Gabrielle Pollacco : MajaDesign

Kladdkaka ~ A Swedish Treat!

25 September, 2013 - Collections, Crea Diem, Layouts, Ska Vi Ta En Fika?, Vintage Spring Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

Hi everyone, it’s me Gabrielle here with you today! Just a short time ago Maja Design opened up their new Facebook page, and I noticed a lot of chatter about ‘Fika’ and something called Kladdkaka! Well, for those of you who are not Swedish, I should explain that Fika is the Swedish version of a ‘Cafe Clatch’ or tea time, where you enjoy a nice cup of coffee or tea with a lovely desert. After seeing the yummy photo’s of the Swedish cake called Kladdkaka, I looked up the recipe on Pinterest and immediately handed it over to my oldest daughter Chloe who was off school this summer and really enjoying trying out recipies from Pinterest. Well, let me tell you, this cake is DELICIOUS! If you love brownies, you will love the dense rich taste of this Swedish treat! Above is a photo we took of the cake she made (we added a dollop or real whipped cream (has to be the real stuff not that oil based stuff!) and some fresh raspberries). You can find the recipe for the cake at my blog post today at Such a Pretty Mess Blogspot (although I hear that Jenny Grotherus’s recipe for Kladdkaka is even more delicious and decadent….we’ll be trying out her recipe next!…thanks Jenny!!) Here is a photo I took of my daughter with her cake…

Okay, so back to my layout….haha, don’t get me started on topic of food, I can go on for hours! I wanted to use a paper collection that would best reflect the theme of the page so of course I had to go with the ‘Ska vi ta en Fika collection’.

Here are the papers I chose to use from this lovely collection: Ska vi ta en Fika: Kärleksmums – bs, Kaffetåren den bästa är…..but I also chose to mix in a couple other collections as well to bring in pinks for the berries and a clock for ‘tea time’. So I also used Vintage Summer Basics: 1923, and Crea Diem: Den oersättliga tiden, as well as some butterflies from Vintage Spring Basics: 6th of May. Here are some close-ups of the embellishments I used on the page….

The pleated flowers are some Recollections flowers that I found at Michaels and the chipboard flourish is from Dusty Attic (I wanted to keep it shabby chic looking so I painted it white, edged it with brown chalk ink, stamped on random text and finished with a crackle varnish). The natural floral clusters and lace trims are from Tresors De Luxe.

You might wonder how I got the flourishes to go all the way around the edges of the inner page even though the page has been trimmed to show the polka dot paper behind? I fussy cut the bottom and right side flourishes off the page first, then trimmed my page and stuck the flourish edge back onto the cut edges.

Dusty Attic has this cute Mini Cutlery chipboard set that I thought would per a perfect accent to the page, I just painted them with bronze 3D paint and squeezed on the flourish design.

I cut the largest clock from the Crea Diem collection and edged it with some Platinum Stickles and some more Dusty Attic chipboard and another flower. To get the flaked rusted look to my chipboard, I first stamped the chipboard flourishes with some Tim Holtz Victorian Velvet ink, then I took my flat paint brush with some gesso on it and just lightly dabbed it here and there. Finally I added a gloss coat to the chipboard pieces.

I hope you enjoyed my project today and hope that I’ve inspired you to try some Swedish baking and maybe make a page about it too! xo

Whimsical Trinket Box

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

11 September, 2013 - Altered Items, Collections, Sofiero, Vintage Spring Basics, Vintage Summer Basics

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Hi everyone, it’s me, Gabrielle here with you today to share with you another whimsical trinket box! I’ve had these cute little 3D Birdhouse chippies in my stash for some time now and have finally had an opportunity to use them! If you are like me, you always need lots of trinket boxes to house your scrapping stash and photos. Personally, I think if you are going to have boxes sitting around you may as well make them look pretty right?

These little birdhouses where so easy to put together I just traced out the pieces on some pretty patterned paper (I used Maja Design papers from the Sofiero collection, and some from the Vintage Spring and Summer Basics colleciton). Once I had my patterned papers glued to the panels and just glued each of the houses together. Then the fun stuff started….dressing up the little houses with tiny picket fences, grasses, scrolls, key holes, branches, birdies, topiaries, vines, bricks and blooms.

And since it’s a box, you dont’t want to forget the back since it can be seen from all angles! Here I used the ‘Elegant Flourish Small’ chippie from Dusty Attic and a cameo to pretty up the back of the box. I also added extra blooms, grasses and picket fences to the backs of the houses.

Maja Design Supplies: Patterned Paper: Sofiero Collection (Strolling Down the Rose Path, Enjoying the Fragrance,Exuberance of flowers in bloom-bs, Enjoying the Frangrance-bs, The Elegant Winehouse), Vintage Summer Basics (1905, 1934-bs), Vintage Spring Basics (6th of May).

I hope you enjoyed my project today, Maja Design papers work as beautifully on ‘off the page’ projects as they do for scrapbook layouts! Give it a try! xo

Take a Hike {with Antligen Collection}

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

28 August, 2013 - Äntligen, Crea Diem, Layouts

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Hi everyone! It’s me, Gabrielle here with you today to share a layout I made using the Maja Design ‘Antligen’ collection papers with a little bit of Crea Diem mixed in. My oldest daughter Chloe loves to go on these little hikes with her friends and uses her phone camera to take pics along the way. I have to say I was surprised to see the beautiful scenic photos she takes (waterfalls, rock cliffs, beautiful woodland), I had no idea we had these beautiful places to hike right here close to home!

For this page I wanted to use very natural looking papers and embellishments so I went with the soft cool pinks and browns in the Antligen collection….here are the papers I used…

Vårdagjämning ~ (I used this paper pretty much as is, I just did a little stamping with some white paint and bubble wrap) and did a little edge distressing with the Tim Holtz edger.

Kaffe på trappan ~ (used as matting for background paper as well as using it with the Cheery Lynn Fanciful Flourish die cut…see close up below).

I just love using clock images in my scrapping so I cut out another clock design from the Crea Diem collection paper (below) and used it to tuck beside my photo…

I wanted a very naturalistic look to the page so I used a whole bunch of embellishments from My Little Yellow Bicycles ‘Naturals’ collection (Cork alphas, Etched Wood Buttons, Canvas Tags, Canvas Tape, Cork Stickpins)….as well as some lace from Tresors De Luxe, lightly tinted with tea stain.

The blooms I added were a modge podge of Prima blooms I had left over from old kits as well as some small roses from Dusty Attic. The chicken wire design I added is again from Dusty Attic, I left the chipboard ‘natural’ in keeping with my design.

I hope you enjoyed my project today and hope that you will try mixing and matching collections, it’s a great way to make your papers stretch!

A Pretty Place for Your Trinkets!

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

18 August, 2013 - Altered Items, Crea Diem, Tutorials

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One of my all-time favorite color combinations is smokey plums with dusty greys. So when I was looking to dress up my box to keep trinkets in, I was immediately drawn to the papers in the Crea Diem collection, lots of lovely vintage greys and smokey plum/pinks.

What is one of the most frustrating things when you are making up an altered box like this one? It’s what do you do at the corners! Some tuck them under other layers of papers, some try to just have them but up against each other, but after looking at the Crea Diem papers I noticed that they have this lovely smokey, vintage edging. I thought I’d take this edging idea and use it on my box design, keeping the paper application really simple!

I began by using my black ink pad and rubbing it along the edges of the box. (the box I got very inexpensively from my local craft shop).

I then cut a square of one of the grey patterned papers in Crea Diem (Efter regn-bs). I made the cut just slightly smaller than the full edge to edge of the box top. Softly ink the cut edges so they match the inking on the outer edges of the patterned paper. I used Aleene’s white glue adhesive to apply the paper panels. (Make sure you bring the adhesive right out to the edges.

What I found was really cool was that the cute little strips that you cut off from the bottom of the patterned papers? …..They are the PERFECT fit for the edge of the box top edges! Continue to apply the rest of your panels to the box, adding decorative detailing with other patterned papers, lace and some flourishy rub-ons. I used pieces of the Crea Diem pinkish/plum paper called Fylid av Karlek-bs to insert into little tears I made in some of the panels (this should be done before you adhere the panel).

To decorate the top I just clustered together some loose flowers I had leftover in my stash from some past kits and painted up a Dusty Attic floral chipboard piece (Floral Corners) and gave it a coat of crackle medium. Voila! You now have a pretty trinket box, easy-peasy! I hope you’ll give it a try!

Capturing Those Everyday Moments

Posted by Gabrielle Pollacco

31 July, 2013 - Crea Diem, Layouts, Life in the Country, Sofiero

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My camera is rarely far from my reach, I love to snap those everyday photos like the one I took of my oldest daughter Chloe when we were out at a little patio in Paris, Ontario having a cold drink and some munchies. To make up this page I went with the soft green paper from the new Sofiero collection and mixed it with some of the greens from the ‘Life in the Country’ collection and a little touch of ‘Crea Diem’ for elegance.

I like to use earthy colors with green when it comes to my embellishments, so I used a variety of embellishments from the ‘Naturals’ collection from My Little Yellow Bicycle.. The chipboard clock is a skelleton clock from Dusty Attic Designs.

For my title I used a word stamp from My Little Yellow Bicycle, but I wanted to give it a little more texture. So I took some gloss medium (I used the gloss medium from Dusty Attic, Glossy Accents would work as well) and just followed the lines of the stamp, it give the title a nice darkness and a great shine.

I hope you enjoyed my project today, and remember, you don’t just have to scrap those special occasions, scrapping those everyday moments can bring back a lot of fond memories.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Maja Design, Sofiero (The Elegant Wine House), Life In the Country (Summer Fields-bs, Kitchen Garden, Kitchen Garden-bs, Crea Diem (Kann dig sjalv), Crafter’s Workshop Brick Stencil, Handmade texture paste, Dusty Attic Skelleton Clock Frames, My Little Yellow Bicycle (Cork Heart Pin, Everyday Stamps, Canvas Shapes – Flowers, Canvas Tapes, Canvas Labels), Flowers & Bling Flourishes Recollections, Lace – Tresors de Luxe, Drywall Tape.