Laura Vegas

In The Works

September 18, 2013

I've been totally wrapped up in work and life this past week, and just haven't had time to come and stick something up here on this ole' blog of mine. On the work front, I've been busy taking care of these crazy daycare kiddos of mine. They definitely keep me on my toes. I've also been consumed with finalizing our design team call for Bella Blvd, which is always a big process. We've lined up our new designers, and I look forward to making the announcement next week.

On the life front, we're just busy. With both girls in high school, we're just constantly busy. And I seem to spend a lot of time driving them to and from all of their school, sports, and band activities. It's amazing how many miles we can log in a week, when everything we do is within just a few miles from the house.

But just to prove that there WILL be a fun new project to share with you this week, here's a peek at what is in the works for my next post. There was a little die cutting today.

There was a lot of digging around for photos to print.

And this is where I last left off. Hours ago, before the crazyness of the evening set it. It's almost 11:00pm, and I'm finally making time to do something with all of this. Check back on Friday to see what I end up creating with it all.
October Afternoon: September Guest Designer Part 1

September 13, 2013

Hey everyone! It's Friday and I cannot be more excited about the fact that the weekend has finally arrived. I had such a great time at CKU last weekend, but in the process I lost out on having a few days off and have been not-so-successfully trying to catch up since getting home. Anyways. Today's the day that I'm up on the October Afternoon blog, with my first project share as their September Guest Designer!

I was really excited when I opened up my box and found all sorts of Daily Flash goodness! I've been looking forward to getting my hands on this collection since it was revealed, and it was even better in person. I decided to start out with the Girl Talk mini collection for my first projects, mixed in with just a few pieces from the Midway collection.

I love the 6×8 paper packs, and cut lots of pieces apart to use on the page. I love that these smaller sheets are filled with a wide variety of small block accent pieces, along with blocks of additional patterned papers to coordinate with the large sheets. I was able to mix and match a few 2×2" squares, 3×3" squares, and even a 4×4" square for my title piece.

I also used the Everyday Roller Stamp on the yellow square piece to add a few phrases, rather than fill in the spaces with my own hand writing. I do recommend doing the stamping before you have it adhered with pop dots, as I didn't get very clean stamped words. "Duh" moment on my part. I just used a pen to add in the parts that didn't fully stamp.

I almost always use alpha stickers and/or chipboard alphas, or a die cut using my Silhouette, for my titles. But the 4×4" "I Love You This Much" block was perfect for a quick title. I just added some machine stitching around the edges and adhere it using pop dots.

I have always loved October Afternoon's buttons, and buttons are something that I use on the majority of my projects. I love to randomly sprinkle them across my layouts. Although secretly, I put WAY too much planning and thought into where each button will go 😉

One thing I love to do after creating a layout, is to create a quick card using my scraps. I figure I have all of the coordinating pieces out already, so why not use a few before I put everything away.

You can stop by the October Afternoon blog for a bit more insight into my design process on these projects. I'm pretty sure I am going to use the divided 12×12" page protectors for next week's project. I just have to decide which of the Daily Flash mini collections I want to feature. Decisions, decisions. Check back here next Friday to see what I decided on!
Bella Blvd: Monthly Project Sheet – Snapshots Collection

September 11, 2013

We have our September monthly project sheet up on the Bella Blvd blog today, featuring the new Snapshots collection.

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You can view and download our September project sheet, which includes a supply list and detailed instructions, right HERE.
October Afternoon: September Guest Designer

September 8, 2013

I am very excited to be guest designing on the October Afternoon blog for the month of September!

You can check out my introduction HERE, that includes some fun Q&A's. I'll be back on Friday with my first project share!
I’m Headed to CKU This Year

September 1, 2013

It's that time again. In just two days, I'll be leaving to teach at CKU: Creating Keepsakes University. This time I'm going to Stamford, Connecticut, which is quite a ways away from where I live. Clear across the states, I found out (yes, I'm terrible at geography!). It's not too late to sign up, if you're interested in joining us.

Bella Blvd has been asked to sponsor one of the Core Classes, and I will be traveling to the shows to teach on Bella's behalf. I have never attended CKU as a student before, but last year I did get to fill in at one of the shows and teach an album track class.

This time I'll be headed out to teach a Bella Blvd sponsored class that I designed myself. Which is kind of exciting, since I've only taught classes designed by others over the years. Want to know more about the class?

{Click image to view larger}

Washi
tapes are all the rage these days, and Bella Blvd has an extensive
assortment of Designer Tapes in bright and fun colors and
patterns that coordinate perfectly with all of our paper collections. We love
to collect and hoard our tapes, but are we using them to their fullest
potential? This class will focus on teaching you new and creative
ways to use tapes on your projects, including creating your own
"patterned paper", flowers, pennants, and other embellishments. In
this class, we will be creating two 2-page layouts using a variety of our
Designer Tapes and a mixture of our newest collections and embellishments.

Here are the locations and dates of the remaining shows for the year:
CKU Stamford, CT: September 5-7th, 2013
CKU Dallas/Ft Worth, TX: October 10-12th, 2013

For more info on the events, to read the class descriptions and meet the instructors, check out the CKU website for all the details.
Kerri Bradford Studio: Me

August 29, 2013

So, I have a new project up over at Kerri Bradford Studio today. Here's the thing. It's not at all what I set out to originally create. But I did manage to turn it into a happy accident, even though at times I was *THIS* close to giving up.

Kerri offered up a little color challenge to us, if we were interested in playing along. The color choices were grey and aqua, and she had attached some super cute grey and aqua images for inspiration. I loved the idea. But at the same time, I wasn't sure how I would work that on a layout, since I couldn't think of any photos that would go well with it.

Then I had this bright idea to create a 6×6" mini album. I was going to cut a bunch of 6×6" backgrounds, using some of my favorite background cuts from Kerri. I would adhere those all to 6×6" white cardstock pages. I was going to do a "favorites" kind of album, and had some themes picked out for each page, pulling from Kerri's titles/words, and even from some of the free shapes that we get thru her The History Project class. Things like movies, television shows, food, music, etc. On the second page of each spread, I would include a 6×6" photo collage using Kerri's Storyboard Templates, filling in some of the openings with text.

I even Instagrammed this photo of some of the background pieces I was cutting. I cut every single piece from white cardstock to make things simple. Although her challenge was to use grey and aqua, I thought it would be fun to make each spread in the mini album a mix of grey and another color. Grey and aqua on one, grey and yellow on another, grey and green on another, etc. I pulled out my small collection of Heidi Swapp's Color Shine Spritzers, and went to work misting each and every piece with either Tinsel (silver, which was my "grey") or one of the 6 colors that I own in her spritzers.

Then I realized I had time constraints that were working against me. Not enough hours in my day, unfortunately, and I haven't quite figured out how to add more hours yet 😉 So then I thought that instead of the mini album, I would simply create a two page layout, using divided page protectors that have four 6×6" openings on a page. I chose 8 of the 6×6" pieces and laid them all out to work with. Then somewhere along the way, I once again made an executive descision to change my mind switch to a one page layout. Indecisive much???

I chose to go with 4 of the silver background pieces to create the base of the page, and stuck with just the hearts (from the Hearts Background kit) and the circles (from the Background Basics kit).

I had already stapled these background pieces to 6×6" pieces of white cardstock. A few staples in each corner is all that's holding them in place. No extra adhesive used on them. Instead of prying staples up, and removing the background pieces to adhere to a full sheet of white cardstock, I simply adhered those four 6×6" squares to a sheet of scrap cardstock.

Then I picked out another 6×6" piece to add to the center of the page. I loved the yellow sunburst background (from the This & That: Freedom kit), so it was an obvious choice to use. I had also already adhere the "2013" (from the twentyTHIRTEEN kit) and the "me" (a freebie from The History Project class), both of which I had spritzed with the Tinsel color. So those were staying put.

To make that center piece stand out a bit more, I took out some Heidi Swapp banners and pulled out two of the large scalloped banners. They're more like a border I think, since they're straight. I cut each one in half, so I could make a border around my entire center 6×6" piece. I spritzed each one with the Mustard spritzer to match the sunburst.

I added some simple embellishments sprinkled from the top left corner, diagonally down to the bottom right corner. A few fun buttons from Jenni Bowlin, some colored rhinestones from Teresa Collins, and some glittered dots from SEI.

And what I ended up with, working with what I had and with the changes I kept making, was a fun divider page for my All-About-Me album. Which is actually a smart thing to have, since when you look through my All-About-Me albums (I have two, which include any layouts I've created about myself), all of the layouts tend to blend together so easy beause the majority of them don't even have photos on them. I think having a divider to seperate the years will help break up the albums a bit, and give a clear indication of what time in my life I created each layout.

Now I just have to create a lot more of these divider pages. And figure out a way to use all of the other pieces that I cut and spritzed for my original mini album idea 😉
Scrapbook & Cards Today: One Fine Day

August 21, 2013

Have you had a chance to check out the Summer issue of Scrapbook and Cards Today yet? If you haven't, make sure and check it out, as it's full of inspiration. And the best part is that you can download and view it totally and completely FREE. You can't pass up "free", right 🙂

I thought I would share one of the two layouts I created for this issue. This layout was for the 3-Designer Challenge, where three designers were given the same exact set of products to work with. We had the Down By The Shore paper collection by Fancy Pants, a fun die-cut placemat from Jillibean Soup, a stamp/die set from Sizzix, small striped accents by Queen & Co, Thickers from American Crafts, and textured cardstock from Bazzill.

This is my take on the challenge. You can check out Emily Pitt's layout and Lisa Dickenson's layout inside the summer issue.

I knew right away that I would likely keep most of the die-cut placemat in one piece on one page of my two page spread, so I figured I would make a photo collage to include lots of photos for the other page. I used a storyboard template from Kerri Bradford to create my collage.

I hand cut some flowers from one of the floral patterned papers and adhered them here and there on the placemat. I'm not a huge fan of fussy cutting, but every now and then you just have to do it. And usually, it's worth it.

I honestly hemmed and hawwed over how I wanted to use the die-cut placemat for days. I was scared to cut it, unless I was completely sure about how I was going to use it, since I only had one of them to work with. I wasn't sure about using it all in one piece. The only thing I knew for sure was that I wanted to leave it white. I finally decided to cut off a few inches from one side to use on the second page, and kept the larger piece for the first page.

I used a lot of the solid sides of the patterned papers for pops of color, along with the cardstock. I cut different sized circles to randomly fill in the holes in the die-cut placemat. Some of them I adhered under the placemat and some of them I added over the holes. I ran some of the circles thru my Cuttlebug, using the bubbles embossing folder, for extra texture. Kind of goes with the pool/water theme of the layout.

Since the white foam Thickers were a smaller font, I used them in some of the larger circles to add a few descriptive words and the year the photos were taken. I added a few of the striped flower accents, and used the stamp and die for my title piece.
Bella Blvd: Girls Day Out

August 20, 2013

This month we have started a few new features over on the Bella Blvd blog. One of those is called "Project Life: Bella Style", where we ask our designers to be inspired by the Project Life concept in whatever way they choose to be. This might be keeping up actual Project Life albums, using Project Life components on regular layouts or even cards, using divided page protectors for everday layouts, etc. Today, I'm sharing my first take on the theme.

I haven't done an actual Project Life album since 2009, but I have still managed to collect a huge assortment of divided page protectors over the last few years. I have used them quite a bit in my vacation albums, sports albums, and school albums, but have only used them for actual layouts a few times. I think part of the reason I don't do it that often, even though I LOVE using them, is that then I have to plan for what will go on the backside of that divided page protector. And since I have never been one to scrap in order, I worry I'll never get around to completing that backside.

But honestly, if I wait to use all of these divided page protectors until the day I come up with an awesome plan, I will never, even use them. Because my life is too busy to sit and come up with an awesome plan. Lol. So, I have decided that if I want to use a divided page protector for a layout, I'll just do it.

The girls and I have had a few days out together recently, doing a bit of back to school shopping. I usually have a lot of wait time, as the girls are browsing, trying a million things on in the dressing room, trying to decide what they like and don't like. All that fun stuff. And I have this nervous kind of energy, where I can't just do nothing. There's only so much I can do to entertain myself, so I have taken to taking pictures with my cell phone, and Instagramming (is that a word?) them in the moment. I thought it would be fun to take some of those photos and get them on a layout.

I decided to use THIS divided page protector for my page. It's from WRMK, and it has eight 3×3" openings and a 6×12" opening. I knew I wanted to print my photos in squares, just like they've been seen on Instagram, so the 3×3" spots were perfect for those. I also used a few 3×4" cards from Bella's new Daily Details patterned papers, and simply cut two of the cards down to 3×3" to fit in alongside the photos.

I knew the 6×12" middle section would be for my title, journaling, and some embellishments. I also knew I wanted to use the ruled patterned paper from the Snapshots collection for this section, but quickly found out that the large opening was actually more like 6×12.5" or so. So I had to add an extension to make my paper wide enough to fill the space.

I cut that purple flower patterned paper and folded it in half, so that it would wrap about the side of the ruled paper. I had it in place, or so I thought, and then machine stitched it down. Then I realized I hadn't extended my paper at all, but just added a little border on one side. Opps. So I grabbed the two small scraps from the 3×4" "together" card that I had cut down to fit in the smaller square pocket, pieced them together, and used those as my extension. There's no mistakes in scrapping, right? Just happy accidents 🙂

I used a mix of older purple chipboard alphas and newer green chipboard alphas for my title. Then I pulled out the black star die cut from the Paper Pieces die cut package, added a punched circle from the purple flower patterned paper, and topped it with an older aqua flower. I finished off the page with some stickers, designer tape, and small jewels.

It was fun to mix it up a bit, and try something new, like the divided page protectors. Rather than creating a layout on one big sheet of paper, I created on lots of smaller pieces of paper and just slipped them into their pockets. I will definitely be doing this more often.
Bella Blvd: Hello Halloween

August 13, 2013

I kind of feel like I've been sharing my Bella Blvd projects with you forever. Lol. As much as I LOVE Bella (and I really, really do!), I do want to switch over to some other things here as well. Turns out, this is my last CHA layout to share. I must have lost track, since I thought for sure I had more than one left.

And out of the 9 layouts I created for CHA, this was the one and only layout that I used my own photo on. I cannot thank my friend Krista enough for letting me scrap her gorgeous photos of her adorable family! There are just times that I find myself at the bottom of my photo piles for certain things, and some fresh and fun photos are more inspiring than turning to my same ole' photos I've used before. And even though I have used this photo of my girls from Halloween a few years ago, I knew I had to use it on at least one of my layouts with the new Trick or Treat collection.

I love a good Halloween collection that works in colors other than just black and orange, and I love that Bella has aqua in the mix. It worked perfectly with this photo, since my girls had aqua in their costumes.

There were so many different patterned papers that I wanted to use on this layout, so I choose four main papers and randomly cut blocks of varying sizes. No ryhme or reason to the sizes. Just very random cuts into squares or rectangles.

Then I matted my photo onto the white grid patterned paper, and started layering all of the other patterned paper pieces around the photo. I also had the "Hello Halloween" card that I cut from the Daily Details paper to use for my title, and layered that in next to the photo.

I added the large yellow star die cut from the new Paper Pieces die cut pack, and a few stickers from the different sticker sheets that go with the collection. The orange border stickers are from the Alpha+Bits sticker sheets. I did pull those from two different sheets of stickers, since each sheet only has one of each border. Then I finished off the page with lots of threaded buttons.

And a quick Halloween card as well. This one was super simple. The "frightful" piece is a die cut from the Paper Pieces die cut pack, and has the cut out heart in the bottom corner. I backed that with a punched circle of black dotted paper, and then pop dotted the entire thing on the right side of the card.

The half circles you see were punched from the large polka dot patterned paper. I love using that sheet to punch out the circles, since they all coordinate with the papers, and are an easy way to add bits of additional color here and there. A one inch circle punch works perfectly. I cut those circles in half, and adhered them as a "border" of sorts in the center of the card.

If you're looking to get your hands on Bella's new Trick or Treat collection, you can find it HERE.
Bella Blvd: Emily Is Three

August 11, 2013

I still have a few more Bella Blvd projects from CHA to share, so I thought I would try and knock those out this week. Not that I have a ton of other things to share. Lol. But I did just print out some photos and am hoping to squeeze in some layouts just for fun.

{Photos courtesy of Krista Lund, friend and photographer}

This is another one of my layouts using the new Daily Chevies & Everyday Bits collection. As I was browsing thru some photos from my friend Krista, these photos of her youngest daughter, Emily, caught my eye. Her outfit was the perfect match for the patterned papers that I had in mind. Her cute black and white striped dress, the pink boots, and her fun green knit hat. Plus, she's just an adorable little girl, and that's all the reason I needed to scrap some more photos of her!

The white and grey triangle pattern makes a great background paper. I cut four strips of the black star patterned paper and adhered it around the edges of the page (a great paper saving trick that I have shared before HERE).

I knew I wanted to add a few feathers to the layout, so I picked out a green, pink, and black feather. I layered them together and tucked them under the chevron paper strips, stapling the bottoms to secure them in place. I added a chipboard heart and the crochet heart to help hide the staples.

I hand cut a few chevron pieces from the green and pink chevy patterned papers. I wanted a light and dark row from each, so I left them together as I cut. I then cut one black chevron from the black and white chevron patterned paper and positioned it between the green and pink rows.

The arrow stickers are a fun addition to the Daily Chevies collection, and they come in four colors. I used a few of the green and pink arrows beside my title.

The journaling card is a 3×4" card from the backside of one of the chevron papers. It actually has an aqua geotag in the upper left corner, which I covered up with the grey crochet heart. I machine stitched around the outside edge of the journaling card before adhering it to the page. I then finished off the page with lots of threaded buttons in coordinating colors.

And speaking of the new Bella collections, they are available HERE, if you've been looking for them 🙂

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