My Crafty Madness: Creative Blog Hop

Hi all,

Its my turn to join in with the Creative Blog Hop that's sweeping around the blogging world like a Mexican wave! I was very honoured to be nominated by fellow Swirly Girly LaQuette Atkins from Swirlydoo's. I really love LaQuette's style, her use of punches and layers, and many of her layouts use stencils/masks with mixed media, all creating a romantic soft pretty effect. Visit her blog LaQuette Atkins . I loved this layout LaQuette made with the February kit.

I became a member of Swirlydoo's Kit club Swirlydoo's Kit Club in March 2014 where I have met so many friendly, outgoing, helpful, 'scrappy mad' ladies like myself, and have been made to feel so welcome. It is a wonderful place to be and I have learnt so much from everyone and their different styles and the tutorials and technique advice available on the forum.

In taking part in this blog hop, we all have to answer 4 questions, so here goes.......

1) What are you working on?

At the moment I have had a mad rush of inspiration using the latest kit from Swirlydoo's, Wistful Blues. It contains my favourite colours, blue with brown hints and a little pink. We had a holiday in Devon a month ago and a lot of my holiday photo's go so well with the papers in the kit, I haven't been able to keep up with the ideas! I am also working on a couple of off the page altered art projects that I have been asked to do, a Kaisercraft drawer unit and a matching photo frame in a requested colour scheme. Its nearly finished so keep looking at my blog for a post!

2) How does your work differ from others of its genre?

I think there are so many styles and interpretations within the world of scrapbooking , it is truly fascinating to see the differences in peoples work. Mine, I'm not sure I am different to some but my style has definitely changed over the last year finding its place in a shabby, romantic, vintage, very much embellished category, which is why I love Swirlydoo's so much, with like minded people. My work is also developing, hopefully for the better. I am finding a love for mixed media which fits in with my 'style' very well.

3)Why do I create what I do?

Well there's a question! I have always been quite 'arty' at school but never really followed it through when leaving and getting into the working world. I went through a difficult time health wise a few years ago and it was in that time my Mum introduced me into scrapbooking. At this time I found it so relaxing and absorbing and loved my time in my little 'crafty' bubble, it really helped me. I got hooked!! I love paper.... I have loads... I love taking photo's... I love remembering all the things I've done and family moments and milestones....scrapbooking was perfect!. I love embellishments and creating something beautiful that's got meaning whether for me or other people, but most of all I love playing with all those wonderful goodies us crafty ladies can get our hands on nowadays and the friendships I have made through scrapbooking.

4) How does your creative process work?

That's depends really, sometimes its the kits that start me of, I see a paper I love and go from there and find a photo to fit the paper. But I can also work the other way and have the photo I want to scrap and go find the paper to work with it. Most times my layouts come from out of my head, I spend hours pinning sketches on Pinterest and then never use them!

The other part of this creative blog hop is to nominate more friends to join the hop and invite you to visit their blogs too. I have to say the majority of my bloggy friends are from Swirlydoo's. My friends in the UK haven't really got blogs and entered into the forum thing like I have. I have some wonderful friends that inspire me at crops and my friend Hayley who really inspired and encouraged me to explore my creativity when she had her shop Funky Farm Scrapbook Barn. There are two ladies at Swirlydoo's, whose work I strive for mine to be like, as I love what they do with their work and look at in awe, Angelica and Misha, are great inspiration to me.

I have nominated Mellisa (PaperFairytails) for the blog hop.

Mellisa is another fellow swirly girly at Swirlydoo's. She is another lady that I look with great interest at her work. She works so well with colour, one thing I'm not good at, whether its colour of the papers or the colour of the embellishments she uses to complement. She also uses lots of different techniques on her pages, each page has a little something different on it to the last one, I like that! And then you get her 'white' page - wow beautiful! I want to get better/ braver with colour, like this. I also like her non photo pages. I've seen a couple that she has done with just words and journaling and they are still so very effective, making me imagine pictures in my head of what she is journaling about. Very clever. I also love her mini album she has made out of the Wistful Blues kit. To see this visit her blog. Here is the link to her blog gaslightmemories.net/mellog

Here are a couple of my favourite layouts of hers....