Behind the Scenes on the Homefront :)

I got a lot of comments on my FabRip flowers during the HomeFront blog hop this week. I decided to do a short tutorial on making those flowers so all of you can try it when you get your hands on the FABULOUS FabRips.

1. Decide how wide you want your flower to be. I wanted a big wide flower for this demo, but it did end up being pretty big. The smaller the strip you use is harder to manipulate...so remember that.

2. Begin pleating the bottom edge only, forming the top edge slowly into a circle.

3. Don't worry, you can always start over if you don't like how its looking :) The FabRips are self adhesive, but the adhesive is weak enough that you can remove it easily and reposition!

4. Keep forming your circle.

5. To end the flower, tuck one end under the other and press together. The strip should stick together. In some of the small flowers I had quite a bit of FabRip strip left. I cut that part off to use later.
6. Add a brad to the center and viola :) A FabRip Flower!!! You will need to glue (or just use your brad) to permanently adhere your flower.

7. To make the center of the largest flower on my layout, I made a strip flower. I cut a skinny strip of FabRips into 3 peices. I made 3 bow loops and used a Crop-a-dile to make a hole in the middle of each of them. I added a brad to the middle of the strip flower and the pleated flower and I stacked them.

Let me know if you have any questions!!!

Member Inspiration

If you haven't noticed Jenni Hufford in the SC gallery, you should have. I love her pretty style, and the little details really make her layouts come together perfectly!

Here is a link to her gallery (I think we should convince her to add more to it!)

Here is some of my favorite layouts of hers:

She added bits from all sorts of places and even though they don't exactly match, they come together perfectly on this layout!

The ribbon and the patterned paper cut outs make this layout for me. I have a couple of blanket babies at my house too, so the story is close to my heart too :)

This photo of Jenni's daughter and that perfect pumpkin are what first drew me into her gallery. I LOVE this!!

The details and photos on this layout are just captivating! That cupcake makes me hyperventilate it is sooooo cute!!

Thanks Jenni for sharing your layouts with the Studio Calico community!!!

Home Front Blog Hop Winners

We'll keep this post updated, so keep checking back to see if your name appears:

April Foster - LotsToScrap
Stephanie Howell - Michelle Wilwand
Lisa Truesdell - Patty B
Emily Pitts - Holly Humbert
Jenn Olson - Denise Nichols
Tina Aszmus - Roberta
Nicole Samuels - Abby

Maggie Holmes - Didee

Kelly Noel - Glynnis

Davinie Fiero - Heather Prins

Nicole Harper - Alison Day
Joy Madison - Beatrice
Celine Navarro - Jenney McAnnally

Grateful for Inspiration

One of my favorite thing about the holidays is looking through magazines and websites and dreaming of what I would do to decorate if I had money and gumption to do so. I just love seeing how different people (and truthfully the magazines) decorate for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The reality of OUR crazy family dinners is "faux" plastic china (from Costco) red drinking cups and lots and lots of food and laughter, but a girl can dream, eh?


Love this simple buffet with a combo of pewter and wood and whiteware. The berry twigs just scream fall, and they can be found in (someone's) yard for free :)

This is another "cheap" idea of turning veggies into candle holders wrapped in ribbon or just hollowed out. Those artichokes are seriously adorable!

Another totally "do-able" paper craft, cut letters out of cardstock or fall colored patterned paper with a Cricut or craft knife, and slip them over candles as covers! I love this idea!

Not really something I'd ever do, but I really like this idea of an all white table. Very modern and wonderful!

I'm always a sucker for multiple things inside of glass pieces. Random, I know. I LOVE LOVE LOVE that big glass hurricane with candles, twigs, acorns and PHOTOS, are you kidding me? PHOTOS! (you must see this bigger, click through, click through!)


That Martha, she (well, her staff) is always a fount of cool decorating ideas. Most of them are do-able by the common (wo)man! I love these corn husk covered votives!!

Glue some acorns onto ribbon, cut leaf shapes for place cards (or press some real leaves) and you're in business!!

Another pressed leaf project. Clear plates sitting on top of a small branch of leaves. Loverly!!!

OMGosh, seriously? The cutest thing EVAH!!! Check out Martha's whole Thanksgiving decor slide show by clicking on that cutie!!


:) This turkey is more my speed. This project totally makes me smile. I have a bunch of nieces and nephews, (and my own 3) and this is a project that we could make at the cabin before we do the big Thanksgiving on paper plates thang ;)

Most of these photos are clickable to other ideas....if you need more inspiration click around through some of the lovely tables I found, and be inspired!!!

Weekly Challenge - Patterned Paper

Hi there! Happy Monday! Hope you are all having a great day and gearing up for a fun Thanksgiving! Personally I can't believe it is already here, but I am trying to ignore the fact that it is almost Christmas so that I can enjoy each day and focus on Thanksgiving first!

Joy and I have the blog this week and we thought that we would focus on Gratitude since it is only fitting, with Thanksgiving being just around the corner!

So, today I am issuing the weekly challenge and it has 2 parts:

1: Use 8 (or more) DIFFERENT patterned papers on a layout or project.

2: Focus on the theme of GRATITUDE for your project.

Yep, that is right -- I said 8 (or more) patterned papers! This will be fun! It is a great way to use up some of your leftover scraps or papers from previous kits. It is also a fun way to experiment with mixing different patterns. You know me - I love to mix patterns and colors and even things that don't necessarily seem to go together. If this is intimidating to you or if you are one that tends to stick to coordinating products, then it will be a great push to think outside the box!

You have until this Saturday to complete the challenge. I will be back to share my layout and I will also draw a winner for a $5 Studio Calico gift card! To enter the drawing you will need to complete the challenge and post it to SC and then come back here and leave us a link to it (on this post). Good luck and have fun!!

Home Front Blog Hop

Studio Calico is sharing part of their home with you by sponsoring a giveaway of their brand new line, Home Front. Imagine June Cleaver styled 1950s domestic bliss. Featuring optimistic colors and smooth vintage inspired patterns. You’ll find fresh stained wood grain, retro home décor, an exclusive SC cardstock alpha set, and much more. Home Front is versatile, colorful, and beautiful (can we say that?)….we think you’ll love it.



Each of the Design Team has a collection to give away on their blogs. Simply visit each below and follow their own instructions and you will have up to 14 chances to win this fabulous collection. Oh, and we're each posting layouts or other designs made with the collection, so you can get some inspiration at each stop along your way. Best of luck!

April Foster
Celine Navarro
Davinie Fiero
Emily Pitts
Jenn Olson
Joy Madison
Kelly Noel
Lisa Truesdell
Maggie Holmes
Nicole Samuels
Nicole Harper
Stephanie Howell
Tina Aszmus



And, since you can't all be winners....this collection is available at many online stores (stopandscrap, amillionlittlethings, and 2peas are the ones I know of off the top of my head) and maybe even your local scrapbook store (if not, there is no minimum order so please ask them to order it).

Sneak Night Winner

The winner of the HOME FRONT collection:

Cynthia Lloréns said...

I love the colors. everything is great! the journaling cards are so fun and the different shapes and elements in the label sheet are fab! congrats on the awesome debut!
Hugs
Cynthia

November 14, 2009 6:37 AM

Congrats! Please send an email to info@studiocalico.com to claim your prize.

Layout of the Week

The layout of the week is brought to you by Gillian Nelson (just g).
Each week, the layout in the gallery is linked, so you can add it to your favorites easily.



This layout has been added to your favorites more than any other layout in the SC community gallery for the week of 11/8-11/14.

Congratulations Gillian! Because of this you have won a $10 gift card to be used on any new purchase at Studio Calico.

Want a chance to win next week? Be sure to upload your projects to the SC gallery, and support your community by adding special projects that catch your eye into your favorites! It could be YOU next week!

Please note, winners are not allowed to win more than once in a four-week period.
Winners are not limited to those using Studio Calico kits.

Tutorial: Creating Your Own Custom Photo Textures!

Remember Emily's tutorial on adding texture to your photographs? Now that you've done that...how about making your own?

I started with the bag that my Studio Calico kit came in.
I punched a few stars and laid them on top of the bag.

I misted several layers and then removed the stars. For the purpose of this tutorial I was going easy and simple to show how quick it really could be--but you could mask, mist and layer to your heart's content!

I let it all dry for a bit.
I took a foil candy wrapper, crumpled and inked it up and then applied that to the bag.

I chose to crumple up my bag for some extra wrinkles and dents.

The next part was taking it outside and photographing it.
I took photos from several angles, making sure to fill the frame.

I also took some other 'textural' photos--the concrete walkway and the siding on the house.

I opened them all up in Photoshop and added them to the photo I wanted to texturize; blending, playing with layer opacity and masking out different portions of each of them to reach my final product.

Now...with a little Photoshop knowledge and an adventurous spirit--you're going to have a great start to your handmade texture collection. Combine your textures, add word art, desaturate them, try stitching, use different blending layers....add different types of texture (see Tina & Celine's ink & paint tutorials, Maggie& April's misting tutorials). In fact, many of the previous Studio Calico Tutorials could be helpful in creating your own textures! Your imagination is truly your only limitation.

A few hints/tips:
Keep your texture image at its largest size--so you're not limited to what size of photo you can use it with.
Start a texture folder (if you haven't already)--you'll be amazed how quickly you'll collect them!
In the beginning, take high quality photos with a deep depth of field (get it all in focus)...when you have a few like that, do the opposite (shallow dof) for effect.
Play with brightness/contrast and/or curves & levels in Photoshop to get different effects out of one photo.

Feel free to email me if you have questions or I can help you in any way. Most importantly, have fun!

Sneak Night Giveaway - Best One Ever!

Studio Calico's debut, release Home Front is now available to your local retailers and is already popping up at some of your favorite online stores. For example, 2peas, amillionlittlethings, stopandscrap, just to name a few.

We're super excited and to celebrate, we're giving away the entire collection to one of our lucky blog readers.

To enter to win, simply leave a comment here and let us know what you like best about the collection.

And, stay tuned for more chances to win.