Just too random

Tea Party Invites

2012-02-13T20:21:00.000Z

For no other reason than I felt like making some cards! I used up some scraps I had lying around and before I knew it I had 10 of these cards completed and lying on my desk! :)

Random Things for Sale

2012-02-12T16:43:00.000Z

I'm having a little bit of a clear out and am selling some random things! Check out my listings by clicking HERE. There are a few crafty items in there too!

Scrapwhisper Challenge

2012-02-10T19:30:00.001Z

The latest challenge has been posted now on the Scrapwhisper blog! It's a scraplifting challenge and this is the layout I have created as inspiration.

I used paper with circles behind it to replicate the paper that used by Nilsa. I scalloped a border across the page and used a similar ribbon which I tied in a bow.

I added a sticker with a bird on it where as Nilsa used a stamped image of a bird.

I used a similar font too and a photo corner.

Then finally some tickets which I attached to the page with some staples!

Messy Desk

2012-02-08T09:20:00.000Z

All that scrapping this weekend has really made my desk super messy! I have a lot of tidying to undertake now!!

More Christmas layouts

2012-02-07T09:40:00.017Z

Here are some more layouts I created this weekend for my Christmas album!

Along with my friend Nicki we created a birthday cake with a Christmas theme for a friend

My cat Rhylee enjoyed lounging on the new bedding I purchased. It was really cute bedding too with little snowmen on it!

We had new PJs for Christmas as is our yearly tradition!

opening stockings on Christmas morning

All the gifts under the tree, they filled up half of the room!

I enjoyed a delicious breakfast on Christmas day and wore my new stripy florescent socks!

I took the opportunity to use up a lot of random letters on this title for a page about the jigsaw puzzle we created over the Christmas period.

Finally a layout about our lovely Christmas jumpers - they were all the fashion in 2011!

Christmas Album

2012-02-06T09:20:00.000Z

I spent some time this weekend catching up on my Christmas Scrapbook album:

The advent countdown - we have pillowcases full of small gifts and we open one each day on the countdown to Christmas!

A works Christmas Party where some of my colleagues dressed up as the blues brothers!

My step dad created a lucky dip of gifts for us this year - he called it "Charlie's Chances" and it was a lot of fun!

We held a line dance social for Christmas and there was a raffle to win a giant piggy bank full of cash as the prize. We've been working on it all throughout 2011 and it was a fun conclusion to the year.

Decorating the tree all in silver this year was fun too. Although we lost the fibre optic angel we usually put on the tree so there was a last minute hunt for a new one!

My cat Rhylee decided he liked candy canes!!

18 Teapot cozies!

2012-02-05T09:00:00.002Z

I had a big order in my etsy shop recently! No less than 18 tea pot cozies! The lovely lady is opening a tea room in Canada and wanted them to add a finishing touch to her decor. She sent me this photo to show me what it looks like:

How great do they look? It matches wonderfully with her decor. As soon as she is open I will let you all have details of where this delighful tea room is in Canada (I know I have Canadian readers!) Then you simply have to visit and send me photos! :)

Reasons for being AWOL and a Challenge!

2012-02-04T23:20:00.000Z

Hi Everyone! Wow! How times flies when you're (not) having much fun! 2012 hasn't been a good year for me so far and it came to a head last week when I found out I was loosing my job and being made redundant (laid off). Uck. I've worked for the company for 14 years so I am hoping to get redeployed somewhere else in the organisation (fingers crossed) if not it means I need to look around for something else or consider becoming self employed in something!! Its been pretty hectic and stressful therefore hence my severe lack of blog time! :) So sorry about that.

So - what do you think of this months new header? How cool is that? Misty totally rocks the headers she is creating for me! (Thanks Misty!) February - the month of love! Do you have any plans?

In Scrapwhisper news I've missed a week of challenges but thanks to the other girls they kept things moving without me! :) I did however manage to participate in this weeks challenge (yeay) its a colour scheme: red, orange and green! Just like English traffic lights.

This is the layout I created. Now, it looks on my screen to be pretty blurry but I'm not sure why? Is it blurry on your screen. Come to think of it my entire web browser is blurry - what on earth has happened? Any IT peeps out there know what I might have done? All the buttons and links on my blogger dashboard are wonky !

The layout is about my trip to Wisley with Rosey and her mum. This was one of the plants I took a photo of - it's common name is red cats tail but we had fun looking for the latin names too and trying to make sense of them, so I included the latin name for the title too.

If you want to play CLICK HERE and go take a look at the scrapwhisper site!

Okay so thats all for me today. I promise to try and check in more often!

Line Dancing

2012-01-29T00:38:00.000Z

As most of you know I'm not only a crafter but a Line Dance Instructor.

Tonight is the Crystal Boot Awards where instructors, choreographers and dances get awards - in fact it's on the whole weekend. You can view it here: http://www.onlinedancer.co.uk/

Gareth Gates has done an awesome job of entertaining the masses and I'm loving picking out all the people I know. Sad I missed it now, but pleased I got to see tonight on line. Facebook has been alive! :)

Tomorrow they have workshops too so check it out then as well.

If you are interested the results are:

Dance of the year: Bittersweet memory
AB dance of the year: Skinny Genes
Beginner dance of the year: Blue Night Cha AND Something in the water (love that one)
Improver dance of the year: Knee Deep
Intermediate dance of the year: Bittersweet Memory
Advanced dance of the year: On the edge !

Scrapwhispers Challenge

2012-01-22T19:24:00.000Z

Sometimes all you need to get you out of a scrapping rut is a good sketch! This one is awesome! Head on over to Scrapwhispers.blogspot.com now to check out some of the layouts the SW Design Team created with it. Whilst you are there, why not give it a go yourself!

Scrapwhisper Challenge

2012-01-13T22:48:00.002Z

I've just posted the latest scrap whisper challenge - this week it is a scraplifting challenge. CLICK HERE to go check it out, play along for yourself and be in with a chance of winning a prize!

I had fun lifting Rosey's layout. I did use a bit of creativity so it doesn't look exactly like Rosey's but it's certainly captured the essence I hope!

My final scraplifted layout!

Scraplifting is so great when you're stuck in a rut! Thanks for your lovely layout Rosey - it made me create this page!

Layout above is by Rosey and you have to scraplift it for the latest Scrapwhisper Challenge!

Sarahs Cards Bargain

2012-01-11T09:00:00.000Z

Talking of bargains - Just after Christmas in the sales Sarahs Cards (UK website) was having a sale and were offering a box of surprise goodies worth £75 for just £25! Well of course I had to try it out and see for myself. I couldn't find any examples on the internet so I decided to post here what I got in case anyone else was thinking of purchasing one.

There was American craft paper, maya road envelopes, brads and journalling cards, die cuts and acrylic notes

stickers and felt

thickers, swirly bling and more stickers

glittery card stock

and plain cardstock

My minds eye paper

Lush paper which has a cool velvety feel

and various other sheets of paper:

More embellishments, rubs ons and stickers

and a sheet of journalling stickers.

All in all I'm really happy with my purchase - I added it up and its definately over £75 worth of stuff according to what is for sale on other websites so I'm pretty happy! The only thing is I don't have many orange layouts in my album because orange is a difficult colour to scrap with! I feel a mini self challenge coming on!

Knitted Baby Pack

2012-01-10T09:00:00.002Z

One of my mums friends is having a baby soon and he asked her if she could make a little baby set in red and blue (they all support Crystal Palace Football Club who play in red and blue). Well we've created between us this cute little baby set:

It consists of a blanket, bottoms, jacket, hat and gloves ....

I think you will agree this will be the cutest baby around! And certainly the best dressed baby at the next Crystal Palace game !

New Year Resolution

2012-01-09T09:00:00.000Z

One of my new years resolutions this year is to only purchased things if they are on sale or I have a coupon. I cannot believe how much money I've saved already this year including on things like groceries. I've discovered that whilst we can't extreme coupon like you can in America, there are certainly a lot of bargains to be had in the UK, you just need to know where to look.

I was thrilled when I found these thickers on sale in a local shop for just £1 each reduced from £4.25! Of course I took one of each - what a bargain ! I have enough of these lovely thickers now to last me months! I feel another no buy challenge coming on.

Scrapwhisper Big Reveal

2012-01-08T23:26:00.000Z

It's been such a long time since I created this layout (back in October) for the Scrapwhisper team challenge that I had forgotten about it! Well, here it is - my lovely Rhyee sitting in our conservatory chasing butterflies that fly past the window!

Do you want to see how people scraplifted this layout and made it their own, passed it onto someone else who did the same and so on? A scraplifting game of chinese whispers or telephone! CLICK HERE to find out!

New Cake Blog

2012-01-08T21:18:00.000Z

Are you bored and looking for another blog to add to your reading list? Why not check out THIS cake decorating blog.

Its from the class I attended at the end of last year and I'm now helping out with it, adding photos etc and keeping it updated. Feel free to follow us over there too.

There are a lot of cake photos from the other students. I'd be interested in your thoughts!

Scrap Whispers Challenge 114

2012-01-06T21:52:00.000Z

The colour challenge has just been posted for this week on the Scrapwhisper Blog

I've been so busy over the festive period I've lost all track of time and so here, for your viewing pleasure are a few of my favourite layouts using this colour scheme that you might have seen before! LOL I scrapped these in 2011 but hopefully they provide some inspiration for you to try this colour challenge yourself.

I should of course take this time to wish all my followers a happy new year! I promise I will update my blog properly fairly shortly and indeed tell you the story of my ration challenge (the other blog crashed and got deleted - I'll explain that in another post very soon!), christmas, new year and more. I will at some stage change my Christmas Blog Header too! (Do you think the 12th night rule applies to blogs too??! ooopss!

Head on over to scrapwhispers in the meantime and play along for your chance of winning a prize!

Pink Purple and Orange

2011-12-30T20:33:00.004Z

Hi everyone ! Sorry I have been AWOL! I hope you have enjoyed a peaceful Christmas and are looking forward to the new year!

The challenge on scrapwhispers today is all about the colour scheme of Pink, Purple and Orange! Wow this one was difficult!

I didn't have much time to scrap today and so I created a really quick simple page - I'm thinking something is missing though and might go back to make some changes at some point!

This is a close up of the title. I outlined it in black pen and I think it makes it stand out a lot more
Want to play along? CLICK HERE. Its the last challenge we're holding in 2011!

Saturday Scruminess: Chocolate Cake

2011-12-24T09:00:00.013Z

Happy Christmas Eve!! I wanted to keep my post short today, its such a busy festive time of year! For once, I'm not working either! Yeay me! Being at home on Christmas Eve will feel quite strange! :)

I just wanted to share my favourite chocolate cake recipe with you - so quick and easy to transform chocolate cakes into something festive looking - just by adding sprinkles! So quick to make too - why not try them out for a lovely desert today!

3/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3/4 flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 cup sour cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 12-cup standard muffin tin with cupcake liners and coat with nonstick baking spray. In a bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, powder, and salt; set aside. In a mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, then beat in vanilla. With mixer on a low speed, add flour mixture in two batches, alternating with sour cream and beginning and ending with the flour. Spoon batter into cupcake pan, filling each cup about 3/4 full. Bake until it comes out clean 20-25 minutes. Leave to cool then make a simple buttercream from powdered sugar, cocoa powder (about 2 tsp) and some butter- frost the cakes and sprinkle

Saturday Scruminess: Red Velvet Cupcakes

2011-12-17T16:06:00.001Z

Red Velvet cupcakes are an American import into the UK - not many people are aware of them, not many people have heard of them before. Thats why its even more fun for me to make them as it really surprises people! I made this batch for my work colleagues recently - just to get us in the Christmasey Spirit.

It's the colour more than anything that is so striking! They are so vibrant and Christmasey feeling. I put these cakes in some red cases too so it enhanced the look.

I made a cream cheese frosting for the top and added a fondant snowflake I made using a snowflake cutter and some red velvet cake crumbs too.

Mmmm!

Here is the recipe I used:

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
2 oz. red food coloring (two bottles)
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vinegar
1 teaspoon baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Sift together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl and set aside. In a smaller bowl, mix food coloring and cocoa powder to form a thin paste without lumps and set aside.In a large bowl, using a hand mixer or stand mixer, beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about two mins. Beat in eggs, vanilla and the red cocoa paste, scraping down the bowl with a spatula as you go. Add one third of the flour mixture to the butter mixture, beat well, then beat in half of the buttermilk. Beat in another third of flour mixture, then second half of buttermilk. End with the last third of the flour mixture, beat until well combined. In a small bowl, mix vinegar and baking soda. Add vinegar mixture to the cake batter and stir well to combine. Bake for approximately 20 mins.

Scrapwhisper Sketch Challenge

2011-12-16T20:29:00.001Z

This is my layout for the scrapwhisper sketch challenge this week ! I'm so thrilled with how it has turned out AND I got to use more scraps up too which I was equally thrilled about! Yeay!

The layout was inspired by this sketch from Rosey:

The page itself was all about the party tent we put up in our garden for the Royal Wedding this year! It was great fun! This sketch worked perfectly with it too! :)

Want to play along with us and try to win this months prize pack? CLICK HERE to see the challenge and join in!

A few Changes

2011-12-12T21:20:00.000Z

I felt that I needed a bit of a change on my blog - the Purple design has been here since 2009!! Can you believe that?! So I've started to change things up a little. I'm going to do a bit at a time. Hopefully you will be able to find things a little easier! :) Please bear with me in the meantime! I hope to get things finished by this coming weekend!

I'd love some feedback on what you think.

I have to say a MASSIVE thank you to my lovely friend Misty however for helping me out with my gorgeous Christmasey blog header! Don't you just love the whimsy of it! She is so talented and a complete mind reader to boot!

Saturday Scruminess: Orange & Cinnamon Christmas Cookies

2011-12-10T09:00:00.002Z

We're buying our Christmas tree today and it's always nice to come home and have a cup of hot chocolate with a couple of home made cookies afterwards. Thats why I made these cookies in preparation!! They are delicious and it makes the house smell lovely and Christmasey!

You need:

1 Cup Butter

2 Cups White Sugar

1 Egg Yolk

Grated rind of an orange

4 tsp orange juice

2.5 cups plain flour

pinch of salt

Cinnamon and Sugar to sprinkle.

Start by creaming the butter, sugar an orange peel in a bowl until light and fluffy.

Add in the egg yolk, 2 tsp of orange juice and mix. Then add in the flour and salt and mix to a dough. Put this sticky dough in cling film or a plastic bag and in the fridge for an hour.

Afterwards, when chilled, place the dough in the centre of some baking paper. Add another sheet over the top and roll (with a rolling pin) to make the dough about 12x12 in size.

Peel back the top layer of baking paper, brush the dough with 2 tsp orange juice, sprinkle with sugar an cinnamon - as much or as little as you like.

Then roll it up like a swiss roll, be careful as it sticks to the baking paper so you need to firmly push it into place. Take your time!

Roll it in cling film again and put it in the fridge for another 30 mins or so. The whole log makes about 32 biscuits but you can do what I did, make half and stick the dough in the fridge for another day or two.

When its chilled, cut thin slices of dough and place well apart on a baking tray. Put in the oven Gas 5 (about 350) for 10-12 mins.

Take them out, leave them to cool on the tray.

Then transfer to a wire rack!

When completely cool enjoy with a nice cup of hot chocolate in your favourite festive mug!

Yum

Scrap Whispers: Anything Goes

2011-12-09T20:50:00.000Z

Today on the scrapwhisper blog the challenge is simple. Scrapbook a layout. Any layout. It doesn't matter what you do - there are no special colour schemes, restrictions, designs, nothing. You simply have to create a page!! Check the challenge out HERE. There is a prize up for grabs too!
I created this page for my Christmas Journal about a Christmas Craft Fair I had a stall at recently! What will you create?

Vintage Lace Technique

2011-12-07T23:38:00.000Z

I created this layout for an article I wrote for Scrapjazz.com and Scrapbook.com recently. Want to know how to make different kinds of paper lace to add a vintage feel to your pages?

CLICK HERE to check it out!

Christmas Journal 2011

2011-12-04T17:04:00.000Z

If you follow my blog regularly you will know that every year I take an online class by Shimelle called "Journal Your Christmas". You pay for the first year and then it's completely free every year after that. You will also know that I am taking the class again this year. I love documenting Christmastime! I have a problem though - every year I always never finish up the album, something always stops me. I've thought about the reasons why this might happen. I've come to realise that I don't enjoy scrapping any other size but 12x12, my albums usually are smaller. I've realised that I was always trying to please someone else with my albums, I tried to use too many techniques on one page, I tried too hard basically.

I've also realised that something that takes too much time is just not possible to complete unless I'm organised. I have so much going on and I rarely loose track of all I have to do. It stresses me out and then I end up ill. SO.... This year I'm doing it my way! I'm scrapping 12x12; I'm creating pages as and when I want; I'm organised with the lovely echo park Christmas papers, I've pre made a lot of the pages and just need to add photos and journalling; I'm not overcomplicating things and simple pages are good. I will on occassion follow prompts set out in the course, but I might choose not to do them every day. I'm doing it for me ! I'm only going to blog about it once a week too - less pressure!! LOL

Having said all that I'd like to share with you what I've done already:

Front Cover

My front cover is very basic but I love these albums. They are American Craft 12x12 fabric covered binders. You can buy them HERE if you live in the UK.

Operation Christmas Child

This year, as with every year, we have donated to a charity scheme called Operation Christmas Child. Click HERE to find out more. You can donate online and fill up a virtual show box too! Basically we fill shoe boxes with toys and gifts for children across the world. Its so much fun to go shopping for them and find great things to fill the boxes up with! We did 20 boxes this year.

Fresh Apple Cider

I went to a HUGE Christmas Craft Fair with my mum and step dad recently. It was held at the Weald and Down Museum. If you are in the UK and have never visited this place - you absolutely HAVE to go! Its awesome. I love going and looking around the houses. We sampled some Christmasey feeling fresh Apple Cider. Delicious.

Little Donkey

Whilst at the museum fair we saw this cute little Donkey - what could be more Christmasey right? They were raising awareness for the Donkey Charity to try and end cruelty to Donkeys. Click here for more info.

Christmas Shopping Fuel

On 25th November every year I go Christmas shopping with my friend Nicki. It might put us on Santas' naughty list but we always eat badly!! We need the energy for shopping! It was McDonalds for breakfast, Subway for lunch and a takeaway Curry for dinner. Terrible isn't it !!

M is for Merry

When we were Christmas Shopping Nicki just had to try on some Snowman ear muffs! I just had to take a picture!!

Crystal Palace 2 Man United 1

And finally, a page about football!! LOL This game was very important as far as the Carling Cup was concerned. As Palace Fans of course the trip had to be documented!! What a result!

Hope you are having a relaxing Christmasey weekend! Have a great week!

Saturday Scruminess - Christmas Cupcakes

2011-12-03T09:00:00.004Z

I'm excited we're now in December, Christmas is not far off! I thought today I would share an easy idea for decorating Christmas cupcakes. Its so easy too. Start off by baking your favourite vanilla cupcakes, make them more festive by baking them in cute christmas themed cases. Then, whilst they are baking colour some fondant icing green and using a holly cutter cut out some holly leaves and leave to dry.

Take the cakes out of the oven and let them cool whilst you do the washing up!

Using an apple corer take the centres out of the cupcakes, be sure not to go right through, just make a dip.

Fill the centres with a red jam - I used raspberry flavoured.

Then, top with some buttercreme icing, sprinkle on some red, white and green sprinkles, add three of your holly leaves and 3 larger red sprinkle balls.

Quick and easy Christmas cupcakes. You could add more icing if you wanted by my family don't like too much icing on their cakes - this is just enough to give you the taste without feeling like you're eating raw butter! If you covered them in more icing, you could dip the edges of the cake in the sprinkles and make the holly leaves bigger!

I hope this inspires you this Saturday! :)

Scrapwhispers - Cream Aqua Red

2011-12-02T21:00:00.002Z

Another week, another challenge!! This week on scrapwhispers we are challenging you to create a layout using the colour scheme of Red, Aqua and Cream!

I created this layout of my mum and cat Ramsee - I just love these photos, my mums expression is brilliant!! She was basically cleaning Ramsee's eyes out with a little piece of cotton wool and chatting to him as she did it! He was purring ... a Lot!

Want to play along with scrapwhispers? Head on over there now. As its a new month there is another prize on offer - don't miss it!

Quick Christmas Gift Idea

2011-12-01T09:00:00.000Z

With just a few simple ingredients you can whizz up this quick and easy Christmas gift with minimum fuss and time! You need: 2 cups of icing sugar (powdered sugar if you are in the USA) , 1/3 of a can of condensed milk, 1/4 tsp peppermint extract, a star cutter (or other shape), a tin or pot to put the sweets in and some scrapbook paper and ink to decorate.

Start by putting the icing sugar, peppermint and condensed milk into a bowl. Keep mixing it until it forms a dough ball. You might need to add some more icing sugar if necessary.

Roll the ball out so it is flat - I use a special cake rolling matt for this as it won't ten stick to the work surface - add some icing sugar underneath so it doesnt stick.

Using a star cutter, cut out shapes from the dough and leave on some greaseproof paper to dry. Usually takes about 2 hours. Keep rekneading and re rolling the dough until its all used up.

Melt some red Wilton candy melts.

And then pipe a red dot of chocolate into the middle of each of the dry stars. If you wanted you could dip the peppermint star half in the chocolate but we don't like too much as it takes away from the peppermint taste a little bit.

When the chocolate has set, pop them into a container and decorate it. I have used some stamps from Waltzing Mouse & added some ribbon and paper.

Thats it - quick and easy if you are looking for a last minute Christmasey gift.

Cards and a story of woe

2011-11-30T21:14:00.001Z

Posting cards with hundreds of thick embellishments is a bit of a pain to be honest. Thats why I made these ones nice and easy and simple

Of course, the gorgeous papers helped!!

Have a great day everyone! :) I hope it's better than mine yesterday..... I worked in the morning and everything I touched went wrong, I got stuck in the lift on the way up to my desk, 30 mins I was in there - great start to the day. Went out for fresh air at lunch time and got caught up in the shopping centre when a fire alarm went off, I got evaccuated and was unable to get back to work immediately or purchase my shopping in my basket. Then after work I travel down lots of windy country roads yesterday I got stuck in traffic behind an accident for 20 mins. I decided to give up, turned around to go back the other way and find another route and ended up getting stuck behind another accident (its been dark and rainy not a good combination) - the police wouldn't let anyone past. Eventually I managed to sweet talk my way through to go a different way - decided on the motorway. Couldn't get onto the motorway though due to a road closure! Eh. I ended up going back to my office and starting again from another random route. By this time I'd been travelling an hour.

It was pitch black and although I ended up kinda knowing where I was going in reality I didn't have a clue. Not being able to see landmarks due to the darkness I ended up turning off a wrong turning on a roundabout and travelled miles out of my way. I couldn't stop or turnaround though as I was on a single lane country track with no visability. Long story short I eventually made it home at 20 to 8pm and my dance class started at 8pm so I shouved the equipment in the back of the car and headed off to dancing. Luckily it made me hyperactive and the class went well, by the time I got home though I just collapsed, had some dinner and went to bed. I'm knackered now too!! LOL

Gee - the trials of a day in the office huh!

Check This Out!!

2011-11-29T23:33:00.001Z

In my etsy shop I sell various different sets of handmade number tags in different colours. I die cut a scalloped circle, then die cut another circle, inside which I cut out numbers from 1 - 31 using a craft knife. It takes a while but I like the final look of them when they're all stuck together.

Well, Jennifer over at Clifton Common purchased some of my tags and has used them as a really cool advent calender for her kiddies! CLICK HERE to check out her full post, its really inspirational! Its given me a tonne of new ideas! She also has some fun ideas on the rest of her blog too! Go check it out!

This is one of Jennifers photos to give you an idea of what's in store on her blog. See - pretty cool right?! Thanks for the great idea Jennnifer.

Want to purchase some of my tags yourself? You can do that by clicking here!

Quick Christmas Card

2011-11-28T17:40:00.000Z

First House

2011-11-27T15:00:00.000Z

Christmas 2011 is on it's way and seems to be getting here so quickly! Eeek! I decided to take a look at some of my photos from last year and came across these ones of my gingerbread house that I made. It was the first one I've ever made and was a little tricky! I'm not convinced on trying it again this year - time will tell! I just thought I would create a quick page with the photos and do some journalling on it before I attempt anything new this year!

Scrawhispers Tutorial

2011-11-25T15:30:00.000Z

Have you checked out the Scrapwhisper Blog today? Rosey is sharing a pretty fine tutorial to be able to use up those random alpha stickers you might have lying around. Go check it out by clicking HERE. Incidentally, if you decide to try it out, link us to your layouts and your name will go in a hat for the November prize draw!

Here is the layout I created:

I kinda made a bit of a hash of it if I am honest! LOL

I didn't have any spray like Rosey used so I decided to use acrylic paint instead. As you can see it didn't dry particularly well. The paint I used didn't like the glossy thickers - my tip of the day, Hobbycraft acrylic paint does not work on glossy thickers. Write that down!

I ended up covered in black paint from my nose to my elbow! Do this properly and you will have a great effect!! Thanks for the challenge Rosey!

Want to see what the other DT members got up too ?

Check out their blogs here:

Rosey

Kelly

Nilsa

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-24T21:21:00.001Z

Can I just say a massive Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends and blog readers! Over the past 5 years of being involved with Scrapbooking and crafting on the internet, I have had the pleasure to chat with, email, forum post, snail mail write to, meet in person many of you and make some really close friends and for that I am truely Thankful. I am so pleased to be able to call all of you my friends! Incidentally I would like to add that I am also thankful for those of you not in America who also fall within this category!! LOL

Anyways - whilst you are eating turkey for Thanksgiving, (which in England is way to early as we have Turkey on Christmas Day) I was thinking of Turkey Day things and started making some Christmas cards! I'm sharing one with you below -

I'm off work tomorrow to shop (we don't have black friday over here either!) with my friend Nicki - yeay day off work and shopping! What more could a girl want! I'm aiming to get my Christmas pressies brought! Have a great weekend whatever you will be doing!

and a close up.....

Oh - and before I go - check out the http://www.scrapwhispers.blogspot.com/ tomorrow as Rosey has an awesome Tutorial for you to use up some of those left over alphas you might have lying around!

Cat Nap

2011-11-20T08:30:00.000Z

Thought I'd share this layout with you today - my cat Rhylee. He was falling asleep sitting at the top of the stairs. I crept up on him, took the photo and when he heard the flash he opened his eyes, so I took another! I've layered up some stickers I've had lying around for ages, a good way to use up odds and ends! I doddled around the edges of the page.

Build A Bear - Scrapwhisper Challenge!

2011-11-18T21:00:00.000Z

I really loved creating a layout for this weeks scrapwhispers sketch challenge! Nilsa created a brilliant sketch for us to play with! This is what I created:

It was perfect for these photos - they are taking on my i-phone and are all a little blurry. Making them 2x3 in size meant they were still clear enough to use on the layout. I didn't just want two photos as was in the sketch so I added a few more. I added the stitching using my sew easy and changed the birds colours with chalk ink.

Do you want to try the sketch out too? Feel free to use it and if you do play along, link us (here) to be in with the chance of winning the November prize pack! :)

All about the Alphas!

2011-11-17T15:30:00.000Z

I thought I would share this layout with you today....

In particular I wanted to talk about what I've done with the alphas! I'm forever changing things around to make them work better with each other.....

Okay - so "I will never forget" is a sticker, I love wordy stickers like this one to really add to the title. "Finding" is made out of thickers. Two different kinds in fact! Firstly the first "i" is actually white normally, but I coloured it with my copic markers so it matched the others. The first "n" is actually an upside down "u" and the "D" is part of the "&" symbol, I just cut off the bits I didn't want. The "g" is a "6" with a little bit added on (gap being covered with copics). Then of course the green lettering are stickers again, nothing different with those. I hand wrote the "&" in between them though. Finally the "Window" - well the first "W" is actually an "m", the "i" is part of a number "2" which I have cut down and the "o" is actually a "zero".

Just goes to show, if you work with what you have in your stash you can still have clear titles -it just takes a little creativity and time! :)

Project #2

2011-11-16T19:15:00.000Z

Thought I would share my project #2 today - I've been on a cake decorating course and this past couple of weeks we've been working on models made from fondant icing. Next week we start on the real thing!! A real fruit cake (not the dummys we have been working on) and patchwork cutters! Eeek! Wish me luck! My friend Nicki and I have also been asked to make a cake for a friend at linedancing ... wait for it - an 8" round, with pink, a Serbian Christmas theme and the flag of Serbia! mmm - Wish us luck with that one - at least two heads are better than one!

Cake Sale

2011-11-13T09:00:00.001Z

I created this layout about a cake sale we held at work towards the beginning of this year. I was aiming for a clean, simple page which was in keeping with the photo.

I'm quite pleased with this page! I'm using up lots of scraps of paper and odd embellishments too which is awesome!

Christmas Craft Fair

2011-11-12T18:26:00.000Z

Today I was selling my crafty wares at a Christmas Craft Fair local to where I live. I had high hopes for this event, it was very well publicised, had a lots of people selling and had a really positive vibe around it. This first photo is of everyone setting up before the doors opened to the public. It is actually a little empty in this photo because not everyone had arrived!

We got there early so as we could set up our table (my mum came to help!) - we were very tight on space as they had crammed us in, but we made it work. This is what my table looked like:

I also had my cards on a turning display at the end of the table. We were selling knitted hats, tea pot cozies, egg cozies and mug cozies, kindle covers, hand warmers, cards, gift tags, baby clothes and more.

The doors opened at 11am and a few people trickled through. Then a few more later through the day. It was actually all rather disappointing. We managed to make the cost of the table back and a little added profit but sadly not much more than that! People just were not parting with their money - for any of the sellers.

I got talking to a few of the other vendors and they were all having a bad time of it too. One lady was selling really pretty candles in tea cups. Last week she sold out at another craft fair - this week she sold two. She said it was one of the worst fairs she had been too. Another lady selling cushions hardly sold anything, the chilli chutneys on another table didn't sell very well either. There was 8 people selling cards (we were one of them - although surprisingly my cards did really well, especially those with kraft coloured cardstock!!) and some random woman customer started ranting at the poor lady selling cakes opposite our stall. She was going off on one, at the cost (£1 each) saying it was bad and she was on benefits and couldn't afford that price for a cake. I have to add here that the cakes were gorgeous looking - they were of a large muffin size, prettily decorated and I thought very reasonable. The lady vendor was fantastic though and just said "I'm sorry my love but thats my prices" off stormed the woman, later to complain to the cushion lady that her covers were also too expensive! pppff !

I know people are on a tight budget right now, I appreciate that not everyone will want to buy everything on someones table but is there really a need to be so rude? right in these vendors faces too. Keep your thoughts to yourself thats what I say!

So all in all a bit of a disappointment all around - I've learnt from it though and met some lovely people today too. Now .... I have loads of stock to go in my etsy shop very soon! Watch this space.

Challenge 106 (Scrapwhispers)

2011-11-11T20:41:00.000Z

The challenge on scrapwhispers today is to scraplift a layout that Nilsa created. I loved working with Nilsa's page - I was immediately inspired to create this page about my Monday night cake decorating classes I have been taking with my mum and friend.

We've been learning basket weave in royal icing and making flowers to decorate the cakes. Its been a lot of fun - even though there is always homework! This was a fun page for me - I hope my mojo sticks around for a while longer! :)

Want to play along with the scrapwhisper team and be in with the chance of winning a prize? CLICK HERE

Sneak Peak

2011-11-10T09:00:00.000Z

Coming soon to my etsy shop: More Kindle Covers - in different colours! Great stocking fillers for those kindle lovers in your life! Currently half price too! Click here to see and buy!

Cute Cat Time!

2011-11-09T12:00:00.000Z

I just had to share this photo of Rhylee with you today. Awww - he's too cute for words sometimes! :)

Christmas Prep

2011-11-08T10:00:00.000Z

I've started my Christmas countdown - I've got tonne's of stuff planned.... starting with a craft fair this coming Saturday! Eeek - I'm so unprepared! I was sick all of last week so haven't got everything done I needed to and am now in a blind panic to get it all done by Saturday! Wish me luck! :)

On a happy note, my supplies for my Christmas album came today. Every year for the past 4 years I have taken part in Shimelle's Christmas Album class. You purchase it as a one off and then as alumni get the course free every year afterwards. Its a great class and I recommend it to everyone. Click here for her website and keep and eye out for this years class details coming soon.

Strangely I have never (a) completed my full album or (b) scrapped in 12x12 size. I think the fact I usually scrap 12x12 might be one of the reasons I haven't finished a Christmas album yet - I love 12x12 its what I feel comfortable with. So this year, no more 6x6, 8x11 or any other size. I'm staying big! A whole red lushious album full of Christmas fun ! I ordered an echo park range of papers (I love echo park right now) plus a selection of Thickers lettering. I'm not overdoing the embellishments and will use whatever is to hand at the time. The papers come with some stickers though. I'm excited for Christmas!

I also decided I wont be doing the course prompts this year either. I'm going to use the principles of the course but make it up for me as I go along. I'm even starting a few days before December! Wooo get me! Such a rebel. I'm looking forward to it! :)

Project One!

2011-11-07T09:00:00.002Z

I've been attending a cake course with my mum and friend for the past few weeks and we recently finished project one - basketweaving and flowers! This is the cake I created (of course it was purple!) I'm annoyed my writing / flowers are wonky but I learnt from that. Its fun to make but stressful too! Its not a real cake just a dummy cake, basically polystryene that you ice to look like a cake!

Next week we are learning how to model a few christmasey shapes - watch this space for project two! Coming Soon!

Funny Hats

2011-11-06T19:11:00.000Z

I'm finally getting to scrap some of the photos from our Royal Wedding celebrations at the beginning of the year! Yeay! This is one of my mum and step dad sporting some funny hats at my line dance classes social.

Scrapwhispers Challenge 105

2011-11-04T18:30:00.000Z

This week on scrapwhispers is a colour challenge week. Purple, Blue and White. A cool colour combination! I chose to create a scrapbook page about my trip to Hampton Court Maze back in September of this year.

I used this flower to border the page - it's actually from a dollshouse collection (from Hobbycraft) They had lots of cute minatures there to choose from! I think it sets the page off perfectly.

Want to play along with this weeks challenge? CLICK HERE

Scrapwhispers Challenge 104

2011-10-28T15:00:00.007+01:00

Its blog hop day on Scrapwhispers today. Its my turn to create a tutorial so I chose to use some of my scrap paper to create my own embellishments. Go and check the tutorial out here.

I used the other embellishment that I made on a scrapbook page:

Can you see it at the bottom right of the page? I added some lettering stickers to tie it in with the title on my page - these embellishments are pretty useful to have in your collection thats for sure!

There is a prize up for grabs if you play along! :) Happy Friday everyone! You can see what the other DT members created on their blogs too:

Rosey

Kelly

Nilsa

Poinsetta Christmas Card

2011-10-27T08:20:00.000+01:00

One of my favourite Christmas traditions is to buy a nice big poinsetta flower for our dining room table. Its not Christmas without one! I thought this stamp was fun to colour in but it took forever! Shame my photography skills haven't improved though - sorry! :)

Let it snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

2011-10-26T12:00:00.000+01:00

Well, I have to admit I don't REALLY want it to snow. In fact I HATE the snow! This snowman paper, silver foil and magnolia all dressed up warm was crying out for the sentiment though! :) I ran my first copic marker out today too ! Whatever is a girl to do? They've lastest me ages.

Christmas Card

2011-10-25T09:20:00.000+01:00

My countdown to Christmas continues with this Christmas card - its a little different to my usual style I think, but I enjoyed all the different techniques. There are a variety of stamps on this page and inks.

Catherine Howard

2011-10-24T20:38:00.001+01:00

Thought I would share a quick scrapbooking page I created today just for no other reason than I wanted to! No scrap blog challenge, no article - just because I felt like it. It was bliss. I loved making this page. Is it too early to start a resolution to scrap for myself more for the rest of the year? Mmmm I like it when I'm organised enough to get some weekday scrapping done! :)

Scrapwhispers Layout Challenge

2011-10-21T22:52:00.000+01:00

So, I don't know if you have visited Scrapwhispers recently - but if you have you will have seen we've been holding a few sketch challenges once a month. This is new for the scrapwhispers team but so far the sketches have been popular with the Design Team. I love working with sketches as it helps me focus my mind on the blank canvas staring me down! It also is another way I can scrap quickly but efficiently and effectively all in one go. I particularly like the scrapwhisper sketches as they are not over complicated and mean that you can add too or take away whatever you want. This is this weeks sketch challenge:

And here is the layout I created as a result.

The photo is of me with my cousins on my 7th birthday in 1987! I'm second from the left! (just in case you couldn't figure that one out!)

Come on over and give the sketch a try for yourselves! There is also the opportunity to win the new Echo Park Christmas paper collection - not to missed its delicious !!

Bo Bunny Kit

2011-10-18T13:44:00.007+01:00

I was lucky enough to win a scrapbook magazine competition recently. A mystery parcel turned up at my door and it was full of card making kits from Bo Bunny! Of course I was extremely excited!

I jumped right in and made some cards! I love the final look of these. These kits are again perfect for when you're in a rush and need a card quick!

Another Starting Point Challenge

2011-10-17T13:42:00.001+01:00

So, whilst I'm on a bit of a roll, I thought I'd do another of Shimelles Starting Point Challenges. You can find this one by Clicking Here.

I'm really enjoying this way of scrapping. Its super quick and perfect for when you're short on time!

Shimelles Starting Point

2011-10-17T13:39:00.000+01:00

Over on Shimelles blog she holds a weekly starting point challenge. I love them! Its opened my eyes to a new way of scrapping! This starting point was from a couple of weeks ago, but I've been so busy I had no time to play along. This is what I created:

You can see the challenge by clicking here

Colour Challenge

2011-10-16T13:35:00.000+01:00

There is a lilac, grey and white challenge happening at the moment on the colour create challenge blog!
This is a great combination for Christmas cards! Here is mine.

Scrapwhispers - 102

2011-10-15T12:45:00.000+01:00

I created this layout about a day trip to Wisley with my friend Rosey and her mum last month. It also happens to be a scraplift of Rosey's layout. To see the original layout I lifted and another 2 scraplifts from the Scrapwhisper DT CLICK HERE! Also check it out and play along because there is some lovely Echo Park Christmas Paper up for grabs!

I'm still here

2011-10-07T21:55:00.000+01:00

Hi there one and all. Sorry for my lack of posting recently I've been totally tied up with so much happening.

Before I get into that though let me tell you about the latest Scrapwhisper Challenge. We're challenging you to create a layout using an orange, brown and grey colour scheme. Its pretty tricky! Come on over and give it a go. Also if you want to join in the team scraplifting game, it starts on 10th October so sign up now! email me to join.

My layout for the brown, orange and grey challenge!

One of the reasons I've been absent though is because I've started a cake decorating class every Monday night. My first challenge was to Royal Ice this dummy cake. The cake is made from polystyrene - its pretty challenging! This one isn't perfect but I'm gonna give it another go this weekend and have to try my hand at something called basket weaving (piping icing to look like a basket) - wish me luck!

I've had a creative fix by making a garden themed cake though for one of our linedancers.

and most scarily of all I've started on a WWII ration diet! I'm doing it for a challenge to raise money for the Alzheimers Society. I've completed one whole week eating things like this:

Liver and Bacon Casserole, potato and cabbage. So far I've raised £403 which is whats keeping me going. If you havent checked out my ration challenge blog yet here is the link: http://www.rationchallenge.blogspot.com/ If you can't afford to sponsor me, I love followers too ~(I need the support!) and I'd love for you just to look around the blog itself! Maybe try a recipe yourself at home! :)

Have a great weekend - I'll hopefully be back soon with more crafting!

Halloween

2011-09-24T09:25:00.000+01:00

I whizzed up a couple of halloween themed cards yesterday! I made a one eyed monster using my cricut machine and attached this with some foam pads to a random selection of last years Halloween papers! Cute!

Colour Challenge

2011-09-23T15:55:00.000+01:00

I'm really loving colour challenges right now - here is a card I've created for the lime green, aqua and white challenge on http://colourcreatechallenge.blogspot.com/ - great combination for a modern feeling Christmas card don't ya think?
The added technique was to add texture. I did this by using a stamp with a texture feeling to it (the branches of the tree - I embossed with glitter powder for a further texture. Then I added a strip of ribbon plus I made an embellishment from felt and a button. Thanks for looking!

Scrap Whispers Sketch

2011-09-23T15:50:00.000+01:00

There is a sketch challenge on the Scrapwhisper Blog this week. This is my take on the challenge:

Head on over there yourself to play along and see if you can win the awesome prize up for grabs!

http://www.scrapwhispers.blogspot.com/ bookmark it now ! :)

Foodie Thursday: Tomato Soup

2011-09-22T08:50:00.000+01:00

A little while back I showed you the bumper crop of tomato's I got out of my garden. Well, there was no way I could eat all of them just as they were, so I decided to make them into soup. Soup is such an easy thing to make, I recommend everyone makes this - so delicious, so quick and so easy.

Basically, however many tomato's you have, cut them all up and put in a big pan.

add a potato - leave the skin on and just cut it up, plus add a chopped onion. I also added an old leak I had that needed to be used up.

Make some vegetable stock. I used three cubes and 5 pints of water.

Pour this over the tomato's and mix. I also added a handful of dried basil for some extra flavour, as well as salt and pepper to season.

Bring this to the boil rapidly and then let it simmer for about 20 mins, until the potato is cooked through and the tomato's are mushy.

Blend it all in a blender (do this in small batches)

and transfer to a new pot. Heat it up again being sure to stir. You will notice by blending it has thickened the mixture.

Serve with some crusty bread or garlic bread as I have done here. Makes a delicious dinner or lunch!

What a weekend! (photo heavy!)

2011-09-20T10:16:00.000+01:00

I can quite honestly say I've had the best weekend in absolutely ages! I've never walked so much in my life but its been really fantastic. It started on Saturday when I got to meet up with my friend Rosey and her mum Ruth and we took a trip to Wisley Gardens.

It was my first time there and it was stunningly beautiful. So many flowers and plants of different kinds, they were all gorgeous. My word for the day was "unusual" everytime I saw a new flower I would be saying "wow look at that, thats so unusual" - there simply wasn't another word that would decribe it better!

I mean - look at this stunning example.

It was so great catching up with Rosey, she's such fun and we had a brilliant day.

Wisley is basically a giant garden owned by The Royal Horticultural Society. They use it as a flagship garden to show the public different kinds of plants and show you what you might want to grow in your own gardens. They have a giant glasshouse too with a tropical temperature to host all kinds of tropical plants. We even saw bananas growing!

We had fun trying to interpret the latin names for the plants (from the labels) and I learnt lots.

Of course on our way around in the gardens I discovered a cat. I had to stroke her, she made me sad though she wasn't very well you could tell. She kept trying to meow at me to tell me, just look at those sad eyes. :(

Wisley really is a beautiful place and I'm definately going back - we didn't get to see half of it. There was so much more to see - I felt like I could spend a whole week there.

Afterwards we went out for a gorgeous meal at an Italian restaurant and I when I eventually got home I collapsed in my bed and slept really well all night! :)

Thanks so much to Rosey and her mum for hosting me all day!

Sunday I spent most of the day in my garden - no photos of that but maybe I will take some for later on in the week! I've planted cauliflower, brocolli, kale (thanks Ruth) and basically had a good tidy up. My greenhouse isn't here yet, so I'm just waiting for that phonecall to come.

Monday was my birthday and I woke to some amazing gifts and had pancakes for breakfast! I was also lucky enough to be able to meet up with an email friend from Utah! (some of you will already know her!)Michelle is over here with her Mom Judy and Aunt Debbie. They are the nicest family ever! It felt like we had known them forever and a day. My Mum and I jumped in the car and drove 20 mins down the road to Hampton Court (the once residence of King Henry the 8th)

We met at the gate and it was fantastic. Lots of walking again but I'm okay with that! LOL I think my feet will thank me for it one day! Kateryn Parr (King Henry's 6th Wife) entertained us with her views on 16th century gossip, illegal torture and reminded us when asked what we believe we should always say "I believe what the king does".

There was lots of photo opportunities and the sun was shining too which was a blessing in iteself. Its been raining quite a lot recently but for my birthday it shone!

We had a wander around the gorgeous gardens, saw the oldest tennis court in the world, found the oldest grapevine in the world and generally soaked in the atmosphere.

I love this time of year when the autumnal colours of gardens really stand out. It has to be the best time of the year to visit.

We attempted the world famous maze. I told Michelle at the time that King Henry was bored and probably needed some kind of entertainment. I've read today though that the maze was not installed until 1700 by William III, it was a fashion at the time to build mazes for entertainment and the maze at Hampton Court is the oldest in Britain. Here we are in the centre.

We also took a ride around the gardens on a horse and carriage. These shire horses are magnificent but I'm not really a fan of horses so I kept my distance! LOL It was a fun carriage ride though and we got to learn more about Hampton Court. I really should look into my own history more !

Again, the gardens were amazing and just stunningly beautiful. I can just imagine living here in Tudor times.

We finished the afternoon with afternoon tea. Scones with jam and clotted cream, tea and hot chocolate. I have to say though I was a little disappointed with the scones, they were a little dry and not enough fruit - I've vowed to send some to Michelle and her family when she gets home! :)

It was a wonderful day and I really was sad for it to end. My mum loved it too and is planning for the next time we can meet up with them. She said it felt like they were family and we just hadn't met up with them in a while! It was lovely!A big thank you to all of them for spending my birthday with me! :)

Later that evening I went to Wimbledon with my mum, step dad, friend Nicki and her dad Ken. We ate a lovely meal in Giraffe Cafe

and the waiter saw me opening some gifts from Nicki & Ken so brought over my desert of waffle, banana, icecream and chocolate caramel sauce (oh my) with a candle! That was really sweet so of course I made a wish! :)

I didn't actually take my camera with me but I did have my iphone hence the dark photos! We had a really lovely evening, totally relaxed and delicious.

Thank you so much to them all for a wonderful end to an awesome day.

Paper piecing

2011-09-17T09:23:00.000+01:00

I've not made many cards before using the paper piecing technique, I decided to keep it simple this first time round and I have to say I love the results. I am definately going to try this technique some more.

Scrapwhispers Challenge 98

2011-09-16T13:31:00.001+01:00

This weeks scrapwhisper challenge has just been posted on the blog. CLICK HERE to play along. Don't forget there is a fantastic prize up for grabs!

This layout is about two of my cats, Millie and Mollie. I've got a new camera and these were the first two shots I took! I've also figured out how to make the pictures bigger on blogger! LOL I've been blogging since 2006 and only just figured this out! Enjoy!

Foodie Thursday: Baked Apple

2011-09-15T09:20:00.000+01:00

If you've been hanging around my blog the past few weeks you will have seen many recipes for apples and plums. This week I'm sticking with an apple recipe but making it super simple. There is nothing like a basic apple, warmed in the oven to make you smile!

You need - an apple, some sultanas, sprinkle of brown sugar

Simply score the apple 1/4 from the top, all around with a sharp knife. This is so some of the steam can cook the inside of the apple. Core the apple by taking the core out of the middle (I used an apple corer) put the apple into a pan and stuff sultanas in the middle. Sprinkle a little bit of brown sugar over the top and pour 5 tablespoons of cold water around the bottom of the apple.

Bake in a hot oven for about 40 mins. Keep testing the apple by digging the knife in the top part of the apple - when its cooked it will be nice and soft and the brown sugar will have melted into a caramel.

I warn you - its not attractive but it tastes DELICIOUS!

Enjoy!

Another Card!

2011-09-11T09:10:00.000+01:00

I've been making at least one card every night recently. This is another Christmas card - I used 5 stamps to create the image and I used my ink and blendy tool to create the shades in the background. I used some more of my scrap paper and jazzed it up with some stretchy thread, thought it made a change from ribbon! I'm quite pleased with the result - I might have to combine my stamps more frequently!

Yoga birthday

2011-09-10T09:20:00.000+01:00

I'm in the middle of a card making frenzy right now! I've found a little bit of mojo and I'm off!! LOL Cute little magnolia stamp this one - I couldn't not buy it! Nice quick and simple card this one!

Scrap Whisper Colour Challenge

2011-09-10T00:17:00.000+01:00

This week over on the Scrapwhisper Blog (CLICK HERE FOR LINK) We have challenged everyone to create a layout using the colour scheme of green, brown and pink!

This is my layout about the sheds in my garden! (last one I promise!) I didn't take a brilliant photo - camera is still dead as is the light at the moment! LOL

I did however also decide to make a card and this photo is much clearer! I used a stamp from Waltzing Mouse and paper pieced the dress with some scraps I had in my stash.

This was a fun challenge and I will definately use this colour scheme again! Why not pop on over to the blog and try it out for yourselves! There is an awesome prize up for grabs too. (and letting you into a little secret - not many people are playing at the moment as I don't think they realise we're back from having the summer off - that means you will get more chances of winning that prize! The odds are stacked with you! )

Foodie Thursday: Plum Jam

2011-09-08T07:50:00.000+01:00

I LOVE LOVE LOVE homemade jam. It's so easy to make and really quick too. As you will remember I've had a lot of plums and apples recently and so many of my recipes at the moment are centred around those fruits. So far however, this one is my favourite! I love the taste of this and its yummy on toast for breakfast.

You will need:
1kg Fruit (stoned and quartered)
1kg preserving sugar
150ml of water
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Basically put the water, lemon juice and plums into a large pot. Boil for 20 mins until the fruit is soft. Put into a blender and blitz until smooth. I like to leave a few chunky pieces of plum but you can make as smooth as you like. Return to the pan and bring back to the boil. Add in the sugar and stir well. Leave for another 10 - 15 mins until it boils once more (you can use a jam thermometer to show you how hot it needs to be) - add to jars and seal well. I keep my jam in the fridge but you can store it in a coll dark cupboard too.

Will you be my bridesmaid scrolls

2011-09-07T09:00:00.001+01:00

My brother and SIL to be are getting married in 2012 and I've been asked to do all of their wedding stationery. So far I've done their save the date magnets and now I've worked on the "will you be my bridesmaid" invitations.

Basically I've created scrolls - The happy couple have written their own personal messages to each bridesmaid and I've played around with a nice font, added their wedding monogram on the top and a nice border then printed it all onto white parchment paper. I've then wrapped them with ribbon, added a handcut, handstamped gift tag and then a single rose as a finishing touch.

They loved them! Yeay! There are 5 bridesmaid and 1 flowergirl in total. I will be a bridesmaid too but I decided not to make myself a scroll! LOL

Next to work on? The invitations!

Happy Birthday Mum!

2011-09-06T09:00:00.000+01:00

Its my mums birthday today and yesterday I frantically made this cake for her. She loves football and she loves cats so this is basically an amagalgamation (did I spell that right) of the two. This is only my third cake and I'm still learning! LOL I sure have room for improvement. The whole thing is edible - the base cake is in her team colours, the football obviously is for her love of football and the cats are my cats!

Now, my issues with this cake have to be pointed out. Rhylee on the top of the cake - IRL he has the orange bit on the other side of his face and his tail is ginger with a white tip - I have no idea why I changed this! LOL I also forgot to give the cat down the bottom middle (Millie) the present she was meant to be holding. The football is sinking, slowly! I under estimated the size of the cake itself and all the cats are saying "oooohhhh" LOL. Oh and I forgot to add the cats whiskers! LOL

Thing is - my mum didn't notice the imperfections - she LOVED it! I can't wait for my Cake course to start soon - I want to learn to do this properly!

Another Christmas Card!

2011-09-05T09:00:00.000+01:00

Thought I would share another Christmas Card with you today! :) Only 113 days to go! LOL

Christmas Card - Angel

2011-09-04T17:56:00.000+01:00

I've found a new size card I'm loving right now. I picked up a pack of 50 card blanks at hobbycraft this weekend, the cardstock used is Kraft card and its amazing - such thick quality and 6x6 is a brilliant size to work with. When I make square cards I usually do them 5x5 but 6x6 is fab!!

I used bling like pretend snow flakes on this card and used some scraps of last years christmas paper for the background, I matched the snowflake theme in!

Then I hung a little charm (thanks Rosey!) on the ribbon for a little extra dimesion. I used silver ink (which IRL is very bright but you can't seem to see it in the photos!) and I covered every "snowy" area on my copic coloured image with frosted lace stickles.

Thanks for looking! Have a great day

Random Craft Projects

2011-09-03T09:00:00.002+01:00

It never ceases to amaze me the different types of crafty things I manage to sneak into my everyday life! This is a wall in my office at work! We had set ourselves a challenge to reduce our outstanding work by 2000 pieces of post, by the end of August. We called it the "road to recovery" because we are so behind with our work situation (I work in insurance claims and we had a major storm, then the riots etc and are sunk). Taking the road to recovery thought I created a road border and each team had their own car - we "raced" around the track, moving each day to see which car could go the furthest - who said competition was unhealthy! LOL The figures in the centre were updated everyday throughout August and showed where we were. As you can see we smashed our target by 679 claims! Yeay us! :)

Then also, work related - I was asked by my boss to create a giant insurance themed trivial pursuit that they could play to lighten the mood in a leaders conference. So this is what I created! It went down well apparantly and everyone loved playing - its going on the wall fairly soon so we can see who won! :)

Scrapwhispers: Blog Hop Day!

2011-09-02T15:00:00.001+01:00

Have you checked out the Scrapwhispers Blog today? We're holding a blog hop to basically try and get back in the swing of things! We've had a bit of an impromptu break over the Summer and now are getting started with the challenges again. Its sure to be a lot of fun! CLICK HERE to check it out now!

Nilsa has shared a tutorial with us today about how to alter a composition notebook. Nice and quick and simple to ease everyone back into their craft rooms! This is the book I created, for use with my etsy shop. I have a hard time keeping myself on track unless I make notes of everything!

Check out the other Design Team Members to see what they have been creating and why not try it out for yourself too! :)

In other scrappy related news, I've stepped down from the Stamp and Scrap Design Team so I can focus on Scrapwhispers and my other commitments. Sometimes I take on way too much and I need to slow down! This is step one! I'm sad to leave but I wish the rest of the DT all the best with their weekly challenges - head on over each Saturday to the blog to play along!

Foodie Thursday: Spice Apple Chutney

2011-09-01T08:56:00.000+01:00

If you're like me and thinking of Christmas already, then this is the receipe for you! Super easy to make but it takes 3 months to develop its flavour - make this now and it will be ready to eat with cheese and crackers at Christmas! Your guests and family will be impressed!

You start by adding the following into a big pan:

2lb apples, cored and chopped
2 onions chopped
handful of sultanas
2 tblsp each of: ground coriander; paprika; mixed spice; salt
3/4 pint of malt vinegar
3 cups sugar

The smell is pretty strong but it mellows as it cooks. I thought it was a lot of salt to add too but this is used to help draw the flavours out of the apples and is needed for preserving the chutney. Basically you heat it to boiling and then let it simmer for an hour until it is thick and looks like this:

Thats it! The chutney is made - add it to jars and wait until Christmas! This makes about 1 large jar or 4 small jars.

Visit back tomorrow for a scrapwhisper blog hop (the reason Foodie Friday is on a Thursday this week)

Garden Update: Harvest Time

2011-08-29T15:34:00.000+01:00

So I have been in my garden most of this weekend - I've done a lot of tidying up and getting the garden ready for the forthcoming Autumn. Its been miserable weather, the rain hasn't stopped hammering it down and everything is just soaking wet. My rhubarb is loving it though - I wish it would turn red so I can eat it! LOL

Today I went out and picked my final harvest and it was a bumper one!

Yellow Peppers:

Tomato's (which I made into soup - recipe to follow!)

Late strawberries - none left now!

Giant runnerbeans! I can't believe the length of these!

A handful of raspberries - I'm looking forward to these with my breakfast tomorrow morning! I have some more still growing but not many.

Green peppers

HUGE chilli peppers! These are the green variety but I still have around 30 growing on the plants

I've started to freeze them down !I won't eat this many chilli's in a month! LOL

Finally three cucumbers

I've still got a handful of tomato's growing and of course the chilli peppers - the rhubarb too. Thats all thats left though. I wish now that I would have grown some winter veggies - I might do that for next year.

Good news though - I went and purchased myself a brand spanking new greenhouse! :) My polytunnel will be coming down, and in its place a greenhouse - I'm pretty excited! I got a good deal on it and it's much bigger than the tunnel. The tunnel was great but the cover has been badly damaged in the weather we've been experiencing. A greenhouse will be sturdier hopefully. Its not due for delivery for at leat 6 weeks so I will show you photos when it's here!

Foodie Friday: BBQ'ed sweetcorn

2011-08-26T08:52:00.001+01:00

Sometimes its the simple pleasures in life! I love corn on the cob and I especially love it on the BBQ. As this is the last official Friday of Summer (September will see the start of Autumn) we of course had to celebrate with a BBQ.

Corn on the cob on the BBQ is really easy to make. Its always best to cook the sweetcorn first so its tender and cooked through - I did this in the kitchen. If you add a pinch of sugar and a pinch of salt to the cooking water it makes all the difference to the flavors of the corn. You can do this well in advance too which means when it comes to popping them on the BBQ its all that much more easier!

Then when you are ready simply pop them on the grill, turning a few times until they are warmed through and chargrilled! Food can't get better than this ! Not everyone in my family things the same though - they prefer a meaty BBQ! LOL

Polytunnel of Love

2011-08-21T11:17:00.000+01:00

My final layout created for the love challenge on Shimelle's website this weekend. I've loved using my polytunnel to grow things this year, its been pretty successful by all accounts.

Grid it Up Challenge

2011-08-21T11:12:00.000+01:00

For this challenge, Shimelle challenged us to create a page with a grid design element to it. I created this page of my step dad building a pond!! It was pretty hard work by all accounts and I caught him sitting down on the job!

once more sorry for the out of focus pictures! I hope to get a new camera soon! I'm excited!! :) My grid element was the graph paper in the background plus the photos in a grid too

Red white and Aqua

2011-08-21T11:07:00.000+01:00

My red white and aqua colour themed page for a challenge on Shimelles website this weekend. This is me and my mum dressed up last week for a fancy dress linedance social. Too funny. We went as Pirates from the Carribean!

Half Page Challenge

2011-08-21T11:03:00.000+01:00

Well, what would you know.. another layout! I'm totally loving scrapping this weekend! Hoorray! This layout was created for Shimelle's half page challenge. Its a layout about our new garden sheds - they totally look like beach huts don't you think?! :)

Signature Accent Challenge: Kay and the Giant (runner)beanstalks

2011-08-21T10:59:00.000+01:00

Another Shimelle Challenge to share with you this weekend! I hope I'm not overloading you with layouts - they come along like buses don't they !! LOL I don't have many on my blog for a while then all of a sudden you get 9 in one day! :)

I once more apologise for the poor blurry photos (dropped my camera) but I hope you get the gist! This layout is about the runnerbeans my mum has been growing. I gave her the seeds and then she went to town!! They are even bigger now and the runnerbeans are delicious!

The challenge here was to create a layout with your signature on it - ie something you do on a lot of your layouts. Well I did two things on this one - I started with a sheet of paper in the middle of the page and then I outlined it in black pen with a border. I do that a lot! Its a good starting point ! :)

Bingo Cards and Butterflies

2011-08-21T10:53:00.000+01:00

Shimelle has a challenge on her blog (click here) for us to use this layout of her's as inspiration for our own:

Old Photo Booths by Shimelle

This is the layout I created:

I kept the colour scheme but filled up more of the page, I created my own mini bingocard and I used a strip of photos too. I randomly covers an embossed yellow paper with black ink and basically threw it alltogether! LOL

Hot Pink Hoopla - Challenge

2011-08-21T10:49:00.000+01:00

Another layout for a challenge over on Shimelles website this weekend. This time we had to be inspired by a hot pink layout! This is my creation. Not my favourite ever - I don't think I like scrapping with hot pink! LOL I also scrapped within a 7x7 square which is pretty difficult I'll tell you!

Sketch Challenge

2011-08-21T10:41:00.001+01:00

Another Shimelle Challenge Layout to share with you (Did I mention I have a lot to add to my blog today?!) This time is a weekly sketch challenge that she holds. You can find it by CLICKING HERE.

This is the layout I created:

and because my camera is officially knackered (after dropping it) a blurry close up too!

I swear that little magnolia stamp is the spitting image of Nicki - I might start using it as her lookalike on my scrapbook pages! LOL This layout is about the cake I made for my friends birthday last week.

Saturday Starting Point Challenge

2011-08-21T10:33:00.000+01:00

Shimelle has started a new weekly scrapbook challenge called the "starting point challenge" - she gives you a layout to copy as a starting point and then you basically add your photos and embellishments. This is the link to her challenge CLICK HERE. The photo above shows my starting point. Here is the layout I then went on to create:

Sorry for the bad photo - I dropped my camera yesterday and now its not working properly :( I'm thinking I might need to go shopping for a new one!

The layout above is of my friend Nicki at a recent linedance social we run. She dressed up as Hermione Granger from Harry Potter!

You will see lots and lots more layouts from me today - I scrapped all day yesterday for Shimelles weekend scrap event! I got so much done! :) I'm a happy girl - I haven't scrapped in ages.

Foodie Friday: Plum Sauce

2011-08-19T08:16:00.001+01:00

It's that time of year isn't it - a surplus of delicious fruits and veggies and a need to try and use them up before they go bad. A need to make scruminess for the Autumn and Winter to come! I've got a reason for bottling up and making my own sauces and things too and you can see why coming soon! I'm starting a little challenge... but I won't reveal any more on that right now! :) You will just have to watch this space!

So, last week I was over run with apples (and still am) and this week it's all about the plums - take a lot at this little lot...

Thats right - two boxes and a carrier bag of plums! Whatever will I do with them all? Well, I started off by making a chinese style plum sauce. Its pretty tasty - you have to try this one!

You will need:
1kg plums
0.5kg brown sugar
3 onions
1 chilli pepper
3 cloves garlic
1/2 litre water
3 litres white wine vinegar
1 bottle light brown soy sauce

Start by de stoning and quartering your plums. Add them to a large pan with the onions, garlic, chilli, water and vinegar. When they are soft - about 30 mins, sieve the mixture so its clear - discard all the leftover onion and plum skins. Make sure you get as much juice out as possible. This can take a while.

Put back on the heat, add the sugar, soy sauce and mix. Leave it simmering for an hour, stiring occassionally. Let it cool. Taste when cold and if too vinegary which is what happened to me, add 2 teaspoon of bicarb of soda and stand back! The soda will fizz so make sure its not too near the edge of your pot - it reacts with the vinegar in the sauce but takes the horrid taste away! Makes about 4 random sized bottles ! (can you tell I recycle?!)

You can use plum sauce as a table sauce or in other recipes - this is an example of one I want to try soon!
Have a great weekend foodies!

Birthday cake and card

2011-08-15T09:00:00.001+01:00

It was my friend Nicki's birthday yesterday and I made her a card (with a figure that looks like her!! - sorry Nicki!!) and a birthday cake with an orca on top - she loves orca's and I hope she loved the cake too! :)

One Sheet...

2011-08-14T20:00:00.000+01:00

Another one of Shimelles challenges this weekend has been to create a layout using just one sheet of paper to embellish it with - ie cut up a sheet of paper to create the layout. This is what I have created!

Using up those stickers

2011-08-13T15:29:00.000+01:00

The latest challenge on Shimelle's website this weekend is to create a layout with the addition of a variety of stickers. This was a great challenge for me as I have been holding on to a number of odd sheets of stickers - you know the types? The massive sheet that has one sticker left but that you don't want to throw it out because you definately will use that sticker one day! LOL I used up lots of word stickers and then the lasrger sassafras one across the top with weekdays on it for my journalling! I'm feeling my mojo coming back slowly! :)

Starting Point Challenge

2011-08-13T14:18:00.000+01:00

The next challenge from Shimelle has been to start with the above seen basic layout and then pretty much do what you want!

This is my finished layout about a cat I have called Penny! Another adopted semi-stray cat that spends more time in my garden than her own! I have no idea why cats seem to be attracted to my house! I know I have 4 of my own but its like they have a 6th sense!

A scrapping kinda day

2011-08-13T14:11:00.000+01:00

What a week! It's gone so incredibly quickly but has been totally messed up in so many ways and on so many levels! The riots that have happened in London have been terrible. Monday night I was watching it on the news in Tottenham and was shocked but it was still the other side of London and I guess I was somewhat detached from it still. Then it came to Croydon and Sutton and it became all a bit too real! Its horrible watching a building on TV burning to the ground, a building that for 12 years I drove past every single day on the way to work. A building that was built in 1876 and has all that history! So sad. I got so mad too. Then Tuesday night we had to cancel a dance class in Mitcham - the police said it was too risky and were recommending places shut early. To top it all off I work in Insurance claims and my workload has now increased ten fold, hence longer days in the office trying to get it all done. Working an hours drive away from home there was also the many text messages warning me which parts of London had been shut so I could try to figure out a way to get home! Nightmare. Then we arrive to today - a sunny day, a calm day. Hopefully its all over now. Thank God! Add that to the never ending list of things for me to do and its been crazy!

I decided today would be a good day to get in my craft room! I'm ignoring my to do list and turning off my phone!! There is nothing like disolving some stress by locking yourself in your craft room with a dvd box set and some nibbles! My mojo is not really 100% though and boy am I struggling - at least Shimelle is having a scrappy weekend too with a tonne of great challenges to keep me motivated.

This layout is entitled "Squished" - although you can't really see that from my rubbish photography skills! LOL When I said my mojo was struggling I really meant it! For this challenge we had to use one or more of a free printout provided by Shimelle on her website. I used a little circle with "friend" written in it and a blue journalling block which you can just about make out behind my title. The layout is about my friend Nicki squashed in the backseat of my mums car when we went to a party shop and collected 20 balloons.

I'm looking at the layout now and thinking its a little bit plain and bear - I might need to revisit it another day and try to jazz it up some more! I'm off now to try another challenge! Wish me luck! :)

Foodie Friday: Apple Sauce

2011-08-12T10:00:00.001+01:00

What do you do when life hands you apples? Millions and millions of apples! Thats no joke! This is just a small selection of the many apples I have in my kitchen right now! I'd say this isn't even a quarter of what I have. I feel there may well be many apple themed receipes in my future - I'll try not to post them all here at once so you don't overdose on the green stuff!

Of course when you have apples it's an unwritten law that you have to make apple sauce! You can use applesauce for so many things - baking, with meat, in chutneys or with custard Yum! Here's how I make mine:

You will need:

3lb of apples
1 jug of water (about half a litre)
2 cups of sugar
1 tablespoon of lemon juice.

Its handy to have a blender too as it makes your apple sauce smoother.

Basically get a large pot, cut your apples up and put them in the pan. Add the water and cook them on a simmer for 15 mins or until they are soft. Ladle the mixture into the blender and whizz it up. Return to the pan, add the sugar and lemon juice and cook for another 10 mins to combine.

Thats it! Let it cool and then add it to jars. It can keep for up to 4 months in a cool place - in my house it goes really quickly though! We've gotten through a jar already!

This recipe makes about 4 medium jars.

I like my apple sauce to have a mit of texture so I am sure to add some large lumps of apple in the mix - I don't blitz it all the way! Hey and I have to point out I am hovering my spoon over my washing up bowl as its near the window and the only natural light I could get to be able to show you my cooked sauce! :) Of course I ate this soonful immediately after the photo was taken !

Happy Friday everyone !

Western Decor: Scrapjazz Article

2011-08-07T08:00:00.000+01:00

Remember this letter rack I created a while back? Well, you can find out how I made it by CLICKING HERE to read my latest Scrapjazz Article!

Friends

2011-08-06T15:00:00.000+01:00

Its challenge time again! Over on the Stamp and Scrap Saturday blog today the challenge is to create a layout about friends and/or friendship. I created this layout about me and my friend Nicki.

Donn't forget if you want to play along part of the challenge is to use a stamp on your layout.....

I used two - the little bulldog and the British Flag. I love this paper too - its from Sandylion and has been in my stash for about 3 years but I've not really found a use for it until now! Love it! The layout is about me and my friend dressed up for a linedance social.

Foodie Friday

2011-08-05T20:58:00.000+01:00

STOP! Do not adjust your computer screens! This is indeed a blog post - can you believe it! An actual blog post! I can confirm I haven't fallen off of the face of the earth, I am still here and I'm raring to go! Life got a bit crazy for a while there - I won't go into too much detail - cos frankly its happened! LOL time to move on!

I've decided my blog needs a new injection of organisation and energy and thus I am christening Fridays on my blog "Foodie Friday"! Kinda like my Saturday Scruminess but better - I won't just be talking cakes, I'll be talking food recipes etc too. Hopefully I can help out with some inspiration if you're wondering what to have for tea one night and having to make things and take photos will make me try out more food!

In fact visit back soon for some more blog posts from me too - I'll be talking scrapbooking, crafting, baking and more!

Of course I decided to start with a cake for my first recipe ! LOL This is simply gorgeous and so easy to make too - It's called Blackberry and Coconut Bake.....

You will need:

250g/9oz or 2 cups white flour
25g/ 1oz or 1/4 cup oats
280g / 10oz or 1 and 1/2 cup brown sugar
200g / 8oz / 1 cup butter
75g / 2.5 oz / 3/4 cup shredded dried coconut
2 medium eggs
350g / 12oz / 3 cups blackberries (fresh or frozen)

This is seriously heavenly ....

1. preheat oven to 180 / gas 4. Put flour, oats, sugar into a bowl. Rub in the butter with your fingers - it makes a sticky mess but keep going until you have sticky crumbs and not large bits of butter left.
2. Add the coconut, then set aside a small cup worth of mixture to use later.
3. Stir the eggs into rest of mixture then spread over the bottom of a baking tray
4. Dot the blackberries over the mixture and then cover with the mixture you set aside
5. Bake for 1 hour - you will know its done by its appearance - slightly crispy on the top layer but soft and cake like in the middle!

Enjoy