Hello everyone!
We are so excited to introduce our October 2019 Guest Designer to you all. We have been following her work for a while, and find it always so fresh and beautiful, so we had to ask her to join us this month, and she said, "YES!". So please help us welcome BARBARA PICINICH to Citrus Twist Kits for this month. You are going to love her and her work!
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GET TO KNOW BARBARA
Hello everyone, my name is Barbara and I am a
true California native having lived most of my life near San Francisco in the
Bay Area. Today I live in the Central Valley of California near the State
Capital of Sacramento. I live with my
husband of twenty years and our almost twelve year old daughter. We love to
travel and we are big fans of Disney parks and we also love spending time in Lake
Tahoe and Yosemite. When I'm not scrapbooking I spend my free time sipping
coffee, browsing Instagram, reading, binge watching TV shows, watching YouTube
videos and going to the movies with my husband as often as we can.
Q& A with BARBARA
1. When did you start scrapbooking?
I started scrapbooking
in 1999 right after I got married. My very first project was my wedding album, talk
about starting big! Once that was done I moved on to traditional layouts of
family trips and events. I was never a consistent scrapbooker in the early days
but in 2007 when my daughter was born
I picked it back up again to document her first year and haven’t
stopped since. One thing led to another and I now have a home full of
scrapbooks, layouts and mini albums that I love so much. These days my favorite ways to scrapbook is to make pocket
page albums, mini books and Travelers Notebooks. I don’t worry about being
caught up any more and make projects based on the inspiration I find in
products, stamps and kits. I love just going with the flow and not worrying
about being current all the time.
2. What is something most people would not know about you?
I’m a makeup and
beauty junkie! I love makeup so much that my last corporate job was working in
the regional sales office of MAC Cosmetics as an Executive Assistant and Office
Manager. It’s an industry that I have always loved and its one that I’m still
super drawn to and continue to be inspired by daily. I had the best job in the
world and worked with some of the most creative and inspiring people every day
and I got to be surrounded by makeup and talk about makeup and be with makeup
every day. Talk about a creative high, it was the best! But I left that job
when my daughter was born and I have been a stay at home mom ever since but I
still love makeup and watch trends and stay on top of all of the latest
releases like it’s still my job. I’m also super into watching makeup tutorials
on YouTube in my spare time, it’s so much fun and I love it!
3. What are the 3 scrapbooking products you can’t live without?
Well it’s not a
traditional product per say, but I cannot live without my Canon printer. I
print everything at home because I like to edit and decide sizes on the fly. I
can’t predict where I’m heading so I need to have the flexibility to print at
home. Next would be good black ink. I love to stamp with black ink and having
good ink that I know will give a crisp impression is a must. My favorite is
Staz-on mainly because I like to stamp a lot on vellum so it’s a must for that.
Lastly I would say embellishments, a project is just not done for me if I can’t
add a little heart or star or a die cut. I like things with dimension and
embellishments are where it’s at for me and a project is never complete without
a little something something.
4. What do you love about the October Life Crafted kit – AT MY TABLE-?
Based on what I said
in question three I bet you can already predict my answer, the embellishments!
I really loved the die cuts in the kit this month and the little puffy hearts
were exactly what I love to add to my pages. The colors and the different
shapes and themes were really fun to use.
5. Finish this sentence “If you could see my scrapbooking space now . . . “
It would not
look like the photos below but it will very soon. I love my space so much and I
especially love how much work and time my husband put in to giving me the space
I wanted. He built my standing desk for me to fit into an existing alcove in
our home and it’s just perfect. I love having a space that I can get messy in
and I’m very much a messy scrapbooker. My work surface typically has layers and
layers of things crowding the space but as soon as I’m done I clean up, even in
between projects. I need to mentally clear the decks and have a fresh canvas and
clean space to begin again.
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I’m super excited to share the first
project I made with the At My Table Life Crafted Kit! I have been in love with
the Life Crafted albums since they came out and just finished adding the last
layout to my first album. I just love having a space for Travelers Notebook
sized projects especially since that’s a size that I’m completely drawn to
right now.
This kit gave me everything I love in a
kit; there are embellishments, there are super cute stamps and there are little
pops of gold in the accents. Not to mention it was food related and what’s not
to love about documenting fun food adventures. When I saw all the soft colors
and pretty floral accents I knew I had the perfect photos for this project.
When planning out projects I always start
with photos and for this particular day I had many to choose from so I had to
edit them down to a manageable number that would fit on a travelers notebook
sized space. For me the photos always come first so I’m always trying to come
up with ways to fit as many as I can on to a layout while still leaving room
for the pretty stuff. In this case I had four photos that I felt really told
the story of the day and sized them to 2.25” x 3.25”. The next part of the process for me is laying
out the photos then placing some of the larger embellishments that I know for
sure I want to use on the spread.
Layering pieces is key for me so figuring
out placement is important. I like to lay everything out and then once I’m
happy with the look I start to stick everything down. I’m not big on a lot of
adhesive for several reasons; one you just don’t need that much and two, I tend
to change my mind so using less means I can carefully lift stuff up and move it
around.
When I’m laying out my key embellishments I
am also keeping stamps in mind. It’s important to leave room or at least plan
out what items I might want to stamp on while I’m coming up with my layout. In
this case these little die cuts were perfect for stamping a few of the
sentiments on. I love how dainty they are and I love how they are the exact
right scale for this project and the photos.
This main embellishment cluster is my
favorite part of the spread; I think it’s all the layers and the little bits of
gold from the alpha stickers. These little stickers were perfect to spelling
out the name of the café we visited and the digital tag was the perfect little
accent to the kit die cuts. I also had the perfect amount of space for the tiny
stamped sentiment which was my favorite one on that stamp set.
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We are so in love with what Barbara has created with the AT MY TABLE kit and stamps! Her work is just amazing. She will be back later this month to share a bit more of inspiration with us! Be sure to leave her some love and follow her on social media ( you are going to love all the inspiration she offers in her projects). Thank you so much BARBARA for joining us!
