Hello and a Share

I know.  I know.  It's been ages since I have posted anything for all you lovely ladies, I express my apologies!  Things have been very busy for me over the last few months and to be honest, I have had NO TIME to play, and I mean none.  It has resulted in serious paper play withdrawal - shakes, shivers, and jonsing and all, serious.  Anyway, this last weekend I had some down time and got a chance to do a little bit of playing.  I thought I would share with you all what I have been up to.  So, here it is:

Isn't she lovely?  I made this for a mini album swap over at Mini Album Scraps for my partner.  She had wanted a shabby chic vintage like mini album.  This was a tough one for me as I have never really done shabby chic or vintage, it is definitely not my strong point.  Despite that, I had a lot of fun making this little mini.  If you have made it this far, you're probably wondering about the juicy details on how I made this little bad girl.

1. This is an upcycle album - the corrugated board, is cardboard I used from a box I got in the mail.  I cut it down and then tore off the covers to get the fluting to show through.
2.  I made my own envelopes.  I cut them and creased them, and then I stamped them with two different background stamps.  I have a love obsession with the envelope dealies that have the strings, they remind me of the 1950s for whatever reason.
3.  I hand stamped my postcards.
4.  The stickpin are from a previous swap at Mini Album Scraps.
5.  I used the Stampin' Up! Spritzer Tool to add more distressing and ink spray to my project. As a side note, I LOVE that tool.  It's way cheaper than an airbrush system and adds a nice distress/vintage look to your projects.  I like the ink splatter look.  This is a definite must have in my tool box.
6.  The distressing was done with the Zutter Distrezz It All, another must have in my tool box.

Supplies:  Cardstock (Recollections, Bazzill, Stampin' Up!); Pattern Paper (Unknown); Trims (PinkPaperTree-Etsy, Unknown); Stamps (Stampin' Up!; Impression Obsession; Tim Holtz Postcard; Paper Trey Ink; Unity Stamp Co.); Ink (Stampin' Up!); Pain (Tim Holtz); Trims (Unknown); Eyelets (We R Memory Keepers, Unknown)

Another Home Decor Min Album Scrapbook Frame

I love mini albums, but to be honest, I've been making TONS of them lately.  And although I love them dearly, they get very tedious SOMETIMES.  And unforuneately, or fortunately, I was feeling the monotony of mini albums during recent assignment at Scrapjazz for an album with the theme of "friends." My thoughts revolved around how to take the concept of an "album" outside the box of an album, and well I came up with, why not lay the album out for display?  This translated into this:

I took a backless frame and a piece of thin canvas board from the craft store to create it.  The canvas was covered with a shimmery cream fabric which I then overlaid with lace.  This was then placed in the back of the frame.  I took 4x4 pieces of chipboard that I had left over from a previous project (yay leftovers!) and covered them with various scraps from my scrap box.  I then found small photos of my me and my friends, and created mini album layouts, using random bits and pieces of left overs - some of the embellishments came from a junk tub that I keep on my desk.  And because I am going through a "everything with banners is better phase" I decided that this piece had to have a title Banner Style.  This is the finished product:

 

And a close up of the fun banner pieces that were also made with left overs and random alphabet pieces from American Crafts and Pink Paislee:

 

 The pennant shape was cut from the Pennants SVG file from Lettering Delights and can be found here.  The Octagon shape was cut using Spellbinders Dies, and the rope is from Stampin' Up!  All the paper that I used in this project are left overs from my scraps.  Pretty awesome huh?