Thursday, April 2, 2009

Scraping Weekend - Flowers

I've written before about my love of scrapping my gardening habit. Actually I use my garden album as a journal. I have pages that are only journaling so there are a host of pages I don't journal on. The series of photos I'm currently working with are of the roses and their first leaves. I was also still doing spring work on the bed. The wonders of having a rabbitry on top of the cattle. The manure is great, no composting needed. Spring cleaning of the rabbit barn goes straight to the beds. By the next year there is no sign of any manure and no burning of the plants. The soil is incredible, dig in it and I'll find a host of earthworms. I'll miss these roses when we sell the house. Two of the roses were planted in clay pots and buried in the garden. My Killarneys. They made the trip to the ranch right after the Houston Livestock Show. I just have to find a place to put them in the ground, still in the pots. When the house is built at the ranch they'll find a bed of their own and have a few more added to join them.

My goal in my Garden Album/Journal is to have a good time scraping and to keep the LO's simple. I'm working in a 7x7 format. I have gotten detailed as I like to on my 12x12 LO's as I did in a recent Tahitian Sunset picture titled "Real." With this LO of my Wild Blue Yonder I used the 2008 Sketch #17 from 52 Sketches...52 Weeks. It was a sketch I never used last year. I love the Wild Blue Yonder. I plan to purchase another one when we moved to the ranch. The Wild Blue is such a deep red with Purple/blue hints. It looks in the right light a dark blue/red rose.


I seem to always have pictures of my Taihitain Sunset. It's a J&P Rose, very prolific bloomer and pretty tri-color rose. No two Sunsets look alike. It is truly a beautiful rose. I kept this really simple as far as the papers. I used the CM page to form a border, grab a tropical color CM TTY Kit that came with the blue photo mat and three daisy stickers. I added a bright yellow paper from the CM Everyday Power Palette and then Bazzill Stitchiz template to make my daisy and heart. The Bazzill Stitchiz templates are so cool. I don't know if it can be seen in the picture but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't get the outline stitch to work correctly. I've never had that problem before on paper. Maybe the holes on the template are just too far apart to make the curves properly using outline stitch. I kind of like how the crossing of the thread makes it look like petals.

The Radiant Perfume is a beautiful yellow rose. This was the first year in the garden for this rose. It was suppose to be a very resistant rose to a number of problems including Black Spot. The joys of having year round roses on the Upper Texas Gulf Coast means lots of Black Spot. It's so frustrating. No it wasn't immune but this rose didn't have near the problems as say the Tahiatian Sunset or the Memorial Day does. I scraplifted the LO from the back of the 2009 Spring/Summer Creative Memories Catalog. I was struck with the LO and decided I would Scrap Lift it. I used all CM Papers. The frame was cut using the CM Wavy Patterns. The chipboard and eyelet is the only items not from CM.

Pope John Paul II Rose was introduced by Jackson Perkins three years ago. One of the most stunning white hybrid teas I've ever seen. The fragrance is delicate. As I thought about presenting this rose I turned to the internet and searched for Pope John Paul II images. You always thinking of the Pope being dressed in white. Yet look again! There are pictures of him in a rich red, too. Then his dress has trims of red, black and/or gold. Perfect! The gold paper I used is my favorite. It's a shimmer gold from Creative Memories. It's discontinued and I'm so disappointed! I love the Archiver's exclusive Brackets 4x4 die. You have a choice of three very different decorative brackets. This was definitely one of my favs from this scrap weekend.

The final LO is of my Ronald Reagan Rose. I love the Ronald Reagan. It's a beautiful bi-color rose. A striking rich red with a hint of white at the base of the petal. Just stunning! This LO came from 2008 52 Sketches...52 Weeks Sketch #47. I found when I used the tab, it really is huge on a 7x7 LO. I had a lot of fun with this LO. The red buttons just made the whole LO. What I don't like and it's not that apparent as it is looking at it. I keep highlighting and I don't like how it ever turns out. I guess I'll just keep trying.

All of these LO's were only done with scraps except the black paper for the Pope John Paul II. I really have this thing about having lots of scraps...I go all out to keep them to a minimum. I've not been that good lately, but I've decided to work harder at it. The 7x7 format is the perfect way to use one's scraps!

Keep scrappin'

Kim

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