Cropping day...

....woohoo!! I was actually fairly organised this time having gone through my AMM shoulder tote bag last night and taken out all the paper I didn't need! I managed to get quite a bit done...almost completed my PL sketch for next week (don't faint Anam ;) ), a journal for myself and another layout.I also bought a fab circle chipboard book from Ali.I have started painting it this evening and am going to make a little book of Holly when she dressed up as a pirate!I got so many good photos, too many for a layout, and I want to actually 'do' something with them!
Anyway, it lovely to see everyone at the crop today and I feel 'refreshed' after my day 'off'!

New sketch is live over at Pencil Lines tonight :) Hmm...so last week I used the same tape as Tracie...this week I've used the same paper a Celine...what the heck's going to happen next week?!Unforunately the scanner seems to hate this Autumn Leaves French Twist paper :( , it looks so much brighter IRL!
So this week I used
Autumn Leaves Fench Twist papers
Heidi Swapp tape (again!)
Heidi Swapp ghost alphas
Angel Kiss star flowers
Autumn Leaves journalling panel
butterfly stamp is by Stamps Away

Right , I am off to carry on painting my chipboard!

Still here!!

Just haven't had much to blog about!!

We have spent this week ploughing through all the junk in the girls bedrooms....and it's been painful!How much junk can a 10 year old hoard?? I guess what scares me is that she is so like me at that age....spends hours supposedly tidying but in reality gets nothing done! Anyway, several bin bags later and it's looking better.I just have to persuade her that it's so much easier to put stuff away as she goes along in future.Hmm...I'm not really the best teacher for this tidying lark !

Yesterday I worked on my Pencil Lines sketch for this week...took me an age to find the photos I wanted to use but I got there eventually :)I am off to Anna's crop on Sunday.I cannot wait,I missed last months and seems like an absolute age since I last saw everyone *waves to Ali, Louise and Kerry!* I have a huge list of stuff I need to take for Anna (including Hazelnut Galaxy ;) )

Tomorrow Geoff is taking Holly out in the afternoon for a treat and Em wants to spend the afternoon scrapping with me, I'd better go clear the kitchen table!

I'll leave you with a sneak of my layout for this week.

A Little Bit of Summer.......

...finally arrived in our garden today! This year our Budhlia tree has really taken off and today the butterflies finally appeared too :) We had two peacock butterflies fluttering about most of the afternoon.I love them, they remind me of being little and of my Nan's garden.
I am so thankful that we had such hot weather over Easter (bear with me!) Because it was dry we took the oppurtunity then to empty the shed out.I had been searching for a box of photo albums that I hadn't seen since we moved here three years ago.Although I was convinced they were in the loft, I actually found them at the bottom of a pile of boxes in the shed. I took them indoors and they are now safely in my wardrobe.These albums contain all the photos of Em from when she was born til she was 2 1/2.So , following the heavy rainfall over the past week, I noticed we had a bit of a leak at the front of the shed by the door.This afternoon I decided to empty it out again to see how bad it was...let's just say, the box sitting where the box of photos originally was, was an inch deep in water!!Looks like it is seeping through from next doors side (we have a divided shed beteween us...) where their roof is leaking. So I am just so thankful for the hot weather earlier in the year , I would have been heartbroken to have lost all those photos.
Today has been spent tidying the girls rooms (zzzzz.....), a walk down to the lakes and mopping out the shed!I'm trying to make sure that I get up at 'normal' time so that we don't spend all morning getting ready !
I am off to bed as I don't seem to be able to fall asleep til about 1am at the moment and it's starting to catch up with me!

Week 42 is live!

This week our guest DT member was the amazing Jen Hall.
My supplies this week were
Scenic Route Laurel papers (love the stripey one!!)
Heidi Swapp tape
scalloped bazzill
Angel Kiss blooms
Cherry Arte chipboard butterfly
Big bazzill brads
Lil Davis chipboard alphas.

As per usual, I didn't go with my original photo or idea...but I just love how this turned out :)
Make sure you check out everyone's amazing layouts. And how spooky is it that Tracie and I used the same Heidi Swapp tape?!Bear in mind that apart from Anna and Anam, the rest of us never get to see the DT's original layout or the rest of the teams work until it goes live!

Six weeks....

...of no school !!! Just a shame it was such a rotten end to the year weather wise - the playground was flooded at pick up time! The teachers liked their presents and both girls shed a couple of tears at the Leavers assembly - am dreading being there next year !

This afternoon we went with friends to an open afternoon at the local fire station.I was hoping for photos of the girls dressed up in all the gear but it wasn't to be :( They did have a go at the hose practice though!It never fails to amaze me though the amount of kids that don't understand the concept of getting a queue and waiting their turn.....
Whilst there, the heavens opened and continued to do so for most of the afternoon!
I sat up til about 1am this morning doing my PL layout for tomorrow, planning on a lie-in this morning.I was woken by the thud of Holly falling over downstairs!! Thank you for the well wishes for Em, apart from slipping on the stairs (honestly, my house is safe really!)and landing on it again yesterday she has been fine.
I leave you with a sneak of my PencilLines layout, made with what has to be my most fave sheet of paper in a long while :)

Bags , buckets and a trip to A & E......

So I finally manged to get the presents done for the teachers and their assistants :)The buckets are for the teachers and have Thorntons choccies and hand cream in, the TA's just get the hand cream I'm afraid!Whilst part of me is so relieved it's the end of term (no more packed lunches for 6 weeks!), I am feeling sad that it's the end of another school year :(
It's been a weird sort of day...had some stuff bugging me all day which has really played on my mind...and I think there are some 'traits ' to my personality that I am just going to have to accept as part of me being 'me'.Whoops...getting a bit deep there!
I went to the library today and picked up a couple of books about digital photography in the hope of trying to learn about shutter speeds and apertures etc etc! I was just mooching about the shops thinking how nice it was to have a bit of time to myself before school finishes...when I got a phone call from school.Em had fallen off some playground apparatus and hurt her arm.So I ended up walking to the school as quick as I could to collect her.She'd calmed down a lot by the time I got there.Once home I got her an emergenncy dr's appt.From the Dr's we went to the hospital for an xray .We went in to see our GP at about 3.10, from there we went to the hospital,visited childrens A&E,the xray dept and had the results back and were out of the hospital again by 4.15!! Not bad going! Luckily there is no break so no further treatment's needed :)
Right I am off to my bed!

Potato salad anyone?!

Yesterday I thought I'd dig up some of our potaioes as we have no idea when we are supposed to and were curious to see if they'd actually grown! So here is our first little crop! Not sure if they're supposed to grow any bigger than that so I think we'll leave the rest for a while longer!Geoff's veggie patch seems to be doing better than the girls now as the potato plants have completely covered theirs, blocking the sun from everything else they planted.Oh well, lesson learnt for next year anyway!

And meet Ted, the little clay bear that Holly brought home from school ,made as part of their learning about toys subject:)
So far the last week of school has brought on a few tears for different reasons.Tiredness is the main one I think, but Holly also seems pretty unsettled at the moment.Hopefully we will have a few restful weeks over the holiday and she will be happier in September.Roll on Friday......:)

Week 41

...is now live :)
This week we have our new DT members joining us as well as being sponsored by Making Memories and...having Keisha Campbell as our guest DT'er! Phew, what a week!
I was very late in getting mine done this week, so I haven't really done much else today other than the normal stuff - hoovering, cooking etc etc!
Everything on my layout was supplied by MM, except the stamps that I used for the title and my own MM Heidi rub-ons .
Last week of term this week and yes, I still have teacher & teaching assistant gifts to sort out! This time of year and the beginning of term in September always make me feel a bit reflective....even more so this year as Em will be entering her last year at junior school in September.I so wish there were times when I could just pickle my girls and keep them as they are forever.
Quote of the day has to come from Holly who, at bathtime time declared 'I'm going to get a tattoo...when I'm 44.I'm going to get a butterfly on my bottom'!! Somehow I doubt she'll be waiting til she's 44......!!

Oh and being very blog technically challenged,I am so pleased that I have finally got round to adding the PL girls blog links!I just have to go make sure they all actually work now!!

New favourite :)

No news as it's been pretty quiet here, just wanted to share this photo I took of Holly this afternoon, I love it! But when did she get so grown up?!

Sports day

Yes, it is that time of year again...I spent all day running between school and work to catch both girls in action:)
Holly's took place in the morning.She did so well considering she was the only one in her group representing her 'house' and won at least five of her activies.All that throwing & catching in the garden has paid off!
Em was really excited to be helping run the events in the morning, see photo of her proudly holding up her number!
Em's turn came in the afternoon.I'm so proud of her as she really doesn't enjoy running, but she took part in the relay and gave it her all.
Still no sign of their school reports but they did find out who their new teachers will be yesterday.They both seem happy.
No sign of any scrapping going on here sadly....yikes, what'll I be like during the summer hols?!

The trouble with ....

...scrapping friends is that they show you stuff, make you want it....and then you can't find it anywhere!!Anna showed me these fab stamps this afternoon on Martha's blog, and now I neeed them to do some LO's of Holly in pirate girl mode!So if anyone sees some on their travels , please shout me!
Finally got the phone line back today - yipee! Before the engineer guy had chance to drive off I was on the phone to Anna!!You just can't beat a good old gossip whilst surfing and comparing scrapping finds!
Tomorrow the girls find out who their new teachers are.Feels a little strange as I don't really know either of the teachers that Holly could get.

Thought I would share a picture of one of my pink lillies which have just come out :)
Don't forget to check out Pencil Lines as we now have our neww DT girls with us :) We go 'live' on Sunday with some fab sponsorship!

Ahoy there me hearties....

...don't you just love it when the kids dress up?! This evening Holly's Rainbow group had a fancy dress farewell party for the Rainbows moving up to Brownies next term .Holly recently declared that the next fancy dress party she got invited to, she wanted to go as a pirate....so a perfect oppurtunity! I added some tattoos to her arms using an eye liner pencil and she wore the necklace to show she was a 'girl pirate' - sweetie!

Today I got some passport photos done....err....they are are awful!! My hair is the longest I've had it an ages, but being so fine and standing against a white background , it knocks about 4 inches off the length as my hair just goes see through.Yuck, I will NOT be sharing them !

Here's the layout I did last week.Anna's popped it a bit for me as I just couldn't get the colours right.I went a bit mad with the paint as you can see!

Shock horror...

...no rain for two whole days!! Which of course does has it's downside as I now have a whole heap of ironing to do!!
Yesterday I spent time out in the garden, weeding, cutting the hedges and a bit of careless strimming...whoops, say no more! But really...cables should be buried under the ground shouldn't they?!In the afternoon the girls went out with my mum & dad to a village fete, giving me time to dust , hoover and de-junk the living room :)
After all that hard work I decided to take it easy today and we have spent the day lazing in the garden, playing piggy in the middle,running races and tennis!(Maybe not so lazy after all then....!)I think Holly's face says it all....

So isn't it typical that as the summer returns...I got a Winter clothes catalogue come through yesterday!! Still, it did have me longing for some gorgeous jumpers!
As it's Sunday, Pencil Lines is live again with a new sketch (no.40...where did that time go?!
I have to admit I struggled this week...not with the sketch as such but with my supplies.I always seem to use the same things..can anyone recommend something new for me?!
Here's my layout anyway :)
My supplies this week were
Doodlebug sugar coated cardstock
KI Memories Surprise papers
Cherry Arte flower
Bazzill big Brad
Heidi Swapp ghost stars
AL journalling stamp
Sassafrass Lass stamp
white sharpie pen
white bazzill
Sophie alphabet stamps

End of term-itis

This is what Em always used to get at the end of term...tired ,no energy,totally run down.End of term seems to be affecting Holly slightly differently...she broke down in tears and sobbed this morning because she 'only has 10 days left with Miss Picton' She absolutely adores her Yr 1 teacher, bless her! It also reminded me that I need to get my skates on sorting out end of term pressies too!
This evening we went to the open evening at school.Managed to get photos of both girls with their teachers :) Listened to Em's year group singing, no point in videoing it as they weren't up on the stage and we could hardly see anybody! I love it when they have the photos from during the year up on the big Smart board screens in the classromms too !Photo for today is of Holly in the ICT suite this evening.
There is no let up in the miserable weather here...are we really going to have this all summer?!
Finished a layout today (when I should really have been doing lots of other stuff!) Just waiting for Anna to 'pop' it a bit for me (my photos were rubbish!) then I will share :) I got a bit carried away with paint which is a bit unusual for me! It doesn't look anything like how I planned it in my head, but there you go!

Celebrating daughters

.is the Deck of Me prompt this week .following the birth of Emily's daughter Yindi :)

So this was an easy one for me having two of them! I used a photo from the end of a photo session with them , when they were messing around together :) 'Celebrate' is stamped with a KI Verbology word stamp.

Tomorrow we have open evening at the girls school.Em is singing in the Yr 5 choir and we will also be visiting their classrooms.I can hardly believe it's nearly the end of the school year already...Can't wait for the hols (if the sun decides to re-appear) but it feels very scary that Em will starting her final year of junior school in September.They are growing too fast for my liking!

I actually started a layout 'for me' last night...first in a long while! Hopping to finish it tonight as well as starting omn my Pencil Lines layout too.We have some fab sponsors lined up for the future which is really exciting, along with our new DT members :)

Righr, I am off to make a dent in the mountain of ironing in my kitchen!

It's Sunday again....

...so that means a new Pencil Lines sketch :) As per usual I didn't go with my first idea for this sketch ...or even my second! One day I will get an idea ...and go with it!

Anyway, my supllies for this week were

Autmn Leaves Frenxh Twist paper

Autumn Leaves Elegant Flourishes stamps

Heidi swapp letters

Playing cards from a Christmas cracker!

Doodlebug paper frills

Holly loves playing Texas Hold 'Em...but in her own unique little way calls it Texas Hold Me instead !!

I was planning on scrapping this evening, but I started watching the Diana concert and that was it.I have to confess to blubbing my eyes out at the end just as I did nearly 10 years go :(

Can't believe it's Monday again tomorrow!
Yesterday morning we all went bowling :) Em came out as the winner...though I have no idea how, she has the scariest bowling throw I have ever see...seems to work though!
After lunch Geoff took Em into town to get her ears pierced...she is growing up! Definitely wouldn't have let her get them done any younger.But she has been pretty good at taking care of her brace and seems to understand the responsibility of taking care of her ears too! The Croc shop also finally got her purple Crocs in too so she cane home a happy girl :) Holly and I amused ourselves by making choc chip cookies and then playing with the Hama beads.As you can probably guess it rained non- stop all day!

Today has been a better day weather wise - I even got to sit out on the sun lounger this afternoon!