March 2023 - Killing that Kit

 Before I get to Kill that Kit, I want to give a HUGE thanks to Amanda Castle for being our guest designer this month! She jumped in with so much enthusiasm and it was really fun to see what she created this month!

One last look at the kit for this month - Time to Thrive Digital Kit from Traci Reed

To be totally honest, I'm not the best at killing a kit. My stash is not very large so most of the time at the end of the month I just put the papers back in their "home" and the ephemera back in the drawer for that designer. 

March in Houston, TX is Rodeo season (yes, the kind with cowboys and bull riding and livestock shows), so I've decided to make this a Round Up Post with a list of ideas for killing your kit, some provided by me and others from the Master Forgers in our community. I'd love to hear YOUR suggestions for killing your kit! Please comment below or post in our Facebook group.

1) Choose a Daily Challenge (or weekly or whatever works with your schedule) I just LOVE the way that Master Forger Tara chose to embrace the 30 Days of Sketches from Christy's Beautiful Life in the month of March. She created a process video for ALL 30 Sketches! If you're really goal oriented, you can knock out A LOT of layouts by completing a daily challenge like that. 

Here are some of the layouts Tara created with her kit this month:

(for the record, she actually finished close to 50 layouts this month, these were just a couple of her favorites)

In the month of April I'm going to join the Paper Issues Bingo challenge, you can request a BINGO card by emailing paperissues@gmail.com and complete it at your own pace. If you complete your card you can be entered for a drawing from Paper Issues!

2) Make a stash of cards for birthdays, anniversaries or to just send to brighten up a friend's day. In January I was so determined I wanted to kill as much of my kit as possible so I spent almost an entire day just making cards from the left over papers and scraps and playing with my collection of stamps (some of which I had never used before!) 

Our guest designer for March, Brandi Jo, created some amazing spring ad Easter cards in addition to her beautiful layouts! Here are some of the cards Brandi Jo created:

3) Make a Themed Mini Album - Mini Albums (I prefer 6x8) are a great way to use up an entire kit! In fact I do this a lot with the mini albums I create, I typically just use a specific collection and all the products that go along with it but I think it would be super fun to mix and match with elements from my CKC kit too. Two of my favorite kit albums so far are my October Album (I used the October 31st collection from Simple Stories) and my Documenting December 2022 Album (that one I used and KILLED the kit!)

You can easily use die cuts to cut a large shape to create a shaped album as well (I just learned how to do this from watching a tutorial on the Stamps of Life website last night!) Sometimes it's just nice to change things up a little and a mini album is the perfect way to do that!

4) Start with the End in Mind - This might be a no brainer for most people who scrap chronologically or by a specific theme, but my squirrel brain does not always think logically. Choosing a specific event to document with your monthly kit is a great way (I've found) to keep focused and motivated (because you want to scrap all the photos from the event!) and to use more of your kit! Back in September I chose the photos from the Renaissance Festival (because that's about as Fall as it gets around here) and I knocked out multiple layouts with my kit and also had fun reliving some of those memories!

5) Make Tags with pattern paper (thank you Julene for this idea) - Tags are so fun to create and make the best base for embellishment clusters! In fact before I even started really focusing on scrapbooking I hosted an entire month of art tag making over on Instagram! I called it Tag You're It and it was so fun! An really tags are even a perfect base for MINI ALBUMS! (see item number 3 above)

6) Use punches or dies to cut shapes to use in embellishments or save for later (thank you Misty for suggesting this)

YES! Break out those dies and don't be afraid to fussy cut some of your pattern papers! I did this with the squirrel (me), hedgehog (my kiddo) and rabbit (my honey) in some of my Maggie Holmes paper and I also used my stitched circle dies to fussy cut some specific phrases from a sheet of Pinkfresh paper. 

Well, that about wraps it up for March! 

You know that we always love to see your work, so please share your kits and projects with us. You can post them in our Facebook Community or share them on Instagram (we are @counterfeitkitchallenge or tag us using #counterfeitkitchallenge and #ckcmarch2023).

Thanks so much for stopping by! We can't wait to see your kits and projects this month!

Be sure to stop by on April 1st (no joke) for the next Counterfeit Kit Challenge reveal.