Gabrielle Pollacco : MajaDesign

“Play” ~ Having Some Fun with Maja!

12 February, 2014 - Collections, Created Art, Layouts, Vintage Autumn Basics, Vintage Spring Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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Hi everyone! It’s me Gabrielle here with you today to share with you my latest project using Vintage Spring Basics collection mixed in with a little bit of Vintage Summer and Autumn Basics. I began by first using a Martha Stewart edge/corner punch on the edges of a neutral paper from the Vintage Summer Basics collection (1899). I then did a little inking with some Donna Salazar Distress Ink (Denim) and used a Heidi Swapp stencil and homemade texture paste over the inked areas.

The photo is one of my great nieces that my nephew’s wife Danielle was kind enough to share with me. I wanted to keep the design light and airy and playful like the photo of Jade and at the same time play up the blues in the photo.

To make the floral design I used some Dusty Attic chipboard (Spider Crysanthemum and Flower Buds), painted white and tinted with some blue and green chalk inks (Versa Magic Inks). I punched tiny blooms using a floral punch (Martha Stewart Hydrangea punch) on some cardstock and the left over strips of paper from the background (tinted blue at the edges, ). The butterfly is from Tattered Angels, Nature Glimmer Glass (I’m trying to use up bits of old stash with each layout I create).

I just love the little strips at the bottoms of the paper collections (not even sure what it says, LOL) but I love the pretty design element they add to a page!

For some reason I really love the way burlap looks with the blues in this collection. In keeping with the neutral accents, I chose a Prima flower in a natural fabric and added some smaller blooms in blue from Petaloo (Darjeeling collection…Love these blooms, I think they are a perfect match for the blues in the Maja collections). And I also used some more clock cut-outs from the Vintage Autumn Basics (I just love this paper for embellishing my layouts, the clocks seem to add a nice touch to any layout whether masculine or feminine). Here are the Maja Design supplies I used for this project…

Patterned Paper: Vintage Spring Basics (4th of April, 4rth of April-bs, 5th of April), Vintage Summer Basics (1899), Vintage Autumn Basics (XVI)

Thanks so much for stopping by today and checkin’ out my project, hope you all get a chance to get your Maja on this week! xo

A Special Anniversary Card

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

29 January, 2014 - Cards, Collections, Life in the Country, Vintage Frost Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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My Mom and Dads 55th anniversary is coming up in a couple of weeks so I thought I would take the opportunity to make up a special card for them. Ever since I was a little girl my parents would always say it’s the card (rather than the gift) that always meant the most to them, especially if the card was handmade. For them it’s the thoughts written in the card that really mean the most to them and if we made the card it meant all the more to them. For this card I primarily used the newest Maja collection, Vintage Frost Basics (although I also mixed in a bit of some other collections as well).

I went with the soft and pretty pinks and wine colors in this collection. For the extra dark burgundy paper I used a paper from the Vintage Summer Basics collection and for the perfect green for my leafy flourish I used a paper from the Life in the Country collection.

I was going for lots of textures and layers for this card so I used some corrugated card that was in my stash (I think it was the lining for a wine bottle gift). I used the darkest Maja paper from the Vintage Summer Basics collection to matte the whole card and as the backing behind the lattice design, so that I could get maximum contrast. The lattice, doily, leaf flourish and blooms are all Cheery Lynn dies.

I handmade the blooms for this card from simple white cardstock and a Gardenia die from Cheery Lynn Designs. I just lightly tinted the petals with some Tim Holtz ‘Victorian Velvet’ Distress ink and a soft make-up sponge. I used their Fanciful Flourish die with the ‘Summer Fields’ paper from the Life in the Country collection for my vine/flourish. At first I was going to just use some green cardstock for this but couldn’t find the exact color I’d been envisioning. Then I thought to myself…silly me, I should look at the greens in the Maja collections, they are made to match! And sure enough, it was the exact green I was looking for!

Maja Design Products used for this project: Vintage Frost Basics (4th of December, 4th of December-bs, 6th of December), Vintage Summer Basics (1922-bs), Life in the Country (Summer Fields-bs).

I hope my parents will love this card as much as I enjoyed making it! Thanks so much for stopping by today and checking out my Maja Design project! xo

Little Wishes {Combining Collections}

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

15 January, 2014 - Collections, Layouts, Life in the Country, Ska Vi Ta En Fika?, Vintage Autumn Basics, Vintage Spring Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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Hi there, it’s Gabrielle here with you today to share a layout I made combining no less than 5 Maja Design collections! That’s the beauty of Maja Design papers, you can have a variety of collections in your stash and they somehow are able to work so well with each other! For the base of my page I used a polka dot paper from Vintage Spring Basics in a soft buttery yellow (it’s actually the backside of one of my favourite papers!). I then used some green gingham paper from Life in the Country to matte my photos and a pretty green damask paper from Ska vi ta en Fika?, to create my heart design. To embellish I used papers from Vintage Autumn Basics (clocks and roses), Vintage Spring Basics (butterflies) and Vintage Summer Basics (labels). Here are a few close-ups of my page….

To embellish my page I combined some fussy cutting of images from the Maja Design papers (roses, clocks, butterflies) with some die cut designs. I used a clock die and a Celtic Heart die from Cheery Lynn Designs. The heart frame I cut from plain white cardstock and the green brocade center is a Ska vi ta en Fika paper.

I created a broken lattice design for this page by cutting out a Cheery Lynn Lattice 2 die and cutting it randomly on an angle. I used part of the lattice in the top left corner of the layout and the other part behind the photo. I also did a little masking behind the lattice design with some texture paste and a Crafters Workshop stencil (Art is). The flowers were handmade using a flower die strip ‘Sweet Williams’ by Cheery Lynn Designs.

Here is a close-up view of some of the fussy cut elements I used on this page. The clocks from the Vintage Autumn Basics collection have quickly become a favourite design element for me for my scrapbook pages and cards (one page of the clock papers can go a very long way!). The fussy cut roses from the Vintage Autumn Basics may take a little more time to cut but I love the pretty results they give to a page!

Maja Design Papers used in this project:

~ Vintage Spring Basics (1st of March-bs, 6th of May)

~ Life in the Country (Kitchen Garden-bs)

~ Ska vi ta en Fika? (Smulpaj m äpplen-bs)

~ Vintage Autumn Basics (XVI-clocks, XVII-flowers)

~ Vintage Summer Basics (1932)

I have one more project to share with you today. I made this layout for my Dusty Attic design team but I used papers from Vintage Summer Basics and Vintage Spring Basics as a base for this page.

I did a fair bit of inking, stamping and used some Tim Holtz tissue tape to add design elements to this page.

I wanted to go with a water/beach theme for this page so I used some pretty new chipboard from Dusty Attic Designs (Reeds 2), fish netting, shells and gems to embellish. I used a butterfly image from the Vintage Summer Basics collection under a crystal dot to add another fun image caught in the fish net.

Maja Design products used in this project: Vintage Spring Basics (10th of March, 6th of May), Vintage Summer Basics (1943)

Thanks for stopping by today and thanks for all the sweet comments, I read and appreciated them all! xo

Maja Card {Done Quick & Easy}

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

1 January, 2014 - Cards, Collections, Sofiero, Vintage Autumn Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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Hi everyone! Gabrielle here with you today. We just got back from a little mini-vacay visiting my brother and his family at his lake house, so nice to spend a week just relaxing and having fun with family! But I realized I have a post I needed to get done for Maja, speedy-fast! So I thought, what better time of year to show that not all projects done with Maja goodies need to be overly detailed or time consuming. This card came together quick and easy.

I used a scrap of pink paper I had left over from another project from the Sofiero collection as my background, lightly inked and distressed the edges and tore a little ‘V” having some of the rose paper peeking out from behind (I simply used a cut off strip from the title part of the paper for this). I then cut out 2 little ‘postcard’ designs from one fo the Vintage Spring Basics papers and added a clock from a Vintage Autumn Basics paper as an embellishment. Here are the papers I used for this card….

I used these Maja Design products: Sofiero-Enjoying the Fragrance-bs, Vintage Autumn Basics-XVI, Vintage Summer Basics-Memories.

TIP: I like to save the little strips you cut off from the bottoms of the pages to use on cards, they have great little phrases and designs!

So, how long did this card take me? 15 minutes!! Yep, even during the holidays you can get a little scrapping on if you can just cut out a tiny bit of time for yourself! Thanks for stopping by today and I just want to say I’ve so enjoyed being on the Maja Design team for this past year and look forward to sharing lots of new and fun ideas with you all over the next year! xo xo

Memories {Gathered Paper Design}

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

18 December, 2013 - Collections, Layouts, Sofiero, Vintage Autumn Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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Hi everyone, it’s Gabrielle here with you today to share with you my latest project using a variety of the Maja Design collections. For this project I used the pretty pink/burgundy paper called ‘Heritage’ from the Vintage Autumn Basics collection, gathering the paper to create a lush fabric looking design.

Here is a close-up view of the tear out section on the page with the gathered paper design peeking out from behind. I created the gathered paper design by cutting out a long strip of the patterned paper, lightly misting it with water and gathering the paper at the edges to create a soft gather. I used Dusty Attic Design ‘Mini-hinges’ to link the two torn edges together.

Before I began my page I took a little time to do some fussy cutting from some of the patterned papers (Vintage Autumn Basics, No. II (floral designs), No. XVI (clock designs). I added them to the page using foam pop dots to add a more 3D look to them

The photo is one that I took of my youngest daughter Meagan and her cousin (and dear friend, Hailee). Here is a close-up look at the page embellishments.

I created a quick template of the heart shapes that I cut out of the patterned papers to create the heart matting behind the photos. Just right click on the photo above and ‘save picture as’ to your computer. When you print just print it out on a standard 8.5×11 inch sheet of paper. Cut out and trace onto your choice of Maja papers.

Maja Design papers used in this project: Vintage Summer Basics (1946 – Background paper), Vintage Autumn Basics (Heritage – for gathered paper, No. II – for fussy cut roses, No.II-bs – for matting behind photo, No.XVI – clocks), Sofiero (Exuberance of Flowers – smaller heart design).

I hope you enjoyed my project today and feel inspired to try some paper gathering on your next craft project using Maja Design papers! xo