Embellish your World

Drinking champagne for no reason

Am sat here on a Saturday evening drinking champagne for no reason, other that to empty the bottle that has been sat in the cupboard since Jamie was born 2 years ago.  WIth it being March tomorrow it somehow seemed wrong that it was still there, and so I am slightly giddy but smiling!

Here are my 25th Feb photos - the penultimate month of this particular Shimelle project.

And so this evening I am hoping to complete my "Here" pages for my Here, There & Everywhere Shimelle class.  I have all the photos printed off and stuck down, paper in place - so I just need to add titles, journalling & embellishments.  Hope to share soon!

Other news, I have tickets for The Script at Shepherds Bush Empire in June (yippee!!) and have booked to fly to Belfast with Ally & Nicki in May to photograph the Giant's Causeway and Dunluce Castle! To add to the events to look forward to I have a scrapping day with buddies booked for July, a scrapping in retreat in April - and therefore I am thinking I need to think of something exciting to do in March!!! Ideas on a postcode please!!

A little bit crafty ....oh, alright then, alot!!!

Have been happily playing with paper and glue again - this time inspired by the cybercrop fun over at Paws last weekend.  One of my favourite challenges was to scrap a layout with a quantity of 28 somewhere on the page (to represent the 28 days in February).  There were brad layouts, button layouts - but I chose to scrap a 28-photograph page (thanks to the wonders of Picasa mosaic function!)  Ever since I started scrapbooking back in 2004 I promised myself I would do a layout summarising each month (and failed miserably!) but this year I will!

Thanks to Lorraine and Janice from GoGo for the date labels too (you lovely ladies!) I used the whole pack on this one page - how decadent is that?!

Other challenges over the weekend included a card challenge, colour inspired pages, a stamping challenge and below a sketch by my fellow sketch dt lady Joanne Ryan:

I also set a sketch/colour challenge - heavy on journalling and to use the colour purple (which was less than popular to say the least!)

 

Papers used above are scrumptious lovely Creative Impressions French Bluebell available from the ScrapShed.

Despite the PAWS cybercrop weekend the winter sketch festival still continues on and my latest layout inspired by the great sketches over on Paws is here - my little monster!

And as if the above isn't plenty of scrapping, I have also been having an absolute blast with the February ScrapAGoGo kit - the contents of which were delicious and it is hardly surprising there is a waiting list for kit subscriptions now! and only 99days til the retreat in June too!!

 

 

 

Phew, think that is plenty of sharing for now!!

"He doesn't look a thing like Jesus

but he talks like a gentleman....."

Utterly awesome, last night at the O2 - The Killers truly rocked!!!

Whoop! Whoop!! Brendon Flowers - I think I love you!

Lessons to be learnt

LESSON 1

Cocktails (in excess) + lager (several) + lack of sleep = hangover

And my first hangover since my hen night in 2003!! Thankfully, almost 48 hours later I feel human again!

LESSON 2

Try as you might to treat others as you would wish to be treated there will still be an occasion when it frustrates the hell out of you that compassion is not returned.  Rise above it, be the better person, don't let it get to you are all well and good, but there are limits.  So for my mum, I was the bigger person, even though playing happy families was  not my intention today.

LESSON 3

Learn from your lessons!!

Here, there and everywhere.

So Shimelle's latest online class has started, and for the first time this is hosted by the USA site "2peas" which is large and vast and well, a bit of a mindfield really!!  Have now managed to add an avatar and some information, and succesfully uploaded a couple of my favourite images taken as the first element of the class "to capture your neighbourhood"

Actually managed to get several shots on yesterday, but took my camera with me to work today and spent 45 minutes walking around the familiar town that I see most everyday.  Am actually quite pleased with the images I have, although some of the photographs I have seen on 2 peas posted by the American participants take my breath away!!

Am going to have a quick play in photoshop now and see if I can follow the next prompts which involve getting a little digital!! I may be gone some time!!

Half Term and the small people rule!

Have managed to get a couple of days Annual leave to enjoy some time with my small people this half term.  Sunday we spent some time at Forty Hall running some energy off with Ally and her kids.  Wasn't long before the rain started - but not heavy enough to send us home straight away - instead we stayed and played and snapped away, ending up with a nice new pile of photographs to scrap!!  This one of me and my boys I simply love!

Yesterday we didn't do too much. Eloise has the orthadentist, I had a parcel to collect (my delicious February ScrapaGoGo kit!) which got cracked open and used immediately!!

 

and we popped to Borders to treat each of the kids to a new book, and me to a few more in the J.R.Ward series I am reading.

Last night I dedicated the evening to decluttering my scrap room, which included emptying part used kits and putting away elements in their respective homes, colour sorting my buttons, and creating a much more organised and tidy area to scrap in.  This I made myself do before I can scrap any more layouts as it was truly getting in a complete mess!

And so today the boys have gone to their Nan & Grandads who are taking them out to the park and to feed the ducks, and Eloise and I are shortly off to Krisy Kreme donuts for a hot chocolate and sugar fix before settling down in the UGC to watch "He's just not that into you".

Addicted again

Having read the 4 Twilight series of books and absolutely loving them, I have found another Vampire/Romance set of books thanks to the help of a very lovely lady in Waterstones! Bought it on Wednesday and finished it yesterday afternoon - Ally it's your next if you want it! (Am off to Borders tomorrow for the next one!)

 

Dark Lover is the first book in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series. It tells the story of Wrath - the last purebred vampire left on the planet. The un-ascended king of the vampire species, Wrath lives only to fight in an endless war with the soulless vampire slayers, Lessers, who brutally murdered his parents centuries ago. As leader of the Brotherhood, his only solace is in fighting, not looking to the past or future, shunning his duties as King.

Within the vampire world, Wrath is known as the Blind King, due to his extremely poor eyesight, though this does not affect his powers on the battlefield nor his ability to sense the feelings of others around him.

Blaming himself for not intervening when his parents were slain, Wrath has wrapped himself in a cocoon of self-hatred and emotional distance, but Dark Lover tells of his enlivening. When the Lessers kill one of his best fighters, Darius, Wrath is left with the responsibility to help the warrior’s half-human daughter, Beth, through her transition. It is through Beth that Wrath learns to feel and look toward the future of his life and of the species as a whole.

Totally awesome book and I can't wait to get started on the next one!

And so today we will be chilling at home.  Most of the housework was done yesterday so if the weather warms up a little we may head over HillyFields to find Roberts favourite tree to climb.  I am on top of all my scrapping committments and even managed to scrap a 6x12 layout of my newest Momiji doll last night!

 

And I have awoken super happy today as I have tomorrow and Tuesday off to spend some time with the kids in half term.  No doubt some McDonalds and cinema time will be on the agenda, and if the weather holds, hopefully some burning off of their energy outdoors!!

Enjoy your Sunday x

Lotsa love from me

Happy Valentines day!! and take a lookie look at my new LOVE Momiji doll, photographed on the envelope of my card from dear hubby (to preserve his handwriting!) soppy maybe, but I do love my man x

 

A funny old day

It has been a funny old day, with clear blue skies to start with and snow to end! I really thought we were over the white-stuff but no, more is falling and just in-time for the weekend.

Plenty going on at work at the moment keeping me busy, now if only I could get a decent nights sleep without small people waking me I could start to feel human again.

All I can say is thank goodness for scrapping - even with the amount I know I have spent on this hobby, it has got to be cheaper than therapy!!

And if you are looking for an inexpensive project to be working on from this weekend, running for 6 weeks, Shimelle has a new class up, hosted by 2 peas in the US called "Here, there and everywhere" 

   I'm a great fan of Shimelle's classes, having always learnt something new on each and every class, and her style of writing is smooth and easy, like you were having a conversation with her really. So pop over and have a read up and see what you think. For less than £20 you can't really go wrong!

Now where did I put my rauchy vampire book? I need to escape into the word of the Black Dagger Brotherhood!

My baby is two!!

Bless him my Jamie turned two today, and awoke full of cold, teething and generally quite grumpy! No mean feat therefore that I managed to get some 80 photographs of him!

Having chosen my favourite and played about with them in Picassa (photo editing software) I discovered I could do this!!!

Guess who is a very happy bunny now with a mind going ten to the dozen on how many more I can make!!!

After a night of very little sleep thanks to stress and small people I had the afternoon off work today, caught up on sleep and managed to enjoy the evening with the family, but I am tired now and ready to sleep once more!

ttfn!