Vacation Album Cover

I've bought a plain old boring album at a very cheap price to store all my vacation scrapbook pages. I just want to get rid of the look on the album cover.

Therefore, I've tried to create a layout based on all the places that I've visited during the vacation. I've got cut-outs from travel magazine, brochures and some I've paper-pieced it.

You will never know what you will come up with when you don't need to scrapbook based on photographs. It's so fun. The plastic actually came with the plain album. Therefore, worries about protecting your work. For more detail on this, refer to my "altered album cover" in my tips and tricks section.

USA review

This is one of my favourite layout. Most of us have a problem of 'what are we going to do with the leftover photographs from a trip?' I've cut out all photographs into 1x1 inch squares and this is what I've got. This idea is from a scrapbooking magazine.

Salmon Festival

The photographs taken at the Salmon Festival gave me a "fishy" thought. Therefore, I've used colours from the stream or river to create this layout. Furthermore, I've included Ryan's Salmon stencilling into the layout.

Sacramento Zoo

I bet most of us had some photographs taken at the zoo to scrapbook. I've used paper and tags from http://www.paperpizazz.com to create this page. The pattern on the papers gives a jungle looked to the layout.

Fruit

We had taken Ryan to a berries farm in California. I would liked to keep this page simple and nice. Why not try vertical journalling? In this layout, it helps to balance the page.

Choo-Choo Train

This is about a train ride that we've had at Sacramento Old Town. It's a steam engined train and it's very old. Here. I've developed the photographs in black and white in order to solve the problem of contrasting colours in them. Then, I can use whatever colour background and accent I want.

Lake Tahoe

This is a two page layout of our trip to Lake Tahoe. It's a fun trip as this is the time that our family get to see snow. The chilling and freezing climate there inspired me to create this layout. The use of blue and white tones really help in this case. This time I had made my title out of free hand writing on coloured paper and cut them out in squares. Didn't they looked liked stickers. I've also included some thumb prints here as part of the layout. (It's a waste to throw them away)

San Francisco - Tulip Garden

Noticed how we photographed the tulips from different angles in this layout. I've cut out some alphabets from magazines and articles to form the title of the page. (Be careful of the colour coordination). This is a flip open page where more journalling and photographs can be displayed on the opposite side.

San Francisco - Dutch Windmill

Have you tried making your photographs into postcards? Here, I've faked the postcard looked on the photograph by free hand journalling on it. Be dare enough to journal right across your photographs will give it a different looked.

San Fancisco - Japanese Tea Garden

I would liked to have an Asian looked for this layout therefore I've used a bamboo photographed background paper. To give it more Asian feel, I've stamped alphabets on chinese newspaper and cut them out to mat them. I've even made a pocket out of crate board to keep my journalling. Using red threads or strings are good ways to add on to the Asian theme.

San Francisco - Golden Gate Park

I've tried on several techniques here. I've distressed the photographs not using softwares but sand papers and ink. I've sanded the edges of some photographs and black inked the edges of the others. The inked and sanded photographs gave a focus effect.

San Francisco - Chinatown

This page is about our visit to Chinatown. The ancient architectural structures are very stunning which inspired me to use this sort of chinese looked (fabric to make "cheong sam") background paper for this layout. This paper is from http://www.paperpizazz.com

San Fancisco - Palace of Fine Arts

I'm glad that we made a trip to the Palace of Fine Arts. It is so beautiful that it could take your breath away. The greenery there inspired me to use a green colour background for this layout. Do you know that you could also distress your ribbons. I've distressed a beige ribbon using some permanent ink to match the ageing roman looked photographs in this layout. Don't throw away your sample squares of your patterned papers. Simple stamped it and make it into tags.

San Francisco - Pier 39

This is a two page layout of your trip to Pier 39 and the Golden Gate Bridge. This is a very simple design. I've created a top loading pocket with a circle window in the front to keep all the postcards that we had bought during our trip there. I believed most of us buy a lot of postcards when we go travelling. Why not display them in your layout.

Summary of Disneyland & Disney California Adventure

This is a layout about the summary of Disneyland and Disney California Adventure. Every time, when we visited a park, we normally get a copy of the route map. It is such a waste to throw it away. It is so informative. Therefore, for this layout, I've made a side inserting pocket to keep the route map. I've even use d the tickets to embellish the page.

Disney Downtown

This is a layout on the photographs taken at Disney Downtown. I've made this paper flower by just cutting it out, scoring it and dusting it with chalk.

Brother Bear

I've used some natural earth tones for this page on the movie "Brother Bear". Some fake stitching are done here using some acid free pens.

A bug's Life

This page is about characters in the movie "A bug's Life" The thought of window views just came to my mind at that time. Therefore, I've created fake windows using some sample squares of photographed papers and a little sewing.

Disney characters

In this layout, I've divided the page into three to display the three different characters. Paper piecing came in handy here.

Disney California Adventure

This is a layout about our visit to Disney California Adventure. I wanted to make a picture pile layout for this page therefore, I've used the folding method to make a board for inserting photographs and arrange them in pile.