BFF

Caroline and I went on a photography day with Kirsty Wiseman last Sunday and not only had a fabulous day, laughing and chatting with friends but we also all went from knowing only how to work our DSLRs on automatic setting to being able to work in semi automatic, ie in apperture priority or shutter priority. Our lovely friend Kathy took this fantastic shot of Caroline and I outside the Open University in the middle of Leeds. I love the colour of Caroline's top and the colour works well with these Pink Paisley, Butterfly Garden papers. As you can see from the sidewards on shot of the layout there are lots of 3D embellishments. I had to add the sticky ribbon on the two opposite sides cos I was inking around the edge of the page with distress ink on a sponge when I dropped the sponge on the layout - ahhhhhh!!!

A Couple of Mini Cards

Not had time to do any scrapbooking today but I did manage to sneak off to my craft room for half an hour and use some leftover papers and a couple of stamped Lili of the Valley images to create a couple of simple cards for my workmates birthdays. The cards are small, just under 4" square and unlike the larger cards I usually make, don't have an insert with a greeting on, I just stamp "Happy Birthday" onto the inside of the card. It's easier this way as I have thirty odd workmates. Going on a photography day with Kirsty Wiseman in Leeds tomorrow, looking forward to learning how to use my camera better and getting together with the girls for a good old chin wag.

You Did What?

You did what? I don't know if you can see the journalling but it says " I told Louise she couldn't have a tattoo. The next day she left the house with brown hair and came back like this!" I think my 18 year old thought she could shock me, I just said "nice hair" and left it at that. The papers are 3 Bugs in a Rug and I believe they are from the Lazy Summer range. I bought three odd sheets in a sale and managed to make this layout and two birthday cards using up the left overs. Because Louise's hair is reddy pink the colours matched nicely. The flowers on the left are cut using the new 3D Fringed Flower from Sizzix, I tried 3 different effects including curling the petals, simple layers one of each in three sizes and thick layers using three of each size layed on top of each other. The mushrooms on the page are hand cut and I've shoved some foam tabs behind a few of them to give a layered look. The butterflies were cut from a sheet of glitter butterflies in Bellaboo's Bubblegum Hills monthly kit. The papers in the kit were by Kaisercraft.

I found out today that Bellaboo is going to be attending Scrapstars Retreat in Leeds in September, I believe it's only 9 weeks away but the excitement is mounting. It will be lovely to actually meet Kate in person and get to buy some of her stunning range.

Happy Together

Been working on this for weeks, the basic design, the circle and the spiked cut outs are a lift from the Fancy Pants gallery and was done by a talented lady called Guisppa Gubler. Once I'd got the circle cut and the pattered papers and cardstock stuck down I couldn't decide what to do with it next so it has just been laying about in my craft room, waiting for me to spill Pepsi Max or some ink on it. A couple of days ago I bought the Tim Holtz Tattered Rose Sizzix die and thought I'd have a play at making some grungy flowers, so I made three using that die and another Sizzix one with two flowers on and a few similar but smaller punches. Of course none of my current layouts would be complete without tons of butterflies, well five anyway, I don't seem to be able to scrap without them at the moment.

I wish the sun would come back, trying to photograph layouts when it's grey and overcast is not good, if you stick the flash on it washes out the image, if you don't it comes out looking dark and flat. Caroline, Kathy, myself and another lady are doing a class at the weekend with Kirsty Wiseman where she is going to attempt to get us away from the Automatic setting on our DSLRs and using them more like a pro, that should be a laugh. Hopefully we won't get stabbed or mugged as we wander around Leeds looking for interesting things to photograph.

Prom Girls

I haven't scrapped or blogged for ages so I put this layout together today showing my daughter on the left and her best friend just before they went to their end of 6th Form prom last month. The layout started as a scraplift of a Websters Pages layout by the super talented Rachael Elliott but went off at a bit of a tangent. I wanted to try out making lollipop flowers and yoyo flowers after seeing them being made on YouTube so I set about cutting up some silky cream cami-tops that I haven't fit into for years and also some black netting that once lived on the bottom of a dress my daughter bought then butchered cos the netting was itchy. The red material is from a sample swatch pack a friend was given when choosing linen for her wedding reception. As usual I went a bit mad with the butterflies, well when you pay alot for punches you need to get your money's worth. I used a red Promarker to colour some clear bling and used a Bazzill gem template to place them.