Review by Laurel Lakey

Okay, so there I was, on a Saturday afternoon, almost ready to go out to a birthday party for a friend of mine, when I suddenly realized that I had forgotten to get her a present! I was in trouble – the party was just a couple of hours away, and I had nothing prepared to give her.

Luckily for me though, I had Scrap Girls! So I jumped on my computer, pulled up my brush collection, and decided to make my friend some coupons for her birthday. And what did I use to make these cute gifts? Layer Your Own Brushes, of course!

So here’s how I did it. First, I opened a new 4x8.5in document, and placed two papers from Amanda Sok’s Charisma Collection onto the document for my background. Then I started to use the Layer Your Own Brushes.

TIP: Always use each brush on its own separate layer. That way you can move each layer around to line them up, add Styles to separate pieces, and play with their Blend Modes.

So on a new layer, I chose the brush that I wanted to use, and stamped it in white to match the collection’s color scheme.

Then I wanted to add some embellishments to the coupon, so I used another Layer Your Own Brush in Amanda’s set on a new layer, and colored it dark green to stand out a little from the type. Then I placed this new layer behind the type so that the scrolly work wouldn’t cover up the type, just accent it a little bit.

Tip: Just as a reminder, now would be the perfect time to save your layout!

Once the basic design was there, I wanted to add some Layer Styles to the individual parts of the coupon to give them dimension and interest. Luckily, since I had brushed each element on its own layer, it was easy to add different Styles to the separate layers.

First I started with the purple background paper and added a Paper Style from Shalae Tippetts. Then I did a nice Glitter Style from Amanda Sok on the decorative swirl embellishment. Finally, I took the text of the coupon and used a clipping mask to clip some cool, textured paper to it from Erica Hite’s Just the Basics Papers.

Once I was happy with the first coupon, I went ahead and created a few more to put together as a gift for my friend. I found that I could fit three of these coupons on one 8.5x11 page by resizing them a little bit. So I made three coupons, printed them out, and then hand-wrote what I wanted them to say for a more personal touch.

This is just one of the many, many Layer Your Own Brush Sets available in the boutique. You can also do a baby shower invitation with Erica’s Layer Your Own: Onesie Brush Set, or a cool-looking paper with Mandy’s Layer Your Own: Argyle Brush Set. You could even make a set of recipe cards with Brandie’s Layer Your Own Recipe Card Brush Set.

The sky is the limit with these great brushes, so go check them out!

Layout by Laurel Lakey
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	Note: Commercial license versions of ScrapSimple Layer Your Own: Onesie, ScrapSimple Layer Your Own: Argyle Brush Set Biggie, ScrapSimple Layer Your Own: Recipe Card 1 Brush Set Biggie, ScrapSimple Tools - Styles: Paper Textures 4902 and ScrapSimple Paper Templates: Get The Edge are also available.

Laurel lives in Southern California with her husband of three years. They have an 18-month-old son named Eli. She is always doing something with ScrapGirls and is eagerly anticipating the arrival of the final Harry Potter book on Saturday!