Life Stories

It's official! I am totally in love with this collection! Life Stories by My Mind's Eye is all printed on kraft cardstock making for muted tones and an all around vintage look. There is a blue collection and a pink/red collection. I can't tell which is my favorite...I love them both!

Here's a story I've been wanting to document for a long time. When I was small I accidentally "stole" a spool of blue thread from a fabric store. After playing in a large bin filled with colorful spools, I didn't realize I still had it in my hand when we left. This is the story of the life lesson I learned from that experience.

Photo courtesy of lepiaf.geo on Flickr.

I got pretty messy with all of these layouts. For the title, I painted Tim Holtz grungeboard letters with crackle paint and then inked over them with dark brown.

I sponged blue and green distress inks onto the grungeboard butterflies, then finished them off with a spritz of Pearl Glimmer Mist.

I love making hidden journaling on a layout, especially if I have a lot to say. ;)

I saw the basic design for this next layout somewhere and now I can't figure out where it came from. (I think it was somewhere in the 2 Peas gallery). If anyone knows, please tell me so I can give them credit.

For my tree, I punched various sizes of circles from plain white tissue paper and sprayed them with Olive Vine Glimmer Mist. When I dried them with my heat gun, they kind of crinkled up, especially around the edges. Some of the circles were hit directly with the Glimmer Mist and show a gold shimmer. The colors soaked through to others when they were layered together which gave them a little different look. I think they turned out great! I attached each "leaf" with a tiny dab of Diamond Glaze.

The tree trunk was cut from a recycled piece of cardboard. I sprayed everything with an acid-neutralizer when I was all done.


This next project is a class I designed for Porter's.

These are a few of my girls who attend our scrapbook classes regularly. Some have been coming for as long as I've been teaching there (7-8 years?? I've lost count!). The idea for this layout was inspired by this video that I thought was way cool.

I've decided that Tim Holtz products work fabulously with this collection! The flowers were die cut from grunge paper. Then I colored them with a variety of alcohol inks, curled the edges, and added tiny beads to the centers. Check out Tim's beautiful grunge paper flowers here.

More Tim Holtz...grunge paper bird covered with crackle paint.

I tried cutting out paper dolls the old-fashioned way, but it was way too hard because they were so small. Then I discovered these cute little stamps by Autumn Leaves. Each girl is stamped individually onto patterned paper with...you guessed it...Tim Holtz Distress Inks. Then I cut around the entire row by hand.

Thanks for looking! I have another project I will post tomorrow.