Guest designer post by Giselle. An album in an evening

I am absolutely delighted that Giselle agreed to do a guest designer post, we met through scrapbooking and I have always admired her scrapbooking style. An album in an evening sounds really difficult so I am looking forward to learning how its done.

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  Hi everyone, my name is Giselle and I'm really pleased that Debbie asked me to be a guest designer for IACW. I have been crafting in one way or another for as long as I can remember but scrapbooking is now my firm favourite. Especially since I became a grandma 10 years ago, because I now have the best excuse to scrapbook - documenting the lives of my three favourite little boys! I make pages about the little things, like trips to the park and the big things, such as achievements at school and losing that first tooth! 

I live in North Somerset with my long suffering husband, who fortunately understands what this hobby of mine is all about. We have 2 daughters, one is a primary school teacher and the other is a photographer - now how lucky is that having an endless supply of photos to 'work' with?!

I like putting mini albums together mainly because it's often too difficult to choose just one or two photos but also because they make such great gifts for any occasion.

One thing I must add is that scrapbooking has given me so many new and wonderful friends, none of whom I'd have met if it wasn't for our mutual love of recording the lives of our families, using lots of gorgeous paper & messy glue!

AN ALBUM IN AN EVENING

To put together an album when you're short of time, it's a good idea to have a page design that basically has the same layout but which can be altered to suit the orientation of your photos. Using a range of papers from one manufacturer helps as well, it takes the guesswork out of matching colours and patterns!

For this album, which measures 6" x 6", I used Prima's Reflections Collection. I also added various embellishments to decorate the pages - flowers, chipboard, lace trims, rub-ons, numbered clips and lots of brads. You can never have too many brads!

I converted all the photos to black and white to avoid colour mis-matching and then printed them all the same size to fit the 6" x 6" pages but with enough space to place 3 squares of co-ordinating patterned paper. Using a square punch is great for this as you don't have to bother measuring & cutting the squares by hand.

Each left side follows the basic page design so there is cohesion throughout the album - one photo and 3 squares of patterned paper. Each right side page had a blank area for journaling which is a particularly good idea if you are making the album for somebody else and cannot provide the relevant info.

This is where a co-ordinated range of papers comes in really useful because whatever pattern you choose will match the opposing page. I cut a few details from the patterned paper, such as the butterflies, which if embossed or covered with Glossy Accents also make good embellishments.

    

You can decorate the inside covers with any left over photos that you want to include and the front page could hold the title, date and any details you'd like to record about the event.

By making the basic elements of your pages all the same size and preparing them with their patterned squares, then gathering up the photos and all the embellishments, it's a breeze to put this album together in just a few hours. Once all the pages are assembled you can easily go back over them adding little bits of decoration here and there.

Another lovely thing about this design is that the overall look is completely different when you use other styles of patterned paper, such as a graphic American Crafts, a floral Prima or a grungy Tim Holtz, so you can use this as a base for lots of other albums.

Comments

[Hils]

Looks great, I may have to scraplift this - it'd be perfect for the June crop :)

[Jennie Hart]

What a great idea, thanks for showing us. Jen x

[kim]

I love your mini book... it's gorgeous!!! Thank you for sharing it with us!
Hugs
Kim
x

[Claireliz]

Gorgeous mini book Giselle, thanks for joining us on IACW today :D
C
xx

[jayne]

How lovely Giselle and what fabby photos too.
can not believe you have completed this in one evening . i struggle to do one layout sometimes :)
TFS xxx

[Lynne V]

Fabulous, I love the way it all flows.
Thanks for all the tips for putting it together in an evening.

[Debbie Roberts]

Thanks for a brilliant post Giselle. I have put an album in an evening on my "to do " list. x