Another crop and a few more pages......

It's been a while since I had two Cyber crops in the same weekend but it happened again. I had very little time to make an effort for either as my weekend turned out to be rather busy. But I did manage to get three layouts done on Saturday night at a Stampin' Up, Consultants Crop.

Over at Scrap of Difference, Jo gave us a theme of a different kind with a video link: To a Child, Love is Spelled T-I-M-E. The layout above was for the colour challenge that used the release this week from the Color room. I used their sketch as a base for my layout as it worked well with what I had pulled out to play with.

Next I did the inspiration challenge that was a direct link to the movie for inspiration. I used a Stuck sketches sketch from here and I just rotated it and varied the position of the photos.
Over at Home and Scrapped, Joy challenged us to scrap lift a layout from her own gallery and use the theme of love in the title or journaling. These photos are from our trip to AQWA where the boys loved seeing the "little Nemo" fish swimming. Funny how the childhood movies never leave our memory.

This week is crazy busy for me and I am off to a Scrapbook retreat in two days until Sunday Night so am so looking forward to some intense creating time and chatter. Just have to get myself together and pack stuff for it.

Have fun and happy craftin'

Woo.... hoo.... I finally made it to a crop night.

I was so excited to finally get to a crop run by someone other than myself. I'm going on a retreat in a couple of weekends and was invited to a crop to meet some of the ladies. It was NOR about 35 minute drive away at the Craft Stand, a lovely shop run by Paula. The ladies were all very welcoming and as it turned out I actually knew two of the ladies from online forums from years ago.... so they got a surprise to meet me too. I took some of Heather's sketches with me from Scrappy sketches:

This is the Mid-week sketch 4-12 with another photo from Paris of St. Michael's statue at La Place de St. Michel. This is a great sketch to use up those little strips of paper you have lots of lying in your stash.

The next is Mid-week sketch 5-12 with the boys dressed ready for their first day of school. I altered it slightly - as one does with sketches..... and I still have not learnt how to do inchies very well.

This is the Mid-week 6-12 from last week and was our breakfast on our last day in Paris. We had been looking at them over the last previous days... drooling at the thought and decided we must try it before we left. So sweet and so yummy - if you like nutella of course.

Last but not least, Heather ran a Step-by-step challenge over at Home and Scrapped on Friday night so to kick start my mojo for the weekend I played along. These were those random shots of me in Paris that did not quite fit in with the other photos I had. I'm quite happy with how it turned out.

Happy craftin' everyone....

Flower sale coming soon.......

The lovely Heather from Home and Scrapped has this awesome ability to make lovely handmade flowers, many of which appear on my layouts. Why should I bother finding time to make them myself when she has it down to a fine art and I just can't be bothered....

This Friday the 10th of February she is having a super sale of her flower packs and will continue with it every second Friday of the month. Of course you don't just have to buy them on the Friday, you can visit her blog and click on the flower shop tab at any time to see what she has on offer. All the instructions are there for how to place an order.

Happy Craftin'

A week of fun and new things.....

Well, it was back to school for the boys here in W.A. this week and so Monday I was at the school buying uniforms and Tuesday I was doing all the iron on naming and taking up pants and shirts etc. Mint green shirts are not the best idea for boys and already a couple of them have texta and paint marks on them.... SIGH!

They did look smarter than I thought they would in them though and they had a good few days settling into school. Ethan and Mitchell are together in class and have a male teacher and Keelan on his own with two female teachers, one does a 9 day fortnight and the other a 1 day. They have made some friends in class already and seem to be very happy at this stage. No homework for the week was pretty good too.

Last Sunday arvo we went up to Trigg beach for a get-together with the Perth Orientation Services group who help people settle into the state. I met some faces that I had met before and a couple of new ones so that was nice. The boys spent most of the time at the beach though whilst I was up on the grassed area so I was quite happy to put up with the conversation and not have to put up with the sand. I did venture down just as the sun was going down to see what they were up to and had to take the pic of the sandcastle they had been very busy building. Pic is not that great cos it was taken on my mobile. Yes..... I forgot the camera!

The start of the month brought with it new challenges over at Home and Scrapped. With a new design team on board, Heather handed over some of the reins to them to provide us with some challenges for the month.

Jewels gave us a challenge to use inks as out media to create our background and challenge ourselves with something that we may not have tried before.

I was blog hopping and came across a layout by Gayle Price - http://blissandgesso.blogspot.com.au/2011/05/new-may-challenge-at-ww1.html which really appealed to me so I lifted it - hope that is okay Gayle..... I used a crafter's workshop template with texture paste first of all and then once that was dry, laid down the mask and sprayed with Denim and Sapphire Glimmermist. I used white paint on the edge of business card to create a matte for the photo, a little stamping with a couple of stamps I have owned for years and not yet used as well a couple of more recent purchases and it was complete. A scrap of paper.... and I literally mean a scrap..... some cut out vintage Collections butterflies and my photo and the layout was finally finished. It seemed to take hours and hours as I am not used of the whole mixed media idea and waiting for things to dry is not my area of patience. I did love the final result though.

I also played with Sarah's challenge to choose a layout to "lift" from all those that you earmark in magazines and create a layout using a song title about summer or sun and include an item that has been given to you or you have bought that is handmade. I lifted a CK 15 min layout from Jan 2010 by Stephanie Howell but adapted her two portrait photos to suit my one landscape one.

Just a little more playing too to create some cards with the Cricut alone to show the shop owner. Off to discuss classes with her this week so wish me luck......

Everyday paper dolls and George and basic shapes cartridge on this one and below is made entirely with Storybook cartridge. Of course you could dress both of them up a lot more but I wanted to keep them very simple to show that you can still make a nice looking card with basic cuts.

Well..... my lamb roast is in the Weber and smelling pretty darn good so I am off to check the vegies and carve and eat...

Happy Craftin'......

Birthday week in our house.....

Well this week saw my "little" boys turn 12 years of age. My Australia day boys enjoyed their day even though they haven't made any friends here yet because school has not yet started and their are no kids their age in the street. As a matter of fact I have seen very few kids in the street at all.

We had some extended family over for a BBQ lunch and after they left we headed into the city to the Esplanade near the Carillon to watch the Skyworks which is of course the boy's favourite thing to do on their birthday. They think they are very special to get fireworks on their birthday. It was all very easy, headed in via train, got off and walked not even a kilometre and we were there where we wanted to be. The weather had been hot and some rain managed to fall which was nice for about 10mins and then it was gone and we dried off quick. There was a lovely natural light show before the fireworks began at 8pm and by 8.30pm it was all over and we toddled off amongst the crowd back to the train station. We caught the second train out and was home by 9.15pm. All very easy and civilised.

Of course Wednesday night I was up till midnight making cards for them all - which I don't normally do as they get tossed pretty quickly but I thought this year they are taking a lot more notice of what I give to others so figured that maybe I should make the effort and give them something different each. I pulled out some stamp sets from The Stamps of Life by Stephanie Barnard and some Fiskars border punches and away I went.

Owls for Ethan

A froggy for Keelan

And a birdie for Mitchell

I had fun creating but was glad to pour myself into bed when I finally finished. I think they turned out rather cute and the kids have them on display on their desks so I must have done something right for a change.

Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend and not sweating it out like we are here in Perth.....

Happy craftin'

Looking over my shoulder

One of the problems with having my scrap area upstairs and my back to the stairs whilst at the computer is that my charming children are doing their utmost to scare the pants of me by creeping up the stairs and sneaking up behind me. I have become so paranoid about it that I am now in the habit of checking over my shoulder continuously so that I can hear or see them before they reach me. They think it is hillarious when they actually achieve their result and I jump.

I finished off Heather's Mid Week Sketch 3-12 from Scrappy Sketches last night and used some really old papers I had in my stash. I think this will really be the concept behind all of my layouts for this year.

I even sorted out my photos from my trip that are left and am determined to get them scrapped over the coming weeks.

Whilst in Vielsalm, Belgium the weather was cold and damp so hiking was not really on the agenda. We found this great tank and thinking of our boys back home both Ingeborg and I decided we would get photos of something that might actually take the boys interest. We did not realise the meaning of the tank's presence until we reached it and read the memorial. It was left in the area following the Americans fighting at the Battle of Bulge and it is there as a memorial to those who fought valiantly at St. Vith. You do not realise how big these machines are until you are standing right next to one.

We got out and about a little this weekend by going to an open movie screening by the local council on Friday night. We saw Spirited Away a very interesting animated story. The kids enjoyed it even though the movie did not excite them so much.

Yesterday we went to Adventure World water and ride park which is only about 10-15 minutes from our place. It was busy as.... and of course we chose a day with a record number of people there. I didn't get many photos cos by the time they lined up and you waited and waited you never knew when to expect them to be ready with the camera. Still.... the boys and I went on the chairlift and the boys and Bruce went on the pedal rail around the front of the park and the kids enjoyed the Kahuna falls with water splashing in every different direction and some small slides.

It was a good day that the kids enjoyed out.

Happy craftin'.....

Continuing to play....

The weather has been hot and humid and hard work to keep the brain focussed on anything but I have played around a little in the evenings to keep the mojo flowing.

Heather had another Mid week sketch up at Scrappy Sketches so I had more photos of the Cathedral to scrap and decided to use them and the same papers as my earlier layout to carry the theme of the Cathedral through both layouts. Not that I want them as a double page but I just wanted to link the story. This is what I came up with.

I also wanted to play with the Cricut machine and make some cards but have only gotten around to one so far so here is the first card I have made entirely from using the Cricut.... apart from the card base that I already had. I had no intention of doing it just from black and white, I was just testing the sizes of some of the cuts to familiarize myself with them again and I decided to use them. Some brads, kindyglitz and the floral fantasy Cuttlebug folder along with only the George and Basic shapes cartridge, gave me this lovely simple card which looks quite elegant in real life.

Well after not much sleep and thunderstorms all night long... I have been up early (most unusual for me) enjoying the cooler break in the weather and having a chance to do some computer things without sweating it out in my little upstairs room. The blue skies are peeking through again though so I don't think the cool will last too long.

Have a good weekend all and happy craftin'