Just Hanging Out!

Good Morning!  I have another page to share; inspired by Stuck?! Sketches.  I have seen this sketch on several blogs that I follow.  I liked the design and saved it for added inspiration:

And here is my take:

I guess the first thing I want to talk about is the cardstock.  Of all things, right?  Apparently, I have a love/hate relationship with this shade of green. I love singing like Kermit The Frog about how it's not easy being green. I love the shade.  I hate working with it; but I'm stubborn.  Each year, I give myself permission to invest in a new "boy" collection and coordinating cardstock.  This shade is actually spot on with a few of the papers in the "Be Different" collection from Fancy Pants, so it was a natural choice.

• Problem:  Every time I pull it out to make a page, my eyes get mad at me, taking my brain along for the ride.
• Solution:  Every time this happens, I put it back and choose a different color.
• Problem:  I've run out of two of the other colors I prefer (light blue and vanilla).
• Solution:  I've ordered more.
• Problem:  I REALLY wanted to make a page -- apparently this page -- yesterday and Oh! Em! Geeeeeeeeeee!  How was I going to make this work?!
• Solution:  Throw as much navy (everything) as I could around the photos to help me chill out.  That started with two different blue mists, blue ink with stencils, and any blue embellishments I could find.  I began to settle into some comfort with my page, but then there was a very blank, massive corner of green along the right.  Gah! More mist, still bugged me.  Then I just decided to listen to the little voice inside my head.  I tested my idea first; by painting hearts with plain water,  I would at least get to see if I liked the shape and knew it would dry clear.  Once that was a go, I dipped my brush into a bottle of glimmer mist to paint heart shapes...then I felt compelled to fill them in.  Almost there; I used a bottle of Mister Huey's and traced the outside with that tiny tube/ spray pump/whirlygig..... In the moment I'm typing this, I'm mostly happy, but I still think they might need something more; maybe a little yellow triangle in each.  Maybe time will tell.

Check!  So now I can talk about everything else:

• My literal brain would have popped if I didn't choose the gaming paper for this page.  It is, afterall, about The Boy and one of my dearest friends playing Skylanders together.  He got her hooked on a previous visit so this was pretty special for them both.

• Again, I played with Pics Art photo editing to choose two colors in the photos, making the rest B/W.  I think I do that more for my benefit, so I can better focus on what I feel is important -- not the messy sofa and coffee table.
•  I went back to my early days and traced a saucer for the corrugated circle; then folded that circle in half to cut out the inside.  I then cut that ring in half and wove it between my paper layers.

•  Instead of using another paper for a large banner underneath it all, I opted to use a stencil and ink.  Then, I was compelled to pull out my trusty brick stencil as well.  Mainly, I was just trying to fight all of the green with more blue around the photo.  I hated it.

• Since I hated the bricks, I started layering over them -- stickers, journal spot.  Initially, I wasn't going to use a journal spot; but I didn't leave space at the bottom for journaling.  Plus, it was more navy to combat the green.

• And the sequin party!  Whee!  Followed by more decluttering of my desk -- the enamel pieces.  Also, I found a roller-date stamp just hanging out, wishing for some love. 

If I owned a stamp that was shaped like a video game controller, I would have thrown a couple of those images onto my page as well.  Trust me, I'm looking!  Until that magical day arrives, this page is "done."    If you're interested in learning about the products I used, here is the link to my gallery at scrapbook.com.

 http://www.scrapbook.com/myplace/index.php?mod=galleries&u=376301&m=view&id=4239263&type=-1&size=0

Thank you for looking!