Nine Light Years

Inspiration: May 2023 Page Maps Sketch + Lasting Memory Layout #671 (Color palette that represents a season - Fall) + Time Out #249 (Vintage)

This layout turned out into a way more involved project that I initially anticipated, but I like that I got to use a variety of techniques and supplies on it. The starting point was the Simple Vintage October 31st collection from Simple Stories. It had been on my mind to pull it out so I looked for pictures to go with it. I found pictures of my niece dressed as Princess Leia for her birthday party. I am not much of a Star Wars fan, so I had to dig deep to find inspiration for her gift packaging. I always do a little something hand-made and she always take notice, so I made the extra effort to find something that could tie in with the theme of her party. I found a simplified image of Grogu online, so I used punches and dies to paper piece him. I covered the bag with black cardstock and I stenciled gold stars on it. 

And then I got this idea to use Word to see if I could print text at an angle in yellow font, to mimic the iconic start of the trilogy movies. I lucked out, as there is a feature that lets you tilt a text box so I was able to get the right angle. I wrote something about a little girl celebrating her birthday in a galaxy far, far away... The bag was a big hit, with the party girl and the guests.

So back to the page, I used the cool double chipboard frame from the collection to frame my pictures and I got the idea to add Tim Holtz's Shattered Windows over the pictures. I flipped it to make sure the shattered part was not over her face, but the result is really cool! 

The other product I recently acquired and was eager to try is the Rosettes stencils and dies combo from PinkFresh Studio. I did the stenciling in orange and black and then used the dies. This is really quick and really easy to use - lining both images up is super simple and the result was perfect on the first try. I can't wait to try Christmas rosettes next...  So I had three sizes, and I topped the largest one with a large decorative brad from the collection, then I tucked the smallest two underneath the picture frame.

I got lucky as this paper collection had a long and narrow journaling block on one of the cut-apart pages, which fit the sketch perfectly. I matted it with black spiderweb paper, and I then I picked the stars on black paper for the background - figured that I should include stars to go with the Star Wars theme.

Speaking of which, I picked the lightest grey for the base paper and even though it has some nice tone-on-tone designs on it, I still added stenciled stars, using a very light touch to keep them subtle. As I was adding a black rub-on to the journaling block, I spotted the "For Skills and Amusement Only" sentiment and thought it could work well, but I didn't want black on the background, so I remembered I had this same sentiment as a stamp, so I pulled the Eccentric set out and stamped it in Basic Grey ink underneath the picture. 

Since I was pulling Tim Holtz elements out, I thought I could use this Candy Corn Confections on the little clipboard I had added to the picture frame. And as I was looking through my box of embellishments, I started pulling out other options that could pair well with the collection and I ended up grabbing quite a lot.

The first thing I realized was that the fringe came in both black (Halloween) and cream (Christmas) so I combined them together to create a really cute border underneath the doubly-matted picture frame. Then I pulled out a word band to add at the top of the pictures. It appears that my Distress crayons have grown legs and gone into hiding so after looking for a bit and not finding them, I switched gears: I grabbed the Marigold stencil butter, spread some over the word with a small palette knife and wiped the excess with a tissue. It worked really well. The other item I grabbed was the Ornate Gates. I placed them on both sides of the layout and I was really liking the look. You might notice I ended up using only one... That's because I inadvertently ended up shifting the papers to the right as I started gluing things in place and I could tell that I would not be able to lift the papers up without tearing the background, so I left things where they were and went for the one gate. Half the price and now I have a gate left for another future project.

I was wondering what to call my layout. While looking through stencils, I had seen the Freight stencil set and so I decided to do a big nine at the top. I was trying to decide what ink or paste to use and since I had Tim's Live on in the background while I was crafting, I got inspired by his demo of glitter and decided to use transparent gloss texture paste and cover it with Nightfall Distress glitter. Speaking of glitter, I also decided to add some to the candy corn, using glaze and fine clear glitter.

After the paste dried, I added the words "light years" using the Alphanumeric Cutout Lower dies and the Type Keys foam stickers from Simple Stories. (Love those!)

I looked through the Bits & Pieces set to fill in the space in the top right corner. I found a cute tag, which I topped with gingham ribbon and a chipboard pumpkin from the Chipboard Clusters kit. The top was too empty, so I cut a cardstock sentiment sticker in two, layered the words and I added a bat sticker as well. I also found a cute cat on pumpkins image that worked well placed over the metal gate on the opposite side of the page.

I created a date strip using my Dymo label maker and I placed it underneath the last word of the title. This was initially created to put over the pumpkin on the tag, but it was too large, so I found a new place for it instead.

 

 

 

Supplies
Stamps: Eccentric (Tim Holtz for Stampers Anonymous)
Cardstock: Black Mirror (Tonic)
Patterned Papers, Chipboard Clusters, Cardstock Stickers, Decorative Brads,
Basics Kit: October 31st (Simple Stories)
Ink: Pumpkin Pie, Smoky Slate, Basic Grey (Stampin' Up!); Tuxedo Black (Memento)
Stencils: Rosettes (PinkFresh Studio); Freight (Tim Holtz for Stampers Anonymous);
Stars (Stampin' Up!)
Dies: Rosettes (PinkFresh Studio); Alphanumeric Cutout Lower (Tim Holtz for Sizzix)
Accessories: Type Keys Foam Stickers (Simple Stories); Christmas and Halloween Fringe,
Ornate Gates, Eccentric Rub-Ons, Candy Corn Confections, Word Bands (Tim Holtz for Idea-ology);
Transparent Gloss Texture Paste (Ranger); Label Maker (Dymo); Black and White Gingham Ribbon,
Stampin' Dimensionals, Black/Grey Baker's Twine, Distressing Tool (Stampin' Up!); 
Nightfall Distress Glitter (Tim Holtz for Ranger); Blender Brushes (Waffle Flower);
Crystal Fine Glitter (Martha Stewart for EK Success); Black Floss (DMC);
Marigold Stencil Butter (The Crafter's Workshop)

 

Comments

[Bobby Hagen]

A lot of thought and work went into your amazing layout and tribute to your niece, Cindy. Thanks for sharing your work of art with us at Time Out.

[Kate L]

Brilliant layout Cindy, love the eclectic mix of vintage papers and elements! Thanks for sharing with us at Time Out Challenges! Hope we’ll see you again soon!
Hugs, Kate

[Ishani S]

Wow.. what a great layout, with so many intricate elements and loving thoughts to make it special. I love how the images and the colors are have the vintage feel, even though the picture you chose is very recent!Thank you for taking time out and joining us. hugs ~ Ishani