I've had this photo of my younger boy in mind to use as an 8x12 photo on a layout, but I decided recently to use it on a digital page instead of paper. I think of digital scrapbooking in the same way I do paper scrapping:

1. I apply products in layers;
2. I have to stretch my techniques to achieve visually what I want using the supplies I have; and
3. I often get a great idea for a lower layer long after I've applied product above it.

Number 3 above is a good place where digital is clearly superior to paper: the undo button! Plus, I can click on different layers to add stuff or delete layers without having the pry already adhered paper off without damaging the page. Not that it happens that often. ;) winking

I created this paper like I would a paper page: I browsed my supplies, found some papers and elements I thought would work, and started creating a layered template for me to work with.
(Note: browsing supplies to me is where actual paper is superior to digi. Clicking on folder after folder trying to find the paper I want frustrates me so much it makes my teeth ache.)

I clustered elements, journaling spots, labels, and brushes in ways I would with paper. The journaling sport from List It! Childhood Digi Plus. It was bigger than I wanted, so I shrunk it on the page--again, a clear advantage of digi.

One cool thing: I couldn't find a piece of orange paper the exact shade I wanted, but I found two close ones, so I layered them on top of on another and reduced the opacity of the top layer so you could see both. Something you just can't do with regular paper! Fun.

One final disadvantage: it took me hours to make this page, mainly because of searching through and choosing supplies. I suspect creating a paper page would have taken less time, but certainly with less flexibilty in the creation process.

And one final confession: though I use digi elements often in my photos, I do not create many digital pages. This one is my third ever. Will I do it again? Oh, yes! I plan on making a digital photo book of my own design (not the premade ones) for my father-in-law next. I look forward to the entire process (well, except for searching through supplies!).

Supplies:
Patterned Paper: Queen of Quirk/Paislee Press You Are Here (oscraps.com), One Little Bird Vagabond (oscraps.com)
Brushes: Katie Pertiet Graphically Scrolled (designerdigitals.com), Cathy Zielske Dotted and Dashed Circles (designerdigitals.com)
Border overlay: Creashens/Paislee Press Nostalgia (oscraps.com)
Label: One Little Bird Vagabond (oscraps.com)
Journaling spot: Ella Publishing List It! Childhood Digi Plus
Scattered flowers: One Little Bird Vagabond (oscraps.com)
Font: Cocktail Shaker, My Own Topher



Giveaway is for a copy of List It! Childhood Digi Plus- leave a comment sharing your favorite digi designer
Giveaway closes in 48 hours, Sept 1 @ 11:00 am MST

Winner of May's Flaums giveaway is Funnybunny

Boot Camp registration marches on! Wendy and I got together at my house yesterday (which is always a riot) and were finally able to get our registration video filmed! Do you like our hats? (p.s. my house is not ALL this beige, but we had to scoot the sofa into the best available light. :)



Register here.

(Remember, the price goes up to $33 on September 1. Save $3 by registering now! OR sign up for our newsletter, and you'll receive an additional $2 coupon in your email inbox on Monday.)

And while I have your attention, I must express my THANKS for helping me raise more than $500 for the Mackenzie Christensen Memorial Fund! I know it will be much appreciated by the family.

Hope to see you in boot camp! (Pink camo optional.)

Thank you to everyone who have participated and thanks Ella for having me here! The winner of tge $15 GC to fei-fei's stuff is...


Congratulations antnaude!!! Please email me at feifeistuff(at)gmail(dot)com and I will send you your prize. Thanks again everyone!!!

PS... If you are still new to digital scrapping and hesitant to buy digital products, you can visit my blog www.feifeistuff.blogspot.com and download my freebies and use it on your scrap pages or hybrid projects!

Hi everyone! Today I am showing a quick example using the Retro Digital Frames from the Ella Store. The set includes five custom frames, but since I have a passion for Polaroids, I chose to use the Pretend Polaroid frame for my layout.

I followed the included instructions to create my three polaroid photos, then printed them out onto 4x6 photo paper.



I trimmed off the excess and then made my page with my three Pretend Polaroids.



I cut a piece of patterned paper the same size as the photos to form a grouping of four, and then continued with my embellishments, title and journaling.

Here are some other ideas for using the frames:
1. You can add text or digital embellishments before printing your photos out
2. You can make the photos smaller by resizing them before printing
3. You can use them directly on a digital page instead of printing them out like I did.
4. You can use a different frame for each of five photos for an eclectic grouping on a page.

I hope I've inspired you to give these frames a try. This month they are on sale for only $3! and click on the banner below to find out the digital month happenings here at Ella

Hi everyone!  I'm back today to share the 10th sketch in Ella's
 

This is the second sketch for the month of August; you can see the first sketch for this month here.

Before we get to the sketch, I want to remind you of this month’s prize.  You might remember that Ella Friend Monika Wright is sponsoring this month's Stretch Your Sketches Challenge Series!
 

Monika has an etsy shop where you'll find a wide selection of modern and traditional art prints as well as mini-albums and journals.

So in addition to winning a free copy of my eBook, Stretch Your Sketches
 

the winner will also receive a $20 gift certificate to i love it all.  Here is an example of a print from her shop, the House and Family Rules Subway Art Print:
 

Monika has also generously agreed to ship any items internationally - thank you Monika!

Now on to this month’s sketch!  Here it is:
 

Usually when I use a sketch I follow it fairly closely.  In this case, I really only used the sketch as a starting point for my layout.  As I went to edit the photos I planned on using and as I put together the layout I ended up moving things around quite a bit:
 

These photos are from Mother's Day and the journaling reads:  These are my Mother’s Day photos. You can’t really tell, but I’m holding onto Nathan mostly because he was trying to run away. And Gabe basically refused to look into the camera.
Oh well, we tried. May 2011


Joining me this week in our sketch challenge is Ella Friend, Mary Jo Johnston.  Mary Jo is an incredible card maker and so I asked her to use this week's sketch to make a card.  And instead of creating one card, she made two!
 

I love how they are both of these cards are different and yet you can see how they where inspired by the sketch.  Here is what Mary Jo had to say about the sketch, "A great sketch can be exactly what you need to jump start your creativity for a new layout.  But, have you ever thought about stretching your sketch to create a card or even altered project?  I chose to use today's sketch and incorporate it into my love of cardmaking - and I love the result! The blocks in the center of the design provide the perfect focal point for the center of my cards.  The three elements are represented by journaling blocks, stickers and patterned paper.  The journaling location, provided for a traditional layout, can also be used to incorporate a sentiment for your card.  Thanks to Donna for a fabulous sketch!  Break out your scrapbooking supplies and be creative!"

Want to join in the fun?  Here's how to play:  First, create your layout based on the sketch.  Next, post it to your blog or any online album.  Be sure to mention where you got the sketch in your post or caption!  Third, come back to this post and share the link to your layout.  All entries must be posted by August 31, 2011, 11:59 pm PST.  The winner of each month will be chosen at random and will be announced here on The Daily Trumpet. 

Remember, there will be two sketches posted each month.  If you create two layouts, one from each sketch, you will have two entries which will double your chances of winning!
 
I hope you all will participate with me and make a layout based on this sketch.  If you are playing along here is a button for you to post on your blog.

Dear Friends of Ella,

Forgive me for getting personal for a moment, but a dear friend of mine was struck by unimaginable tragedy this week.

A devastating car accident took the life of her beautiful 16-year-old daughter and her vivacious 66-year-old mother on the same day, also killing her stepfather and critically injuring her nephew.

They had been travelling through Wyoming on their way to a family reunion in Yellowstone National Park. The entire extended family was planning to be there until Saturday, enjoying the time away to spend with cousins, brothers, and sisters, grandma and grandpa. You can read the news story here.

Instead the family is back home planning three funerals.



Mackenzie Christensen, age 16, was bright, kind, talented, and full of life. She was one of those people who made me feel such hope for the future. I was excited to see what great things she would accomplish in her life.

She was just weeks away from starting her junior year of high school.

She had just made the varsity volleyball team.

She was a talented pianist.

She loved to read and was a wonderful student.

She was gentle and kind—truly a friend to everyone.

She was involved in her church and in service oganizations.

She was a wonderful older sister to her two little sisters, ages 12 and 8.

The family had been saving up to send Kenzie to college, and instead they're trying to afford a funeral.

In an effort to help the family raise money for funeral expenses, we at Ella Publishing Co. have put our $5 gift certificates on sale for 10 percent off through Wednesday, August 17, the day of Kenzie's funeral. All proceeds from $5 gift certificate sales will be donated to the Kenzie Christensen memorial fund at Wells Fargo Bank.

Remember, you can "send" the gift certificate to yourself if you wish (just specify your own email address in the recipient field). And you can use your gift certificate at any time; it will never expire.

So, if you were thinking of purchasing something anyway in the next little while, get a $5 certificate now for $4.50, help a family in need, and simply spend the certificate whenever you want—now or later.

(Important note: gift certificates cannot be redeemed in conjunction with coupon codes. And only one gift certificate can be redeemed per transaction. So if you plan to purchase several for yourself, plan to use them on several different future purchases.)

Thank you for your support,



Update: For those who have asked about donating directly to the Kenzie Christensen Memorial Fund at Wells Fargo Bank, there's now also a PayPal address for donations. Send via PayPal to kenziechristensen@gmail.com

How's your summer going so far? Busy? Me too.

I find it ironic that, the busier life gets, the more stories there are to tell… but the less time I have to spend telling them. I try not to stress about it though. I take photos and keep notes (emails sent to friends, blog entries, Facebook updates, tweets on Twitter) with the hope that I'll have time to pull together a few pages once the dust settles. But there never seems to be enough time.

Just this past weekend, though, I rediscovered the joy of speed-scrapping with digital templates. It's a bit like starting a paper layout with a sketch, only it's even easier because the template designer has already pre-cut all the paper and photos to the proper sizes. All I have to do is choose my photos and type out my journalling. Yes, it's really that easy.

I decided to start with a few templates by the ever-so-talented Cathy Zielske, which are available at Designer Digitals, and I simplified the process of choosing digital papers and embellishments by using supplies from several coordinating kits from one of my favourite designers, none other than fabulous Ms. Crystal Wilkerson herself (author of Ella's upcoming August eBook!).


Supplies: CZdesign template no. 84 + Crystal Wilkerson Spring/Summer 2011 Distressed Solids

My first layout is as simple as it gets. Template + photos + words. Once you know how to use clipping masks in Photoshop, then it's a piece of cake. (If you don't know how, I recommend that you watch Cathy's tutorial on vimeo.) The only bit I customized: I changed the colour of the text and the stitched border to match my photos. Easy peasy. Hint: use the eye dropper tool to get a good match.



Supplies: CZdesign template no. 86 + Crystal Wilkerson Spring/Summer 2011 Stripes XS, Distressed Solids, Woodgrain and Colorful Banners

My second layout was a little more complicated. I wanted to play up the birthday theme by adding a pennant banner, but that covered the spot where the title was supposed to be, so I added the title directly on top of the photo. Also, in order to include the non-square horizontal photo of my boys playing chess (in the upper left corner), I merged two squares in the template into one layer and used it to clip my photo. I ran out of photos, so I used a bit of patterned paper in one of the squares and added a text layer (11) to finish it off.




Supplies: CZdesign story guide no. 5a + Crystal Wilkerson Spring/Summer 2011 Woodgrain and Distressed Solids

The third and final layout I did was inspired by Cathy's recent obsession with camera-phone photos. I used photos taken on my iPhone and edited them using the Camera+ app (square crop, special effects and borders). Then all I had to do was plunk the photos straight into this template. I changed the title by deleting the artwork layers from the template and adding my own title as text layers. I used pre-formatted text block to make up my own set of questions and answers, and I typed until I filled the designated space.

There you have it: three layouts in one afternoon. That's more scrapbooking than I've done in the past three months! Super speedy scrapping, all made possible by digital templates. Go me!

.....

Now for the fun part! Cathy is giving away to one lucky blog reader a prize package of any five products from her shop at Designer Digitals. That's right, folks. You get to choose any five of CZ's templates, album sets or word art sets. Just leave a comment on this post, telling me how much (or little) experience you have with digital templates—or anything else you want to tell me about digital scrapbooking for that matter. We'll chose a winner on Friday!

Now go on, and enjoy the rest of your summer!


Click here to see a list of all the digi deals, articles, and more happening this month!
 

And the winning comment is...

We're wrapping up our first fun week of Digital Scrapbooking Month! Thanks to everyone who has joined us. We've got LOTS more fun things planned, including four more awesome eZine articles, two new eBook releases, and more!

We hope you had a chance to read Aly Dosdall's fun introduction to digital scrapbooking (OR if you're an advanced digi girl, isn't this a great link to share with your digital newbie friends?)

Next week, look forward to a new article from Celeste Smith that's all about digital scrapbooking freebies. A definite must read!

And now for the winners of this week's giveaway:
Swiss and BlessedintheUS won the Ella Fun Digital Frames
C.ting won the Kit from Pretty Little Studio
Congrats winners!

See you Monday.