Bloom | Scrap the Girls March Challenge

Hi everyone! Today I am sharing my layout for the March challenge at Scrap the Girls, which is called "Bloom From Within". It's a super cool inspiration board that looks like this...

Isn't it awesome? I love all those beautiful images! I knew immediately that I had the perfect photo for this challenge - a shot of my daughter that I took a little while ago while she was dressed up in a Cosplay costume. 

There were several elements from the board I wanted to include - a white background; the colour palette of green / pink / red; lots of florals; typed text; and hearts to represent the human heart.

Here's what I came up with...

(Click on photos for a better view)

How perfect is that photo with all the blooms growing out of her skin? I love it! In hindsight, I am so glad I took these photos of her in this costume.

Now onto my layout. I began my page with a sheet of white cardstock, 'Worn Lipstick' Distress Oxide and the 'Distressed Grid' stencil from Dusty Attic. I added some subtle stencilling using a sponge to begin building my layers from. I then used my 'Grass' Colour Artist Ink from Bee Arty to add some large splats, and 'Soot' to add some tiny splatters. 

Next, I added stamping using black ink and some fabulous floral stamps by Vicki Boutin from her 'Wildflower and Honey' release (which I was able to borrow from my friend Amanda Hartmann during a scrappy girls weekend away). At this point I was pretty happy with the mixed media layers on my background so I moved onto adding some papery ones.

I chose to use the Vicki Boutin 'Color Kaleidoscope' collection again (are you getting sick of it yet? I'm not! haha), as I knew the rich tones and florals would be perfect for this page. I chose a couple of patterned papers - one teal and one kraft (which featured typed text) and cut some pieces to add as my layered photo mat. 

Now it was time to embellish my page! I gathered up a variety of pieces from the 'Color Kaleidoscope' die cut ephemera packs and set to work tucking them in around my photo. I also added lots of small green leaves that I fussy cut from one of the patterned papers from the range. 

For my page title, I used a clear sticker that said bloom from one of my MAMBI sticker pads. The hot pink on the sticker really stood out from the page, as it was a slightly different pink to everything else I had already used, so I added a couple of small coordinating watercolour flower stickers from the same pad to help tie in. I also added some small pink and green heart stickers and I was done! 

I am SO happy with how this page came out; it's fun, quirky, multi-layered and a little bit messy - much like my daughter is. (And yes, she loves it too and has already asked me if she can put it up in her room.)

I hope you will play along with us this month at Scrap the Girls, we have Cocoa Vanilla Studio on board as our sponsor (and who wouldn't want to win themselves a CVS prize?) For all the details, and to see what the rest of the design team created for this challenge, head over to the STG blog HERE

Until next time, happy scrapping! X