A Nice Cup of Tea...

Right, let's get this straight right away. I'm not a digi-scrapper. I never will be a digi-scrapper. Digi-scrapping is completely alien to my philosophy of cutting and sticking and getting really messy and hiding smudges and random glue smears under various cunningly positioned embellishments. I don't even type my journalling!

However, when Shimelle asked me to take part in her weekend inspiration party over at her blog, I was intrigued. Could my computer really be more to my scrapping than a glorified photo editor and printer? Would I actually be able to use a pdf file full of images on my layout? I decided I had to have a go.

Shimelle kindly sent me a gorgeous set of 'hot-drink' themed images. I'm a big tea-lover, and had immediately jumped at the chance to use this set as I had a layout in mind commemorating my very important work mug (which has my name and a rhyme on it and everything!). When I opened the pdf, I loved the images, but started wondering how to use them. I'm not that confident using photo or image editing software beyond Picasa really, so I knew I wasn't going to be doing any image manipulating on the computer.

So I decided to stick with what I do best, and went back to basics. I printed out several sets of the images on good quality paper. I wanted to use the journalling spaces on my layout, but I didn't want to 'lose' the sweet hot drinks images amongst my scrawl! So I cut and layered the images up, using foam pads to make them 3D, meaning that they really stood out above the journalling. I then cut another tea cup away from the journalling spot to use as another embellishment. The beauty with pdf embellishments is that you can print out as many as you like for layering up without having to spend anymore - and of course use the images for other projects if you wish. I'm thinking of using them to print a set of cool notelets and envelopes...

So here is the finished project - it's not digital, I don't think you could even describe it as hybrid, but it does make good use of my printer for the bulk of the embellishments. So even if you are as dedicated to cutting and sticking as I am, don't completely dismiss the idea of digital - you might be pleasantly surprised...

If you think you'd like to have a go, check out this class running throughout August - you'll get all the pretty printables as part of the deal.