Getting Started Bible Journaling

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

As you probably know, Bible journaling is really popular. The moment I saw it, I fell in love with the idea of it...but here's the thing, I'm no artist. I'm a paper crafter, but I don't art journal, I can't draw, and I don't even have very good handwriting. I decided, though, that it doesn't matter. I want to journal in my Bible. There are some amazing Bible journaling artist out there, and my pages aren't going to look like theirs (not now, and maybe not ever), but that's okay. Today's post is just a bit of encouragement and a few things I've found helpful for getting started Bible journaling.

First of all, if you're already a  paper crafter, I'd encourage you to use what you have in your stash. Have lots of inks? Use those. Love Gelatos? Use those. Like to stamp? Then by all means, stamp in your Bible! Then start building on your stash as you find your groove and learn what you like to use. A few things I do suggest having are:
1. A journaling Bible or if you're want to start with something a little less permanent, a pretty journal, or a Bible Study Book (I love the ones from She Reads Truth, and they're great for journaling in).
2. Some good pens. I love the Illustrated Faith Pen (that I bought specifically for Bible Journaling), and I use a handful of colored American Crafts Precision Pens (that I already own for layout journaling).
3. Something to place behind the page you're working on to keep the ink/paint/whatever from bleeding into the rest of your Bible. I started by just using a thin piece of cardboard, but as soon as I could get my hands on an Illustrated Faith Bible Mat, I got that (you can see it peeking out from behind my pages in some of the photos below). It really helps to protect your Bible.

That's all I bought to begin. Everything else I have been using for the past 6 months or so has come from my craft stash. Now, I'll show you how I created the page above.

Since I'm not great with drawing, I love to add color and drama to my pages with inks and watercoloring. I thought I'd combine the two by doing some watercoloring with my Distress Inks. I just pressed my inks in Cracked Pistachio, Squeezed Lemonade, and Picked Raspberry directly onto my Sticky Thumb Splat Mat. Then I used a Water Brush to pick up the inks and paint then directly onto my Bible page.

Next, I used a Penny Black stencil to add some dots to my journaling space. I placed some washi tape on the stencil to block off the area of the stencil that I wanted to use. I sponged some Picked Raspberry ink directly onto the paper through the stencil. 

 I finished up by adding my journaling, some washi tape, and a few stickers.

My finished page isn't perfect, but it's my thoughts on this part of Genesis written down in a way that makes my creative heart happy.

 Have you tried out Bible journailing? What are some of your favorite techniques to use?

Scrapping a Large Piece of Memorabilia

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from American Crafts and  A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

I've found that when we travel (whether it's a short weekend trip or something longer), I not only end up with lots of photos to scrap but lots of memorabilia like maps and tickets, too. Today, I'm sharing a layout that shows how I dealt with scrapping a large piece of memorabilia - a city map.

I decided to treat the map like I would a large photo. I let it take center stage on the left hand side of my 2 page layout. Since the map is such a big embellishment, I kept the rest of my embellishments on the page pretty simple. 

Because the map is black and white, I decided to go with some of the more colorful papers from Pink Paislee Atlas. Adding some pops of red, blue, and green helps brighten up the dullness of the map.

The right hand side of my page is also full of bright colors. Since the photos on this page are in color instead of black and white, I matted the photos with a bit of green paper to make them stand out and draw your eye. 

Since I had a little more space on the right hand side of the layout, I added a few more embellishments and a bit more layering. 

Scrapping a large piece of memorabilia definitely worked better for me when I treated the map like a large photo. Do you like to keep maps, tickets, and bits of non photo memories too? 

Disney Cruise Door Decor

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

It's not too long now before we head out on a Disney Cruise. Not only is my family going, but my parents' and my sister and her family, too. One of the fun thing about a Disney cruise is that people decorate their doors. Of course, I eagerly volunteered to create our Disney cruise door decor.

 

 We will be in 3 separate rooms (close by each other) so we wanted to have similar but different decorations for our doors. We thought it would be fun to make Mickey Mouse inspired heads representing everyone going along. I wanted to utilize my Silhouette Cameo to do the heavy lifting for me, so I found an Etsy store (Miss Addison's Closet) that had the cutest Disney inspired cut-able heads. 

After deciding on a theme for each of our doors, I cut the heads from card stock. Then I used my Cameo and Silhouette software to create a word sign that goes with the them for each door. We get Star Wars. 

My sister's family gets Snow White (I still need to make a Grumpy inspired mouse head for their door...but I couldn't wait to share what I have done). 

And my parents get pirate Mickey heads. 

Finally, I wanted one piece of door decor that would be the same for all of our doors, so each door gets one of these. The cruise ship is a cut file from the Silhouette store. Then, I created the words to go along with the ship.
We're getting pretty excited for our trip now!

Travel Pocket Layout

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from American Crafts and  A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

I don't do a lot of pocket style scrapping, it often just doesn't come naturally to me. I have found, though that there are times pocket pages really help break up the look of an album, especially when you have lots and lots of photos of the same thing. For example, I'm still plugging along scrapping photos from our trip to Ireland. For some of these photos, I have a about 1 spot worth of journaling to 10 or 20 photos. Breaking up the photos upon photos with a travel pocket layout really helps give your eye something different to look at and helps get those piles and piles of photos into an album.

I like to mix my pocket pages in with "regular" pages in my album. You can really see the difference between the 2 style of pages here, even though the layout of the pages is similar. The page on the left is a standard page, whereas the page on the right is a pocket page.

To keep the pages feeling a bit congruent, I used the same paper collection (Pink Paislee Atlas) on both pages, the same font for creating words, and pops of the same silver and teal foil on both pages.

I created my foiled titles by cutting custom words out with my Silhouette Cameo from Heidi Swapp Minc Toner Sheets. Then I covered the words with either silver or teal foil.

Then I added more pops of foil with Minc stickers, journaling cards, and patterned paper.

For me, using pocket pages for this travel pocket layout was a bit outside of my comfort zone, but in the end it really pays off. Using a pocket page really breaks up the look in my album, and gives your eye something new and different to look at. 

So, how about you? Do you love using pocket pages, or are they a bit outside of your comfort zone, too? I'd love to hear about how you break up pages and pages of travel photos!

Snow Dog Layout

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from  A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

Our dog, Steve, loves the snow. He seriously can't get enough of it. Between the kids and the dog, it's super easy to see the joy in all that white stuff on the ground. Last week I had fun scrapping the kids in the snow, this week it's the dog's turn with this Snow Dog Layout.

Bo Bunny always does some of my favorite winter collections and this year's Whiteout by Bo Bunny is no different. It's full of rich blues and pops of brow, but what I love the most is the glitter! Every sheet of paper has gold glitter accents on it that make this collection oh so pretty.

Even though there's a lot of glitter to be had Whiteout, it's not at all a girly collection. The deep blues keep it really gender neutral.

I decided to play up the gold in this collection by adding some gold glitter Thickers to create my title. Since my photos are quite white (what with all the snow), adding a layer of deep blue card stock behind each photo helps to make the photos stand out a bit on the layout.

With the way the forecast looks, I'm guessing I'll have a few more opportunities to use Whiteout to scrap some winter fun. I'm sure by spring I'll be ready for some warm temps and sunshine, but for now I'm going to enjoy my snow dog and some cold weather fun. 
Do you enjoy the snow, or would you rather head south when the temperatures drop?

Snow Day Layout

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from American Crafts and  A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

We have had quite a bit of snow here in NW Iowa. After almost no snow last year, it's been a welcome sight. I don't think I scrapped with a single piece of winter paper last year. But this year's already a different story. We've had 3 Snow Days already this year...so with that in mind I bought a bunch of winter paper and here's my first Snow Day layout.

For this layout I chose Pebbles Inc Winter Wonderland Collection. This is a bright and joyful winter/snow collection that is super fun and easy to use. There's a bit of pink and purple in this collection as well as some snow princesses, but as you can see you can totally make a layout from just the frosty blues and silvers if you want.

I added in a few snowflake sequins from Pink Paislee's Yuletide collection and a bit of American Crafts Silver Glitter Tape to add some sparkle (because every snow layout needs at least a little sparkle).

This photo was taken on the first snow day of the school year (right before I put on my snow clothes and headed out to play, too). There's just something special about playing in the snow on a day off from school!

How's the winter weather in your neck of the woods this year? Will you be needing a lot of winter paper like me?

Layout with A Lot of Journaling

This is a personal blog. All editorial content and projects are intellectual property of Taylor Stamped. I do receive financial compensation and material product from  A Walk Down Memory Lane to develop my craft posts, but all ideas and opinions are my own. Some links are affiliate links.

Often I have layouts with a lot of photos and a little bit of journaling, but today I'm sharing a layout that's the opposite. Today, I'm sharing a layout with a lot of journaling and only one tiny photo. 

 I had a lot of story telling to do in this layout and only 1 small photo, and a bit of souvenir paper. I decided to use large journaling cards from Simple Stories Gold Snap Pack as focal points (as well as give myself plenty of space to tell my story).

I mixed and matched papers from Crate Paper, Ken Oliver, and Bo Bunny that I felt lent themselves not only to the feel of the photo, but the feel of the stories I was telling in my journaling. 

Usually I'm careful to keep my photos the focal point of my layouts, so it was kind of fun to do something different and make my journaling the focal point. How have you dealt with a lot of journaling on a layout?