Christmas Rundown

Good afternoon blogland, hope you all had very merry Christmases.  We had a lovely time, but doesn't it go past in a flash?  If I'm honest I am glad its done now, a little too much in the way of christmas visiting this year and my smile is aching a bit from it all (not to mention all the small talk required by people who ask you a question but have no interest in the answer - I'm guilty of it too!)  Yes I am glad that I don't have to go through all that fake smiling and chit chat for a while now.

Its not all bah humbug though, we had a lovely christmas eve and day, my brother did us proud with a stunning meal which he did with  very little fuss, no help wanted and he got it to the table bang on time - well done lil bro!  Christmas night we dropped the children at their dads and just chilled in our new jammies and slippers.  Boxing day we hit the sales, and I bought a kindle with some christmas money, then later to the pub for a few festive drinkies.

In the last few days we have vegged at home and I have read and read, its been lovely and restorative, I did not sleep well over christmas and the lead up and the last 3 nights I have slept til 9am each morning, I almost feel human again!

Today I felt the need to cut and stick, the printer was not being co-operative so I almost had a meltdown when it took 1 hr to print off a photo, but here we have it a lovely relaxing hour or two doing what makes me happy!

Tomorrow is NYE and a change from the usual curry and pub, we are going to our friends Matt and Mandy for a meal, I am looking forward to it immensely, I have long hated NYE in pubs and the though of a nice meal and then getting quietly sloshed in comfort makes me smile like this :D

Basking Mad

Well I know its christmas in just a couple of days and this layout is decidly summery but what can you do?!  This was my take for this weeks Twisted Sketches Challenge with the twist being 'Jewel

Right I am currently trying to play monopoly with the family and then we have to go to my sisters for her step sons 6th birthday party, so I must dash!  Merry Christmas everyone, have a good one!                    

Making my own embossing folder

Wow its amazing what you can learn when browsing the internet, yesterday I learnt how to make my own embossing folders!

Heres how:

Get an empty embossing folder and then with a die cutter cut out a shape (I went for a quatrefoil background




Stick the negative on one side and the little cutout bits on the other, you need to ensure the cut out bits fit into the negative bit, I did this by sticking the frame bit down on one side and then fitting the little bits into the holes, appy glue to just the cutoutbits, close the folder and voila! the little bits will be stuck to the opposite side.



All the while I was making this, I was skeptical, would it work? Well yes it does, here is the result, and if you turn it round you get the other impression, the frame standing pround and the cutouts depressed!

Christmas Prettiness

Yesterday Jason and I did our annual christmas shopping trip, once a year, normally late November but later this year, Jason books a day off and we go and finish off our christmas shopping, its really about an enjoyable trip picking up last minute stocking fillers and having a nice lunch out. The weather outside was frightful, i'm talking freak hailstorms that made it look like there was 2inches of snow on the ground in a matter of seconds - it was amazing!

In one of our shopping centres a cadbury garden and leisure christmas shop had opened and I got some amazing bargains!



From top left: Cute heart fabric banner £2.49 (everthing was half price!), Bauble that I instantly fall in love with £1.75, Whicker white heart £2.49 and Wooden Heart photo frame £2.49

I also bought another 100 lights for the tree as I thought it was lacking lights. I then decided I wanted them on the tree so I had to take everything off and start again, fine if you're a fan of the spartan look, but I like a loaded look and this year I bought a ton more baubles so re-doing was a hell of a job



The tree to prove my point! Its so pretty when its all lit up and I love the over produced fit to bursting look that I achieved this year!

No Christmas shopping trip is complete without an outfit for Bruno. DISCLAIMER it greatly saddens me that I dress my dog up, its naff, I'm not that sort of person but I just cannot STOP doing it! Truthfully he could not care less as this pic shows:



Job for today: Wrap relatives presents, or it would be if those bl**dy children hadn't run off and hidden the cellotape, nothing in this house, NOTHING is where I leave it!

Angels

I finally got round to making the inserts to my christmas cards today, whether I will actually get round to writing them and sending them out is quite another matter, but at least they are ready and waiting now if the urge takes me.

Having done all the boring work on the inserts and feeling a bit christmassy I decided to make another couple, nothing special just a simple cut, colour and layer job, but here they are anyway!

Look What I Made

Thats something that can be heard quite a bit in our house between me and Jessica (last week she made a winter tree scene with some cotton buds, that looked really cool!) but its also the title of this layout made for this weeks challenge at Twisted Sketches - pop on over and take a look and join in with us.

This was made whilst we were having cavity wall insulation installed, so amidst lots of drilling and noise, best bit was NOT when they were doing the outside wall that is the kitchen, and we had a little hole in the wall and all of a sudden, loads of black polystreyne balls came spilling in - arghhhh!

Its blowing an absolute gale outside and looks so cold and yucky, I have to go out in a little over an hour to pick Jessica up from school after a netball tournament and then walk her over to her old school (in the opposite direction to home typically) for performing arts. I am not looking forward to it at all, a round trip of 50 mins walking in the almost dark cold rainy windy weather.

Fish Frenzy

Phew! I have had my most productive day for a very long time, and I have actually felt proper back to my old self, so much so that I crafted (fanfare!!)

It was so lovely to sit down and get paper out today. My printer spent 45 mins being uncooperative and jamming, but I did eventually get going and have a good play.





I used for this, a piece of scalloped MME cardstock, I tend to steer away from scalloped edges as my base as I find them hard to photograph and crop, but the colours on this one shouted at me! I used my Cameo a lot on this layout, the 'fish' lettering is a print and cut using some free digital paper that I had. The bumpy border, other lettering, orange circle, note paper edge, fish and kite were all cut on the cameo, in fact even the journaling strips were as I wanted them extra thin.

I do wish we had better light for photography at the moment, but it is what it is!

Echo Park Holly Jolly

Hello, a couple of cards to share today, yesterday I got a nice little parcel in the post that included the Echo Park Holly Jolly Elements Stickers and some of the papers. They are perfect for Christmas cards and I got stuck in!

Right I am off to have a 40g bowl of cereal, I'm doing the cereal diet at the mo, where you have 1 bowl for brekkie and one for lunch and then a sensible tea, its just calorie control really, but it seems to suit me and I have lost 4lbs, regular readers will know that I do not loose weight easily so I am pleased with that in 12 days, the first week however I nearly gnawed on my right arm I was so hungry!

Being Mary

Hello, Yes I am still alive (just!) I got poorly again and so have not been up and about much this past week. Enough about that though, who wants to keep hearing about someone being poorly!!

Yesterday I managed a layout, it was nice to get cutty and sticky but I did struggle a bit and this simple layout too far longer than it really should!



This is a picture of Jessica being Mary in her Nursery School Nativity Play, when she was just 3 years old - look at those chubby little cheeks. I knew the nursery were putting on a play but I did not realise what until the day of the 'performance' and I had no clue Jessica was Mary, so it was a lovely surprise to see her in the staring role. She was very good and mostly well behaved, but she couldn't resist telling the audience in a quiet bit that "I'm going to my Nannas for Christmas - I am!" Also during a song that involved counting she may have made a rude finger gesture that I managed to get on film!!! And lets not even talk about poor baby Jesus and the way he was manhandled.