C'est Magnifique Scrapbook Kits and Store: Meet our January Guest Designer

We are so excited to announce our January Guest Designer, the very talented Cathy Cafun. She has created some awesome projects using our January Kit, "The Height of Chic". Cathy's style is perfect with this kit. We will turn it over to Cathy now.

Hi there, my name is Cathy Cafun, and I live in Queensland, Australia with my very supportive husband, and teenage son and daughter, my muses, who put up with me constantly snapping away and recording their journey through life.

Scrapbooking and papercraft have been part of my life for over 8 years now, and it has become an all-consuming passion. If I had to describe my style I would say it is predominantly shabby chic/romantic, but I am very partial to the grungy distressed look on my masculine layouts. My creations always have elements of texture and dimension and I find fussy cutting, layering, distressing and any form of mixed media a wonderful way to achieve this.

I love to experiment with new techniques to keep things interesting, and at the moment I adore anything related to mixed media techniques, as it allows me to play with colour, texture and layers which adds a beautiful depth to my creations.

Being part of the scrapbooking industry has given me so many wonderful opportunities, like teaching classes at the Scrapbooking and Papercraft Expo, which I would say has been the highlight of my journey so far, having my creations published in magazines, but best of all meeting so many amazing and inspirational artists and making new and wonderful friendships all over the world.

For me, scrapbooking is the perfect way to express my creative/artistic side as well as being a fabulous form of therapy, and I have the added bonus of being able to record all those precious family memories in the process.

I have always admired the gorgeous kits at C’est Magnifique and inspirational creations from their super-talented Design Team, so I was very excited to be invited as the Guest Designer for January. Here is my blog if you would like to pop in and say hello - http://cathycafun.blogspot.com.au/

"So Lovely"

I was in heaven playing with the gorgeous January kit, as it is so beautifully feminine and perfect for my shabby chic style of scrapping. On my first layout I had some fun with the Luminarte products from Magnifique Mixed Media kit to create a soft and pretty background. Once I figured out the placement of my photo, I adhered the wooden doilies and chipboard alpha letters for my title from the main Kit, and also the silver flowers from the Mixed Media kit, then I coated the over the embellishments and patterned paper with gesso, leaving some of the pattern visible around the edges of the paper. Once dry, I stamped a few flower branches with the ink from the main Kit, then painted and splattered over the top with African Jade & Azurite silk glazes, thinned down with a little water. I also mixed the Bolivian Blue and Tahitian Blue Primary Elements powders to create a lovely blue-mauve colour, and some Chiffon Pink for a pretty highlight.

Items from my stash: Pink glitter glass, floral branch stamp, paper leaves, pansy border punch, gesso.

"Beautiful Dreamer"

For this layout I decided to used a pink and grey colour palette. I tore, distressed and fussy cut the papers and highlighted the torn and grunged edges with silver glitter glass. I love to play with colour, and decided to mix some of the Silks and Pigment Powders to create a few different shades. To create the medium pink for my splats, I mixed the Raspberry Wine silk glaze with a little white paint and thinned down with water. I coated the large chipboard doily with gesso, then mixed the Raspberry Wine Silk Glaze and Chiffon Pink Primary Elements with some water to paint and splatter over the top. When dry I randomly stamped with a Script stamp.

Items from my stash: Gesso, Croco Crackling, Silver glitter glass, paper leaves, ink - old rose, border punch, script stencil, stamps.

"Remember This Moment"

Love these pics of my daughter and her partner at her Senior Formal and they were a perfect fit for the blue tones of the patterned paper in the January Kit. Kept this fairly simple by softening the pp with some gesso, then overlaying with a some stamping. A few fussy cut elements, for the flower cluster to frame the photo and a touch of glitter glass. I think you can tell I am loving glitter glass at the moment!!

Items from my stash: gesso, stamps, blue and silver glitter glass, Versamagic ink - night sky, pansy border punch.

"Simple Moments"

For this layout I went for pretty and pink, with pops of black. I punched 4 12" strips from the white paper to create a border for the pink gingham paper, stenciled and stamped the background and to add a little twist to my paint splats I used some extra fine glitter glass. To create the glitter glass splats on the background, I mixed the clear glaze with some white pva glue that dries clear and thinned down with water. I then splattered the background with the medium and while it was wet I coated the splatters with extra fine glitter glass. I love to recycle, and found the black packaging from the Prima flowers was perfect to use as part of my title.

Items from my stash: stencil, paper doily, silk leaves, border punch, stamps, gesso, pink glitter glass, Saltwater Taffy mist, black soot distress ink.

"Your Wings" Canvas

One of the items in the mixed media kit is a sweet little canvas, which I was going to use in an OTP project, but as I had so much gorgeous product to work with, I decided to create a large canvas. The beautiful Blue Fern butterflies were the inspiration for this canvas. I had a lot of fun creating layers with mixed media on my background using patterned paper, Luminarte silks and primary elements, gesso, masking, stamping, punched elements and a bit of mesh. Once I was happy with my background, I layered flowers and embellishments from the add ons which I altered with paint, diamond dust and micro-beads. My title was cut with my Silhouette Cameo, then altered with some pink german glitter glass.

Items from my stash: pink German glitter glass, Diamond Dust, border punches, Silhouette Cameo die-cut and stencil for masking, floral die, stamp, gesso, pearl embellishments, recycled bling earring and book pages, mesh.