Designing with Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Designing with Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

On the Road in South Dakota

In our new Diamond Mine Die series of dies, there are a multitude of options for designing a layout. Today I’ll feature three of those dies, the Diamond Die 4×4, The Diamond Mine Cross and the Diamond Mine 3×4 dies. I’ll use Pattern #344 a mostly squares pattern to complete my layout. I’ve used the “Between the Toes” Grid from the new Summer Grid Collection.

Mosaic Moments Pattern #344 a mostly squares pattern

Mosaic Moments Diamond Mine Dies and Between the Toes Grid paper from the Summer grid paper collection

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies featuring Summer Grid Collection

I have a travel-themed layout that makes a good page to introduce my vacation with a few of the places we visited. I’ve incorporated one of my favorite additions, a map. I’ve used a travel guide map from South Dakota to surround my photos.

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

The map sections relate to the photos and the areas that the rest of the album will represent. By a series of fussy cuts to isolate the areas of the map I needed it was easy to use the Diamond Mine 3×4 Die to cut to fit each section. They are embedded into the cut die section framing. These sections were cut in a green darker than the base grid and close to the color of green in the map outlining each of the counties. The smaller triangles in the corner I cut in black.

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies and travel maps

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies

Each of the corner sections of the pattern are filled with a portion of photo and a portion of a map cut using the Diamond Mine Cross die. The map sections used here are out-takes from the previous die cut, it keeps it close to the same area, although not exact.

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

The center section of the pattern is sized just right for the Diamond Mines 4×4 Die. I’ve cut this one in black cardstock; I thought I’d like to draw your eyes to the center and it balances with the black triangle corners in the 3×4 sections. With a little bit of careful planning, I cut the photo to fit both dies (the 3×4 and the 4×4) for four photos ‘on point’ as diamonds.

I haven’t included any journaling or tags and titles for this page; I wanted the map to do the talking for me, featuring Sioux Falls, the Badlands, the Black Hills and Mitchell, South Dakota. The pages that will follow will tell those stories in due course.

Included with these dies are a few suggestions of patterns and how to use the dies and you will love exploring the possibilities.

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies

Mosaic Moments Designing With Dies: The Diamond Mine Dies and Travel maps

Be creative! Try including maps in your next travel layout to help you tell your story.

Andrea Fisher