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2019 Favourites | Mandy Melville

Mandy Melville 14/12/2019

Hey friends!

Well, can you believe that we are fast approaching the end of 2019?! Does anyone else feel like this year disappeared in a blur? To finish the year off, our design team will each be sharing their favourite projects that they created during the year. I always find it so hard to narrow down to just a few, because so many memories have been documented on my layouts throughout the year, BUT I think these three layouts would definitely have to be amongst some of my faves!

The first layout I’m sharing was created using the super gorgeous Happiness collection, along with the coordinating cut files designed by Cut to You! The colours and the florals in this collection are sooo pretty, and the cardstock titles were definitely a fantastic addition too! It was perfect for documenting a photo of my three kiddies taken on Easter morning!

The next layout I’m sharing was created with the beautiful Wild at Heart collection. This collection is still one of my favourites, with its gorgeous rich colours, and I think it worked perfecty with this photo of my eldest daughter and I, taken on Mother’s Day this year. You probably know by now that I’m a huge fan of fussy cutting, and the floral patterned papers in this collection are perfect for this! For more details about this layout go take a look at the full blog post here.

And for my last layout, I’m sharing one that I created using the most recent Cocoa Vanilla collection, Unforgettable. One thing I love about this collection is that there are lots of different colour combinations, and for this layout I decided to focus on the peach and mint colours, along with that beautiful woodgrain patterned paper. I documented a photo of my youngest daughter and I, taken on one of our ‘Mummy and Ella’ days, and again I couldn’t resist fussy cutting some gorgeous florals to embellish my layout. You can check out the full blog post here.

I’d like to take this opportunity to wish you and your families a very happy Christmas and New Year! And I’d also like to say a very big thank you for all of your encouragement and support that you’ve shown me over the year in the way of comments and likes on my projects. I’ll be back here in January to share some more inspiration with you. Until then, take care.

Mandy x

Christmas cards | Tis the season | Anna Komenda

Anna Komenda 13/12/2019

Hello Friends. Counting down to christmas is starting to look serious. Only 10 days!!! If you didn’t have time to mail your christmas cards, it’s the last call. I prepared some isnpirations for you for quick and easy cards. Cocoa Vanilla had a christmas collection – “Tis the season” – few years ago and I still got some bits and pieces left, mostly papers. When Zoe recently released the digital versions of older lines, including the christmas one, I thought it’s the perfect moment to revisit “Tis the season”. I printed myself three sheets of embellishments included into this line. They are already prepared as a PDF versions, so all I needed to do is to pust the “print” button.

Making those three cards took me about an hour, including some fussy cutting of printed elements. It’s a combination of paper scraps, few stickers, ephemera leftovers, wooden elements and digital pieces.

I usually make 10*14 cm cards but I wanted to use up some longer stickers from the sticker sheet so I decided to use 10*20 cm size for the first card. I arranged longer strips, combining them with a piece of paper and glued them over a dotty background.

Something I like to include into all of my projects is dimension. I knew that the cards have to survive being mailed so I used solid cardboard instead of foam squares under the bigger surfaces. I finished my card adding few flowers cut out from printable sheets and wooden elements.

Second card is smaller. Once again I reached for papers scraps. I had few 3*4 elements from one of the papers and I decided to use them on cards. I started with a green background, then I added 3*4 card and finished it with a title from sticker sheet. Winter flowers are from digital version. Even if you don’t have papers, you can print them too!!! If you have a regular printer, you will get A4 size paper – perfect for any cardmaking.

Last card I made has a cute, retro Santa as a main element and it was also taken from cut apart paper.

Santa is quite big so there was no much room left for embellishing. I created my title using ephemera leftover – word “christmas”. I added word “merry” using alpha stickers, that were included into the older lines. You can buy them really cheap now! I mixed real wooden element with the printed ones to finish my card.

I am so, so happy that Zoe decided to release those printable versions of older lines. I can come back to my favorite lines and use up the leftovers. And using up the leftovers always makes me happy and I know I am not waisting anything.

Thank you for stopping by and see you in two weeks.

XO Anna

The Good Life | Unforgettable collection | Kylie Kingham.

Kylie Kingham 09/12/2019

Hello lovely friends. It’s Kylie back with you today to share another layout I have created with the ‘Unforgettable’ collection. Looking through my craft supplies I had so many decorative punches and border punches that I decided I wanted to use them to create some decorative edges for my layout. These punches were the inspiration for my completed design.

I layered several co-ordinating papers over each other.The top pages, (UNSCRIPTED & GARLAND), were cut slightly narrower than the base,(STORYTELLER) to create a border. I used a delicate scalloped lace border punch across the top edge of the top papers. Layered together it gave them a lovely texture as well.

For a little extra colour on my page I added a heart punched strip to the top of my page from the NATURAL BEAUTY paper. Some simple back stitching was added to the small edge that I added to the base of my page.

Since there was so much colour happening in my layout I chose to print my photo in black and white. It was mounted to my background with foam tape so that it say up a little, enabling me to layer some floral accents for a dimensional look.

To complete my layout I added a title using the FOAM TITLE STICKERS as well as some sub phrasing below using the ACCESSORY STICKERS.

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today. I hope you have enjoyed seeing my latest layout.

Until next time,

Kylie.

Tis The Season | Tis The Season Collection | Tarrah McLean

Tarrah McLean 08/12/2019

Hi there creative friends!

It’s Tarrah McLean back with you and today I am sharing a new Christmas themed layout using the gorgeous Tis the Season collection.

I started my layout by cutting a Christmas Tree cut file design (sorry I am not sure where this one comes from) from white cardstock. I don’t have much of the traditional collection left now but I am so happy to be able to get everything I need in digital form! I will never run out again! If your stash is getting low of Tis the Season, make sure to grab the digital collection here and print your own! There are some of the older collections available in digital form now, so check them all out in the Cocoa Vanilla Store here! I did have some of the green holly paper left and I love how it looks behind the cut file design. I also had a small amount of the red and white diagonal stripe paper and decided to adhere a strip of that to the left side of the page. I chose a photo of my youngest taken on Christmas Day when he was about 3 weeks old, he just turned 9 yesterday so the photo is quite old but its one of my favourites! I changed the colour of the photo to a soft black and white as the colours in the photo would have clashed with the soft colours in the collection. Underneath the photo I layered a small paper doily and a smaller piece of the red and white stripe paper to the right of the photo. I also layered a wood veneer frame on top of the photo, I like how this draws your eye to the photo. I popped up the photo using craft foam and then placed embellishments around the photo. The ticket that says ‘Child’ die-cut definitely had to be added, it was perfect tucked at the bottom of my photo.I used accessory stickers, enamel dots, die-cuts, wood veneer, sequins and a bitty bow to embellish. I have tons of the sequins left, I love the gold stars so I scattered a few of those around to add some sparkle. I placed the white bitty bow at the base of the tree to separate the tree from the pot. To finish the page, I added the date stamp of when the photo was taken. I love how my page turned out even with only minimal pieces from the Tis the Season collection!

Thank you so much for stopping by today! I hope you enjoyed my page today and that you are inspired to create your own Christmas themed layout using your stash of Tis the season!

Happy creating!

Tarrah x

Happy Times | Happiness collection | Kylie Kingham.

Kylie Kingham 23/11/2019

Hello lovelies! It’s Kylie back with you all today with a fun new layout. My assignment for today was to use cut files….Yay! I immediately headed to the website and found myself drawn to the ‘Colour Me Happy’ cut files. I teamed some of these with the gorgeous ‘Happiness’ collection for my layout today.

I cut some of the flower clusters from the files as well as some extra leaf bunches and the ‘XO’ letters. I wanted to work on a white background so that the colours of the papers that I backed my cut files with would really pop. With the ‘Botanical Bliss’ paper I added a 1.5cm border on both vertical edges of my layout.

Once I had backed my cut files I began adhering them in place. I used some adhesive foam tape to back them, this way they sat up from my page with some height. I also added some extra flowers from the die cut pack with foam for dimension.

My photo was printed in black and white, and I have backed it with some white tissue paper from my stash. It was adhered flat to my page so that the floral embellishments could sit above in height for effect. Some of the typed words from the sticker sheet were used to create a small sub title phrase which completed my layout.

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today. I hope you have enjoyed seeing my latest layout and it has given you a little inspiration.

Until next time,

Kylie.

Happy Christmas | Tis The Season Collection | Tarrah McLean

Tarrah McLean 20/11/2019

Hi creative friends!

It’s Tarrah McLean back with you on this Thursday! I hope all my fellow Aussie friends are all safe from these horrendous bush fires we are experiencing in our country at present?

Today I am sharing a layout for the Cut Files theme we have on all this week and being that its Thursday I was also given ‘Throwback Thursday’ where we create with an older collection. I decided to create a Christmas layout since it is fast approaching!I started my page by taking a sheet of white cardstock and adding a piece of vellum over the top to mute the white a little bit, as I had lots of the sequins left from the Tis The Season collection, I decided to add lots of them under the vellum to create a shaker pocket. Once I had added the sequins, I then machine stitched all the edges so that they wouldn’t fall out. I love how this turned out! I like that it adds another feature to my layout.

I took two of the 12 x 12 papers and cut some vertical strips from them and placed them down each side of the layout. then chose a gorgeous cut file title design by Cut To You and added some of the patterned papers behind each of the words. I added craft foam to the underneath and placed it in the centre of my page. I also popped up the photo of my sons on Christmas Day with craft foam so that it was at the same level as the title on my page. I love the shadows and dimension this creates on my page.

I then began to embellish my page using some of the accessory stickers (that are still available in the store) some of the die-cuts, wood veneers and of course a bitty bow and the tiny metal key! I only had 1 of the poinsettia flowers in the die-cut pack left so I added just the one to the very bottom of the title and layered the bow over the top. Lastly I added some of the enamel dots from the Tis The Season collection. Have you got any of the Tis The Season collection left? Pull it out and get creating with it! Its such a soft and gorgeous collection for Christmas photos.

Thank you so much for stopping by today! See you next time!

Tarrah x

Shine Bright | Unforgettable | Mandy Melville

Mandy Melville 14/11/2019

Hey everyone!

Mandy here today to share my take on the ‘white out’ theme, using the gorgeous Unforgettable collection. I use white cardstock A LOT for my backgrounds, so I really enjoyed the challenge to use a patterned paper instead. I documented a photo of my two girls, taken at Eleanor’s 5th birthday party last weekend. They were both dressed up for the party, as Eleanor chose to have a ‘magical’ theme, and the colours in their outfits matched perfectly to the gorgeous peach and purple tones in the Unforgettable collection! (Not intentional, but definitely a happy coincidence!)

I decided on using the reverse side of the Lacewing patterned paper as my background. I love the beautiful peachy colour of that paper, and the tone on tone sketchy flowers! I then added an 8 inch strip of the Story Teller patterned paper (reverse side) across the middle section of the background. I’m not sure if that was cheating just a little bit, because it’s still white, but it really helped all of the elements on the page to stand out, and it also gives the viewer’s eye a place to rest amongst all of that colour. Plus it’s still a patterned paper, so technically I didn’t cheat right?! I also trimmed down a piece from the Pretty Bits paper to tuck under the top and bottom edges of the white patterned paper.

Next I fussy cut a few floral clusters out of the Glorious patterned paper and then layered them across the layout to create one long cluster. How gorgeous are the florals in this collection?! I also tucked a few extra die cut leaves into the cluster where I felt like it needed a little something more to help it feel balanced. When I adhered the floral clusters and die cuts, I added glue only to the middle, so that the leaves would lift off the page, giving it some nice dimension.

For my title, I used the words ‘Shine Bright’ from the Foam Title Stickers pack. I love the contrast that the black title adds to the page, and I think it’s a perfect sentiment for my girls!

I matted my photo with the reverse side of the Unscripted patterned paper, and then tucked it in above the floral cluster. I also added a couple of die cut butterflies around the layout, as well as a larger one that I cut out of the Pretty Bits patterned paper. To finish the layout off, I scattered some enamel dots around the page.

Thanks so much for joining me here today! I hope that you’ve been inspired by my layout!

Mandy x

You make me happy | Happiness Layout | Anna Komenda

Anna Komenda 13/11/2019

Hello CVS friends! It’s Anna here with my project created with no white background. It is a theme for this week – “White-out”. Each Cocoa Vanilla collection has plenty of amazing pattern papers to choose from so it was a real pleasure to play with them. I was going through my paper stack thinking of what line I should use this time and I was drawned to pretty colors of “Happiness”. You all know that I love colorful designs and ugly fall outside need some proper, colorful medicine to be scared away.

I started with cutting out my title using electronic diecutting machine. I did it twice in the same size using two different papers: “Good vibes” and “Botanical bliss“. I layered them creating kind of a shadow. I also added white false stitches around the top one using white pen. Pretty paper with navy hearts is perfect as a background paper. I added a thin layer of white acrylic paint to help my title pop a little bit more.

I placed my photo on one of the empty spots between the letters and embellished it with tickets and flowers from ephemera pack. I can never have enough of those amazing flowers added to this line. Pretty shape and watercolor look, combined with juicy colors are the perfect match.

Between the paper flowers I also mixed in some flowers from clear sticker sheet. Their colors are more intense and they look amazing on light background. Butterflies cut out from “Bright and beautiful” paper are great embellishment too. Fussy cutting is one of my favourite techniques. I finished embellishing by adding one of the flair buttons on top of the title. I needed some darker accent in this spot.

After I finished working with paper, I decided to add some more colors to the background. I know that usually we work in opposite order but I felt that this project is unfinished. I gently added some watercolor stains here and there with pink and green paint. It made my layout looking more cheerful and complete.

That is all for today. I love working with pattern paper as a base of my page as much as I like using white backgrounds. It’s a double joy :) Thank you for stopping by and see you in two weeks my friends.

XO Anna

Bloom Memorydex Cards | Midnight Collection | Kylie Kingham.

Kylie Kingham 09/11/2019

Hello lovely friends! It’s Kylie back with you all today with a fun new project I have been working on. Have you been captured by the new ‘Memorydex’ card craze?? I certainly have. Memorydex cards are a great fun way to produce some mini scrapbook pages or to create cards with positive sentiments.It’s also a nice way to display your ‘mini layouts’ all together either in a Memorydex storage box or on a Memorydex spinner. Thanks to their size they are also a great way of using up any left over supplies you may have on hand. I’ve been creating quite a few cards lately which I will share some of today. For this trio I have worked with the beautiful Midnight collection.

To create my cards I was lucky enough to find a die from my local scrapbooking store but you can also find free templates online too. Once I have my card cut to size I can begin embellishing. My photos have been printed quite small- around 3cm x 3cm so that they fit nice and snug into my card amongst all the gorgeous die cuts.

So that my cards had some lovely texture and dimension I have added my embellishments with foam adhesive. This is so they sit up from the card background. For colour contrast I also used a leaf punch from my stash to create some darker leaves as well.These have been tucked in and around my flowers. I love using flowers and the Cocoa Vanilla die cut packs are always so generous in the quantity you receive.

I created a Memorydex card with a masculine theme for a photo of my son. This collection is very versatile and allows you to be able to do that. I have layered several foliage die cuts amongst a frame and my favourite embellishment of this entire collection….A mason jar! To finish my card I also added the ‘Shine Bright’ button flair.

I’ll be adding these to my Memorydex spinner once I have completed more but for now I can enjoy them in their storage box.

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today to see my latest project. I hope it gives you some inspiration for your own creating.

Until next time,

Kylie xo

Hello | Unforgettable Collection | Tarrah McLean

Tarrah McLean 08/11/2019

Hi Cocoa Vanilla friends!

It’s Tarrah back with you and today I am sharing a new layout featuring the gorgeous Unforgettable collection!

The colours in the Unforgettable collection are beautiful so I decided to showcase them all on this layout! I pulled out the 6′ x 8′ paper pad and starting using the papers to back a heart cut file available in The Cut Shoppe. Once the heart design was backed, I added craft foam underneath and adhered it to the black and white spot paper also from the Unforgettable collection. I decided to trim down the black and white spot paper so that I could add the grey chevron paper is a border right around the page. I trimmed this paper down slightly also so that I could add a black cardstock border also.I added my photo of my 2 beautiful nieces slightly to the right of the heart and added a couple pf layers underneath including a paper doily and some more of the 6′ x 8′ papers from the paper pad. I also added one of the tags from the die-cut pack to the left of the photo and I popped up the photo and paper layers to give even more dimension. I pulled out the ‘Hello’ foam title and added it to the bottom of my photo and added a flair button and a phrase die-cut on the left of the photo.The butterflies in this collection are beautiful, quite a few of those made it onto my page also. To further embellish, I added 2 of the black foam hearts, some die-cut hearts and florals, some enamel dots and some of the stickers from the accessory sheet.