Bella Blvd Studio Blog

Adorable Puppers | Nathalie DeSousa

Hi there Bella Blvd. friends!

Nathalie with you today with a new project using the new COOPER collection.  Being a Fur-mama to our 10 yr old Boston Terrier baby is probably one of the most rewarding experiences.   So, you can imagine how much i love this collection, as i get to document our little boy using the fun colors and designs. 

 

I started the page by adding a bit of blue and aqua watercolor on the background.  My idea was to bring focus to two area -in a diagonal line- on the page.  While the watercolor dried, i pulled papers from the Cooper collection to build layers behind the pictures of our baby boy.

I overlapped the pictures when attaching them  together, and then cut a few pieces from the Daily Details paper, and mixed them with pieces from the 6x6 paper pad.  I made sure that most of the colors in the collection are represented in the paper layers.

To build the page, i cut two strips of the Paws paper and attached it to the right and left edge of the page. I added  the colorful scalloped strip from the Doohickey cardstock sticker under the paper strip, and cut a second strip from Borders paper ( so that both sides of the layout mirror each other).   I added the pictures and all the paper layers at the top left side of the page.  

 

With so many cute stickers and pieces of ephemera was so easy to embellish the page.  I added a few word stickers from the World Salad sticker tablet in between layers, and i love the small cute clips, so i added one to the tag in the cluster.   

My title came together so easily by combining the Adorable acrylic word and the large word ephemera piece.  I backed one of the pieces from the Faithful Friends cut outs with vellum and attached it at the end of the title.

I created a last cluster of ephemera and stickers at the bottom right end of the title.   Once again, i made sure to use pieces that represent most of the colors from the collection.  This small cluster created the perfect spot for all my lines of journal.   All that i added to end the page were a few puffy Orange stars.

 

 

I love this collection, as it is perfect to document our little guy with colorful and fun designs.  Be sure to check it out, as you are going to love it, too!

 

XO

 

BELLA BLVD. Supplies:

COOPER Collection: 12x12 paper kit, 6x6 paper pad, Cut Outs-Faithful Friend, Epoxy Heart Dog Stickers, Chipboard icons, Cardstock stickers, Ephemera icons, Ephemera words.

BELLA BESTIES Collection: 6x6 paper pad

LEGACY Collection: Word Salad Sticker tablet

PUFFY STICKERS:  Orange Mix Stars

CUTE CLIPS:  Pretty Boy

ACRYLIC WORDS:  Adorable

 

BE YOU | Nathalie DeSousa

Hello Bella Blvd friends!

Nathalie with you today to share a bit of inspiration using the Florence Alphabet stickers to create an impactful layout.  I love large titles, as they are easy to put together, and help to embellish the layout at the same time as conveying the feeling of the page.   The Florence Alphas are the perfect size to create a large colorful title in minutes just like the one in today's page:

 

I started by adding white acrylic paint to the White Grid side of the Bella Besties paper.  Once it dried, i used Vicki Boutin Watercolor markers to create a rainbow on the page ( the stripes of watercolor create a soft diagonal design in the background of the page).    

 

While the background dried, i started to work on putting parts of the page together.  My idea was to keep the rainbow of the page throughout the entire page, that meant that i had to try at best to color block papers, alphas and embellishments.  I started by using the Squeeze the Day and Bella Besties collections 6x6 paper pads to back and picture and add layers behind it.  I added a piece of the Wreath cut out to help form the corner design at the top left side of the page.   In addition, i added a piece of the Squeeze the Day Ciao Chips and ephemera,  a cute clip, ephemera from the Sweet & Spooky collection,and a mini heart embellishment  to bring more of the colors present at the top of the page.

Once i placed the picture at the top of the page, i chose the Be You Acrylic word to anchor the title to the page.  Since i added my watercolor in sections along the diagonal of the page, i wanted to play with the colors of the Florence Alpha to complete the title.  

 

I used Florence Alpha stickers in Orange, McIntosh, Punch, Peep, Cotton Candy and Plum to add the title on the page.  I tried at best to match the color of the background with the alphabet stickers, and chose to finish the sentence with the Punch Wonky Alpha puffy sticker.

 

To balance the page, i chose to add a piece of ephemera from the Squeeze the Day collection, along with an Epoxy Heart and a sentiment from the Sweet & Spooky collection.  Since the title already tells so much of the story, just a few lines of journal were added at the very bottom right corner of the page.

 

 

I hope this inspires you to pull your Florence Alpha stickers and create  a fun colorful project with lots of words and sentiments on it.   Remember to share with us what you create!  

'Til next time!

 

BELLA BLVD Supplies:

BELLA BESTIES Collection - Freehand Grid  & Dot - White paper, 6x6 paper pad

SQUEEZE THE DAY Collection - 6x6 paper pad, Epoxy Hearts, Ciao Chips, Ephemera Words, Ephemera Icons.

SWEET & SPOOKY Collection -  Ephemera words

CUT OUT - Wreath

CUTE CLIPS Collection - Pretty Boy

PUFFY STARS collection - Cotton Candy, Punch

HEART HUGS Collection -  Mini Sentiments

WONKY ALPHA - Punch

My Beautiful Calico | Patricia

Hello Bella Blvd Friends!  This is Patricia to share how the May Mood Board inspired my Traveler's Notebook project today!  The first thing I noticed was the texture, then the colors, and the black and white.  The black and white inspired me to use a stencil with black ink to create a similar affect from the Mood Board.  I created this on a separate piece of cardstock to insert into my very full Traveler's Notebook.

I also worked from the inspiration of the brand new Chloe Cut Files!  I created the napping cat and the flowers from Squeeze the Day and Bella Besties pattern paper.  I clustered those together at the bottom, and layered more pattern papers under my photo to help it pop more.  I could have made this photo black and white, but I really wanted to show that my cat is a calico and the girly blankets from my daughter's bed really went well with the Bella Blvd papers.

For the top, I layered an Oh My Stars Gift Tags in black under the top of my photo and a purple one at the top of the Squeeze the Day Ephemera Words.  Then layered a Pretty Boy Cute Clips to it.  The blue from the bow and the purple help to create a triangle from the colors on both sides of my notebook.  All of this is adding to the wonderful colors found in the Mood Board.

With my right side having a lot of texture and color, I used a light pink Bella Besties polka dot paper trimmed with another Oh My Stars Gift Tags layered on top.  I picked the tag because of the black and white and the lines, drawing inspiration from the Mood Board.  I used a Squeeze the Day Ephemera Word along with the Wonky Alpha and Florence Stickers to build my title pulling colors from the right side.  I finished this with an epoxy heart and washi tape.

Aren't the new Chloe Cut Files adorable!!!  The cut files are available now.  So hope the May Mood Board and the cut files inspire your next project!

Your #1 Fan | Mother's Day Layout | Brianna Lepper

Hey y'all! Brianna Lepper here and I hope you had a fantastic International Scrapbooking Day and weekend!  This Sunday is Mother's Day and the creative team will be honoring that day with some fabulous Mother's Day projects all week long!  For my layout, I used the Mom Life collection since it has so many cute elements!

For the base of my layout, I chose the Jammies All Day patterned paper.  I love the black and white pattern and thought it would be awesome to lay a bunch of bright, pretty colors on top of it.  First, I punched out some squares using a few punches from my stash.  Then, I applied some color using the Vicki Boutin watercolor markers.  I sprayed water down to wet the surface of the paper and then dropped on some color.  I made sure to use colors that matched the collection nicely.

Since this page is about my Mom, I wanted to use a lot of floral pieces.  So I went ahead and fussy cut a bunch of flowers from the My Tribe patterned paper.  Once those were all cut and ready, I started working on the design of my layout.  My mixed media squares were all dry so I started adhering them onto the page having them cascade down on the left side. I staggered my photos on the large squares and glued those down as well.  I usually don't add multiple photos to a page, so this was fun for me!

Now that my mixed media squares and photos were down, I started embellishing.  I pulled some ephemera icon pieces as well as some cardstock stickers from the collection.  I love layering and adding foam squares to a lot of my embellishments.  I especially love layering floral pieces.  I grabbed the fussy cut florals and started tucking them here and there, also adding some tangled thread underneath a few.  

I pulled the Bella Besties Word Salad sticker book and added some to one of my square pieces.  I also added some of the hearts from the cotton candy Florence alpha stickers.  There are quite a few pineapple pieces in this collection and since these photos were taken in Hawaii, they fit onto this page perfectly! I fussy cut some small ones from the Borders patterned paper to add around my page.

For my title, I used some Florence alphas in Black as well as some Wonky Alpha Puffy Stickers in Punch.  I love puffy stickers so I decided to sprinkle some of the Punch Mix Puffy Star Stickers around my page as well.

I loved embellishing on the smaller squares with smaller pieces.  So fun and simple!

Thank y'all so much for stopping by the blog today!  I hope you have a great week and don't forget to come back all week to see even more layouts about celebrating the Moms in our lives!

 

Bella Blvd Supplies Needed:

Mom Life Collection: Jammies All Day, Borders and My Tribe 12x12 patterned papers, cardstock stickers and ephemera icons.  Wonky Alpha Puffy Stickers in Punch; Puffy Star Stickers in Punch Mix; Florence Alpha stickers in Black and Cotton Candy; Bella Besties Word Salad Booklet; Cute Clips in Baby Girl.

 

 

Tell A Story Day with Nathalie

Hi there!

Nathalie with you today to celebrate National Tell A Story Day!  Well, with most of the world still sheltered-in-place, we all are missing our families.  Unfortunately for us that meant missing our niece's 12th birthday -we did celebrate on line, but it wasn't the same-.  So, i  pulled Bella Blvd Squeeze the Day collection, a few embellishments and a piece of vellum to create this page...

 

I wanted the story to be the highlight of this page (it is after all my love letter to  my 12 year old niece), so i used my computer to print it on an A4 size piece of vellum.   The b side of the Fruit Salad paper is the perfect shade of yellow for the story and the pictures to shine.  So, i trimmed the excess vellum from the story page, and glued it to the top half of the paper.

 

I printed the last three selfies that i had with my niece so that they fit within a 4x6 in shape, and decided to glue them to  a piece of Fruity Hearts paper.  I glued this to the top right corner of the vellum, and decided to start embellishing the page.

 

I used embellishments from the Squeeze the Day collection to add  a cluster to the top left corner of the pictures.   All the little chipboard flowers are the perfect size for this.  And the small felt clips just bring more of a girly look to the page.

 

Building a title was so easy to do by combining an acrylic word (Family Time collection), Florence Alphabet stickers and  Wonky Alpha puffy stickers.  I love the texture and color combination that this brings to the layout.

 

To balance the page, i trimmed that little flag from the Daily Details paper, and created a cluster with some of the florals from the Squeeze The Day collection.  In order to tie together all the clusters, elements and colors of the page, i used an Altenew die to cut butterflies from patterned paper and vellum.  These were layered together, and then attached around the clusters in the page.  A bit of hand stitching just adds a bit more texture and interest on the page.

 

I hope this inspires you to write your story and embellish it with all the beautiful Bella Blvd. products.

XO

 

 

Bella Blvd.  Supplies

Squeeze the Day collection:  Papers - Fruity Hearts, Fruit Salad, Daily Details, 6x6 paper pad;  Embellishments:  Chipboard stickers, Ephemera Icons,  Ephemera words, Epoxy Stickers.

Florence Alphabet: White

Wonky Puffy Alphabet Stickers: Punch

Acrylic Word:  Blessed

Bella Bows: Baby Girl

 

Creative Journaling | Patricia

Hello Bella Blvd Fans!  I hope you feel the same as I do in being so thankful to have a creative outlet and beautiful Bella Blvd products to play with during this difficult time.  As I looked at this Easter photo of the family together for Easter at church last year, it really struck me that our Easter service this year could very well be at home streaming a live broadcast of the service.  Those thoughts played into my creative journaling.

After applying and using a small brayer with white paint onto the Squeeze the Day Fruit Salad pattern paper, I put the dried sheet through my typewriter.  I stopped where 'HOPE' would be placed using the Wonky Alpha Puffy Stickers and 'Good' would be placed using the Blueberry Florence Stickers, then sent through my typewriter again to finish the journaling.

Applying the paint over the pattern paper, gives me a great place to add journaling with my typewriter or handwriting it.  And using the different stickers as part of my journaling, helps add color, texture and a unique way of journaling.  Notice the small hearts over the journaling from the Florence Stickers?  Well, as the first sentence says, I am not perfect, and I had two ooopsies on the typewriter, so I used the stickers to cover them up a bit, but still being able to read it.  I really love the look of adding color throughout the journaling!

I left room after the journaling to add more stickers and die cuts to combine 'Us Happy Together' using more Florence Alpha Stickers, Blueberry Mix Puffy Hearts Stickers, Heart Hugs Sticker, and a die cut from the Home Sweet Home collection.

For this right side of my Traveler's Notebook, I used Home Sweet Home House Plants pattern paper for my background.  I used the Silhouette to cut this Spring Florals JustNick Studio cut file, and backed it with the 6x6 Bella Besties papers.  I finished it off with leaves and butterfly die cuts from the Home Sweet Home collection and Fruit Mix Matte Enamels from Squeeze the Day.

I love the texture on the right with the background pattern paper against the cut file with the Bella Besties, so very Spring, light and airy.  And the left side in yellow is a complementary color to the right side, bringing in more of the blues from the photo and the right side.  Adding the white paint also adds a nice airy, soft Spring feel to my spread as well.  Hope this gives you ideas of how to get creative with your journaling with paint over pattern paper, handwriting/typing combined with stickers, and also being a little transparent behind the details of the photo.  Thank you for stopping by and hope you continue to be creative!!


 

Slice of Life Flip Book | Dorymar

Hello everyone, thanks for stopping by the Bella Blvd blog today! My name is Dorymar Perez and today I am sharing with you my first project as a 2020 Creative Team Member.  I’m so happy to be invited to be part of this wonderful team for another term. Today I present a Flip Box, this project is a mix between a box and a flipbook, to create it I used one of my favorite Bella Blvd Collection, Squeeze the Day.

For the cover, I created a slide closure for the box and decorated it with my own embellishment piece created with a mix of goodies from the collection. To cover the outside of the box, I selected the beautiful Sweet Berry Paper. 

By sliding the closure, you will find several flaps, all full of beautiful designs and wonderful pieces from the collection. I love incorporating all the pieces from the collection into my designs, but one of the pieces that I like the most is the Bella Pops, these beautiful pieces full of color and dimension are fantastic and they look beautiful wherever you put them.

You can see that this beautiful surprise box is full of pockets and flaps that open on the side and up and down. All with space for photos and journaling.

In my projects I love to incorporate threads and ribbons, I think they give a special touch to the project.

Here I used a 3x4 card to create a flap and made a closure with one of the tags included in the ephemera pack, I loved how all the elements look perfectly coordinated.

The album is very easy to create! the ephemeral packs have a ton of beautiful pieces, which are perfect to decorate every interactive surface of the mini-album.

See more details below!

I hope you have enjoyed my project and it will inspire you to create your own with this wonderful collection. I Love all the flowers, fruits, and lovely sentiments included in every piece. I was so excited to get playing and creating! I love how it turned out!

Thanks for stopping by! Happy Crafting! 

Squeeze the Day Collection, Squeeze the Day Besties, Squeeze the Day Ephemera Icons, 

Squeeze the Day Words, I Pick You Bella Pop, Dotty Washi Tape, 

Fruity Mix Matte Enamels, Epoxy Icons

 

The one with my favorite TV show | Friends

Hi everyone.  Heather here with one of my favorite things...FRIENDS!  Everyone around me knows I'm a Friends fanatic and this past year, I finally let my teenager watch it with me.  Let's just say the rest is history and now we have even more to relate to and talk about.  I love it.  

When I found out Lego had a special edition Friends set, my girl put it on her Christmas wish list.  We had a blast building it together and re-enacting our favorite scenes. Of course this was the first thing I wanted to document when I was assigned Favorite Things week - my daughter and Friends!

To create this layout, I knew I needed to recreate the famous yellow peep hole frame. Then I realized a page full of frames would be super cool. 

I pulled in various cut files from Bella Blvd and others and designed the page. To make sure everything would fit, I sized everything in my Silhouette Studio software first.

Once all the files were cut, I glued some down and stitched the others with my sewing machine. Next, I added the title.  Every episode of Friends is named with "The one with..." so I only thought it'd be appropriate to to my page title the same.

I have three photos in three yellow frames on this page. Two are from the building of the set and the third is of my daughter's completed set that now sits on her shelf in her bedroom.  We get it down occasionally and to "play" with.

I left three frames empty so I can add journaling to them.  I just need to find the right words. The great news is that when I do, I can use the inside cut-outs to make sure everything I want to say will fit in the available space.

Squeeze the Day 6x6 paper pad, Doohickey stickers, Caio Chip, ephemera icons, ephemera words, matte enamels; Heart Hugs, Bella Bows, Designer washi - red stripe, dotty, black white stripe, red hearts; Bella Besties Graph & Dot Bell Pepper


 

Sweet Sisters Scrapbooking Layout | February Mood Board

Hi everyone.  Heather Leopard here, taking on another Mood Board challenge and I especially "love" this one because it's inspired by all the fun February lovey dovey things. I chose to do a layout about my sweet girls.

So here's my layout.  Let's take a look at how the mood board inspired me.

The things that stood out to me were the X's and O's and the images in the bottom row. I'd also say the garland of hearts is what inspired the banner. 

To get started, I sketch the layout out in my Silhouette software. I like to do this to make sure everything will fit.  It really takes guesswork out of the process and helps reduce waste too.

I started out by creating the background.  I cut the pink patterned paper to 3.5" x 12". I then cut the grey graph paper to 9" x 12" and adhered the grey graph paper over the pink, so that the pink would take up 1/4" of the page measuring 3". I used the 0.5" inch to glue the papers together.  I then added a small black strip of torn patterned paper to the border and stitched over it with a sewing machine (not shown). I also added mist splatters.

Next, I placed my banner up at the top of the page and then filled in the bottom of the page with a tic tac toe grid. I cut the white squares 2.2" x 2.25" and then just trimmed different patterned papers behind it. The only exception is the red heart clear cut; I put that one on top. Then I used the Florence alphabet digital cut file to create my "i", "u" and "X"'s. I then cut "O"s  at 2.25" x 2.25" to use as frames for my photos.

I used the same Florence alphabet cut file to cut the letters for "sisters" and used the offset feature in Silhouette them to create a black border around them to help them stand out on the page. 

I added a combo of stickers, Heart Hugs, Caio Chip, Bella Bows, etc. for the banner as well as around the page and title on the left.  I hope you can see just how inspired I was with this month's mood board.  I find these mood boards help me frame up my design while still allowing my creativity to flow.

Bella Besties Graph & Dot Gulf, Graph & Dot White patterned paper; Plaids & Dotty Ice patterned paper; Clear Cuts Hearts McIntosh; Squeeze the Day Caio Chip, Doohickey stickers, Ephemera Icons, Ephemera Words; Epoxy Hearts Christmas Mix, Matte Enamels; Heart Hugs Black & White; Bella Bows; Illustrated Faith Oh My Heavens Mix; Silhouette Cut Files: Florence Alphabet

Mixed Media & Bella Cuts by Kim Watson

Friends...! Are you as excited as I am for Christmas next week??

I thought I'd get into the holiday mood by scrapping a photo of my DD from when she was young....& what better way to do it than with some of the NEW Bella Cut Outs, Santa Squad & some mixed media mayhem LOL.

This is the result.

It's Christmas by Kim Watson

I was desperate to use the super, cute, blue-snowflake paper but being so bright, I thought a mixed media 'mat', might make the layering of the other goodies easier.

This was my process:

1. White Gesso
2. Dry time
3. Lime green & Forest green glimmer mist
4. Almost dry
5. Pink, Red & Magenta color powder....spritz with water
6. Dab, mix, smoosh, swirl & get messy until it looks right
7. Dry
8. Splatter with Magenta, Gold, Forest Green inks
9. Dry
10. White splatter
11. Dry
12. Add ALL other fun bits

The resulting color-chaos is exactly what I was aiming for. 

By selecting patterned papers that worked within my a narrow color palette to back the 'gifts' Bella Cut Outs; helped diminish the business of the page. I love how the large felt bow adds great dimension & ties the blue of the background into the central cluster; as does the chipboard tree & acrylic gingerbread man. 

The title, 'Christmas', another of the NEW Bella Cut Outs, was backed in red dot paper, again to reduce the business of the overall design, yet adding much needed color punch!

The photo backed with layers of tissue paper, a tab & holly die-cut, nestles in-between the x2 Bella cuts, adding balance to the top right corner of the page. 

Magenta thread clusters help with color balance & add simple texture, for visual interest. 

Ok...so I have a secret to share.

You can clearly see the torn paper section edged in gold paint & backed with pink patterned paper, right? Well what if I were to say, it wasn't planned like that hahaha!!

Seriously, it wasn't. It was a cover job for the large, gold paint puddle that happened when I knocked a bottle of gold mist over. The paper was so wet, it tore when I was trying to mop up the paint...now bear in mind the page was 90% finished, so I wasn't about to start all over again. So the best thing to do in a situation like this, is to improvise & make it part of the design.

Voila! One interesting tear, edged in gold, with pink hearts peeking through. 

Do you know what?! 

I absolutely love the result. Sometimes happy accidents can take you by surprise & this was one of those times :D

So allow me to finish off by saying how much I love the Santa Squad & Bella Cut Outs. They are the perfect go-to supply when you can't be bothered to die-cut anything or if you don't have access to a cutting machine. I urge you to look at the other designs, you are going to want them all.

Follow the links below to the Bella online store for all the supplies I used. Have an awesome week friends...until next time. X

Santa Squad Collection ,Bella Cut Outs