Guest Designer: AJ Otto

We love getting the chance to meet new faces, especially after seeing their amazing work all over the many social media outlets like Pinterest & Facebook, and personal blogs. We had the pleasure of meeting AJ Otto last month at CHA-W. We must say, she is a real gem and a true talent! She even brought us some amazing handmade gift bags with the most delicious chocolate inside... and who doesn't love gifts that contain chocolate?! When AJ brought by some of her work, we immediately decided that we needed her to fill a guest design spot! 

We will let her take it away and share her amazing talent with you all today! 

I am a sort-of-stay at home mom with a husband and two children. I began scrapbooking when I found out I was pregnant with my oldest, and it went down hill from there. I have since gotten into cards and stamping and now I find my self somewhat addicted to this little hobby of ink and paper and ribbon and all things crafty. I have a less is more sort of style, and a small obsession with patterned paper! I currently design for Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L, Spellbinders, CardMaker Blog team, and Gina K Designs

Here I stamped an Easter sentiment and attached it to my bunny patterned paper. I love polka dots, and couldn't help adding some polka dot paper for contrast!

I just loved the adorable bunny rabbit on the paper, so I die cut him out as the focal image for my card. I popped up the Easter Greetings sticker with 3D Foam Squares and adhered it to the card- I love using adding a little dimension to the stickers this way.

I found these board books at Joann's for a dollar! They were calling my name to take them home and make into mini albums. I covered each pager with the various papers from the Hope Collection, laying them out to check to see if I like the mix of patterns before permanently adhering. Since it's so many pages, I will just share a few-

For the cover, I again die cut the cute bunny and popped him up on a few other die cuts. 

I wanted to spell out Easter with letter stickers, so I used an alcohol marker and my "Lovely" elements letter stickers. 

For the first inside page, I cut a few fun banners and more die cuts. I had to use the fun little arrow sticker, not sure how many more egg hunts my youngest will participate in!! 

For second inside page, I adhered the 'Remember' sticker to a die cut and layered some seam binding behind it as well. Since the book is already so very chunky, I opted to keep embellishments flat inside.

For this card, I again used a cardstock element for the focus. I cut out the saying, and popped it up with foam tape. I die cut flowers and roughed them up a bit before adding with 3D foam squares. To finish it off, I adhered a few rhinestones to the center of my flowers, and a few sequins to my card.

Be sure to stop by AJ's personal blog and say hello, and please let her know we sent you! 

Also, check out our "We Spy..." board on Pinterest! If we spy fabulous projects using Authentique products, we might just feature you in a future blog post!