A super dog, a twirl or two, and a burst of sunshine

I've had a really busy week with two days of work, an all-day meeting, no dishwasher and no respite worker for the weekend... The weather has also been up and down, not knowing if it wants to be winter or summer (rather than just sticking to a nice spring climate)!

But the designers I CT for still released some great kits and that always makes me happy :D

Mel Hains Designs released a beautiful Mother's Day kit, just in time for you to scrap those photos you took a few weeks ago ;)

I however used to for a template challenge at Mousescrappers with a fun template by Pixleyyy (which there is still time to participate in, by the way).

The kit is called Mother's Day and is exclusive at My Memories:

And my layout is of my Dad, hubby, little dude and me in the Mad Hatter's Tea Cups in Disneyland Paris in 2012. Cedric loved it soooo much, even though his Dad and Grandpa were going as fast as they could. I wanted to keep it fun for him and kept saying "wooooo". He seemed to have his stoic face on the whole time but when we left the cup, he kept saying "encore wooooo" because he wanted more. Since then, the teacups are a must-do at every Disney park visit :D

And the ever productive ladies of Bella Gypsy had another two kits out this week.

The first is Super Dad and combines a super hero theme with a Father's Day theme. It even has an add-on for Girls called Super Daddy's Girl!

I used it to start scrapping some pages of Helio way too short time with us. This one is one of the first rides in the car, which I used to get them used to each other is a safe space at first, but which we also kept taking and Cedric always played with Helio ears and lips.

The second kit is called Burst of Sunshine and has great matching Chips:

The colours and theme were perfect for me to add a two-pager of Typhoon Lagoon phtoos to my March 2014 Florida album:

I also got good news last week as the Bella Gypsy ladies asked me to stay another month in their guest CT. That makes me super happy as I had a peek at what is coming out in June and it is pure gorgeousness :D

So I'm going to go clean the house and shower so I can get to scrapping sooner ;)

New releases

I'm running out of ideas for titles, so this one is very simple and to the point: I'm here to show new digiscrap releases for the week.

Bella Gypsy releases two new kits. They couldn't be more different, but they are both really gorgeous.

The first one is called Boy Oh Boy and as the name suggest, is masculine and boyish:

I used it to scrap my photos of the birds and reptiles show that came to town in November of last year. Cédric looked at the birds a little and was somewhat patient... He did enjoy walking around the reptile tanks and really looked at the turtles. The kits worked really well for it with a snake, a nest and the perfect colours for my photos.

The other kit, as I said, is quite different. It is all pastel colours and rainbows, hearts and glitter. It's called Head in the Clouds and it is absolutely beautiful:

It was perfect for one more Disney layout, and worked especially well with my Downtown Disney photos, particularly for the BabyCakes box :D

The kit names and photos are linked and both are on sale and you get free goodies for a limited time (bonus papers for Boy Oh Boy and Chips for Head in the Clouds), so hurry to the store if you like them!

Disney - scary - selfie

The words all rhyme and could make a weird mad libs type sentence, but no, I did not take a scray selfie in Disney. They are the themes of 3 unrelated pages I made this week!

Scary is because it was Halloween, but really, our costumes were not scary this past October. We had Cédric dressed as Robin Hood and I found a really cheap second-hand dress perfect for Maid Marianne and Dave wore the same brown robe he's worn many times for many themes, added a cross and was Friar Tuck.

I bought a kit called Archer by Kristin Aagard to scrap the photos and I tried to emulate medieval book pages for the writing and design. I'm actually really proud of how it turned out :D

The selfie is just that! I had a good hair day and took a selfie in February, simple as that.

I used Bella Gypsy's new release: Just Add Glitter and the Just Add Glitter Bonus Papers (great girlie kit, I LOVE all the glitter and great colours, especially that amazing deep Indigo):

I also used the Fuss Free Freebee 135 template by Fiddle-Dee-Dee.

And the Disney part is no surprise to anyone. I don't think I'm ever going to catch up to my enormous collection of Disney photos... But anyways, I started scrapping the photos from our road trip to Florida last March (2014 that is).

Bella Gypsy had a beautiful new release called Play Hard (and matching Play Hard Chips) which had perfect colours and even the right theme for the Monstrous Playground at Epcot during the Flower and Garden Festival.

I had to think fast of what I wanted to do with the album to have my layout ready for release, and for some reason, I decided to go with a blocking/pocket style type album. I was worried because I don't do a lot of that and when I do it's with template, but I really wanted to include lots of photos and I think it's the best way, I hated it at first but by the time I rounded corner and added white borders to the photos, I warmed up to it and I think the album will look good all in this same style.

Hope you like them.

Enjoy your week-end and thanks for looking!

I'm so excited...

...and I just can't hide it :D

LOL, last post I said I had exciting news (for me) and I wasn't lying. Non-scrappers reading this might not get the excitement, but trust me, it's awesome news!

I am very lucky to be a guest CT member for the month of May for BELLA GYPSY!!!

For those who might not know, they are an amazing sister team of designers who create the brightest, happiest, kits. Their collections are always fun colours and amazing textures. I am sooooo thankful that they are letting me use and promote their products this month!

So with that said, here are the first two layouts I did as part of their CT.

They released the Snap Happier: May 2015 Collection. It is HUGE, amazing and full of really fun elements that relate to the month of May, but can also be quite versatile! Take a look:

It has lots of really cool stars and a banner that says May the Fourth be with You. As it happens, a couple of days before I used it was May 4th and I dressed my little man in his Yoda t-shirt that we bought him for Christmas in Downtown Disney. So the second I saw it, I pictured a Star Wars themed layout!

I love the face he makes in the bottom photo, and that in the top one, he has his hand and even mouth looking quite like Yoda's :D

Isn't he the cutest little Padawan?

I loved this so much that I used the Instagram version of the photo I had posted on May 4th and did my desktop background for May with it!

Bella Gypsy has two more kits coming out Friday, so I'll be back soon so show you more of these amazing products (woohoo, so excited!!).

Happy hump day, thanks for looking!

Lots of layouts

I haven't blogged in a while but I have been scrapping!!

I'll keep this short and sweet and just show you what I've done :D

The first two are CT layouts for my awesome two designers.

First my April desktop with Work Force by Artgal Style. The kit is work and office related, but I used it to make a bit of an autism awareness month desktop with that cute puzzle piece!

Then one with Beach Holiday by Mel Hains. It's a fun summer kit and I cheated and used it for a pool party :D

I also forgot to show you Mel Hains' previous gorgeous collection called Bloomin Wonderful. I loved it so much I used it twice.

Once for a sleep routine layout (template by Fiddle-Dee-Dee):

And once for one more page with Winnie and the gang at the Crystal Palace (I already have one with Cédric with each character and one with me with each character, but I had to show that the rest of the family joined the fun!):

The rest of my layouts were done in an effort to finish my xmas 2013 album (so I can move on to the other 4 trips to Florida we've done since :O).

To motivate myself to get it done, I did challenges at Mousescrappers.com

Using templates and recipes really helped and I surprised myself by using a lot of combinations of kits in one layout, which I usually don't do!

The first one shows the Crystal Palace where we spent Cédric's birthday:

Done with Berry Tangerine by Designs by Jen Yurko and a template by Fiddle-Dee-Dee Designs

The second is of us on Big Thunder Mountain, for which I have photos because my Mom was there and didn't come on. She managed to get really good shots of us!

Done with Berry Tangerine by Designs by Jen Yurko and a template by Fiddle-Dee-Dee Designs and a template by Pixleyy

Then we have the UK pavilion in Epcot:

Done with The Last Key by BellaGypsy, Gone Fishing by Mel Hains designs, Royal Knees Up by A Work In Progress and Mom's Night Out by mel Hains Designs and a template by Pixleyy

I also scrapped the awesome chef at the Crystal Palace who took care of Cédric's intolerances and played along, putting his finger in his ear to imitate Cédric who wouldn't take it out for the photo:

 Done using Over Easy by Artgal Style, Kitchen Capers by A Work In Progress, and Baked Memories by Modern June.

I used a truly beautiful template by Neverland Scraps to show all the things we did at Epcot that didn't get their own layout:

Done with Any Given Wednesday, Celebrate Summer and Friday Saturday Child all by Jen Yurko and a template by Neverland Scraps.

I also made one of our xmas supper at a local restaurant where the waiter had fun photobombing and exclaimed his surprise at how tall Dave was:

Done with Holly Jolly Tinsel Day by Just Jamie and Winter Blessings by Artgal Style

And to finish, I made two pages to journal a general overview of the vacation and use some cute photos of Cédric I hadn't scrapped yet!

Done with Doodle Me Spring by Simple Girl Scraps and the On The Spot alphas by A Work In Progress

Now it's late, and I'm sure that quite enough to look at for one post, so good night. I should be back soon with some exciting stuff (for me anyways :D)

Fontastic

No no, it's not a typo, it's just a bad pun :D

I'm here to tell you that I am Marie-France and I am an addict!

For the past 7 years, I have been collecting fonts like a maniac. I use a very small portion of them, most just take up room on my hard drive, a bunch of them look like each other,

but I can't help myself... lol

I know some people out there believe that fonts should be limited to Times New Roman, Helvetica and Arial. For some, it's even a pet peeve. I agree that for formal writing, like published work or work related documents, that's preferable.
I however, do not see the harm in a teacher using a fun font on an assignment instruction paper, even if it is Comic Sans Serif!! That's right, I said it, and I've used it!

In digital scrapbooking, I think a collection of fun fonts is not only okay, it's a must! Varied, original fonts make titling your layout easier and more interesting, and if you journal at all, while a typewriter style font can look good on some layouts, I think it might get a little boring if used on every single one. For that, a variety of fonts, especially some handwritten type fonts, is great!

Let me show you some of my favourite layouts using fonts as a tool to add interest:

Here I used three alphas combined with two fonts for the title, and a third font for journaling.

Here, I didn't want to use the alpha for the entire title, which would have been too long, but as the second part of the title is right above the journaling, I used a fun font for the second half of the title and another handwritten one for the journaling.

Here, I wanted the title to be simple and not stand out to much, so an alpha with shadows would have been too much, so I chose a font, but a fun one that matched the theme of the page.

I go a little further than that though...
I like to make myself happy with little details that don't matter in life. Little things like matching my socks to my top, or using a cute mug, or placing things in rainbow order.
Well, I sometimes kind of do that with fonts. If a page has a clear theme, I match the font to that (like a Western font for a cowboy themed page like above), but if the page does not really have a cultural or geographical theme, I try to match the name of the font...
Let me give you examples so you can understand the madness, lol

If the page features pancakes, or a family brunch, I use a font called Second Breakfast. If the page shows my little guy in his snow suit, I might use Canadian Penguin, and if on the other hand he's wearing his raincoat, I'll use Grenouille (which is frog in French). If I'm quoting Antoine de St Exupéry (a famous author and aviator), I use Santos Dumont (the name of another aviator). I'm pretty sure nobody every notices (especially as I am really bad and never credit my fonts) but it makes me happy :D

Now, the only hard part, which limits my font collection and choice when journaling, is being French! There are many many many fonts out there, but only a small portion include accented letters :(
So when I'm doing a page in French, which I have done more and more of for my son's sake, I have to take that into account. I used to type a comma or an apostrophe and manually go add accents on letters. Seriously! It took forever and sometimes didn't look great... But the little guy used to nap for hours and go to bed early, lol. Now he sleeps a lot less and I work more and I just don't have the time for it. So I choose from the accented fonts available out there. I've also never paid for a font as there are soooo many awesome free ones out there. And therefore, I want to share the name of my two favourite font designers. One if from Québec and therefore naturally includes French accents. I don't think she creates anymore, but I love the few fonts she's made. Her designer name is Jellyka Nereva and you can see her fonts here on Dafont.

The other one is Darcy Baldwin, who does not have any reason to include accents, except for being awesome! Here's the amazingly long list of DJB fonts with euro letters.

I'll conclude with a couple of the fonts I use most often. If I don't have time to think about it and I just want a cute, accented, easy to read, handwritten font, I pick either DJB Geeks Who Wear Glasses or Aint Nothing Fancy. They are my go-to fonts!

What are your favourite fonts?

Hello You

Well, hello there!
I had a pretty busy short week, with a day and a half of work, and a day-long meeting added to my regular routine. So I didn't scrap a lot, but I had one CT layout already made for release this week and I did manage an extra one! Here they are.

This week, Mel Hains released a really happy kit called Hello You, available at My Memories and I used it to re-scrap an old photo that I wanted to include in a photobook. The old layout was from the first year I ever scrapped and not up to par to my current style and, if I may say so, skills.

I ended up with this cute page for the book:

And here's the kit:

I also had time to scrap one more page for my Xmas 2013 vacation album. I did it for a fun recipe challenge at MouseScrappers and ended up loving the result! Yay!

I used a combination of 3 kits, which I rarely do, but they all matched the theme, photos, and each other pretty well. The photos were of our first time in Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room. The attraction is one of the original ones at Disney World so I'm glad we finally tried it, and my journaling says that everyone liked the decor and show and Cédric looked everywhere and really enjoyed it!

I used Hawaii by Dream Big Designs, Hoola Loola by Mel Hains, and Retro Island by Leidee Q Designs.

The weather here is finally getting decent, and it's looking like spring might be here, so hopefully that makes up for all our respite being canceled this week, and it helps me get some energy to take on a few busy weeks ahead and still take time to scrap and blog! Wish me luck and energy, I might be coming down with what my hubby, my little dude and 2 respite workers had last week :(