Floral Tributes



A couple of floral cards today that I have enjoyed making, the flowers are print and cuts of the Echo Park Silhouette Files that are in the store - I love that Echo Park do Silhouette files and particularily that a lot of them are print and cut, really handy for cardmaking and scrapbooking alike!



Both the floral embellishments were finished off with a little bit of glitter, stickles in crystal for the above and yellow for the below

These cards are perfect for lots of occasions, not just birthdays.  Think Mothers Day, Thank-yous, get well soon etc!

Bike Boy

Just a simple and quick card to show you today. This card was made for a friend of ours who cycles pretty intensively. The bike and cyclist shape is of course from Silhouette.

We had a lovely weekend with the gorgeous weather. On Saturday Jason and I went to a local restaurant for lunch and it was warm enough to sit in their little courtyard, it was really nice and relaxing despite our waitresses best efforts to spill a pint of lager over us (she managed to save the situation by pouring it over herself instead!!) After lunch we went on for a few drinks in our local hostileries for a while before back home for some telly and bed.

On Sunday we went to my mother in laws for breakfast, then a spot of shopping before we picked up the kids and then we took the kids to see The Hunger Games. I don't normally 'do' cinemas, as I am far too bad tempered to put up with other peoples noise, but it was surprisingly quiet and enjoyable.

Right I am off to do battle with the printer which is running on a go slow today. I'm making a nice card and am almost done if only the blummin printer would co-operate!

Scentsy Heaven

* I am not a consultant, neither do I personally know a consultant, I just love and am excited about this product*

Do you like scented candles? I do but I am often dissapointed by the amount of scent that I get from them and they are so expensive and messy. I heard of Scentsy some while ago whilst reading some American blogs and thought the idea sounded really good and was sorry it wasn't available in the UK. Now it is, since about last April I think.

After another disappointing candle that wasn't burning consistently I decided to take the plunge and order a warmer (a bit of an initial expense) and some wax.

This is my new Scentsy warmer, its quite modern and unfussy (I do find a lot of the scentsy warmers a bit fussy/old fashioned). It works via a 25 watt light bulb that gently warms the wax cubes you put in the dish, the wattage is designed to warm it to the correct degree to get the scent in the air but not to dispense all the scent at once. Each cube lasts 8-10 hrs and there are 8 in a bar (60/80 hrs per bar for £5) Once you've got the warmer, then it works out a fair bit cheaper than premium scented candles in wax. Also the wax does not get over hot, you can stick your finger in it and not burn yourself, there is no soot and the wax does not dissolve, you simply through it away when all the scent has been released.

If you've burned a cube for a couple of hours and fancy another scent, simply pour the wax back into the empty hole in your container, wipe the dish with a paper towel and pop in a new cube.

Made it sound good havent I? But its only good if it really lets off scent. Does it? Are the scents strong and long lasting, was it worth the initial set up money? (£30 for a full size warmer).

Resoundingly YES!

I am so pleased with this buy, the smells are strong, they carry around my house and they are high quality

These are my scents so far:

RED CANDY APPPLE - OATS AND HONEY.

Red Candy Apple really smells of apples, its sweet crisp and fresh

Oats and Honey is simply devine, its a warm baking smell with lots of honey and a nutty smell, this one is nice and strong and one cube lasted a lot of hours. Walk in the door with this burning and it almost knocks you sideways (in a good way of course!)

LEMON COCONUT CHIFFON - BAKED APPLE PIE

Lemon Coconut chiffon is my absolute favourite because it smells just like my fav ever candle, its lemony, with a creamy soft tone, strong but not the strongest of the scents - I will forever be buying this one!

Baked Apple Pie - smells just like an apple pie straight out of the oven, with that perfect little bit of cinnamon.

STICKY CINNAMON BUN - CHERRY LIMEADE

Sticky Cinnamon Bun, only buy if you love cinnamon, its a strong scent and very spicy in tone, great one for christmas I would think.

Cherry Limeade, this one is STRONG, it has a fizzy smell, slighly soapy and is perfect for the spring/summer days we have coming, it makes your house smell clean and fresh and zippy!

I know this sounds like an advert, but im so happy to have found 'the' perfect alternative to candles, that will work out cheaper and has over 80 different scents. If I knew enough like minded people I would so be a consultant but alas my few female friends are unlikely to make a business!

Leapin' Lizards

On Sunday (mothers day in the UK) we went to my sisters for lunch, she had just completed on the house she was buying which was also the house that she has been renting for the last 2-3 years, it was a lovely sort of mothers day/celebratory lunch and very enjoyable.

Her partner Sam has a couple of lizards and the kids enjoyed handling them for a bit. Bruno looked like he might like to eat them although I think he probably would have run away if he got too close, wussy dog that he is!

I took a couple of snaps on my iphone 4s of them both with the lizards specifically to scrap (I am running out of current photos, I really must try harder.



It was nice to sit down and scrap today, i've been in a bit of a creative funk lately and just have wanted to sit and do nothing all day. I knew I had nothing much on today - no revision (yay) no mock driving tests and so I ear marked it for a spot of scrapping with my two new photos and what do you know I made something.

Tomorrow I might have to post about my new obsession - Scentsy - So glad its come to the UK, it is blummin lush!

Driving update

Long time readers may remember that about 3 years ago I had a go at learning to drive, I got quite far along the road (so to speak) but nerves got the better of me, I was a nervous wreck and I just had to stop as I wasn't enjoying it at all.

Last September after a lot of regrets about stopping my lessons, I started again, I'm lucky to have a driving instructor for a husband and so we started slowly slowly, taking ages on the little roads with me wanting to vomit everytime I got into a car or thought about getting into the drivers seat! We did this until my confidence was increased. Once I got proffecient I drove us everywhere, not necessarily taking structured lessons, just lots of everyday driving, to the supermarket, over to my sisters in Bath etc. Then came manouvers and then I couldn't put it off any longer and I had to book my theory test.

I had my theory test yesterday - I passed - I passed well ;) I cannot believe the state I got myself into over my theory, anxiety, didn't sleep etc etc and that was with me KNOWING I was going to pass (I studied and I studied hard and I didn't fail a single mock test) and also lets face it 64% of test takers pass, its not that hard!

With the mess I got myself into over the theory (my first test in 21 years so understandable) I got Jason to book my practical yesterday and he is not going to tell me when it is until the morning of the test, that way I will at least sleep the night before and will only know about it for a couple of hours beforehand.

Wish me luck!

Wedged In

Sigh, I have a poorly husband who (as they all do) has taken to his bed and is dying, when Jason is poorly he acts like you do when you are calling in sick for work, you put on that silly 'sick' voice and act all pathetic. That is my life today. I am at least grateful that he is at the moment staying out of my way!



Im not fireing on all cylinders myself thanks to a wisdom tooth thats been giving me hell since Saturday and is making the whole of the left side of my face feel dreadful. Crafting therefore has not been on the top of the list of 'things to do this week' I do however have this layout to share that I made a couple of weeks ago, just a quickie telling the story of the day before our new sofas were delivered. We had cleared the room and were having to make do with cushions for the night, Bruno managed to wedge himself between Jasons head and the wall, with a plug socket pushed into his back, not the more comfortable of places but he happily fell asleep - silly pooch!

Babyface and a BIG hello

Well imagine my surprise today when I logged on to my little blog and found that my visitor stats were through the roof - thanks to all of you who have visited from Silhouette where my hexagonal card was their fan feature today - chuffed to bits!

Back to the business of the blog then..... I can share this now that I was asked to make for The Scrapbook Magazine, who sent me some Kaisercraft goodies with which to make my layout.

I think you will realise that the papers are not my style but I am actually quite pleased with what I created, fussy yes, but I love the layers that I cut on the cameo, and they suited this baby picture of Jessica perfectly and its nice to step 'outside of the box' occasionally!

Right I am off for a cuppa, just had a major panic when Jess did not come home from school, resulting in me walking her route and still not coming across her. Turns out that there was a misunderstanding on going home with friends and the mother thought Jess had told me and Jess thought the mother had cleared it with me and I...... well I was nearly having a fit to be honest, but alls well that ends well! Girls eh?

Mothers Day

Here in the UK its Mothering Sunday next Sunday (18th March) a fact that had slipped by me until I was invited to lunch at my sisters for the occassion.

Seeing as how I got a timely reminder, I thought I should make my card for my mum now before I forgot again and had a mad panic to make one.

This is made using My Little Shoebox (for the tag) and Echo Park This and That Graceful stickers, a nice simple, quick but effective card in pretty colours for my mother!

Snapshots

I have a couple of photobooth type apps on my iphone but i've never printed out any of the photos before.

I decided to have a go today and thought I would scrap this one of Joe. One of those days when I kind of wish I hadn't started, everything was a struggle, but I perservered and managed to save it from the bin!



Bit of misting on this one, haven't used my mists in a while! Also chevrons which I found quite tricky to incorporate if im honest.

Inspired by Paper

Looking through my new papers a couple of days ago, I came across this one from MME with lots of pretty hexagons on. I wanted to make a card featuting the honeycomb pattern seen here, but these hexs were too big for a card.



So I cut out lots of hexs in white card, then using the internal offset feature in Silhouette Studio I cut out lots of hexs in pretty patterened paper (again MME) just smaller than the white ones and then stuck them on the white card.



I added and trimmed the hexs to fit the background paper on my card, leaving 2 small gaps to the side to add texture and give the card some dimension. The card was then finished off with a banner and sentiment for a simple mens card.

Leap in the Air

And so to my last Twisted Sketches Layout and the twist was leap, which went with these photos very well!

I cut the little photo strip frame on the Cameo, making sure the aperture of the strips fit my individual photographs. Nice and simple, bobs yer uncle.

We were up at the crack of dawn this morning as Jess is going to Paris on a school trip - 5.45am she had to be a school for - yawn, right might go for a nap ;)