Coffee in Paris

Two layouts shared in a week, I really must be spoiling you! This is what happens when I have a holiday and a bit of free time, I get back to doing the things I love for just a week or so.

Stupidly enough, I think all the anti-teacher press that's currently doing the rounds in the media courtesy of Gove and co is starting to sink into my psyche and I'm actually feeling guilty about getting up in the mornings, chilling out with a cup of tea and pottering around the house. This is madness - we teachers do deserve some holidays after all!

Anyway, back to today's layout, Paris again. On the last day we had to check out of our hotel a few hours before the Eurostar was due to leave the station. The hotel was really accomodating and let us leave our bags for a while, but we decided to get the Metro to the station with plenty of time to spare, which meant we didn't want to be lugging our bags around with us. So we found this cute (but expensive, as always!) coffee shop near the station and just sat and watched the world go by for an hour or so.

The Cocoa Daisy May 2011 kit was ideal for my Paris pictures because it had lots of grungy, vintage style papers in it that seemed to fit with the Paris scenery pretty well. Having said that, I made a few pages with an even older kit which are much brighter and fresher, so anything can work.

It's nice to be onto the June 2011 kit which is much bolder and more colourful in style for a change now though. I'm currently creating some layouts for Shimelle's online crop from the June kit which I should share on here over the course of the week. She has also announced a new class which I have signed up to - I like the fact that her classes leave you with access to the message boards and class materials for ever, so that you can access them in your own time. I've completed a lot of Shimelle's classes in the past, though none recently, and think it's about time I had another go at something to get me scrapbooking more often again.

More news from the house of fun...

So my Easter hols continue to fly past the mid point all too quickly, and today I find myself feeling so heavy, stretched and uncomfortable! It seems to happen every week or so, I think it must be little one going through a growth spurt and my poor belly trying to accomodate it!

The fun and games in the kitchen continue, but the cats have been enjoying playing amongst the miscellaneous debris which litters the back garden.

Poor Ed was not having a very happy weekend when I took this photo - apparently our walls are not very good for hanging cabinets from. I gathered the state of his peace of mind when he hit the wall with his drill and swore at it - this is so unlike Ed, I made him an immediate cup of tea and told him to take a break before he had a mental breakdown!

Here is another page to share, using last year's May Cocoa Daisy kit (I'm onto the June one now - yay!), and again it is a photo from our trip to Paris in 2010. We had a really happy and eventful 2010 which I'm quite glad about, considering how awful our 2011 turned out to be!

This page tells the unfortunate story of our trip out to a bar in the Bastille district. It was opposite the Opera House, which can be the only explanatory factor for the prices they charged! Ed wandered off the to toilet as soon as we got there, telling me to order. The waitress was immediately upon me, so I ordered a beer and what looked like a nice cocktail from the French (obviously) drinks menu.

However, when Ed came back, we realised the prices for both the drinks were nearly £25! And my cocktail was horrible. Ed didn't let me forget about it, and finally told my dad the story a couple of weeks ago, which I could have killed him for as my dad hates wasting money in any way and I had been happily hiding the event from him even though he was in Paris with us on holiday.

Still, you live and learn.

I've been trying to take part in the online crop over at Shimelle.com. I say trying, I'm currently creating my second page. But this is a great creative achievement for me in recent times, and if I can possibly get to four or five challenges completed I will be happy. I'm trying to plough through my old Cocoa Daisy kits and use them up too, horribly aware that time is flashing by and I really need to clear out the spare room in the very near future...

Turning Thirty

Finally, finally I have time to sit down and write a post! As always, the last few weeks of term were entirely hectic, and my time at weekends has been spent on a variety of activities, mostly enjoyable ones.

Firstly, I managed to finish this little set of winter woollies. A little behind the season I know, but they will be great for next year and I'm really pleased with how they turned out. The hat took about two or three days to knit, but the snood took forever because I was sooooo bored with knitting stocking stitch that after a while I put it down and had to force myself to pick it up and knit the last ten centimetres.

 In 'I'm getting old' news, I turned thirty two weeks ago! I always thought I would feel absolutely terrible on my 30th birthday, waving my twenties goodbye and all that, but being pregnant and looking forward to the excitement of the rest of the year kind of took the edge off it. I had a great night out with friends (despite staying entirely sober!) and also had a yummy Sunday dinner with the in-laws.

My mum and dad sent me this gorgeous bouquet - it lasted for ages, and was the same shop I got my wedding bouquet from. It was a shame not to see my folks on the day, but I spent the whole of the Easter weekend with them last weekend instead, so I had a good catch up too. My little sis turned 28 on Tuesday too, so I managed to see her the day before her birthday. I don't often get to see my family on birthdays and special occasions, so I really appreciate the times I do.

In pregnancy news, I am now about 27 weeks pregnant! Time is flashing by and little one is really wriggly now. I am a bit concerned that I am putting on too much weight too quickly - I started at 10 stone 5 pounds and this morning weighed in at a massive 11 stone 12 pounds! Seeing as the most I should reasonably put on for my height is 2 and a half stone, I may need to hold back on the eating - not fun! I depressed myself slightly looking at some pictures of me pre-pregnancy in which I am looking lovely and slim, but it is all for a good cause after all.

One of the reasons I don't have a lot of time to think at the moment is this:

We are doing up our kitchen before the new arrival gets here - it means the house is covered in food/pans/crockery and the kitchen is a bit of a mess. Ed is doing a really good job with it, but has to fit in around work. I'm hoping that we will get finished by May, but I may be being optimistic!

Finally, here is a page to share, another one of my trip to Paris in 2010 and made using the May 2011 Cocoa Daisy kit. I love the effect of the clock mask and the spray ink - I think it is a Tim Holtz one. The page didn't need much added because of the gorgeous background paper with poppies and crosswords bizarrely enough! I haven't made any new pages in a while but I have got about five more to share, which I will do as soon as I can photograph them and get on to blog again.

Taking a break

Another week passes too busy to blog, but I'm determined to manage at least a post a week if I can, so here is a quick one. I'm now 23 weeks pregnant and loving all the kicking and squirming that little one is doing. In fact, I got a bit worried earlier today when I hadn't felt it kick in a while and had to have a little listen on the doppler (which was an absolute godsend in the early days of this pregnancy, but hasn't been used so much lately). But all was well, and since then I've been reminded of little one's presence several times!

Sleep is starting to be a problem - not actually getting to sleep, but waking up with lower backache and not being able to get comfortable again, not matter how I prop myself up with pillows. This morning I got up at seven as it was useless lying there trying to sleep - I'm convinced this is all training for the early mornings I will get to experience as a mum. My own mum exists on about 3 hours sleep a night even now, all thanks to yours truly who was a nightmare sleeper!

I actually got a Mother's Day card today (clever bump!). Nice to think that next year it will be for real...

So a layout to share, not photographed very well I'm afraid due to poor light this evening. It was made using last May's Cocoa Daisy kit, and shows some photos of our holiday to Paris in the Autumn of 2010 - this is me and mum taking a rest outside the Louvre. Everything on the page comes from the kit, except the chipboard thickers and the pink mist which I used to add a bit more depth to the background. I love that rose ribbon!

In other news, I managed to sell a few stacks of scrapbooking paper, but have lots more to go, including a stack of about 150 sheets of Basic Grey! I think I must have had a bit of an obsession at one point...

Anyway, off to bed now to get my couple of hours of sleep - back next week!

A difficult fortnight

Despite my intention to keep up to date with the blog, I was foiled at almost the first stage by managing to catch one of the most horrible viruses I've ever been lucky enough to suffer! It was a form of sinusitis I think, but was so painful I assumed it was an ear infection at first, and left me incapacitated and off work with head pain for a week! For someone who has barely any time off work normally (three days in a year would be the maximum) I'm now up to twelve days this year and absolutely hate it. However, being pregnant appears to have lowered my immune system and a school environment is probably the optimum place to pick up every disease going.

It meant of course that when I went back to work last Monday, I had a horrendous amount of work to catch up on and detentions to set for students who had decided to take advantage of the cover teachers! I finally feel like I'm getting back on top of things now and so can turn my attention to more pleasant things like blogging.

On a more positive note, baby has been kicking away happily for the last few weeks, and Ed has even been able to feel some of the stronger kicks, which is lovely. I ordered my first brand new maternity clothes yesterday (not that I needed to really, I have sacks of donations!) and have been living in a pair of hand me down maternity jeans at the weekend - so much comfier than the clothes I have been squeezing myself into at work. I'm at that awkward stage where my bump makes normal clothes difficult, but maternity wear is just that little bit too big. Still, it's lovely to have a bump - makes it all seem very real. We've been having some disagreements about names already - why is it that men never come up with names that they want, but feel happy to veto everything you come up with?

In scrapbooking news, I've been going through my stash and starting to sell some of my vast collection of papers on UKScrappers. There is no way I will ever scrap with them all, so it's best that they get moved on to a good home. I'm down to my last set of 'old layouts' to share on here too, before showing you some of the pages I have produced recently (though not that recently - the last two weeks have been a bit of a write-off when it comes to creativity of any kind).

The first is a page I really like, despite its simplicity, for the beautiful bright colours. It really reminds me of the day in question which was such a glorious autumn morning, it could almost have been summer.

 

 

Secondly is this page recording a cup of tea shared on the beach at the Isle of Wight with my in-laws. This was on holiday nearly two years ago now - we didn't go last year and probably won't this year, which is quite strange as it had been a regular trip for so long. I'm sure we'll be back again one day though. 

So hopefully I'll be back soon to update you with some of the six or seven 'new' layouts I've created.

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...