Challenge Central: Hello Happy Girl

Happy Thursday!  I would like to introduce a new, reoccuring Thursday post:  Challenge Central.  Every Thursday (hopefully, I am not being too ambitious here!) I plan on introducing a "challenge" that I find on the scrappy web and present my take on it.  I scour the web on a daily basis and am always on the lookout for a mojo buster, something to get me out of my regular routine and I want to share my finds with you.  Now these may be simple or they may border on the more complicated/totally out of my comfort zone area!  The whole purpose is to take me from "wow, I like that idea" to "Been there, done that!" and hopefully spread some scrappy inspiration around!

For this first challenge, I turned to Glitter Girl's Episode #86 that you can find here at 2peas.  In this episode, Glitter Girl's challenge is to pay attention to design and make sure all the elements on a layout are cohesive.

This is what I came up with....

When I think of a design being cohesive I think of these things:  color, motif, and repetition. 

Color is my favorite element.  The possibilities are endless.  When it comes to color I do my best to match my products to the picture. Here I went off of the blue dress my daughter was wearing and matched it to Dear Lizzy's Lucky Charm--a line I have yet to tire of.  Also, when choosing my colors, I try to take into account the overall mood of the photo or story I am trying to convey. In this photo Allora is very happy that she is climbing up the "big girl playset," so I chose to incorporate yellow because it is a happy, energetic color. My next choice, red, was a no brainer because it is a natural compliment to both blue and yellow.

When considering motif, I am looking at the overall "main idea" of the page.  As I said previously, I really wanted to convey my daughter's happiness and joy and this is what I thought about as I looked though my stash. I ended up with some happy, butterfly stickers, a frame with the word "smile" on it, a "happy" diecut, a yellow flair button with the words "Hello Sunshine," and gold glitter Thickers.  All these elements work together to make, in my opinion, a "happy" layout.

Finally, repetition.  This to me, is the most technical of the bunch.  Basically, take your elements and repeat them.  Ha ha.  Here I chose to repeat the chevron pattern three times.  The color yellow is repeated in three differnent spots (think visual triangle), I have two butterflies, and my main colors are repeated throughout the layout.

So there you go, I completed a challenge that required me to really "think" through my own process and strive to make a cohesive design.  Fun stuff :-). 

Michelle