Giveaway Winner!

Hello again!

Yep, two posts in one day, that doesn't happen on here too often these days, does it? It's getting quite late in the evening too, but I've just won a game of scrabble against my husband and my dad so I'm in a jolly mood!

Do you want to know who won my giveaway for this handmade smash-style book?:

I just put the numbers of comments into www.random.org, and it came up with number 1! Seriously, how often does that happen? The first comment was left by Sian, so congratulations Sian, this book will soon be on it's way to you! (I already have your address I believe). I hope you enjoy the book and manage to get some use out of it.

I also thought I'd share a couple of photos I took yesterday. It was quite sunny, so as my Dad was here and able to drive me and the kids around (I have not yet learned how to drive!), he took us to Swanage for a walk on the beach:

It was lovely to get some sea air, I think I like the beach even more in the autumn than I do in the summer - it's a lot less busy for one thing!

I should go and get some sleep now before baby wakes for his first night-time feed. How old do babies need to be before they start sleeping through the night? I've forgotten and I'd like to know when I might start getting a full night's rest again! 

x

Tweet

slip-slide, a sketch challenge entry

Hello all.

First of all I want to say a big THANK-YOU! to everyone who commented on my last post. It really did cheer me up a lot to know that you enjoyed looking at my layouts. And thanks for the encouragement to keep going, on Friday I was a bit sulky and ready to shut my craft-room door for a while, but after reading all your kind comments I decided it would be better to just plunge straight back in with another project, and keep going as if nothing had happened to dent my confidence. It's working so far, as I finished off the below layout and am halfway through creating a card. So thanks again for perking me up and keeping me crafting, you guys are amazing!

The layout I have just finished off is for a sketch challenge over at the My Mind's Eye blog (the challenge ends today - nothing like a deadline to get me to finish something off!), to use this sketch by Anam Stubbington), and as it's autumn, to include the colour brown:

Supplies: My Mind's Eye: Lost&Found2 Rosy 'Best of Friends' Dotted Paper and 6x6 paper pad, 12 Days of Christmas 'Deck the Halls' Paper, Rosy 'Ordinary' Decorative Brads, 'Everything' Stamps and 'Ordinary' Label Stickers, 12 Days of Christmas Chipboard Accessories and Rhinestones, Lost&Found Union Square Glittered Alpha Sticker, My Little Shoebox Mini Alphabet Stickers 'Cream', brown thread, a brown Faber Castell pen for journaling, gold glitter, white acrylic paint, VersaMagic Jumbo Java Chalk Ink Pad, Mod Podge.

I used a piece of paper from the MME Rosy 6" paper pad to make a paper pleat, by spritzing a 1.5"x6" strip with water, pinching it gently together, and then flattening it out a little and shaping it how I wanted it to end up. I then left it to dry (can be sped up a bit with a heat gun). When dry I dipped the bottom edge into Mod Podge and then into gold glitter, and leaving to dry again (this didn't take too long):

I made a journaling block by gutting a rectangle of the main green dotty paper before sticking anything else onto it, and turning the rectangle over to the 'b' side which has text printed on it. To create a space to journal on I painted a block of white acrylic paint, and to finish the block off I dipped it into Mod Podge and glitter the same way as I had with the paper pleat: 

Underneath the paper pleat, and under the embellishments in the top right corner, are pieces of light brown paper from the Rosy pad which I cut into semi-circles and then used scallop-edge scissors and my Cropodile Big Bite to make them look like doilies:

I love these banner-like alphas, they are a really fun finish to the page!

Now I'm off to cook steak for dinner - my Dad's down for the weekend so he bought some for us. We've had a nice weekend so far, yesterday was nice and sunny. I'll be back later with a couple of photos and to announce the winner of the smash-style book giveaway.

Thanks for reading! x

Tweet

Feeling a bit blue :-(

I know in the grand scheme of things this isn't much to worry about, but it's got me feeling down today so I thought I'd share. I'd entered some layouts into UK's Scrapbook Magazine 'Scrapbooker of the Year' competition, and I received them back this morning with a polite note saying I wasn't a winner this time. I'm kind of gutted as I put a lot of time and effort into the layouts, as well as typing up all the supplies and instructions, and I thought I stood a chance of a runner up place at least.

Oh well, at least I can share the layouts with you now! And I know that the important thing is that me and my family enjoy the layouts. It's just that as well as enjoying the layouts for myself I like to know that other's like them too - striving to improve my layouts is what I do to feel like I'm 'myself', as well as a mum and a housewife, if that makes sense.

Anyway, I'll stop babbling and show you the pages. I hope you don't mind me having this little rant on here! If you can spare a minute to leave me a comment, whether it's layout love or constructive criticism, I'd really appreciate it :-)

Layout 1: 'Your 1st Trip to London':

See the button and twine clasps? They both hide some 3D elements. If you're a regular reader of my blog you might remember this 3D mini that I made about how much I wanted to make a trip to London. I thought because the mini was 3D my layout about the trip should be too:

I'm glad that my daughter loves looking at the layout too because of these fun elements!

Layout 2: Sweet Dreams:

Complete with lots of handmade embellishments including a rocket-ship made from corrugated cardboard, and a cloud cut from felt and blanket stitched around the edge:

And one of my crochet flowers and a fimo button:

Layout 3: Autumn:

Including some leaves hand-cut from felt and embroidered with veins, layered up with skeleton leaves:

Thanks for taking the time to have a look. If anyone wants any more info on supplies or techniques used on any of the pages just let me know.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend. I'll be back at some point over the next couple of days to let you know who won the giveaway! x

Tweet