Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Easter DIY Decor


Easter, I love Easter! That it's officially spring, the fun colors and not to forget, all the candy!! 
In Sweden we have this tradition of bringing in branches and decorating them with eggs and feathers. why? I have no idea but we have always done it and probably always will...  But for this year I will make some new decoration! 

I wanted to change out the old feathers for some cute tassels and make the eggs a bit more glamours!





I'm so happy with how it turned out, all glittery and colorful!! 
 I really like when you can make something really pretty with so few and simple steps and I even have plans for those tassels later on...

Happy Easter to you
Love Julia


Monday, March 21, 2016

Studio Vlog 1 sunday 20 march

This last week has been filled with paint, bu not the good pretty kind. Just plain white wall paint but that means it's a few spets closer to when the studio will be ready!
So last week dad said he was done with his part for now and that meant for me to clean it out and start painting.
 The studio is in our old stable so it's not very big and not very light, my biggest problem. I have a few ideas to maximas the little light there is. Paint it all white, I rather want it a bit cold then a yellow tint to the room. I have a long mirror going up on this right wall, opposite the window, that hopefully will add some light.
 I have got my hands on two pieces of furniture, a cabin and a drink-cart. These will have a little makeover too. White paint and... well I'm not sure just jet what to do with them but I have so many ideas, just need to pick one... or two. 
 I have to say, painting and then painting again and again, it's not fun. But it looks really good, much brighter and I still have at least one more coat to do!
Filmed a short vlog from yesterday, but this is what I have been doing everyday for the last week!
 Having the end in mind, keep painting! 

This week I hopefully will have the furniture done and the room painted so that dad can go in and do his finishing jobb. In just a few week I might be sitting out there to do my thing!
Love Julia

Thursday, March 17, 2016

Bargains at secondhand

In my town we have a number of secondhand stores, some have good stuff and some just have... well crap. But my favorit, Emmaus, has a great store, well organised and lots of kitchen things (YAY!). So when ever I'm near and have some time, I pop in. So that is what I did this week while waiting for my brother to get out of school. I got three thing that I'm so happy about!
 No judgement, but I have started to buy these white horses and I love them. 
So I'm secretly 80...
 Something more useful is this light-blue tin/flowerpot. It is one big with three smaller tins whit in. I think this will be perfect to have on my desk for roller-stamps and washi.
 And then I found this! It's a pretty glass cake-stand. I love glass, and cake. If there is something that I actually want to collect, it's cake-stands! and teapots... 
I love "finding"  things that others no longer love, and what I pay for them is 1, very cheap and 2, it goes to charity. These this coat in total; 100 SEK, a real bargain! 

Love Julia

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

scrapbook page "Selfie" with PL cards and watercoloring

So the other day I was putting away my Project Life stuff after finishing week 10's page and I saw the cards on top of the corekit-tray. Next to the tray was a photo that hadn't made it to the page and the colors was just perfect for each other!


I love it when this kind of stuff happens, getting inspired by the things on your desk and making a layout that you just love. Here it was the colors of the cards that inspired me, the light blue, grey and soft coral and they went so well with my photo. 
 I took the PL cards, layered them behind my photo and them slabbed watercolor in the background. I really like how soft the layout id without being overly feminin. well apart from the lace-flower...
I wanted a soft, messy background and watercolor is perfect for that. 
 Adding the gold glitter tape and white dots adds texture without jumping out in your face. The tiny wordsticker are cream with blue lines and gold text, perfect! The journaling I added with a "stabilo 88/13". This is one of very few pages where I haven't added heavy black elements and it really accents the soft colors of the photo.
 Here you can really see the bad print of the photo, but I had just ordered some photos, this among them, so I will change it. I normally don't mind if my photos are printed at home or ordered but when this print is so bad and I really like the layout, it's worth changing it. 

All in all, I like the page (just going to change the photo) and I'm so happy that I stopped what I was doing and made this cute page of me and my brother.

Love Julia

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Maggie Holmes "Bloom" Haul

I really liked the new collection "Bloom" by Maggie Holmes made for Crate Paper, So pretty
with fun colors and beautiful floral. But getting your hands on it has proven very difficult!  
If I like a line I like to get the 12x12 paper pad, ephemera, stickers and maybe the chipboard or some fun embellishment. But sens "Bloom" has been so popular the paper pad is sold out, the ephemera is nowhere to be found and is hiding somewhere with the chipboard... 

But I did mange to get my hand on these:
  • 5 12x12 dubble-sided papers
  • the cardstock stickers
  • the clear stickers
  • the 6x6 paper pad
  • the stamp-set 


This stampset is so pretty! I love it and have played with it all weekend! 

 The 12x12 papers I got are: "little bird", "moments", "lizzy", "ribbons" & "adore"

Loving the black swan  and bow papers! 
I do would want the pad and the ephemera but I think with the pretty papers and the stickers I can make some pretty layouts (if I don't hord everything...) And if I absolutely love it, I can buy more later when it's back in stock.

Love Julia

Monday, March 14, 2016

Felicity Jane-Tuesday Printables "Good Times" A4 scrapbook layout


I'm super excited! I have signed up at Felicity Jane kit club in their two month bundle subscription. I have wanted to get this kit forever, always loved the fun and clean designs and the stamp-sets looks amazing.  So now they have this "bundle" where you get two kits every other month but only pay half the shipping cost. So I have signed up and will get my March and April kit in April. Of coarse I really want it now but at least I will get it! 

This March kit Tuesday has me so inspired and when I got the email with the 
printables I knew I had to make a layout with them!

The layout I made is going in to my "school" album from my time at Strömma 
(where I trained to be a horse-groom). I have allot of horse photos and this one I really like and I wanted to talk about that we always trained on tuesdays and that I often had Nova, even though I actually didn't really like him... 
 I did like riding him, allot, and we work together well, we just didn't click. But we had good times.

So I wanted to tell that story with the super cute printable from FJ. I wanted a bright white background with black accents to make the photo pop.
 When doing layout with "just" flat elements, like paper and paper, I like to add some things that will make you look twice. Here I added that cute bow, gold twine and pearls. Tiny things but they add just a little bit of texture.
 The tag is from Crate Paper and it goes so well with the FJ designs. The gold adds just a little bit of sparkle and the watercolor platters adds some fun unexpectedness to the page. 

I had so much fun working with these printables and can't wait intill  get the "real" stuff!
Love Julia

Sunday, March 13, 2016

The black swans

In our little town we have one park with a lake, in this lake hundreds of swans came each winter and every winter I drive past it and think, I should take my camera with me... Well this Tuesday I actually did, so when I had pick up my brother we walked around the lake and looked at these amazing birds.

I have a thing for birds, I really don't like them, except for swans, owls and flamingos...
But liking them or not, that are stunning 
 A day at the beach, or an ice floe 
 I have never seen any black swans, never hard that they would come here but there they were...
 I think they are amazing and stunning and beautiful and amazing.

Now I really need some of Maggie Holmes "Bloom" stuff, that black swan paper especially! 

We have a really good time walking even if it snowed/rained, and I'm now so inspired by these birds

Love Julia 

Friday, March 11, 2016

the Crate paper "Hello Love" Marathon

Today I  have a longer process video, doing four pages. Why you might wounder. Well, when I got the "Hello Love" I told myself that I had to use it up before march... I didn't so earlier this week I sat down. pulled out some photos I wanted to scrap and just dug in.

I love doing it this one, just letting go using what ever with out thinking if I should save this or that. I had so much fun and loving the pages! I had two "guidelines" 1 was just to use all of these pretty papers and 2 was to use my sewing-machine. Now when I knew I was going to have a marathon I just placed it on my desk and I used it on every page!

The first page I love!!! Inspired by a pattern in the collection I cut the papers in different angels and sew around them 
 This page is about our process in rally-o and what we still need to work on. I love these tiny wood vener letters from Studio Calico and they just spell out the date and #Rally Wiola
 The bold gold glitter word is from Maggie Holmes "Open Book" collection from last year and it goes so well with my favorit leaves! 
 I like using black as an accent color, it makes the layout pop and bumbing up the contrast
 The second page is a easy and clean page with two big layers and all the 
embellishments on the photo.
 I punched out some hearts and played with some stickers and then the page was done!

 Also here I have sewn around it really adds allot. Love how simple is it, 
have to scrap-lift my self later...
 With a gold striped background and a piller of die-cuts, this one is not clean and easy. But it is fun.
Here I really wanted to use all of those pieces that I have been looking at fore the past month but haven't found a place for them. Now They have one, all on the same place! 
 This page is about how much I love my mum and how happy I am when we get to spend some time alone together, like this snowy day. 
 Also this page I thoink would be super easy to scrap-lift and get a totally different result. 
Last page from the epic "Hello Love" marathon, and also this one I'm super happy with. The page is about when we where at My Dog to show baby Majken and baby Laban (Majken- Best In Breed puppy) Here I layed out some paint samples that happened to match perfectly! 
Love these colors together with the bold black
 More sewing and some wood
 I added some black & white washi over and under the photo, just to ground it and to add more of that black.

As you might have guessed I love this line and to work with it, check out my other blogpost, the crate paper Hello Love -pages- to see the pages without process videos and read more about it!
Love Julia!



the Crate paper "Hello Love" -The pages-

Today I have a sort of recap of the Crate Paper "Hello Love" collection, what I made with it and what I though about it, I think you can guess! 
I have really enjoyed working with the Crate Paper "Hello Love" collection and I have made many layouts, 9 of them I really like! 
 Some of them you might have seen, like Right Now and My Funny Valentine,  some you can see over here but now, here are 3 layouts that I really like but don't have a process video


 This page is one of the first ones I made when I got the "Hello Love". It's titled "Not today" and it's about me learning about myself and that it's okay to have an off day. That I may have a hard day or very negativ thought but that is not me... That is the bad day and that will pass. 

I knew I wanted to journal allot here so I went with one of my favorite designs, the half & half. One part is journaling and one is more "scrapbooky". I used that amazing floral and vellum under the layered photo. 


This page is a very happy, girly page about baby Majken and how sweet and weird she is. She has satrted to run inside only to stop and throw herself on the floor like Anja Persson! It's so cute!
 I really like the fun and cute feel of this page and all the gold! Here I did a band across and worked with pink and gold, the journaling I placed under so that the title and photo would be the focus. 

 My sewing-machine has been working hard this month and I love it! Here I started with a 6x12 panel,(half & half again) made a grid and then I sawed around the pieces. The craft background is sprayed with white "Heidi Shine" through the negative space from die-cutting, like the ones I have used here.
I really wrote allot here, about W, and why I love here so much. I have made sooo many pages about this dog and sometimes they don't say anything, or anything new but I have so many cute photos of her I can't stop! 

 I have really enjoyed working with this collection and I can honestly say that, because I have hardly anything left! I bought it, I used it ans I have loved it. I know it can be hard using all of thous pretty things but now I have many pretty pages and I had a blast working with them!
My favorits must have been the thickers, the papers and of curse the colors!!!

Now I'm looking forward to start playing with the "Bloom" collection
Love Julia