Carry the Torch Challenge || Paper Issues

Good morning everyone!  Happy Friday!  I wanted to pop in and share my take on this month's "Carry the Torch challenge over at Paper Issues.  This challenge is about scrapping fire - bon fire, s'more fires, or in my case - birthday fire (well, candles)!

I used some photos from my daughter's last birthday to highlight her with her birthday cake.  I pulled out the Elle's Studio birthday collection for this one.  I kept my design fairly simple and just created an easy grid made of 3x4 rectangles.  I also sprinkled around some embellishments in the form of wood veneers and cardstock stickers.  My favorite feature of my layout is the repeated date along the right side of the page.  I stamped my date stamp in a bunch of different Distress Oxides to create that border.  Here's what I came up with:

I hope you're able to play along with us this month!

Also, don't forget that each design team member has a code you can use in the PI store to save 20% off your entire order.  My code is KAT20.  Enjoy your weekend, friends! :)

Wednesday Sketch || Paper Issues

Good morning everyone! It's Wednesday, which means it's time for a new sketch!  Today's sketch was designed by Lindsey and is so much fun:

I loved the block-style design of the layout and the opportunity to get 3 photos on the page.

I had some cute photos of my daughter playing in a creek and knew that the new products from Elle's Studio would be perfect to use.  While I tried to keep pretty close to the original sketch, I did add some extra scallops and moved the scallops to frame my photos instead of my patterned paper block.  I also moved the positioning of the tags.  Here's what I came up with:

I loved this sketch because it gave me a really good starting point, but also gave enough room for me to work in my own style.  

I hope you can play along with us this month!  And don't forget: each design team member has a code that you can use in the PI store to save 20% off your entire order.  My code is KAT20.  Happy scrapping! :)