Successfully forging ahead

This month's Counterfeit Kit - Ingonish Beach - has proved so successful this time around. I've made a total of 8 layouts and think it would be possible to make at least one more if I added in some more cardstock. I definitely have enough for a handful of cards so I'll have to see what I want to do with what's left.

For these layouts, I think the only extra I added in was two sheets of cardstock (the original kit only had 6 sheets I think and I back my layouts with cardstock almost exclusively.) which just goes to show how easy it was to combine the products to create what I think are totally different looking layouts. I have really made the most of cutting up elements in the kit and mixing all the products together - old and new, different manufacturers etc. I have really had a lot of mileage out of a few of the papers (the October Afternoon banners, the Cosmo birds, kites and strip elements and the BasicGrey flowers) and haven't really needed to steal the middles very much as I usually do!

I made them all as part of my daily challenge, Whimsical Musings, where we have been following some Lain prompts. Prompts to follow and ready made kits certainly takes a lot of guesswork out of this and on the whole, this has been a very easy month to create a layout every day!

The prompt for this one was "N for Never" meaning try doing things you don't do normally. So for me this was: white space, misting on the background, same photo twice, no background paper on top of the cardstock, not much distressing. But it seemed to work and I ended up with something I love! Those banners again... Sorry so many banners (more to come :-) ) but they were on the October Afternoon paper and were just calling out to be cut out individually!

Ingonish Beach #4

Ingonish Beach #4 detail

"O is for Order" or pay attention to the order you work (paper, photos, story or technique first?)

I can do a page from any starting point so this was an easy one for me. But I deliberately started by grabbing this difficult to use paper from my kit and cutting out the dogs to make a dog centric page. Only then did I go and find some photos to match the theme.

Not so happy with this one. Bit too much overall. But the dog banner? Cute!

Ingonish Beach #5

This day's prompt was more difficult. There was an interview with Liz Tamanaha and we should be inspired by her style. Well, even though I found her stuff stunning, totally gorgeous and lift worthy, it just didn't get me. In the end I decided to have a go at some sort of film strip as this is something which she seems to do a lot. I went with the music papers I have in my kit (both of which I'm not keen on!) and came up with something I can only say was disappointing! Never mind. Live and learn!

Ingonish Beach #6

I'll post the last couple of layouts soon to spread out the banner overload!

What do you find yourself adding to your pages time and time again at the moment?