Hello one and all. I just want to give out an apology to everyone for not keeping things up to date here. I also just want to let you all know that scrapstars is taking a break for now. Hope to be back in the future. Once again Scrapstars apologies.

I would like to thank everyone who participated in our sketch challenge last month.  It was so hard for us to vote on a winner because all of your layouts were so fabulous!!  We had to decide on a winner though, so the winner is…

Ari!  Here is her awesome layout!:

You win this fun fun scrap stuff

Ari, please email me with your mailing info at jily122684@gmail.com so I can send you your prizes asap!

Here are some of our absolute favs this month!!

Vicki:

Brittany:

Mica:

Tracy:

Thank you so much girls, we loved your layouts too!

Hello everyone!  We are so sorry that we did not get our winners up for both of these challenges sooner.  We all voted and actually ended up with a TIE for challenge #10 and had to vote again! :)  We loved EVERYONE’s creations and like always, it was so hard to pick a winner.  Congratulations to the winners and thank you to everyone else who participated, you are all so talented!!
The Winner of Challenge #9 is…

Sasha with this fabulous layout based off of our Christmas sketch!

Sasha you will win a wonderful prize pack from Lydia full of Maya Road embellishments and other goodies!

The Winner of Challenge #10 is…

Heather with this amazing altered framed canvas!

You win this amazing tote handpainted by Melonie.  She’s also included some goodies inside of it for you as well!

Girls, please email me your mailing info at jilly122684@gmail.com and we will get those prizes in the mail to you!

Congratulations again!  We are currently adding up votes for our sketch challenge and card challenge.  We will announce the winners soon!  I will be back tomorrow to post Challenge #12!

Hello Everyone! It is time for our new Song lyrics card challenge this month! We challenge you to make a card using lyrics or a title from a song to create your card title. There are so many possibilities out there it is practically endless! Our design time has created a few cards for your inspiration. We went with a valentines/love theme this month because it is the perfect time of year to start working on those Valentines Day cards. You are not obligated to make a Valentines Day card for this challenge, it’s just an idea!

Sarah:

Song: “Better Together” by Jack Johnson

Jill:

Song: “Little Thing Called Love” by The Darkness (hehe!)

Marix:

Lydia:

Song: Mi Amor by Color Me Badd

Bekka:

The winner of this challenge will win this cute owl stuffie:

Isn’t it precious?? Each card that you make and link up to the comments in this blog post will put you in the drawing for this one. The deadline for this challenge is the 31st of January at midnight no matter what time zone you are in. We will use a random number generator to draw a winner!

Thank you so much all, we can’t wait to see your cards!

Hi Everyone! Happy New Year from all of us at Scrapstars! I know it’s a little belated, but we thought it would be the perfect time to welcome in the new year to you all. Now that all the holiday bustle has wound down and we are all settling in to our normal routine again, it is the perfect time to record our 2009 New Years resolutions and really concentrate on keeping them! I haven’t always had luck keeping my resolutions, especially when I make resolutions like “I will not eat any more sugar” or “I will lose 20 pounds”, lol! The ones I made for myself this year are a little more easy to keep, yet I think they are really important resolutions that I am determined to keep! It really helped me to write them down on a list and then create a layout about it. This way I can look back on it all year to motivate myself to stick with my resolutions.

Our challenge to you this week is to use this sketch that I have created and make a layout with the theme “My 2009 New Years Resolutions”. Be as creative as you like! We cannot wait to see all of your resolutions and fun layouts!

The winner will win the entire collection of Tinkering Ink’s “Becoming Green” paper collection (all papers are made of 100% recycled paper), along with a set of coordinating handmade buttons made by my friend Babydoll! You can see all of her pretty buttons at her Etsy store!

Here is the sketch:

Here are the layouts that our talented design team has created for your inspiration!:

Jill:

Julie:

Melonie:

Roberta:

Sarah:

Lydia:

The deadline for this challenge is Jan. 25th, at midnight, no matter what time zone you’re in. We will announce the winner on Jan. 28th! Thank you so much everyone! We will be announcing our Challenge #9 and #10 winner in a few days, our apologies for not announcing it sooner! I will be sending the winners a fabulous prize pack, full of NEW scrapbook stuff! Please stay tuned for a *new* Scrapstars layout on the site, along with our Song lyric card challenge on Jan. 20th!

Hello everyone. I hope you all had a fabulous time ringing in the new year. Can you believe its already 2009?! I cant, but its here.

Well this time around for the B.L.F I want to bring you to think outside the box. I know we all have used non-scrappy things on our layouts,alter items, and etc. I also know, that some of us when we started out in scrapping way back in the days…you know before our passion became so popular! We all cut out letters, pictures, numbers, clothes, and etc from magazines.  Im guilty as charge on that one, BUT you will NEVER see any of those . Well with that fresh in mind I give you all something to think about next time you pull out some of your scrappy stuff and non-scrappy stuff. I did a layout awhile back with an ad from Sassafras. This was before I realize they were calling for everyone to come up with something from there ad.  When I saw it I couldnt pass up on useing the ad. So next time you see something in a magazine, regardless of the magazine use it in a layout or any other project. You might be surprise with how it turns out. I know I was! So I leave you with my finished layout.

So what are you waitting for? Start looking through those magazine you have laying around. I know you have some, cause I can see them ! HAHAHA

Hello All!  Our new challenge for you is to make your own home made christmas presents!  With the economy that way it has been I think this is the perfect year to make your loved ones home made presents from the heart.  It saves money AND who wouldn’t want a beautiful home made present?  I know I love getting handmade gifts better than anything else!

Please share your home made gifts with us!  Just link them up to us in the comments section of this post.  Melonie is giving away the prize to the winner this time around, check out the home made tote bag she made for her daughter this year!

She made an extra one that she is generously giving away to the winner of this challenge.  It is chock full of scrapbook and art goodies, you definitely won’t be disappointed with this one!

Here are the rest of the Design Team’s creations:

Lydia:

Bekka:

Christy:

Julie:

Melonie:

Shannon:

Shaunna:

Mollie:

Merry Christmas to everyone!!  I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season.  We will be back SOON to announce the Challenge #9 winner.  There were so many wonderful entries, we cannot wait to announce our winner!  Entries are due at Midnight on December 30th in case you don’t want to share before Christmas!

sorry it took me so long to get this up for you ladies — i know some may be discouraged by the fact that it took forever to decide on a winner — i won’t lie, i have been extremely sidetracked throughout the week, with preparations for Christmas…. working on my stuff for the next challenge…. and my son’s 8th birthday on Sunday….. i REALLY didn’t mean for this to go by the wayside but it did

Boooo on me.  If it wasn’t for Jill reminding me, i would almost have totally forgotten.  at any rate…. i used the random number generator over at psychicscience.org to pull a winner for us… and it picked……..

COMMENTER #24 — TIMI !!! !!! !!!

this page is so pretty — i am amazed at the flowers & all the different aspects Timi used to make this page beautiful & reflective upon her daughter and all her sweet nicknames!!

as a reward for all her hard work, i am going to give Timi a gift certificate for Scrap Attack Scrapbooking!!  Timi, if you will please send me your email address to shaunna@scrapstars.net, i will GLADLY get you the certificate ASAP!!!

thanks a bunch to everyone who came out and participated, we really REALLY enjoyed having so many participants for challenge #8!!!  there were so many amazing entries

we hope you’ll come back to check out what we have coming up for our “Holiday” challenge & keep coming back to check out what we have in mind for the New Year!!   keep scrappin’ ladies!!!!

Hello ladies! I’m back again with another great feature to show and share with you all. This time around I have decided to take a different route. Instead of showing/sharing with you all some amazing work. I wanted bring you all a fabulous photographer who has some amazing work. Like most of us we love to snap those photos of our little ones, pets, spouses/better half, and everything in between. Sometimes I love the photos I get and sometimes I hate the photos, but know deep down inside they could have been better.  So if you are like me, I google photography to try and learn and get tips on what I can do to improve what I want my photos to look like.  Well without further ado I like to introduce you all to Heather. She is one photographer who I love to study her work and get some amazing tips from to improve my photos. I had the opportunityto ask her a few questions to help me out this Christmas Holiday to capture some great photos. Here are my questions and her reply.

My questions:

Well my 2 questions for now will be based on group photos. Answer all questions based on what you have encounter. If havent encounter, please give any info on what you would try out.

1. For a group family photo of 8 or more. What is the best way to place them?
2. How would you place them if taking a smaller group of each family,siblings, cousins, and etc.?

Heather’s Reply:

I hope these answer your questions!

For a large family group, I usually place the parents and/or grandparents
in the middle, and then build the other people around them.  It’s good to
have varying “levels” so that it’s not just a straight row of people.
Also, be aware of “totem pole” heads.  With the people that are standing,
have them put their weight on one foot so that it relaxes them and they
don’t look like toy soldiers.  With the people that are sitting, have them
roll forward slightly because it’s a bit more slimming.  Watch for hand
placement.  I prefer to usually not have arms around people because then
you get random fingers poking out in funny places, so I have people “hide”
their arms around one another, but without hands/fingers showing.

The same basic principles apply to smaller groups.  Of course with every
rule there are always exceptions, and occasions when rules are meant to be
broken! 

And an example of a large group:  http://heathertaylorphoto.com/blog/?p=232

Heather

Thanks again Heather for given us all some great tips and wonderful photos to look at and get that awesome visual!

So I hope she has inspired you all to take that chance to take some fabulous photo this Christmas Day and everyday to make our layouts and just everyday photos awesome!

Hello Everyone! I am so excited to present to you our next challenge, our Christmas Wish List challenge!! The subject of your layout must be your christmas wish list this year, or if you don’t want to scrapbook yourself it can be a friend or family member’s wishlist. It’s just the perfect time of year to be writing out your wishlist for Santa, and what would be better than documenting it in a scrapbook layout? Another guideline for this challenge is to follow this new sketch, made by me!:

Here are our DT member’s examples!:

Shannon:

Sarah:

Lydia:

Julie:

Jill:

Bekka:

Mollie:

Roberta:

The deadline for this challenge is Dec. 10th, by midnight no matter where you live! We will announce the winner on Dec. 13th. Thank you! If you have any questions please leave us a comment, we’ll be happy to help. I hope you have fun with this one, I cannot wait to see your layouts! Merry Christmas!

P.S. We will be posting our Challenge #8 winner SOON! Shaunna is using a random number generator to choose a winner!