Girls Night

I completed this layout last night. Its called Girls Night, and is about an evening spent with my sister and our friend Nicola a few weeks before her recent wedding. The evening was good fun as we spent our time catching up and gossiping, but as my journalling shows, I ended up feeling a bit nostalgic for the times in our teens when we would get dolled up and go dancing at the weekends. Its only 7 years on but already it feels like those days are lost, which is a little sad.

I wanted to use some of the Junkitz Salsa paper I had ordered in the First Class Crafts sale, so decided to go for the darker paper which has lovely concentric circle designs on it.

I had been meaning to try making my own felt embellishments for a while now, so I cut them out with a cuttlebug die I had ordered off ebay. I've got to say, these dies are brilliant - they cut so easily, far better than thin cuts or sizzlets. I made felt flowers out of three different coloured felts and arranged them around the layout, along with a few brads. I decided to stitch around the top, as the title (which is handcut from PussyCat font) looked a bit lost without the border.

It was actually a very easy layout to complete. Its not my favourite layout, but I do like the felt flowers and the sentiments in my journalling.

I'm going in to work later today - I need to prepare a few things before Monday and also ease myself back in a bit. So no crafting this afternoon unfortunately.

Two layouts on the go...

I can't believe how many ideas I have for layouts at the moment - they seem to be filling my head all the time quicker than I can get them done! I have two layouts on the go right now - one is at the sticking down stage, the other is awaiting some embellishments from Rebecca (a boomin blossoms kit full of green and orange and yellow blooms) before I can move on with it.

The depressing thing is that all these creative ideas have come just at the time when I am going to have very little opportunity to make the layouts. I'm happy because my weekly Wednesday crop will be back on and I'm looking forward to seeing the girls from there again and to having a dedicated 2 and a half hour stretch to work on pages. But unfortunately a little thing called work is going to get in the way of a lot of my time. Now why do I have to earn a living again??? ;)

My China

Here is a layout called My China, about a trip to a Chinese Restaurant in Coventry of the same name that we made for my 25th Birthday this year. The photos all came out a bit blurred unfortunately - the lighting wasn't very good but my aversion to using the flash (it makes everything look washed out) meant that a few glasses of wine and we weren't exactly holding the camera steady. Even so, I think this layout has made the best of them.

I used Basic Grey Phoebe papers for this one, as well as Blooms and embellishments from the August Boomin Blossoms kit by Rebecca's Scrapbooking Stash. The little birds peeking out from the flowers are cut from the Basic Grey paper.

The title is handcut using a free font I found which is rather appropriately called 'Chinese Takeaway'! Its got an oriental feel but also looks modern which is ideal.

On another note, the end of holiday blues are really starting to kick in now - I so don't want to go back to work, I think I have forgotton how to teach! Also I got up this morning at 6.45 to make Ed's sandwiches for work which I had forgotton to make last night and it reminded me how much I hate getting up in the mornings :( Admittedly, I didn't go to bed till 1 last night, but even so. Anyway, enough of my rant.

I'm starting to ponder over whether to join in Shimelle's new class on her website. I still haven't made my mini book from the last one yet but I do have all the PDFs saved for making several different style books which is nice to have. However, I am also trying to decide whether to subscribe to the Back Porch Memories kit from America and I don't think I can do both. Decisions, decisions!

Check this out...

Yay, I made the BG gallery with one of my layouts - I submitted it the other day. Here is the link http://www.basicgrey.com/catalog/idea_gallery.php?page=4

Colour

Just a quick post today as I've got to go and sand around the plug sockets in the living room but here is the layout I completed yesterday evening. As I said, it is pretty 'inyerface'! Its called Colour of the Summer which might seem a bit ironic considering the weather we've had this year but its actually about the floral display at Eastbourne. The pics weren't the best but I wanted to get across how beautiful it was in the colours I used on the layout.



The paper is BG Lollipop Shoppe, the buttons are by Doodlebug Design and the other embellishment bits are from various Little Silver Hat monthly kits (I love the little Summer Days stamp!) I made the little felt flowers using my Big Shot - def a technique I will be trying again!



I'm not sure if I'm totally pleased with it - perhaps I would have done the title differently if I started again but overall I think it achieves the effect I wanted which is the most important thing.



As for the living room, I think I will wait until it is totally finished until I post the piccies of that - just a few more jobs to do now :)

The room is done!

Well nearly anyway. There are still the new plugs to put in and the edging trim to put around the edge of the flooring but most of it is there and it looks great! I may even take some pics to share tomorrow when the light is better. Now its time to start accessorising - I've already got my eye on a great big mirror and a DVD stand...my bank manager will hate me!
My two Creative Team layouts are up on Rebecca's website so check them out if you like - the link is on the right. And tonight I finished another layout - I'm obviously going through a really bright phase because this one is another one of my 'inyerface' style layouts - I can do more toned down ones, but sometimes I just love piling on the embellishments until the cardstock is groaning :) I will upload it to share tomorrow.

Soooo tired!

Well, me and Ed have spent all day trying to finally finish decorating our living room. This was a job that began with us stripping the wallpaper on my birthday (1st April!) and we have only just got round to laying the floor. It looks great but we've only done two rows so far - this is very much a learning curve and a slow one at that! And my sheer hatred of all things mathematical doesn't help much - its not that I can't do it, its more that I get really horrible if I'm made to. So measuring around door frames etc is not my idea of fun.
I may try to do a little scrapping this evening although to be honest I'm so tired I can barely type properly but at least scrapping relaxes me. I've got a few photos printed out which it would be nice to work with so I may just sketch some layouts tonight for them.
Hope to have more to share soon, other than the DIY blues!