My Flying Unicorn September Challenge - "What I Did On My Summer Vacation"

"What I Did On My Summer Vacation..."

This is my first time hosting a challenge at Flying Unicorn; I hope you'll pop by and play along!  As usual, there are beautiful RAKs up for grabs for all challenges, and international entries are welcome.

Where I live, school starts the first week of September, so my challenge to you this month is to create a layout along the theme of "What I Did On My Summer Vacation," similar to the reports we had to do in elementary school.

Rules for the challenge:

1) Layouts only, no digital, must be new as of September 1, 2012

2) Following the theme of "What I Did On My Summer Vacation"

3) Must include: some kind of ruled paper; some elementary school-type art supply, such as paint, crayons or pencil crayons; journalling and either paper clips or staples

4) Limit of 2 entries per person

Here is my example:

I had the good fortune to take a couple of classes with Anna Dabrowska, aka Finnabair, this summer, so I wanted the style of my layout to be a tribute to some of the things she taught us in class, but with my own style mixed in.  I used Bo Bunny Weekend Market and Simple Stories Aweso[me] papers and distressed the edges with my Ingvild Bolme Distressing Tool, then went to town on the edges with several border punches and finished them off with ink and some lace and flower parts tucked underneath.  I inked my background heavily with Distress Ink in Salty Ocean, Squeezed Lemonade, Tea Stain, Mowed Lawn and Weathered Wood, and once it was dry stamped several background stamps with black Archival Ink. The hexagons are cut by hand, distressed, inked and painted with Picket Fence Distress Stain to tone them down slightly. I finished off my background with some gesso bricks, burlap and some Dusty Attic chippies.  My journalling is hand-written on the pennants which I've cut from Prima canvas tape.

Here are a couple close-ups:

And here is the gorgeous RAK that is up for grabs:

Standard Rules:

1) Challenge closes at 8:00 EST on September 30th

2) Winner will be selected by random draw

3) Each individual can only win one challenge at Flying Unicorn per month - enter as many challenges as you'd like to increase your chances of winning

4) Layout cannot be used for any other Flying Unicorn challenge

5) Projects must be uploaded to the challenge thread and the Gallery

6) Leave love in the Gallery for other participants.  We all like to feel our work is appreciated!

7) Winner will have 7 (seven) days to claim their prize by PM'ing Alda their full name and mailing details or will forfeit their RAK

Hope you can play along - I can't wait to see what everyone was up to on their summer vacations!