Hi all!

I’m taking a blog vacation day today.  I know you’ll all understand.  Look for some exciting posts coming in the next few days, as well as a new release this coming Wednesday!

Have a great day!

One commonly used method in digiscrapping is to “scrap lift” or “lift” someone else’s layouts.  Scraplifting is the process of using another person’s layout to inspire your own.  This can be a great tool for times when your creative mojo is on vacation, or when you see a layout by someone that you really like.  Sometimes, a scraplift can be a pretty exact copy of the original layout.  Other times, your layout can just be inspired by the original layout.  It is important that when you do a scraplift you make sure to credit the original layout in your credits.  When you are using someone else’s layout to inspire your own, it’s like using someone else’s template or papers – it’s a tool you used.  The person who originally created it deserves recognition.

This is a scraplift I did not so long ago.  On the left hand side is my layout, on the right is the layout I lifted, originally by Denise Beatty.

You’ll notice that in this lift, I recreated the original layout pretty exactly.  While doing this, I still managed to make the layout my own, and fit my own style.  If you click on my layout, you’ll be taken to my gallery and in the credits you’ll see that I put that it was a scraplift, and linked it to Denise’s layout that had inspired it.  Sometimes, linking may not be an option.  In those cases I usually put something like, “Inspired by the layout Poker Night by Lady Gaga in the July 2011 Creating Keepsakes.”  While not linking directly to the layout, I am still giving credit to the original designer.

So, in today’s Scrap Along, I have an assignment for you.  I want you to do a scraplift.  For this assignment, I want you to go through CT Member Laura’s gallery HERE, pick a layout, and scraplift it.  Come back here and link me up to the layout, and Laura and I will randomly pick one winner from the entries to win a GC to my PDP store!

Have fun! I can’t wait to see what you come up with!

I’ve not been at FPD all that long, so my list of products is considerably shorter than at PDP.  However, I wanted to share with you again one of my most favorite kits of all time. Practically Perfect is soft, airy, and light.  It screams late summer to me, and I absolutely love how it came out.  Check it out.

I loved it so much, I actually did my own layout using it.  For this layout I also used an awesome set of templates by Jaclyn Bernardo who also sells at FPD.  She has some great ones, but I especially loved this set that I used.

And just because I love this kit so much, I am putting it on sale for 50% off until Monday morning.  Make sure you grab it now!

I’ve got nothing new coming out this week, so I thought I’d take today and tomorrow to show you some of my favorites that I’ve created.  Today, we are going to look at Polka Dot Plum.

And, as a special treat, I’ve marked all three of these kits 50% off until Monday morning!!  Enjoy!!

Seeing as I am such a template-a-holic, I thought it would be great to share with you some of the template designers that I regularly use.  You’ll notice that they represent a pretty wide range of styles, but I think that keeps everything looking fresh and new.

Cindy Schneider at Sweet Shoppe Designs – I’ve talked before (and talked and talked) about how much I love using Cindy’s templates.  I love the clustered look of them, which I have such a hard time coming up with on my own.  I also appreciate the little things that Cindy does to make using her templates easier, like color coding the layers.  One of my favorite sets of Cindy’s templates is this bundle:
Janet Phillips at Sweet Shoppe Designs – Janet’s templates are almost the polar opposite of Cindy’s.  Janet’s are clean and graphic, and always put the attention right back on the photo.  Janet is also the master of templates with an insane number of pictures.  I especially like this template:
Amy Martin at The Lilypad – Amy’s templates are always a little bit funky.  She recently has been doing some templates that have cut out spaces in them, and I love the way those look.  I also love that Amy often offers mini bundles, singles, and larger bundles.  One of my favorite sets by Amy is
Jaclyn Bernardo at Funky Playground Designs – Jaclyn really is awesome at stacking in her templates.  Stacking paper strips, or background papers, or elements, they always look awesome.  She even has sets of just her stacks, which I love too.  I love this one especially
BTA Designs at Polka Dot Plum – BTA Designs templates’ are great for white space layouts.  They often feature a large background with a small cluster in one of the corners or the middle.  I especially like this set of templates:
Berry Sweet Designs at Polka Dot Plum – These templates are excellent white space layouts too!  They are minimal with a little layering and lots of space around them.  This set that I picked also has ample space for journaling, which is a major plus.  Check them out
Nikki Epperson at The Digi Chick – I got hooked on Nikki’s templates when she was at PDP with me.  What I really like about Nikki’s templates is that sometimes, they are nice and super layered and fun…and other times they are nice and simple.  She has a variety of styles, which makes her templates appealing to me.  I love this set
Ali Edwards at Designer Digitals – Do I really need to say more than her name?  Ali is one of the masters of digi scrap.  I love her simple styled layouts.  Always clean and graphic, but never boring her templates always seem to make a statement.
Cathy Zielske at Designer Digitals – Cathy’s another designer with nice, clean and simple templates.  What I always find fun about Cathy’s templates is that they usually have some great word art already built into them.  I love this template

So those are 9 of my favorite template designers.  Who are yours?  Whose templates do you love using?  Let me know in the comments below!

July 12th – July 25th

On the Sir Scrapalot Designs Blog:

• 9 Quick Ways to Date Your Digital Scrapbooking Layouts
• Exciting New Paperclipping Digi Show with Katie Pertiet and Me!
• What Walt Knew..
• 4 Ways to Use One Photo on a Multiphoto Template
• 5 Tools for Creating Digital Scrapbooking Wishlists
• Twitter Post

Some Great Conversations on the Facebook Fan Page

• Digi QOTD: If you could find your dream kit, what would it look like?
• Digi QOTD:  Do you edit your pictures before you put them on a layout?
• Thought Provoking QOTD: How long do you think you could honestly go without internet?
• Non Digi QOTD: What’s your favorite Non Digi website?
• Digi QOTD: How do you share your layouts with others?

Stop by, I’d love for you to join the conversation!

New Products!

One really effective tool all Twitter users should know about is lists.  Lists are a way to group the people you follow on Twitter and so much more.  Once you get hang of working with lists, they will clean up and speed up your Twitter experience.

What are Lists and Why Should I Create Them?

Lists are just that – lists of people on Twitter.  You can look at lists as a separate stream in Twitter, so by grouping the people you are following you can look at just their tweets.  For example, I have a list of Social Media and Branding people I follow as well as a list of Digi Tips and Tricks people I follow.  When I look at one of those lists, I see only tweets from the people I have put on that list.  That makes it a lot easier to keep up with what my Tips and Tricks people and see what they are tweeting about.

You can also follow other people’s lists.  What’s totally excellent about following other people’s lists is that you follow just the list…the people on the list don’t show up in your home stream.  You are following them, without following them.  This can really help to clean up your home stream.

Ok, So I Should be Using Lists…How Do I Make Them?

So, if you go to your Twitter homepage and look at the right hand side of the page, you’ll find “Lists” in the column.

Right below it, you’ll see “New List.”  Click on that.  When you click on that, a dialog box will pop up.

You’ll be asked to name the list, as well as provide a description for the list.  After that, you’ll see a place where you have to decide whether you want to make the list “public” or “private.”  Basically, if you list is public, other people can look at it and follow it.  If you list is marked as private, only you will be able to see the list.  The people on the list won’t even know that they’re there.  It’s really private, LOL.   When you decide, you will click create and you will be ready to add people to your list.

There are two ways to add people to your list.  First, you can search for people to add to your list.  This is what you are prompted to do when you first click create.  You can also add people from the list of people you are following.  What you would do is find the person you want to add to the list.  Once you find them, on the right hand side of their box is a button that looks like a list.

If you click it, a drop down will show up with the lists you have created.  You would check off the lists that you want the person to appear in, and then click outside the box.  They are added to your list!

Ok, So I Made a List.  How Do I Find Other People’s Lists to Follow?

Well, first off, if you look at someone’s Twitter profile, on the right hand side in the Lists section, you’ll see all the lists they have created and made public.  Click on one of those lists, and you’ll be able to follow the list.  Easy Peasey, right?

Another way to find lists to follow is Listorious.com.  Listorious is basically a directory of lists created in Twitter.  You can search the lists, and even check out the Top 140 lists.  Get it, 140 lists…140 characters…gah, I love a good pun!

Are You Inspired Now?

I hope that with this you’ll be inspired to create and follow some lists.  Lists really reach their full power when you are using a Twitter client such as Hootsuite or Tweetdeck, where you have an option of creating a column for the list.  Hey…that’s another post though.

What lists have you created?  What lists are you following?  Let us know in the comments below!

I am delighted to share with you today a HUGE collab that I was part of.  The We Are Family Collab was put together by Tara at Geek Chic Designs to benefit one of our dear digi friends, and CT member to many of us, Sally.  Sally was recently diagnosed with Cancer, and we are hoping the proceeds from this collab with help to offset her medical expenses.  You can check out Sally’s Blog to hear her story, and read about her progress.  Right now though, let’s check out the kit!!

Nine of the top digi designers, myself included, came together to create this incredible light and bright kit.  I have downloaded it and started playing with it, and let me tell you it’s HUGE and full of fun stuff!  You can pick up the collab HERE at Gotta Pixel.

Check out this incredible layout by my CT member Kristin, I think it showcases how fun the collab kit is.

This sweet layout is by CT Member Laura

By CT Member Alix

By CT Member Sarah

We would really appreciate it if you picked up this collab and helped us help out a dear friend.  Thanks!

If you’re anything like me, you don’t always shop for stuff when it first comes out, and then you inevitably forget about the items you wanted and never purchase them.  That was how I shopped for a long time – if I didn’t get it right at release, I didn’t get it at all.  Lately, I’ve really begun to appreciate the benefits of creating a wishlist – a list of products I want, but can’t buy right now.  By creating a wishlist, I am able to keep track of what I want for times when I have a bit more money, or when a sale is going on.  Also, it gives me time to think about products that I may be on the fence about…sometimes, I go back to my cart and don’t want them anymore.  There are a few different ways to create a wishlist.  Here are five of the most popular.

1. Kaboodle – Many digiscrappers use Kaboodle to keep track of their wishlists.  With Kaboodle, you can add products from any site to your list simply by clicking a button you install.  Items are saved to your list with a description.  You can create different lists for different types of products, and you can share your lists with others (perfect at birthday or holiday time!).  Kaboodle also is connected with Facebook, where you can sign in with your Facebook account and connect the two.
2. Evernote – I mentioned Evernote a few weeks back in THIS POST about tools to make your life easier.  With Evernote, you can clip pieces of the web, and add them to your Evernote files.  Using Evernote for wishlisting is great if you are already using it for other purposes.  You are able to clip the products you want, as well as organize the notes so you can see them all at once.  However, if you are new to Evernote, it may not be the place to start keeping your wishlists.
3. Amazon Wishlist Button – I was surprised to learn about Amazon Wishlist Button, mainly because it’s a universal wishlist button which allows you to wishlist items from any online store, not just Amazon.  Getting started with the wishlist button is easy enough, you just need to have an amazon account set up, be signed in, and drag the button into your toolbar.  When you want to add something to your wishlist, you click the button.  This is a great option for keeping all of your wishlisted items together, however, it doesn’t have the ability to share lists like Kaboodle does.
4. Specific Store Wishlists – At this point, the majority of digital scrapbooking stores offer their own wishlist option.  Usually, when you are looking at a product, you are given the option to click the “add to wishlist” button, and the item is added automatically to your wishlist.  The advantage to using this method is that it keeps everything “in house,” there’s no third party site keeping the wishlist.  This is great if you regularly shop at a few stores.  If you don’t regularly shop at a store, a wishlist there may easily be forgotten, so an option where you can keep items from multiple shops may be better suited for you.
5. MS Notepad/MS Word/Paper – According to many, the best way to keep track of items you want to purchase is to keep the list yourself.  That may be on paper kept by your computer, or in a Notepad or Word document that you create specifically for this purpose.  This method is great if you don’t want to deal with using an outside source to create your wishlists, but if you’re like me, you’re likely to lose the list or delete on accident.

So, what’s your method for keeping your digiscrap wishlists?  Vote in the poll below and let me know!

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

If I haven’t listed your method, or you want to tell me why you picked what you did, let’s get talking in the comments!

It’s not often that I come out with CU Products, so I thought that I would celebrate three new CU products by offering them together as a mini bundle.  Check it out.

In the bundle, you get these three CU products for only $4.00!!! That’s right, three products for $4.00!!  This deal is for a limited time only, so make sure you snap it up now!