Graphic 45 Place in Time Calendar

Hello! I'm Annette Green and I'm thrilled to be posting for my first time as a new Eclectic Paperie Design Team member. My project today is an 8 x 8 desktop calendar featuring the wonderful Graphic 45 Place in Time 12 x 12 paper pad and 8 x 8" easel album, with a mix of die cuts from Tim Holtz for embellishment.

Here's a quick look at the project...

You may be wondering why I chose to use 12 x 12 paper with the 8 x 8 easel album. After all, there is an 8 x 8 pad of the same paper, as well as a 12 x 12 easel album. So why mix them up? Mainly because the proportions of the images in the larger paper pad were more in tune with my project plan for an 8 x 8 easel album. 

Here's a look at how it came together, then be sure to check out all the images from each month below. (Lots of photos, so you might want to grab a cup of coffee and get comfy.)

This is the back side of the page which has the month's name on it. I liked this printed border so I just had to figure out how to get it smaller.

I created a template from chipboard measuring 7 x 7 3/4 inches, then sliced it down the middle diagonally to create these two pieces. Placed into this position on the paper for each month, I cut along the template with a craft knife and ruler to keep the lines nice and straight.

Then I pieced those two corner together using clear tape on the back side. It's not extremely perfect, but worked pretty well. This now becomes the base for each month's page.

Each page in the pad has this similar set-up. This shows how I began each month's cuts.

This shows where I flipped the paper over and used the back side. In some cases, I altered this a bit if I needed more contrast. For example, the upper right piece: I cut away the border along its bottom and cut another piece from the Christmas tree border below it. But in other cases, I left the border there because I liked it. (Make sense?)

I cut three of the four postage stamp images from the page and then trimmed around them with my very old pair of tiny scalloped scissors. It almost matches the stamp exactly! I inked the edges of each piece with Walnut Stain to fix any imperfections.

This is how each page starts out. The top banner backgrounds were cut with assorted border punches.

Each month's page has this same format. 

For easy embellishment that wasn't too bulky, I made die-cuts (all from Tim Holtz).

Each page also has three large tags to choose from. In this case "Be Merry."

The calendar portion with the dates was created by first cutting the page apart with all the months, inking the edges, then hand-stamping the numbers with black ink. This took a bit of time, but worth doing. (and I couldn't figure out an easier way to do it, honestly.)

Okay, now that you get how it all came together, here's a look at each month...

I'm a big BIG fan of Graphic 45 papers, but I have to say that the Place In Time papers are most definitely my all-time favorite so far. So with some of the beautiful leftover pieces, I just had to make a little something more. To check out my Bonus Project, visit my blog. 

Thanks for visiting the EP Blog today. Have a wonderful weekend!