Prima + Pink Paislee FUN!

It is always a blast to join two manufacturer's products together and just PLAY!

Today I have a sweet, innocent layout up on the Prima blog of my two granddaughters. I LOVED Pink Paislee's Color Wash line and Heidi's Color Shine sprays. They mixed beautifully with Prima products. (And how did Pink Paislee know I needed a pastel line like this?)

These polaroid frames were some of my FAVES! I just printed out 3x3 inch photos and added those amazing frames right on top! Easy-peasey and I LOVE how they look together on a page. And Prima's wood icons? Some of my favorites. I love them natural...but I think they are even better colored with some Color Shine happiness!

Prima also has two amazing give-aways today...one on their blog and one on their Facebook page, so HOP on over to those and throw in your hat. You will LOVE the mix of products!

Did I mention the beautiful projects by PP team right here? I was just blown away. They are GORGEOUS! And inspiring! Now I cannot wait to sit down and scrap some more photos of my sweet granddaughters this week-end!

#primapinkpaislee #watercolorfun

Prima & Echo Park Hop!

Echo Park and Prima decided to pair up and do a little blog hop together! Our products work so well together! You can see Prima's give-aways here and Echo Park here!


(And a cool tidbit: Jen and I lived in Savannah at the same time and taught at our LSS! Now we have both moved away and are coordinators for design teams with these two fab companies! It's a small world after all!)

 So it was extra sweet to work on this switcheroo together!

Here is my guest spot featured on EP's blog! I loved working with their lines!
 





Sweet Girl Mini Album
Echo Park's collection, Sweet Girl, is filled with fabulous colors and delightful patterns! Prima is known for their romantic products, but they work perfectly for bright, cheery lines as well. I had so much fun adding flowers, wood icons, washi tape, pearls and clips to the Little Girl mini featuring my two granddaughters. This brag book is surprise gift for Amariah, 3, who just gained a little sister. She can carry it around with her and show it off to everyone! Don't we all need a brag book to carry with us?

Echo Park:
Sweet Girl papers, stickers

Prima:

Lady Bird Vintage Trinkets-563578

Wood Icons-563875

Pearls-300456

Songbird Pearl-553937

Zephyr Leaves-562502

Sun Kiss Flowers-555658

Zephyr Alphas- 559175
Serenade Roses-561451

Cabaletta Pink Flowers- 561758

Lyrique Felt Flowers-562069

Washi Tapes: 561178 (Welcome to Paris); 561185 (Rondelle)

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Love This Little Face Layout

This layout was absolutely wonderful to put together (in no time at all). Add the beautiful papers from the "Sweet Girl" collection. Then add flowers, pearls, leaves, washi tape, and a bit of Prima Packaging (black banners). Prima works very hard on their packaging so you get a FREE product and less waste.

 

Echo Park:

Sweet Girl papers, stickers

Prima:

Wood Icons - 563875

Pearls - 300456

Zephyr Leaves - 562502

Sun Kiss Flowers - 555658

Serenade Roses - 561451

Washi Tapes: 561178 (Welcome to Paris), 561185 (Rondelle)

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Family Layout

Beautiful Life is appropriately named! The papers and sticker accents work wonderfully with any family photo. I chose my favorite family photo (yes, we are a big family now that we have older girls with significant others, and a few granddaughters.) Add a few of the fun paper/sticker accents to create a colorful layout base...then top with Prima flowers, leaves, crystals and wood buttons for stunning results.

Echo Park Collection: Beautiful Life

Prima Products:
Tivona White Flowers- 557164
Welcome to Paris Leaves- 562380
Clear Crystal Sheets- 565053
Sunrise Sunset Wood Button- 564957
Welcome to Paris Roses- 562359

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Hope you enjoyed these projects! 

TFL!

:) Sharon

(inter)National Scrapbooking Day!

 

Today is National Scrapbooking Day in the states and Prima is having an AMAZING blog hop! So if you are working your way down their list, welcome! You are at the right place! (Make sure you scroll all the way down for the blog list and a GIVE-AWAY!)

Prima also has a wonderful line-up of LIVE classes, including my layout class shown here at 9 AM eastern time!

Here is a direct link to the Prima ustream channel. Hop on over and watch a class or two today. The classes go ALL day long. There will be prizes and lots of fun to be had on the chats.

  .....................................

The layouts shown above don't have a lot of my normal feminine touches. And that's cool. Since I have a few older boys I thought I would play around with some of our newest metals, stencils, gesso, stamps, and so on. (My boys REALLY appreciate me NOT adding flowers to their layouts. Imagine that!)

I love the cleaner graphic & bright effect on this layout of Billy using Lady Bird.  It totally fits his personality and his photo!

You can achieve this bright look with PanPastels and a stencil! (Use a neutral backdrop paper like this one in the Lady Bird line so your attention is on the photo and techniques.)

Just set the stencil on the paper (I use washi tape on the sides to help secure it to the paper. When you are done coloring you can pull it up easily and it will not tear your paper.)

Start with the lightest color of PanPastel first, then work your way through to the darkest color.

(Just make sure you seal it once you are happy with the colors. I use SpectraFix which is safe to spray inside and has no nasty fumes.)

Next add a photo mat with foam squares, chipboard shapes, stickers and crystals. Add the photo with foam adhesive to pop it up off the page a bit.


Staple some twine to the page with a Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher to mimic the chevron pattern for a nice GUY touch.

Create a banner flag with our stickers (and a toothpick!) and tuck it under the photo.

Stamp all your important dates and sayings on the stickers with these cool roller stamps by Smash and Dear Lizzy! I use them ALL the time.

 That's it!


My other layout is about my 16 year old,  Brayden. It definitely has a different look than the first layout.  You can see the whole layout created in my class so check it out! (All shows are recorded in case you cannot catch them live.)

Prima Supplies

• 922375, 922351 DD Art Stencil
• 891671, 891633 Tiny Junkyard Findings
• 562861, 562908 Alphas
• 890995, 891003, 891015 Comfort Craft Chalk Fluid Edgers
• 960353, 960261 Mechanicals by Finnabair
• 960124 Clear Stamp- Sunrise, Sunset
• 564377 Washi Tape Stamp
• 563042 Clear Stamp-Engraver
• 564896 Lifetime Washi Tape

Other:

• Fiskars Star Punch
• Ranger Studio Gesso
• Ranger Archival Black & Brown Ink
• shipping tag
• orange twine
• Color Shine: BlackVelvet
• Glimmer Mist: Dark Denim
• Fabri-Tac by Beacon

Here's the video!



Video streaming by Ustream


So what do you think? Ready to try a few of these techniques on your next project? Leave me a comment and I will pick one person to win this fabulous prize on May 13th. Open to all countries.

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Here is the list for the blog hop!

Prima Blog
Sharon Laakkonen (You are here!)

Cari Fennell
Jamie Dougherty 
Frank Garcia 
Nic Howard
Janine Koczwara  
Heidi Kelley 
Brit Sviggum
Trina McClune 
Gerry van Gent
Lene Bjornerud 
Magda Bolinska  
Anna Dabrowska
Maiko Kosugi  
Felicity Wilson  
Larissa Albernaz 
Marie-Nicolas Alliot 
Louise Nelson  
Juliana Montoya  
Steph Devlin
Stephanie Miller
Solange Marques
Lea Lawson

My Jump Start Post!!!

I am so excited to be a part of Nathalie's AMAZING Jump Start 2013 Summit!!!

I have a special prize just from me for one of YOU! Just leave a comment on NAT's site where the video is hosted! (not here!!!! Although I would love to hear from you here too!)

So go sign up for Jump Start and get the video emails sent right to you!

And here are a few shots of my projects featured, along with a close-up or two from the video..

Let me know if you have ANY questions, okay?

Challenge-to use NO flowers on my son's page. I always use flowers so lately I have been trying hard to scrap some more masculine pages. Now, my 8 year old son doesn't mind flowers on his pages (YAY), but the 19 year old...that's another story! See the tucked in tag for journaling? I misted lightly over a mask to create some dimension on it.

I also used a few decorative wood elements that I got as a gift from Zarza Laser in Brazil! I loved making the page even more special with them.

Prima's Reflection mirrors are perfect for a guy's page. They are sturdy, yet reflective, adding a unique element to the design.

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Next up is a very special Christmas card I made for Gerry van Gent as part of the Prima DT Christmas card swap! (Shown before, but I love using tags for cards and had these pics handy!) Isn't it exciting to send something to someone who will appreciate all your hard work?

Sometimes when I get stuck making a card I decorate a tag and add it to a card base. It just opens up the path to creativity for me!

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My last project using tags is this sweet layout of my granddaughter's first birthday. I added supplementary photos & trimmed them to fit the chevron bags at the top. I think I stuffed almost 12 extra party photos in those two pockets. Some photos are added to tags for extra journaling space.

The bonus technique can be found on the video using Golden Glass Bead Gel and a Prima mask! You are going to LOVE the glimmer and sparkle it adds to your tags!!!



So-I hope you were inspired just a bit to get your creativity going! THANK YOU for stopping by!

~ Sharon

That Zephyr Line is GORGEOUS!

Oh, yes, it is!!!

I wasn't sure if I would like the bright colors,

but they make my heart happy...

...especially when you get to scrap this little sweet pea!

I asked Amariah (my granddaughter) to pick up her toys.

She did not want to listen to me.

So she gave me that pouty look.

Of course I cracked up...which made her crack up. 

And now she thinks I am wrapped ALL the way around her pinky. :)

The silly girl!

(I think she's right though.)

Prima and Rondelle

Prima just started posting their CHA sneak peeks! And I am in LOVE with this line:

Rondelle

It's soft and feminine, yet it has bold contrast

AND

Polka-dots!!!!! 

I love polka-dots!

Here is one layout I made using it:



























That's my oldest daughter, Bethany, and her daughter, Amariah.  I love this picture and was saving it for a special layout to frame.

Hoping to post some more projects soon! Keep watching the Prima blog, the Educator Blog, and our Facebook Fan Page for more projects & give-aways!

Prima Scraplift Challenge

I was really excited to participate in Prima's "Scraplifting Each Other" challenge! 

My project is inspired by fellow Prima designer, Anna-Maria Wolniak. (I would have LOVED to have been assigned ANY of the DT gals. They are all super, super talented!) 

Besides the amazing texture Anna-Maria creates with art mediums, she always has a fun, colorful, yet feminine touch to each project. It was hard to narrow down the choices of which layout to lift! Each one of her designs is simply gorgeous and so inspiring.

I finally chose one she did a few months ago for our PPP challenge. I LOVE her colors, her placement of elements, and her whimsical artsy touches across the page (and what a sweet title!) I focused on these three areas and came up with my own interpretation using Prima's flocked rub-ons for a major source of texture.

This layout features one of the only shots I have of all seven of my kiddos (and grand daughter) with my in-laws. They JUST came down to see Britt graduate from college last week. I think we overwhelmed them a bit. Our house is NEVER dull. Or quiet. Imagine that. Haha!

 

(Go Green tip: use the negatives from the flocked rub-ons too! They will provide a fun little piece of texture for FREE! )

Here's a close-up of our resist canvas butterflies. I LOVE those resist pieces. So fun to color and customize. On this layout I used PanPastels to color them. Gorgeous colors and so EASY to use.

Anna-Maria always adds artsy little touches to her page for some contrast.  I seriously LOVE that! So I copied her. :)

Above: More flocked rub-ons and a masking technique using PanPastels again.

Hope you enjoyed the scraplift feature! Our whole team is participating so check out the Prima blog each Friday this month for more samples.

Prima Products:

• 844059, 844042, 844080 Songbird paper
• 550844, 550851 Flocked Rub-Ons
• 544699 Resist Canvas Butterfly
• 891084, 891176 Prima Chalk Ink
• 550042 Gate Mask
• 544324 Pink Alphas

Other:
circle punch, seam binding, glitter paint, Ranger turquoise paint, PanPastels, glass bead gel, modeling paste, Ranger Tiny Attacher, Ranger Enamel Accents, date stamp, doily


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