Shhhhh, I have a secret

That's right, I have a secret.  I get to reveal it this weekend so stay tuned!  Until then I have to tell about the wonderful, scrapping weekend I had last weekend.  With the hubby out of town and rain, what's there to do besides scrap?  It was made even better by a fantastic "monstrosity" of a weekend from Keystone Scraps.  They held a series of speed scraps over at Mousescrappers and what fun!  Despite the timezone challenge, I managed to make all five speed scraps and come away with a wonderful, new monster themed kit!  Perfect for my little monsters. 

There's something about scrapping with a time limit and restrictions that really get the creative juices flowing.  Or maybe it's scrapping after midnight that does it--can't remember how many of the pages I did after midnight.  At any rate, it was great fun and I am very happy with the pages that came from the challenges.



This is my favorite from the bunch.  I used Britt-ish's Alice kit, Tanya's Templates and Shadows.
I even got a gallery standout from Scrap Matters!

My little guy helped me with this one.

Another that I had fun with.

Only a couple more days until I can spill my secret.  Time to get some more scrapping finished!

Conquering Shadows

Ever since I began digital scrapping, shadows have been my nemesis.  I just never felt I could get them right or get those cool effects that so many others were achieving.  I followed tutorial after tutorial, paid attention to templates that were pre-shadowed.  It was just too much effort and thinking when doing pages I just wanted to get finished.  Scrapping wasn't much fun, being too worried about getting shadows down.  Well, life is different now, things have changed.  A couple weeks ago Tanya of Crossbone Cuts designs released a set of styles--what are those?--for shadowing, Shadow Like Tanya.  I have seen other shadows set before, but never quite understood them.  Since I'm on Tanya's team I'm able to try these out ahead of time and Oh My Gosh!  I'm in love.  I can shadow!!!

This set includes two sets of shadows.  One up and one down.  Installation is easy in Photoshop.  Just open the folder, double click on the .asl file and it will automatically install into your styles palette.  Tanya has named all the files for easy reference.  I think I already have their positions memorized too.  When you need to shadow something, highlight your layer and click the appropriate style.  Done!  Faster and easier than messing with your drop shadow windows. 

When I have a template that I want to manipulate, that too is easy.  I'll leave most of the shadows as is, but when dealing with some of the elements, I want the deeper and darker shadows of the styles.  I use those, but make sure to check the angle degree on the templates and keep those the same.  Don't want my shadows going all over the place! 

I love how all the shadows are different.  Some are really deep others quite shallow.  I never thought I'd like the differences, but it makes such a difference.  Here are two pages I recently completed with Tanya's Shadows.  For the first, I used a template from Little Green Frog--a new template addiction I fear. (Be sure to check out her blog freebies.)  The second page is my own design.  Really loving my clustering now.  The shadows make such a difference!

Template by Little Green Frog.
Most backgrounds and Elements from Haynay Designs, My Magical Place collection
Confetti from Britt-ish Designs
Frame and Mickey crystals by Sahlin Studios

Everything from Scrap Matters Collab, Island Cruising, now retired.
Hidden Mickeys by Sahlin Studios (my go-to Mickey element)

I am even more overwhelmed by the shadows.  For the first time since scrapping, I am getting compliments on my shadows and clustering.  Something I never expected.  So Tanya knows what she's doing and I'm so glad she's willing to share it with us.  My hope is that a second series of shadows, for even more element options will be released in the future.  If there are, you'll hear about them here that's for sure!

Busy, busy, busy!

Seems like it's been ages since I've scrapped,  but it's only been a few days.  I feel like I've been neglecting the computer and Photoshop.  It's been crazy here with scouting and life.  I have no excuses today though and should be scrapping.  Scrap Matters had their 4th birthday last week and what a fun time in the forums and with some great challenges.

Speed Scrap!  It's Obon here in Japan and this is the Bon Odori at our local temple.  The most challenge part of this speed scrap was making sure to have 20 elements on the page!
Backgrounds and Elements by Britt-Ish Designs: Imperial Girl
Lanterns are by Genevieve and recolored, so sad she's retired.

Another speed scrap!
Love this kit!  The California add-on to WM[squared]'s Great Escape kit.
These pictures are from our last trip to the city, oh so long ago!  They were also taken with our ancient camera and when I uploaded them to the page, they were the size of postage stamps!  How far our cameras have come.



Went into Tokyo last weekend for the Ultraman Festival.  What fun!  We went somewhere new in the city, Sunshine City, and I know we'll be back.  In addition to a lot of shopping, there is also a museum and aquarium here too that the boys want to go to.  I enjoyed putting this page together and had fun with my photos.  The title is an extraction of one of the signs and the background an overlay I created.  There were a few bins of little Ultraman finger puppets that I took a picture of.  Really like how this turned out.

Time for School!

It's the first of the month and that means time for the Mix-A-Kit release at Scrap Matters.  This month has some fresh greens and reds, a touch of blue.  Tanya came up with a really cute school kit for her part of the kit!  I was really happy about this as I'd been wanting to do some back-to-school projects.  PERFECT!!!  So I dug out some templates and went to town.

Pencil case, crayons and box

I knew I wanted to do the crayons for sure, and used Heather Roselli's template for that.  She has a set of easy to follow templates for 8, 16, and 24 count crayons.  My box was a tad bigger than the box of crayons I had, so I cut the top off and cut out a window, then slipped it into my box.  If I wanted to make my own box, I would have been sure to reinforce the template with card stock before cutting.

I have seen many pencil holders out there and can't wait for Halloween to create some rather creative ones.  For this project though, I wanted simple.  Kelligh Ratzlaff is awesome with hybrid templates and has even branched off into cutting files as well.  I used her pencil box set for this.  It's a kit with two templates, one very simple, shown, and another more complicated but made to hold several more pencils.

The box is of my own creation and uses blank coasters.  I purchased a stack of these several years ago and they're great for these kinds of things, mini books.  Very sturdy and white in color so you can really have your way with them.

I will probably add some more parts to this little collection and complete a nice gift for the new teacher this fall.  Until then, here are Tanya's parts of the kit.  It's 53 pieces in all, with several different themes.  Very cute, lots of fun and very versatile.