See the Good Mini Album by Steffi Ried

I don't know how she (Stefanie Ried) does it. Every single mini album she makes is golden and completely unique! I mean, words can't do it justice. Pictures are worth a thousand words :) I asked her to make a mini album featuring the Turn the Page Layerable Stamp Set and she took it to a whole new level. Take a gander:

Hello and welcome to a new project with the new collection Turn the Page. Have you seen the great stamps? I find the flowers, leaves, and butterflies very sweet. And they fit easily into all projects. I have created with this a 3D mini book. There are cards with this effect and I wanted to try with a mini album.

First I picked the papers. I used Paper 01, Paper 09, and Paper 23. I like the colors very much and they have a light touch of autumn. The photo, which is on the last page, is the central point of the album. There is a wreath of leaves, flowers, and stars.

Through the leporello binding, the stamped flowers and leaves can be fastened on all sides around the punched circle. This makes a great eye-catcher. For stamping the leaves I used a black ink pad. The flowers were first stamped in coral and pink. Then came the embossing powder in white, peach, and rose. Due to the embossing powder the color covers very well and looks beautiful.

The cut out circle is very large and the edge narrow. For this page, I used a large photo with the motif on the upper left so it fits well on this side.

At the back, the large, round photo is matted on several patterned paper circles and stitched in place.

The stars I embossed with copper powder. So I have a nice color combination between the photos, papers, and motifs.

I also have a video about the origins of the album. Have fun watching!

I hope you like this album. With little effort and the great stamps + papers, wonderful albums can be created. You can also expand the album by many more pages! I will definitely try it!

SUPPLIES: TURN THE PAGE: Paper 01, Paper 09, Paper 23, 6x6 Paper Pad, 12x12 Paper Pad, Layerable Stamp Set, Ribbon, Ephemera Die Cuts, Pennant Paper Clips, Wood Veneer, Chipboard Stickers, Puffy Stickers, Sticker Book

Blog: steffiried.blogspot.com / Instagram: @steffiried / Pinterest: @steffiried / Facebook: stefanie.ried.96 YouTube: Steffi Ried

Just three spreads of amazingness and awesomeness in this album - and yet I feel like I could keep looking at these pages for hours on end, there's so much detail!! Leave it to Steffi to make us all inspired to create more minis :)

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Teotihuacan Pyramids

On our third day in Mexico City we hopped a train to go and explore the ancient Teotihuacan Pyramids. Since I had done pretty much zero research about this trip, I was so overwhelmed with how awesome this place is! Never seen or been to anywhere like it! The world is amazing.

Armed with our "sneakers and sunscreen" (the only two recommendations, ha!) we started huffing it towards to the Pyramid of the Moon.

Stop for a selfie! That first pyramid waaaaay back there was our first goal!

From Wikipedia: Teotihuacan is an ancient Mesoamerican city located in a sub-valley of the Valley of Mexico, located in the State of Mexico 25 miles northeast of modern-day Mexico City, known today as the site of many of the most architecturally significant Mesoamerican pyramids built in the pre-Columbian Americas. At its zenith, perhaps in the first half of the 1st millennium AD, Teotihuacan was the largest city in the pre-Columbian Americas, with a population estimated at 125,000 or more, making it at least the sixth largest city in the world during its epoch. Apart from the pyramids, Teotihuacan is also anthropologically significant for its complex, multi-family residential compounds, the Avenue of the Dead, and the small portion of its vibrant murals that have been exceptionally well-preserved. Additionally, Teotihuacan exported fine obsidian tools that garnered high prestige and widespread usage throughout Mesoamerica. The city is thought to have been established around 100 BC, with major monuments continuously under construction until about 250 AD. The city may have lasted until sometime between the 7th and 8th centuries AD, but its major monuments were sacked and systematically burned around 550 AD. Teotihuacan began as a new religious centre in the Mexican Highlands around the first century AD. This city came to be the largest and most populated centre in the pre-Columbian Americas. Teotihuacan was even home to multi-floor apartment compounds built to accommodate this large population. Although it is a subject of debate whether Teotihuacan was the centre of a state empire, its influence throughout Mesoamerica is well documented; evidence of Teotihuacano presence can be seen at numerous sites in Veracruz and the Maya region. The later Aztecs saw these magnificent ruins and claimed a common ancestry with the Teotihuacanos, modifying and adopting aspects of their culture. The ethnicity of the inhabitants of Teotihuacan is also a subject of debate. Possible candidates are the Nahua, Otomi, or Totonac ethnic groups.
Teotihuacan is the most visited archaeological site in Mexico!

The amount of detail in the foundations is astounding - someone had to place each and every little rock to get this cool pattern, and they were everywhere!


Men and women were parked in the sun and shade all around selling trinkets.

One of the many well-preserved murals, I think this one was of a leopard.

Me in front of the Pyramid of the Sun (the biggest one), Chris in front of the Pyramid of the Moon, and Chris documenting the excursion.

We made it to our first pyramid! Next step: UP! (literally, steps up, lol).

The city's broad central avenue called the Avenue of the Dead is flanked by impressive ceremonial architecture, including the immense Pyramid of the Sun - the third largest pyramid in the world after the Great Pyramid of Cholula and the Great Pyramid of Giza! The Pyramid of the Moon and The Ciudadela with the Temple of the Feathered Serpent Quetzalcoatl are placed at the both ends of the Avenue.

Doggies basking in the sun on the steps of the pyramids.

Then we climbed the big kahuna: the Pyramid of the Sun.

Interesting fact, the interior of the Pyramid of the Sun has never been fully excavated.

Super rocky texture on the side and pretty mini sunflowers (my favorite flower).

View from the top. So green! I can't believe it!

Look closely at this photo and you'll see me arms stretched up high at the top! I'm standing at the top right corner, to the left of those two dark spots of people.

The drive to and from Teotihuacan was a rainbow of color! Made me soooo happy!

Such a fantastic day at the Teotihuacan Pyramids! I highly recommend it if you're ever in Mexico City!

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Le Mont Saint Michel Mini Album

I started this mini album back in the hotel when we were moving from Germany to the states this past July so you can see it's taken awhile to finish - I just kept adding pages!! That's the beauty of mini albums though, you can keep going or call it good even after a few spreads! The cover is made from Turn the Page Paper 23 - I trimmed a 4x6" section and simply stitched through the printed lines using the same color of thread. I machine stitched the Thickers and mini alphabet Sticker title in place and the album is tied shut with some floral printed Ribbon. Everything you see with the exception of just a few things is from my Turn the Page collection!

Here is the flip through so you can see how this album looks IRL:

There were SO.MANY. photos from our day at Le Mont Saint Michel that I wanted to include, I had the hardest time narrowing them down. In the end I created three entire spreads solely dedicated to  2x2 mini photos and every other spread includes a full 4x6" photo of my absolute faves.

The base is made from smooth white cardstock sheets that were trimmed into 6x12", folded into (3) 4" sections, and then accordion folded. I made six of these accordion pages and then attached each one together with Washi Tape to make the world's biggest accordion album base, lol. On the first spread I added a photo to the right side with the date we went stamped onto a label, etc, and the left page is typed and printed journaling onto a floral Journaling die cut on top of a bunch of Stamped leaves!

I rounded all the corners so that they wouldn't get bent and torn over time and from being handled. This spread contains an insert that I attached with Washi Tape and stitched through it. The embellishments that I made didn't quite match and I found one more photo I wanted to add, so this insert was the perfect solution. The left side is a photo with typed/printed/trimmed journaling and then this side of the insert is a 4x6" piece of Paper 22 with a white washed background and a butterfly Ephemera Die Cut on top along with a tangle of thread a-la Missy Whidden.

On the left side, this is the other photo I wanted to include :) Peace out haha. The right side is a-la Steffi Ried - I love how she stitches through her lines of embellishments so I tried that with the Sequins.

I made these patterned paper flowers while we were staying with my parents and didn't have immediate plans for them. They fit nicely here! Can you spot the little French knot and flower Sequin in the center of each one? They were fun to make :) On the right photo all I did was slide on a Pennant Paper Clip. Easy peasy!

This next spread has lots and lots of 2x2 photos! Half are glued right down and the other half are attached with Washi Tape so you can lift them up and read some captions/journaling. Embellished with patterned paper, chipboard, and puffy sticker butterflies! I love all the colors.

Here I fussy cut all these sentiment bubbles from a paper in the 6x6 Paper Pad and adhered them with foam tape. In Photoshop I copied/pasted some journaling from my blog onto a photo, printed it out, trimmed it down, and glued it in place!

No photo on this spread! It's probably where I meant that other photo to go but it must have slipped out at some point and I forgot... Anyway! I used a lot of Wood Veneer and machined stitched around each one. I left some of the spaces empty so I could write journaling. I like mixing hand written and printed journaling in my mini books.

Another full 2x2 photo spread! Told ya I have a hard time narrowing down photos! In between each photo I trimmed a super thin piece of patterned paper and stitched it in place. I added a "moments" die cut with transparency "embrace the" stickers above for a sweet sentiment.

I die cut a design that reminds me of the window in that 2x2 right above! I backed it with lots of 6x6 Papers. One of my dilemma's at the beginning was I had lots of vertical and horizontal photos that I wanted to include full-size, but it seems silly to have to keep rotating the album for them to be oriented the right way. Sooooo! The front side of the album is all vertical and then once you get to the end, you flip it over and everything is horizontal! This colorful back page makes a nice segue.

This other half of the album contains a lot more mixed media: acrylic paint and watercolors. I made a sentiment page from a mix of all the different kinds of alphabets found in Turn the Page and stitched a floral die cut trimmed in half to the top and bottom. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the kingdom in Tangled was directly inspired by Mont Saint Michel?

The top half of this spread is 2x2 Paper Pad pieces trimmed a little bit smaller and then I tied a bow from each of the 5 Ribbons - the 6th one (bottom right) is the colorful striped ribbon tied backwards. The bottom is a cute photo of Jane with the magical mountain still visible in the background as we drove away, and then topped with various embellishments.

Similar to what this spread looks like on the opposite side, I added embellishments inside each section and journaled in the larges one. Jane hugs animal statues! It's just what she does!

Here is the final 2x2 photo spread and once again I glued some and attached those with captions with Washi Tape!

I made a banner for my little sister's baby blessing gathering last weekend and I love the patterned papers she chose. I used the scraps to punch circles and folded them over bits of white string to make banners. I think I'm going to show how to do this technique in Paige's Pages 14 at Big Picture Classes - coming in September I believe!

On this second to last spread I used watercolors (I would have used ink pads but my colored inks are still with all our stuff - but BEST NEWS EVER our stuff is getting delivered this Friday!!! Better than Christmas!) to Stamp butterflies and I actually love the soft and pretty look the watercolors make! So maybe it's a good thing I didn't have access to my inks! More typed/printed/trimmed journaling on top and I didn't do anything to the photo. I may go and add something later but for now it feels finished.

For the last spread I used my cloud trio cut file and before peeling them off the mat I watercolored over them. Once dry, I used spray adhesive to attach them to the top and wrote my closing thoughts with a white pen.


All-in-all I am still LOVING making mini albums!! I am so inspired to keep documenting our travels so I'm going to start the next one right away!

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Chillin' Layout

Here is the last of my layouts from Paige's Pages 13 at Big Picture Classes! This layout features a paper weaving technique.

I love love love the colors in the Summer Lights collection by Pink Paislee, and even though it has a lot of water-themed embellishments, the colors were spot-on with this photo of Fox in Reykjavik Iceland in front of a painted mural.

 To learn how to make this paper weaving pattern, hop on over to Paige's Pages 13 and watch the process video!

Patterned paper, die cuts, chipboard, stickers: Summer Lights by Pink Paislee; Watercolors: Loew Cornell; Pen, adhesive: American Crafts

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