A bit of this and a bit of that from Crate Paper

Morning all!
It’s Nat here – no doubt you have been snapping up lots of the lovely items that were in the recent sale in the store and I am sure that the brand new CHA items that started arriving last week have been flying out. But I wanted to share some of the things I’ve been working on using a mix of pre-Christmas releases from Crate Paper plus the recent Valentines releases from Crate Paper and Pebbles Inc. which are still in the store.
I have managed to get woefully behind on my 2014 album – in fact I haven’t managed to scrap anything for April 2014 onwards, but I really wanted to remedy that. So I printed out a good stack of photos and got to work on April and May.
Scrapping photos from spring and summer could be a bit of a challenge, but actually the Crate Paper Notes & Things, Maggie Holmes Open Book, and Kiss Kiss collections provide a lot of elements that could work with any season. I mixed up lots of lovely papers and embellishments from these lines, plus some additional bits and pieces from the store:

So before I get started, I’ve got to warn you this post is definitely picture-heavy! But pictures can say a lot more than words sometimes… April had a few photos to pack in and as we were entering spring time I was hoping to match up some colours that fit with my April desktop calendar page. I’ve been incorporating the pages from my Caroline Gardner desktop calendar into my 2014 album pages as a way to easily record the month, but also because I just didn’t want to chuck them away – too nice for the recycling box! The Notes & Things collection contains plenty of colours that matched that pink calendar page. I mixed up the papers with some of the elements from the ephemera pack – which included that fab bit of printed vellum – and from the chipboard set. I loved all the gold accents in this line, so when I came to die-cut some letters, I went with my favourite technique of the moment – die-cutting from white funky foam and then from gold glitter paper and layering up the letters. I think Notes & Things ephemera and chipboard accents look so nice layered up together. There are just so many tiny little pieces in the pack, but also lots of larger journaling card bits that can fill in some gaps nicely. I’ve used a mix of ready-made journaling cards from Notes & Things plus earlier releases, but mainly simply cut paper from this collection and some of the aqua tones in Shimelle‘s line to size for these pockets. I love the patterened strip at the bottom of the paper as it adds a nice border when you need it, as you can see here: Also that “This end up” was a very apt addition to the Notes & Things ephemera pack! Another nice complement to the Notes & Things line is the pack of star enamel dots by Gossamer Blue in their On My Desk collection. And more layering up of vellum ephemera and chipboard from Notes & Things, plus a wood veneer accent from last year’s Oh Darling collection by Crate. I do love how older lines can be combined so nicely with more recent releases. So onto the next pages from April, and we were definitely entering Spring territory here… … but also lots of randomness for that month (the end of Silk <sob>, the dangerous return of my addiction to Gregg’s Tuna Mayo Stotties after a 10 year break…). The Open Book ephemera pack came in quite handy for the miscellaneous nature snaps I had:   I also used up some of the smaller journaling cards in the Notes & Things journaling card pack for 6×4 photo pockets, layering up stickers and chipboard accents from this release and older ones:   The accents on the journaling cards also got blinged up a little. OK, so there’s already a gold foiled heart – but why not add a chipboard foiled heart to the mix? And I wanted to share this lovely bit of ephemera in the Notes & Things pack – love this little clipboard that works as a great frame for smaller pics: And then we were onto Easter territory… Notes & Things definitely lent itself well to the task of recording these pics. I even managed to find a “bunny” accent that would work in the Open Book chipboard set: There were some lovely Spring-friendly floral accents in the Notes & Things chipboard set too: And of course, there had to be more gold accents – what with there being a gold Lindt bunny on the scene: And it’s not just vellum and card in the Notes & Things ephemera pack, there are also some handy wood veneer shapes: And then it was onto May! May was definitely the month for pink. Lot’s to celebrate with a new addition to the family and an excuse to use that gold “Special delivery” label from the ephemera pack: I used a lot of Kiss Kiss papers on this page. As well as a lot of the chipboard accents in the line. The engagement ring is actually an enamel ring accent from the Save the Date collection by Teresa Collins that was in the sale, with a heart bling accent added on top. There had to be more diamonds and bling for this photo, and the Diamond paper in the Bella Rouge line by Pink Paislee was perfect for this! Can’t beat a bit of grey and pink together. The chipboard set from the Open Book line also had some nice apt accents as you can see above. And the Love Life paper in the Kiss Kiss collection provided the perfect border to the calendar section.
And for the last May page I stayed with the Valentine and grey theme:
The We Go Together collection from Pebbles has some great grey patterns in it that matched nicely with the Pink Paislee diamond paper and the general look of all that pink on the other side of this spread. Definitely some fab “everyday” B-side patterns in that collection! But there was also a great pattern to complement the Postman Pat pic (the May addition to the tradition my friend and I have for our cinema outings – basically I get her to pose with whatever prop or cardboard cut-out they have going that visit and she does it without fuss! What a true friend). There are lots of “post” themed items in the Notes & Things ephemera pack so another great Postman Pat nod!
And I chopped up some of the ephemera to use it in various places when hidden behind photos: This page was also a great one for using up some of the chipboard frames in the Notes & Things set: And layering up accents for smaller photos: And I now have all my June photos ready to scrap – but the new Fancy That line by My Mind’s Eye came in just in the nick of time as June 2014 involves quite a few wedding snaps! Looking forward to scrapping those with the lovely gold-foiled papers and accents.
But before I was ready to tidy everything away, I wanted to make a couple of cards with those lovely We Go Together papers by Pebbles – it’s not all about Valentine’s! Again, the border strips that come with these papers are fab for little accents. And a great way to use up left-over scraps is with the Die-namics Hexagons die set by My Favorite Things. It’s great for DIY backgrounds and you get little die-cut hexagons in two sizes. Here are the items in the store I used:

Happy crafting!