Happy

Sunday was the local Hopeman crop, an enjoyable afternoon full of chat, laughs, tea, cakes and of course a wee bit of crafting!!!

I'd taken a couple of page kits, and managed to complete one layout (apart from title and journalling) and half finished a second layout.

This is the layout I almost completed at the crop, after I had added the title and journalling at home :)

I used a 8.5 x 11 horizontal PageMap from November 2011. The photo is of my Grandparents, taken whilst on holiday in Eastbourne around 1952.

The papers I used are from Pink Paislee. I love double sided papers! I had fun decorating the circles with punched butterflies and tiny flowers. I added a bit of handstitching to finish things off.

TTFN

xxxx

Nuts About Sketches week 187 :: On a log

This week over at Nuts About Sketches, Shawn has created a beautiful one page sketch. Sometimes I just love to have a single photo on a page, especially when it is a favourite photo of mine. The sketch called for a 5 x 7 photo, but I just matted a 4 x 6 photo onto a piece of 5 x 7 cardstock ;)



The photo is one of my favourites of Tom and Jemma, and was actually taken with a wet film SLR camera. I would love a DSLR one day, although I know I cannot justify one right now, from both a financial and an ability perspective. From the roll of film I took, maybe 3 or 4 photos were any good LOL. Never mind. The "photo shoot" (in the loosest terms of the phrase) took place at Roseisle, in August 2006. My kids never stick to the paths, always ending up in the middle of the forest as they seek out things to climb on. This fallen tree didn't escape lightly LOL.

I used Bazzill Basics Kraft cardstock, and papers from American Crafts, Prima Marketing and My Mind's Eye. The title was made with raw chipboard alphas from PaperMania, which were inked with Walnut Stain Distress Ink, and then covered in brown Stickles. The tiny alphas are from Making Memories.
The leaves were from my stash, and the butterflies were made using a Martha Stewart punch. I added some stitching, using a Bazzill InStitchz template, and a length of green rik rak finished it all off.

Please head over to the blog to see the other beautiful layouts from the rest of the Design team!

TTFN


xxxx

Nuts About Sketches week 186 :: Special Day

This week, the sketch over at Nuts About Sketches was a fantastic 2 pager. As ever, Shawn manages to fit lots of photos on the sketch without it looking cluttered. I was drawn to using some old photos again this week - I am really going through a heritage phase just now!

These photos are of my Mum's Christening Day. I love all the photos of her with the close family - with her parents (my Nana and Papa), Little Gran (Great Grandma), Big Gran and Grandpa (my other Great Grandparents) and Auntie Nellie (sister of Little Gran).
The originals of these photos only measure 2.5 x 3.5, so when I scanned them in I decided to keep close to the original size, and just scale down the size of the layout instead. So this is an 8 x 8 double page spread :)
I used My Mind's Eye papers again - a bit of Lost and Found with a bit of Stella and Rose thrown in :) I used Martha Stewart punches for the butterflies and the border.  The letter stickers are PaperMania, and the gems are from Kaisercraft.

Head over to the blog to see what the rest of the girls have been creating!

TTFN


xxxx

November PageMaps sample:: Walk

About a year ago, I put my name forward to Becky Fleck over at PageMaps to say that I would like to be considered to do a sample layout for the monthly newsletter and website. I didn't think anymore about it, until October when an email came from Becky asking if I was still interested in doing a layout, and it was for the November PageMaps reveal? Interested? Boy, was I ever!!! PageMaps has been my go to sketch site since forever LOL, and it was the first sketch site I ever found. It was a long time before I realised that there were other sketches out there, so Becky has been like a sketch Goddess to me for many years. To be asked was such a big thing for me!!

So after I had finished running roung the house like a mad woman, and stopped chanting OMG over and over again, I got down to the nitty gritty and made my page. And I must say, that I love this layout. Simple it may be, but oh my, I just love it! Thanks Becky, for your great sketch!

As you can see, I was given a 8.5 x 11 Map to work with. I just flipped the sketch, as the photos were placed on the left hand side of the sketch, and  I have a thing about people looking off the page...

The photos show my Mum (aged about 16 months) walking along a wall holding  my Great Grandfather's hand. This is the guest house they were staying at whilst on holiday in Eastbourne in 1949. I have a whole album of these kind of photos to work through, and I love seeing the family connections.

I used some of the beautiful My Mind's Eye papers from the Stella and Rose collection - I am loving this colour combination at the moment, especially on my heritage layouts. I made the rosette using an edging strip from one of the papers, and scored it at 0.5 cm intervals using my Hougie board. The title was done with American Crafts Lullaby foam Thickers - I coloured them using a ProMarker (Cool Grey 5) and then added Black Diamond Stickles on top to add some texture.

I'd also like to say a big thank you to Francine, for featuring me as Inspiration du Jour over at CraftGossip.com today!

Thanks for stopping by the blog today, I hope you enjoyed your visit :)

TTFN


xxxx