I'm on the Piccolina Designs Creative Team! - Part 1

I was applying to be on the Piccolina Designs Creative Team and I made it. I am so excited. Follow this link for more info on Teri's site about the creative team: http://piccolinadesigns.blogspot.com/2010/10/sooooo-busy-long-post-warning.html She gave us her brand new kit, "Welcome Home," that was released today, it is so cute!For the application we were supposed to create digital scrapbooking pages, I also did a hybrid project. I will post my Digital Scrapbooking pages in a part 2 post.

For the Hybrid project I made some Harvest blocks.

To make your own set of Harvest Blocks you will need to first purchase Teri's Welcome home kit, here http://ahhhscrap.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=49_180. Then you can design your blocks in Adobe PhotoShop, Photoshop Elements or whatever program you use to design with.

I designed the H,V,T in the workspace measurements of 5 high x 3 wide. I then designed the R and E in a workspace of 4 x3. Last I designed the A and S in a workspace of 3 x 3. Make sure when you are opening a new workspace to set the resolution to 300. If not your pictures will be grainy when you print it out.

When you are done designing the letters you may want to save each letter as a .psd file so if you want to make any changes you can go back.

You will want to make sure when the pictures are printed that the size of your design doesn't change. What I did was open a 4 x 6 workspace with the resolution set to 300. I then used the paint bucket to color the background so you will know where to cut around the letter design after it is printed. After the area was painted I pulled the final letter design into my 4 x6 workspace area and centered it. (You can create a group for each letter by selecting all of the layers and then pressing Alt+g, then you can drag the whole group over or you can got to Layers, Merge Visible and then you can drag your letter over, just make sure you don't save the .psd after you have done this step or your layers won't be separate if you try and go back to make changes.) You will want to save your final file as a .jpeg so you can get them printed. Hopefully this all makes sense. You can see below what the final letters looked like right before I sent them in to get printed. (As a rule of thumb you want a 1/4 of an inch of dead space and not design to the edge of your workspace, in this case, 4 x 6 print because it usually gets cut off.)

Next you will need to get wood blocks cut. I went to Lowe's and had an employee cut them for me. I had them cut from a 2 x 4. You need 3- 5.5 inch tall blocks (For your H,V and T), 2 -4.5 inch tall blocks (For your R and E), and 2- 3.5 inch blocks (For your A ad S). I was able to have him cut 2 sets and still had some wood left. The wood for 2 sets cost me $1.98 after tax.

I then routered, sanded and stained the blocks. I used Minwax stain, the color was Early America 230.

This is what the pictures looked like after I got them printed at Wal-Mart Photo. I paid for 1-hour photo and the 7 pictures cost me $1.28.

I then trimmed the excess brown around the edge of the pictures.

Here are the pictures before I Mod Podged them onto the blocks.

To Mod Podge them onto the blocks I put a thin layer on the block and then a thin layer on the back of the picture. Just make sure you don't get the Mod Podge too think or it can cause wrinkling.If you want you can apply a coat of Mod Podge over the top of each letter. I usually do if the paper is thinner, but when making the blocks the pictures were thick enough I felt they didn't need a layer on top.

Here are the final Blocks. :)