Play in Our Current (July) Challenges

Click the images below to find our current challenges, along with beautiful inspiration from our design team and guest designers. Both challenges stay open until the end of the month.

Play to win one a prize from one of our 13 July sponsors!

Congratulations to our June Sponsor Prize Winners!

We'd like to thank everyone who participated in our June challenges, and a HUGE thank you to our generous June sponsors!

PRIZE WINNERS:

Randomly selected from our players who were placed Under Surveillance:

Winner of the 2Crafty Prize Pack - Jess Mackenzie
Winner of the Cocoa Vanilla store voucher - Caroline Ducharme
Winner of the Creative Embellishments gift certificate - Lisa Moen (this was before Lisa was a DT member)
Winner of the Lindy's Gang gift certificate - Amanda Hartmann
Winner of the Scrapmatts prize pack - Elisabeth
Winner of the Scrapbooker's Confetti Box prize pack - Wendy Crowe

Randomly selected from all of our players who solved our May Case Files:
Winner of the digital kit from a2z Scrapbooking - Barb Holmes
Winner of the Dies R Us gift certificate - Cynthia B
Winner of the Imagine Crafts gift certificate - Anna
Winner of the FabScraps prize pack - Piia
Winner of the Maja Design "Summertime" collection - Lauren Mullarkey
Winner of the subscription to Mixed-Up Magazine - Deanna Deaton

Randomly Selected from our American or Canadian players:
Winner of the goodie box from Cocoa Daisy - Wendy Crowe

Randomly Selected from Our Australian players:
Winners of the Scrapbook Fantasies prize - Bridget Blake

Aussie Apprentice winner:
Winner of the Scrap Matrix gift certificate - Amanda Hartmann

Star Witnesses:
Winners of the Scrapbook Fantasies prizes - Kylie gW & Elisabeth


To claim your prize, please send a me a private message with your email, mailing address, and phone number via the CSI Facebook Page by August 15. Please also indicate which month and which prize you won.

Under Surveillance - Our Favorites from June

A big thank you to everyone who participated in our June challenges. We have chosen our favorite layouts inspired by the June Case Files. (Sorry for the delay again. My husband took me away for a little vacation.)

Congratulations to all of our players who are highlighted! You can grab your badges here.

Here are our favorites from Case File No. 255. Here's a reminder of the Case File they used:

For each Case File, three of our favorite layouts are chosen to feature as our "Most Wanted." (We had a tie again this month, so we chose four.)

Lynette Jacobs

Caroline Ducharme

Bridget Blake

Judy W

Tell your story. It's our tagline, and here at CSI, it's one of our missions to get our members to delve deeper into journaling--to document the meaningful bits and pieces that make up our lives. We would like to shine a special spotlight each week on a member who did an exceptional job telling their story. And we'd like to thank Scrapbook Fantasies for donating a wonderful prize to our Star Witness for each Case File.

Kylie gW

We love the little peek inside Kylie's creative mind revealed through her journaling, and we delighted in her clever title accompanied by the playful seal at the bottom of the page!

Here are a few more that caught our eye...

Denisescrappt

Elisabeth

Wendy Crowe

And here are our favorites from Case File No. 256. Here's a reminder of the Case File they used:

Yeah, we had a tie again, so there are actually five favorites!

Lisa Moen (created before she became a Detective)

Amanda Hartmann

StacyLee

Lynette Jacobs

Giorgia Rossini

Elisabeth Hatlen

We're not sure exactly what Elisabeth's journaling says about her trip to Aberdeen, Scotland, but we love how she jumped into the Creativity Portal summer writing prompts, number 14, which said "go with the flow," and she certainly did, making her reflections center stage in her design!

Jess Mackenzie

Cynthia B

Piia

linolas blogg

Case File No. 258 - Deadline: July 31, 2018

Hi, CSI Fans! We're back with our mid-month challenge, another fun one for your summer photos.

Our challenges stay open all month long. And did you know that you are welcome to submit as many layouts as you'd like for the challenges? We also don't mind if you combine our challenge with other challenges or with your design team work. We are here to inspire you to scrap and tell your story!

So, are you ready for the new challenge? Grab you forensics kits, CSI players, and get ready for some serious sleuthing as we open Case File No. 258.

CASE FILE

We are celebrating summer with our Case Files this month! To help us do that, we found this summery Scene by Brooklyn artist Danielle Kroll to inspire our Case File.

Feel free to interpret the Case File in any way that inspires you, or for our traditional clues, scroll down to the bottom of this post.

For our Russian players, Detective Anastasia has translated our Case File into Russian:

Правила на русском языке вы можете прочитать здесь.

SPONSORS

We're so excited to have thirteen generous sponsors this month! Our sponsors are among the best in the crafting industry, offering unique and trendy products. CLICK HERE to read more about these generous sponsors and the prizes they're donating.

GUEST DESIGNERS

We're excited have talented design team members from Scrapmatts and Therm O Web joining us as Guest Detectives. Therm O Web's teams' work will be presented for the July 15 Case File.

INSPIRATION

So...are you ready for some serious inspiration?

The awesome design team from Scrapmatts rocked the Case File:

Elena's blog

Jodie's blog

Lizzy's blog

How Lizzy solved the Case File: I have used the colors, and I documented a trip to the beach. I also used beach elements, circles, wet medium (water color).

Tania's blog

How Tania solved the Case File: My inspiration came from the colours. I used Stripes, Beach Elements, Wet Medium and Shell Elements.

Our Guest Detectives from the Therm O Web design team did a beautiful job solving the Case:

Shemaine's blog

How Shemaine solved the Case File: Here's my layout that I created for this challenge. I drew my inspiration from the color scheme and summer theme. I wanted to incorporate the black and white with the polka dot patterned paper. I also loved the summer theme and felt it was a good fit with photos from my daughter's 10th Birthday Luau party.

Daniela's blog

Here's how Daniela solved Case File No. 257. I used pops of yellow from the inspiration photo, I was inspired by the clouds and added my own die cut clouds with Deco Foil Polka Dots. I added various circle elements and flowers. I documented something about summer. Here's a reminder of what Case File No.257 looks like:

Here is how the CSI Detectives have expertly cracked the case. You can read more about how the Case File inspired them on their blogs (links on sidebar).

How Marinella solved the Case File: I was inspired by the colors of the Scene and beach theme. I use stripes, watercolors and modelling paste for the background. I used flowers, sun and blue and white elements. I used a tag for journaling and I document an happy drink on the beach with friends

How Lisa-Marie solved the Case File: I was inspired by the stripes, playing cards and circles - so I incorporated all three of these into my layout. Instead of a shell - I copied the design / shape and used a fan instead - I adhered it so that it looked like my daughter had it in her hand. I also added some sun chippies for additional interest.

How Sue solved the Case File: I was inspired by the colours, the beach scene and the sea for the watercolour background. I have used elements from the scene; circles, stripes, chevrons, glasses.

How Lisa solved the Case File: I was inspired by the colors and beach theme. I used nautical elements,animal and a wet medium. I documented a beach trip.

How Laura solved the Case File: I used stripes, nautical items, whale and octopus and seagull, watercolors, and shells. I journaled about the coast (beach).

How Nina solved the Case File: I was inspired by the beach scene, and chose to document a playful swimming lesson at the cabin a few years ago. I used all the colours.

How Debbi solved the Case File: The beach scene on the Case File reminded me of last summer when Tracee and I spent the day at the Chesapeake Bay. We were trying to take a selfie of us making fish faces in front of this restaurant that had a giant fish on the front of the building. The sun was in our eyes, and we couldn't quite get our mouths right, but we sure had a lot of laughs and some fun pictures as consolation. I used several of the traditional clues--Evidence: stripes, beach elements, animals, wet medium; and for Testimony, I used the topic of documenting a trip to the bay.

How Debbi solved the Case File: I couldn't help but create a 4th of July layout. I mainly drew inspiration from the Color Scheme, substituting yellow for the sand color, and the stripes.

How Natsuko solved the Case File: I was inspired by the colors and the beach. I scattered the photos and elements like the picture, and used stamps for sketchy patterns.

How Louise solved the Case File: This page was all about the story! I chose some beach photos of Master Z very unimpressed because he's "All wet!". Watercolour stripes, sparkly sand chipboards and nautical themed elements.

Louise made a process video for us! Check it out:

How Annie solved the Case File: I went old school again with this one, using all the colours in the Scheme and several items from the Evidence to document this memory about a trip to the seaside in 2011. I also used the Scene as a kind of sketch to inspire my design.

How Libeeti solved the Case File: Inspired by the theme of the seaside, I used all 5 colors. From the clues I used: stripes, noutical elements, animal, circles, wet medium, something grainy (embossign powder, texture modeling paste and mini art stones) and shells (real and stamped). I documented one of our visits to the Red Sea.

Libeeti made a process video for us too! Check it out:

How Michelle solved the Case File: I was inspired by the blues particularly in the colour palette, along with the stripes, as it reminds me of my favourite old deck chair and umbrella  I also just had to use this great beachy photo of my two great nephews. The sun was the perfect cut file to set it off.

How Taru solved the Case File: My inspiration was the inspiration photo and red like berries.

How Vivian solved the Case File: The orange colour inspired this layout this time, since orange always reminds me of my ginger haired son. The photos are outtakes of a passport style photo session that we were doing at home, so that he could add his picture to his black belt certificate.

Because I didn't have that shade of orange in my stash, it gave me the opportunity to go shopping at my local scrap booking store, where I found the wooden circle piece. While I was there, I thought about finding some watercolours, and the owner told be about a faux watercolour technique using distress inks. So I gave it a try at home, combined with some stenciling and surprise, surprise, I actually did some mixed media again!

I didn't think I'd like working with the bright orange, but in the end, I really really love how this page turned out. That's what I love most about CSI - how it pushes me to step outside my comfort zone with every combo.

How Patty solved the Case File: I was inspired by the colors and a story that has been on-going for two and a half years.

How Ginger solved the Case File: l loved this one for it was about swimming at it reminded me of my grandkids having fun in their pool. The colors are so beautiful and really shows up the photos!

CASE FILE CLUES 

Choose as few or as many as you are inspired to use!

EVIDENCE

• Stripes
• Watercolor pattern
• Sketchy patterns
• Beach/nautical elements
• Lobster or other animal
• Cards
• Glasses
• Circles
• Wet medium
• Embossing powder or something else grainy like sand.
• Sun
• Fringe
• Elements from the Scene, like candy, ice cream, bikini, shells, pail, beach ball, etc.

TESTIMONY (JOURNALING IDEAS)

• Topic: Document a trip to the beach or other place near water.
• Prompt Idea: Choose a July question.
• Presentation: Add journaling to stripes on your paper.
• Writing Format: Write a list of things you need to bring to whatever event is in your photo.
• Inspiration Words: relax, entertain, away

THE SCHEME

• 114.191.211 – bright sky blue
• 71.94.144 – navy blue
• 255.255.251 – white
• 238.79.39 – red with a hint of orange
• 246.239.221 - sand

We trust we've left enough clues for you to solve the case!

The deadline for completing this Case File is Tuesday, July 31, at 11:59 p.m. EST. Be sure to link your layout using the link tool in the sidebar, and mention the Evidence and Testimony clues you used. Also, please title your link with your name and country.