design each moment

Cropdog.com - Digital Photo Collage

Check out our new site Cropdog.com. You can create many collages and mosaics in 12x12, 8x8, 8.5x11 and other sizes. Plus there is a special size to create a FREE Facebook Banner (shown above). There are many designs to choose from and it is super easy. Just load up your photos and insert them into the spot you would like to place them.

Here is a little tutorial on how to use Cropdog:

 

 

You can also post to our Member Gallery, where you can publish your Collage, plus see what others are creating. If you need some new ideas for your collages, see the Cropdog Blog for tips and ideas.

April's Literary Inspiration: The Lorax

    

In honor of National Poetry Month, Earth Day, and National Arbor Day, we decided on Dr. Seuss' The Lorax to be our April inspiration. If you are not familiar with this story you can check out the synopsis on Wikipedia, or visit your local library to read the book.

    For today's post, I will be showing how I gathered inspiration from The Lorax. (By the Way, If you plan to plant a tree this year or celebrate Earth day, a Lorax page would be really cute!)

My Inspiration List:

Theme:

    The Lorax portrays a message that is important to me. I imagine, in the book, many of the people missed the traffula trees. The lack of trees took away some of the beauty of their town. I live in a growing town that has changed a lot, especially over the past decade. I expressed, on my page, how I enjoy the convenience of the new businesses; however, I am glad that someone took action, years ago, to make sure the town's history and nature is preserved. We will continue to enjoy their efforts for many generations to come.

    To convey my message, I decided to show two sides of my town: the nature side and the business side. I put them on opposites sides of my page (the nature areas on the top, and the business areas on the bottom) so the viewer could see the contrasts of my town.

 

The fun part: making a Dr. Seuss Page!

    *Notice that I did not use a single picture of a character from the book? You don't have to use characters or images from the story to make a themed page. There are many ways to be inspired, and have people say, "That page looks like it came from Dr. Seuss!"

Illustrations -  Dr. Seuss was known for his unique illustrations. Here are some things to keep in mind while making your page:

• Color - What types of colors do you think of when you envision a Dr. Seuss story? The colors I chose were inspired by the book cover:
  

 

I found Paper Tiles that were similar colors and went with this scheme:

• Illustration Style - While looking at the illustration, I was inspired by the ink drawings. Notice how Seuss adds dark lines around all the objects in the image shown above? I decided to put this look into my page. Here is a close up:

Technique: I used black chalk ink around the edges of all the little squares. I liked how in the illustration that there is a little green hill, so I decided to make little hills and shrubbery within the blue squares. I put chalk ink on the edges of them too. This page started to really look like Dr. Seuss' illustrations.

Typography - another distinguising feature of the Dr. Seuss books

• Fonts - Many of Dr. Seuss's stories have a similar font as the one on the Lorax cover. I found a font on-line and used it on my page. You can download it for free on dafont.com. This is a cute and fun font that really adds to the theme of your layout! If you don't plan to print your journaling from a computer, you can possibly find 'seuss' like alphabet stickers at your local craft store. Here is a close up sample of the font I chose:

Quotes and Writing Style -

Add a quote that ties in with the theme of your page. Here are few quotes from the Lorax you can use on your page. Here are a few samples:

• "Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
  Nothing is going to get better. It's not." (This is what I chose)

• "It's not about what it is, it's about what it can become."

• The Word "Unless" is often associated with this story. You can use this as a title.

• Check out more quotes on goodreads.com

Do some of these quotes inspire what message you would like to use for your page?

And of course, what would a good Dr. Seuss story be without the rhymes? I am not a poet, but I attempted some rhyming for my journaling. Have fun thinking of cute little rhymes to tell for your story.

What's In Your Easter Basket?

 

What’s in Your Easter Basket?

“Eggs”-tra!! “Eggs”-tra!! Read all about it! Four tips to perk up your Easter Scrapbook pages!

Easter is only a short time away and I thought I’d turn to something pastel and pretty and give you a few ideas to perk up your upcoming Easter pages.

1. The first is using ribbons and Sticky Face Easter/Spring Stickers.
2. The second is a basket weave on basket weave technique that was inspired by a past tip post.
3. The third technique is bringing paper lace into the layout by using border punches.
4. And finally some tags, big and small for journal spots.

 

1. Last post I used glitter on Sticky Face Sticker squares, this time I’m using the Easter/Spring set and the medium and small eggs. I began by removing the entire egg from the page, leaving the top cover on for now; I also put a spot of adhesive on this top side and then attached to my board with the Sticky Face sticky surface up to add rows of ribbons across the surface edge to edge. The ribbon will extend beyond the edges and can be trimmed once the egg is full, just turn it over and trim close to the egg. If you are worried about fraying ribbon edges use some fray-check to seal the edges. Remove the backing and attach wherever you would like to place your eggs. I have also used a trimmed rectangle of foam mounting tape to give the front egg a little more depth.                     

2. Now in Paije’s previous post on weaving she was working with a three row section. In my version I have added texture and extended the weaving to the whole page that doesn’t have a photo. I also really wanted a basket feel, so I used an embossing folder from Cuttlebug, Anna Griffin collection, to achieve that. From a sheet of Core’dinations Color Core from the Whitewash Collection, I cut several 1”x 11 1/8” strips for my horizontal strips and lightly sanded them to allow the blue underneath to show through for a weathered look. I also cut several strips in the blue and aqua colors for the vertical strips. I lined up the pattern according to the 12 x 12 White Mosaic Moments Grid Paper. I have used the weaving predominately for the lower two rows but carried it up to include the area I was going to use as a journal block. 

 

3. For the basket’s top edge I thought a nice lacey look would be nice, so I cut four strips of 1” x 11 1/8” pale yellow and put two as the base layer. The top layers were punched with a border punch for a lace effect. On the top straight edge a row of adhesive tape was laid down to attach a 3/8” satin ribbon. Then, I turned it over and used foam mounting tape on the back and lined it up to the top edge. This gives it a nice shadow and dimensional feel. A ribbon bow at the end of the row adds a perfect touch! What Easter layout doesn’t need a few bows? So don’t forget to add them!!

 

4. What’s a basket without a tag? I’ve taken one large piece of yellow cardstock and rounded the top corners then punched a nice scalloped edge along the bottom. I attached one of my ribbon eggs, wrote my journaling, punched a hole for a loop of hemp cording, and looped the cording through a bow and attached the bow with a glue dot allowing it to swing free. The smaller tags were also strung with coordinating colors of hemp cord threaded through the ‘slats’ of the basket weave with a tapestry needle and knotted to hold in place.   

     
 


With all those elements put together here's how my layout turned out!

Hope you will share your Easter pages with us on our Facebook page or on the Story Board at Journella.com we’d love to see what’s in your Easter basket!

 

Andrea