Mixing it up for April!

Well hello Magpies and welcome to April!  It’s Rachel here with a bit of a mixed bag of products to showcase for April Fools Day. No jokes though!
I’ve mainly used papers from one of the last Basic Grey collections, Urban Luxe and also a new manufacturer to Hey Little Magpie, Illustrated Faith. I love the Illustrated Faith collections, the colours are a little bit lush and I had to have them! I think this collection has really been developed with Bible Journalling in mind but I do like to prove that a collection doesn’t need to be used for the intended purpose. That’s my MO!
So on to some of the products I used this month. I love these phrase Foam Thickers from Amy Tangerine – Better Together. There’s 2 sheets in the pack and they’re a great size for titles, and some fab words too.  I used the word ‘cheers’ in my LO below.
I also used some of the Chipboard Stickers from this pack from MAMBI, I’ve long been a fan of the MAMBI Embellishments and this pack has some awesome stickers in lush colours.

From the She Blooms collection from Illustrated Faith, I chose the She Paints Clear Cuts Transparency. This is a great acetate sheet and the colours are gorgeous! I was well impressed when I was looking through my order and knew I would be using this sheet immediately!

So my first LO is a extra simple design that always works with a larger size photo. I have given about an inch top and bottom, centred the photo in the page and cut my paper the same width as the photo. I think my photo is roughly 7″ wide here. So I used the She Paints Clear Cut Transparency below my photo here. I just love the colours in it. I adhered it with tiny little dots of Glossy Accents under some of the coloured stripes and then I sewed around the photo and acetate with a zig-zag stitch to hold the acetate in place properly. But you could use staples or photo turns etc. I’ve embellished with the Chipboard Icons from the She Blooms collection and then used some of the MAMBI Friend Chipboard Stickers I showcased above. The colours of the Friend stickers matched perfectly! My title is from Amy Tangerine, Better Together Thickers. This is a very easy design to showcase a larger size photo and there’s not much embellishing needed.

 
Another collection from Illustrated Faith is Whatever is Lovely and I love the 3×4 Paper it has some fab cards on the sheet and I’ve used the ‘lovely’ and pink heart ones on my LO below.

From the Illustrated Faith, She Blooms line, the Chipboard Icons are awesome! I have pretty much used every one on the LO’s here so I think I’ll need to buy another sheet soon!

It’s no secret that I’m a massive fan of Heidi Swapp and I love the little packets of Wood Words she does and have used one of the words from the Today pack on my LO below. I used the word ‘memory’ and it was naked wood colour in the pack but I coloured it black with a Sharpie for my LO.

My next LO is a bit of a breakout for me, look everyone, a patterned paper background!!! I loved the Floral Stripe Paper from the She Blooms collection so much, I had to use it as a background. I find it really hard to create on anything other than a plain white background but this paper is awesome! This LO is 9×12″ size which I decided to try and I love it, I will do more this size and bought a 9×12″ album to store my LO’s in. My LO is pretty simple, I just layered up 2 of the 3×4″ cards from the Whatever Is Lovely Sheet I talked about above. I had a couple of offcus of white cardstock on my desk, so I added them in behind to add some contrast. Then I embellished using stickers from the Chipboard Icons sheet and the memory word from the Heidi Swapp Today pack. The bright flowers on the paper meant I didn’t need to embellish much, the paper does it for me!

 
Back to the Basic Grey, Urban Luxe collection, I loved this pack of Mixed Embellishments which has sequins, faux leather flowers and some square buttons in it. I’ve used the sequins on this LO below and love them!

Heidi Swapp does a couple of Foam Title Words and I’ve used the Adventure one on my LO below. There’s also Beautiful, Memories and Happiness available as well and they make such an impact on a LO.

This next LO is another simple one, this design will always work. Just cut strips of paper and put them behind your photo, instant LO! I used papers from Urban Luxe and the ones I used came from the 6×6 paper pad which is unfortunately out of stock now but the 12×12 Paper Pack is still in stock and the papers are awesome! I used the Heidi Swapp Adventure title and some of the sequins from the Urban Luxe pack as well. Super simple and you can throw a LO like this together in no time.

 
This pack of Gold Foil Puffy Accent Stickers from the Heidi Swapp, Hello Gorgeous Memory Planner Collection are awesome! They’re so cute and I love the pop of height they add to a LO. There’s some seriously cute stickers on this sheet as well.

This little book of Heidi Swapp Puffy Phrase Stickers are also super cute, there’s some awesome words there, I am loving cheeky and fancy lol! I’ve used some of the arrows and stars on my LO below but I am looking forward to using some of the words real soon.

I love these Acetate Words in Black & White from Heidi Swapp as well and have used the ‘enjoy on my LO below. These ones are actually out of stock right now but if you sign up for an email alert, you will be emailed as soon as they come back in to stock. They do come in Teal, Gold and Pink as well but they all have different words in the packs. They are awesome, well worth the money.

My next LO uses the Urban Luxe papers again and I’ve added in the black & white striped paper from Pink Paislee Cest La Vie – Paper 02. This is such a versatile striped paper, I love it! I have used a postcard from Napier, NZ where I recently had a weekend with some good friends. We stayed in the penthouse at The Dome and it was awesome! I layered up some of the papers from the Urban Luxe paper pack and then embellished using the Heidi Swapp products I mentioned above. I also used some older Thickers from my stash.

 
I love, love, love this Urban Luxe collection from Basic Grey, if you haven’t already bought this, you need to buy it now! I will miss Basic Grey a lot, they were one of the first manufacturers I ever used way back in the day. I will be hoarding this last collection for a long time, along with my bags of B Side and Highline. This is the 12×12″ Collection Pack and I think I’ll be buying another one….. just to hoard!

This last LO is another simple one. I don’t know why I say that every time, I am a simple scrapper! This design is another one that works so easily. I had a square photo and cut 3 papers from Urban Luxe to the same size. It looked a little boring like that so I added a strip of yellow paper above and below and then an extra strip of the Pink Paislee striped paper on top as well. I embellished using a Heidi Swapp title, some other bits and bobs and then added in a strip of black pearls above and below everything as well. A design like this will work over and over again, just cut papers the same size as your photo and make a grid. If it needs more, add some strips above and below.

 
So welcome again to April Magpies, bring on the sunshine I say! I shouldn’t complain, I had nearly 3 months of awesome sunshine in New Zealand but I’m always happier when I can wear flip flops and sunglasses! I hope you take this opportunity to stock up on some Basic Grey if you haven’t already. There won’t be any more once what is in stock, is sold out *sob*. And definitely check out the Illustrated Faith lines, especially if you like bright colours, or want to do some bible journalling.