Simple Stories

Life Documented with I {Heart} Summer and Maya Road

Hi Simple Stories fans! Rebecca here to share a Life Documented project with you using both Maya Road and the Simple Stories line I {Heart} Summer. I think the greatest element of Life Documented and using Simple Stories products is that they lend themselves both to the simplest form of scrapbooking as well as the most complex. I have major time constraints like all of you and often I want to just get my photos scrapped. Enter the simple side of Life Documented (the Pocket Pages and SN@P cards that slip right in).  And then sometimes I just want to play with paper and embellishments and get creative and have fun. Enter ALL the other Simple Stories elements that are available. And sometimes I want a little of both! So for my Life Documented spread this month I decided to do a 2 page spread with one 12 x 12 layout as the first page and one Pocket Page as the second.

Like I mentioned I made a traditional 12x12 layout on the left side:

I included lots of fun Maya Road goodies that compliemented the Simple Stories I {Heart} Summer line perfectly! Like the linen star decorated with twine cording:

And the cool canvas flower. You will notice that even this very dimensional flower fit easily into the Simple Stories 12 x 12 Pocket Page--they are very generous indeed!

And the Fabric Tape was loads of fun! I used it as a border and to create little flags:

And finally, I used the Mini Chipboard Heart Confetti stapled with some more Twine Cording to make this little embellishment:

On the right hand side of the spread I made a Pocket Page. I love the square pockets for Instagram photos!

And again, I embellished with lots of I {Heart} Summer and Maya Road! I cut the 4x4 journaling card from a larger 4x6 SN@P card, used my typewriter to journal on it and added a Maya Road mini Chipboard Say Cheese Camera.  I loved how you could take the pieces of the camera apart so they could easily be painted different colors!

I also layered a Maya Road flower over patterned paper, a border sticker and a brad element:

But my favorite pocket was this one, where I layered Simple Stories SN@P! Cuts over a piece of patterend paper from the 6 x 6 Paper Pad. Then added a Maya Road Butterfly flag. I faux stitched around the Kraft butterfly with a white gel pen and tied it with some twine cording which I unrolled to look a bit like a bow. Next I added a mini polaroid from the Maya Road Mini Chipboard Set Say Cheese which I painted white. I covered the bottom of the Polaroid with Maya Road Fabric tape and added a Simple Stories Chipboard heart to the center of the frame! PHEW! Lots of work, but like I said it is my favorite!

Like I mentioned, I used a traditional 12 x 12 Pocket Page for the left hand side of my page. I love the Simple Stories 12 x 12 Pocket Pages because they are so generous even fitting layouts with lots of dimension.

And on the right side of my spread I used the Simple Stories Pocket Pages Design 10:

Since I already have traditional scrapbook albums, my Life Documented albums tend to include lots of phone photos, so I LOVE the 4x4 pockets for all my phone and Instagram photos. I also love how the Pocket Pages are matte enough that they dont cause a huge glare, but clear enough that they don't look foggy. Just right! I hope you are enjoying our Life Documented series and see that whether you like to keep it simple or get a little more complicated Simple Stories has what you need to document your life!

Other Supplies Used:

Simple Stories I {Heart Summer} Products Used:

Fundamentals Cardstock Stickers

Expressions Cardstock Stickers

6x6 Paper Pad

Chipboard Stickers

Decorative Brads

Layered Stickers Flair Icons

Hello Summer Paper

Yellow Boardwalk Paper

SN@P! Cuts

SN@P! Cards

Maya Road:

Twine Cording

Fabric Tape

Butterfly Flags

Mini Chipboard Sets Heart Confetti and Say Cheese

Linen Star

Canvas Flower

Trim Flower

 

 

Life Documented with Pocket Pages

Happy Friday Simple Stories friends! It's Nichol here today and I'm excited to be sharing my first Life Documented Project here on the blog showcasing the Pocket Pages!  

I, like so many of you, am addicted to the idea and concept of recording my life in a weekly format with the ease of use and functionality of Pocket Pages. I find that by recording all those little bits and pieces of daily life I am recording a clearer picture of our family's daily life and it gives me a great deal of satisfaction to flip through and see our memories, our history and our life. Documented.

With the wide range of styles of Pocket Pages available from Simple Stories, there is sure to a design that fits whatever style of page you want to create!

Now, how about a couple of my most recent two-page spreads featuring Pocket Pages?

My page design(s) are always dictated by what photos I'm going to use and when creating these weekly layouts I find it helpful to start with a list of the photos/journaling I want to include first. Then I pick the Pocket Pages that will best fit those photos and journaling and from there I pick out the paper, embellishments and extras that really make the pages "pop"! Sometimes my pages are simple, sometimes more detailed. For me, it's really all about  how I'm feeling at that moment. I don't look at it like a chore but more like an art project or art journal. It can be a great place to try out a new technique or to use that stamp set that you've had forever and never got around to inking up. I also tend to mix all my Simple Stories product up and use them all together in my Life Documented page spreads. Okay, I mix all my product up on all my scrapbooking projects but that's just me!

Life Documented | Week Twenty-Two 2013

 

One of the things that helps me the most when beginning a weekly layout spread is to break down the page creation into simple steps. I print my photos first (or most of them) and lay them out on the Pocket Page where I intend for them to go. Then, I pick 1 or 2 colors to work with for that week's spread. By limiting the color choices I am able to focus on choosing coordinating product/colors to design a cohesive page that flows nicely from the left side to the right.

When working with lots of "pre-made" product, I like to add in personal touches to customize my pages to my personal style. I use lots of stamping and die-cutting (my 2 favorite techniques) to make my pages "me".

One of my favorite tips for adding dimension without bulk is to add some Glossy Accents to the Simple Stories stickers (I did this to all the heart stickers on this spread). It gives them that great glossy raised look without the bulk!

My other favorite tip is to "replace" the printed polaroid images on the papers in the Sn@P! Life Collection with your own photos or journaling. It's easy and fun to do!

Life Documented | Week Twenty-One 2013

I did something a little different for this spread in that I used a bit more color and I incorporated more custom embellishments. Those custom embellishments included lots of stamping which I layered and dressed up with Simple Stories stickers and also die cut embellishments that I created with the Silhouette Cameo and Simple Stories Patterned Papers!

I kept each of the pockets pretty monochromatic which is a really fun way to use up supplies that you may not have enough for an entire spread!

I created almost all my own 4x6, 4x4 and 3x4 inserts with Simple Stories patterned papers from the Sn@p! Life Collection, I Heart Summer Collection and 24seven Collection.

I die cut the title above from scraps of 6x6 patterned paper and printed my dates on one of the Sn@p! Life Stickers.

I was able to create my own faux chipboard slide frames by die cutting the frames from Simple Stories patterned paper first, then an additional 4 frames from kraft cardstock and layering them all together. The result is a dimensional perfectly coordinating frame! Adding additional stamping gives it that finished look.

I even used the "notebook paper" from one of the Sn@p! Life 6x6 Paper Pads to print my journaling on and inlcude on some of the inserts. I love combining custom embellishments with pre-made ones. :)

I'm using the Green Sn@p! Leather 12x12 Album for my 2013 Life Documented Layouts. I love the rich, vibrant colors of the Sn@p! Albums , the beautiful stitching, bookplates on the spines and reinforced corners. These are truly gorgeous albums to showcase and protect your precious memories.

I used the Sn@p! 12x12 Pocket Pages Design 3 (4x6 | 3x4) and Design 10 (4x4 | 3x4) for my pages.

That Design 10 Pocket Page with the 4x4 and 3x4 pockets is a new favorite. I am a sucker for smaller pockets. The more the better and that square size just speaks to this 12x12 scrapper's heart! ;)

Additional Life Documented Products Used:

• Sn@p! Snapshots Stamps
• Sn@p! Icons Stickers
• Sn@p! Labels Stickers
• Sn@p! Typeset Stickers
• Sn@p! Cards 3x4 Life
• Sn@p! Cards 3x4 Fill in the Blanks
• Sn@p! Cards 4x6 Fill in the Blanks
• Sn@p! Life Collection Kit
• Sn@p! Life Basics 6x6 Paper Pad
• Sn@p! Color Vive 6x6 Paper Pad
• I Heart Summer Collection Kit
• I Heart Summer 6x6 Paper Pad
• I Heart Summer Sn@p! Cuts
• 24seven Collection Kit
• 24seven 6x6 Paper Pad

I hope that this has inspired you to document your life using the wide array of Simple Stories Pocket Pages!

Thanks for hanging out with me today. We'll catch you next time!

 

Life Documented with I {Heart} Summer

Hello all you Simple Stories fans!!

It's Kelly here today to share with you my very first Life Documented project using the new SN@P! Pocket Pages and gorgeous I {Heart} Summer line!

First, thank you so much for having me! I'm so thrilled to be a new part of the Simple Stories team and am beyond excited to be working with these stunning products. When Layle first approached me about working on the Life Documented team, I only had one concern - would I be able to incorporate the Life Documented approach and philosophy into MY personal scrapbooking style.

And very quickly I arrived at the one word answer: YES!!

I already knew I'd loved the Simple Stories concept and the products! That was a no-brainer! Then I saw the new designs for the Pocket Pages and I was sold! I loved the idea that I could incorporate some of these new divided pages with my traditional scrapbooking pages for a whole new look that was still "me" but gave me so much more versatility! I've always been a fan of all scrapbooking sizes so now I just have tons more to play with!

Now before I share with you what I created, I have to first put out a disclaimer and tell you that for Mother's Day I got a brand new iPhone5. Can you see where this is going? I have been wanting an iPhone for forever, mainly because of the quality of pictures it took...not to mention ease of Instagram-ming! (It's the little things, people!) To say I went on a photo taking spree with my new phone would be an understatement! I loved being able to take photos of things I might normally miss if I didn't have my big camera around. 

And guess what? Simple Stories had just what I needed to share my Instagram photos with ease! 

Check out my right side using the SN@P! 12x12 Pocket Pages Design 10 #4057! Oh yeah! Those 4"x4" slots were perfect! All I had to do is print my photos, slide them in and my page was almost done for me! Using the I {Heart} Summer line made me completely happy! I adore the colors and um, hello - the CAMERAS and HEARTS on all the embellishments? I die!

One of my favorite product elements I used for the above pages (and yes, I know I used MANY!) were these awesome SN@P! Pages!! They are traditionally designed for the SN@P! Binders, but I couldn't help myself! The cutout pages were screaming to get on my page! I simply trimmed the edges of the punched holes, added patterned paper behind the cut-outs and instantly I had a new layered element that really made my photos stand out. Whats more is you can even draw attention to specific details simply by changing the color of paper that you choose just like I did with the hearts and clouds above. It's so fun using product in non-conventional ways and I really encourage you to try it! You'll be thrilled with the results!

Additional I {Heart} Summer Products Used:

• Expressions Cardstock Stickers
• Chipboard Stickers
• SN@P! Cards
• 6x6 Paper Pad
• Flair Badges
• SN@P! Cuts
• 12x12 Collection Kit

I hope this post and these pages encourages and inspires those of you that also were unsure if Life Documented was for you! I can assure you it most certainly is! It's your life, you just need to document it! 

 

 

Life Documented with Vintage Bliss

Hi, Simple Stories fans! Melissa here today to share a Life Documented project with you using our Vintage Bliss line! I'm excited to be kicking off the project portion of Simple Stories' month-long Life Documented celebration, and I wanted to get things started with a page from my weekly album.

Some people like to sit down with a journal for 10 or 15 minutes each night to write about their day. I've never been great at keeping up with something like that on a daily basis, but I do love carving out an hour or so all at once each week to document the highlights of a seven day stretch. 

And when I say an hour, I mean it! I love working on these pages and adding little creative touches here and there along with my photos and journaling, but I don't like to spend more than 60 minutes on any given layout. Simple Stories products are an amazing resource for helping me stay within that time period. The wide variety of perfectly coordinated journaling cards, embellishments, and Pocket Pages perfectly sized to house them all make it a Sn@p to put together a weekly page!

 

You'll find me using the 12x12 Sn@p Leather Album in teal for many of my Life Documented projects. I love everything about these albums from the rich color of the leather binding to the details like the stitched edges and metal corner protectors.

And if you're like me (and many, many other scrappers) and store your 12x12 albums in an Expedit shelf, I have great news for you- the 12x12 Sn@p Leather Albums do indeed fit in those little cubbies!

 

For the longest time all of my weekly layouts have been scrapped in Design 3-style pages (4x6/3x4), but with the huge variety of Pocket Pages that will be shipping to stores at the beginning of July, I think I'm going to have to branch out and try some new designs soon!

Simple Stories' Pocket Pages are hands down my new favorites to work with. The 3x4 pockets are true to size and not slightly smaller like many other brands, so all of those 3x4 cards that come with the collections will fit perfectly on the first try, no trimming required! A few of the 3x4 pockets (depending on location) are also large enough to hold a 3x4 Sn@p Pocket!

 

Vintage Bliss Products Used:

• 12x12 Collection Kit
• Fundamentals Cardstock Stickers
• Expressions Cardstock Stickers
• 6x6 Paper Pad
• Decorative Brads
• Layered Stickers
• 3x4 Journaling Card Elements Paper
• 4x6 Journaling Card Elements Paper
• Sn@p Cards

I'm so excited to share more Life Documented projects with you over the coming months, including two different travel albums put together both after the trip and while on the road! And I'm also so very excited to see what the other talented ladies on the Life Documented team share- these women have inspired me for years with their projects, and I can't wait to see what their amazing creative minds come up with for these new products.

Happy Monday, everyone, and have a wonderful time documenting your life!

I {HEART} Summer layout

Hi there! It's Yuki with you today. Have you seen our new fabulous collection, I {HEART} Summer? I really love it! I made a layout using lots of products from this collection.

Fundamentals Cardstock  Stickers  help you to make your layout quickly.

SN@P Cuts is my favorite item. I put it under the title card  this time.

 

Thanks for stopping by the Simple Stories blog! I hope you enjoyed my layout.

Supplies used:

I HEART SUMMER COLLECTION

Fundamental Cardstock Stickers 12x12 |#3202

Expressions Cardstock Stickers |#3203

Layered Stickers |#3228

3x4 Journaling Card Elements |#3210

2x12 Border & 4x12 Strip Elements |#3214

Yellow  Boardwalk/Ledger |#3219

Sn@p Cuts |#3225

 

Enjoy Today with I {heart} Summer

Have you been loving all the layouts using the I {heart} Summer line as much as I have? Well, all I can say is the moment this line arrived on my doorstep, I was looking for photos to scrap using it. These pictures taken the week my daughter and I moved to Flagstaff, AZ seemed fitting. You see, living in Phoenix for 20 years where temps stayed above 100 degrees for several months, I couldn't really say "I heart summer" with a straight face. But moving about 130 miles north meant temps in the 70's and 80's in AUGUST. Oh yeah.

Bright sun, flowered fields, blue skies, and wispy clouds epitomized our surroundings, and wait! These are just the elements of the I {heart} Summer line! A perfect pairing worth jumping for joy over, don't you think? 

I'm especially loving the little pocket elements and die cut pieces for fun layered touches. 

I typically prefer a bold title that stands out, but here I chose to use the smaller font alphas with this line to create a more simple title, similar to its simple message... just enjoy. 

And enjoy I did making this layout. The lace trim accents were courtesy of our friends at Petaloo and they couldn't match this line any better. I hope you are enjoying this line too! I know the whole DT is in love with it. 

I {heart} Summer Products Used:

• Fundamentals Cardstock Stickers
• Expressions Cardstock Stickers
• Chipboard Stickers
• Decorative Brads
• Feel the Breeze Paper
• Daydream Paper
• Snap Pockets
• Snap Cuts

Sweet Summer Memories

Hi there.  It's Cari with you today.

I love summer!  It means lots of family time with my kiddos.  And every year we go strawberry picking. They actually look forward to it.  So I decided to scrapbook some pictures of our 'picking' adventure from last summer.

This new Simple Stories release, I {Heart} Summer is amazing!!  When I was creating my projects for today I didn't want to stop ( ... the ideas just kept coming! So I've got a list for a few more projects. :))

My first layout "Sweet Summer Memories" uses quite a few items from this collection. I'm not a big double page creator.  But having a collection where everything goes together so nicely it makes creating pages that will be side-by-side in my albums so easy!

I turned one of the 4x6 Journaling cards on it's side and printed my journaling on it. I love all the embellishments that come with this collection so it was hard to decide what to use.

The chipboard & stickers embellishments are just so easy to use.  I love adding foam squares to some of the stickers, too, for added dimension.

One of my favorite designs in this new release is the chalkboard design.  It's such a hot thing right now and Simple Stories has got it right!

My second layout, "Hello Sunshine",  I kept the design simple to focus on the enlarged photo.  I love the various colored Boardwalk papers in this collection and chose to use the teal colored one for my page.

Again... adding the embellishmnets is so much fun and can really 'dress up' and finish a simple styled layout.

I used one of the border stickers along the right side of my page and kept all the punched out little holes and then used those as dots around my layout.

 Simple Stories has created another incredible collection and I hope that I've inspired you a bit with my layouts today.

Supplies used:

I HEART SUMMER COLLECTION

Fundamental Cardstock Stickers 12x12 |#3202

Expressions Cardstock Stickers |#3203

Chipboard Stickers |#3227

Layered Stickers |#3228

Flair Icons |#3229

3x4 Journaling Card Elements |#3210

4x6 Vertical Journaling Card Elements |#3212

2x12 Border & 4x12 Strip Elements |#3214

6x12 Page Elements |#3215

Red Boardwalk/Ledger |#3217

Teal Boardwalk/Dotted Line Notebook |#3218

Sn@p Cuts |#3225

 

Other:

Core'dinations Colorcore Cardstock; EK Success (Border punch); Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L (foam squares)

Summer Love

Happy Friday everyone! Tonya here with you today. I have a couple of projects to share with you using my all time favorite collection from Simple Stories...I {HEART} SUMMER. Such fun colors, images and papers!!!

There is still about a month left of school for my kids, but it was fun to reminisce over last summer's photos for this layout. 

Cut the sun out with my Cameo and then embellished it with one of the decorative brads. 

How about the colored woodgrain papers? They really add some great visual details. 

I also made a card. I just adore all of those bicycle images with the baskets full of flowers! The little paper strip above the ribbon (the one with all of the little hearts) is from the throw away strip along the bottom of one of the papers. 

Products:

LAYOUT

I {HEART} SUMMER

   Fundamental Cardstock Stickers #3202

   Expressions Cardstock Stickers #3203

   Decorative Brads #3226

   Layered Stickers #3228

   Sunshine & Laughter #3204

   Hello Summer #3209

   Teal Boardwalk/Dotted Lined Notebook #3218

   Brown Boardwalk/Graph #3220

CARD:

I {HEART} SUMMER

  4x4 Quote & 6x6 Photo Mat Elements #3213

   Feel the Breeze #3205

   Daydream #3208 (throw away strip)   Layered Stickers #3228

Hope you all have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. Thanks for stopping by the Simple Stories blog!

Let's "Go!" with Urban Traveler

The end of May always marks the beginning of summer break for me. The school year is over, grading is done, and it's time to spend some quality time enjoying the outdoors of the great state of Arizona. Nobody loves this time of year better than my dogs, Sweetness and Boone. This past March, we almost lost  fourteen year old Sweetness to a huge tumor on her spleen, but thankfully the surgery went well, and she is doing amazing! But that event made me want to document some of the happy times with this dog while I was still enjoying them. And well, there is nothing this dog loves more than a good road trip. 

 

We have to be very careful around our house because Sweetness understands the words, "hike," "walk" and "go." She will look up, stare at us, and run over to the basket where we keep the leashes if we forget to spell these words out. It was time to get this on paper, and the Urban Traveler line was the perfect complement. I'm loving the extra dimension the new embellishments give the Simple Stories lines of products, and here I used them to accent my dog's happy grin. 

A simple design, and a few embellishments, and this layout was done. I'm especially loving the new brads with their bright colors and fun added designs. 

If you're headed out on the road for any reason at all this summer, now might be a good time to pick up this line for all the photos you are bound to take. Most of all, be safe out there! 

Products Used from the Urban Traveler line:

Expressions Cardstock Stickers #2903

Fundamentals Cardstock Stickers #2902

Chipboard Stickers #2927

Decorative Brads #2926

Layered Stickers #2928

Border and Title Strip Elements Paper #2914

Grey Concrete Chevron Paper #2917

 

Here Comes Summer!

The I {Heart} Summer line is so fabulous that I could not wait for the official start of summer to start using it! Fortunately for me, living in the southwest means summer weather comes early and my kids were in the pool over Easter weekend this year!

Do you ADORE all the new fun embellishments that the Simple Stories lines include? Like fun flair and brads...

If you don't have an electronic die cut machine, the die cut pages are fabulous to add the same type of look without the cost. The chipboard stickers add just enough dimension...Super cute stacked or Layered stickers offer even more dimension:

And all the fun usual suspects including alphas, element stickers, tape looking stickers and more. After including all those fun goodies, I ran out of room to journal so I did it along the edge of the scalloped sticker!

Isn't I {Heart} Summer such a fun line? Ican't wait to use this line for even more summer fun and activities!

Supplies Used:

I {Heart} Summer Collection--

12 x 12 Collection Kit #3200

Fundamentals Cardstock Stickers #3202

Expressions Cardstock Stickers #3203

Chipboard Stickers #3227

Decorative Brads #3226

Layered Stickers #3228

Flair Icons #3229

12 x 12 Simple Basics Kit #3224

SN@P Pages #3222