Introducing our January Guest Designer!

Please help us extend a warm welcome to our January guest designer...Nicole Samuels!

Nicole lives in Virginia with her husband and 4 children, ages 10 to 4.  She discovered scrapbooking more than 10 years ago after receiving some supplies as a gift and immediately fell in love with this hobby as both a creative outlet and a way to document life's sweetest moments.  

She's been fortunate to design for several scrapbooking manufacturers, teach at both local stores and conventions, and be published in various print and digital paper crafting magazines.  Nicole currently designs for Studio Calico.  In addition to scrapbooking, she enjoys reading, being outdoors, spending time with her family, and practicing photography.  You can follow Nicole on her blog or on Facebook.

Q: What is your fave MME collection of all time?

 

A: Ok, this is really going to date me and show just how long I've been scrapbooking, but my favorite MME line would have to be Wild Asparagus.  I think I bought EVERY last piece of that collection when it was new and I still am hoarding some of it.  It's not even my scrapbooking style anymore, but I have such fond memories of it and loving it so much that I still keep it.  :)

Q: What did you enjoy working with the most?  

A: I think the patterned paper from MME is the best and what I enjoyed using the most. The designs are always so easy to work with and the colors are just gorgeous.

 

Supplies:Cut & Paste-Charm: Sweet Spin, Carefree Relaxed, Carefree Mellow, and Sweet Treat patterned papers, journaling card, decorative buttons, layered stickers; tiny word stickers, label stickers

Nicole says: I wanted to fit a lot of photos on this page, so I used a template that allowed me to just drag and drop them in using Photoshop.  I print the photo grid on a 8.5x11 sheet of photo paper and attached the whole sheet to my page.  I added patterned paper squares to fill in some empty grid spaces and to add some color.  Finally I used a button for a sun, adding in some hand stitched sun rays for some texture. 

 

Supplies: Cupid's Arrow:Alpha Love, Confetti Hearts, and Love You patterned papers, 12x12 sticker sheet,enamel dots,decorative tape; Misc: vellum, twine

Nicole says:I was drawn to the "Alpha Love" paper right away and knew I wanted to use it as the background of my layout.  However, the photo and title of the page seemed to get a little overwhelmed by the bold letters on the background.  

To solve that problem I cut out some vellum in the shape of the die cut heart and layered it over the background.  This helped to make the photo and title take center stage. The scalloped heart and "valentine" cut designs are available for free download on my blog!

 

We are in LOVE with these layouts, aren't you? Nicole is an amazing scrapbook designer and we are overjoyed she joined us this month.

Check back tomorrow for two more outstanding layouts by Nicole!