mixed media

Feelin’ Fine | Sunkissed collection | Sue Plumb

Hi everyone,
It’s Sue Plumb here to share my latest design team project with you. This week our team were challenged to pull out some dies or punches from our stash and use them in a project. It’s been a little while since I used my dies, so it was fun to dig through them and choose some to use. I had already decided to use the ‘Sunkissed’ collection, because I thought the beautiful bright colour palette would work well with this fun series of photos of my daughter and her friends.
I began my page with a sheet of 300gsm white cardstock. This cardstock is by House of Paper and is my absolute favourite to work with. It’s a great weight, takes mediums well, is a beautiful bright white, and it’s super smooth and silky to the touch. And the best part? It’s now available in the Cocoa Vanilla Studio store! (Also available in 250gsm for those who don’t want it quite as thick.) If you want to grab some and try it for yourself, you can find it in store HERE
I started by adding some colour to my background using a brayer and a sky blue acrylic paint. I also added pink, orange and yellow splatters of ink.
With the paint dry on my background, it was then time to start adding some paper layers. I chose the blue striped pattern from the Bright Side paper, and the blue tiny floral print from the A5 Paper Stack. (This paper is exclusive to the stack and not available in the 12×12″ size.) I also had a scrap of a yellow chevron print that I layered over the top. I matted my photo strip using the heart print from the Feelin’ Fine paper and added frayed gauze before sticking my photos down.
When it came to incorporating the dies into my project, I didn’t really consider exactly how I was going to use them before I cut them out. I just grabbed some small scraps of paper that I had left from previous projects and cut each of the different shapes from different patterns.
If you know my work, you would already know that I love using doilies on my layouts. So it should be no surprise that one of the dies I chose to use was a small doily design. I cut two of them using the Feelin’ Fine paper, and tucked them in under my photo mat at the top left corner and along the right edge. I also had a sweet little butterfly banner that I had cut, which I added on top of the yellow chevron paper.
I had some large butterflies that I had cut using a die and the Summer Lights paper, which I layered with some punched butterflies using the same paper. I had also punched the same butterflies in the small blue floral paper, which I added at the top and bottom of my page.
On the right side of the layout, I tucked some die cut banners in under my layers and then placed my feelin’ fine title piece (fussy cut from the Fun in the Sun paper) popped up on some foam tape.
I added a few flowers from the Floral Ephemera pack, as well as a few phrase stickers from the Accessory Sticker sheet. I finished off with handwritten journalling and a few small hearts from the Puffy Sticker pack.
I love challenges like this that remind me to get out some of my under-used tools and put them to work. I ended up using four different dies for this page, as well as a punch, so I’d say that was mission accomplished! (And the best part was, I hardly used any extra embellishments because the dies, punch and papers did most of the work for me.)
If you would like to see exactly how this page came together, you can watch my process video here:

Thanks so much for stopping by today so I could share this with you. Until next time, happy scrapping!

InterNational Scrapbook Day challenge winners!

Hi everyone!

Thank you so much to everyone who joined in our InterNational Scrapbook Day festivities. We had so many fabulous challenge entries uploaded into our community group, it was really great to see all your work. Here are our winning entries…

Challenge 1

The winner of Laura’s sketch challenge was this awesome layout by Anja Curvers…

Challenge 2

The winner of Tarrah’s cut file challenge was this sweet page by Wendy Germain Crowe…

Challenge 3

The winner of Melissa’s mixed media challenge was this bright, happy layout by Michelle Jamieson..

Challenge 4

And finally, the winner of Michelle’s Grab 5 challenge was this fabulous layout from Nicole Hary…

Congratulations all our winners and thanks again to everyone who played along!

Don’t forget you still have another chance to win this month with our “Slice of Summer” May monthly challenge. Entries close 31st May via our community group.

Happy scrapping!

InterNational Scrapbook Day challenge winners!

Hi everyone!

Thank you so much to everyone who joined in our InterNational Scrapbook Day festivities. We had so many fabulous challenge entries uploaded into our community group, it was really great to see all your work. Here are our winning entries…

Challenge 1

The winner of Laura’s sketch challenge was this awesome layout by Anja Curvers…

Challenge 2

The winner of Tarrah’s cut file challenge was this sweet page by Wendy Germain Crowe…

Challenge 3

The winner of Melissa’s mixed media challenge was this bright, happy layout by Michelle Jamieson..

Challenge 4

And finally, the winner of Michelle’s Grab 5 challenge was this fabulous layout from Nicole Hary…

Congratulations all our winners and thanks again to everyone who played along!

Don’t forget you still have another chance to win this month with our “Slice of Summer” May monthly challenge. Entries close 31st May via our community group.

Happy scrapping!

Live colorfully | Sunkissed Layout | Anna Komenda

Hello crafty friends. It’s Anna here and today I want to share with you layout in my signature style. It’s a theme of this week and I was so excited to see this assignment in the schedule. Can you guess what I added to my project? It’s a really easy one to figure out :) RAINBOWS!!! You all know that I just love colorful designs and it’s totally something I could describe as my signature style. It’s get even easier with such a colorful and cheerful collection as “Sunkissed”. But rainbows are not the only element I love adding to my pages. I created soft, mixed media background using Distress Oxide inks and played with scissors to fussy cut some flower clusters.

I picked five inks in matching colors to the “Sunkissed” line and just smeared them over the white watercolor paper sheet. They react with water beautifully so I added a little bit using mister and let the colors flow and mix together. I left my background to air dry and took the scissors in hand. Fussy cutting is such a relaxing activity to me so I went ahead and cut out all the flowers and flower cluster from paper called “Growing wild“.

My rainbow design is highlighted by the layout title LIVE COLORFULLY. I went through all the pattern papers both in 12*12 size and in paper stack and chose 10 scraps matching to the mixed media background. You can spy “Growing wild“, “Sunny days“, “Fun in the sun“, “Feelin fine” and “Bright side” pieces here. I cut out the letters using alpha dies, but you can also cut the title using digital die cutting machine. Dies just seemed faster to me.

Top and bottom edge of the pages is decorated with flowers fussy cut from “Growing wild” paper. You can save some of them by cutting bigger clusters in halves. It’s also a perfect way to use up the ones from the edges of the paper. I never throw them away! I keep them and hide missing part under some other layer of my project.

This is quite a simple layout with not so many layers. I let the colors to play main role. I finished my page by adding few puffy stickers here and there and three wooden buttons (my favorite embellishment ever!).

If you want to see how this layout came together, I recorded a process video for you.

Can you tell it’s my page by just a quick look? I hope you do and and I hope my signature style is quite visible here. That is all for today. Thank you so much for stopping by and until the next time.

XO Anna

Live colorfully | Sunkissed Layout | Anna Komenda

Hello crafty friends. It’s Anna here and today I want to share with you layout in my signature style. It’s a theme of this week and I was so excited to see this assignment in the schedule. Can you guess what I added to my project? It’s a really easy one to figure out :) RAINBOWS!!! You all know that I just love colorful designs and it’s totally something I could describe as my signature style. It’s get even easier with such a colorful and cheerful collection as “Sunkissed”. But rainbows are not the only element I love adding to my pages. I created soft, mixed media background using Distress Oxide inks and played with scissors to fussy cut some flower clusters.

I picked five inks in matching colors to the “Sunkissed” line and just smeared them over the white watercolor paper sheet. They react with water beautifully so I added a little bit using mister and let the colors flow and mix together. I left my background to air dry and took the scissors in hand. Fussy cutting is such a relaxing activity to me so I went ahead and cut out all the flowers and flower cluster from paper called “Growing wild“.

My rainbow design is highlighted by the layout title LIVE COLORFULLY. I went through all the pattern papers both in 12*12 size and in paper stack and chose 10 scraps matching to the mixed media background. You can spy “Growing wild“, “Sunny days“, “Fun in the sun“, “Feelin fine” and “Bright side” pieces here. I cut out the letters using alpha dies, but you can also cut the title using digital die cutting machine. Dies just seemed faster to me.

Top and bottom edge of the pages is decorated with flowers fussy cut from “Growing wild” paper. You can save some of them by cutting bigger clusters in halves. It’s also a perfect way to use up the ones from the edges of the paper. I never throw them away! I keep them and hide missing part under some other layer of my project.

This is quite a simple layout with not so many layers. I let the colors to play main role. I finished my page by adding few puffy stickers here and there and three wooden buttons (my favorite embellishment ever!).

If you want to see how this layout came together, I recorded a process video for you.

Can you tell it’s my page by just a quick look? I hope you do and and I hope my signature style is quite visible here. That is all for today. Thank you so much for stopping by and until the next time.

XO Anna

What the Fun | Sunkissed and Boys Rule collections | INSD challenge | Sue Plumb

Hi everyone, it’s Sue Plumb here to share my latest design team project with you. I hope everyone had a chance to celebrate InterNational Scrapbook Day (INSD) last weekend with a bit of creative time? Maybe even one of our special INSD challenges? If you haven’t had a chance to play along yet you still have a couple of days to get your entries in.
In fact, it was one of the challenges that inspired my layout for today, as I played along with Michelle’s “Grab 5” challenge. Here are the challenge criteria:
For my page I decided to document a fun photo of my boys that I took recently at SeaWorld. I used a combination of the ‘Sunkissed’ and ‘Boys Rule’ collections, and went bright, bold and a bit messy!
I started with a sheet of the Summer Lights paper from the ‘Sunkissed’ collection, which features a stunning colour gradient that runs from yellow at the to, through orange and pink, and finally to red at the bottom. It was absolutely perfect to match with my photo. (In fact, when I took this photo I thought of this paper right away – that’s when you know you are a true scrapper! haha)
I began by dry brushing on some black acrylic paint using a wide brush. This not only provided some great contrast, but also defined the focal area of my page. Over the top of the paint I added the white die cut star background. This left-over piece was actually part of the ‘Boys Rule’ Large Die Cut and Backing Kit. I like the way it added interest to the background right away.
Next, I added more patterned papers with a variety of different sized pieces from both collections that I cut and tore then layered together. I also added a green paper doily and some frayed gauze from my stash and used staples to secure my stack down on the page. I then added my photo on top.
When it came to embellishments, I wanted to ensure that I ticked off the sticker criteria first. I used  mix of Accessory and Clear Stickers that I had left-over from ‘Boys Rule’. I also used some Chipboard Pieces and Die Cut Ephemera from the same collection. The sweet little Wood Button was from ‘Sunkissed’. To the right of my photo I added a handmade star embellishment which I topped with a Flair Button.
To add some extra interest to my background I added some stamping using a small stars background stamp and a roller phrase stamp.
Now it was time to finish off my page and tick off the remaining criteria. For something gold I added a few pieces of gold twisted wire, which I stapled down onto the page. For stitching, I added small hand stitched crosses using white embroidery thread. And finally, I added some splatters of white acrylic ink and that was all five criteria covered.
I had a lot of fun putting this layout together and I hope I have inspired you to play along with one of our INSD challenges while you still have time. Entries to the challenges close at midnight (AEST) this Sunday, 9th May. You can find all the challenge rules, or upload your entries via the Cocoa Vanilla Studio Community group.
Until next time, happy scrapping!

What the Fun | Sunkissed and Boys Rule collections | INSD challenge | Sue Plumb

Hi everyone, it’s Sue Plumb here to share my latest design team project with you. I hope everyone had a chance to celebrate InterNational Scrapbook Day (INSD) last weekend with a bit of creative time? Maybe even one of our special INSD challenges? If you haven’t had a chance to play along yet you still have a couple of days to get your entries in.
In fact, it was one of the challenges that inspired my layout for today, as I played along with Michelle’s “Grab 5” challenge. Here are the challenge criteria:
For my page I decided to document a fun photo of my boys that I took recently at SeaWorld. I used a combination of the ‘Sunkissed’ and ‘Boys Rule’ collections, and went bright, bold and a bit messy!
I started with a sheet of the Summer Lights paper from the ‘Sunkissed’ collection, which features a stunning colour gradient that runs from yellow at the to, through orange and pink, and finally to red at the bottom. It was absolutely perfect to match with my photo. (In fact, when I took this photo I thought of this paper right away – that’s when you know you are a true scrapper! haha)
I began by dry brushing on some black acrylic paint using a wide brush. This not only provided some great contrast, but also defined the focal area of my page. Over the top of the paint I added the white die cut star background. This left-over piece was actually part of the ‘Boys Rule’ Large Die Cut and Backing Kit. I like the way it added interest to the background right away.
Next, I added more patterned papers with a variety of different sized pieces from both collections that I cut and tore then layered together. I also added a green paper doily and some frayed gauze from my stash and used staples to secure my stack down on the page. I then added my photo on top.
When it came to embellishments, I wanted to ensure that I ticked off the sticker criteria first. I used  mix of Accessory and Clear Stickers that I had left-over from ‘Boys Rule’. I also used some Chipboard Pieces and Die Cut Ephemera from the same collection. The sweet little Wood Button was from ‘Sunkissed’. To the right of my photo I added a handmade star embellishment which I topped with a Flair Button.
To add some extra interest to my background I added some stamping using a small stars background stamp and a roller phrase stamp.
Now it was time to finish off my page and tick off the remaining criteria. For something gold I added a few pieces of gold twisted wire, which I stapled down onto the page. For stitching, I added small hand stitched crosses using white embroidery thread. And finally, I added some splatters of white acrylic ink and that was all five criteria covered.
I had a lot of fun putting this layout together and I hope I have inspired you to play along with one of our INSD challenges while you still have time. Entries to the challenges close at midnight (AEST) this Sunday, 9th May. You can find all the challenge rules, or upload your entries via the Cocoa Vanilla Studio Community group.
Until next time, happy scrapping!

InterNational Scrapbook Day – Challenges 3 & 4!

Hi again everyone! If you missed our earlier post with our first two InterNational Scrapbook Day challenges, make sure you scroll back to see them after you are done here. We’ve got another two challenges to share with you now, courtesy of two more of our talented design team members.

First, here’s a reminder of our Challenge Rules

  1. Entries must be loaded into the correct challenge album in the Cocoa Vanilla Studio Facebook Community group prior to midnight (AEST) Sunday 9th May to be eligible for the prize. (If you aren’t already a member, make sure you click the link to join.)
  2. Some Cocoa Vanilla Studio products must be used. Yes, you can include other supplies as well, but there must be some CVS products clearly used. (If you don’t have any CVS products, you can always download and print some of our digital products HERE.)
  3. Entries must be created solely for each challenge and not combined with other challenges or design team work.
  4. You may enter each challenge as many times as you wish and entry is open to participants worldwide.
  5. One randomly selected winner from each challenge will receive a $25 store voucher to spend in the Cocoa Vanilla Studio online store.
  6. By entering the challenge you automatically give permission for your work to be shared by Cocoa Vanilla Studio via any of our social media channels.

Here are our next two challenges for you…

Challenge 3 – Mixed Media with Melissa Vining

Melissa’s challenge to everyone is to create a project that includes a wet medium (such as paint / ink / mist / texture paste, etc) AND a soft textural element (such as fabric / thread / lace / ribbon / fibres / twine,etc). She created an amazing sample layout for this challenge using our ‘Sunkissed’ collection which you can see below.

For her wet medium Melissa chose Distress Oxides and used the inks to add colour to her background; and for her soft textural element, she used embroidery thread, which she glued down in rows to form the bristles of her brush. (Such an awesome idea!)

 

Challenge 4 – Grab 5 with Michelle Stokes

Michelle’s challenge is a “grab 5”, where you are are required to create a project and include all five of the items on the list. Michelle also used the ‘Sunkissed’ collection for her sample layout, and you can clearly see how she has included each of the five criteria onto her page.

So there you have it – four very different challenges, in four very different styles. There is definitely something for everyone in this bunch! You have until next Sunday (9th May) to load your entries into our community group to be in the running for the prizes. And if these challenges are not enough for you, make sure you also enter our May monthly challenge that was revealed yesterday. (You can find all the details for that one HERE)

And don’t forget about our sale that is happening now too. We’ve got a massive 30% off in our store (including the ‘Sunkissed’ collection) AND free gifts to give away with purchases too! You can shop our sale HERE

Good luck to you all, and happy scrapping!

Scrap girl | Sunkissed Layout | Anna Komenda

Welcome CVS fans! It’s Anna here with another page made with my fav “Sunkissed” collection. This time I want to show you that it’s more than a summer line and you can easily use it to make many more projects. Sure, some paper patterns scream summer but most of them are very versatile and can be used whole year round. Floral ephemera is also great for any girly projects and this is what I decided to focus on today.

I created a layout documenting my younger’s daughter love to scrapbooking. She is always so excited when I allow her to play with my goodies (you can imagine me having few heart attacks watching her play with my precious inks and stamps so careless) and she loves to pose with the finished art. One of those photos got it’s own highlight on today’s page.

Colors in my photo are mostly purple and pink so I decided to make my scrappy process easier and I focused on pink papers only. I started with white cardstock for my background and lightly covered it with pattern using pink ink and stencil. Color is darker around the main composition to draw an eye to this spot.

Next step was to trim my papers to strips. I cut into “Feeling fine“, “Growing wild” (the cutest pattern ever!) and pieces of pink paper from Paper stack. A5 size of paper stack limited my possibilities to spread stripy composition from the top to the bottom of the page. But I still love this wonky and fun effect. I added pink machine stitching along the stripes to add even more texture.

Photo and some pink flowers from Floral ephemera were the next layer. This is such a fantastic product with so many flowers to choose from in many sizes and colors. I focused only on pinks and had more then enough to embellish this page. I also added few puffy stickers and some transparent hearts from Clear stickers sheet.

Adding title, little “hey there” sticker from Sticker sheet and wood epoxy button with cute heart was just a perfect finish touch. My last step was to splash everything with even more pink color using mist.

I had so much fun making this page and after a bit of a struggle of deciding what papers I should use (I started with whole colors of rainbow) it went really fast. This is my favorite king of project, with a cute vibe and a little bit of mixed media involved.

That is all for today. Thank you so much for stopping by and see you in two weeks <3

XO

Anna

Summer Holiday Memories | Sunkissed collection | Guest designer – Josefine van der Hoeven

Welcome to the Cocoa Vanilla Studio blog today!
It’s Josefine here and show you my new scrapbook layout that I created as a guest designer for Cocoa Vanilla Studio with the amazing summer collection Sunkissed. This is definitely one of my favorite summer collections. The colors are amazingly matching and everything fits together so well, your projects will look summerlicious!

I was inspired by the summer cocktail die-cut and decided to make a summer cocktail on my layout filled with a summer vacation memory.

I started with a white sheet of cardstock and grabbed different colors of distress oxide to make a light mixed media background. The colors I used are, mustard seed, picked raspberry, broken china and kitsch flamingo.

For the background I use two stencils. I start with the yellow color “mustard seed” and a sunburst stencil. with my distress (tool) brush I take a little distress oxide and start making circles over the stencil. When I’m done I remove the stencil and go over it again lightly and use the same technique. I do this also with the blue color “broken china” and using a dot stencil. The coloring of the stencil is done in the same way. Then I make splashes with the different colors on my background. This creates a colorful summer look.

I cut two strips of a 12×12 design paper of 3 inches and fold them. I glue the two strokes together. In this way I create a half rosette. This will be the base of my cocktail.

I use double sided tape and 3d foam to hold everything together. I place the half rosette on my background. I cut some designer paper to size and place it behind the photo to create some more layers. I place the photo in the middle of the cocktail and start decorating my layout with the awesome die-cut flowers.
I use a straw from my own stash and decorate it with an orange slice. Just like a real cocktail!

I am also using the beautiful wooden buttons from this collection! I am going to look for the perfect tittle for this layout. The awesome golden titles in this collection give just that little extra summer feeling on your projects! I choose the golden “summer” as a title and finish it with a word strip.

I’m almost done. I mix some white gesso with water and make splatters with my brush on my layout. This way I create an extra festive look to my page!

I cut the edges of the white cardstock sheet to size and placed a woodgrain design paper behind it. I use a sewing machine to sew the edges. I love how this layout turned out.

I hope I was able to give you some great ideas and wish you lots of fun creating beautiful projects with this fabulous summer collection! I want to thank you for stopping by on the blog today!

Happy crafting!

XoXo,
Jo

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