A host of golden daffodils...

Wasn't it a wonderful day today? It was lovely to see the sun after what has felt like an interminable winter of endless grey days. Of course, it will probably only last for a day, but at least it was a reminder of what is to come in the next few months.
 It makes the layout I am sharing today particularly appropriate. This one was created for an ill-fated Scrapbook Inspirations design book, and records some memories of my sister's birthday a couple of years ago in Wimbledon. The tables in the pub were decorated with some lovely daffodils, cue much posing amongst all the guests! I pinched the idea for the rolled paper daffodils from an old issue of Papercraft Inspirations, but I cannot for the life of me remember whose design it was.

I really liked this layout - it seemed to come together easily, included a lot of photos which isn't like my normal layouts, and has an interesting colour scheme which is different to my normal style. It's always good to experiment.

So what has been going on in my life? I've been busy creating a few layouts, I have pretty much used up last May's Cocoa Daisy kit, which takes me onto June - I know, I'm way behind! I've managed to create six layouts from it, which I will photograph and share on here over the next week. It is so unlike me to create any layouts lately, this has to be a recent record for me. I think I have picked up the scrapping bug again.

I have also been browsing the divine issue 42 of The Knitter and am currently purchasing the yarn for this little number. It's all Rowan Felted Tweed and Kidsilk Haze, so not cheap, but I love Rowan yarn and patterns never look quite the same if you make it in something cheaper. I just love the shirred edging and the slashes, and the button up neck at the back - it is such a unique pattern. Of course, I probably won't be able to wear it for a while but by the time I have finished it I will hopefully be back to something resembling my normal weight - I have such a queue of knitting projects!

Finally, we had the excitement of my 20 week scan yesterday. I'm not quite 20 weeks, just a few days under, but baby was looking well and all it's organs were measuring correctly. Despite the scan taking a good twenty minutes, I barely got to see any of it as the sonographer had the screen turned away, but Ed got a good look. He said it was all a bit difficult to make out anyway, though it was funny when the scan started as the baby was kicking away but its head was wedged under my full bladder! I got a little run through at the end and got a little glimpse of its face - it is so strange being able to see this tiny person that is currently all curled up inside me. It is certainly a wriggly one, and an awkward one! At the last scan, it wouldn't lie correctly for a neck measurement, and this time it kept covering its face so the sonographer couldn't check its lips till right at the end when it finally deigned to show us its face.

Unfortunately our scan photo isn't great - it looks like two floating blobs, one its head, one its belly, with nothing connecting them! And it cost us £10 which in my opinion is a bit of a rip off for scan photos, but I suppose the hospital have a captive audience really. We have to go back for another scan at 34 weeks as I have part placenta praevia, so we need to check the placenta has moved out of the way ready for birth. Apparently most do, and at least it means we get to see it again.

We both have a feeling that its going to be a boy, I've thought this since the beginning for some reason, but have decided to keep it a suprise till the end, so will have to see if we are right in July...

Down by the river

The cold from hell continues unabated this week, despite being back at work. I'm not normally one to suffer from colds - when you're a teacher, you develop a super-strength immune system that will not succumb to the usual rounds of sniffles - but being pregnant seems to have broken down my defences and now I'm struggling to break the back of this evil cold. So I'm off to bed in a minute, but before that I thought I'd share these. I think these were for Papermaze, but they never made it to my blog, and I'm trying to document everything I've done here now.

Last Easter, we went down to visit my folks in good old Sutton and went to see my brother who is currently living in the very nice Kingston-upon-Thames (home to various nightclubs I frequented a long time ago). I took a few photos as we were walking along the river side in the blazing sunshine - I seem to remember that Summer happened in April last year and this was pretty much the only opportunity I had to wear my shorts! The first layout is of me and Ed - Ed pulling his obligatory stupid face for the camera - I have loads of photos like this.

 

 

 

The second layout is of the river itself - if you have never visited the river at Kingston, you should definitely go for a walk there - you'll find some lovely pubs between there and Richmond, or if you have your sea-legs on, you can get on a river boat and see it from the water.

I can't remember what these papers are now, they may be Jillibean soup?

I have a few more old layouts to share, and I've also been busy scrapping in the last few days too - I have five new layouts from my half term which I will photograph and share in due course. I've been getting messy with mists and inks which is always good fun!

Anyway, I'm off to smear myself in Vick's vaporub and watch Whitechapel before bed. Fingers crossed this cold might have slunk off to bother someone else by tomorrow...

A bit of modelling

One thing I've been doing plenty of since last May is knitting. Can't wait to start knitting things for the baby, though they will all have to be white before it is born as we are having a surprise! Anyway, I thought I would share two of my proudest achievements, both of which are patterns from Rowan Magazine Issue 49 (which is one of my favourite collections of knitting patterns ever).
The first is the Lazy Tunic. This was made using a combination of Rowan Purelife Revive which is a recycled yarn. This had many frustrating moments as I went wrong in the lace pattern and had to get my mum to rescue it at least once. But I'm really proud of the finished piece.

The other is called Soothe. It's made from Rowan Lenpur Linen and was a much easier knit, even though my tension was a bit off! It's amazing what a bit of blocking will do for a garment.

I have loads more yarn stashed under my bed for future projects which I'll probably never get round to knitting. I have a terrible craft shopping habit, be it yarn or paper products, which I'm really going to have to break before the baby is born or there won't be any room for it! I spent yesterday 'de-stashing' - trying to clear some space in the spare bedroom so the baby will fit in...

 I've got quite a few more layouts to share too. I thought I would share a couple of snowy layouts, recording snow from a couple of years ago (which I made well over a year ago!), in tribute to the light dusting we had this morning! Apologies for slightly poor photos - couldn't get any decent light when I took them last night!

So very much to tell...

Yes, hello, it's me again, absent blogger extraodinaire! Every now and then I get the urge to scrap, and to blog, and it appears that now is the time. Strangely enough, it also seems to be when I'm ill, as I have been suffering from a terrible cold for the past week. Maybe this is the only time I slow down enough to actually put the effort in!
So I thought I'd catch up with uploading some of my (now rather ancient) efforts onto my blog. And I'm obviously going for a rather romantic theme today...

This one is our engagement party - this photo is from 2009!

And this is from our wedding day, just after we signed the register. Our wedding being in 2010, and this the only photo I have scrapped from it - the shame! I did however create a photobook on Photobox to distribute to relatives, so they are recorded somewhere at least.

Gotta love that bling!

So why have I gone all romantic?

Possibly because I thought it was about time I shared the news that after a long, sometimes traumatic road, I am finally going to become a mummy in July. There were times over the last year when I wondered whether I would ever be able to make an announcement like this, but thanks to the wonders of science and the great British NHS, our dreams came true. I am almost 19 weeks and I cannot wait for the day I get to bring my baby home.

Worthy of a blog post, no?