About A Boy.

Hello and happy Sunday!
I am thrilled to share a page today that is a little different in appearance to my usual layouts as it's 'about a boy'! Also this is the last of the projects that I have done for The Studio Challenges as their Guest Designer for August. They have such fun and inspiring challenges so it was a pleasure to join in with them this month.

The challenge today over on The Studio Challenges blog is Tic Tac Toe.

I chose the column on the far right, stars, paint splatters and 3 types of alpha's.

It was a bit daunting at first to be creating a page about a small boy but I knew I had a PL card with 'photo bomb' on it so I found that and some coordinating MME papers and set to work.

Two different colours of paint for my splats and my title has 3 different alpha's.

There is a a few stars scattered about - love the wooden ones from Studio Calico.

There are girls in the background and they were supposed to be the focus but Owen was having none of it and made himself the center of attention!

The camera was made using a old Sizzix die, embellished with a star.

I also made a pinwheel and managed to find a star small enough to go inside the well of the button.

I do hope you can join in with this fun challenge and don't forget to hop on over to the Studio Challenges blog to be wowed but the design teams take on the Tic Tac Toe challenge -HERE.

Thanks for stopping by. xx

Friendly Challenge - Fimo Clay.

Hello fellow crafters, I have a fun friendly challenge to share with you today! 

As most of you know my dear friend and partner in crime Helen (it's criminal how much paper we own!!) regularly challenge each other to create a layout with a particular theme, stash item or technique. This time around Helen challenged us to use Fimo clay on our page.

Not too difficult for me as my youngest daughter has numerous colours in her stash as she regularly makes little critters from the malleable stuff to give as gifts on Birthdays and Christmas.

An ideal time to scrap about her hobby!

I took some photo's of her house of critters and set about making my page. 

All the papers I used are My Minds Eye as the flowery one seemed the perfect colours for my photo's. Then found some co-ordinating colours of clay, a couple of which needed some added white to tone them down a bit!

I rolled out my clay and started simple with some hearts cut out using a mini icing cutter.

The next easy step was some triangles to make my bunting (banners) these were cut with a knife using a stencil as a template. Note to self - make the holes bigger next time as Fimo breaks even when cooked!

The clay embellishment that took the longest was this birdhouse, although the house itself was easy enough it was the bird that took me 'forever'! I just couldn't get this tiny piece of clay (about the size of a pea) into a shape resembling a bird! I would of enlisted the help of my daughter but it was about midnight at this point!

I got there in the end as you can see and I think she is quite happy with her little house among the flowers!

On to Helen's awesome page!

I'm not sure what came first the quote or the photo's! But either way they are perfect together as Helen is the owner of a messy desk, or is it organized chaos? Helen has a craft cabin in her garden that I am most jealous of  where she creates her beautiful pages and cards and where I got to spend several crafty hours!

Helen is often creating long titles and this time her quote is made up with die cut letters, Dymo strips and these adorable stamped Fimo circles that were made using a flower center icing mould, though the air was apparently a couple of shades of blue when the clay refused to part with the mould! 

Helen also had the same shaping problem as me when it came to shaping her paint palette! But us girls will not be beaten by a small piece if clay and her patience paid off!

I very much hope you enjoyed seeing our clay inspired pages and our next challenge (set by me) is to use a pie-chart on a page. Time to head off to Pinterest to acquire some inspiration!

Thanks for stopping by and I will be back tomorrow. xx

Published!

I am excited to now be able to share with you a layout I have had published in the current issue of Scrap365 magazine!

The theme was holidays and these pictures are of our last day in Ibiza, saying goodbye to our fabulous villa and the wonderful island.

I had a hand stitching obsession at  the time I made this page, so I created the sun rays from some yellow ombre thread.

More stitching to embellish the quote strip.

I had only just got my Silhouette then too so I made most of my title with it.

The flowers were fussy cut from some older Echo Park papers.

It seems such a long process from submitting a layout to a magazine to actually seeing it in print and then to finally be allowed to post it here (you have to wait a month from the release date). But I am glad to be able to show it to you now. 

Hope you liked it.

Back soon. xx

A Perfect Summer.

As you know I am guest designer over at The Studio Challenges blog this month and on the 17th August was their second reveal for August, this time a mood board.

The mood board is perfect for me as I am trying desperately to finish last years holiday photo's!

I took the general theme and feel of the mood board and found these photo's that's seemed to encompass the overall summer vibe going on.

I found this great quote to accompany the page and as it was so long I split it so the beginning was the title and used a great deal of rub-on's to finish it!

Some washi, a couple of buttons and a smattering off sequins.

These flowers were just cut from the main patterned paper and a PL card was tucked behind the photo to add my journalling on.

Hope you liked the mood board as much as I did and can find time to play along with us at The Studio Challenges. Check out the awesome design team takes on the challenge too,  Amazing!

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon. xx

Love Life.

Whilst happily enjoying the delights of France and Switzerland on my holidays the rest of the world and in particular blogland carried on without me and so today I am still trying to catch up on past scrapbooking reveals.
Today I am sharing the page I created for Sketch N Scraps 15th August sketch.

This fun sketch was designed by Kelly Holifield.

Here is my page and I substituted two photo's for the three in the sketch but otherwise stayed pretty much true to the design.

I managed to squeeze these flowers from a remaining piece of ancient papers in my attempt to use up the old stash in my ever growing paper hoard!

Lots of fussy cutting used up the remains of this cute sheet of paper. Long forgotten the name of the manufacturer!

Hop on over to the Sketch N Scrap Blog Here to see whats happening with all of this month's sketches. There are three layout and two card sketches to play with and until the end of the month to submit them for a chance to win the prize- a $20 gift certificate to Scrapbook.com from our awesome sponsor:

 Lissa at  Mighty Crafty:

Lissa is excited to sponsor this month's prize giveaway: a $20 gift certificate to Scrapbook.com. She also has a special bonus to share her love of Origami Owl -- a free Charm giveaway for new subscribers and Facebook followers for August. Visit MightyCrafty to find out more and enter to win!

Playing Catch Up.

Hi crafty friends, I have a card to quickly show you today that I made using the card sketch from 5th August reveal at Sketch N Scrap.

I am not on the card design team but had masculine card to make and used the sketch as inspiration.

Here is the sketch designed by Kelly Holifield.

I loved the quote that I put on the front - perfect for a Fathers Day card.

I love layers on cards and as this one was not going in the post I could add more chunky embellishments too!

Hope you can play along with us at Sketch N Scrap with this sketch and/or the new one that was revealed today, you can never have enough cards stashed away for a rainy day!

Back tomorrow with a layout. xx

Holiday Snaps.

Hi everyone,

I have just arrived back from a awesome holiday that didn't allow me any access to a computer so I have missed lots of creative goings on!

I hope I will catch up in the next few days but until then here is a little of what I have been up to (not a drop of glue in sight!).

First off, a week here in beautiful Annecy, France.

Where I swam (briefly!) in the glacial mountain fed lake.

We climbed!

Some of us were not so happy with the climbing part!

But  so worth it!

Sampling the local drink whilst watching the para-gliders jump off the mountain.

(yes it was only lemonade - but I was driving that day!).

This is me trying to convince hubby that he could fly!

Oh No!

We did have to queue for the cable car to take us up one mountain!

Said mountain - Aiguille Du Midi, part of the French Alp range - complete with glacier!

Here we are 3842meters  above sea level!

Another country this time - Switzerland. More awesome scenery on the drive there!

A quick stop off at a Swiss Chocolate Factory on the way to our next destination.

Arrived in time for the children to have a twilight swim in lake Thun. I got as far as my ankles - gosh the water was cold!

Someone had left this frame just lying around at the top of  Schynige Platte!

Catching a train this time to take us up the mountain.

A game of cards half way up????????????

Rebecca decorated her hair with Alpine flowers on the walk down.

I could never get tired of seeing waterfalls!

Lunch with a view!

Me in the snow on top of the Jungfraujoch mountain!

At 3,466 meters above sea level, this has the highest railway station in Europe!

There might have been one or two selfies taken on this holiday!

For the last five days a complete change of pace!

No snow at Disneyland Paris!

No reality here!

We did take a day out to find some culture!

Wow, sorry for the photo overload! 

But I hope you enjoyed my little run through our holiday and no doubt these photo's (and MANY more!) will be seen in the coming month's on my scrapbook pages!

I hope you have had an awesome summer too (feels decidedly Autumnal outside for the middle of August!). Back to school here in the UK in a couple of weeks so we are off to town today for shoes, books and new uniform!

Until tomorrow. xx