New York Travel | The Digital Press

As a member of The Digital Press creative team, I am lucky enough to work with loads of different digital products in all sorts of styles. One of my favourites come from Rachel Hodge. She is so talented!

On our travels to Chelsea Market, NYC, we encountered so many photo opportunities. There was great street art in all sorts of places - even a huge garage.

I've gone all mixed media for a change - something I don't do all that often!

I created a very textured background on watercolour paper, adding stencils, texture paste, inks and stamps. I might have gone a bit over the top for me.

I also layered washi tapes here and there - I love the translucent feel of washi tape.

Then it was time for the awesome die-cut shapes from Rachel. The New York scene is one of my favourites - it's appeared on many a layout and cards! The great thing with die-cutting on white is the way you can completely change the look of them.

You can see more shapes from the New York bundle; the globe is from the Travel Set. They're great value for money because they are jam-packed with gorgeous goodies - just sayin'.

So if you need your own bundle or any of the other amazing bundles - hop over to The Digital Press. I have my eye on some new Amsterdam and Family goodies.

New York Bundle

Travel Set

Thanks for popping in.

Morag x

Stretching Your Stash | Digital Press Hybrid Project

Hey - how's it going?
It's been a very busy month for me so far - work is off the hook. I have turned to crafting more and more to keep me sane!

This week, I'm up on the Digital Press blog with a Silhouette tutorial using digital elements from 2 amazing TDP kits...

Go.See.Do. by Mari Koegelenberg.

Project Twenty Fifteen | July by Laura Passage.

I upcycled some everyday items such as clothing tags, envelopes and packaging to create a cute mini travel album.

The great thing about digital kits for a paper scrapper like me is the ability to print and cut out embellishments time and time again.

The Silhouette makes cutting out even the most intricate of shapes a real doddle.

Hop on over to the Digital Press Blog, where I will show you how I trace, print and cut out digital elements, together with the rest of my project.

Thanks for stopping by.

Morag x

Brrr... A Frosty Silhouette Tutorial

Britain is in a cold snap at the moment. After such a mild Christmas, it's kinda nice to feel icy. We don't have snow here but maybe tomorrow....

I had the fabulous special kit from Clique Kits. I couldn't resist the adorable little characters and pretty designs. So I scrapped some photos from our last big dump of snow. We had an amazing foot of powdery snow - perfect for igloo building.

DD was in her element in her new snow suit. The colour really pops against all that white ( and perfectly matches the kit!

I cut out a large snowflake on the silhouette. I also created a dotted line outline so that I could easily stitch around the outside.

 Add your shape to your project and keep it selected. Next select the Offset icon. Select Offset (Internal Offset creates the new shape inside the existing shape).

You can use the slide or type in the amount to offset. 0.15 inches worked well for my project. Click Corner then Apply.

Last step is to change the type of cut line. Click the line type icon and then chose the a dotted line. I played it safe with the medium dots but the smaller ones might work depending on the size of your shape. Voila!

It did take a bit of time to sew around the outside but worthwhile.

The cute letters were part of the kit and I added my own bit of fun (Freckled Fawn). I adore the little birdies on the patterned paper which I fussy-cut.

Such adorable images!

Thanks for stopping by.

Morag x

Step Into Christmas | The Digital Press

There's nothing like a  festive lunch with friends to get the Christmas spirits up!

My lovely scrappy friends are always great fun and always up for a photo op.

I couldn't resist this adorable digi kit by LJS Designs - Kindess is Cool. There are adorable papers and elements perfect for any wintery project!

I really love the polar bear. There at actually to kissing polar bears in the kit - so adorable.

I added some snowflakes here and there

And a bit of sparkle.

I traced the tree and bear in the Silhouette Studio. To give it the white outline, I simply offset the cut line. Makes life so easy!

Here is a quick tutorial to trace and cut your own tree...

Select the Trace option from the tool bar. Select the area to trace. The object will turn yellow.

Move the High-pass slider bar so that the object is filled in nicely. You may have to use the low pass filter depending on your shape. Trace the Outer Edge.

As this was an intricate shape, I added the white border to my die-cut. To do this, I used the offset tool. Select the object then click the Offset button. I set my offset to 0.04 which is about right for me. Just move the slider or type in the number to increase or decrease. Then apply. You can see the outer edge in the above shot.

I deleted the original shape to give me the outer shape only. You can cut this out but there are extra cuts that I didn't want. To delete these, select the Modify too, then Release. The shape will be ungrouped so that individual cuts can be removed. I deleted the small cuts in the middle of the tree.

Here's the final cut shape. Remember if you are printing and cutting to use the registration marks so the silhouette can line up with your printer.

I hope that you see how easy it is to print  and cut your own die-cuts! That's the beauty of hybrid scrapping!

Thanks for stopping by..

Morag x

Autumn

I have seen a lot of lovely layouts with circular cut files. In particular, I saw a gorgeous layout on the Fancy Pants blog by Zsoka. She had used a fabulous cut file which I just couldn't find on the Silhouette store. So I set about making my own version.

I bought some flower and leaf cut files and created some of my own. I then very painstakingly arranged them around a circle.

Here are a few quick tips to creating your own...

Create a circle as guide. I changed the colour so that it is easier to distinguish it from the shapes.

Grab a bunch of shapes and drop them onto your circle. It is easier to drop the larger or focal pieces first. Don't forget to move, resize, flip to get the shapes that you want.

The top tip is to weld the pieces together one at a time. This way you can correct anything that doesn't go to plan!

Do you ever have shapes that don't weld correctly? See the leaf on the right, the inner veins disappeared when I welded it to my wreath.  To fix that, I undid my weld. Then just click on the leaf and choose 'Make'.

This ensures that the leaf is a complete path before welding to the wreath.

Now when it is welded, the veins remain in tact! Simple.

My last top tip for this is to colour the welded piece so I can see what I'm doing. As I weld the next piece to the wreath, it automatically changes colour to blue in this case.

I created my own outline leaves by simply taking a leaf shape and use the offset tool. I added my cut out leaves to add a bit of texture and dimension.

Speaking of texture, I'm in love with the Nuvo Crystal drops. I mixed in some sparkles to complete the look.

Thanks for dropping by.

Morag x

Hybrid Scrapbooking

I'm just loving autumn leaves right now. They can be dressed up in so many ways. They added a bit of fun and whimsy to quick snapshots of our little puppy.

I used a fabulous little digital collection from Digital Press. The kit by Laura Passage is adorable and on sale at the moment! Bargain. 

One of my favourite ways to use digital kits is to print and cut them out on the Silhoutte.

I love the way you can recolour elements, change their hue or saturation to get different looks.

I also like to crease and fold them so they add more texture and dimension.

Here's a quick tip for those of you who have a Silhouette...

I often take the cute elements that come with a digital kit and trace it for cutting. This normally works great except where the colours are very light or do not have much contrast.

You can see in the yellow where the trace has worked successfully. If I were to outline the above, I'd get a very strange cut indeed! To fix the problem is really simple, but you do need photo editing software such as Photoshop, etc. There are lots of free programs available.

The easiest thing to do is fill a copy of your image with black (see left cup).

Then, when you trace the element there is enough contrast to outline successfully. Just create the outline then drag it over your actual image.

Whilst I'm at it here's a little card I made with another of Laura's kits  Out of this world.

I love the cute little rockets. The colours are just fabulous.

The set makes an ideal card for kids.

Thanks for stopping by.

Morag x