"Today" for Creative Scrappers #298

I finished this page this morning, yay! The photo is over two years old now, and my Brenna Bean can read chapter books all on her own - she picked up reading soooooo fast! It's amazing how little kids can soak up everything they learn like a sponge, isn't it?  

Here's the sketch I used for inspiration from Creative Scrappers:

I mirror-imaged it (haha, don't think that's really a word, or a verb!) so my photo would face the right way, but other than that, I think I stuck fairly close to the original. I cut some hearts instead of stars with my Cameo - hearts seemed to go better with the digi stamp I already had on the photo - as well as the sketchy circle, which was a free cut file from...actually, I don't know where it's from, cringe! My apologies to the designer, and if you recognize this, maybe let me know in the comments and then I can giver credit to the artist.

I'm quite impressed with how the background turned out. I pressed some old CTMH ink pads (Sorbet and Creme Brulee) onto a piece of plastic packaging, sprayed with a bit of water, and smooshed that around on top of the white cardstock. I've done this before with Distress Ink and Dylusions spray, but I wasn't sure how the CTMH ink would work out, and without gesso to boot. The circle accent and hearts felt a bit too stark (I cut them out of plain white cardstock) so I dabbed my waterbrush in the same inks and traced around them all. I like that effect, too, it's kind of doodly (also not a word, but I'm on a roll, so why stop now!)

And here's a final close-up of the photo and some of the accents. I just love Brenna's pudgy little baby cheeks and cute pigtails! 

Since I used my September Counterfeit Kit and a sketch, I'm going to link this page up on the CKC blog for Challenge #1. I'm also going to put this into Mercy Tiara's 27-Day Scrappy Challenge. This is a new group for me, so not sure what it will be like to post in a Facebook group. We shall see. 

And that's it for me for today. I hope I get to create more with this kit, but now that school is back in session, it feels like life is crazier than ever - how did that happen? Tomorrow I'm helping with Nolan's cross-country team's bottle drive, so hopefully your weekend involves something more lovely than divvying up stinky beer and wine bottles in the rain!