Sunday Sketch with Melanie

Hello crafty friends, Melanie here with another Sunday Sketch. This week's sketch is so fun, I just love it! Let's have a look:

And here's what I came up with. This layout is all about a wonderful evening I spent with a friend of mine watching Mama Mia. It was the sing along version and it was so fun singing Abba songs and watching the movie. This month's Kits are full of great patterns and colors, I love all the purples and the orange. One of my favorites this month are the wood veneer pieces, they are so gorgeous!

The  notebook stripes were perfect for this Layout and I layered them with some other matching  papers from the Scrapbook and Add On Kit. 

I also love the phrase stickers from the Embellishment Kit which go so great with the theme of my layout.

I used the awesome exclusive wood veneer words to create my title and added some of the cute wooden hearts for even more texture.

I used a black pen to create faux stitches and added some of the triangles on top of it with some foam adhesive, just as the sketch suggests.

I finished it off with some black splatters like I almost always do! This layout came together so quickly and I am happy to have this story documented. Now I can't wait to see what you are creating based on this sketch, so go to your craft room, make something pretty and share your work in our Facebook Group  or on Instagram and use the hashtag #citrustwistkits so we can see your creations!

Happy crafting,

Melanie 

3-To-Inspire | Amanda Baldwin

Hi CTK Friends! 

Amanda here for today's installment of our awesome 3 - To - Inspire challenge! 

I love a good challenge, and I had such fun creating for this one that I made not one, not two, but 3 layouts to inspire you with today! Lol, what can I say? I love memory keeping & crafts! 

I hope you'll find some time this week to play along too! 

All you need to do is feature the following three prompts in your creating....

1. Use alphas in your project. 

(There are a few varieties in this month's kits - plus we won't mind if you use some from last month too! ;) There are always plenty of alphas left over, right?)

2. Include some die cut shapes or ephemera. 

(Again, there are plenty in this month's kits and oh my heart, the exclusive ones in the PL Kit are divine!!!) 

3. Add a wood element to your page. 

(This could be a wooden embellishment, or even some wood grain pattern paper) 

Easy Peasy (CTK)  Lemon Squeezy!

Before you get started, here are the three layouts that I created for today's challenge.....

"Be-You-tiful"

Isn't this pretty?! 

I have used the gorgeous Little Things Scrapbook Kit, as well as fussy cut butterflies from the Pattern Paper Play Kit, the October Embellishment Kit and the Pinkfresh Studio Liquid Watercolors. I just adore the blue hues and embellishments featured in the Little Things Scrapbook Kit, and they coordinated beautifully with my sweet photograph! You'll spy lots of Crate Paper, Pinkfresh Studio  & Vicki Boutin on this layout! 

Here's a closer look for you......

Aren't those fussy cut butterflies super pretty?!!

And those Liquid Watercolors are just stunning!!! I have used Sapphire, Lavender, & Sky Blue and they're all available in the CTK store HERE. 

Lots of luscious layers of papers & die cut ephemera beneath my photo! I love having ephemera tucked in and around my layout focal points. The wood element in this layout comes from our October Embellishment Kit - the gorgeous gold foiled wood veneer from Pinkfresh Studio! 

The pretty mint alphas for my 'Be-You-tiful' title are from the Scrapbook Kit, and are also from Pinkfresh Studio - LOVE!!!

So.much.pretty in the Little Things Scrapbook Kit!!!
My next layout has a very fresh feel to it.....

"Beautiful Ordinary Life" 

Sigh! Beautiful, indeed! 

It's no secret that I heart me some Pinkfresh Studio, & this is exactly why! 

So clean, fresh & contemporary! A really elegant and beautiful page of my darling daughter! 

All the Pinkfresh Studio goodies here, plus a couple of those super cute inflatable hearts from Amy Tangerine. 

Created with the Little Things Scrapbook Kit and teamed with the fabulous phrase stickers & wood veneers from the Embellishment Kit & paper from the Pattern Paper Play Kit.  Perfection! 

Those floral die cuts have my heart!!! SO pretty! 

The mint alphas add that tiny pop of color to break up all that peach, and add balance to my design. Love it! 

And last, but by no means least, my third layout for this super fun challenge....

"Boy: Slow Down"

Such a fresh & fun page for my darling boy! 

I have opted for a 8.5" x 11" design, and used the beautiful Little Things Pocket Life Kit! I am LOVING the exclusive pattern papers & just had to make a feature of them!

I layer quite a few of them beneath my photo to really draw your eye in. You'll also spot the vintage book paper, and lots of the exclusive die cuts too! 

I use the wood grain pattern paper for the wood element in this layout, as well as the pretty blue alphas to complete the 3-to-Inspire requirements. Such a cool adventure boy page! 

Those alphas are such a gorgeous shade of blue! All the heart eyes for these!

The PL Kits are always jam packed full of exclusive must haves! So good!

And there you have it! Lots of inspirational ideas to get your creativity flowing! 

I can't wait to see what you create for this 3-to-Inspire challenge! 

Need supplies before you begin? Visit the Citrus Twist Kits store HERE

Thanks so much for stopping by today! 

Til next time, 

Happy Arty Days, Amanda xo 

TN Challenge - Put it in a Pocket

Hey Crafty Babes! Andrea back again with a super fun TN Challenge for ya! Currently my go-to format is an open ring traveler's notebook and the beauty of this is that I can insert lots of different items within the rings. In a traditional TN, the pages are stapled and there's no opportunity for moving things around. But I love variety or I get super bored!

On that note, we are going to use pockets in our TN today! I love mixing styles and formats together and adding a 3x8 pocket page to my notebook gives me so much more to work with. We all have thousands of pocket cards, I'm sure of it, so let's use them!

I take a 6x8 pocket page (the design with 4 3x4 pockets) and trim off the column farthest from the holes. For me, this is more economical than buying the 3x8 pocket pages because I already own the 6x8s and I have plenty because I still use them in my other pocket projects! Now you're left with a 3x8 pocket page and you can fill them with all kinds of delicious pocket cards and embellishments from the kits! 

Here I used a piece of the 6x8 paper and trimmed it down to 3x4 for the background. Then I made a cool little label using the stamps and added a tag! And using pockets meant I didn't have to trim down my photos or find a new creative way to layout all the items I wanted to use for this story! 

So what if you're not using a ringed TN and you can't just add in a pocket page. Let's talk about it real quick! One options is: you can trim off the edge of the pocket page where the holes are and use washi tape on both sides of that edge to secure it into the gutter of your notebook. Your pocket may be slightly taller than the notebook so you can trim off the top but also keep in mind that you'll also have to trim the card or photo that goes in that top pocket.

Another option is to place your cards an embellishments in your notebook as if there were pockets. So decorate or journal on the cards and then adhere them to the notebook so they appear to be pocket style! See, everyone can play along!

I sure hope you'll join me for this challenge! Thanks for hanging with me and I hope to see something beautiful you've created with the October kits this month!

Sunday Sketch with Trina, Nathalie & Emma

Hi CTK friends! It's Nathalie, Emma & Trina on the blog with today's Sunday Sketch :)

First up, here is a look at the sketch:

It seems like most days with my daughter, McKenzie, off at college, that my pages tell many of her "away" stories. I'm lucky enough that she calls, texts and sends photos home on a regular basis. This page is sharing one of her stories, so it seems perfect to use this vintage book page from our October Little Things Scrapbooking kit. I started by simply stitching the book page down to my 6" x 8" PL page to create a mini layout.

The little crosses on the sketch inspired me and (mostly) I grabbed from the Scrapbooking kit to fussy cut them from the smaller patterned papers. Pretty much I love sprinkles of anything on my pages!

I also used exclusive patterned papers and embellishments from the Little Things Pocket Life kit that I absolutely love. In addition, the Little Things October Traveler's TN stamp was perfect for stamping sentiments on the page. I used my Tiny Attacher to staple some elements on the page. (Who else uses a Tiny Attacher just for the look of having staples without actually stapling something down?!)

I don't like flat pages and often add foam pop dots beneath some elements to add dimension. I did this with the fussy cut flowers in the photo below.

I can't wait to see what you do with this month's sketch. As you can see, all 3 of us took different approaches to the sketch, so have fun and please share!

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Hello friends!  No surprise that I love a sketch; it's such a huge time saver for me (and life is pretty crazy right now so it's the perfect solution to get a layout finished!).  And this week's sketch is a super fun one.  Here's my take:

I have used this month's Main kit and teamed it up with a few sentiments from this months TN Stamp.

My background paper is plain white cardstock cut slightly smaller than 6x8 so I could back that up with one of the pattern papers (Indigo Hills v2 “Ridge” by Pinkfresh) to create a subtle border around my page.

For the background I used one of the stencils from Vicki Boutin's Field Notes Stencil Set (sadly it's sold out at the moment!).  One of the circle stencils has the exact cross pattern I needed so I just used some modeling paste (left it in white) and positioned them in a few spots on the top left of my page (to match the sketch).

I also hand-cut a few of the crosses from one of the Maggie Holmes papers using my scissors (so they're far from perfect!) and just popped them on top, once the modeling paste had dried ;)

I positioned my photo roughly centered, height wise)  on the right of my page and instead of having 2 photo's like the sketch, I've just used a large die-cut piece to anchor it.  Then I stamped a few sentiments underneath to fill the white space underneath (how perfect is this month's TN stamp?! Love it!).

To finish off the page I added a couple of the flower die-cuts in opposite corners of my page, popped a couple puffy heart stickers on, then added a bit of machine stitching (because my pages feel naked without it) and called it done! 

The only slow part  in putting this page together was waiting for the modeling paste to dry (but even then I just left it sitting under the heater vent in my room so it didn't take long lol).

Take care, Em xo

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Hi there! How awesome are Trina and Emma's designs!  I find sketches a great starting point for a project, as they are a building base of your page; but let me show you my take on the sketch...

I used the Main and Embellishment kits along with the TN stamp set to create my page, and of course a bit of mixed media!

I created my background using some watercolor paper and a few of the Pinkfresh Studio liquid watercolors (available in the CTK shop).  I wanted to bring the blue/purple color in the Indigo Hills 2 ephemera (included in the Main kit) so that all the other colors will stand out.

Next i used an old Heidi Swapp stencil and some texture paste to create the white crosses on the background.  While this dried, i cut a few crosses from some of the papers, and used  a bit of foam adhesive to attached them to page.   I decided to switch the placement  of  the title; so, I added used some gold paint to color one of the wood pieces -included in the Scrapbook kit- and layered a piece of ephemera under it.

I kept pretty true to the sketch from then on.   First i used papers from the kit to back and layer the photos of my son, and then just switch the position of them a bit.   Once in place, i added a few extra stickers from the Embellishment kit, as well as some elements from the cut apart page.  To finish, i added a few sentiments to the page using the TN stamp (love all the phrases included in this month's stamp set!)

I love how easy this was to put together by using the sketch as a blueprint for my page, and mixing in a bit of this month's "Little Things" kit.   

Now it's your turn - we can't wait to see how you interpret this weeks Sunday Sketch. Remember to share them with us in the CTK Facebeook Fan Page!

xo