This & That Notebooks..

Hello friends. I have another notebook to share with you today. You can never have too many notebooks, right? And I just can't get over this mixy matchy/ Thrift Store Decor style that I've been creating with lately. It's all about combining lots of colors and patterns...and many different embellishments....and old and new items. But it all seems to work in some sort of quirky, eclectic, pieced together like a quilt sort of way. Now some of you may think I've just lost it and totally gone off the deep end. Please just humor me and say my stuff looks cool and we'll all be happy little campers. :)Many of you have left me comments like "You're so good at picking colors and embellishments, I could never do that!". Oh yes you can, honey. First off, you need to collect a stash of fun embellishments to chose from. You can't add cool stuff to your projects if ya ain't got any cool stuff in your stash. Take my notebook for example. In about a 3" square area, I've added a Carnival Ticket in Tilt a Whirl Teal, a Small Manila Parcel Tag, October Afternoon patterned paper, big honkin' Papertrey Vintage Buttons, Rustic Cream Twine, an angled piece of Simply Chartreuse felt that has been stitched and cut with the small scallop die, the word "notes" stamped from Take Note and a snippet of my Wrinkle Ribbon. Whew, that's a lotta stuff in one small area. But I love the collage look of it all. No rules. Just start creating.
Now let's look at the bottom part of my notebook. Here's where you'll see lots of mixy matchy colors and patterns on the patterned paper I chose. On this one notebook, I've used four patterned papers that are all different in color and motifs. One great way to get this look to work is to purchase papers from the same line from the same company. The papers from my notebook all came from just a few lines of October Afternoon's newest papers called Thrift Shop and Fly a Kite. The little 8 x 8 pads are scaled down in pattern, perfect for the notebooks. So cute, I am in love with it all. The ruler is also an October Afternoon stamp. Notice that all of the pieces are adhered to a Large Manila Parcel Tag turned upside down. I was so jazzed when I discovered that the large tags layer perfectly onto the notebook fronts. The This & That sentiment is also from Take Note.
You may have noticed in my top photo that I took a photo of my way cool notebook on some vintage fabrics......
I wanted to show you that I use the same mixy matchy process when selecting fabrics. Aren't these just wonderful vintage pieces? I love them so much. I chose a handful of fabrics for you as if I were going to create a tote bag or a quilting project. I chose colors that are similar like the blue and green tones.....but then I also added in a few quirky colors like the fabrics with the pinks and yellows and orange colors. Such a fun little mix of colors and patterns.

And here's a tip for you: When selecting patterned papers or fabrics, fan all the colors out like I've done below. Take a step back and then squint at your fabrics until it gets blurry. If one item stands out too much or is too bright or off, then you know you might want to chose another one in place of it. Scroll back up to my notebook photo and do the same thing.....squint til it's blurry and you'll notice that all the pieces are the same overall tone.
Okay, that's it for today folks. I so hope that you enjoyed my post. Now go get all mixy matchy!! And get ya some cool embellishments to add to your projects. And have fun with it! No stressing allowed.

P.S........Who's diggin' in their stash of Papertrey Vintage Buttons for THE BIG HONKIN' ONES now? I love those big ol' buttons!

P.P.S.......Why didn't someone tell me that Manila only had one "L"? I've been spelling it like vanilla with two L's all this time. Dang.