Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Studio J

The March special on Studio J has ended.  I couldn't help but take advantage of the sale.  I had forgotten how much I really enjoy our digital scrapbooking.  I started digital scrapbooking with Paint Shop Pro a long time ago.  It was a bit time consuming.  My introduction to Close to My Heart was actually through Studio J.  When I found how easy and quick a page could come together, I was hooked.  Don't get me wrong, I still love  traditional paper scrapbooking, but there is room in my life for both.  I had pushed it to the last weekend to take advantage of the sale.  I did eleven layouts.  There is no way I could have done eleven layouts in a weekend's time the old fashioned way.

I am not going to bore you with all my layouts, but I did want to share a few with you.  For those not familiar with Studio J, all of the papers available at Close to My Heart now, and most of the ones from the past are available to work with in a digital format.  And that is a lot of paper!  There is no program to buy and it's free to create.  You only pay when you decide you can't live without them :)  Even without the sale, $6.95 for a two page layout is still a spectacular price.  Not to mention that when you do purchase a layout for $6.95 you also get the .jpeg file.  You get a large version perfect to print your own or a web version, which is what you see below.  If you didn't want to purchase the 12x12 layouts, there is an option to just purchase the .jpeg's for $2.95 and you can print your own or keep them in digital format.  I usually order my layouts and then print mine out as an 8x10 picture and trim it down to 8x8 for my smaller photo albums.  It works perfectly.

Here's one of my favorite layouts I did this past weekend...

You have a lot of freedom even within all the presets in the program.   This paper pack, Giggles and Grins, which is retired, just happened to have the color yellow I was looking for.   Once I found the paper pack with the color I wanted, I was able to manipulate all the other papers to match.   Because the theme of the paper pack wasn't exactly "bee" themed, nor were they the right color, I didn't use the My Stickease that came with it.  Instead I made my own flowers out of ribbon, picture clasps, and a brad.  

These pages are fun to do and you can do them anywhere you can connect to the internet.   I won't bore you with all eleven of them, but I may share a few more later on.  If you would like to look around in Studio J, you can click on the tab at the top of the page or click here.  Remember, it is free to create!  If you should decide to make a purchase, make sure to join the Mystery Hostess party.  Did I mention that you can purchase Studio J layouts with hostess rewards, too?  It's a win, win, win situation :)

That's it for me tonight.  Thanks for stopping by!