Happy New Year! where ever you are in the world, its round about NYE for us all, and I wanted to wish you all a very very happy one! May 2009 hold a lot of scrapping memories and opportunities for you!

This weeks Just my Type challenge is easy and arty! my favourite kind!
Just my Type Challenge - ‘Glad all over’ Use repeated letters or words all over as patterns or backgrounds.
Yup, all you gotta do is choose your title/phrase/quote/name and repeat it. and repeat it.
not other journaling allowed! Okay -you can add the date, because adding the date is one of my ‘things’ and I get all twitchy over date-less layouts!
youre going to need to check your font for this one, make sure you can read it when its repeated over and over. So its a free choice of about 40,000 fonts then!
For my page here I used Cholo Sperry Rand R20 a good ol’ typewriter font.

That’s my Father and I, at opposite ends of a table during a family meal this Christmas
I cant wait to see what you conjure up with this challenge and dont forget to post your layouts here in the JMT gallery for all to see!
Thanks for playing along and see you all in 2009!

Any items that are “Christmas” type items are now marked down 30% until 7pm EST on New Year’s Eve (1/31), that’s 343 items!

In honor of the first day of official winter, just a few days ago (December 21), I chose a kit for the 3kits 3ways challenge with a snowy theme: Lynn Grieveson’s lovely Baby It’s Cold Kit. Of course, where Lynn lives in New Zealand, and for many of you in the southern hemisphere, it is summer! Maybe next time, Mollie, my 3kits 3ways partner, will choose something more tropical for all of us wishing to escape winter! In the meantime, I hope you like my choices for the wintery challenge. I love Lynn’s kit and I also rediscovered 2 wonderful products I love by Katie Pertiet. Katrina and Paula, from the Creative Team, created beautiful example layouts to inspire us. I am so proud to post their layouts here.

First,  here are the 3 products for the challenge:
Baby It’s Cold Kit by Lynn Grieveson

Stitched Frames Brushes by Katie Pertiet

Revealing Overlays No. 01

Here are the layouts Katrina, Paula and I designed using the 3 challenge products:

Holiday Shopping by Katrina (aka Katrinak)

Katrina added Worn Page Edges by Lynn Grieveson; Stitched by Anna Cream No. 03 and 12 by 12 Holly Plume Overlays by Anna Aspnes; plus Absolutely Acryllic No. 03 by Pattie Knox which is coming soon to the Designer Digitals Store.

Dear Santa by Paula (aka PaulaSG)

Christmas Eve by Merrilee (aka digigrandma) (My layout is a lift of a layout by Katie called, Cousins)

I added Old Time Christmas No 02, Basic Twill Holiday, Blank Safety Tags: Vintage,Krafty Frames Curled and Flat, Photo Wraps No. 01, Photo Wraps No. 03 and Letterbox Holiday Corners by Katie Pertiet; Holly Christmas Paper Pack by Jesse Edwards and stitches from Quaintly Roam Kit by Anna Aspnes.

There you have it! The same 3 kits were used by all 3 of us for 3 completely unique looks. I hope you will be inspired to check out the products we used and if you have them in your digital stash, we invite you to add your own design to the 3 Kits 3 Ways Gallery. The next time the 3 Kits 3 Ways challenge is posted on the blog, it will be 2009! Mollie and I look forward to continuing this challenge next year, and, in the meantime, we wish you all happy and safe holidays. In addition, we’d like to thank everyone who participated in this challenge in 2008.

This page by Vicki (aka Oldvwblues) is a real eye-catcher:

It’s a great design for when you have one big and one little photo, and I love the cool effects she used. Have a play with the artistic filters in PS and see what you can come up with. Try blowing up a close up photo for real impact, just like Vicki did.

Here’s how it inspired me and Cassie:

Credits: layout by Lynn, Scribble Primary paperpack (coming soon), Tinsel strips, Jungle Juice kit and Stitched stars all by Lynn Grieveson.

Credits: layout by Cassie, Puzzled Paper, Vintage Ads paper, Messed up overlays 2, Revealing overlays and metal sheets by Katie Pertiet, Textured overlays no. 4 and Double Simple Swirl alpha by Anna Aspnes, Alpha Jumble Jewel papers by Mary Ann Wise, Blooming remnants by Lynn Grieveson.

~ Lynn

Here we are, it’s Thursday again and we have a new template challenge for you to try. This time we used this fun template by Pattie Knox:
Speed Byte No 116

Heidi used the template to create this adorable layout about her dd at 2. The soft colors look so pretty here - she used papers from Mod Bebe Girl Solids paper pack

Bonnie also flipped the template on its side but she gave it a completely different look with her bright colors and cute puppy photos!  This blue and green color combo just makes me happy! Her papers are from the: Kiana paper pack

And with another take on the template, Mollie just blew me away with this layout about her youngest daughter’s letter to Santa in 1981. Can you believe she saved the letter? It works beautifully as a background for the photos here.

I didn’t flip the template but used it in the original format—I’m in love with Mindy’s Christmas Dreams Kit

Check out the template challenge gallery for full credits to these layouts. And don’t forget to play along!