The Butterfly Effect

Intro

Hello sweet friends! I'm guest designer Michelle McClure and I'm super excited to be rubber stamping along side you all this month.

I reside in Temple City, CA which is a small suburb in Southern California with my hubby and two doggies. I taught elementary school for sixteen years and just love those third graders. I've naturally been scrapbooking most of my life, making my own Smash type books as a kid. I seriously started crafting when stamping was all the rage and later transitioned to official scrapbooking. Now I can combine my two passions of stamping and scrapping as I'll be sharing in today's project. 

The Layout

When I first heard that September's first challenge was about butterflies, I immediately imagined a rabble of them fluttering across a page. I thought that would be the perfect background for a layout. 

The Details

I wanted a soft color palette to match the butterfly theme so I chose to use My Mind's Eye's Follow Your Heart, Be Happy collection. Using the patterned paper as a guide, I picked 4 coordinating ink pad colors. I wanted an ombre effect, so I stamped from dark to light, and right to left going diagonal on my page using just one stamp, Bold Butterfly Medium. I drew a rectangle slightly smaller than the size of my photo mat so I'd know where to stamp and the lines will be covered by the mat later. 

I wanted the butterflies to be the star so I faded my photos prior to printing so most of the color would be in the stamping. To further emphasize the butterflies, I added some Stickles glitter to them. 

It made the plain cardstock look like expensive glitter embossed designer paper. 

Here is a look at the date and journaling cluster. The bit of the patterned paper peeking out from behind the photos is actually the color inspiration for the entire layout. 

I was thinking this sketch would look cute as a card, just scale everything smaller and replace the photo block with the sentiment. 

If you have a stamp that you love, try using it to make your own patterned paper. Then you can get the exact color and design that you need for any type of project. 

Thanks so much for flutterin' by,

Michelle