Meet The Design Team!

Good morning!

Fall is upon us, I think... well at least the calendar says it's late October.  I think Mother Nature is enjoying some time off in the South where it's still warm and sharing it with us before Ol' man Winter starts his nonsense!!

We put out a Design Team Call earlier and the response was overwhelming!!  I'm always so honored with the response to each call.  There is such amazing talent in this scrapbooking world and it makes me all warm inside to think that so many of you want to share your talent with us!  I'm truly blessed!

So without further adieu, meet our next Design Team!

Aurélie Cormier

Beatrice Lawson

Brenda Caldow

Cécile Lavoie

Cheryl Kosakura

Christine Perez

Christine Santos

Diana Poirier

Elisa Delora

Fernande Brideau

Gisèle Julien

Heather Robertson

Isabelle Elliott

Janice Yue

Jocelyne Roy

Kelly Carroll

Majo Wybranietz

Nadine Carlier

Shirley Mascarina

Help us welcome the following Guest Designers to our team!

Brianna Marshall

Lynn Lefebvre

Sabina Galfre

Joining in with our Design Team are these amazingly talented Sketch Designers!  I'm so very excited to welcome them to our Team as well!  

Laura Whitaker

Emma Stafrace

Shirley Mascarina

Pagemaps

Isabelle P. Doucette

Who's excited to see what all these talented ladies will create?  Me! Me! Me!  Join us on November 8th with the first reveal! 

Happy scrapping!

Meet The Team - Part 3

Happy Friday!

Today, we are sharing another set of talented designers with you.  They are super excited and eager to get going!  Help us welcome them! 

Jocelyne Roy

My name is Jocelyne and I'm a scrapaholic... I'm also Maman to two beautiful, very intelligent daughters and wife to the love of my life and best friend. I am biology by trade but decided to put my career on hold in order stay at home with my girls.  My scrapbooking addiction started about 9 years ago when my mom introduced me to it not long after my first daughter was born. At first it was an excuse to get me out of the house and occupy my time when I was on maternity leave but it quickly turned into my sanity saver. I'm never as calm as when I'm cutting paper, stamping, and gluing pictures and pretty embellishments to layouts. I love the social aspect of it too and love all the friends I made in the scrapbooking community. But most of all, I love how my girls get to flip through the scrapbooks I made over the years and know the stories behind the pictures.

Kelly Carroll

Hi, my name is Kelly Carroll and I was born and raised in Miramichi, NB.  I am happily married to my best friend, Joe and we have 2 boys, Aaden and Jarett who keep me on my toes.  I started scrapbooking nearly 10 years ago and immediately fell in love.  I was hooked ever since a co-worker introduced me to classes at a local scrapbooking store and never looked back.  I joined LCOM just over 2 years ago and this opened my eyes to a whole new side of scrapbooking.  My love for the craft has never been stronger and I take every opportunity to attend crops in and out of town!

Lucinda Davidson

My name is Lucinda Davidson and I am a wife and mother of two daughters and to our new fur baby puppy (Buddy).  I have been Scrapbooking for about fifteen years starting with pictures of the children 

I babysat, then I went on to do my wedding album and now I scrapbook everything in my kids/family life.

I work part time at Michael's and have recently taken on their paper

crafting Instructor classes that I am so excited to teach.

Sher Brown

My name is Sher. I live with my husband and 2 sons in the wacky weather state of Michigan. I'm 42, and have been a housewife for the whole 24 years that I have been married. I spend my time making cards, and scrapbooking when my family is away at work, or off to college. I don't have a particular style, I really like to change it up. If I had to describe my cards I would say most of them are clean and simple, nothing too fancy.  I love to sit and color with my markers cutesy designs mostly.  I'm just now starting to play with Prismacolor pencils and getting into airbrushing too. I enjoy playing with different techniques and hopefully I will be able to share them and inspire you too. Don't be fooled though, I'm ready to learn from you also, so bring it on!  Let's inspire each other. 

Shirl Tait

Hi My name is Shirley Tait and I live in sunny Queensland, Australia with my wonderfully supportive hubby of nearly 20 years and my gorgeous children aged 16, 13 & 11 years.  I started card making and scrapbooking a decade ago when a friend held a party for a crafty company and I haven't looked back.  At the time we were living in a small country town & there were no scrapbooking stores close by so I consider myself to be self taught with no particular style.  Whilst I do like lumpy bumpy pages when both making cards & layouts I also like simple, clear cut lines as well.  I am hopelessly addicted to all things involving bling or glitz as well as flowers and I also have a small fascination with Magnolia stamps.  I love spending as much time as I can in my craft room creating and whilst my main loves are definitely card making & scrapbooking I have dabbled in ATC's and do enjoy making the occasional OTP as well.  I am tickled pink to be joining the  wonderfully talented ladies at LCOM again for another term.

Shirley Mijares Mascarina

Hello everyone, my name is Shirley Mijares Mascarina, some people know me as Probyte. Probyte is my username when I created my profile lab account back at University and I stick with it until now. I am Filipino and base now in British Columbia, Canada. Caregiver during the day and scrapper at night. Arts and Crafts have been my passion since I was a kid and finally join the world of scrapbooking in May 2012. I like to try everything, but I feel empty without textures and inks. I love playing with sketches and doing challenges.  They are a great source of creativity and offer so many possibilities you can ever imagine. To see more of my work, please feel free to visit my blog - www.mascarinashirley.blogspot.ca

Join me in welcome these talented ladies to the team!!

Happy scrapping!

Meet The Team - Part 2

Good Thursday morning to you all!

Another gorgeous day here in the Maritimes!  It's perfect weather to introduce more amazing, talented ladies from our Design Team!

Help me give a warm welcome to the following gals!

Cécile Lavoie

I am from Dieppe, New Brunswick, Canada and my husband, Serge and I, are the proud parents of our 17-year old son, Patrick. He is graduating from high school this year, which means more pictures to scrapbook.  I always needed to have a crafty hobby to relax after my regular days at work. I started knitting in my 20’s and then I made jewellery later on. In 2006, on the eve of my wedding, I discovered the beautiful art you could do with a bit of paper, glue and ink. I sold all my jewellery stuff and bought a Cricut right after the wedding so I could make a “nice” wedding album. I was hooked.  As I have quite a good collection of stamps, they are my “go to” tools when making cards. I also love to use ink and glitter on my cards. The creation process is a definitely my stress reliever but I also like the social aspect of this beautiful craft.

Diana Poirier

Hello! My name is Diana Poirier and I'm absolutely thrilled to be a part of LCOM Layout design team! I love paper, design, tidy spaces, scrapbooking, chocolate, bright colours, did I say scrapbooking?? LOL!!, my girlfriends, flowers, reading, writing, but most of all my husband, son and puppy and the wonderful life we have together! I've been scrapbooking now for 10 years and absolutely love how it makes me feel! My style - bright and clean! 

Elisa Delora

I'm the happily married Mom of 3 boys who fell in love with scrapping after my first son was born.  I've always been kind of artistic, but creativity was put on the back-burner while I was studying sciences.  Scrapping was introduced to me by my friend Marielle and has been a passion ever since.  I've never been much of a cardmaker, but there's always time to start.  My layouts are mostly boyish, colorful and bright and loud, like my boys!!  I love buttons, sewing and texture and I love hanging out online and at crops with kindred scrappy friends!  Other hobbies include running and cycling, mostly to stay in shape so the boys don't clobber and/or outrun this Mom!

Fernande Brideau

I live on the Acadian Peninsula in New Brunswick, Canada. I've been married to my very best friend for 28 years. We have a 23 years old daughter, Danika, a 19 years old son, Jérémie. We now have a wonderful four months old addition to the family: our lovely grandson, Tony.  I started scrapbooking six years ago and I have been hooked ever since. Scrapbooking is a therapy where I can really “escape” from the daily grind and relax. My style is mostly vintage. I start imagining the endless possibilities with any scrapbooking paper, embellishment or anything else I see that is “scrapbookable”. 

Gisèle Julien

Gisèle Julien taught in New Brunswick for 32 years and has been retired since June 2007.As her 1st trip after retirement, she took a scrapbooking cruise to the Caribbean. Scrapbooking has taken over her passion to create and to preserve family memories. It has been a big part of who she is since 2005 when this craft was introduce to her by a colleague. She has always been involved in crafts of some kind so this has fed her creativity.

Isabelle Elliott

I have always been crafty.  Ever since I can remember.  I have dabbled in all kinds of crafts, may it be painting ceramics way back when with my mom, woodworking, crocheting, sewing, quilting, cross-stitching, watercolouring... actually, name a sort of craft, and I've probably tried it!  And having done so many crafts throughout the years, I should have known that I soon as I scrapbooked for the first time, I would add it onto my list of crafty hobbies - but I honestly thought that I would make a gift and a few handmade cards and that would be it - HA!  For a good three years now, I have been papercrafting in some sort of way.  I have fallen in love in capturing life's event with mini albums, browsing through Pinterest for the ideas, and scrapping with friends I have made along the way.  I also enjoy to listen to e-books while crocheting.  I live in Moncton, NB, with my husband, our thirteen-year old son and our two dogs, Dougie and Lily.

Join us tomorrow as we share more Design Team Members with you!

Happy Scrapping!

Meet The Team - Part 1

Good Morning and Happy Wednesday!

It's the middle of the week and it's starting to feel like Spring!  This time of year sure makes me happy!  You know what else makes me happy?  Our new design team!!  Let's get to know a few new talented ladies and some very familiar ladies, shall we?

Alicia Hill

Hi, my name is Alicia Hill. I am from Puerto Rico, but I live in Douglasville, Georgia. I am a mother of 2 and I have loved card making since I was a teenager. I love everything about papercrafting. I love to draw and love coloring. I practice yoga and love music. 

Ashley Hamm

I started scrapbooking when I was 16.  In July, I'll turn 30.  This hobby of mine has led me to many new people and places.  I've been part of the LCOM team since December 2012 and I just love this little community!  I'm so grateful to Isabelle for this opportunity.  My real job is a registered nurse and this year marks my seven year anniversary.  My other hobbies are reading and running.  My boyfriend is an attorney and we rescued a black Lab, Bentley, who keeps our hands full.  I also recently just bought my first house so there are plenty of projects filling up my "spare time" these days!  

Aurélie Cormier

I originally hail from Cheticamp, a beautiful Acadian village right on the Cabot Trail in Cape Breton, NS. Studying in Moncton, I quickly fell in love with NB and have been a permanent resident since 2005. I now reside in Dieppe with my husband, Mathieu, our five-year old son, Louis-Olivier, our newborn, Éloïse, and our cat, Caillou. Since 2007, I am a public servant by day and a full-fledged scrapper by night. Scrapbooking has become an integral part of my life. I try doing something scrapbook-related every day, may it be working on a layout, browsing through online galleries or reading scrapbook magazines. Published in a few editions of Canadian Scrapbooker and most recently in France's own Histoires de Pages, my style has been known to be called "rustic", which is fine by me as it enables me to relish in fattening things up with dimension, tearing and texture. Other than scrapbooking, I have recently rekindled a romance with reading through a monthly book club I joined at work in February 2012. I also tutor, teach voice classes and sing most weekends at a few church services around the area.

Beatrice Lawson

My wonderful, supportive husband encourages my passion for crafting, and our son is the apple of my eye and my main source of inspiration. After our lives were derailed by my chronic illness, I fell in love with the beautiful papers and accessories that allowed me to escape reality. I have been blessed to meet lovely scrappers near and far, and documenting happy moments saved both my sanity and sense of humor. Now I cannot imagine a day without scrapping! 

Brenda Caldow

Hello my name is Brenda and I'm a married mum with two lovely boys who manage to keep my life very busy and happy. We live in country Victoria, Australia and run a beef cattle and cropping farm. I also drive buses but mainly now just for our local primary school. Scrapping, card making and Off the page are my passion and my boys, family and friends are my inspiration. My other passion is taking photo’s. When I leave the house so does my camera. Since my boys are now 10 and 11, I replaced the nappy bag with the camera bag and all its extras.

Brianna Marshall

Hello, My name is Brianna Marshall. I am so happy to be joining the team, making new friends, and sharing new perspectives. I am married to my high school sweetheart going on 10 years. Mommy to three sweet little girls, and one furry dog, Chester Blu. I am a lover of Starbucks, music, hot baths, photography, being barefoot, and of course paper and glue sticks.

Join us tomorrow as we introduce more of our talented team!

Happy scrapping!

Design Team Reveal

Good morning!

We are so excited to share with you today an amazing and talented group of ladies!  The response to our call was superb.  It wasn't easy choosing from such a pool of talented scrapbookers!

Please help us welcome, returning and new members to the team!

Alicia Hill

Ashley Hamm

Aurélie Cormier

Beatrice Lawson

Brenda Caldow

Brianna Marshall

Cécile Lavoie

Diana Poirier

Elisa Delora

Fernande Brideau

Gisèle Julien

Isabelle Elliott

Jocelyne Roy

Kelly Carroll

Lucinda Davidson

Sher Brown

Shirl Tait

Shirley Mascarina

We have an amazing team and they are so excited to share with you they're love of scrapbooking in the next months to come!

Join us all this week as we share with you a little bit about each of them!

Happy scrapping!

Inspiration Station: Carta Bella!

Hello everyone! I'm back with an inspiration post today featuring Carta Bella's So Noted patterned papers and sticker sheet. If you're unfamiliar with these papers, you can view them in the store HERE. The specific pattern papers I used are: Dear Jane, Script & Scribbles, Note Cards, and Always You.

Here were my inspiration pieces:

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I especially loved the Jimmy  Buffett quote (even though there is no doubt about Heaven for me). In the second inspiration piece, what I really liked was the splash of orange at the top and the bottom. So with those pieces, are you ready to see what I came up with?

If you're unfamiliar with these Carta Bella papers, they are thick and textured. You can view larger photos of the patterns on the Carta Bella website HERE. I also have a couple of close up shots so you can see the layers, patterns, and stickers.

I hope you can find some inspiration in my pieces this week. Hope to see you share your work in the LCOM gallery. For more details about my page, be sure to stop by my blog today.

Product Shuffle: mixing alphabet fonts in your title

Today we're going to talk about mixing alphabet fonts for your title. If you're like me, you probably have tons of alphabet sticker sheets. Mixing fonts on your page is a great way to use up your stash! You can combine different colors, different fonts, big letters, small letters... the possibilities are endless. Combining different alphabet stickers can add a lot of character to your page and help put emphasis on certain words.

Here's a new page I created for you:

I used three different alphabet sticker sets on this page: EK Success (small white), American Crafts (grey), and Amy Tangerine (Thickers). Maybe you don't feel comfortable mixing so many sizes and colors just quite yet. That's ok! Here's one I did a little while back using two colors and two different fonts.

Making a quick trip through the LCOM Gallery, I found some other examples of how members have mixed alphabets. Here's one by Gisele. She used three different fonts and three different colors.

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One from Probyte. I like the script font combined with the more bold font. Both colors in her title match her layout perfectly.

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And one more from Isabelle. She incorporated a sticker into her title + two other fonts in two colors.

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Browse through the gallery and find your own inspiration! Use these examples as a starting point. We hope we've given you a creative push to dig into your stash and use up some of those alpha stickers!

Inspiration Station

Hi guys! I'm back this month with a second inspiration station! This time I found a layout by the great Janna Werner in the Elle's Studio gallery. I loved the white space on her page. Here it is:

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I used the Serendipity collection from Elle's Studio. THIS is the patterned paper I chose. It's flipped on its side and trimmed to 8.5x11 size. I also had the Serendipity circle tags and tabs. Even though I chose to scrap my page in a smaller size, I still kept the design pretty similar to Janna's original.

The cut outs at the bottom of my page are also from Elle's Studio. They're from the Saltwater cut out sheet. You can see I've layered the Serendipity tabs and circle tag behind my photo. I added strips of washi tape to the top and bottom of the page and cork heart stickers and enamel dots to finish the page. You can view my blog for the story behind my page; this is an Instagram shot from last year taken on a trail run near our home.

Hopefully you find inspiration from my post today. Please share your creations in the LCOM gallery!

Inspiration Station

Happy Monday ladies! I have the first March Inspiration Monday post.

While shopping online, I came across this photo and I was really drawn to the blue and white contrast + the metallic purse. Such a pretty shade of blue - it reminded me of the ocean. Which was great because I was just vacationing in the Bahamas!

I thought I would try for a blue/white/gold color scheme on my layout. Since it's another vacation photo, I added in some accent colors that are colorful and fun (pink and yellow).

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Isabelle had me use the Elle's Studio Serendipity line + the Crate Paper DIY line and these two collections go together really well! Plus I am a huge fan of anything Elle's Studio.

The flower pattern on THIS paper from the Serendipity collection is something I would never use but that blue/white B side is great for my inspiration photo. I also had the Serendipity circle tags and the Serendipity Large & Medium journal tags. I layered these on my page.

My embellishments are from the Crate Paper DIY Shop layered stickers + accent stickers. I did think these embellishments coordinated quite well for the most part but I wanted the gold tags to match a little better. I just removed the top sticker from the tag and replaced it with a different accent sticker. I also wanted to use the blue flower from the flower cluster so I just cut it and used it alone on my page. Enough talking... Here's my page:

I hope you've been inspired by this photo and use it to create a project. I'd love it if you uploaded to our LCOM gallery and linked it in the comments here on this post so I can see it!

Thanks so much for stopping by today and for more details about  my page, visit my blog!

Product Shuffle: Altered Journal Tags!

Hey guys!! Today I've got my altered journal tag project to share for our product shuffle. I got the Elle's Studio You and Me note tags and large journaling tags. These little tags are the cutest things ever! Love them.

So I had a few projects in mind for these babies. First, I don't do project life or pocket style scrapbooking but I knew these would be so cute for that kind of thing (if you're into that kind of thing). BUT I do sometimes use these little journal cards and tags on my regular scrapbook pages. So that was another idea. Lastly, I thought about making a little mini album with some journaling on the back and maybe a couple of photos. Since these all seemed like such excellent ideas, I never got around to completing ANY of them because I'm kind of waiting to be inspired by one of the projects specifically. So we'll see what happens there.

At any rate, I did alter the tags and I think they're really cute. Here are four that I designed:

You could use literally ANYTHING from your stash to alter your cards. I used stamps, wood veneers, die cuts, washi tape, and candy dots.

If you were into pocket style scrapbooking, here's an idea of how they could work for that:

 

I'd love to see your ideas and how you alter your own journal tags and cards. Please upload them to the LCOM gallery! Hope you enjoyed today's Product Shuffle and I'll see you soon!

Meet the new Sketch Design Team!

Hello!

Today you get to meet the new and not so new team members!!  I'm excited about this term!  We have some fabulous ladies on the team and I can't wait for them to share all their beautiful creations with you every Saturday!!

Please help me welcome them!

Ashley Hamm

I'm Ashley and I've been scrapbooking since I was 16. I've met some awesome people in the scrapbooking community and I'm grateful to have the opportunity to work with the LCOM group! Over the years I've been blessed to have my work published in print and online. Aside of crafting, my other hobbies are reading and jogging. My boyfriend and I adopted a black Lab, Bentley, who is about 2.5 years old and he also keeps us busy. I've been a registered nurse for five years and I'm lucky to be able to work (mostly) part time. I want to thank Isabelle for this opportunity and I can't wait to meet all of you! 

Gisèle Julien

Gisèle Julien taught in New Brunswick for 32 years and has been retired since June 2007.As her 1st trip after retirement, she took a scrapbooking cruise to the Caribbean. Scrapbooking has taken over her passion to create and to preserve family memories. It has been a big part of who she is since 2005 when this craft was introduce to her by a colleague. She has always been involved in crafts of some kind so this has fed her creativity.

Jocelyne Roy

 My name is Jocelyne and I'm a scrapaholic... I'm also Maman to two beautiful, very intelligent daughters and wife to the love of my life and best friend. I am biology by trade but decided to put my career on hold in order stay at home with my girls.  My scrapbooking addiction started about 9 years ago when my mom introduced me to it not long after my first daughter was born. At first it was an excuse to get me out of the house and occupy my time when I was on maternity leave but it quickly turned into my sanity saver. I'm never as calm as when I'm cutting paper, stamping, and gluing pictures and pretty embellishments to layouts. I love the social aspect of it too and love all the friends I made in the scrapbooking community. But most of all, I love how my girls get to flip through the scrapbooks I made over the years and know the stories behind the pictures.

Shirley Mijares Mascarina

Greetings everyone, I’m Shirley Mijares Mascarina (a.k.a. Probyte) from Philippines but currently based in British Columbia, Canada as a caregiver. Scrapbooking is one of my childhood passions. Remember all the good old tricks: paper tearing, stamping with flowers and vegetables, dried leaves, clips from magazines and newspapers for embellishments? Those are some of my faves when I was a kid and even now. But all these things was put on hold when I worked overseas, for over 10 years. When I moved to Canada last year, I found my first love again! I have no particular scrapping style. I love to try everything from paper to fibers, pens to paints, traditional to contemporary, trash to treasure. But my page is not complete without any of these three - spray ink, ink pads and paints. To be featured and be on spotlight in different clubs and sites is a blessing but to be on print is something. One of my page was published in the Canadian Scrapbooker Winter Issue 2012 and in their upcoming Fall 2013 Issue. I am so excited and grateful to be part of this team. I can’t wait to share my works with you, to give inspiration and be inspired by you. To know more about me, please feel free to visit my blog. Thank you and see you around!

Shirley Tait

Hi My name is Shirley Tait and I live in sunny Queensland, Australia with my wonderfully supportive hubby of nearly 20 years and my gorgeous children aged 16, 13 & 11 years.  I started card making and scrapbooking a decade ago when a friend held a party for a crafty company and I haven't looked back.  At the time we were living in a small country town & there were no scrapbooking stores close by so I consider myself to be self taught with no particular style.  Whilst I do like lumpy bumpy pages when both making cards & layouts I also like simple, clear cut lines as well.  I am hopelessly addicted to all things involving bling or glitz as well as flowers and I also have a small fascination with Magnolia stamps.  I love spending as much time as I can in my craft room creating and whilst my main loves are definitely card making & scrapbooking I have dabbled in ATC's and do enjoy making the occasional OTP as well.  I am tickled pink to be joining the  wonderfully talented ladies at LCOM again for another term.

Tarah Demerchant

I have scrapbooked for over 8 years; which corresponds with when I got married (We have been together 18 years total).  I started in order to do our wedding book but still haven't gotten around to it...lol.  I have a much better focal point now....our 4 year old who surprises me with new and sassy things daily. Within the last couple of years I have lost sight in my right eye and partial in my left.  I have recently decided to do some design team work as I have not done any in a very long time.  Presently,  I am also focusing on challenges for Maritime Craft Challenges.  I am a guest designer for Beccy's Place and Chichi Memories.  I am a Design
Team Member for Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge and now, LCOM!!  I look forward to learning loads from the talent here at LCOM :) 

Thank you ladies!!  You'll find these fabulous ladies design work first thing in September!! 

Happy Monday!