Hello American Crafts fans! Every year, I collect bits and pieces along our travels around the world—anything from ticket stubs to brochures and restaurant business cards. Many of these ephemera pieces are too large for a pocket page, and if I’m creating a traditional scrapbook layout, I need a different solution. Today, I’m sharing a new layout that holds all of the special memorabilia from a summer trip trip using the Wildflower and Honey Collection and the We R Memory Keepers Book Binding Tool Kit!
A fun, patterned envelope can be made in many different ways, but for this layout that introduces several projects documenting our trip to Mexico last summer, I wanted to create a special element! To add color, texture and another media on my page, I grabbed the We R Memory Keepers Book Binding Tool Kit. This fun kit has everything you need to create Coptic, saddle and Japanese bindings—the type I used on this layout. I simply attached a 6” x 6” cut of the colorful pattern from the Wildflower and Honey paper pad to a piece of white cardstock using washi tape, and placed both pieces into the bookbinding guide before punching holes in a pattern found in the handy bookbinding guide included in the kit.
Next came the fun of Japanese stitching along three sides of the papers to create a perfect pocket for my page! Once my envelope was complete, I topped it with a 4” x 4” photo and started to prepare my mixed-medial layout background using the beautiful Wildflower and Honey Collection stencils, ink pads and mist. I added subtle flowers with spray and more bold colors with the wonderful Vicki Boutin ink pads.
Adding these stenciled elements to the background established a diagonal line, which runs directly through my envelope and photo. The next round of layering began with both the Wildflower and Honey frames and journaling and icon ephemera packs. I chose large leaves and flowers to layer behind my custom envelope to give the layout a tropical feel. A banner, “happiness” die cut and heart sticker added directly below my photo added some weight and helped to draw your eye to the photo.
Next it was time to add my title, and I wanted it to be large, colorful and bold. I used the beautiful patterns from the Wildflower and Honey 6” x 8” paper pad to die cut the word “hola”, then topped it with black letter stickers from the Slice of Life collection to document our trip location.
I finished off my page with a grouping of embellishment at the top corner, including a fun pom-pom chipboard banner, which reminded me of Mexico, and beautiful cardstock sticker butterflies in a triangle around the page, which I popped up using Sticky Thumb adhesive foam tabs. Adding a few lines of stitching using my sewing machine helped to get even more texture on the page. To finish, I tucked all of the ephemera that I gathered on our trip inside my pocket, including additional photos in a photo strip that I had not yet scrapbooked!
I love that this layout not only records a beautiful memory, but also does double-duty by holding special mementos from our trip! Be sure to try this hand-stitched envelope technique on your travel layouts using the We R Memory Keepers Book Binding Tool Kit! Thanks so much for stopping by today!
Supplies | Wildflower and Honey Collection: Full Bloom paper (352243), 6 x 8 paper pad (352254), ephemera icon pack (352262), ephemera frames and journaling (352263), cardstock sticker (352257), sticker book (352258), gold holographic chipboard stickers (352255), stencils (354111), metallic ink pad (354116); All the Good Things Collection: warm tone ink pad (343902), cool tone ink pad (343901); Slice of Life collection: glitter and foam foil letter Thickers (354163); Other: We R Memory Keepers Book Binding Tool Kit (660443), Sticky Thumb adhesive foam tabs (340273), Sticky Thumb adhesive tape runner (342038)