Digi-Scrapping...

I am one who downloads a lot of great stuff, but has ventured very little into the field of digital scrapping. One reason is (or rather...WAS) that I was using Photoshop, and wasn't very proficient in it. But I have learned a lot lately with my photo editing...and then I fell in love with a set of digital scrapbooking things from Vicki's Blog - A Work In Progress.

The line I used is called Fired Earth...the colors are all so luscious...and the elements sets are beautiful! The alpha set coordinates wonderfully too. But best of all? Vicki, the creator of this set (and MANY others) makes everything available for FREE. Seriously! She downloads through 4Shared which I use regularly (this is a free file sharing site that allows you to upload things, then share the link with others - a virtual server. It's come in very handy to share my "big file" pictures with my sister...much easier than sending each picture individually). And all you have to do at 4Shared is sign up.

But I digress. I created a layout...with some of the "fairy" pictures I took of Hannah...I don't believe I've shared my full fairy with you (wings and all!), so here's my digital layout....

digital scrapping

I enjoy a challenge...I really do. But digital scrapbooking has just not been my forte. I don't have a dedicated scrapbooking program. I was thinking about getting one. But then I thought, "I have Photoshop...I should just learn to digi-scrap in that. It's not very user friendly. But, because I've been working on editing a lot of my photography, I'm learning more and more...how to work with layers.

The thing is...I have been COLLECTING digital scrapbooking stuff for a while. My sister sent me a lot of freebies...and I joined a group called Scrap Snaggers. These amazing folks SHARE digital scrapbooking stuff...a LOT of it. And FREE. So...I have been downloading freebies...but doing nothing with them. So I decided that I needed to start using them, or get all these files off my computer.

I found this one blog, in particular, to have AMAZING stuff...Vicki's Blog - a Work In Progress - she makes these wonderful kits. They are coordinated...every day or so, she releases something. One day it's solid paper...then patterned paper...then elements...and more elements...and an alphabet or two.

I found one kit to be adorable...and so I decided to try digi scrapping again. Here it is...using the Ella kit from Vicki's Blog



I have yet to achieve "torn paper" look (if anyone's got hints on how to do that, PLEASE let me know - the pink tag on there was already "torn", but I wanted the effect on the pink paper)

I learned that I can flip elements to suit my needs (the blue scroll design is actually 2, I flipped one horizontally)

I learned that I can use the eraser to pull up a bit of the lower layer...see how the paper clip looks like it has actually been tucked behind the tag? And the fold on the paper is OVER the letter Y?

I learned how to resize those individual letters in BEAUTY...to contrain the size so that they are all exactly the same size.

I am still learning...it's a work in progress, of course. But it's a start!