Right Now She Likes...

...Not me, that's for sure. But that's a whole new story.
Let's just say exams, boyfriend & not allowed out!!

Anyway...
What does she like right now?
This is one of my new May LO's made with my lovely new Cocoa Daisy kit.

 

I pulled out all the golds and yellows to create this light and happy page.

You can view the May Kit here.

The papers come from the paper addon and the rest of the bits & pieces are from the main kit.

 

 

Here are her likes right now at the age of almost 15yrs.

I love those big gold alpha stickers from Fancy Pants.

 

 

I jazzed up the plain chipboard.

 

 

And added a bow. Both the alphas and ribbon as also in the main kit.

Pretty eh?!

The kit goes on sale to non subbers on the 1st May.

You can view our designer's galleries here if you want to see what else was made with this kit.

 

Thank you : )

xxx

 

 

 

  

Here I Am!!! - Sneaks

Hello.
I hope you had a lovely weekend.
It was a weekend of cleaning, work and scrapbooking for me.
My Cocoa Daisy Kit arrived last week.
I had been look out for the little red van for a few days.
It took longer to arrive that normal due the the Easter weekend and then towards the end of the week, this appeared at my studio window.

Yay!!! It had arrived!!
Ade was heading out as my lovely postie arrived.
So this weekend I needed to get some serious scrapbooking done ready for the kit reveal tonight.

Here are my sneaks.

4 LO's and a mini book that's almost finished.
Not bad!!
The reveal is at 8pm EST.
www.cocoadaisy.com
Don't forget!!

Have a great day xxx

Life's just one big Adventure

It certainly is right now.
Oh how things have changed these recent months.
The word this month over at 'OLW' is 'adventure'.

 

When I made this LO a few weeks ago, I was really struggling. The kids were off for Easter for 3 weeks and I was also trying to work. I found these school holidays harder than any other before. Surely it's supposed to get easier as they got older?

Instead I was battling with Louis who was going from one device to the next, Hollie has boyfriend troubles on and off, messy bedrooms, lazy teens not wanting to help around the house, being a taxi service...oh the joys!! Plus to top that with Ade working from home it's even harder. Trying to keep a few 12yr old boys quiet whilst Ade's on a conference call (Ade's office is opposite Louis' room upstairs).  

It's been really really hard.

But at the same time, now they are older we do have such a laugh together. I love that we all enjoy the say comedies on TV. We do have very similar sense of humours. We all love our movies and still enjoy days out.  

 

 

This photo was taken in London on an inset day at the start of the school break. We went in to London for the day and enjoyed the Southbank. We did the London Aquarium, had a coffee & cake treat, wandered down to the the Tate Gallery (Art) and had Sushi before getting the train back home.

We love the Southbank. So much to see. There were these silly mirrors along the wall so we had some fun posing.

So life isn't all bad, just changing. 

 

 

Please take a look at what the others created on the OLW team here and use the word 'adventure to inspire you too. You can upload your own creation here. It doesn't have to be a LO as you will see from the teams work. You have until 15th May to play.

Enjoy!!!

 

 

Wedding Card

I do like to try and make my own cards.
Not because I am so creative and everything I make has to be handmade.
And not because I have so much time on my hands that I can spare the time.
And not because I'm such a nice person and want to put so much time and love in to my friends and family.
But simply because I really begrudge spending money on cards when I have a studio full of the stuff to make them.
Nice cards are so expensive!!

So there, the truth is out : )

Ade and I had a wedding to attend to recently.
It was his cousins.
That afternoon I thought I'd better make a card to take and made this.

 

The wedding had quite a rustic/country feel to it so I figured this would be a good match.

I used a note card from Chic Tags and the gorgeous chipboard is from Scrapmatts.

I didn't do anything to the chipboard as I thought it was just perfect as it was. Naked!!

Love that rustic feel.

 

I wanted to share the Scrapmatts gallery with you today too. I love their chipboard so much.

Take a look here.

 

Thanks for stopping by today.

I am slowly catching up since the kids have gone back to school this week and aim to reward myself with some blog hopping time very soon.

I miss keeping up with everyone.

Have a lovely day xxx

 

 

 

Fleet Scrappers

Hello.
It's all getting back to normal again.
The kids are back at school.
What a whirlwind of 3 weeks that was.
I sit here now at my desk with a hot latte and enjoy the peace and quiet : )

It's so unlike me, I've barely scrapbooked at all.
I have been very busy behind the scenes though.
I'm excited to share my news that I've taken over our local crop.

I love this little group and our get-togethers. But sadly the lovely lady who organises can't do it anymore, so I've decided to take it on.
If you are local and would like to join us, you can see all the details here.

Our next crop is Saturday 31st May.

I am promising myself some crafty time today.
Hugs xxx

Mixed Media Tags with Chipboard

Sometimes you just love creating a project more than others.
This was one of those moments. I loved every moment of this creative process.
I shut myself away for a couple of hours with my inks, mists, masks and pretty chipboard that was sent to me by Scrapmatts for my guest designing spot.
This is what I made.

 

I really enjoy making tags, there are so many things you can do with them. This time I added them to cards.

 

 

I have a whole step by step tutorial over on the Scrapmatts blog here today if you would like to see how they were made.

 

Thanks for stopping by today xxx

Here I Am!!

I'm still here.
Just busy with kids off school and work.
I seem to find juggling the 2 harder as the kids are getting older.
Surely it shouldn't be that way, should it?!!

I have a LO to share from the April Cocoa Daisy Kit today along with the new sneaks of the new May Kit 'Here I am'. Cool Kit name!!

I had so much fun making this LO here.

I created upon white cardstock but took a craft knife to a piece of 12x12 patterned to cut my border around the outside.
I started off making puddles : )

With Tattered Angels Glimmer Glaze, but you can use mists too.
I brushed it around abit.

And then took a Cocoa Daisy heart stamp that came in the April kit, pressed it in to my inky puddles and stamped over the page here and there.

I used Martha's 'Panda Eight' printables that come with the kit subs. I love working with these.
Just print them, cut them and away you go.

This was in March, it was the first warm day of Spring and also happened to be the weekend of our wedding anniversary and the weekend before my birthday.
My sister and her family came over for the day.
It was such a nice day.
We had dresses and sandals on and walked to our local pub with the kids.
We sat outside whilst they played with a ball.
Bliss!!

And now here I am waiting for my May Cocoa Daisy kit to arrive.
I love the anticipation.
It was sent at the end of last week, so it could be anytime from the weekend onwards : )
Here are the sneaks for now to keep us going.

I'm sorry for not blog hopping lately, like I said before I'm struggling with kids and work and keeping it all running smoothly.
It should all get back to normal again next week : )

I hope you are enjoying the Spring so far.
Lots of love xxx

Love this Shop **HOT TOPIC**

It's been a whirlwind of a few days.
I can't believe it's been almost a week since I blogged.
The fact is the last day I blogged was the day the kids finished school for Easter break, so that says it all really.

Today I have a layout to share that I made using some more of the 'Scrapmatts' chipboard.
I'm guest designer for them these next couple of months.

Remember my last blog post when I said about that little dish I keep with photos in of stories to tell? Well, these photos were also in there.
This was one of our favourite stores in Orlando. Hollie found it online so we went in on Hollie's recommendation and spent an age in this little store and had so much fun. We all came out with purchases.

I used the Scrapmatts chipboard in a few ways on this page. I used the negatives of the chipboard with PanPastels, so using it like a mask.

 

I used these larger chipboard chevrons. I stained them white first with Tim Holtz Distress Stain and them used a green Prima Chalk Ink over the top. It shows the true colour of the ink much better if you paint/ink them white first.

I also used the little chipboard words. I love adding these to my layouts. They are like little subtitles.

 

 

The arrowed words are one of my favourite items that I received from Scrapmatts, I started by inking them yellow, but they didn't stand out as much as I would have liked, so I went to cover them in the same white Distress Stain to start all over and started dabbing and really liked the effect, so I left it just like this. I think they look pretty cool. 

If you love the chipboard as much as I do. Here is the Scrapmatts blog which I think you will love.

Thanks for stopping by.
It's another day of juggling kids and work for me today. xxx

Choosing Photos, Sibling Love & a Sketch

How do you go about choosing what photos to scrap?

Do you scrap month by month and keep up to date?
Do you let the papers choose for you? Deciding what papers go with what photos?

I keep a few little photos in a small dish on my scrappy desk. These are like 'go-to' photos.
I'm finding that right now I'm drawn by the materials that I am using.
It might be that I fancy playing with water colours to make a pretty background or that I have a new mask to use or that some gorgeous papers have just arrived that I want to use straight away.
The little dish of mini photos is then the 'go-to' place for me.

That was the case with this LO here.
I had my lovely new Cocoa Daisy Kit and the monthly sketch challenge that I am hosting at CD this month. I wanted to use the Jillibean Placemats for this layout as they were perfect for this sketch and I found this cute photo that came with an untold story from back in July.
*happy dance*

 

Here is the sketch.

 

See what I mean about those Jillibean Placemats?
These two kids of mine really do make me smile.

 

And here is the story.

 

I'm so pleased that I'm so good with filing my photos. Times like this it really helps. I file everything by year, then month and then day. It's so easy to go back then and find photos along with the dates.

 

 

The wooden veneers that come with this months kit are plain with a little colour added here and there. So I flipped them over and used a Prima Chalk In - Ladybug as I needed some red accents on this page. There was no red within this kit, but as it was the schools colour, I needed to bring it in to the LO. By adding the wooden veneers, the stitching and some Maya Mist - Cherry Metallic, it really did the trick and pulled it all together.

 

 

There are some really cute stamps in the Main Kit this month.

Spot the masking?

I didn't want to go too heavy on the red masking, so I used the Prima Chalk Ink again over the mask rather than a mist. It's a little more subtle and it's easier to control where exactly you are adding your colour.

The Cocoa Daisy Sketch Challenge is running until April 15th. We'd love you to play along.
One lucky winner gets a $10 coupon to spend in the Daisy Boutique. 

Have a lovely day scrappy friends xxx

 

Guest Designing for Scrapmatts

Remember my blog post yesterday, the best week ever?
I met the most memorable group of ladies whilst in LA at CHA.
We called them 'the Aussies'.
They were the most bubbliest, friendliest and the highlight of this CHA trip.
They would walk through the hotel lobby in the evening where us CD girls would be drinking and chatting and it's like a little source of light and energy entered the room.
I will never forget these ladies.
Here's a pic of Denise, MandyK and I with all our Aussies.
(Angella is missing I notice. She was on the Maya Road booth, so not always with them)

Anyway, Sofie introduced us to her Chipboard.
Her company is called Scrapmatts. I was so impressed. This is like the Rolls Royce of all chipboards. Chipboard like I have never seen before.

So when Sofie emailed and asked if I would like to guest design for them for a couple of months I jumped at the chance. How exciting!!
The online store is here for you to see.

The first project that I made using the chipboard is this layout here.

 

These filmstrips are so perfect to use as little photo frames.

 

 

I have included some tips on how to do this on the Scrapmatts blog today.

Please pop along and leave me a little love : )

 

Thank you so much to Scrapmatts for having me.

I just keep creating more and more with their goodies.

xxx