Wedding album

I have finally got back to my own wedding album and I am planning on getting it finished today to give to Phil for his birthday tomorrow but we shall see. I managed 4 pages yesterday and have 10 to go I just don't like scrapping on 8x8 I feel like it stifles my creativity but then having a kit with all the papers etc doesn't helps as I no longer like the kit as I did when I bought it but I am determined to use up some of my stash as there is so much coming out soon from Glitz and Websters especially that I want to buy lol.

So here are the 4 pages I did yesterday cross fingers I get to finish it today x

My home

The fourth weekly challenge in August was set by one of my lovely teamies Jules and I got mine done a little early so that she could use it as a sample page and then forgot to upload it here lol. The challenge was to scrap about house or home, use your favourite colours, use a list and have three of something.

This was a bit tricky for me as we move so often being a forces family I don't really have any photos about any of the houses and no real desire to scrap about any of them either. I decided to go a bit outside the box and thought of home is where the heart is and for me that is the kids. The houses change as often as yearly and Phil is often away for moneths at a time but the kids are my one constant and so home is where they are. My favourite colour is red and I love bright and bold colours, and I included a list of what I love about the kids and three birds and three hearts.

Red, White and Aqua

My final Shimelle challenge for today is her Colour Challenge. Shimelle challenged us to use a Red, White and Aqua colour scheme which is one I have used before so instantly knew which papers (Cosmo Cricket) and photo I wanted to use.

Signature accents

Over on Shimelle's blog one of her challenges from last week was the Signature Accent challenge which got me thinking what would my signature accent be? I thought about it and I do a lot of cutting, a fair amount of stamping and distressing and lots of mixed alphas but the one thing I do really use on most of my LO's are Thickers. I am fairly new to thickers but I love love love them there are so many styles, colours, textures and effects they can fit any LO. So here is my go at this challenge of Shimelle's;

Gramps

I have finally gotten up the courage to scrap my Gramps thanks to Shimelle's Bingo cards and Butterflies challenge and the August Gottacraft kit. I used the challenge LO as a sketch and the colours of the kit as well as honouring Shimelle's LO went so nicely with the photo :)

Lots of distressing and inking, a bit of stamping and hidden journalling. The photo is my Gramps in Sept 2007 with my brother Marc at a family wedding.

Going Retro

I decided to have a go at a couple of Shimelle's challenges from her online crop weekend, I have been feeling a bit lost so thought some inspiration would help me along. I started with Shimelle's Let's go Retro challenge. After doing my Dad's book for Father's day I had one old photo left from when he went on holiday with his family in 1963 before I was even thought of lol. I was very tempted to use one of the photo's I have from sorting my Gramps' things which go back to the 1890's but that would have been naughty as I need to copy them all before we do anything with them.

The photo isn't the best but it truly reflects the time when photo's were an expensive commodity and you didn't take a couple to make sure you got a good shot and way before the digital age we enjoy now where we can take several shots and delete the ones where the subject is half out frame before we move on to our next shot :) I used Websters' Pages Ladies and Gents papers and alphas and some Jenni Bowlin tickets.

Saturday Workshop pt2

So here is the second layout I completed at the workshop yesterday, I posted them seperately as this is my LO for this months' Scrapology challenge. The photo is of my beloved Nan who we lost in 2004 unfortunately this Monday just gone we lost my Gramps as well, I had a photo of me with both Nan and Gramps at my wedding and some other photo's of Gramps but I wasn't up to scrapping them yesterday. I decided to use this photo as it was as close as I was able to get to remembering my Gramps without crying.

I used Crate Paper Potrait and lace ribbon and some bling from my stash;

Saturday Workshop

Yesterday was my first ever full day workshop :) I was a little slower than I would have been at home and unfortunately started getting a migraine in the afternoon so I only got two layouts done. This is the first one I did which was for the weekly challenge on UKS;

The photos are from 3 years ago I will have to adjust the date as I wrote 2009 instead of 2008 lol when we lived near Battlesbury hill in Warminster. Of all the places we have lived this was my favourite I loved all the peace of being in the country and having so many places to take Molly on her walks. The kids used to run around and hide from her in the trees although Molly found them very quickly having a superior canine nose :)

Using sketches pt 2

Last night I completed my second LO for the sketch challenge I am running at the crop tomorrow. This one follows the sketch very closely and uses the Gottacraft kit from July.

Using sketches.

I am going to a new crop on Saturday and have volunteered to set a sketch challenge. For the challenge I have chosen two sketches from Pagemaps one for cards and one for layouts. As a lot of the people attending have not used sketches before I have decided to do two examples of each sketch one where I follow the sketch closely and one where I use it to inspire the card/layout but do not copy it as closely.

For the card sketch I chose this one and decided to use my acetate card as the example which does not follow closely as I used butterflies stamped repeatedly but not as ordered as the sketch. This is my card following the sketch closely;

For the layout sketch I chose this one and this is the LO which uses the sketch but alters it. I haven't strayed very far from the sketch but have altered it to use multiple photo's and have changed the orientation of the sketch. I am going to do the LO following the sketch closely tonight.

For both the card and LO all elements apart from AC Thickers and some gems are from July's Creative Craft World monthly kit. Thanks for popping by hope you are having a good day x

Legoland trip

We had a great day yesterday so I thought I would share a few photos with you :) We seemed to spend a great deal of the time soaking wet between the water rides and the rain but as the weather wasn't the best it seemed quieter and our longest wait for a ride was 15 minutes so the rain didn't worry us.

Hope to do some crafting tonight but I may be all together too tired as I am suffering with my fibro today after such a long day yesterday!

Smiler

Just a quick LO I did tonight as tomorrow we go to Legoland with the 3 big kids while my lovely mum comes up to baby and dog sit :) We got 3 free tickets using Tesco clubcard vouchers and have some half price tickets left from Chessington last week so the 5 of us will get in for the price of 1 child's ticket not too bad eh?

Using Gottacraft's July kit and some old old old AC sticker alphas thanks for popping by enjoy your sunday x

Acetate cards

After seeing my Acetate LO this morning the kids wanted a go (of course) So I cut a sheet of acetate to make 4 cards and decided I would do one for the Creative Craft World challenge this month as well.

So this is mine

here is Dylan with his unfortunately the light is not our friend today so none of the photos came out too well :(
Kari with hers;
Joel with his;

Scrapping on acetate

I have been wanting to do a scrapbook page on Acetate ever since I went to Olympia in March and saw Michelle Jackson-Mogford's stall and all her amazing work. Michelle better known online as mjm recently did another LO and some cards using Acetate and Alcohol inks on her blog here and here and it finally gave me the shove to stops admiring her work and give it a go. So last night I did a LO using acetate and alcohol inks and this is the result;

It was impossibly tricky to photograph it so as well as the photo up to the light to show off all the glorious ink colours I took this photo against a white background to show the LO itself off better;

I used Citrus, Pool, and Sailboat inks, Basic Grey two scoops swirly stamps, Scenic route chipboard saying and all other pp's and embellies are from June' Gottacraft kit.

So now I need to get some easels to display my Acetate LO's as this will not be the last and I also need to get more alcohol inks and some blending felts and the tool I am hooked lol. I am going to try doing some cards today so may be back later with more pics for you :) Thanks for popping by x

When in Rome....

So today's let's keep the kids amused worked out very well. It has been a rainy day and the kids have behaved better today than on day's where it has been sunny and good for playing out go figure! They started this morning playing hide n seek which Alex loves it is so sweet to hear his little 2 yr old voice shouting excitedly "I find you I find you" :D Then the big three dressed up as there own made up super heroes for a photo shoot which we are going to scrap about at a later date.

After lunch they did mosaics at a grand cost of zero to me :)

All you need is some plain card or paper, some glue, a pencil and some paint shade cards (if you get asked by a staff member why you are taking so many the property developing excuse works wonders lol)

Cut the shade cards into lots of squares you can cut the white bits off if you want I am not that patient unfortunately lol

Give each child a piece of paper/card and a pencil and get them to draw whatever they want their mosaic to be and if they want to note which colour they want where

Sit back whilst they become utterly engrossed in glueing and sticking and a little more cutting when needed

and here are the finished results;

Joel and his sea monster;

Dylan and his shark (sorry for the poor picture);

Kari and her rainbow;

We still have plenty of squares left and the ability to get lots more if needed lol and Kari has already started her second project.

Too cute

I sat down last night and completed the weekly challenge for UKS. The criteria were to use pink and/or blue, scrap in a different size or shape, use something old, and have some journalling.

I chose to scrap this photo of Dylan taken over 6 years ago looking all adorable and sweet. The pp's are from MME's Lime Twist range which were in the June Gottacraft kit and the journalling card, flowers and buttons are also from the kit. I crocheted the "lace" and the brown fibres tied in the buttons has been in my stash for years.

Thanks for popping by x

Unusual sunday crafting

I didn't scrap last night, I didn't make cards, I didn't even do any crochet or cross stitch I made a dress!

But I have jumped ahead of myself a little bit. We did family stuff yesterday morning and took the kids out to get some garden toys as they seemed to have none left that were in one piece lol. When we got home we watched the Grand Prix then I was supposed to be having "me time" for the rest of the day. Kari had other idea's though and decided to go crashing into the garden wall on Dylan's scooter resulting in nor one but two nasty cuts about 1cm apart just below her right knee.

I duly cleaned it up and searched out a large plaster but a couple of minutes later the blood was coming through the paster and showing no signs of stopping and so off to the minor injuries unit we went. Thankfully the wait time wasn't too bad yesterday so we were only there around an hour. Kari had to have steri strips and glue to hold it all together but it has still bled through onto the dressing which I am not sure it should.

When we eventually got home and the kids were fed I shut myself in the dining room to have my (very delayed and now much shortened) me time. I had seen the link for the Pillowcase dress on Fi's blog and thought I would give it a go and so made a dress for Kari. I had to alter the pattern slightly to make it a little larger but am really happy with how it turned out;

My idea was to make this for Kari see how I found it with my fibro and if I could make some for the charity. I remembered why I hadn't done any quilting for a while I do find sitting at my sewing machine fairly tough on my fibro so I may get a couple done for the charity but it will take me a while and I promised Kari I would do her two so I have another to do for her as well.