Easter Stargazers - Helmar Creative Team

On Easter Weekend 2016 we decided to watch something we had missed when it was live (I love that catch up TV means we can watch things when it suits us) so Easter Saturday we brought up the Stargazing Live event with Professor Brian Cox and so began a day filled with pausing iview so hubby and the boys could discuss some Astrophysics.  It was a interesting day, especially seeing E start to expand in his enthusiasm and knowledge for this topic and was just another step in my journey as a person with multiple Astrophysics enthusiasts in my life.


I really wanted to tell this story in my album, as I don't have photos of us on the day I thought a good way to do this would be to scrap a photo of the Hubble Space Telescope  and a photo from the Hubble Space Telescope that my husband and boys love, the Ultra Deep Field 2014.
The photos from the Hubble Space Telescope are public domain which is just so awesome as it means my boys and hubby can surround themselves in their favourite photos, for example Hubby's work diary has dividers made from some of his favourite photos.


To create my layout I grabbed out a selection of Space themed scrapping supplies in my stash and started playing.

I decided I wanted to matt my photo on some of this shimmery navy paper I have in my stash and that I should have a border of it around my layout too.  I thought the border would be perfect for my journaling but I wanted to be sure it would fit before I started so I grabbed my gold gel pen and wrote my journaling around the edge of my 12 x 12 shimmery navy paper.  I cut out the middle by leaving 1 inch all the way around.



I selected a background paper from the Carta Bella Space Academy pack that I bought from Aunty Vera Scrap and Craft last year, I went with Racing Rockets as I love the Solar System map on the back.
I needed to trim it so it wouldn't cover my journalling and I started by first trimming 3/4 inch off the bottom and 3/4 inch split between the 2 sides to get a 11 1/4 inch piece.  I then checked it wouldn't cover my journalling and trimmed another sliver off the bottom and side.

After some playing I decided to make the Hubble Space Telescope itself the main feature photo of this layout.  I matted it on some of the shimmery navy paper and then I started layering.  I had a small scrap of this gorgeous paper from my Crafter's Choice Galaxy paper pad so I wanted to save what was going to be behind my photo and I cut a little window out.

I added a scrap of the star paper from my Scrapping Fun Kits April 2018 kit and another layer of the shimmery navy paper and then I decided to use my husband's favourite Hubble Space Telescope photo as layer so I trimmed out what would be behind my layers, applied some Helmar Acid Free Glue to the inner edge so I could play with my layer cluster to get it just right.
I then applied Helmar Acid Free Glue around the outside of the back of my cluster and through the middle to ensure I would get all my layers adhered down.

For my title I decided on Easter Stargazers.  I decided to use some very useful Ruby Rock-It chipboard alphas and paint them gold to pull it all together with the journalling.

I adhered my chipboard alphas down with Helmar 450 Quick Dry Adhesive.

For the Stargazers part of my title I used a sticker from the sticker sheet from Carta Bella's Space Academy pack. 
I needed to adapt the Stargazer sticker to say Stargazers so I stuck a S from some old Basic Grey alphas so some white cardstock and trimmed it.  I then stuck this and the sticker down to a scrap of that shimmery navy blue paper and roughly cut around it.

As my Easter was thick chipboard I felt Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots was my best option for adhering down Stargazers as it would mean I cn adjust the height easily to suit my chipboard alphas.  I applied several dots along my word and at the S and g I added a extra on to ensure the full length of the letter would be supported.

I love how it sits up perfectly with my chipboard alphas.













My photo cluster covered over a planet on one of the outer circles so I decided to add this cool wood veneer planet I got from Corbett Creations last year to my layout as well as the cute stars that came in a pack with it.

Now that I was happy with everything I needed to adhere it to my journalled boarder but my Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots were still drying so I ran some Helmar Acid Free Glue around the inside of the journalled paper and then put down my main paper.

Using Helmar Glue gave me the wiggle room I needed to get this perfect without having to possibly rip my page if I didn't get it perfect first time.  And best of all I know my project will last a lifetime.