First Hybrid page

I love Websters Pages you may have guessed that lol. Whilst browsing around their website the other day I discovered they had some free digi frames to match their new collections and so I downloaded a few. I used the frames with a photo and printed out the whole thing frame and photo on photo paper to use with the paper collection.

This is my first proper Hybrid (I have used digi stamps a couple of times) and shows me aged 2 with my new telephone toy;

I was on a little roll last night DH was out with work and I got this page done using the gorgeous Gottacraft Kit featuring Lily Bee Memorandum papers and stickers (I love this line). The page shows our eldest finally getting how to tie laces this summer. He has Aspergers and the dexterity required was something he really struggled with and it was such a small but important acheivement for him;

Finally I am trying to get some LO's done of our second son Dylan who has the least pages done about him so far :( This page shows the presents he got for his birthday this year first wrapped and then unwrapped and I am going to do another page with all the blurred photo's where he was ripping paper with gusto lol. I used MME Lime Twist FLy and Kite papers;

My Dolly (photo heavy)

Today I sat down and spent a couple of hours making my entry for the Scrapology November challenge F is for Fabric Flowers. The LO that inspired the challenge was by a very talented lady who is a facebook friend Hannah Young and this is the sketch from the LO;

I chose this photo from when I was just a 3 year old babe to scrap;

and this is the finished LO (layout);

But you say she said Photo heavy??!! Well I have gained some lovely new followers and one of them commented that she couldn't "do" scrapping. So I am going to go through my process in making this page to show Judie that it isn't as disimilar from making the beautiful cards she makes, and all you need to do is swap your stamped/decoupage/other image for a photo or two (or 3 or 4) and get a bit bigger.

I decided that I wanted to use white cardstock as the photo is fairly old and a little dark so I wanted to keep everything as light as possible to make it easier to see the photo but I inked the edge with pink ink to soften it a little. I went with the lovely aqua and pink tones of Glitz' Beautiful Dreamer line and then placed papers and photo together on the card to ensure they all match nicely;

I then went through my embellishments and picked through several that would go with the papers and could make the final LO depending on how they looked once the papers were cut to size;

As the challenge involved fabric flowers I made these three flowers to go on my layout;

I decided which papers I wanted to use and where and cut them to size. I then arranged them and the selected embellishments to fit the sketch until I had a LO I was happy with;

Finally I distressed, punched, and stuck down the papers. Added the journalling and photo and then adding the final embellishments and title;

Thanks for popping by as always I am so pleased when someone likes one of my projects enough to leave a comment and I hope this has encouraged my card-making followers to give scrapping a go.

Art journalling with inks

This morning hubby was out, 3 big kids were glued to Spongebob and little man and I had nothing to do. I have wanted to do some more for my Art Journal but can't get paints out when the little man is around unless everything in sight is covered with tableclothes/ newspaper/ something indestructible lol so I thought I would have a go at using my distress inks rather than paints.

This first one is about my love of "Art" and what makes an artist I used Wild Honey, Fired Brick, Vintage Photo, Walnut Stain and Black Soot to colour my chipboard. I then stamped the harlequins with Walnut stain and the saying with Black Soot. I also stamped the word Artist but as it didn't come out too well I highlighted it with white gel pen. I added a bit of doodling and then wrote my thoughts down. You may not be able to read it all in the photo but it is all perfectly legible irl.

The second one I used Peeled Paint, Broken China, and Wild Honey to colour the chipboard. This one was pure doodling and built around those questions I think to myself like Why are Polar Bears only found at the North Pole and Penguins only at the South Pole? I started by doodling the large question mark then just added my journalling around the page. I am sure most if not all of the questions can be answered by googling but I never quite get around to it!

Grow

The first sketch this month at Stuck Sketches was this one;

I started off with my page looking like the sketch but then it drifted off on a slight tangent as always. I used my CCW November kit featuring papers and embellishments from Fancy Pants' Summer's End line the only thing not from the kit was the title as the one in the kit was dark brown so I used these old alphabet stickers from American Crafts that I have had for years.

The pictures show my eldest Joel this year (green jumper) just as he started Secondary school and in 2006 (purple jumper) at the end of year 1. It amazes me that he has changed so much and yet in other ways he hasn't changed at all. Thanks for popping by again enjoy your weekend xxx

How you doing?

Anyone who is in the slightest bit familiar with the comedy series Friends will recognise the title of the post and LO as Joey's greeting to any attractive female that came his way (I can hear you doing it in the American/Italian accent you know lol). With this LO I followed the 15th Nov Stuck Sketches sketch here and followed the criteria for this weeks challenge on UKScrappers as well.

I again used my glue lids to stamp circles on my background as I love the way it looks and this time I used Worn Lipstick, Broken China and Black soot distress inks to do them in.

The entire LO was made from my Gottacraft kit (the twine was in a previous month's kit) apart from the chipboard arrow which was one of the earliest things I got and the camera which is another gorgeous Digi from SJ's Little Musings shop. I love the Lily Bee Memorandum papers and stickers and it is great to be able to make the letters go around the "bubbles" as they are small enough to make circular.

Thanks for popping by hope you are having a lovely Friday x

Think Negative!

That was the challenge this month at Sarah's Cards Ltd. This was left open to our own interpretation and the DT came up with some wonderful idea's and LO's to inspire us all. I have been trying recently to get some of my early years recorded and am compiling a "Book of Me" and had a set of photo's from a school trip to France in 1988 most of which were completely unusable.

This got me thinking these were the days when you actually had negatives with your photo's and as the photo's themselves were big blurry messes the negatives would not be needed for re-prints and so instead of ribbons I used the actual negatives (my kids find them hilarious they don't understand why we have them when your pics are on the computer!).

The trip wasn't a pleasant experience for me until we visited the Amphitheatre. Amongst those that went I was in a group of five pals but all the rooms slept 4 and the teachers decided to make it easier we would all work with the people we shared a room with. I was the one seperated out from our group of pals and put with 3 girls I didn't know too well and found while I didn't dislike them they were not like me and we had little in common. The Amphitheatre though was amazing I could feel the history and the photo's don't convey the size and height of it. I am so glad that some of those pics came out ok and the one of the Roman shield carving.

So this my Think Negative page the photo's that turned my trip from a negative experience to a positive one that awoke my passion with Architecture and History and I used the actual photo negatives to embellish it. Thanks for popping by x

Finished glass vases

At the begining of the month I started to alter 2 glass vases with alcohol inks which I blogged about here. Last night I finished them off. I am going to get a couple more to make some more christmas gifts as I think they look fab :) Thanks Nora for the inspiration x

Purple pumpkin goodness

I had the surprise of my life on Friday a great one random.org actually came up with my number for the $50 voucher for Purple Pumpkin's end of year giveaway! I couldn't believe it I was so pleased and Sam and Sandra aren't even charging me for postage even though it is coming all the way from Australia. I got two lucky dip bags and cannot wait to get them and see what they contain :)

In the meantime I used some of the gorgeous buttons I bought last month to make this LO inspired by the Lily Bee sketch I did here which by the way I won too :D Great week for me crafting wise :D

The Advent Calendar (photo heavy)

I decided this year I wanted to make the kids an advent calendar, I started looking at the blank ones sold in craft stores that you could decorate but they seemed a little well chest of drawers like and I wanted something a bit different so in all my wisdom (or not) I decided to make them one. It has taken 2 weeks of cutting, sticking, finger-crossing, and tantrum throwing but it is done :)

I designed a christmas tree shape and made a template then drew and cut 2 trees from mountboard;

I then used my Cricut to cut a scalloped circle template which I then drew and cut from mount board for the base;

I cut a cross in the centre of the base for the trees and cut one tree from the bottom to half way and one from the top to half way and slotted them together and then through the base;

I spent hours cutting out boxes and drawers from K&Co christmas papers and even more putting them all together!;
I decorated the base by covering with paper and the tree by colouring with distress inks;

Finally today I finished assembling the little drawers and adding numbers to each one then sticking around 3 of the 4 tree sides. The last side I decorated with some die-cuts of baubles and snowflakes and then I finished it off with a 3D snowflake as a topper;

Each of the little boxes is big enough to hold a sweet for each of my 4 monkeys. I hope you like it but if you don't shhhh don't say anything lol thanks for popping by x

Christmas bunting

I received my wonderful Christmas grab box from Handmade Hannah yesterday and couldn't wait to get started on my bunting that had been the plan for it. I cut everything out and stuck and glittered everything last night and then strung it all together today. The box came with these lovely Teresa Collins papers, Kraft card and stickles I cut the Kraft and pp's into heraldic shield shapes with the kraft being a 1/2" wider and longer. I also cut little border's from the pp for the top of the "shields". I added a sheet of dark green card which I used for the letters, holly, and wreaths and some liquid pearls for the borders. Each letter was glittered with stickles and the wreaths had a little black diamond stickles added for definition and finally I coloured some white pearls red to add to my holly ends.

First Domino mini mini mini

I made my first set of decorated dominoes into a mini mini mini last weekend but forgot to get pics. I made it for a friend so I asked her to get pics for me and here it is;

I found that the archival ink that the tutorial called for smeared and rubbed off even after leaving overnight and so I restamped with Stayzon which worked perfectly. I coloured the inside pages with Distress Ink Antique Linen and then used distress inks and Tim Holtz stamps to stamp inspirational quotes and butterflies inside the book on one side. The other side is title My dreams for 2012 and is for my friend to jot down what she wants in the coming year.

But you're not camera shy?

I follow a fair few of the paper manufacturer's on facebook as they update you not only new product lines but their blogs, challenges and giveaways. On the Lily Bee blog they have a challenge to follow this sketch using multiple photos;

As I knew that the ever fabulous Gottacraft Kit this month was Lily Bee Memorandum I thought I would give it a go. What I didn't factor was the deadline being tonight and my kit getting here today lol but I am so in love with the papers it was hardly a hardship to sit down tonight and scrap and DH had Modern Warfare 3 to amuse him.

So this is my take on the sketch;

I used the Memorandum papers Whiteboard and Boardroom. The white board I cut a large section from and used it on the reverse as the 3rd layer and hid the missing section with the boardroom section. I distressed and inked all the PP's and using pot lids and archival ink stamped some circles on the 1st pp layer to grunge it up a little more and then layered them on the blue cardstock from the kit and added my photos. I added the gorgeous coloured digi stamp from SJ at Little Musings and added some twine, a title and my journalling.

The journalling reads;

"One Septmeber morning Kari decided she wanted to check my skills in fixing her hair and asked me to take a photo of the back of her head. She turned around and then struck her usual "model" pose but I continued snapping away. My little narcissist who usually loves the camera (and attention) laughed at me, told me off, waved her hands in front of the camera, jumped up and down and eventually ran and hid to prevent me taking any more pictures of her. So even though the photos are not the best I had to record the event"

The infamous "Sudocreme Incident"

When Dylan my now 9 year old was two he decided he wanted to be just like daddy (doesn't every two year old boy?) and at that point daddy wore hair gel but that changed after the infamous incident I have recorded for all eternity lol.

Here is what the journalling reads;

"Oh the infamous sudocreme incident of 2004. Dylan wanted gel in his hair like daddy and while mummy's back was turned this was the result! It is so thick and gloopy it took us 6 washes to get it out completely!"

I mixed some white acrylic paint with water and then used a straw to "blow" the paint into a random splatter over the card to resemble the sudocreme in the hair! I used this month's CCW kit and punched or distressed the edges and inked them all. The rough twine in the kit was fab and I have seen the effect of wrapping it around the photo(s) or pp and so decided to give that a go and added some of the teeny buttons to it. Finally the background of the photo was very dark and I decided to again cut my subject out, it might seem scary to cut into your photos but if it is a recent one the worst that can happen is you have to print another and it can look so effective. Thank you for once again popping by and the lovely comments you leave I appreciate every one of them x

Craft Barn blog candy

The Craft Barn are celebrating reaching and exceeding 600 blog followers with a fab giveaway :)

To be in with a chance of winning just go to their blog here and follow the instructions. Good Luck everyone x

November sketch challenge at Purple Pumpkin

I loved this month's sketch as I knew exactly the photo's I wanted to use;

I had these great pics of Alex riding on Joel's back playing horsey just like my little brother used to do with me. I was planning on using the lovely horse button with these pics and added two of the hearts I received in my little kit I received as a thank you for applying for the PP design team.

I was creases up laughing whilst taking these pics as whenever Joel stopped still and tried to get Alex to get down ALex would yell "Giddy up Horsey, YEEHAW!". Eventually Phil had to take Alex off as he wouldn't get down but when Kari offered to take over Horsey duties she got a firm NO!

This charming boy

Our little man has had some adorable moments like all of the kids but seeing as I am more into my scrapping since he has been born we tend to capture more of these moments on film. I loved this set of photo's of him with my santa hat during his first christmas in 2009, he loved wearing the hat and looked gorgeous but the funniest part was when he tried taking it off by pulling it down over his face!

This is my entry for the lovely My Mind's Eye challenge this month why don't you pop over and have a go it is a fab sketch and you could win 3 entire MME collections!

First bash at art journalling

Just to warn you I cannot draw. I was not any good at Art at school and was relieved to give it up to be honest even though I have always been a creative person it just doesn't extend to drawing. I am intending the majority of my Art journalling to be messy paint techniques, stamping, collage and decoupage but my first bash was a tribute to Remembrance Day.

My husband is in the Grenadier Guards and during their two tours in Afghanistan there have been ten Grenadiers lost and I wanted to honour that. Honi Soit Qui Mal Y Pense is the grenadier motto and roughly translates to Evil be to he who thinks it.

Altering glass vases

As soon as I saw the Creative Craftworld creation by Nora for the UKS bloghop I knew I had to try it out. We don't drink a lot of pop or anything that comes in glass bottles so I decided what better than to use the technique on some vases and make them as christmas presents instead.

I started with a plain clear vase;

I added some elastic bands in a criss cross pattern as random as I could get them lol

I then applied alcohol inks (I used Pebble, Sailboat blue, and Butterscotch) and blending solution and coloured all 4 sides of the vase top to bottom

Once dry I removed the elastic bands which leaves intersecting stripes of clear glass. The cylindrical vase I did in a similar way except I left a clear section at the top and didn't use the blending solution. The colours on the cylindrical vase were Clover, Citrus and Pool.
I am going to add some decoration to them and hopefully get some better photo's when it is daylight. Thanks for popping by x