, as this subject is quite in-depth, I have decided to break it down over a number of weeks, and I’ve taken quite a lot of material from John Magnik, a compositor and teacher who teaches principles of graphic design. His site is here, but I am going to adapt the material specifically for scrapbooking.

This week, we will talk about visual weight. I am also going to show you some befores and afters to provide some examples.

Visual Weight:
Graphic designers use the terms “visual weight” and “visual balance” – where things are placed in connection to the layout space. Something that has a lot of visual weight is dark, or large – your eye is drawn to this and rests for a longer period of time than for something which is small, or light.


Look at this layout – this was my first attempt.


Now – I am not asking you to critique my scrapbook page – this is using my oldest wedding stash, and the photos are some candid night time shots at my wedding – so I started off with less than premium materials. The photos are not well composed – there are chairs in the way, and they are full of red eye. I made this page from a class on the recent UK Scrappers cybercrop, but I decided to change the page quite considerably, in order to better suit my own purpose.

Being that I have all this stash in place for my wedding scrapbook, I am determined to use it - even though I may not love it as much as once I did. So, I popped the stickers onto cardstock, cut the letters out, outlined the letters in ink, and raised them onto foam pads to add more depth. I added eyelets into the scallops for more detail.

The ribbon and key detail was recycled from a lovely handmade card sent by a friend.

I added the prima flowers and stickers strategically - to block out bits of the photos I didn't want to see. But when examining or self-critiqueing the page when I thought I had finished, my layout didn't look balanced. The curve on the right hand side of the semi-circle means that there was more space and there were less elements on the right hand side - I felt it needed "more visual weight" to make it look balanced. But how?

I fiddled and faddled for a while - and then came up with the idea of adding more cornflower ribbon, which partially achieved the trick, because it was a darker colour, and thus drew the eye - but it still needed more.

The addition of threaded beads weaving their way on the right hand side really worked for me - and thus gave the layout a finishing touch, and I felt it added the "wow" factor. Here it is in more detail -

And so I was finally happy with the end result, after some considerable time.

I have added more visual weight to the right hand side of the page, in order for it to be balanced with the elements of the left hand side. So, after some considerable faffing - I am pleased with the end result - and happier to know WHY my layout didn't work in the first place!


Next week, we shall talk more about visual balance, and I shall be doing some more research into the science bit - and the design principles of scrapbooking! Until then, happy scrapping.

Ali x

Tuesday 15 May 2007

A LITTLE SEASONING

Isn’t this year simply flying by?? I really can’t believe that spring is nearly over and we will soon be officially in summer.

I live in the far north of Scotland – so far north that a couple more miles drops us unceremoniously off the top of the country and into the sea. I’ve been here for 14 years and this year is the first I remember us actually experiencing a proper spring. Normally we go straight from winter to a poor summer and back to winter again.

I’m lucky enough to have a small nature reserve just a few yards from home where I normally walk the dog. It’s the sort of place that makes you feel good to be alive – there is hardly any traffic noise, the birdsong is so loud and varied, there are lots of rabbits and the occasional deer and, just now, there are new leaves growing and starting to unfurl on the trees.


I think these buds are a gorgeous colour. What a great colour the sky was too.

My favourite parts of the reserve are the wooded areas where the coniferous trees grow. I love watching these trees change over the course of the year. They are usually fairly uniform in colour but each individual tree can vary from dark bluey-grey through storm cloud purple to rich, deep green. They can easily withstand all the elements and we certainly get 'some elements' here!


It's hard to believe this snowfall was only a few weeks ago. The snow reminds me of candy floss that has been spun over the branch.

The time I like best in the woodland has to be spring when the tips of the branches are wrapped tight in a shiny, golden brown covering, like parcels waiting to be opened.



They don’t stay like this for very long and soon bright green, soft, needles emerge from underneath the golden brown.


Aren't they amazing? Most of the trees will look like this - like they have flouncy, multi-layered dresses on with bright green frills swaying in the breeze. Others have these fabulous, exotic looking cones. It could almost be a Mediterranean cactus.



I complain a fair bit about how far away we are from civilisation here - it's a two hour drive to the nearest Marks and Spencer each way, but having this almost on the doorstep helps to make up for some of the hardships!

Monday 14 May 2007

Chipboard

My scrapping style changed when I discovered chipboard. It is so versatile and forgiving.
As pages normally have titles at present I am using a lot of the Maya Road Chipboard letters, and my 'thing' at the moment is to cover them with UTEE. I painted these letters with Making Memories Lime Green paint and when it was dry I pressed it into a versamark pad and sprinkled with clear UTEE. When it was heated it left a pitted effect which I left as I thought it was scale-like. I did the same with the scrolls which I thought looked a bit like his chin and neck



With this one I used a red UTEE using 2 coats and by the same method as before for the letters and the arrow. The centre of the flower and the photo anchors were from the Basic Grey Undressed Elements and I coated these with Diamond Glaze and sprinkled them with microbeads


Again the scrolls were coated with black UTEE. It gives a lovely rich, glossy finish and before it is completely cold after heating it is nice to sprinkle just a little gold UTEE on the letters to give a rich finish.

They can also be painted, chalked, glittered, painted with H2O's, left bare, decorated with crystals and rub ons. You can punch holes in it for brads and eyelets, tie ribbon and fibre around it. In fact your only limitation is your imagination. But don't just stick with letters, use shapes and flowers. Cut out shapes using a Sizzix.
On this layout the letters were coated with diamond glaze and then covered in glitter and left to dry. The problem with glitter, as you may have found, is that it migrates but with a thickish coating of diamond glaze the glitter sinks into the glaze.
The scrolls I painted with H2O's which gave a shiny, metallic finish and I the added some crystals

Amazing Chickens

My love affair with chickens began around 20 years ago when I saw some little bantams at a show. These daft little creatures really fascinate me and as my husband says ‘ Little head - Little brain but they are comical to watch.
Chickens used to be only kept by farmers and country dwellers but the fancy breeds are now to be found in city gardens as well. Their eggs range from dark reddish brown through pure white to a beautiful blue. The sizes range from monsters to dainty little bantam eggs.
Throw them some scraps or corn and they will scratch around in the garden for hours. I did once have some chickens rescued from a battery farm. When they reach 18 months old their egg production drops off and they are used for food. When I got them home and put them in the garden at first they were very timid as they had been kept in a tiny cage and their beaks cut to stop them from pecking themselves in boredom. Within a short while they were scratching about in the dirt clucking happily to themselves.
But my real favourites are bantams. Over the centuries chickens have been bred into an amazing variety of shapes , sizes, patterns , textures and colours. Some of the cockerels are vicious as they are descended from the fighting birds in the Far East but generally they are happy little birds.
This is a Polish White Crested Blue bantam and Polish have a mop type crest on their heads.

Frizzles have feathers that curl away from their bodies and this one is a Frizzle Polish


















or how about these lovely little silkies in a variety of colours

Spotlight on Heather

Another member of the Jillybeans Design team is Heather Pearson and she has given us a little bit about herself:

I am Heather, wife to Andrew and stay at home Mum to 4, James (14), Chelsea (12), Whitney (10) and Nicholas (3). The children are mainly the subject matter for my scrapbook pages.
I began Scrapbooking in January 2006 after following a few leads found through on line craft supply shops on the internet. I found UK Scrappers and I have never looked back. My children
were the inspiration behind my scrapbooking as I have always kept memory boxes full of things that they may treasure in the future, first nursery drawing, cards they made,favorite items of clothing, badges, bookmarks, all their birthday cards, all the little things that I would have loved to have had kept for me. Scrapbooking seemed to me a perfect addition to those treasures. It let me put even more memories into the archives with much more detail than I ever would have.
It also lets me speak to them in a most unusual way. I can start with a picture from any given day and tell them how I felt about their achievements, hopes and dreams and just how much they mean to me, good and sometimes not so good,
I wonder what they will make of those pages in time
As a keen photographer scrapping gives me another way to get my many 100's of photographs in albums. I belong to a camera club which is another wonderful source of inspiration and I find that my photography assignments often end up on my scrapbook pages. The two hobbies compliment each other perfectly and each enhances the other.
I have always struggled to put my style of scrappiing into a particular category. I seem to leap from one style to the next depending on the project I am working on. I love trying out new techniques and styles and definitely have my favourites which I use over and over again. I could not live without ink and stamps, I confess to being a real 'stampaholic'. At this point in time I am having hours of fun playing with textures and various mediums and paints.
I love altered art and dabble in many forms, ATC's, Inches, working with glass and metal, I seem to have permanent inky/mucky fingers with one thing or another.
Challenges I take up with great gusto, I like nothing more than to be given a title or a list of items to use and left to run with it as I choose. I do love subscribing to courses and I constantly strive to learn new design elements. techniques and principles.
I teach classes for my local craft shop crops, design scrapbook pages for a couple on line shops and of course I am a proud member of Jillybeans Design Team . Earlier this year I also taught classes at the Luxurious Angels Retreat in Lockerbie and I am teaching again at
the next retreat, now that was great fun.
I have had a whirlwind scrapbooking year and enjoyed some small success in my own way. I seek no fame or fortune (good job as I spend a small fortune on stash!) I just enjoy being creative and I can't ever see that ending.
I find it an impossible task to choose a favourite layout so I have chosen to share a recent page starring my youngest son and my husband. This photgraph was taken on Easter Sunday on a family day trip and my recent submission for Jillybeans Design Team Gallery. Now this page I love,
my eldest daughter and I did have this conversation and she thinks it is hilarious that it ended up in her scrapbook album. These memories are priceless!
This wonderful hobby has brought so many hours of pleasure it is almost beyond measure, investing in memories, designing recollections, what better way could I spend my time


Heather
www.designrecollections.squarespace.com