Hand Crafted Memories

At last I've managed to complete a Pencil Lines Challenge again. I love doing these challenges and try to do a page for each week but sadly over the last couple of weeks I've missed them. They were really good sketches as well 8-(. I've saved them to catch up with later. Initially I started scrapbooking to try and document all my travels, this has then diverted to a scrapbook for my brother and a scrapbook of me, so I went back to my original mission and got out travel pictures. The photos of this page are a bit pinky /yellowy, this is due to the synthetic lights the pages are actually white. You can get the idea though. I've realised that I have made three pages from my trip to Greece and each one I have used white bazzil as the background, I think its because it represents how bright everything was when I was there. If anybody is looking for a fabulous day of crafting on 5th December with great tutors and a scrummy dinner, click the link on the left of my blog. Thes...

You have to go over to the Craftwork Cards website here , they have had a major reworking of their website and it looks fabulous. Still to come is the design Team section, keep watching you might know somebody. 8-) Its coming up to Christmas party season. Our company very generously pays for a lovely dinner for all its employees and their partners. By the time the event comes round everybody has forgotten what they ordered, so each year everybody gets a little card with their choices printed on it. I was asked to do them this year and this is what I have come up with. They are about 2" x 3" and open like a standard card with the menu selection inside, i thought they were really cute. I love this stamp it's Stampin Up's Compliments to the Chef and stamps beautifully .

Here's another of my simple cards that I've made for Christmas, I am planning to sit and write them all this weekend because I have a pile that need to go abroad and I am in London the following weekend. This little card makes me smile, I love the image on it and it stamps beautifully every time. A few dabs from the copics and a bit of glitter glue and it's done. Lovely!

Last Thursday I went to my monthly crop at Craft Haven in Sheffield. This months theme was winter, so I sorted through my travel photos and found the gorgeous view from Andorra. We'd gone on a skiing trip, which I hated. It was the first (and last) time I had a go at skiing , and I have to say its not for me. The scenery was beautiful but if you see on the photo there wasn't enough snow. All the seasoned skiers were disappointed and tried to convince me the reason I wasn't enjoying it was that the conditions weren't suitable. My partner also managed to fall on the second day(he was a seasoned skier) and damaged his hand so skiing was off. The country itself was just beautiful so we went for lots of walks, and I made a mental note that holidays were too precious and expensive to spend miserable and cold! I've also noticed I've had exactly 4,000 visits to my blog, I'm well chuffed. Hello visitors!

The weekly challenge over on Bubbly Scrumptious this week is advent calendars. I made this one a couple of week s ago. One of the boys at work asked me to make one for his girlfriend so this is another version in pinks and purples. I also found this picture of one I made a few years ago, believe me making all those boxes drove me mad, especially when I got an order for five more! The photo doesn't really do it justice its much brighter in real life.

I've missed out on the Pencil Lines challenges for a couple of weeks, so today I've made this page based on sketch 161. There have been some lovely sketches and I intend to catch up with all of them. I recently won a couple of prizes on the Pencil Lines birthday celebrations, one of the prizes has arrived and I'm delighted with the fabulous Cosmo Cricket Early Bird pack.

The weekly challenge over on the Bubbly Scrumptious blog is to Go Wild, make something with a wild animal on it. I loved this cute sticker that I bought recently and thought it fitted perfectly, it's too cute to be wild really!

What about this for a new take on an advent calendar? Without chocolate I'm afraid. This was my favourite project but it took most of the day on Saturday to make. The whole thing was made from chipboard, including the frame. It took a few attempts to get it right but I'm very happy with the result. Craftwork Cards is offering some blog candy, all you have to do is leave a comment on their blog saying what your favourite product is and why you can't live without it. The winning post will be drawn on Monday 23rd, the fabulous prize is a bundle of their fantastic new products. Believe me it will be well worth it. They are launching a new blog soon. it just has to go through its final testing. It will feature a Design Team (look out for a familiar face or two), new ideas, card challenges, new products and much more. We're all very excited to see it launched. Why not go over and become a follower, that way you'll be notified of any new posts.

I loved this layout, another one from the UK scrappers cybercrop . What a brilliant way to use up the ribbon that you never want to throw away. I've enjoyed the crop, all of the instructions were really clear I've really pleased with the pages I've done. I didn't have photos for them all so I just used the same picture on all of them. It was the one I use on my blog profile, everybody must think I love myself. I laughed with each photo that I posted in the gallery but I wanted to post the pages and they look better with an idea of how it looks with a photo. Plenty of posting material for the rest of the week.

I'm doing my best to keep up with the UK Scrappers cybercrop but my goodness it's busy. I am at this moment one class behind but I am enjoying it . Hopefully, I will catch up with that class tomorrow . The first class on Friday night was titled Twister and Shout, I love this page, the instructions were to use the back of the Basic Grey papers but I loved the patterned side. They are all from the same set so they match. I'm not going to use this picture but I just put it on so I could photograph the page. I will have to fish through my stack of photos to find something suitable, but its such a gorgeous page it won't be hard to find a picture that will suit.

It all began last night, my first ever cybercrop , I haven't been to any workshops or classes recently and needed some creative inspiration. The theme for the UK Scrappers cybercrop is the Wizard of OZ and through out the weekend various challenges and online classes will be taking place. For a couple of weeks the supply list has been posted, I got the kits together for all the classes because I don't know what to expect. I can then decide which ones I want to take part in and be ready, rather than scrambling to find things. The only thing I didn't do in advance was print photos, I have plenty to choose from so I haven't worried about that. A pre -crop challenge was set Home is Where the Heart Is In the Wizard of Oz, all Dorothy wants to do is go Home. What is it that makes 'Home' for you? Is it a particular place? or a person/people? Create a layout to do with anything that makes you feel at home. Here is my layout. There was also the mystery kit challenge, ...

I worked in the Middle East for 15 years on three separate contracts. Specifically in Saudi Arabia from 1986 to 1999, I was in Riyadh through the Gulf War and working at the military hospital. I was a civilian employed by the Armed Forces Hospital. We didn't see any fighting or injuries in Riyadh but we did experience the scud missiles and the influx of British and American Forces who became our friends. This makes Remembrance Day poignant for me personally. So to mark this day here is a simple card to say it all to those that have served and are serving.

These advent calendars made from match boxes were all over the net last year. One of the girls at work asked me to make one for her aunt, so this is what I came up with. She wanted traditional colours so this paper from Craftwork Cards was just perfect. to finish the top off I made the roses again, I love making these and they look so elegant.

Sometimes I get a bit caught up with using lots of 'stuff' and techniques on cards and pages. Two reasons really just because I know different techniques and others because I have a huge amount of stash. At times this makes some of the things I work on too busy then I'm really disappointed with the result. Generally I like plain and simple things, my pages I like to be clean and ordered, so why do I get bogged down with my crafting? Yesterday I sat for ages in my craft room just looking at the mystery kit for the UK Scrappers cybercrop next weekend. I've got to say I have no idea what to do with it. The papers are lovely but no a colour that easily lends itself to an idea, there are also bits in it, that are kicking around in my 'to give away' box already, and there's one thing in there that initially I thought had fallen in by mistake. That is until I read the contents list! Today I went through to the Craft Box to see if there was any mojo in stock bec...

I know I've not done much posting this week, for two reasons really. 1. I was working in Salisbury for two days so was away from home and 2. I have signed up for my first cybercrop. The theme for this is Wizard of Oz. I'm not sure if I'm doing to right thing but I'm looking at it as a way of using up some of my stash. Over on UKscrappers they have a cybercrop planned for 13-15th November, it looks like it could be fun and they've got a few classes planned, I thought why not sign up. It's free and I can use up some of the stash I've been hoarding. A list of all the goodies needed to complete the classes is posted, I've got each class list laid out on my spare bed and i keep adding the stash to the pile. A couple of things have had to be ordered but so far I had most things or a decent substitute available. One of the challenges is a Mystery kit, which I bought, unfortunately nobody can discuss the comments or post what is made from it until the crop. I...

Well I have to take back my statement last week that I never win anything, at the moment it looks like I'm winning everything! Yesterday I logged onto the Bubbly Scrumptious blog, last month the challenge was Angels and I've won! with this card. Bubbly Scrumptious do a monthly challenge and a weekly challenge, so I usually pop over and try to have a go. I've won a lovely Fiskars embossing punch. A couple of weeks ago I won two prizes On Pencil Lines with a couple of entries I'd made for their birthday challenges, here is the post about it. when I got into work this morning the winning streak continued, we have a bonus ball lottery at work, we've only started it this week, and guess who won the first lot of money? Yes me! Now all I have to decide is what crafting goodies I'm going to spend the cash on. Mmmm wonder if I should do the lottery this week?

Friday was Wear it Pink day for us at work. It's well documented in this blog that I work in a heavily male environment so when I sent the e-mail round that everybody should dress in pink and donate money to do so, you can imagine the response. The thing is I knew they would all take part they just wanted to moan a bit first, you've got to love them. So I promised I would bring buns in for everybody who wore pink, that worked! We managed to raise £76, not bad for a small company like ours, but the majority of people did wear pink even one of the directors wore pink glittery socks! To promote the theme I made pink butterfly buns, not my normal type of baking, I hadn't made these since I was a child. I tried to make the sponge pink but it didn't matter how much I added it wouldn't go any darker, so I added it to the butter cream, loads of it but this was the darkest it would go. Never mind nobody had them in their hands long enough to inspect them!