What a great way to break in the New Year (better a tad late than not at all) 🙂 These days the time just seems to fly by and before we know it we’re celebrating Halloween and struggling to remember all the beautiful details in between. I love how this layout has several tags representing each month of the year so that you can journal your thoughts, dreams, things you were thankful for and so on… Then at the end of the year you can compile your treasure & create a truly heartfelt (accurate) “Year In Review” layout or if it was an eventful year a mini album.
Before we get started I like to thank Anna-Karin author of the “Layers Of Ink” blog for sharing this work of art with us today. Be sure to stop by her blog anytime you need a burst of inspiration. Anna-Karin is truly an amazing designer, you are sure to fall in love with her Unique Artsy style.
Creating scenes are a fun way to start your background design. Notice how Anna used several tree stamps where she creatively nested the photo.
Ranger’s Specialty Stamping paper were used for the background, you can get a similar effect with glossy cardstock. The Hero Arts Tree Trunks stamp were then clear embossed repeatedly to create the birch forest.
When building up layers of dye ink, start with the lightest shade and gradually build up color, since dye inks are transparent. It is also easier to get a smooth application of darker inks if there is a lighter ink underneath. The Adirondack Lights dye inks are perfect for that first layer. Anna used a Colorbox Stylus Tool for the inking, which works well in scenic stamping. You can use other ink-blending tools too. For an amazing tutorial on scenic stamping colouring with dye inks have a look at this post offered by Anna on the Layers Of Ink Blog. The tree die cuts are from Simon Says Stamp, Tall and Small Forest Tree. I love the thin branches layered on the heat embossed tree trunks.
The darkest inks were applied only at the top of the sky and at the bottom of the grassy area Anna splattered the scene with water, a technique that works great on Specialty Stamping paper. The hearts and word die cuts are from Simon Says Stamp, titled ‘happy’.
The grass was stamped with Old Letter Writing from Hero Arts for a tone-on-tone effect. To add more detail to the grass, Anna also stamped it with the Fabulous Flourish, using Archival Fern Green ink. The gauzy fabric is cheese cloth died to match.
For the journaling Anna used the Sizzix Tag & Bookplate & die cut the tags from white paper, if you don’t have the die, no worries you can easily cut your own by hand. The months were stamped on the tags, one for each side. Don’t stress you can have more than one side of a tag a month if you need it. :-). The crinkle ribbon was dyed with the green inks used on the scene so they coordinated perfectly. On each tag include a short summary of each month of the year. What a fuzzy.
My hope for you is to be fearless when it comes to your creativity, to try new techniques & most important to have fun! Thanks for visiting & have a very creative day.
Supplies
Paper:
- Stamping Paper (Ranger ISP32908 /6.8 $7.99)
Stamps:
- Tree Trunks (Hero Arts S5477 $7.99)
Inks:
- Archival Ink (Ranger AID38962 /1.7 $5.99)
Accessories:
- Tall Forest Tree Die (Simon Says S126 /0.5 $9.49)
Other:
- Cheese Cloth
- White Ink
- Embossing Powder
- Ribbon
