7.14.2010

At the Beach - an American Crafts Challenge

Happy Wednesday! We have been having a nice week so far...swimming lessons, playing outside, and a successful trip to the outlet mall. I also have been squeezing in lots of crafting time...4 layouts and a few cards so far...hoping to finish up a few more before the end of the week!

So, have you seen some of the new CHA releases?! I am loving the new American Crafts City Park...great colors, fun embellishments and some new products too like decorative tags and tape...can't wait to get my hands on some of these goodies! :) Did you know that Amercian Crafts also has a challenge every week on their blog? I made the time to play along this week and finally scrapbook a few pictures from our summer vacation last year to Cannon Beach, OR.


I love that middle picture of the boys so into building their sandcastles and roads...a trip to the beach is always a fun filled day. In fact my oldest was asking just yesterday when we can head to the beach again!

Except for the sandpaper, everything on this layout is American Crafts...from their Everyday, Backyard, and Blue Skies collections, plus pretty much no layout is complete without some thickers and ribbon! :)

Just a few tips from this layout:
- for pictures that may have something you don't care for, skip the photo editing and simply cover it up with an embellishment or some patterned paper like my middle picture above (in fact, that picture is actually of the beach and sky but I think by covering up the people/building in the background with the wave-like paper it actually now looks like a photo of the sand and ocean)

- To create waves use a circle punch along the edge of the paper varying how far in you punch to give each strip a more realistic feel. Then ink the edges to help the waves stand out (here I used SU's not quite navy). Finally adhere the waves to your paper, just along the bottom, so that you can gently fold/roll each wave up to give the page dimension.

- For the sand, I highly recommend a gritty sandpaper...it gives your page great texture and a real sand feel. You can also cut little sandcastles out of it for an extra fun embellishment!


I hope you have a wonderful day! It is looking like another beautiful day here...maybe we'll head to the beach! :)

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