limited edition........

sometimes you have a limited edition of an event. last year that happened to me. marius had been building the whole of 2010 at Oubos. every single weekend. from the previous November. we NEVER saw each other. we both have full time jobs, working really hard. and every weekend he would go and help at Oubos, doing all the work mostly by himself. our marriage took alot of strain. at some point i did not think we were going to make it. then, about a month before his birthday in november, my aunt phoned me and said she was going to give me some money to give to marius - he did not want anything for the work at Oubos, but she knew i would take it. ( she was right!!!) so, instead of the money disappearing into the daily abyss of living, i did something outrageous - i booked a 2 night stay at a 5 star game lodge!! YIP!! we also have never been on a honeymoon, so it served a double purpose - something so out of character for me ( i am a bargain person) and for marius - the less fancy, the better!! so, we did it!! we spent two glorious nights at the wonderful Kichaka Lodge. (you can read more about it here). anyway, when i was moving papers around in the shop last week, i moved these Prima papers - the collection is Reflections. and i saw the layout in my head. i also never use fancy flowers, but i knew that i wanted to use some of these stunning new Prima and Petaloo flowers, supplied by the Wholesaler. i have also never scrapped with yellow, so i knew it would be a challenge for myself. i am very happy with the result!! you might think that the paper is not really suitable for lions, elephants, rhinos etc, but i say who cares!! anything goes and it is supposed to make me happy! ( i think alot of scrappers worry so much about mainstream and what others are going to say, that they forget to scrap in a way that makes them happy!! the opinions of others are quite simply irrelevant when it comes to YOUR memories!

i used a chipboard title that i painted with butterscotch paint dabber and added glossy accents over it. to the right you can see my journaling spot. it is an index card that i sprayed with the same home made glimmer mist ( actually perfect pearl mist) that i sprayed all the pages with before i started taping the photos down.

a close up of those pretty flowers!! also, please note the Tim Holtz film strip stamped in Versafine Sepia ink, and the PRETTY Prima pebble - was looking for something to fill the gap, and seriously, this pebble just jumped out at me! those are really the greatest little embellishments!

more stamping and my corner - it is an Enmarc corner, and i embossed it with Ranger's Rust Embossing powder ( i had the wrong bottle out first, and i was embossing until i was sure my heatgun was going to burn out, and then i looked at the bottle - HA - i was using Vintage Photo Distress EP instead of Rust!! it can happen when you get excited about finishing a layout!!!) and that is it! i really hope you like this and will let me know if you do! just a note - i used 9 3inch x 3inch photos on this layout. that is about 7.5cm x 7.5cm. i did have 10, but then i wanted to journal, so i took the one photo away. i am fairly sure you could add about another 2-4 photos of the same size to this layout without crowding it too much. if i knew how to do those sketches, i would put a sketch here for you guys to use - but alas, i don't know how and those who do don't want to tell me how, so you will have to use pen and paper!! you are welcome to copy any of my layouts - if you feel like it, please refer people back to my site or give credit, but if you don't want to - that's also ok. your choice! enjoy the rest of your week! xxxxxx