3 to Inspire with Alena

Hello friends! I am so excited and thrilled to be joining the CTK DT!! I hope you will enjoy seeing my projects every month! Today I am bringing to you my  3 To Inspire challenge!
This week's 3 to Inspire prompts are:

1. Include hand-cut items on your layout/spread.
2. Use the Puffy Alphabet.
3. Stitch (machine, hand).

I have used the July "Skyland" Pocket Life and July "Skyland"Scrapbook kits + July 2018 Travelers Notebook "Not My Best Moment" Stamp.

I like all the kits this month - perfect for summer photos. This spread is  pretty simple, but it's all about bright accents.

The main elements are hand-cut flowers from patterned paper, which were sewn to the card. I added words of Puffy Alphabet to make my spread look harmonious. And also added a few phrases, using a stamp.

 Use the three (3) prompts to create your own project and share it with us on our Facebook Fanpage! 

Thanks for stopping by and I hope that you have a great day!

Product Highlight - PATTERNED PAPER

Hello CTK friends!

Anna and Nathalie with you today to shine the spotlight on Patterned Paper.  Let's be honest, we all have a stash of paper we are keeping to document that special memory, and this month's Skyland  Scrapbook, PL kit, Patterned Paper Play and Outside Stories kit are filled with beautiful papers. But before you put them away in your stash, let us show you how you can combine and use them in your projects.  First up is Nathalie.

Hi there!,  Nathalie here to bring you a bit of inspiration using a few of the patterned papers from this month's Skyland kits.  This month, the papers are gorgeous, filled with fun designs, and perfect to document all your memories.

For my layout, i wanted to create a very coastal mood for the page, as it documents a picture of my daughter after spending a day basking in the sun on the beach. For this i picked papers from the Skyland Scrapbook Kit, PL kit, Patterned Paper Play kit and also used a digital card to create a patterned paper for this page.  

What better way to use paper and mix patterns than to crate paper flowers. I used a combination of cut files (Silhouette Store) and some dies to create the centers and petals of the flowers.  I used a bone folder to add some movement to the petals. Some of the flowers were layered together, so that they add dimension to the page.

Along the way,  i added a few die cut leaves  (Maya Road die) cut from white cardstock (color a few with green paint, too), so that they will form clusters around the picture and the entire page.   A few of the Scrapbook kit embellishments and elements from the cut apart sheet also were added along the clusters to embellish the page. Finally a few sentiments using the Conversation Starter Stamp complete this page.

Really, the patterns and designs on this month's Skyland kits are gorgeous, and easy to combine in your projects, so do not put them away (not yet at least!).

Well that is all for me, now it is time for Anna to show you her gorgeous project and give you a new take on how to use all the beautiful papers in the Skyland kits.

xo

Hi dear CTK friends! Anna here bringing you some more patterned paper inspiration made with the July Skyland Kits. But first, don't you love Nathalie's beautiful layout!? So much to love about that, as always with Nathalie's work. Pure happiness:)

Anyway, my layout is made with a combo of Skyland  Scrapbook kit, PL kit, Mixed Media kit and one of the gorgeous July Cut Files.

And here's what I came up with.

I decided to let a part of the gorgeous Simple Stories paper be the focal point and "queen of the page" since backing this lovely "Celebrate" Cut file with it as my BIG title. I love how this turned out.

For my background I've been playing around with the two pink acrylic's from the Mixed Media kit and a few ordinary color mists from my stash. Just smooshing (or as Vicki Boutin said, "Kissing" lol!) my paper with a plastic bag prepped with color until I'm satisfied with the result.

Look at these lovely layers of pattened papers, yummy!

And here's another stack of layers, a combo of papers, cotton and die-cuts, beautiful! Also there's a good idea to tuck some epoxy stickers or other embellishments within/underneath your layers of paper.

The colors and design of the papers in this kit (and all of the past CTK kits as well, lol!) are perfectly unperfect matched with the stickers and other goodies in the kit. Trina is the queen of making kits, thats the way it is, can't help it.

Well that is all for me and us! Now it's your turn to dig into your kits, packed with gorgeous pattened papers, and play along with us here at CTK. Be sure to hang on with our weekly challenges and don't forget to share them with us at the CTK Fan Page. Also,please do hashtag us, #citrustwistkits, so we can see and enjoy all of your beautiul creations.

If you still haven't signed up for a kit (or more) by your own, don't wait to long they are tending to selling fast :) Just click here and you are home!

Thanks for stopping by! Take care! Anna xo

Tuesday Tutorial with Nathalie

Hi there!  Nathalie with you today bringing you a few ideas on how to put those 3x8 bookmarks (available in the Digital Files section of the CTK shop) to work with this month's Skyland kits.  What can i say,  I love adding variety to my Traveler's Notebooks, and having the option of  creating hybrid entries for my journal is not only fun, but also a fast way to put a TN layout together.

 The 3x8 cards are designed to work on all your memory documenting.   Since my prefered way of daily memory keeping is a TN, I want to show  a quick video on  how easy it is to work with the cards on Photoshop, so here we go:

Isn't that easy?  But don't be discouraged if you don't have access to Photoshop, you can still work with the digital cards by printing them and adding them to your projects.    In fact, i have created 2 projects one with a hybrid option, and the next just using a print from the digital files.

The first project features a card that was designed on Photoshop, as seen on the video.  Once the page was printed, i  trimmed a bit off the edges and framed it with the Heidi Swapp paper (it has a very soft rose design on it), and added a small  floral ephemera piece at the bottom of the page.

 The same paper was used to back the picture, which was then mounted on the Pinkfresh Studio paper that matches the floral cluster element at the bottom of the hybrid page, all these papers are included in the Skyland Scrapbook kit.  To complete the page, I added a few stamped sentiments using the Conversation Starter set and a few drops of gold ink.    This entry took no time to put together!

Now, this entry was created by printing the  3x8 bookmark cards without using Photoshop.  First I added my journal on the card using a typewriter, and glued it to one side of the TN entry.  The photo strip was then backed with the matching paper from this month's Skyland PL kit, and glued to the opposite side of the layout.

Once again, since the card is holding the journal lines, and has a title built  in, I chose to only add a few more embellishments.   This month's cut apart element page (available for free at the Citrus Twist Kits shop) is amazing!,  so i combined a few of the cut aparts with pieces from the Skyland PL kit.  Once again i added a few stamped sentiments using the Conversation Starter stamp set (Check this stamp set out, it is amazing, and filled with so many possibilities!) to complete the page.

Well that is for me for today!  Do not forget to check all the new July kits, and while you are at the shop also add a few of the CTK digital files to your cart;  these are great options to stretch your kits, and add variety to your memory keeping.

Remember to share your projects using CTK products and digital files in our Facebook Fan page or in social media (please tag @citrustwist kits).    I am looking forward to seeing what you create this month.

XO

Sunday Sketch with Kira

Hello again friends!  It's Kira and I am back with a 12x12 scrapbook layout for the Sunday Sketch.

Here's a look at the sketch I will be using:

And here's a look at my finished layout:

I stuck fairly close to the sketch this week.  And I used mostly pieces from the PL kit, along with a few items from the main kit.

I started by trimming my photos down to 2.5"x2.5".  My youngest son is obsessed with splash pads, and lucky for him, we visit one every week at the farmers market we go to on Sundays.  I have so many photos of him just giddy with excitement as he plays in the water. I printed the photos in black and white since there were a lot of colors going on in the original photos and his shirt was red...which isn't conducive to the type of colors I like to use in my scrapbooking.  Lol.

Since I printed in black and white, I was able to pull in whatever colors I liked to my layout.  And the first paper that called to me was this blue and yellow floral in the PL kit.  Isn't it gorgeous?!  I cut a 1" strip to layer behind my photos.

I played off the blue in the floral print by bringing in this cornflower blue striped paper to layer behind each of the photos.

I was flipping through the PL cards when this speech bubble card jumped out at me.  I thought it would look so cute to use speech bubbles instead of squares, like the sketch suggests, so I fussy cut each of those out. 

I drew some squares on the right side of my layout with a pencil and then picked a matching blue thread to stitch over the top of the squares.  I chose a simple title, Fun, for my layout using the Wild Heart glitter Thickers.

I finished off the layout with some flower and heart ephemera from the PL die cut pack.  And it was complete after I added some typed journaling.

I can't wait to see how everyone uses this sketch!  Thanks for stopping by!

xo, Kira

3-to-Inspire with Nathalie

Hi there!

Nathalie with you today with  the first challenge of the month.  The new "Cypress" kits are so gorgeous, that i was inspired to create two projects using the same prompts in different formats.  But before i show you what i created, let me share this week's challenge prompts:

• Use a limited color palette
• Add stitching (either hand, machine or faux stitching) to your project
• Use digital elements (cut files, cut apart sheets, etc)

 Here is the first of two projects created with these prompts:

This month's Cypress PL kit is packed with CTK exclusives, and totally sublime designs and colors, plus the Scrapbook kit includes a Traveler's Notebook Insert which is the one i am using for this page. My choice was to use all things pink (or that had pink) in this layout.

I chose to layer some of the  printable digital PL cards behind the picture.  I love having the option of sizing the cards to fit into my projects, plus I can easily print them on copy paper which helps to reduce the bulkiness of the pages.

To balance the picture, I created a large cluster of elements from the June 2018 cut apart sheet.  I added a bit of journaling to one of the pieces, and then just layered more cut outs around it.  I used very little tape on this page, as i chose to secure most of the layout using some sewing machine stitching.

Love how easy it was to put this together following this week's prompts.  But now, let me show you the second project created with the same prompts.

The inspiration for this page was the acrylic pieces that are included in the  Cypress Scrapbook kit,  the color of the acrylic was the inspiration for this layout's cooler palette.  The teal/ light blue color in the background (created using this month's Mixed Media add on) provides the perfect  canvas for the  picture and embellishments.

This month's digitals are  amazing, from cut files to the cut apart sheet,  so i took advantage of the Doodle Heart cut file to create this layering die cut, and then pulled all the pieces from the cut apart sheet that followed the color palette, and used them to embellish the page.

Once again, I chose to secure some of the pieces (cut out and map) to the page using a bit of machine stitching.   The texture it adds to the page is lovely, but also i chose to leave a large tail behind each stitching line, so that it adds to the movement of the page - think of it as water waves-.   

This page came together so nicely using this month's Cypress main, embelishment and mixed media kits.  The following video will show you a more in-depth look at how this page came together:

Now it is your turn to use this three prompts to create projects of your own.  Remember to tag Citrus Twist Kits (use the handle @citrustwistkits or hashtag #citrustwistkits) when sharing your projects on social media.   You can also share your finish projects in the Citrus Twist Kits Friends page on Facebook.  

I cannot wait to see how you use these prompts, and all the projects created with this month's Cypress kits.  Remember I am always a comment away of you have questions on how any of the projects came together.

XO

Nathalie

3-to-inspire with Kristel

Hi all! 

Today I have another fun 3-to-inspire project for you;  made with this month's Malibu Pocket Life kit - which is filled with so many pretty goodies, yet again!
I also used all of this month's kit-stamps and single stamp sets, to add some fun details.

I started this page by choosing some of the cardstock stickers from the kit and placing them, along with some fun stamping. I just went from left to right, as if I was writing, using
various phrases and colors.

When I was done filling up the left page, it was time to add some background to the right page.
I chose a paper from the kit and added a PL card behind my photo.

I added a little detail with some cute embellishments and this layout was finished!

Today's 3-to-inspire prompts are:
* Combine stamping and word stickers to fill up a page
* Use various fonts and colors to add more interest
* Use one of the papers from the kit as a full background on your other page

I hope you like this 3-to-inspire and I wish you a lot of fun with it!
Have a lovely weekend and until next time!

Love, Kristel

“Love This” Pocket Pages by Suzanna Stein

Hey there, crafty pals! I’m so excited to be back sharing another project and post here on the Citrus Twist Kits’ blog!

If you’re anything like me, you might forget to take pictures in the moment, and then find yourself trying to document small stories with only a few photos. Today, I’m going to share a few tips on how to work with just a couple photos and tell a small story in a full layout!

For this layout, I wanted to tell the story of a fun lunch date - I only took 2 photos (one before we left and one in the car), the photos are very similar, and my story isn’t super long.

A lot of everyday moments and memories end up like this, and if you’re not a weekly pocket page scrapper, these little stories can go untold.

I started out with my two photos, and then chose 6 cards from the kit that I liked together. I chose the placement of my photos - because these two photos are so similar, I chose to put them on opposite ends of the layout.

When deciding on the “ratio” of cards, I used this model: 2 decorative, 2 title, 2 journaling.

By following a layout model, or ratio, for layouts like this, I am able to go into it with a plan and not feel lost or overwhelmed. I started by embellishing my decorative cards, since this was the simplest step.

Then, I moved to embellishing my photos.

From there, I worked on my title cards - I used one for a very descriptive “title” or large sentiment, and the other for a general sentiment that described how I felt about the story I was telling.

I’m a person of few words when it comes to my layouts. I usually go with a sentence or two and let the photos tell the story. With a story like this, where the photos don’t tell very much, except who I was with, using your feelings on the moment can make a huge difference!

Thinking outside the box with the cards you choose can also make a big difference. The “Here & Now” grid card was perfect because there isn’t a ton of journaling on that card, but when you’re looking at it, it seems as though it tells a big part of the story of this layout!

I also used stamps to fill in empty spaces on cards throughout the layout. It’s a subtle step, but makes a huge difference in the overall layout.

I really love the way this layout turned out and am so happy I documented this small everyday moment. These are the memories I love to look back on, and I know in the future, I won’t care how many photos I had, how similar they were, etc. All that matters is that the story was documented!

Whether the memory is huge and you have tons of photos, or it’s a small everyday moment with just a photo or two - I encourage you to document it and don’t be afraid of using an entire layout for it - every memory is special!

I’ll be sharing more crafty goodness with the Savannah kit throughout the month over on Instagram!
Thanks for reading!

- Suzanna