a "smash"ing saturday

Shortly before my trip to Cuba this summer, I mentioned that I'd found the perfect reason to buy a Smash journal.  And of course, if I was going to buy a Smash journal, it made sense to buy some of the accessories, too.  Right?

But I have to admit - I wasn't sure how well I'd do at this whole Smashing thing.  I mean, even though I really like the eclectic look and admire others' work with that style, it's not necessarily my style.  You may have noticed that I tend more toward the traditional scrapbook layouts in my pages.  For this album, though - which represents an overview of my trip - I decided to go a little more relaxed...a little more artsy.


So last night, when I was trying to decide what to work on during the local store's crop today, spending the day on my Smash book sounded like a perfect choice


The theme of this album - the wonderful idea that I concocted - was a play on the Flat Stanley project I did in 2007 (whoa!) for my trip to New Orleans.  Since I always travel with my little bear, I decided to make an album of "Bear's Trip to Cuba," in which I documented his travels and experiences.


And - surprise! - this whole Smashing thing wasn't quite as difficult as I'd anticipated.  Something I'd been particularly worried about was how I would get the mix-and-match papers that are prebound in the album to coordinate with the photos (since I still wanted them to go in the order of the trip)...and yet figuring out how to get the papers and the photos to work together turned out to be surprisingly easy.


I also had fun with the various accessories I'd gotten - from the paper tabs that I used on the sides of pages and within, to the date stamp (that's just visible in the top right corner of the right page)...


...to the printed pockets that can be glued in, one of which I trimmed to be shorter, so that the postcards and cropped pictures could peek out more visibly...


...to the polka-dot tape that I used to "secure" things to the pages (and by that, I mean I used regular photo squares and added the tape for effect), to the light blue labels.  Quirky little pieces that encouraged me to do a little more collage and stacking and "just put it on there" than I might normally do.


And let's not forget possibly my favorite accessory of all in this world of Smash - the label maker.  Granted, I grew up playing with Mom and Dad's label maker, but having my own little one to make labels for my scrapbook is just fun.

I'm not quite done with the album yet...partly because I have more space and pages than I anticipated...but I'm hoping that, this coming Tuesday, I'll be able to finish what I can.  It's turning out so well, and I'm really looking forward to seeing it as a finished book.  Stay tuned for more...

Where I am: home
What I'm reading: Living Yoga by Christy Turlington

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