Inspiration from a Gift Bag

Do you ever find yourself walking through the store and noticing a throw pillow or a little girl's dress, or even a gift bag and thinking, "Wow! That would make a great scrapbook page!"? Well, you know when you do that you are hopelessly scrapbook diseased, which may or may not be a good thing. I admit, I am and that's OK with me. I thought today I'd share a little of my illness with you. The photos you see are a two page layout I did of my son, Tannon on St. Johns Island of the U.S. Virgin Islands. I found this gift bag at Target one day shopping and of course didn't think, "What a cute bag. I think it would make a darling birthday presentation." No, of course not. What I thought was, "Cool color combo and nice blending from one color to another. Love the words and where they are placed. Fonts are cool. PERFECT inspiration for a scrapbook page!" What you see here are the results of that sick but productive thought process.

I did a lot of rubbing ink directly from the pad onto the cardstock, sponging ink onto paper, scissor distressing and sanding to get the look I wanted to recreate from the bag. I even decided to distress the edges of my photos and rub a little ocean ink on them too. I really liked the outcome.

So, next time you are feeling creatively challenged when it comes to scrapbooking, go shopping...and not for scrapbooking supplies! Go browse and see what inspires your little scrappin' heart that day. It works. Trust me...keeping in mind that I do have a scrapbooking illness.

Close To My Heart products used: moonstruck cardstock (1293), kiwi cardstock (retired), ocean cardstock (textured- X5745), goldrush cardstock (1243), white daisy cardstock (1385), white daisy embossing powder (Z673), goldrush embossing powder (retired), ocean stamp pad (Z2136), moonstruck stamp pad (z2134), summer celebration (Z468), white daisy (Z400) and autumn garden (Z466) sassy strands , dimensional elements basic shapes (retired), playful alphabet stamps (retired), tiny typewriter alphabet stamps (D1222), sans alphabet stamps (C1304), star struck stamp set (D1237). Click here to order any supplies above.