In shock!

Do you know that after all the personal stuff that's gone on (and some of which is sadly ongoing)...last night and this morning have been awesome! Checked my inbox late last night and had a email from Mandy at Scrap Studio (previously the Modscraps kits) and she's asked me if i would like to be the first guest DT on the new kit! Dumbstruck i was...completely dumbstruck...of course i bl**dy would! So these lovely goodies are winging their way to me and i hope i can do justice to it all.

Im loving the look of these colours and just check out those embossed birdies and crotched flowers.....can't wait to get my hands on them. It's come at a really good time for me, a bit of a confidence boost i suppose. I'd not entered Scrapbook Inspirations BOB Newcomer because i just wasn't feeling very confident so to be asked to do this and feature in the newly launched kit mag with the likes of Kirsty Wiseman, Cleo Evans, Jenny Cocks and Ruth Austin is truly going to be humbling. I've subbed to the kit since January and have been in awe of some of their work.
Thanks for the opportunity Mandy and i hope i can do a good job for you!

My second little surprise arrived about an hour ago. There i was expecting Liz to send me instructions for an envelope book she'd made and what i got instead (or should i say aswell as) was this pizza box brimming with not only the instructions, mountboard, paper and embellis to make it....but this lovely envelope book that she'd made for me. It is gorgeous Liz, so well made and I can't wait to have a play with this myself now. This is one of those days when i realise what a lucky girl i am!

These pics really don't do this book justice but i can tell you it's amazing and perfect as a gift, going to think of a nice way to use it so that everyone gets to see it.

And last but not least, here's my HSMS photo for the day....lock. Unfotunately Pete is still in bed and as i only have Picassa on the downstairs pc i can't put a title or anything on it. After the last couple of days i'm beginning to wish i had more interesting windows, doors and locks in my house...unfortunately i don't so you're stuck with these!

Beer and Kebabs!

WEll my friend Liam came round last night to keep me company whilst Pete was having a beery night with mates. The plan was he would be out all night and staying with his friend to save me listening to drunken ramblings at 3am, however at 2.45am the phone goes and it's a not too rambling Pete downstairs asking me to unlock the kitchen door so he could get in! Apparently they lost one another so he'd ducked into the nearest kebab shop and made his way home. Great shot of the kebab which greeted me when i came down to the kitchen this morning! YUM!

Got to tackle Freya's bedroom today as she's coming home from a fortnight at her dads tomorrow and then i'll tackle the ickle girls room tomorrow when the pair of them are at nursery for the morning. Believe me these are full four hour jobs each!

Took delivery of some new reading today. I've never been into 'fantasy' books apart from the Lord of the Rings; Harry Potter for instance holds no draw for me and so i've never really thought about the Terry Pratchett books as anything that would interest me. But after watching the Sky TV production of the Hogfather at Xmas i was really bowled over with the humour in it which Pete had said is also in the books so when i was ordering Pete's new Harry Potter book last month i decided to add a few of the Discworld books for myself and due to some of them being out of stock at the time I recieved delivery this morning so todays plan is reading, bedroom, reading, scrapping, reading, bed! AND LITTLE ELSE!

Will leave you with todays HSMS Prompt: Chop!

A New Layout To Share

I've been working on it for a couple of days actually but after putting it together as a 12x12 I was so scared by the amount of 'white space' that i ended up ripping it apart and reassembling it as an 11x8.5 layout. It's more usage out of the new Scrap Studio kit which i am loving. The layout comes from a picture taken 10 years ago (OMG Can it be true!) of myself and one of my best mates Tammy. She's my oldest friend and i've known her since we were at primary school together. This picture was taken at a time when things were pretty rough for me, i'd just lost my first baby and was kind of hiding myself away when i got dragged out to the HMS Raleigh air show where my then husband was working. We had a fun time, picking out unsuspecting sailors as potential love interests for her and we definately had too much to drink, sloshing around on the Torpoint Ferry on the way home. It's funny to see my hair like this aswell, not only so short...but red.....and straight! I think i must have had at least 30 different styles since we've known each other.
I used a Jenni Bowlin chipboard star to cut out the paper the right shape and added some Ice Stickles and Doodlebug sticky gems to the flowers to give them a bit of a sparkle. Aren't these flowers from the papers damn hot?! I think so anyway. Oh and the journalling block is from the very fantastic Creative Imaginations Journalers Notebook.

Shameful

That is the only word i can use for Tottenhams performance last night. Whenever Everton play Spurs it's an unwritten rule that either me or Pete watch the match in a seperate room, however...as we currently have no other TV in the house showing the match...and a friend came round to watch / keep the peace....we were stuck in the same room. And we lost...badly.....again. Oh well, today is another day and hopefully we'll come up with the goods against Derby next weekend before my husband rubs my nose in it any more!

Got a major housework day ahead of me today (boo hiss) but as the weather is pants there's little else to do. Pete is on a guys night out tonight and staying over at his mate Franks house which saves a ridiculously large taxi bill tonight and me listening to his drunken ramblings at 3 in the morning. So my good friend Liam is coming over with some wine and a curry and several DVD's, chill out and relax eh...as long as i get the kiddies into bed at a reasonable hour. Will leave you with my HSMS photos for today. The prompt was 'window'. Well as my window cleaner has done a runner for the last six months (around the time the conservatory went up...how unsurprising)they aren't the cleanest windows in the world, we also have no nice view to save the fact that they're filthy so i've done my best....the first is a pane from the front door and the second is my conservatory windows, or at least some of them which finally now have the blinds fitted.
Enjoy and have another grey day.

Also congratulations to Jenny (Craftiemum) on the birth of your first grandchild, can't wait to see the piccies! X

Sleep Tight

Well i managed the mother of all lie ins today....after deciding that it was pointless having a sleep during the day yesterday i decided to stay up and just get an early night instead. However, it wasn't exactly an early night because i forgot to take the Banoffee tart out of the freezer to defrost and there was no way i was leaving Pete along with a whole Banoffee tart and going to bed because the whole thing would've disappeared! Cheesecakes, Tarts and Tubs of Ben & Jerrys' have a very short shelf life in this house when Pete is on the prowl for night time sweetness!

So i took my uncompleted work into the living room (feeling slightly the worse for wear) and added the finishing touches to my minibook. I made it using the new Scrap Studio July kit (previously Modscraps) and these Cherry Arte papers are so bright and summery.
The minibook was inspired by the one that new Scrap Studio DT member Cleo had done in the kit magazine. Check out her blog for the most amazing wedding cake i've ever seen, it is just too gorgeous and so was she on her wedding day, congratulations Cleo. I used some of the photos that i'd taken on Saturdays beach trip for the minibook, and i've spent ages putting together some VCD slideshows of photos taken this year for the family. I only learnt how to do this since seriously having a proper playaround with adobe elements and they're perfect to send to Petes family who are all up in Wigan. Big softie i am, I always get a bit teary and choked up watching slideshows accompanied by music and if the kids are being a little too scary or i'm feeling down it's the greatest pick me up in the world.

The sun has finally gone in down here, grey skies and a storm apparently on the way so another beach trip looks unlikely this week. I'm hoping it will brighten up a bit when Freya comes home from her dads on Friday. This weekend they'll all go to see the Simpsons movie, I've drawn the short straw and will be home with the ickles so i know by the time they come home afterwards i will have had the full run down of exactly what happens!

Well i've just looked up the HSMS Prompt for today and it's Pasta. So will leave you with my photo du jour! Or rather two of them, I couldn't decide which one i liked best so i'd be interested to hear your comments on which one you think is the better picture. Thanks for looking and have a great grey day! X

Sun is still shining

Good god how do you spell 'shining' if that is right it doesn't look right if you know what i mean. Could have something to do with the fact that i haven't been to bed yet. Pulled an all nighter last night to get my latest CJ entry done but also did a minibook and a new layout. Just have to add a couple of piccies which i can't print out til Pete gets up. And when he does i'm going to have to get a couple of z's myself. But thought i'd check out the HSMS prompt and today is drive. Well as luck would have it the girls are chilling in the playroom and Natasha is driving her playmobil zoomobile...or rather a monkey is driving it (go figure)! Sorry no good artistic shot or anything but this was on Freyas camera and i don't have the software on the downstairs pc to add a title or anything so this is raw without being RAW!

Oh I do like to be beside the Seaside!

Well lets not mention the football today, not pleased is the only way i can describe today's action. Oh well, Tuesday is another day and I really need to win that one as Pete is an Evertonian and I cannot afford to lose face with him two seasons on the trot!

So today was full of football but as the final scores came in we bundled the kids into the car and headed on down to Looe for a few hours. I love going to the beach once all the grockles (tourists) have gone home and it's quiet and still warm and beautiful to watch the kids running around like lunatics and in Natashas case eating sand. I don't know why she does it ..... she just does. Had a play with the camera, messing around with settings and things so now i'm ordering some from photobox to make a mini book with next week. I love my new modscraps kit although i suppose i now have to call it Scrap Studio! The new website is coming together and the new DT member Cleo has created a book that i'm going to use for my beach photos so i can't wait now to get my mojo up and running again.

And here are my catch up pics for HSMS....Down which was taken today at the beach, little Natasha trying to dig her way to Oz.....and double which wasn't from today but from a couple weeks ago where Emily fell in love with her reflection...or rather mummy told her to kiss the mirror!

Earrings

One of the things that happened last week was Freya getting her ears pierced. She had a lovely pair of studs put in but wanted to buy a pair for when her ears heal properly in about 4 weeks so i was excited about this prompt. Her very girlie, very gemmy earrings which she can't wait to wear.

Well I have to get ready to go to the airport in a bit and pick up Pete who's back from Glasgow for a fortnight and i can't wait. I've really missed him this past three weeks and the girls can't wait to see Daddy. Emily even said to me this morning as i dropped her off at nursery..'I don't want you to pick me up mum, it has to be daddy, you can stay at home!'. Cheers Love!

Thanks to all who've offered me stash over the past couple of days but honestly i have plenty to go around and best papers are all kept in a hopper cropper in the cupboard and were luckily put away the night before i went to bed so have escaped unharmed. Did lose what i had left of my Elsie Flannigan Roxie papers though which included the fabric paper with the notes on which i was going to use for a layout of Freya's Orchestra Concert from last month so will have to be tracking some more of that down.

Can't wait for the football season to kick off tomorrow and as the Spurs game kicks off at noon, we could well be top of the league tomorrow...if only for a couple of hours! Hope everyone has a good weekend...we're off to the fair tonight and will probably take the kids to a beach on Sunday if the weather stays like this....maybe Looe, Milendreef, Bigbury or Croyde....I think Newquay will probably be too packed on a weekend. So glad that we live close to the beaches here and just need to kick our butts into gear and make the most of them. Have a good weekend whatever you're up to. X

Her Space: My Space`

well almost caught up, still got today's to do but i'm in the middle of prepping for Petes homecoming tomorrow and therefore up to my eyes in jobs that have been put off til the last minute as always! Here's yesterdays though....no, i didn't nip off to New York for the day (I wish) but this is a photo i took when we were there on honeymoon. X

Abscence makes the heart grow fonder......

.....well in some circumstances but in others it's out of sight out of mind! LOL sorry about my recent abscence but I've had possibly the worst two months of my life and things have been really getting on top of me. Thanks to everyone who's supported me during this time and hopefully the worst of it is now behind me. I've missed out on loads of stuff, didn't get to enter BOB, lost contact with everyone on UKS all but a few friends that have called and emailed to make sure i'm OK but I am now....better than OK although a little tired and behind.

Most of building work has been done to rectify the flood i had this week (don't ask, it's messy!) and i've got a new carpet being put in the bathroom tomorrow. I just wish i hadn't lost so much stash. I had to throw out 3 pizza boxes which were full of patterned paper, managed to salvage some rub ons which were all in poly bags but i reckon i've easily lost about £200 worth of paper, card and stickers. Suppose it gives me an excuse to go stash shopping but with a lil holiday around the corner i really have to pull the reigns in.

I have done some scrapping though and i've noticed that the herspace:my space is back up and running so i've just come on to get back into the swing of things and catch up with those. Thanks to everyone who's been a shoulder to whinge, cry and moan on the last few weeks, you've been invaluable and big hugs to Lesley. X