How to get started on your December Daily Album
17:51
Hi, Aimee here. I’m
super excited to be here today to kick off the first of our December Daily
series. By now, I’m sure many of
you have started amassing a pile of Christmas supplies. I know I have! This
year, I’ll be using the Polly December Daily kit and whatever else I find lying
around. I have to admit that I’m not really one for preparing pages. Partly
because I like to use the colours from my photos to dictate a layout and well…
I don’t have kids, so scrapping everyday is not that much of a drama. I have,
however, taken the time to pimp out my album. Would you like to see?
Now three days, four
coats of paint and a hot glue gun burn later, I want to talk to you today about
inspiration. I do truly believe
that creativity is just like a muscle – the more you use it the stronger it
gets. Personally, more often than not, I have a vision for a project long
before I begin, but what if you don’t know where it is that you’re headed? What
if you want to tackle a project, but have no idea where to start? It’s a great question and that’s exactly
where I found myself at 4am on Thursday. I had just wrapped up another amazing
project that encompassed 3 of my CT teams. I was pumped and motivated by the
result. I was up early to watch the Becky Higgins Creative Live class. I sat
down on the floor behind my coffee table to watch the class with a bare BasicGrey Capture Album in front of me and… nothing. No ideas at all. What is a girl
to do in situations like this?
Well my first port of
call is always Pinterest. I adore Pinterest because the cream of the crop
naturally rises to the top. It’s different from doing a Google search because Google
works on a very particular algorithm that is influenced by your previous
searches. Pinterest is people-powered. The more pins and likes it has, the more
likely it is to show up in your search. I did get an idea for a misted cover,
but ultimately abandoned it because my mist was the wrong shade of green.
Next stop is always
Instagram. There is something
truly wonderful about Instagram because not everybody’s album looks posed and
perfect. I also love that it all happens in real time. People are working on
their albums at the exact same time as you. Sadly, in this case there were A
LOT of red binding star albums out there, which wasn’t a lot of help to me.
Usually, if I’m still
out of luck by this point, I would head for the big galleries, such as Studio
Calico, Two Peas or even here, but you can guess what that would result in… red
binding, painted stars.
Lean in just a little
closer, because now I’m going to fill you in on a secret. My absolute last stop,
which never seems to fail, are the archives. I head to my favourite blogs, the
blogs written by my scrapping Idols, and I search their tags for relevant
topics. More often than not, the posts go back many, many years and guess what
I found?
This was an image I
found of Elizabeth Kartchner’s (Dear Lizzy) Daily December album from 2011. I loved the simple title and the use of
frame. I also felt the combination
of textures were brilliant. The doily, washi, wood and glitter are just a great
combination. I used enamel dots as a nod to her confetti motif.
So how did it come
together?
1. Gather supplies. I
didn’t have a frame similar to the one in the picture. The one you see on the
front of my album is actually a letter stencil. I used to use it to address
letters back in my pen pal days. The doily came from my present wrapping
supplies. I dug through my washi basket to find all my red tape and I’ve got an
uber crush on velvet ribbon right now.
2. Paint. I masked off
the binding on my album (P.S. this album can be found in the Polly store) with
washi and painted the front and back covers with Acrylic white paint. It took 4
coats over a period of a day and a half. I wasn’t really prepared to use a heat
tool to dry the paint between coats because I have heard rumours of it warping
the cardboard. Once dry, I gave it a light sand with fine sand paper to remove
brush marks.
3. Layering and
placement. Long before glue was involved, I shuffled the elements around and around
until I was happy. I asked my scrappy friends, I asked my husband… then I
ignored them all and did what I liked.
4. If it can’t survive
a toddler attack, you didn’t use enough glue. I’m a minimalist and, don’t get
me wrong, I understand the logic behind making flat covers, but I really do
love mine so the only other option was glue and lots of it. I used a hot glue
gun to glue everything (EVERYTHING) down.
5. Ta-da! Admire your handiwork.
Just in case you were
wondering, here is my supply list:
- Green Basic GreyCapture Album
- Red Velvet Ribbon
- White Doily
- Maggie Holmes Gold Daiquiri Thickers
- Freckled Fawn Red Stripe Washi
- Small Freckled Fawn Red Sequin Bow
- Wooden Letter Stencil
- Red Enamel dots form the DD kit
- Gold Enamel Dots from past Polly Kits
- Green Enamel Dot I found lose on the bookcase
Just a few more things
before I leave you. I’ll be back in
early December to show you my progress, but if that isn’t soon enough please
feel free to check on my progress over on my blog. If you are using the Polly kit too, please feel free to tag me in any and all social media. I love seeing
how you are all using my designs. There is no greater feeling as a designer. Oh
and just a reminder, there are still December Daily kits and Christmas stamps
available in store. Any questions?
Have a fantastic
weekend.
Aimee xx
2 comments
Gorgeous Aimee, I can't wait to get my album next week to make a start.
ReplyDeleteThanks Sue. I can't wait to see what you make. xx
ReplyDelete