Bella Blvd Studio Blog

Flashback Friday

Welcome to Flashback Friday! Sometimes we get so caught up in using our newest Bella collections that we forget about all of the older collections that we still love and can find so many uses for. We know that so many of you have these same collections in your stash as well, and thought it would be fun to "flash back" and be inspired by them once again!

“Frightful” card, by Laurie Schmidlin.

Bella Blvd makes my favorite Halloween papers! I love the bright, fun colors ... making them not too scary! For my first card, I chose the previously released Trick or Treat collection to create a whimsical and bright Halloween card. I chose a dark background paper so that the focal images would really pop! I chose several Trick or Treat Paper Pieces as well as some stickers for the focal images. For embellishment, I added a Gulf Crochet Heart.

Supplies:
Trick or Treat: Alpha+Bits, Captions, Paper Pieces, Pick a Punkin', All Webbed Up; Crochet Hearts: Gulf

“Mummy” card, by Laurie Schmidlin.

I have been wanting to make this card for quite a while! Bella's fun style works perfectly with my googlie eyes, don't you think? I chose papers from the Trick or Treat collection to create the background. After stitching on all of the white strips, I added my googlie eyes. The sentiment (one of the Trick or Treat Paper Pieces) doubles as the mummy's mouth!

Supplies:
Trick or Treat: Leaf Storm, Happy Owleen, Paper Pieces

"Love You", by Heather Leopard.

I thought it would be fun to create hearts within a larger heart with a similar wide variety of colors. To create this layout I cut several sized hearts out of the center of a larger heart using my die cut machine. I pre-planned everything, making a larger heart for the photo and leaving some blank spaces for crochet hearts.  Then, I adhered pattern paper to the back of each heart and stitched it to the white cardstock background.  I also cut the title "Love You" and used the black pattern to make a bold statement.  My journaling refers to one of the many reasons why I love my littlest girl in a million hearts of hearts.

Supplies:
Color Chaos: Daily Details, Peep Strandz, Months, Punch Strandz, Scallop Strandz, Ice Strandz, McIntosh Strandz; Crochet Hearts: Salt Water, Cotton Candy; Enamel DooDads: Ice, Punch, Milk White; Bella Bows: Cotton Candy

Spread It Out: Two Page Layouts

We've got a new feature, called "Spread It Out", that we'll be bringing to you once a month. This feature is all about the two page layouts! While there are plenty of you out there that shy away from two page layouts and like to focus on single pagers, we like to believe that there are also plenty of you out there that embrace the two page layouts and could use a little inspiration featuring Bella collections and products. So that's just what we're aiming to bring you with this new feature!

"BOO-tiful", by Laura Vegas.

For this two page Halloween layout, I dug deep and found these photos of my oldest daughter from Halloween 2004, a full 11 years ago. When working with photos from my film days, it definitely changes the way that I scrap them. I don't have the convenience of digital, where I can edit my photos, print them in smaller sizes, or create photo collages from them. So I trimmed up my 4x6" photos here and there, until I was able to fit them together on the spread to my liking. I used three of Bella's Halloween collections on this layout - Too Cute To Spook, Trick or Treat, and Halloween Magic. I used my Silhouette Cameo to die cut a diamond background from one of the orange patterned papers, and used pieces of that on both pages of the spread. I love using die cut backgrounds, so that it breaks up the "heaviness" that can come from too much patterned paper on a layout.

Supplies:
Halloween Magic: Ghosties, Goblin Treats, Borders, Treasures & Text, Paper Pieces, Chipboard Icons; Trick or Treat: All Webbed Up, Alpha+Bits; Too Cute To Spook: Itsy Bitsy Spider, Full Moon, Cute Cuts, Just Write Journaling Stickers, Alpha+Bits, Chipboard Icons; Ciao Chip Elements: Stars & Hearts; Tiny Text Alpha Stickers: Black

“Trick or Treat”, by Becki Adams.

Creating across a 24 inch canvas is so much fun! It's even more fun when Halloween themed collections are involved. I mixed 2 older Bella Blvd Halloween collections, Halloween Magic and Trick or Treat. These two collections went together perfectly, you wouldn't even know they were different collections.

Supplies:
Invisibles: Calendar; Halloween Magic: Ghosties, Goblin Treats, Treasures & Text, Paper Pieces Die Cuts; Trick or Treat: Pick a Punkin', Leaf Storm, Paper Pieces, Alpha+Bits; Crochet Hearts: Orange; Amorie Chipboard Alphas: White

Mix & Match

Today's feature is all about mixing & matching Bella's collections. One of the great things about our collections is that you'll find the same colors throughout, whether you're using an older collection from a year or two years ago (or more!) or a newer collection that you just got your hands on. While it's so convenient to pull out a single collection and work from just that assortment of products, it can also be a lot of fun to mix and match between two, three, or even more collections.

"Two Is Always Better Than One", by Lisa Dickinson.

The new Valentina collection is all about love, but it can be used on so much more than Valentine pages! The black, red, and white elements in this line are easy to incorporate into other themes. On this layout, I mixed in several of the red and black papers with the Hello Autumn lines. I love how it gives the autumnal hues a bit of punch with bold contrast!  

For a bit of added detail and texture, I incorporated several of the small phrase stickers from the Valentina Treasures & Text and Little Bits on the red and black areas of my design. 

To draw the eye to my title, which incorporates a die cut word with some of the new Tiny Text alphabets, I fussy cut lots of leaves from the Time to Rake paper. I adhered them so they’d appear to be falling around my title and help soften the strong horizontal lines in the design.

Supplies:
Hello Autumn: Time to Rake, Autumn Floral, Day Dream; Valentina: Love, Borders, Daily Details, Treasures & Text, Little Bits; Tiny Text: Black

Boy & Girl cards, by Julia Akinina.

I want to show you how to create cute cards for baby boys and baby girls using the same paper from different collections. It's not necessary to have the baby collection, you just need to find the paper of the right color.

For my baby boy card I used two sheets of the patterned paper from the Campout collection and one sheet from the Color Chaos collection. I added some clouds from the chipboard sheet and printed out the Russian sentiment which means "Congratulations with the Newborn Boy".

The same things I did with the Girl card, I used pink patterned paper from the Simply Spring collection and the yellow patterned paper from the Campout collection. I added more white embossed flowers and leaves to make this card more "girlish". I love the colors and the details on it.

Supplies:
Simply Spring: Spring Patchwork, Daily Details, Chipboard Icons, Trinkets; Color Chaos: McIntosh Strandz, Peep Strandz; Campout: Under The Stars, Daily Details, Borders; Ciao Chip Elements: Flowers & Clouds; Little Bits: Punch; Enamel Dots: Cotton Candy

Bella Blvd & Illustrated Faith

Hi there friends, it's Shanna Noel here! I wanted to share with you a fun technique for making a cute little prayer journal! Janel Mclean actually showed me how to make these and now I love making them for any occasion! My youngest, Addison LOVES journals and when I asked if she would like a prayer journal she literally flipped! She was so excited! 

I pulled some of my favorite papers from the Whatever is Lovely collection and cut them down to 6x12. What is nice about that is you can get two from one piece of paper. For this journal I made 6 (6xx12) pieces. Then I also took white cardstock and cut it down to 6x11. You will need as many of the white papers as the pattern papers (so in this case 6). 

Once you have all the papers cut you are going to fold the 6x12 papers in 1/2 created 6 cute little booklets. 

Now this part seems a little odd but I promise it will turn out great! You are going to tape the ends of the white paper to the ends of the pattern paper so that it kinda makes a diamond shape when you lay it on the table. This will allow our spine to not be as thick and will also allow the pattern paper to peek out when you turn the pages which is always fun! 

Once you have all of your booklets stack them on top of each other in the order you want them to appear in the book, keeping in mind how the text is reading and what you want as the front cover and back cover. *Note: don't nestle the books in each other, stack them on top of each other, and we will stick them together in the next step*

Now we are going to make a book out of these little cuties using what I call a "washi tape hinge". So you are going to lay the cover booklet and the second booklet flat on the table next to each other and simply lay the washi there right in the place they meet, and snip off the extra with your scissors. 

 

You are going to flip that page over as if you were turning the page and put the next booklet right next to it in the same fashion, again connecting them with the washi tape. You are going to continue doing this until all of your pages are connected in a book. 

For the outside binding you are going to use that washi tape again and place a piece of washi there on the binding and fold it over. In my small book this covers almost the whole binding but I go ahead and do this same technique from both sides to give it a really strong binding. 

WAHOOO you are done! Now is the fun part! At stickers, washi, paint etc. to really customize it to your own look! Once you are done, give it to a friend, or keep it for yourself to keep all your prayers documented! 

Thank you so much for stopping by the Bella blog today! Make it an amazing day!

Did You Know: With Stephanie

Happy Monday! Wow, what a weekend it was for us at Bella Blvd! We recently announced the She Loves Color Scrapbooking Event and yesterday registration went live.  

She is Bella Blvd. She is Stephanie Smokovich. She is our Educators. She is you, an attendee. If She loves color, then She will want to be at this event! 

Hosting a scrapbooking event is something that’s been on my wish-list for years. I finally feel like we have the right team in place to do it right and so, with the commitment of these amazing Educators I know it will not disappoint. The event offer 2 full days of workshops with these 5 celebrity industry Educators, totaling 6 workshops.

Within an hour the event sold out. WOW! This exceeded all my expectations, and I am so very humbled. Attendees are coming from all over, just some states on the list are Florida, South Dakota, California, New York, Ohio, Alaska! Thank you for such an astounding response. 

For those of you that did not get in, and for those of you still interested and just discovering this today, we have begun a wait-list HERE. There is no charge to be on the wait-list, but your priority order is important. If and when spots open up, we will contact you. We hope you understand that for year no. 1 we want to get it right! We will get to know our venue, the staff and little “isms” about the place and plan to master that so we can grow the She Loves Color event year after year. 

Our Educator Line-Up includes Educators that were selected specifically for their colorful and classy styles alongside their beautiful products:

Amy Tangerine / Award winning Designer / Visit Amy Online Here 
Cynthea Sandoval / Owner & Creative Director at Doodlebug Design Inc. / Visit Doodlebug Online Here
Laura Graff / Creative Director at Webster's Pages / Visit Webster's Pages Online Here 
Stacy Julian / Scrapbook Industry pioneer, founder of Big Picture Classes / Visit Stacy Online Here
Stephanie Smokovich / Owner & Creative Director at Bella Blvd / Visit Bella Blvd Online Here 

We are so thrilled for October 2016 as we begin this new adventure in business. Thank you for all of your love and support. There are more details on the registration page HERE. Please don’t feel left out if this is all brand new to you, we’d love to add you to our wait-list and see what we can do to make it happen. Wishing you a wonderful week!

 

Fabric Style

Today we are switching things up, and instead of featuring projects using our paper collections, we are sharing projects created with our fabric collections!

Halloween Quilt, by Nichol Magouirk.

Last fall I saw a Halloween quilt made with the Fig Tree Quilts Navajo Stars Pattern and I immediately pinned it knowing I had to make one to add to our Halloween home decor. 

For my quilt I pulled Riley Blake Bella Blvd fabrics in shades or orange, gray and black from the Halloween Magic, Too Cute To Spook, Military Max, Snapshots and Puppy Park Collections for my version of the quilt. One of my favorite things about the Riley Blake Bella Blvd Fabric Collections is how easily so many of the designs mix and match and work together!

I love how the Halloween Navajo Stars look like spider webs on a white on white background. While the navajo stars look difficult the process was actually a breeze. No y-seams at all. The pattern explains the piecing process in detail however I found Joanna Figueroa of Fig Tree Quilt’s Smarter Strip Quiliting Class at Craftsy super helpful in learning how to work with angles easily. 

I chose to have this quilt professional quilted since I enjoy the piecing process but maneuvering a large quilt on my machine can be a bit of a hassle. I used Crinklelove.com and can’t recommend them enough! Great service, speedy turn around and the quilting….just fabulous! When I received the quilt back from them I sewed on the binding and my family’s new Halloween Quilt is ready to be enjoyed!

My finished quilt measures 68” x 68”, and the quilt is backed with the Halloween Magic Black Halloween Stars fabric.

Supplies:
Bella Blvd Halloween Magic fabrics by Riley Blake Designs: Black Halloween Stars, Orange Halloween Stars, Orange Halloween Pumpkins, Black Halloween Web, Orange Halloween Web, White Halloween Pumpkins; Bella Blvd Too Cute Too Spook fabrics by Riley Blake Designs: Web Gray, White Spider Stripe, Orange Spider Stripe, Dot Orange, Dot Black, Web Black; Bella Blvd Military Max fabrics by Riley Blake Designs: Military Skulls Black, Military Skulls Gray, Military Skulls White, Military Words Gray; Bella Blvd Snapshots fabrics by Riley Blake Designs: Hearts Orange; Bella Blvd Puppy Park fabrics by Riley Blake Designs: Black Park Crosshatch

Boy's Jacket, by Christine Ousley.

Hello everyone! Today I’ve got a fabric project that’s for the boys. Actually this jacket would be great for girls too, but with the awesome Military Max collection and the fact that it is so hard to find great fabric for boys, I am dedicating this one to them!

This is my 4 year old son modeling this adorable reversible jacket. Next time I think I will modify it a bit and add a zipper and some pockets but it is looks just precious on him. I love the plaid fabrics that came in the Military Max collection.  

The jacket is lightweight enough for those fun fall days where you need a little warmth in the morning but by afternoon it’s hot enough for short sleeves. Those that live in the south know exactly what I mean.

I love the hat on this jacket but do you think I could get him to keep it on, no way, but it’s a really cute accent and so are the sleeve cuffs. You could have so much fun with the fabric combos on this pattern.

I love the hat on this jacket but do you think I could get him to keep it on, no way, but it’s a really cute accent and so are the sleeve cuffs. You could have so much fun with the fabric combos on this pattern. Thanks for stopping by! Happy fall to everyone!

Supplies:
Bella Blvd Military Max fabric by Riley Blake Designs; Children’s Corner Pattern Casey

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Riley Blake Designs markets our fabrics under Stephanie Hunt as the designer. When purchasing or searching the Riley Blake website it's actually easier & more efficient to find the Bella Blvd fabrics under "Stephanie Hunt" as the artist.

Beyond The Theme: Campout Collection

Welcome to our new feature, "Beyond The Theme". While Bella has plenty of collections that can be used for everyday layouts, cards, and other projects, we also have a wide assortment of more themed collections. You might dismiss a themed collection at first glance, thinking it doesn't fit in with your scrapping needs. If you take the time to look at them more closely, you'll find that most of our themed collections are actually very versatile. This month, we're challenging our designers to think "beyond the theme" while working with our Campout collection.

“Friends Having An Adventure Together”, by Christin Grønnslett.

My kids are two years apart (8 and 6) and for most of the time they get along great. One thing they have in common is that they love to roleplay together and they don’t have to go anywhere to go on an adventure. All they need is each other and a few stuff from around the house. You can always tell from their faces that they have plans. This day the picture was taken they were on their way on another type of adventure. Aneas first day of the After-school-program in First grade. This started a few weeks before the real school started. Troy is being a great big brother taking care of his little sister in this process and stayed a long time to keep her company in her classroom before returning to his own corridor.

The Campout offers patterns that can be used for anything. I picked out papers in mostly three colors and made a background to correspond with the green, yellow and I also added brown/green as a contrast paper. For this layout wanted to go a little outside my comfort zone and use a odd shape and use my sewing machine. I started by making an arrow with one side longer. My original arrow had very straight sides to when I cut it out I widened it in each corner and for each layer I cut it a little different.

I glued the layers together and then I took out my sewing machine to sew a line in the middle.

The picture needed a little matting too, I cut the different papers I chose in different sizes in layers. To avoid straight lines I added scalloped borders in different sizes.

Supplies:
Campout: Let’s Go Camping, Daily Details, Go Jump In The Lake, Into The Woods, Collection Kit Bonus Paper, Trinkets, Treasure & Text; Star Student: Treasures & Text; Clear Cuts: Arrows; Ciao Chip Elements: WhatNots, Symbols

"Rough Snap", by Leanne Allinson.

When using the Campout collection to help convey the story on my layout, I've looked beyond the normal concepts for putting a page together and refocused on the colors and patterns. My son had a terrible accident during a sporting event leaving him unable to play for the rest of the season but even worse than that, completely eliminating him from participating in State Titles the very next weekend. For a 12 year old, it was the end of the world!

I wanted to share his devastation on the page by adding sharp angles, as seen in the triangle paper sharpening the soft lines of the cut out letter 'S' and broken lines which are layered beneath the photo. The stars and spots were also added to relate the idea of what he saw in front of his eyes at the time of the break, while the flowers signify the many get well wishes.

Sometimes I wonder if I read too much into patterned paper when I put my layouts together. But ultimately everything on my page supports the story I want to document regardless of the specific collection I am creating with.

Supplies:
Campout: Under The Stars, In The Woods, Daily Details, Borders, Go Jump In The Lake, Trail Mix, Treasures & Text; Clear Cut: Pickle Juice Confetti

“Let It Snow” card, by Laurie Schmidlin.

What a fun challenge! I love stretching my papers and embellishments to use in more ways than originally intended! For this collection, the obvious choice for me was to make a Christmas card! Living in Montana, the outdoors is a central theme to just about any occasion, so it was natural to extend that to Christmas. I chose a couple of pretty neutral patterns in the Campout collection, and created a chilly, night scene. I cut out a tree from the Let's Go Camping paper to create the tree. The sentiment was created from a word die I had in my stash. The star of the show, in my opinion, is that charming bear (from the Campout Ciao Chip Icons)!

Supplies:
Campout: Let's Go Camping, Under the Stars, Chipboard Icons; Enamel Dots: Milk White

What's New Wednesday

Welcome to "What's New Wednesday"! Every Wednesday, our designers will be sharing projects using the latest and greatest products from Bella Blvd. Especially our newest collections, which our designers are having so much fun creating with!

“Pocket Letters Make Me Happy”, by Stephanie Buice.

After swapping a few Pocket Letters with friends I decided that it was finally about time for me to make a layout about how much fun I have getting them but most of all making them special for each girl. I decided to play on the “pocket letter” and made a bunch of tiny envelopes out of some of my favorite new Bella papers.

Supplies:
Just Add Color: Speak Freely, News Flash, Dotty, Passcode; Valentina: Love; Fresh Market: Sweet To Eat, Freshly Squeezed, Tutti Fruity, Little Bits; Whatever Is Lovely: Praiseworthy, 3x4s, Lovely; Family Frenzy: Donut Day; Tiny Tots: Trinkets; Rover: Loyal, Daily Details; Tiny Text Alpha Stickers: Black; High Five Alpha Stickers: Black-White; Enamel Doodads: Bell Pepper; Enamel Dots: Punch

"Love Knox", by Kat Benjamin. 

I haven’t had a chance to play with the Whatever Is Lovely collection too much, so I decided this was the perfect opportunity. I have some great pictures of my new nephew, Knox, so I decided to pull out a lot of the more masculine colors from the collection to create this baby boy layout. The blues, greens and yellows in this collection, along with the amazing patterns, were perfect for highlighting the photo.

Supplies:
Whatever Is Lovely: Praiseworthy, Admirable, Lovely, 3x4s, Treasures & Text; Ciao Chip Elements: WhatNots; Enamel Dots: Bell Pepper

“You're a Gem” card, by Corri Garza.

I was so excited to receive a box of new Bella Blvd goodies just in time for this assignment. I chose to work with the Valentina Collection. I have always loved collections that add black along with pinks and reds. My card was inspired by the "You're a Gem" sentiment. I love how the new Tiny Text Alphas are the perfect size for cards. They make it simple to create any sentiment for your cards. 

Supplies:
Valentina: Cross My Heart, Borders, Daily Details, Treasures & Text; Tiny Text Alphabet Stickers: Wild Berries; Bella Bows: Cotton Candy; Enamel Dots: Cotton Candy

Bella Blvd & Illustrated Faith

Hi there! It's Laurie again today, sharing some more projects that I created using products from the Illustrated Faith line combined with our Bella Blvd products! I’m finding so many uses for the Illustrated Faith products, and today I’m sharing a notebook, card, and little gift box.

“Remember” notebook, by Laurie Schmidlin.

I love notebooks. Love, love them. I also love to give them away! I have a handful of friends that love notebooks almost as much as I do, so I like to have a few notebooks that I have decorated a bit on hand to give away. I designed this notebook around the Philippians 4:8 focal image (from the Whatever Is Lovely Art Prints sheet). I then started bringing in other elements, like the red and white 3 x 4 (also from the Whatever Is Lovely collection). Before I ever glue anything down, I play with the placement a bit. And when I see an open area, I like to add some smaller details like stickers.

I also felt that the notebook needed to be "grounded" somewhat on the left side, so I brought in some of Bella's Designer Tape as well as the smaller Illustrated Faith By Grace Washi Tape. When I had the placement exactly where I wanted it, I used a very strong adhesive to glue everything down (this is particularly important on items that will get a lot of use).

Supplies:
Whatever Is Lovely: Art Prints, 3 x 4s, Little Bits; Illustrated Faith: Label It, Say It - Colorful, Love It, By Grace Washi Tape; Enamel Dots: Oreo Black; Enamel DooDads: Cotton Candy; Designer Tape: Chevron Combo

“Let Go” card, by Laurie Schmidlin.

I have wanted to make this card ever since I first saw all these colorful labels (from the Illustrated Faith Label It sticker sheet)! I love all of the pretty colors and shapes! I started with a piece of patterned paper from Bella's Color Chaos collection. I felt like the labels didn't pop enough on the paper, but still really wanted to use it, so I added a smaller piece of vellum over the top of it. 

I chose five different labels and then added multi colored heart stickers on top (from the IF Love It sticker sheet). For the sentiment, I cut a small piece of polka dot ribbon and added it to the top to act as the base for the title sticker. I then chose a sticker that fit the encouragement theme I was going for. For the final touch, I added small, clear rhinestones to each of the hearts.

Supplies:
Illustrated Faith: Banners, Love It, Label It; Color Chaos: Oreo Black Strandz

“Excellent” pillow box, by Laurie Schmidlin.

I wanted to make a little "pick me up" giftie for one of my friends. A little something to let her know I am thinking about her! I created the pillow box using one of Bella's Clear Cuts sheets. I didn't want to over decorate it as I wanted the inside contests to still be visible. I decided some of the Illustrated Faith By Grace Washi Tape would be perfect to add! 

For the focal image, I punched out a large heart from the Praiseworthy sheet form the Whatever Is Lovely collection. I added sentiment stickers and the cute little butterfly sticker (from the Whatever Is Lovely Treasures & Text sheet). For embellishments, I added some ribbon and a little clothespin.

Supplies:
Whatever Is Lovely: Praiseworthy, Treasures & Text, Little Bits; Illustrated Faith: By Grace Washi Tape, Love It; Clear Cuts: Oreo Confetti

October Guest Designer: Katie Rose

We are so excited to introduce you to our talented October Guest Designer, Katie Rose. Let's get to know a little more about Katie and check out the projects she created to share with us!

Hello! My name is Katie Rose and I am super excited to be Guest Designing for Bella Blvd today! I live in a small town on the coast of NH with my hubby and our three kiddos. I have been scrapbooking consistently for about 14 years, shortly after my second son was born. A few years ago I entered the design team world and was even lucky enough to have served on the Bella Blvd design team in 2013-2014! I have been a fan of Bella Blvd’s since they came on the market…the whimsical designs and bright colors are so fun to work with. When I am not scrapbooking I run an early childhood center for 120 children that I co-own with my sister. I am passionate about photography and love all things Disney and watch entirely too much reality TV.

Here’s a look at the layouts I made with Bella Blvd’s gorgeous new collections.

“Camp”, by Katie Rose.

My tried and true circle cutter and circle punch that I bought 14 years ago in my early days of scrapbooking are still two of my go to tools. I used them both here to create several circles of varying sizes using patterned papers from the Family Frenzy collection. I balanced the circles with a photo collage on the top half of the layout. I then added lots of fun stickers and embellishments for some finishing touches. I especially love the look and texture that the circles cut from the Clear Cuts add to the page.

“Oh The Places You Will Go”, by Katie Rose.

The Whatever Is Lovely collection is such a special collection. I just knew I had to create a very special layout with it. My oldest son has just entered his senior year of high school and is looking at colleges and thinking lots about his future. I am sad knowing that he will soon leave home but also so very excited for what the future holds for him. I created this layout to tell him just that. Aside from my photos, I wanted to highlight my favorite patterned paper from this collection…Admirable. I cut a strip of it to use on my background and added coordinating colors of Clear Cuts on top. I stitched them on for added detail and texture. This is a very special layout for me using a very special collection.

“Yum Yum”, by Katie Rose.

I think the Fresh Market collection is so adorable! I just love all the cute little fruit throughout the line. I paired this collection with these equally adorable photos of my daughter eating strawberries as a toddler. I love watching toddlers savor every juicy bite of fruit. She could literally take a good 5 minutes to eat one strawberry! I was inspired by the grid design of the Fruitful patterned paper. I created a grid of squares on my Silhouette Cameo with white cardstock. I then cut a few squares from Fruitful and other papers in this collection and placed them under my cut. When I was happy with my placement I stitched it all down. I then added other fun bits inside of some of the empty squares.

“One Year Later”, by Katie Rose.

Another special layout for me. My husband had a heart attack a little over a year ago and we almost lost him. This summer we celebrated as a family the one year to the date of his heart attack with him fully recovered. It was a very special moment for us that of course we had to commemorate with a family selfie! I used the Family Frenzy collection. That Let’s Take a Selfie paper is perfection! For this layout I wanted to use a diagonal design but keep my photos straight. So I used some strips of patterned paper diagonally across the middle to separate the top and bottom corners. I used the top for my photos and the bottom for my title.

Thank you so much Bella Blvd for having me guest design today! I had so much fun playing with these new collections!