Laugh often, be silly........

One of my favourite sounds is Craig giggling with one of the kiddies, it's the best sound ever!  I didn't think too much of all the giggling coming out of Emily's Bedroom, until I was asked to look over my banister!  This is what greeted me......

Craig, who has very little hair anyway, had put on Emily's new school swim hat, and Emily had put her new goggles on!  They looked a right pair of Charlies!

This layout has been completed using my May Kit from Cocoa Daisy.  My Blazonry Stencil came out again, but I've used it upright this time.  I've used my Prima Chalk Ink in Brick Wall to ink through the stencil, then I've used a black and white gel pen to draw on the lines and add some definition.  I've also used my Kits Border Stamp to stamp the 2 black borders, and I've finished this off with a chipboard flower by Prima Marketing.

The wording Laugh Often, Be Silly is cut from a sheet of Fancy Pants Be You paper called Subway Art and mounted over the ink using foam pads to give a bit of dimension.

The paper I've used is Prima Marketing Doodle-Deux Collection - Lucky Charms, which was very patterned and makes this layout look good without having to do too much.

The main technique I've used on this layout is inking, stamping and stencilling, all three of which I'm now starting to experiment with.  Watch this space, as I'm sure you'll see more experimenting going on.

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My Scrapbook Magazine Debut.....

I'm now allowed to showcase all of my layouts that appeared in Scrapbook Magazine, so here they are!

I loved these photo's of James and Emily playing on the Beach in Cornwall.  Because there is an 8 year gap between them, they don't often play like this.

This is my Niece and Nephews Wedding Cake!  It contained all my favourite things, the colour pink and butterflies.  I just had to scrap it!

I'm nearly always behind the camera taking the photos, so to have a nice photo taken with Emily was lovely.  I love all the lovely flowers on this LO!

This is one of my favourite photo's of Emily, again taken on a beach in Cornwall.  I used a sketch to complete this layout and was very pleased with the end result.

All of these layouts were completed using Scrapagogo and My Creative Scrapbook Monthly Kits!

I'm currently completing more work for Scrapbook Magazine, so please keep an eye out for my future layouts!

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Little Madam..

I'm often found telling people that Emily really has horns under her hair, and I captured her inner devil on a recent trip to Stowe!

We were at the Chinese House when Emily asked me to hold her coat, when I declined, she folded her arms with a "I'll carry my coat this way then!".

This is the first layout I've completed using my May kit from My Creative Scrapbook!  The Kit this month has gorgeous Pink Paislee Spring Jubilee papers.  I've used three on this layout, Soiree, Festival and Bash!  I've also used my new Martha Stewart Butterfly Punch to make the butterflies on cocktail sticks!

I had some gorgeous Petaloo Mulberry Flowers and Prima Meadowlark Flowers, which I used along the bottom of the photograph, which made a lovely frame and matched the summery colours of Emily's outfit.

I've kept the layout fairly top heavy by layering papers, which I've punched and making my own embellishments.  I've used my Butterfly Punch to make my own cocktail stick embellishments, and my Stampin Up Doily Punch to make the rosettes on the layout.  I've used some Spring Jubilee Chipboard stickers to finish off the doily at the bottom of the page.

The papers really make this layout look lovely, with all the spring colours.

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Beach Bum

James really embraced the Surfing life last year when we went to Cornwall and bought a really nice body board.  For some reason, we hadn't taken swimming kit with us to the beach, so he had to have his first try at body boarding in his normal trousers.  Needless to say, James got very wet!

This is the first layout using my May Cocoa Daisy Kit.  This kit is full of American Crafts Amy Tangerine Sketchbook papers, and I love this one, as it looks like it's painted.  The paper is Indigo Inspiration.  I also loved the Hambly Screen Print paint splats.  The May Cocoa Daisy Kit is called Graffiti Bridge, so thought it fit James's Graffiti body board perfectly.

I love Julie Fei-Fan Balzers's Stencils, and I own a few.  My kit contained Julie's Blazonry stencil, which I was thrilled about.  To me, the stencil looked a bit like waves, so I stencilled onto the paper using my Blazonry stencil and a Prima Marketing chalk ink in Cold Ice.  I then drew in the "waves" using a white gel pen.

How do you use your stencils?  I have a feeling I'm going to be using this one again!!

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Brave Girl.....

Hello, I know I've been missing from my blog!!  Being ill and working on a bigger project has kept me away, but I do have a layout to upload!

It took us quite a while to persuade Emily to have her ears pierced.  We coerced her into it when we were in Cornwall last year by saying that the only way she could go into Clare's Accessories was if she had her ears pierced.  She eventually agreed, and got bought all the girly bits she originally wanted afterwards.  Emily was such a brave girl!  The materials I've used are the last little bits from my Cocoa Daisy April kit, along with my new Martha Stewart Cherish Punch, which I love already!

I love the circle embellishments that I made after seeing these made on the Cocoa Daisy forum.  They are really simple.

All you need is two contrasting pieces of card stock, 1 inch circle punch, some good glue, a ruler and a scoring tool.  Punch out 2 circles, one from each piece of card stock.

Make two score lines, splitting the circle into thirds.  Bend up the two wings on either side of the circle.  Only do this to one of your circles, the other circle becomes the contrasting base.

Using a good glue, I've used Glossy Accents, glue the scored circle on the top of the full circle to make your embellishment!  I then used a Prima Chalk Ink in green to ink the bent up edges of the top circle.  I'd recommend doing the inking before gluing to the base circle!

Hope you've enjoyed my mini tutorial, and give it a go!!

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Birthday tea.....

We have a tradition in our house when it comes to special occasions, the person who is celebrating picks where we go for a celebratory tea!  Emily was 5 in January, and she decided that she wanted to go to Wagamammas!

April's My Creative Scrapbook kit was full of gorgeous Bo Bunny Country Garden papers and embellishments, so I wanted to use these to go with Emily's pink top!  I layered two or three of the papers, inking each of the edges to give each paper some definition, along with some Bo Bunny noteworthy pieces.  I then used my new Tim Holtz Doily Die, which I love, to add an extra layer on one side of the photographs.

The Bo Bunny trinkets and the Prima flowers just called to be used at the juncture of the photo's.  They give an element to look at, but keep the two photo's separate.

Materials List:

Bo Bunny Country Garden patterned paper - Garden Vines, Bo Bunny noteworthy, Bo Bunny trinkets, Prima Flowers - Meadow Lark, Bo Bunny Country Garden Sticker Sheet, Tim Holtz Doily Die, Martha Stewart Doily Punch and Tim Holtz Distress Inks in Vintage Photo and Victorian Velvet.

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2012 Yearbook - April

We decided to go to Lanark Mill Hotel in Scotland for our Easter holiday, like we did last year.  Last year we had brilliant Sunshine and it was warm.  This is what greeted us this year......

The day these photo's were taken, we travelled from Lanark Mill over the lowland mountains to Falkirk.  We travelled in heavy snow (although the roads were very clear), and we experienced rain, sleet, heavy snow, heavy wind and sunshine all in one day!

I've used Hexagons for my pages, as these are really popular at the moment.  I inked a Maya Road wooden bird with a Prima Chalk ink.  It seemed appropriate to use this bird as an embellishment because it should be spring!!

For the second page, I used the paper that I cut the hexagons out of for the first page, and kept the page simple by using some stickers, an evalicious badge and Thickers for the title.

You can see the gorgeous Evalicious badge here.  As we had all weather in one day and the main weather trait was rain, this badge seemed appropriate.

Materials List:

My Minds Eye pattered paper, follow your heart - be amazing, Basic Grey patterned paper, pb&j - whole wheat, Crate Paper Story Teller Stickers and phrase stickers, American Crafts Cupboard letters, Prima Chalk Ink - Rock Moss, Wooden Bird and Evalicious button.

Thanks for stopping by!