"Recycle" Bulk Mail

A couple weeks ago I was at a craft fair, and I saw some beautiful fine art collages created with old newspaper and bulk mail...something in this vein.  I don't know how the artist whose work I saw managed to create these beautiful pictures with throwaway materials--what an amazing talent!  But I do know one way that we can all "recycle" our bulk mail.  We can use it as a source of inspiration.  Though this is not physical recycling, it is still a recycling of sorts--a recycling of ideas.

A few days ago I got the July 19-20 advertising booklet from Archivers, a local scrapbooking chain store.  (Some people call this sort of thing "junk mail."  But I'm not going to call a booklet that's full of scrapbooking coupons and ideas "junk."  I'll just stick with the term "bulk mail.")  I was inspired by this photo (below), which was on page 14 of the booklet.

I decided to use this inspiration as the jumping-off point for my contribution to the Color Room this week.  I came up with this layout (below) called "Love."

Supplies: brown and white cardstock sheets (Wausau Paper), dark pink cardstock (Echo Park), patterned papers (all from My Mind's Eye), journaling boxes (Echo Park), large and small alphabet stickers (Echo Park), pen (Zig), heart punch (All Night Media), embroidery floss (DMC), dry adhesive (3M tabs), wet adhesive (3M Scrapbooker's Glue), oval template (Fiskars), misc. (mechanical pencil, dinner plate, postage stamp, emery board or distressing tool, sharp sewing needle, & blunt embroidery needle).

The journaling reads: "On Labor Day, Maggie died of old age.  She was a pampered princess, and I'll always remember her as she was in life--usually sleeping sweetly with one delicate paw extended, just waiting for a pat and a kiss.  Her sympathy cards are behind this page."  The small alphabet stickers spell out this subtitle: "You may now kiss the royal paw."

Here are a few detail photos and tips:

The set of large letter stickers I was using did not have a dark pink "V."  So, I carefully trimmed a "W" to make the "V" for my title (below).

My husband has seen me use many funny and unusual scrapbooking techniques recently.  A few weeks ago he watched me sew rocks (stone chip beads) to a different layout.  This week, he watched me sand the edges of my page components with a nail file!  :)  I love the distressed look that this gave me (two photos below).

To create the banner on the page, I first used a pencil to trace a portion of the curved edge of a standard-sized dinner plate.  Next, I adhered the banner flags along this guideline.  I then used a sharp needle to poke holes to guide my sewing.  I used a blunt embroidery needle to backstitch along the poked holes, adhering my loose ends to the back of my page with adhesive tabs.  When you use this sewing technique, this is how the back of your page should look (below):

I miss my dear kitty, Maggie, but this scrapbook page will keep her alive in my heart forever.  Thanks for looking!