Saving scraps, to toss or not to toss that is the question...

Do you ever save too many bits and pieces of scrap paper or elements you save? I find if it has an interesting shape, texture or color I tend to save it. Sometimes the piece looks totally useless and I still tuck it in the drawer for future possibilities, ah the curse of a pack rat. But then again whenever someone needs something, a bit of this or a piece of that who do they ask? Why the pack rat of course, and I produce the needed item from a drawer or shelf with a bit of a smug smile on my face. Mind you never saying aloud "see I told you it would come in handy" but just handing it over with a renewed conviction that being a pack rat is not always a bad thing. This is a layout of my daughter when she was about three. I started with a piece of pink polka-dot paper and than proceeded to dig through my scrap leftovers drawers. The green in the corner is a left over piece of cardstock I used to punch out my flower leaves for various flowers I have made in the past. I had punched every usable inch of it and was going to toss it out but changed my mind and stashed it back in the drawer. Looking at it reminded me of a quilt pattern so I used my Zig pen and applied stitch line around all the cutout areas. I added a few flowers to give the piece a splash of color it needed. All the remaining pieces in this layout are scraps from my stash, the only new cut item was the title (I used Cursive 101 & Home Decor). I finished "stitching" everything to tie it all together. Moral of this story is "Waste not, want not" (or never throw away something you may use sometime, somewhere in someones lifetime, LOL).

Black & white or color...

This is the first of my layouts using the new stacks I bought yesterday. The background paper came form the Paper Pizazz Heritage stack. Each year my daughters take all the kids to have their portraits taken together and it always gives me a wealth of ideas for layouts. I have a love of black and white photos, they tend to be my favorite to work with. Color photos I find you have to blend in the basic colors in the photo with your page color scheme while black and white allows you can choose the color the photo makes you feel. For that reason many times I will make my color photos b&w or just add a touch of septa tones . With this layout I loved the colors in the photo and they seemed to tie in well the the paper I had picked to work with. I wish I could say I had a process of how I pick my paper or pictures but I don't. Sometimes I find a photo and work from there. Other times I find a paper I want to use and work form there. Sometimes when the scrapbook Gods are smiling on me I get an I idea that brings to mind a picture and paper at the same moment. I love those layouts that just come together, because I tend to be one of those scrapers that tweaks a page until it feels right.

And the blog begins...

Well it's a new year so I thought I would give something new a try. Today I decided to try to start a blog for my scrapbooking projects. So here goes...

I started out yesterday by sifting though the drawers of my paper scraps and extra cuts of this and that. I never disguard scrap pieces I think might be used somewhere, sometime for something. So now that I am having a bit of trouble getting those drawers to close I figured I should make an honest attempt to use some of them. I did get three layouts done and have another possible three laid out.