Category: Videos

CKC Kit Build, January ’24

I love kit building and that is why I am on the design team for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge project. We take an inspiration kit each month and proceed to replicate it, or as we say, counterfeit it. This is a free, friendly group that helps inspire you to use up supplies you already own. We are not about needing to buy the latest and greatest thing (though we won’t stop you if you enjoy new crafty goodies๐Ÿ˜‰ ).

Welcome to the new year. There are just a couple of changes happening over at CKC that I want to tell you about. First, we’ll be including extra inspiration for you every month! Second, our team has had a few people need to step away and we need a few newbies to take their place. We have a design team call open and if you’re interested, we are a relaxed crew of scrappers who just like to share ideas and inspiration.

With the business out of the way we can start the new year of inspiration with a scrapbook kit build! I do want to take a moment to welcome our guest designer right away. Kristen, aka Scrapping on the Fly on both YouTube and Instagram, is joining us this month. Kristen shared this little info about herself

“Hello! My name is Kristen, I am the proud mom of two, mostly, grown kiddos and a lover of all things scrapbooking! Making the memories to scrapbook, buying the collections and crafty tools, organizing all the fun stash and, of course, using all the different craft things to make a layout! I started my fist official scrapbook in 1996 and have been creating ever since! โค๏ธ“

Give Kristen a big welcome on her socials or over on our Facebook group! Now we can get to the pretty paper. To start, here is our inspiration kit. It is the very recent December 2023 kit from Hip Kit Club. Take a look at what we have to inspire us.

I was inspired by a few things in this kit. The tree trunk paper with the birds was a starting point for me. I knew I wanted something nature leaning. The next stop in my thinking was plenty of plaids based just on one single print. I also wanted to include some snowflakes without getting too wintery. I did like a lot of the wintery branches and foliage so that got added to the kit as well. With those icons included, I next turned to the color inspiration. I used a palette of light & dark blues, yellow, and pops of red and green.

So these are the papers I came up with. Notice the left side is plaid heavy. That just felt so cozy to me for the season.

For the embellishments I leaned heavily into cozy and homey icons, as well as the woodland critters. Since one of my papers had a bit of gold I also added that into my embellishments. What I forgot to make sure was in my picture was a sticker book from Simple Stories that has homey icons I want to use. It also include some alpha stickers. Which, leads me into the second thing I didn’t photograph โ€” the plain black foam that I’ll be die cutting with an alpha die set for my titling.

Don’t forget that each month I also create my own elements to add into my kit. I have much of that done but don’t have the photos edited just yet. You can join me on the 4th for the full reveal of those items.

There is a tradition over at CKC of titling our kits just like companies do. So I’m calling mine…

Comfy & Cozy Are We

If you want more details on my kit building thought process, check out my kit build video. [[Coming soon!]]

I hope you can follow along with the other designers and see how they interpreted their own kits.

Hereโ€™s the full hop link list

Have fun kit building and don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

I’ll be back on the 4th, for our Product Forgeries. Until then, have an artful day!

Freebie Friday, Dec 2023

I’ve been trying to offer freebies to you every month from sketches to cut files to printable papers & embellishments. Well… my energy fell away over the summer and I have not been able to get anything new out. However, I am here to release a couple of items for the Christmas season.

Sketch

First up I have a lovely holiday sketch for you

This one definitely takes the holiday seriously. However, if you don’t celebrate Christmas, OR if you want more flexibility for this sketch, turn it sideways! Once it is sideways it looks like an arrow which can be used for many stories. Take a look at the two ways I put it to use.

If you want more thought process on how I put these layouts together, I have a video for you.

If you’d like to download this one, here are the links. If you want more sketchy fun, check out my entire back catalog of sketches.

DECEMBER 2023

  • Download
  • files types include:
    pdf, psd, jpg
  • Released Dec ’23
  • See video

๏ปฟ

Cut File

If you are a cut file lover, I’ve got you covered! I’ve created a cut file very similar in feel and style to the sketch above. Check it out.

Christmas Tree

  • Download
  • File types include:
    jpg, svg, png, Silhouette Studio
  • Released Dec ’23

That’ll wrap up this post, as well as this year. Happy holidays to everyone. See you in the new year.

SCT Sampler Kit Unboxing, November ’23

Getting my SCT Sampler kit in the mail each month is a bright spot. This small affordable package is just enough newness + surprise to keep me satisfied. Yet, this package is coming to an end. The kit is being discontinued after December. Read down below for a sneak at what is coming next for me. But first let’s check out this month’s kit.

As is typical for November, this month’s kit is Christmas related. While I don’t do a lot of very themed scrapbooking, getting just a few new holiday themed products is a little treat. I especially loved the die set, stamp set, and gold embellishments this time around.

I wouldn’t want to leave you wondering just what to do with these supplies. So I almost always make a project as soon as my box arrives. That way I am sure to use it instead of just showing it off. This time around I made a Christmas layout using some color blocking with my 6×6 papers to build up a 12×12 layout.

So, now that the SCT kits have almost come to an end, what is next for SCT and what is next for me? I did talk on this topic in my reveal video (below) so I will leave you to check that out. What I did mention is that I know I want a monthly goody selection and I considered many options! Here is the list of companies I considered. As of now, I believe I have chosen which company I will use so stay tuned next month as I reveal which one met the most of my needs!

I’ll be back soon with more crafty goodness. Until then, have an artful day.

CKC Kit Build, November ’23

I love kit building and that is why I am on the design team for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge project. We take an inspiration kit each month and proceed to replicate it, or as we say, counterfeit it. This is a free, friendly group that helps inspire you to use up supplies you already own. We are not about needing to buy the latest and greatest thing (though we won’t stop you if you enjoy new crafty goodies๐Ÿ˜‰ ).

We have arrived at the final CKC kit of 2023. I can’t believe the year is almost over. I’m feeling it in my bones though. It has been a long, tiring year, but I digress.

Before we move into this final kit inspiration let’s welcome… Silvia Jorke! Silvia is a scrappy friend of our fearless leader, and November hostess, Lisa. You can find Silvia on her Instagram account. I hear she is a prolific project maker so you should be able to find lots of inspiration!

Now we can get to the inspiration kit for this month. We have the November ’22 kit by Hip Kit Club. Hip Kit is a big, popular, original product club company with a big following and lots of product and inspiration. The November kit is always Christmas Holiday inspired.

I don’t prefer my kits to be highly or specifically themed since my heart is in everyday moments scrapping. That is the beauty of CKC! I can be inspired by a lovely kit to pull together my own fresh prettiness and collate what works so well for me. So let’s dive in.

Notice that there are a few holiday specific papers, but many of the papers are just highly patterned paper in a holiday color scheme. So my shift in kit will keep the pattern, focus on cozy colors and ditch the Christmas. I’m not anti-Christmas here, mind you. I will just go to my holiday file when I need the theme. LOL.

So these are the papers I came up with. I pulled lots of blue, a teal sweater style print, plaids and a couple of light & bright yellows, and pinks to replace the reds. All have great pattern to them. All papers are by Pink Fresh studio since the Hip Kit work often reminds me Pink Fresh.

Here is a look at the embellishments. I did far less planning with the embellishment and just went with my gut. I sorted through a pile of Pink Fresh embellishments and just grabbed anything that grabbed me! I found texture, color and any little phrases caught my attention the most. As for alphas I *think* the inspiration kit had a woodgrain alpha (hard to tell from the pic), so I started with that and then added in blue, and neutrals for a variety. Also included is a small scale alpha book for my mix-and-match font titles. As a final touch I have a jar of Lunar Paste since HKC always offers a mixed media add-on.

Don’t forget that each month I also create my own elements to add into my kit. Of course these are inspired by the original kit, but often have a twist of their own. So don’t miss what I will make in just a couple of days.

There is a tradition over at CKC of titling our kits just like companies do. So I’m calling mine…

Winter Peace

If you want more details on my kit building thought process, check out my kit build video. However, again this month, my thoughts were captured pretty well here in this post!

I hope you can follow along with the other designers and see how they interpreted their own kits.

Hereโ€™s the full hop link list. I’m not on the official hop this time as I’m taking on the mini-kit role this month. However, I always do the main kit no matter what my role is!

Have fun kit building and don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

I’ll be back on the 4th, for our Product Forgeries. Until then, have an artful day!

CKC Kit Build, October ’23

I love kit building and that is why I am on the design team for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge project. We take an inspiration kit each month and proceed to replicate it, or as we say, counterfeit it. This is a free, friendly group that helps inspire you to use up supplies you already own. We are not about needing to buy the latest and greatest thing (though we won’t stop you if you enjoy new crafty goodies๐Ÿ˜‰ ).

I’d like to start by welcoming Laurie Crouse Winiarski as our guest designer for the month of October. She’ll be sharing her work over on the CKC Facebook group, so be sure to follow along over there.

To start our kit this month, here is our inspiration kit. It is the October ’22 Limited Edition kit by My Creative Scrapbook. I don’t know much about their company. I do know that they have these simple compilation images of their previous kits. Finding more details is a bit challenging. However, our CKC team hostess this month, Leslie, was able to get us a breakdown of kit contents. She also linked us up to CityScrapper’s YouTube channel where she unboxes the entirety of this kit, if you want all the details. Below this overview photo is a sample of some of the papers and products, but not the entirely of the collection.

This kit was LOADED up with 49 & Market papers and embellishments. I honestly was feeling a bit overwhelmed by the amount of florals in this collections and I really wasn’t sure where I was going to go with my kit. I thought I would just take inspiration from the mixed media painterly effect. However, the very first item I looked at in my stash was a floral that worked perfectly. Plus, it was a floral in an entire paper pad of florals. So, boom. Paper choice done. What will I do with all the florals? I’m not sure yet, but I know the b-sides will play a big role in my crafting this month.

This is the DCWV Wildflowers pad and not only do the watercolor elements work with the 49 & Market inspiration, but the color palette is pretty good too..

With that choice done, I grabbed just a few embellishments to add in. I wanted to keep things easy. I had a busy September, ending with a recently sick kiddo, and I’m moving into a mad October. So, yeah, easy is required.

I added in kraft cardstock since there were some raw chipboard embellishments in the original kit (there is a peek of that in the overview picture). Dies will be used to create faux chipboard pieces. The embellishment pack was full of frames, florals, words strips, tabs and more. I narrowed that down to a floral die, a tab punch and some Tim Holtz word strips. I threw in a stamp set that will work well for some easy mixed media techniques, plus three stencils for more mixed media and I’m done. See, kitting does not have to be hard.

There is a tradition over at CKC of titling our kits just like companies do. So I’m calling mine Easy Peonies. (Okay this is my very bad attempt at making the Easy Peasey phrase floral related. Tell me, do you have a better one?? My tired brain isn’t figuring it out!)

If you want more details on my kit building thought process, check out my kit build video. But honestly this blog post really says most of my thinking already. ๐Ÿคช

I hope you can follow along with the other designers and see how they interpreted their own kits.

Hereโ€™s the full hop link list

Have fun kit building and don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

Until next time, have an artful day.

CKC Kit Build, September ’23

I love kit building and that is why I am on the design team for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge project. We take an inspiration kit each month and proceed to replicate it, or as we say, counterfeit it. This is a free, friendly group that helps inspire you to use up supplies you already own. We are not about needing to buy the latest and greatest thing (though we won’t stop you if you enjoy new crafty goodies๐Ÿ˜‰ ).

Before we dive in let’s give a warm welcome to Jennifer Croasdale as our guest designer. You can find Jennifer over on her Instagram account.

Now we can get to the pretty stuff. To start, here is our inspiration kit. It is called Aurora and it is put out by the Not Just for Boys kit club. Our CKC team member hosting this month, Tina, appreciated the fact that there was NO pink in this one and contained some of her other favorite colors. Plus there is enough masculine options to make it flexible for any crafting.

I was inspired by the color palette of green, teal and purple. And yet… August was a purple month for me so I wanted to go in a different direction. This was the perfect chance to substitute in a color that I have been hoarding for a while now: Magenta! All shades of magenta, from plum to burgundy. Check it. The four papers on the right were the keepers and the other four will go back into my stash. Will they stay with their magenta buddies, or will they be split up for other categories? Oh the mystery! ๐Ÿ˜‰ย 

With those magenta papers sorted and narrowed down I was able to add in the greens and teals to round out my kit. I also have a pop of black as the inspo kit had a black and white polka-dot print.

So these are the papers I came up with. Notice I also found a plaid magenta and a Pinkfresh floral with magenta to buddy up with the other papers. How did those sneak by my magenta radar?

Not only was I hoarding the papers in that color, but some embellishments in that color as well. Plus I found a few extra that I happened to have from a Paige Evans collections. Puting those together, adding in a whole slew of alphas and throwing in come colorful sprays (in place of the brown spray in the inspo kit) and my kit was (almost) done. Take a look at the embellishments.

Notice the third photo? This was my “add-on embellishment pack” that I included in my kit after I pulled the main embellishments. Some of these beauties were too good to put back right away. Will I have a chance to use all this? Probably not. But I think I’ll need this kit to stick around for a while so I can get through this hoarded color collection!

Don’t forget that each month I also create my own elements to add into my kit. Of course these are inspired by the original kit, but often have a twist of their own. So don’t miss what I will make in just a couple of days.

There is a tradition over at CKC of titling our kits just like companies do.
So I’m calling mine Hoarded Delights in honor of my focus color.

If you want more details on my kit building thought process, check out my kit build video.

I hope you can follow along with the other designers and see how they interpreted their own kits.

Hereโ€™s the full hop link list

Have fun kit building and don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

I’ll be back on the 4th, for our Product Forgeries. Until then, have an artful day!

Freebies Aug ’23

I love learning, creating and sharing. That is why I offer freebies up to you each month. I have both a layout sketch (in printable pdf as well as editable photoshop) and an electronic cut file (in svg) for your electronic die cut machines.

Here is some further exciting news… new for 2023 are PRINTABLES.!! You can print them at home, cut apart the embellishments and use them to create your projects. This month I was inspired by the upcoming Mother’s Day holiday here in the US. You can see all the details in my reveal video, or read on for the short version.

I’m very happy to report that I have the August freebie files ready. After being so late with July, I thought August would never make it. However, I’ve put in extra hours to get things done and I can now present to you this latest release called New Adventures.

I’ve combined the idea of small trips with back to school through the key word of adventure! You can see this collections is full of icons and word art that can work for both travel and the new school year. I hope you enjoy this two-for-one collection as much as I do.

๏ปฟ

Sketch

Once upon a time I started my freebie creation life by offering sketches. And I continue to offer them to this day, so let’s start here. This sketch features ticket embellishments to capture those special events from concerts to school plays!

JULY 2023

  • Download
  • files types include:
    pdf, psd, jpg
  • Released Aug ’23

๏ปฟ

Cut File

If you are a cut file lover, I’ve got you covered! My video covers any details for this file and any tips and tricks I have to share. Be sure to get all the info by watching above. This one has lots of layering options for building fun tickets. You can frame out your layout or build up individual tickets for embellishing.

New Adventures cut file

  • Download
  • File types include:
    svg, png, Silhouette Studio
  • See release video
  • Released Aug ’23

๏ปฟ

Printables

These files come to you in an 8.5×11 inch format for easy at-home printing. Keep in mind that monitor/screen colors and printed colors will NOT be the same! Screen colors often appear more vibrant. Colors even vary from printer to printer!

The pattern papers are ready to print and use. Embellishments will either need to be fussy cut, or you can use the print-then-cut version for your electronic die cut machine*. I try to keep the fussy cutting to simple shapes and basic circle elements can be punched out with a 1″ circle punch or die. Any cutting tips beyond these will be in the current video reveal!

New Adventures

  • Download
  • File types include:
    jpg, png, Silhouette Studio
  • See release video
  • Released Aug ’23

The download links have been included besides each image. However, you can always head over to my Freebies Page to peruse the catalog of files I have offered in the past. And if you have any ideas I’d love to hear them. I can’t make promises but I can take suggestions!

* Note, not all software can use the print-then-cut svg file. I have included a native Silhouette Studio file to avoid some current Silhouette software issues.

Freebies from July ’23 (Despite it now being August)

I love learning, creating and sharing. That is why I offer freebies up to you each month. I have both a layout sketch (in printable pdf as well as editable photoshop) and an electronic cut file (in svg) for your electronic die cut machines.

Here is some further exciting news… new for 2023 are PRINTABLES.!! You can print them at home, cut apart the embellishments and use them to create your projects. This month I was inspired by the upcoming Mother’s Day holiday here in the US. You can see all the details in my reveal video, or read on for the short version.

My apologies for posting these freebies from June here now in mid August. The process for this month was riddled with complications from my own lack of skills to accomplish certain things, to software oddities that I just couldn’t problem solve. Yet, with all of the slow downs, here we are with a new set of Freebies. Whew. I am glad to get this out to you finally! I hope you enjoy them.

I have also simplified my upload process by combining each category into a single downloadable folder. You’ll have several file types to choose from, so you’ll need to know which will work for you. If you have any questions on this, please reach out to me in the Contact tab!

Now if you want all the info in one place, please do watch the video. Otherwise, all the images and downloads are listed below.

๏ปฟ

Sketch

Once upon a time I started my freebie creation life by offering sketches. And I continue to offer them to this day, so let’s start here.

JULY 2023

  • Download
  • files types include:
    pdf, psd, jpg
  • Released July/Aug ’23

๏ปฟ

Cut File

If you are a cut file lover, I’ve got you covered! My video covers any details for this file and any tips and tricks I have to share. Be sure to get all the info by watching above.

Growing Strong cut file

  • Download
  • File types include:
    svg, png, Silhouette Studio
  • See release video
  • Released July/Aug ’23

๏ปฟ

Printables

These files come to you in an 8.5×11 inch format for easy at-home printing. Keep in mind that monitor/screen colors and printed colors will NOT be the same! Screen colors often appear more vibrant. Colors even vary from printer to printer!

The pattern papers are ready to print and use. Embellishments will either need to be fussy cut, or you can use the print-then-cut version for your electronic die cut machine*. I try to keep the fussy cutting to simple shapes and any circle elements can be punched out with a 1″ circle punch or die. Any cutting tips beyond these will be in the current video reveal!

Growing Strong

  • Download
  • File types include:
    jpg, png, Silhouette Studio
  • See release video
  • Released July/Aug ’23

The download links have been included besides each image. However, you can always head over to my Freebies Page to peruse the catalog of files I have offered in the past. And if you have any ideas I’d love to hear them. I can’t make promises but I can take suggestions!

* Note, not all software can use the print-then-cut svg file. I have included a native Silhouette Studio file to avoid some current software issues.

Forgeries on the Fourth (aka FOF), August ’23

As a design team member over at the Counterfeit Kit Challenge group I play along with as many of our monthly inspiration challenges as I can. The Forgery on the Fourth project is definitely one I enjoy! That is where we see a scrap product we like and set out to recreate it with supplies we already own. So let’s go ahead and dive in to what I have for you this month.

We are being inspired by this kit from this June kit by Pink and Paper. This is a European company and their kits are built to accompany bi-monthly lesson plans. They are all about education, and not just hoarding! But I tell ya, I was so in love with several of these items and couldn’t narrow it down to just one. So today I four forgeries for you in a bit of a compilation as I’ve done many of these techniques before.

Let’s take a closer look at the items I’ll be recreating.

Let’s take them one by one. First up is the scalloped paper. I simple punched circles (well, actually, half circles) from paper and glued them down into straight lines. This takes some time but zero brain power! It could also be done with stamping (mask off a straight line with tape and stamp half of a circle onto the paper). However, the paper version gives you a bonus… Notice in the final photo the little lift I gave that second row of circles? A layout with tons of dimension is in my future!

Up next is the puffy words. Now, I do have some puffy words already in my kit, but I could not resist pulling out my Nuvo drops for a favorite technique. I created these words and images by drawing with my squeeze bottle onto a non-stick sheet. Let dry for 2 days and these embellishments are ready to go. Nice thing with this technique is that you can use whatever colors and words work for YOUR project!

Want more Nuvo/dimensional drop techniques? Check out this video for lots of ideas!

Third up I have another sheet of pattern paper. I really liked the piece of paper but I knew it would take a while. So I increased the size of my text to reduce the time it would take to get everything done. Now I could have copied the original word for word, but again the beauty of DIY is making it your own. I’ve done my own word art before, and this watercolor piece shows how to get these letters looking good.

Finally I took a flat paper embellishment and recreated it in full real life 3D! I’m taking about the tassels in that ephemera pack. I’ve done tassels more than once over on my YouTube channel because they give so much texture and they are just plain fun to make. If you enjoy fiber based embellishments I have an entire video for that as well.

You could go watch the previous videos I’ve linked up for you, or see all these projects in this compilation video.

Okay, that is my share of forgeries for this month. For more creative ideas, the CKC blog has more forgery examples to check out. I hope this gave you some ideas on how you can recreate your favorite products with supplies you already have on hand. Don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

Until next time, have an artful day.

CKC Kit Build, August ’23

I love kit building and that is why I am on the design team for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge project. We take an inspiration kit each month and proceed to replicate it, or as we say, counterfeit it. This is a free, friendly group that helps inspire you to use up supplies you already own. We are not about needing to buy the latest and greatest thing (though we won’t stop you if you enjoy new crafty goodies๐Ÿ˜‰ ).

Let’s welcome our guest designer before we dive in. Clair Rigby will be joining us this month! I enjoy seeing when she posts over in our Facebook group, so it’ll be fun to watch her all month long!

Our kit is from a newcomer on the European kit market: Pink and Paper. We will take inspiration from their June 2023 offering. Lisa, our CKC leader is also our hostess this month and she chose this new-to-kits company for their position in Europe (where Lisa lives), and for their education-first approach. (More information on their subscriptions can be found here.)

This kit is bright and flowery with plenty of pink. While I love all those things on their own, I do find it a bit hard to use in my own layouts. So I’ll take inspiration from many things in this kit but shift the color palette just a bit and keep my florals on the calmer side.

I leaned into the purple marbled paper in the inspiration as well as the more peachy pinks. After replacing the teal with just a bit more green, I felt like my papers were ready to go.

Embellishments in the inspiration felt pretty straightforward with some ephemera die cuts, puffy hearts, and puffy words as well. I followed along with much of that, keeping my color palette in mind. A few partially used sticker packs hitchhiked along to complete my embellishments.

Since there were no alphas in the inspiration, I took free rein to use a variety of fonts and styles in colors that coordinated well with my papers.

Don’t forget that each month I also create my own elements to add into my kit. Of course these are inspired by the original kit, but often have a twist of their own. So don’t miss what I will make in just a couple of days.

There is a tradition over at CKC of titling our kits just like companies do. So I’m calling mine Lavender Bliss for it’s lean into purple and the calm florals I included instead of the bold inspiration florals.

If you want more details on my kit building thought process, check out my kit build video.

I hope you can follow along with the other designers and see how they interpreted their own kits.

Hereโ€™s the full hop link list

Have fun kit building and don’t forget to show off your stuff over on the CKC Facebook group, or tag us on Instagram @counterfeitkitchallenge or use #counterfeitkitchallenge.

I’ll be back on the 4th, for our Product Forgeries. Until then, have an artful day!