Little Bird 2

We woke up this morning to the little bird at the bottom of the stairs. We obviously need to re-think his final resting place!

Little Bird

Well after 2 years, it finally happened! Skittle our cat gave us our first present, a little dead bird, which she left on the kitchen floor whilst I was cooking tea. After an inital scream and a panic, I threw a tea towel over it whilst I thought what to do next.

Jessica unfortunatley saw it, and got very upset, she LOVES all creatures, and was distraught to see it there, but she also knows that telling Skittle off would not help so she was cuddling Skittle whilst sobbing her heart out.

Jessica then wrote the above note, and very bravely scooped the tea towel covered bird up and we put it in the garden with the note on top.

I really hope this isn't the start of something with skittle! I don't have that many tea towels!

First ever mini book

Yesterday was my birthday, I got a fantastic parcel of craft goodies off mum, and it contained the lovely Scenic Route Garden Groove Collection and lots of other bits and pieces, including this little chipboard tag album, so I got straight to work and for the last 2 afternoons, have been making this! I love to pieces!!!Its an album of pics from out recent mini break to Haven in Doniford Bay, I think the Garden Groove papers are lovely on this, and it was so easy to make, a real pleasure to do!

Last night we had a meal out with friends, at our local The Ship Inn, great food and a really fun night and the good news is I feel fine today, no hangover whatsoever!!!

Hurrah Layouts for Publication, and I booked our wedding - Productive day!

I am a very happy person today, Scrapbook Inspirations have asked to publish 2 layouts that I submitted to the Readers Gallery. They need the LO's in 3 days, but I live right near Bath where their magazine is based, so I am going to take them down in person, as with only 2-3 days I don't really trust the post!

I had to fill in this form that was sent to me via email, and can I get this form to attach to one of my emails, no I cannot, I have ended up filling the blasted thing in about 3 times (and its not a short affair) and still the form sends blank! I have now copied and pasted it and I hope that it is ok that it is not an attachement! This has taken me about 2.5 hours today and I have got quite air-rated about it I can tell you. The other thing is, one of the LO's features my daughters friend, so I have to get permission from her parents, can I get hold of them? no! AAARGGGGGGHHHHH.

Joe and Jess are at their first leisure day today, its a day of activities at the local leisure centre. I dropped them off at 8.30 and they both looked quite nervous as they waited on the bench for the people running it! I hope they will be ok, and I hope they like it, if they do they can go one day a week. At £14 for the both of them from 8.30-4pm its a bargain! and it breaks the week up for us all!

Its my birthday tomorrow, not doing much in the day, apart from a trip to Bath to drop off the layouts and then drop the kids off with my sister, who also lives in Bath, she is having them overnight as Jason and I are off for a meal with friends.

And finally (and I almost forgot!) I booked our wedding today, it will be on May 29th 2010 at 2pm. We wanted May 29th as that was the day we met and on our wedding day it will be exactly 5years that we met!

Bling your Bike

This is a LO I completed today, of Jessica decorating her bike, so bling your bike day at school a couple of weeks ago, is is surprisingly hard to decorate a bike, but we manages it and her wheel spokes had lots of coloured ribbon bits attached to it, and we stuck loads of bits and bobs all over it!

This LO did not photograph well, the letters are glossy but that doesn't come across and it would photograph straight for the live of me!

First day of the summer hols for us here, we have had quite a busy morning, and we all had chores to do, housework for me and then kids both had to gut their bedrooms, it took us all 90 mins, but it looks a lot better for it, then we had to go to the dentist. Good result there, both Jessica and I have "nice teeth" and he is at least happy at us! I saw Joes xray and its amazing that he still has 12 baby teeth to lose (you could see his adult teeth in his gums, very strange) The dentist said he will not have a gap in his teeth when the rotten one comes out as he has more teeth to grow at that side and they should all push over into the available space, so that was good news as well!

Gift Boxes and Brats

Had a lovely weekend so far, needed to recharge my batteries as Jessica is being a little madam at the moment, and a break was much needed.

Went out locally on Friday and then again last night. last night we went for a meal at a local pub/restaurant chain and made the mistake of sitting among loads of families, not normally a problem, but one family had no control over their 2 girls and were what I call 'namby pamby' parents, lots of "oh darling, sweetie don't do that" and then just letting them run riot, fine for them as they enjoyed a conversation, whilst everyone else had to put up with their 2 girls, jumping up and down on the seats, stamping the floor and running around the tables, bloody awful, what took the biscuit is when silly posh dad started to photograph his little darlings!!! Never mind that love, try exerting some authority, you are bringing up a pair of little brats!

Yesterday I was messing around a bit with the craftrobo, after my sucess with the lovely little teachers pillow box gifts, I thought I would have a go with some other boxes and this is what I came up with


Very cute, and a bit addictive to make (as well as quick and simple) these are just plain, but of course you would decorate them as you like!

Not sure what we are doing with the last few hours of freedom, we've just done the weeks shop and are relaxing, we possibly may go for lunch with Nicky and Alan, Alan seemed keen to get out this afternoon last night in the pub, so just waiting to see how Nicky feels as she is on her way back from a hen night and could be a bit on the rough side.

Chillin on a sunny afternoon

Did this today, pic is of Jess and Joe at a family BBQ in June. I traced around the scallops, to save getting out the craft robo.

Last day of school today, then 5 weeks of having to entertain the kids! its not so bad these days as they are less demanding and can entertain themselves a lot of the time, on Tues they have a leisure day booked so that will be a change for them.

The kids are off to their dads today, its the first full weekend since their half sister was born a month ago, I am looking forward to some time off, pub tonight, feels like ages since we went out, we are now ónly drinking on nights we go out, so I am looking forward to a glass of vino!

3 together

Another LO finished using the July Scarlet Lime papers, the tree was cut out on the craft robo, well eventually, once the craft robo was feeling like it wanted to co-operate! Its moodier than me that thing I swear!

Sports day today, in just over an hour in fact, so thats 2 hours of dis-organised chaos to endure (if you've seen as many sports day as I have you will understand what I mean!) I am praying for a last minute long burst of rain!! Would'nt mind but its impossible to get a decent photo, and being stood up for 2 hours watching not a lot is not my idea of fun!

Got the verdict back on our pc today, its going to be set back to factory settings and a bigger hard drive, but we have lost everything on it, all my photos, itunes, gsd files everything, and more importantly Jasons accounts. Big lesson learnt here about backing up files! Luckily I have only lost about 6 months of photos as I have all the old ones on discs and a lot on my memory card still, but there are quite a few lost still. And it will take ages to download all my music and fonts again :(

A Bruno LO

I am cross with Bruno today! He seems to be developing a habit of pooing in our bathroom overnight, its been twice this week and I can think of things I would rather be doing other than cleaning up his mess at 2.30 in the morning! However I did a Bruno LO today, perhaps to remind me that I do actually like him!

Its made using 3 of the pp from this months scarlet lime kit and the words are done by drawing around letter stickers, its taken all blummin day! A simple lo maybe, but a time consuming one!

80's Boy

My July Scarlet Lime kit arrived this morning, as luck would have it, just after I had finished the housework! Its another challenging one, although I do like it better than last months. I sat down to create and this is the result, from the kit I used the papers (I made a journaling spot from pp and the notepaper sheet from last months kit, I also used the pom pom trim, 0ne of the stickers and the rub on numbers that are running across the top of the photo. This is the first time I have used paint and done a 'messy' paint effect, so that was fun to try. The LO features my partner Jason (on the left) and his brother Marcus in 1987.

Still loving the laptop! its so zippy!

Teachers Sweet Boxes

This is what I have been up to today (as well as stroking my new lap-top!) Its little sweet boxes for the childrens teachers for the end of term on Friday. Its almost entirely done on the Craft Robo, its a cut out pillow box with cut out scallops and scalloped tags, the lettering is also cut on the Craft Robo and is Cafe rojo font. Really good fun to make, and now I have my Craft Robo set up in my craft space, its so much easier to use, and I hope to use it a bit moer now its easier to get going! I lifted these little boxes entirely from this website: wwwpinknblacknsnapsnscraps.blogspot.com


Not much else to report, tried to walk the dog, but got very wet, so we are just having a lazy day inside!

I'm back on a new laptop!

Well last Saturday our pc, which has been moaning and groaning for a while finally gave up the ghost and conked out. A whole week I have been without the internet and its really stunted my creativity! The PC is still poorly and has been sent off for data recovery and then a reinstall to factory settings.

Jason had decided he would get me a laptop for my birthday, so I just got it a bit earlier and I am so pleased with it, its an Acer laptop with 3gb of ram and 250gb of hard drive, it runs very fast and its very pretty and shiny, good price too as it was reduced by £138! However I cannot get used to the mouse pad so I have my rollerball mouse plugged into it, and its great! very pleased person here.

The LO above is one I did last weekend, really pleased with it! Glossy accents on the letters and flowers, love the orange colour with the blue too.

I now have to reinstall design master for my craftrobo and that is a stressfull thing to install, its difficult, complicated, takes and age and then you have to apply to the company for a license file and install that - it is not easy and I am not looking forward to it at all!

Sweet Treat

This is our dog Bruno, enjoying the ends of my McFlurry last Saturday, I am a bit addicted to the Oreo Mcflurries, but it gets a bit sickly and Bruno is always happy to hoover up my reject!

Used my new Glossy Accents for this, the red title word is cut on ordinary matt card on my craft robo and then I just applied the Glossy Accents on top, (and to the red scalloped card too) I am so pleased with the results, I think it makes it look like those puffy Thickers you can buy, will deffo be using my craft robo a bit more, now I can get a better texture to my letter!

I love my craft robo I really do, but it can also do my head in as well, it can be very tempermental and sometimes I want to throw it very hard at the wall, but othertimes I am so glad I bought it!

In other news, Joe is happier about his tooth, he found out that lots of his classmates have had fillings and one has had an extraction, and they all told him that it didn't hurt, so he is a lot more relaxed about it now.

I am off to the leisure centre later today to apply for a leisure card for Joe and Jess, they came home with a brochure about a holiday club in the summer hols and with the card it is only 7 pounds per child each day! So I am thinking of booking them in one day a week, there are lots of activities and it sounds like something that they would enjoy. We are not going away so it will be nice for them to get an activities day once a week!

On yer trike!

This is Jessica the Christmas that she was 2, we got her a Tweenie Trike, that she loved, had to do a black and white photo as our kitchen at the time, was horrible shades of brown (with a brown carpet!!!). I used October Afternoon papers, with a bit of Little Yellow Bicycle paper thrown in, the flower is folded concertina paper and the bike is from the patterned paper and glossy accented, it will not dry so I have photographed it wet!

In other news, Joes trip to the dentist was not good, he has a large hole in the upper left molar, so large that the dentist thinks he may have nerve damage and it may have to come out! He is going for x-rays on Monday to see the extent of the damage. The dentist was surprised that he was not in a lot more pain, but Joes only been complaining on and off of a tooth ache for maybe 6 weeks, he only mentions it once a week or so and thats why I did not take him straight away! I am hoping that the fact that it was not bothering him too much is a good sign and that the nerve is not damaged and that it is just a filling!

I could have cried at the dentist, I felt so neglectful! I have perfect teeth, never had a filling or any dental treatment, so it was such a shock to find out that 10 year old Joes tooth is rotting! I saw the hole and it wasn't pretty. I have ordered an electric toothbush today online and I am now fully supervising tooth brushing again, nothing like this is happening again, not on my watch! I think he has not been scrubbing hard enough and that coupled with about 3-4 apples a day has not been good for his teeth, so I am now hawk like with the brushing. I am very upset!

Joe is also upset, he is worried about what will happen, I think Jason has re-assured him about the procedure for a filling, Joe was thinking along the lines of power drill (bless him) Jason told him its not the end of the world and that the drill is tiny and will not hurt him at all! But he is very fearful.

Joe has been promised a present after all this if he is brave! (guilty mother alert)

Vintage Day

Today I have been trying to get some of the photos of Jason's childhood scrapped, I am giving an album each to his mum and dad, documenting Jason and his 3 brothers childhood. The first Lo I quite like, I moderned it up a bit, its of Jason and his brother in a play. The second is Luke and Marcus as children, no title on this as the 2 other brothers have it as part of their page, bit like a double LO. Its a bit plain, but there you go!

Vintage or muted colours are not really my thing, I much prefer modern, bright prints etc, still its nice to have a change every now and again! And the kit I am using for this album is absolutely beautiful! check out the link below for it, there is so much stuff in this kit, papers, so many alphas, chipboard mini albums, 2 albums (8x8) in a box, embellies, loads of beautiful ribbons, the lot and it is an amazing price, that if you are into that sort of thing, its an unmissable buy!http://www.qvcuk.com/ukqic/qvcapp.aspx/app.detail/params.item.587461

Today has been thrilling! apart from scrapping I have defrosted the freezer, and soon I have to take Joe to the dentist as he is suffering from toothache. I have already had a lecture from the receptionist for leaving it too long between appointments, and have been told that the dentist "will be talking to you about that" Can't wait!

Sweet Lil Funny Face

Another for the Cosmo Cricket Early Bird, its Jessica again, gurning for the camera. Thats it I think for Early Bird, I am going to mix whats left with other papers now, to avoid to much samey samey. I black daisy edge is actually drawn on and coloured in, that took some time!!!

Not done much scrapping in the last 2-3 days, been too tired, another episode of sleep talking from Jason, it wasn't so bad this time, but it put me on edge and I couldn't sleep! Have been a bit zombie like this last week, hardly known which way was up, but I think I have finally caught up on sleep and feel more with it now!

Weekend was ok, Meal at the ship was lovely as usual, the trip into Bath for drinks after, was ok (and just ok) as normal. Sunday was the annual Music Festival in Keynsham, I decided not to attend, was just too tired, even though we could have had a nice relaxing time with a couple of beers and our mates Nicki and Alan, I was shattered and spent the day watching Road Wars on Sky 2!

Make a Wish

Just finished this of Jessica blowing her candles out on her birthday cake.

Used Basic Grey Urban Praire (not a BG fan really) paper, and lots of Sassfralass cut outs.

The finished Ribbon dispenser and a LO

So this is what the finished ribbon dispenser looks like. We had to drill the holes as there was no way an eyelet setter was getting though and also the hole would not have been big enough, you can almost hear the sighs as I got Jason to do it, he really wanted to watch the tennis, and that was the pay off! I am quite pleased with it and it holds a surprising amount of ribbon!

And a Lo of a photo taken 2 weeks ago, during a night out, we're lucky Jason and I as we get a lot of child-free time and are able to maintain a good social life, we get every other weekend on average without the kids, and there is pretty much always something going on and some night out planned!

Today I woke at 5.30am, I don't know whats wrong with me at the moment, but I wake and then I just can't drop off to sleep. I eventually got up at 6.45am but thats obscene for a Saturday morning, and I really wanted to catch up a bit this weekend!

Tonight we are going out for a meal to celebrate Jason's mate Mavis's (his nickname) 50th! It is at one of our local pubs and I think we have got one room as there will be a lot of us. Mavis HATES curry, so Bill (another mate) has mocked up a curry night special menu and has got the Ships staff in on the joke. I am tempted to get Mavis a big helium balloon with 50 on it, just cos I know he would hate it, and frankly if I can get up his nose subtley and with a smile on my face, then I am all for it!!!!

Ribbon Pull-ez, Altered Bisto Can

This is what I have been up to today. Saw this idea on Scrapbook.com and had to give it a go. Its going to be a ribbon pull-ez, I'm waiting for Jason to get home and then he is going to drill holes all around, and I am going to thread some of my ribbon collection in the can and through the holes! This is the first altered item I have ever attempted, it should look like a riot of colour and mess when it is completed!! I wanted to take a photo now, whilst it still co-ordinates with itself and in case anything went wrong with the drilling. Used my Cosmo Cricket Early Bird for this!

Sleepy Head

It really is too hot to scrap, I have my fan going in the kitchen, but fans and paper don't really get on to well!

This is a LO of my Son Joseph when he was a baby, used my lovely Cosmo Cricket for this, the spotty paper is folded to look like ruffles, I think it works well, saw the technique in Scrapbook Trends, and had to try it! This Lo was so easy to do as I used those two chipboard words for the title. Title work is the biggest pain and time consuming thing for me on a LO, and can take me about an hour or more to work on, so this was a breeze!

Joseph is having a day at his secondary school today, he had to get there under his own steam and was most nervous about this, he had a hug, went out the door and 2 mins later was back for another hug! Very very nervous for him, as I still walk him to his junior school so it was a big deal for me too! He was so convinced he was going to get bullied on the walk. But hopefully when he gets back he will be filled with confidence having done it!

We are supposed to be having thunderstorms and lots of rain this afternoon, we'll see, the BBC is quite frankly a bit crap with the weather at them moment, and it won't be the first time we have been told to expect torrential rain and instead we have had a blazing hot day!

Boiling Hot and the Hunt for White Trousers

It probably wasn't the smartest idea to go clothes shopping on the hottest day of the year, but on the plus side the shops were very quiet.

I really really needed some new white trousers, I live in them in the summer time, but I have put on 2 dress sizes since last summer, and even the most forgiving of my current trousers were complaining a bit.

Its always hard to confront the fact that you need to go up a size, it never pleases me, but there did not seem to be a lot of shops stocking white trousers this year, nothing that suited me anyway, eventually my sister suggested M&S so off we slugged there. And I found 2 pairs, so comfy (one even has an elasticated back of the waist jobbie, but please do not tell anyone that, I can cope with being a size 14 but do not want people to know I have elasticated waists on! lol)

I am now in one of the pairs, and they are so comfy and cool and I think I may very well live in them all year round! So its M&S now for white trousers as they were a bargain 15 squid each!!!! Also popped into good old primark to pick up a tshirt that I have and like and wanted another colour, and that was 1 pound when I got to the till, can't knock it!