Elsie and Leigh-Ann asked me a while back to contribute to their Style School as a “style feature.” I was happy to share my style inspirations, of course, but I was even more delighted to be so inspired by the class content. One of the projects entails compiling visual inspiration and ideas into a notebook, or “style file.” It’s a great home for the inspiring images I have been collecting, many of which came from the Spring UO catalog.

To make the shell of this little book, I gessoed the cover of a binder from Target so that the style of the notebook could be completely customizable. I’ve mainly been accenting the images with Hambly rub ons and Jenni Bowlin paper. There is much more to come, of course, but I wanted to share my progress so far.

Here’s the last “strictly from the kit” layout I created with this month’s JBS Mercantile kit. I want it to be just as wonderful next month… but I think that this chemistry only comes once in a lifetime. ;)

(oh my gosh, I just used an emoticon! I’ve been trying to abstain from those little guys, but I just couldn’t resist it.)

I’ve been thinking about doing this for quite a while, but never got around to it. I was thinking… what if I put rub ons onto vellum and then sprayed ink over them? The rub ons would resist the ink, and the pieces of vellum would have a pretty, sheer color to them.  Then I could stitch a few of them in a nice row and it would look oh so pretty on a scrapbook page. This is a new technique for me, and I was kind of excited to try it!

So here is the result! I think it has a nice wintery feel. Perfect for this snowy beginning to 2010.

I created the background by brayering gesso overtop of a bright blue piece of cardstock and then stitching it onto another 12×12 piece of cardstock, for security. Gesso makes paper wavy, you see.