Inspired by Shimelle: The First Layouts

So this is how I started.  I'm finding that knowing I have a limited amount of materials is keeping me on edge.  I'm completing things when they still feel a little incomplete -- which is lending a clean and slightly retro look to my pages.  I'm not sure if I love it this page about the cookies, but it was an interesting exercise in using things.  I also feel like it was stretching before a big game -- just warming up a little, seeing what you can do without playing to win.  I have no idea what is going on with those doily stamps. As I write this I am pretty much making a face just like that cut out pumpkin cookie.  But that mess did give me a fun idea for later, so it wasn't all losing.

This is layout number two from the kit I put together and I'm feeling better, but not OMG YES A MASTERWORK! about it.  I cut the tag out of the card stock that is the mat for the first layout (yes, I cut the middle out of the mat.  I am so horrified to run out of materials.  I think it may be psychosis!)  I love that background paper, though; I love it with a fiery passion, so that makes everything gravy. 

I hope all of you playing along are having fun.  I know I am, and the challenge is teaching me a lot about the way I work that I didn't really realize before. So hooray for self discovery!

The Shimelle Challenge Commences!

 Hooray!  I love a good challenge, so I'm playing along with Jennifer Smith Sloane's Inspired by Shimelle Challenge, where, much like the master herself, we take a limited number of supplies and then work and work and work until we can work no more with what we started with.  Which is pretty much how I roll to begin with (no beautiful scrap shall die without being glued SOMEWHERE!) I'm not used to such an insular process.  I think it'll be fun, and might encourage me to bring something like this along with me on vacation since we vacation in no-mans land with not a lot of entertainment options besides reading books and riding bicycles and family dinners. (Which are all great, but sometimes after 4 days of that it gets a little old, you know). 

So here were the rules of the challenge:

The challenge is to create a kit using supplies you have on hand that includes:

-10 patterned papers
-5 sheets of cardstock
-1 spray ink (Mister Huey/Glimmer Mist/etc.)
-1 stamp set
-1 Alpha Sticker large (Thickers, etc.)
-1 Alpha Sticker small (mini alphas)
-1 sheet of bling/embellishments
-1 pre-made/cut die cut accent
-1 set of border strips

*Any of the embellishing items above can be traded out for one other type of embellishment with that noted. Tools do not count as do stamping inks.

The challenge comes from using this kit to create as many projects as you can.

I just got a huge box of goodies from the Charity Box Sale (which, by the way, was TOTALLY AWESOME!) so I pulled 10 Sassafras papers from the box as well as a package of flowers and border strips.  The Thickers, Stamps, Cardstock and Cosmo Cricket page (partially used, I love those little cut apart tags) came from my bins.  I haven't yet got on the mist bandwagon, so I substituted the ever elusive Target Yellow Washi Tape Set instead.  The stamps are Amy Tangerine and the Letter stickers are Thickers and from Michaels.  The Cosmo Cricket page is substituting for my die-cut accent.  So there you have it.  Challenge accepted and ... may the odds be ever in your favor?

I hope its not that kind of challenge!

XOXO