Cliffs of Dover (Redo)

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  I'm back with another redo layout, you can see my original one here.

I switched up the pictures I used and this time all of them were taken ON the Cliffs of Dover, two of the pics on the original layout were from the castle.  I'm happier with this version.

I kept Basic Gray and Bordering Blue from the original color palette, but this time I used Basic Gray for the page base and Bordering Blue for the DSP.  Always Artichoke is my accent green this time instead of Handsome Hunter.  I'm not going to make a habit of redoing my layouts, but in this case I am definitely happier with the results.  From now on I'll just have to get it "right" the first time ; ) Not that there was anything wrong with the original, per se, it just didn't feel quite right to me.

Also how is it May already?!  Three weeks from today, the packers arrive to start packing up our house here...and then the real chaos begins.  Going to be a busy month.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Rough Type, Stippled Stencils
Ink:  Basic Gray, Bordering Blue, Always Artichoke
Paper:  Basic Gray, Bordering Blue, Always Artichoke, Thick Basic White, Bella Birds DSP
Accessories:  None

Dover Castle (Redo)

Scrappy Monday, y'all.  Hope you had a good weekend...it's still pretty cool here (it warmed up on Saturday but was back to cool and rainy yesterday) but Ryan and I managed to get out of the house for a little bit and go pick some tulips at the blumen feld down the road from us, so that's something.  I'm doing a temperature tracker cross stitch this year and we've been in the blue ranges for a long time!

Anyway, it's Scrappy Monday, let's talk scrapbook pages.  Today's layout is actually a re-do, which I try not to do very often (because how am I ever going to catch up if I'm constantly redoing pages I already did?) but every once in a while something about a layout just bothers me enough that I do end up redoing it.  And that's what happened with this one, you can see the original layout here.  And here's the re-do:

As much as I love doing challenges for cards, I quickly discovered that trying to do challenges for scrapbook layouts just does NOT work for me (the original was a sketch challenge).  I also redid the layout for the Cliffs of Dover, which you'll see next week, and one layout from our 2012 Mediterranean cruise.  So for this layout, I started over with completely different colors and papers and I'm happier with it now.  I even ended up choosing some different photos to work with for the re-do layouts.

I also used those re-dos as an opportunity to try out a different photo printer.  I've used Winkflash for *years* but last time I ordered pictures from them (thankfully it was a very small order), the photos were super super cheap quality.  Like seriously, my fingers hated touching them, they looked like crappy one-hour photos from a pharmacy.  Needless to say I was not happy about it.  So I tried Shutterfly for these pics, and the quality was a bit better than the finger-shriveling Winkflash ones, but still not as good as Winkflash *used* to be (I'm still scrapping some older photos so I have a lot for comparison).  Anyone out there have an online photo printer that they like, with high-quality pictures that don't make me shudder when I touch them?  I cannot express how much I hated that last set from Winkflash, they were awful.

Today's new and improved color palette:  Bordering Blue, Buckaroo Blue, So Saffron, Basic Gray, and white.  The patterned paper I used technically has a very watered-down So Saffron as well as a smidgen of Pink Pirouette in it, but I focused on the grayish blues for my layout.  I was searching around for some kind of accent to stamp on the layout and ended up with Stippled Stencils, which is one of the oldest stamp sets in my collection, so it was fun to ink it up again.

That's it for me today, kids.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Rough Type, Stippled Stencils
Ink:  Basic Gray, Bordering Blue, Buckaroo Blue
Paper:  Bordering Blue, Buckaroo Blue, Basic Gray, Thick Basic White, Bella Birds DSP
Accessories:  None

Friday Flashback: Fruit Stand

Happy Friday, y'all!  I just finished up my Flashback card, and as soon as I go back downstairs I'm going to clean off my stamping table.  I don't *think* my girl dog Sadie gets up there to have fun with my craft supplies, but somehow her hair does--I've long suspected it is self-aware and also independently mobile.  But I've been needing to clean off my table for eons so I'm gonna do it TODAY.

On to the Friday Flashback!  Today's retired stamp set is Fruit Stand, a set of three stamps from 2008 and wouldn't you know, I happen to have cards with each stamp in the set.

Also features Amazing to Zany

I admit, the peaches are my least favorite stamp, but that might be because when the set was released, there was a huge discussion on Splitcoast about the peaches' resemblance to a certain male body part.  o.0

Also features Stippled Stencils

I do like the grapes, though.

Also features Short & Sweet

And the raspberries are my favorite, though I suppose they could be blackberries too.  This card has the most comments in my entire Splitcoast gallery thanks to a little prank my Mothermark. I later sent her a card with like 85 buttons on it.

So anyway, here is today's new creation:

I had to go with the raspberries because they're my favorite, and also because of today's FabFriday color combo:

The colors might make you think of Christmas but I'm a rebel so I did something else.  I get kind of annoyed at those people who like to pretend fall doesn't exist and start dragging out their Christmas stuff before Halloween (I have a cousin who's planning to have her kids pose in their Halloween costumes next to the Christmas tree.  NOOOOO!) so I like to wait until at least November to think about Christmas stuff.  Thanksgiving deserves its own time in the holiday spotlight if you ask me.

Anyway, Christmas colors aside, I figure a fruit stand (and fruit in general) is a summertime thing, so I'm entering over at Retro Rubber:

And staring at that fruit stamp is kinda making me crave a piece of triple berry pie.  With ice cream because of course ice cream.  Anyway, as I said Fruit Stand came out in 2008, so it's now 8 years old, and the Four You sentiment is 3 years old.

I also used this week's Retro Sketch:

I turned the sketch on its side, and instead of having the three small circular elements clustered around the image, I lined up some Candy Dots in the corner of my card.

Okay kids, I'm off to clean up my stamp table and maybe organize a few things.  Then I can start my next scrapbook layout with a clean slate.  Have a great weekend!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Fruit Stand, Four You
Ink:  Versamark, Early Espresso, Cherry Cobbler, Garden Green, Blushing Bride, River Rock
Paper:  Cherry Cobbler, Garden Green, Very Vanilla, Bella Rose DSP
Accessories:  Clear EP, Neutrals Candy Dots, Dimensionals

Friday Flashback: Sincere Salutations

Thank goodness it's Friday, kids.  Not my best week ever.  I will neither confirm nor deny that I ate brownie batter for breakfast today.  Is it weird that I like brownie batter better than actual brownies?  Don't answer that.  Also, I laugh in the face of salmonella.

But anyway, I bring you today's slightly late Friday Flashback.  Today's retired stamp set of choice is Sincere Salutations, and I remember how excited we stampers were when it first came out--eight sentiments in a pretty classy mixed-font format, what's not to love?  So again, this flashback would take a week if I put up every single project I ever made with this stamp set.  Let's just select a few, shall we?

Also features Baroque Motifs

And right off the bat this one might be my favorite of the bunch.  I like the color combination :)  And of course Baroque Motifs can do no wrong.

Also features Natural Beauty

My long-ago SU! upline used to do that thing like on this card where a smaller-than-A2 card is folded and then backed up with a piece of colored cardstock; not really my thing but it did let me do a nice bow on the side of this card.

Also features Pretty Peony

Some pretty purple peonies for a birthday...

Also features Roses in Winter

And Christmas roses.  Yeah, Sincere Salutations has got you covered for most events.

Also features Stippled Stencils, Weathered

The sentiment showed up better IRL on this card than in the scan (and this was so long ago that it was a scan rather than a photo)--it's embossed in gold.

Also features Wonderful Wings, Filigree

One last card featuring one of the gorgeous butterflies from Wonderful Wings, and also last week's Friday Flashback set of Filigree.  And now for this week's new creation:

I'm pretty pleased with it.  I used the color challenge from ColourQ:

And apparently I was influenced by the picture in the challenge graphic too, because I think that's what made me reach for Medallion.  I also used this week's Retro Rubber Challenge sketch:

In the spirit of the challenge, I've had Sincere Salutations for I suppose 11 years because I think I got it when it came out; Medallion dates from 2011 so five years, and True Friend I've had for 9 years.  Yeah, I think I got the "retro" part of the challenge covered this time ;)

Well, hubs just got home and he's taking me out to dinner so that's it for me.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Sincere Salutations, Medallion, True Friend
Ink:  Marina Mist, Pear Pizzazz, Tangerine Tango, Night of Navy
Paper:  Marina Mist, Night of Navy, Whisper White
Accessories:  Circle punches, Regals Candy Dot, Tangerine Tango ribbon from Sale-a-Bration a couple of years ago

Friday Flashback: Weathered

Welcome to this week's Friday Flashback!  Today's stamp set of choice is Weathered, a great background stamp.  I was kinda surprised how big the SCS gallery for it is, usually background stamps aren't the ones that people choose to upload cards under.  Anywha, let's flash back!

 Ah yes, before I learned to tie pretty knots :)  I'm not a huge fan of this card but I do like the color combo (Elegant Eggplant, So Saffron, and Wild Wasabi).  The main image and sentiment are from A Beautiful Thing.

Here's an older card I do still quite like and it might possibly still be in my card stash somewhere.  The beautiful butterfly is from Wonderful Wings, and the sentiment is from Fancy Flexible Phrases.

How do you like how Weathered looks when stamped with white craft ink on dark cardstock?  I like the crackle effect.  The main image is from the wonderful lighthouse set Coast to Coast.

Here's one that features Touch of Nature (I know lots of people were gaga over that set, and I liked it okay but it was never one of my favorites) and Amazing to Zany.

Stippled Stencils and Sincere Salutations for this one, and you can't tell from the scan but the sentiment was embossed in gold.

Another Touch of Nature card with a sentiment from Short & Sweet.

And apparently I really liked using Touch of Nature with Weathered, 'cause here's a third bird.  Sentiment on this one is from All-Year Cheer III, and the harlequin is Print Pattern.

Ready for today's brand-new card?

I admit, I had to do another fall card before Thanksgiving...I figure that starting next week I'll be doing Christmas stamp sets for the Friday Flashback but I refuse to start that before Turkey Day :)

The color combo on this one is courtesy of the challenge over at Create with Connie and Mary, lovely fall colors:

And the sketch is from Freshly Made Sketches:

I kind of wish I'd used some kind of pattern for the Tangerine Tango strips on my card, but maybe that would have been too busy with the Weathered pattern on both the card base and the main image strip.  Regardless, I'm not going to redo it now :)

Thanks for stopping by today and have a great weekend!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Weathered, Lovely Leaves, Vintage Verses
Ink:  Sahara Sand, Always Artichoke, Tangerine Tango, Chocolate Chip
Paper:  Sahara Sand, Tangerine Tango, Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  None