"Bescherung bei Oma" - Stuck?! Sketches

Today I want to share the new Stuck?! Sketches sketch with you that was designed by Laura Whitaker. I decided to scrapbook some Christmas memories for my December sketches, so look out for December 15 where I will share another Christmas layout. I fell in love with the Pinkfresh Studio line: "December Days" and bought several pieces of that line. With the sketch printed out I went to my past December photos to look for photos that work with the sketch and found these two of my husband, sons and brother in law all busy working on building Legos after unwrapping the presents on Christmas Eve. However, the photos were horizontal instead of vertical as suggested in the sketch. How great that we can make the sketches work by simply turning it 90 degrees.

I used all different kinds of papers as well as washi to create my strips, that I adhered with just a tiny bit of glue and then used my sewing machine to stitch them to the background. I love the texture that it adds to the layout. Before I added the strips, I primed my paper with gesso and used watercolors and some packaging to add color to the background. I'm always a bit too hesitant when it comes to the size of the color splotches and so I had to go in later after the strips were added and enlarge the area. Otherwise it wouldn't have been noticeable at all. Then I started embellishing, I created two clusters in the areas where the staggered photos left some open spaces and thus almost squaring up the photo cluster. The third cluster of embellishments is up above the title and finishes the layout nicely. I added lots of journaling to the side. I really love that it melts into the background. It is there and if you want to read it you can but it doesn't force you to.

Here is a closeup of the bottom cluster that I struggled with for a very long time. The stack of presents wasn't high enough to cover the whole height of the photo and it took me a while to realize that I didn't have to align it with the bottom edge of the photo.

This is the top cluster with the title. I just love it! Did you know that the first E isn't an E? It actually is an F because I didn't have any more Es in that color. I tucked the letters under the photo and so the bottom part of the E didn't show. What an easy solution to make a wrong letter work on a layout.

We would love for you to join us this month and create a project off this sketch. Be sure to link it up to Stuck?! Sketches for a chance to win a prize from one of our sponsors.

Here is the process video for this layout where you can see me struggle for quite a while and then see the layout come together quite easily and quickly after that.