i'm still here!

Well, I cannot believe it has been 4 months since i lasted posted , eek, where has the time gone? Christmas has been and gone and now its almost Easter. ...I did get that sewing machine for Christmas, yippi, so I hope to be posting some of my sewing makes on here soon.

I hope you are all well. I have had what seems like continual sinusitis...in fact I am wrapped up on the sofa with it again now! Never mind, I am enjoying Midsomer Murders on play back and planning my next knitting project!

Anyway, I have been continuing some basic scrap booking . I put together an album for my Mum and Dad, of their recent trip caravanning around Spain. They started at Santander and went down to Cadiz then back up to Bilbao...meandering around on the way! They visited Caceres, Seville, Malaga, Cordoba, to name a few places!

It took me quite a while to scrap the whole trip, as the trip was 7 weeks long, and many photos were taken! I included emails, maps, postcards, and a space at the back for leaflets and extra photos they particularly loved and wanted to include. I tried to keep the colour scheme and patterning coordinated through out the album, to show it was all of the same trip. bright and sunny!! My mum and dad had a fantastic time away, and it was the first of what hopes to be many travelling adventures for them. I wanted the album to celebrate their first trip. 

Well, at home we've been continuing our geocaching with the kids. Now that the weather is better and the storms seem long gone, we are able to get out more. I cannot imagine a child hood that is not spent mainly outdoors, so we are out as much as we can :-) . This picture was taken after our streak of 40 days caching in a row...it is very addictive. The kids love it!  Out latest favourite finds include a cache in a fake snail shell, one in a bolt , and one in a piece of false grass! The hides always keep you on your toes these days, and the challenge of a treasure hunt never fails to excite the kids. 

My daughters favourite cache so far was on a walk called "The Great Sausage Hunt"!, that we did during the holidays. 

See www.geocaching.com if you want to give it a go...its FREE!!!

National Trust gardens also continue to amuse the kids too, with trails, letterbox hunts, teddy bears picnics and forest parks. We have never yet actually been inside a property, not had time! We are trying to continue the "50 things" challenge too... my son having completed 25 so far, and my daughter 15. 

https://www.50things.org.uk/

This was some beautiful cyclamen in the half term hols in Devon.

Well, after Easter we are off to the Scilly Isles!  Yippi Yippi Yippi!. They look amazing, and we've always wanted to go... have any of you been there? The Gig racing, pancakes on the beach, sea, moorland, pony rides,  island hopping, bronze age stone sites, bird hides...endless fun. We especially want to go to St. Agnes. That is my dream. A well deserved holiday to blow away the winter cobwebs. What hols have you planned for this year?

http://www.islesofscillyholidays.co.uk/the-islands/stagnes.html

Minnie

x

Christmas mail

Happy Thursday everyone, i hope your week is going well. My daughter and i seem to be having a week full of play dates which is lovely...tomorrow i really must catch up on all those jobs!

The other night i was tinkering away in the craft room, and came up with this!

It was such a special time with my kids, writing to Father Christmas, so magical that i couldn't wait any longer to scrap it! no sketches or challenges used, just me , myself and my ideas.

Hopefully Father Christmas will have received his letter by now and will bring a nice toy on Christmas eve :o)

I  really must write my Christmas list now, to include things like a hand held hoover for the car, a veg steamer for the kitchen, a mini sewing machine for my layouts or a new mixer for baking...all highly exciting...but would make my day lol! oh, plus the spa, Ferrari, cruise round the world...!

what do you want for Christmas?!!

pumpkin madness

Hello Everyone!

Who had a great half term then? We did, and I didn't want it to end :o( !! We had just the right balance of catching up with jobs and having relaxing family time.

One of the fun things we did was a local pumpkin trail. We'd not been to one of these before. Most of the shops in the town had pumpkins in their windows and each had been given a name. The challenge was to find all the pumpkins, list the names and then enter a prize draw.

It was really good fun, the weather was sunny and the kids were on top form. The pumpkins were so creative, from Harry Potter to Humpty Dumpty.

I hope they do it again next year!

I am linking this layout up with http://www.lifepaperscrapbook.com/ as I used their fabulous sketch. Materials used: Bo Bunny Apple Cider collection and various stickers.

Hope you had a great half term too.

x

apple day jam scrapbooking

Good morning all, and its half term , yippee! Phew. We have survived our first ever half term at big school. I don't know who is more tired, me or the kids lol! Hopefully lots of fun times this week to photo and scrapbook.

Here is my latest layout. Its of my first ever jam making success! My first attempt at jam making, blackberry jam, solidified over night :o(. However, this apple day jam is still going strong and tasting yummy. Hooray! Made with apples fresh from a friends allotment.

Materials:

apple cider papers : Bo Bunny  2012

wooden tree : Hobby Craft

buttons

gems

punched leaves

borders and phrases: Bo Bunny

alphabets: Crate Paper and We R Memory Keepers

oven glove brads

Ranger pearls

Tim Holtz distress ink

Tools:

leaf punch

Techniques:

inking

tearing

punching

ranger pearls

I was inspired by the scrap365 sketch challenge :http://sketchbook365.blogspot.co.uk/ and have entered it into the competition.

I hope you like it

x

summer memories

Did you get up to anything crafty over the summer? hubby and i entered a craft show ! 

I entered 5 categories and actually won 3 prizes, i was so chuffed!

 I won 1st prize for my scrapbook page. it was a page about my sons first blackberrying adventure :o). i used lace, buttons, blackberry pins, die cut birds on my sizzix machine, inking, embossing on my sizzix, twine, die cut flowers, gems, journal tabs and patterned paper.

I won 3rd prize for my anniversary card. its a triple easel card. i used shrink plastic, gems, inking, embossing, acetate, die cut squares using papermania dies, metal words, sticker letters...

I also won 3rd prize for my beach photograph. i took it in Polzeath, Cornwall, on a lovely week away.

I didn't win anything for my knitted hat or finger puppet farm, but i had so much fun making them and looking at everyone else's handy work.


Hubby also entered. he put in 3 photographs and he won a prize for each of them! very proud moment!...it was so lovely to see (especially after I had "encouraged" him into it lol!). Next year the munchkins will be old enough to enter too, I cant wait to see them getting crafty x

what crafty things did you get up to this summer?