Creative Scrappers

Just a quick one from Creative Scrappers. Here is the sketch :

And here is my take:

Have a nice weekend every one ! Looks like the weather is going to be lovely !! Enjoy !!

Anne

Two in one day !!

Well, my day is going really well, so well, I have already finished my page for Sketchy Thursday and I have already baked my cookies for the teachers !! the sketch for Sketchy Thursday this week was as followed



And this is the page I made...

I Thought I would also enter this page for The Paper Variety Challenge. Here is the brief:

-Challenge-

This week's challenge is to create a paper project that features a grid design or rainbow colors. Kudos to you if you can use both! :)

I think there are enough colours on my page to make a rainbow !!

It looks a bit crooked but I assure you it is straight !! this page is about Martin Plage. A little place where my parents have got a summer house and where we spend most of our holidays. I have never actually lived there and yet when people ask me where I am going on holiday I always say "Home". It is a very special place where I get to see my mum and dad and often my sister and her family and my brother and his wife. I guess this is why it feels like "HOME".

And here is a quick picture of the cookies for the teachers !

Last day of school tomorrow !! Bring on the holidays and the fun times !!

Anne

This day is for me and only ME !!

Kids are still at school for another two days and I have finished my lessons so today is MY day !! Crafty things, a page started that needs to be finished, a few gifts tags to make, some cookies to bake and may be a cup of tea at my friend !! Better get on with it !! But just before I go, these pictures are for my anonimous friend Rachel, I know she will appreciate !!

Now, I know this probably doesn't look spectacular to you, but I have organised and tidied my draws. ( Well, there might still be one little messy draw !! ). I have tidied my ribbons and threads, put all my flowers together, sorted out my papers !! ( I should so get a life !! ) but I know my friend will be proud of me !!!

Hopefully I will come back later with my latest crafty creations !!

Oh, and I almost forgot !! I won a RAK, yehooo. The lovely and very talented Helen Tilbury has chosen me to be the worthy winner. I am so chuffed, I can't wait for my little parcel !! In the mean time go and check her website here. I love reading her blog and her creations are truly amazing.

See you later.

Anne

Once Upon a Sketch.

Raining again, still depressingly autumnal weather, can't wait to go on Holiday !!

Still, had a lovely night yesterday, scrapping with my friends. I managed to finish a page I had started a while ago for Once Upon a Sketch. Here is the sketch..


And the challenge was to include a quote in the journaling. So here is my page..

I am happy with this page, although I can see the ribbon has already moved !! The journaling is about winning. I don't really understand why people keep on telling kids that it is the taking part that counts when in life, if you don't fight for everything and believe you can win, you don't get anywhere. I am very competitive, and so are my kids. It doesn't mean we are mean to others, it just means that we always thrive to do our best and are confident we can do most things.

The other things I made last night were two cards for the teachers. I also like them both and in fact, I like them so much, I will find it hard to give them away. I made the first one using a flower that was on one of my birthday cards.

And the second one was inspired by a card that Valerie made. I really loved the original and I am pretty impressed with the result, although the original was even better !!

That's it for today. Tomorrow I will show you pictures of my newly organised craft draws and boxes !! Someone I know will be impressed and won't call me the messiest scrapper in town anymore !! ( although we all know it won't stay tidy for long !! )

Take care

Anne

Raining, again !!

I need to immigrate, not sure where to, but there must be a country where it doesn't rain 24/7 in the middle of the summer !!

We had a nice weekend despite the horrible weather. It was the Horticultural show in our village on Saturday and we did enjoy it. I love this very English tradition. People compete for the best homegrown vegetable and fruit, the best piece of art and cake, the best picture and and flower arrangement .. Harry had entered a competition of an "Imaginary mini beast " and won first prize !! ( ok, his was the only one !! ) but he was also chosen as the best piece of children's art and another cup. Amelie won second place for her non functional piece of art . She had made an insect house with some painted clay insects and butterflies and I won third prize for my "Flowers from the garden ". Which I am very pleased with as there were dozens of entries and I was competing against very old ladies who have been doing these kind of things for years !!. We also came back with bags of vegetables from the auction, a few tomato and pepper plants, and I won a flower pot at the raffle !! So a very good day indeed. And that was despite the terrible hangover, but we won't go into details !!!

On Friday I received a fantastic parcel from Natalie Elphinstone. I had won one of her give away and I was very excited when I saw the Australian stamp. The parcel was full of beautiful goodies and the picture only shows a few but trust me, it was once more, Christmas in the summer !!

Finally, I have decided to enter the Sketchy Thursday challenge, although I have checked and there are already some amazing entries !!. This is the sketch...





And this is my take.

The pictures where taken last Friday during Sports day at School. Both Amelie and Harry did extremely well. (must be the training at 6 every morning !! ) ( I am kidding !!) (Better clarify this before Social Services come knocking on my door !! ). I know, people say it is the taking part that count and they are probably right, but I am very competitive and so are the kids so I was really proud of them !!.

One for my sister and my mum !!

This page started with Amelie showing her new Brownie badges and ended up with the story of my inability to sew !! I used a sketch from Creative scrappers again !
Here is the sketch...( still can't make it small for some strange reason ! )

.

And here is my take ..

I like all the little bits and pieces, they all tie together well. I especially like the red bobbin. There is this great clothes shop near us where they have even better labels attached to their clothes. Now, I know, I should may be see a doctor, it is not right to be interested in labels more than clothes !! But anyway, they are having their sale on at the moment so I asked the young lady who worked there if she had a few spare labels and she offered me to choose a few from the sale rack !! It was like Christmas !! And I had already noticed that little red bobbin !! So, the moral is... if you don't ask, you don't get !!.

Take care

Anne

Where does time go?

Already Tuesday and I haven't had much time to do anything crafty since last Thursday. Well, I did manage to make a couple of cards. One for my very good fantastic friend ( I have to write this as she threatened  to read my blog !! ) who has just moved house and another for a teacher. I have to make quite a few cards for all the other teachers so I'd better find some crafty time !!

I have had time to browse the web though !! And there are a few challenges out there that I would like to do. Also, I have found this amazing company that does very cute buttons ! Now, I have never ordered from them, but they are having an amazing give away, so go and check their website at http://purplepumpkincrafts.blogspot.com/2011/07/huge-purple-pumpkin-giveaway.html
 and this is what you will see:

Sunday, July 3, 2011

HUGE Purple Pumpkin GIVEAWAY!!

We are having a HUGE GIVEAWAY to celebrate our first birthday, with not one, not two, but FOUR PRIZES up for grabs! First prize will be a $50 VOUCHER to spend in the next sale. Second prize will be a $25 voucher, third prize will be a $15 voucher, and fourth prize will be a $10 voucher.

The winners will be drawn on the 22nd of July - just before the next sale!




So how can you enter? It's easy!

1. Be a follower of this blog.

2. Post about this giveaway on your blog with a link back to here.

3. After you've done that, just leave a comment after this post. For an extra entry, post about this giveaway on facebook, or on any message boards, and then leave an extra comment :)

I will definitely give it a go, why don't you !!

See you soon:

Anne

Sit down and have a cup of tea !!

I have made one myself as this post will probably be a long one ! Lots to show !! 

First of all, yesterday afternoon I went to my favorite charity shop and found lots of old Lady Birds books. You know the books I mean, old children picture books. They are really lovely and the little old lady serving me looked very shocked when I told her I was going to cut them out !! Her little face was saying it all, "how dare you cut into this piece of British Heritage, you silly foreigner !!" I am sure she was going to tell all her friends and I will probably never be allowed to set foot in her shop ever again !!. Still I have got them now and I will show you later how I have already used one of them !!

Last night, my anonymous friends, Rachel, Claire and Sue came over for some scrapbooking. We decided to all do the new Sketchy Thursday Challenge. We had a lovely evening ( eating far too many liquorice all sorts, well especially me and chocolates and crisps ) and it was great to see the results of three people looking at the same sketch !! The four pages are really nice yet amazingly different, I wanted the girls to leave their pages here so I could enter them all for the challenge but they all chickened out !! Chicken, chicken !!. Anyway here was the sketch...




And here is what I made...

These pictures were taken last weekend at the summer fare. Harry was doing the May pole dancing and Amelie was doing Country Dancing. They both did really well and put on a brilliant show. I wanted to make this page quite simple as I have used a lot of layers and embellishments recently. I felt had had to go back a bit and "purify" my pages if that makes sense. I interpreted the bunting with three little tags and some string. I really like the result and especially the picture in the back ground, straight from my "new" old picture book !!

This morning I got a lovely surprise in the post !! A parcel from France. Jeanne, a very lovely friend of my mum, has made me some more crochet flowers !! Merci Jeanne, encore une fois elles sont superbes et j'ai deja plein d'idees comment les utiliser !!

Finally, I got a bit of time for myself today, ( that it after I had to go round the shops and distribute thank you letters to all the generous shop owners who gave us presents for the school raffle !! ) so I decided to do a bit of baking. I had to make some cookies for Amelie anyway as she needed some for her Brownie Camp . Yes, Brownie camp, two nights away !! My baby girl  is gone for two whole nights !! It is going to be so quiet and tidy here !!  

So I saw on a blog a long time ago, some little biscuits made in the shape of buttons. I remembered them well as I thought they would make great presents for the teachers at school. Today I looked for a recipe and I found something quite similar but not exactly what I was looking for. I wanted to make something special so I decided to make a dough and add some lavender flowers. I have lots of them in my garden ( you know, part of my blue scheme !! ). I thought today would be a practise and I would just try them on my friends and family !! As it turned out, a friend came round and told me they were nice and they actually took me quite a while to make. The shape was easy and the cooking very quick. It was threading the ribbons that took forever. The little holes close up a bit when you cook them so it was harder that I thought. So I just thought I would use this batch for the teachers !! Two and a half weeks early but yeh !! I wrapped them up nicely and tadddaa !!

I am so pleased with the result !! They look so cute !! Now, if I am completely honest, they do look better than they taste ! But they will be perfect dunk in tea !!

The teachers looked a bit puzzled this afternoon when the kids gave them their biscuits but now I feel it is done and all I have to worry is making a couple of cards !!

Right, time to go and read my book.

Have a lovely weekend everybody.

Anne

Creative Scrappers

They have a new challenge at Creative Scrappers (http://creativescrappers.blogspot.com/) and here is the sketch.. ( not too sure why I can't make it any smaller !! ) never mind !!

I liked what the design team did so I thought I would have a go. I used lots of Gesso which I had to leave to dry during the night ( that was the hardest bit !! ) I am not very patient and I would rather have it done "yesterday", but I like the end result. I have loved the homemaker collection and I can say it is probably my favorite collection ever, shabby chic and bright. I used a picture of Harry while we were "picking your own ". I like the picture as you can clearly see Harry's dilemma. It is a nice strawberry, shall I put it in my box or just eat it !! (For the record, he ate it !! ). So anyway here is my page...

Thank you so much for all your nice messages of encouragement and praise. The really do mean a lot.

Take care,

Anne

Looking Pretty !

We had a beautiful weekend here. The weather was wonderful and our summer fair at school was a real success. I hope that everybody had a great time, it looked like they did anyway ! We made loads of money for the school, but as usual I didn't win anything at the raffle, which is a shame since I got all the prizes myself !!

Sunday was a lot quieter, I did some gardening in the morning. This time of the year is the time to enjoy and I love pottering about and looking at my pretty flowers. This year I went for all shades of blue and pink and I am very happy with the result. The borders look colourful and bright but yet are all coordinated !! ( may be I am a little obsessed with colour coordination !! ) (It is when I start dressing the whole family in different shades of blue that I will have to start worrying !! ). Anyway, for those who will appreciate it, here are some of  my pretty flowers !!

 

Sunday afternoon we went strawberry and raspberry picking with some friends. It was so much fun. Harry kept eating them all and I am very surprised he hasn't complained of a tummy ache! The funny thing is when we got to weigh our baskets, Harry said to the lady, I didn't pick many because I was too busy eating them !! You couldn't but laugh at his honesty !!

And here are the kids caught in the act !!

This weekend I also managed to make a page for Once Upon A Sketch. I really love this website. The amount of talent is extraordinary and the challenges really push me out of my comfort zone. This week you had to use this sketch..

And talk about the person on the picture.

I said this page took me out of my comfort zone since I decided to use some stencils and quite a lot of ink. I am not sure it shows on the picture but I first made a circle with stencils then added the leaves in a circle. I added a bit of glitter in the end to brighten up the page. I made the little birds and used a crochet flower that my sister ( or my mum !!) ( I might get into trouble here for not remembering !) made me last summer. So here it is..

I have decided to also enter this page for a challenge blog called The Craft Garden. You had to add a bird on your page and another challenge blog called Get Picky where you had to use this picture as an inspiration.

And if you look quickly, my colours kind of match !!

Have a great week everyone.

Anne