Beautifully easy

I'm enjoying putting together the Basic Grey Origins page kits for the November crop as they go together so quickly and easily, especially once you have your photos to hand. For this layout I've used M&E's 2010 school photos. Whilst looking at the group photo of Matthew's class which comes complete with all of their names, I noticed Matthew's name is wrongly spelt. Damn, I shouldn't have thrown the proofs out.


I will save the double layout for the actual crop and hope that I can put it together quickly enough to be ready when the two single pages are completed by everyone else. For the double, I plan to take some trick or treating photos this afternoon and some photos of Lizzie and her friend pumpkin carving.

It's time

... to apply my homemade spider tattoos and head to Brian and Joanne's fright night. I have just finished my red white and black pinwheel quilt and I will wash it tomorrow to take out the markings. Mustn't forget to pack Elizabeth's hat and dress for the party.

Halloween - 1

The last day of my staycation for one has arrived. Two airport runs to do today - Mum & Dad return from Mallorca at 2 and Nick and kids arrive back at about 8. Then it's on to Joanne and Brian's fright night. I cooked up a box of apples last night that Kitty gave me and as we're a bit tight for space in the freezer I used some of the apple for some scary spiced apple mini muffins for tonight's party. I think the scary ones might get left in favour of the plain ones. I need to set up my silhouette cutting machine to do some spider's web and spider tattoos to accessorise our witches' costumes.



Here's the first of the Basic Grey classes for the kit for the November crop. They go together very quickly. Do bring your photos as some of the rub ons and embellishments go over the photos. Warning - once stuck the chipboard elements don't come off!!

Still alone but not idle

Have had a few busy days - lunch at Lorraine's on Monday - always a joy. She has prepped a card making class for Sirens WI - hopefully Saturday 5 March, all welcome and was showing us the samples - I only asked Lorraine on Thursday and by Monday she was all prepped. Lorraine is a wonder woman, I wish I had her energy.

Tuesday I went bowling with WI, a great laugh and met some lovely new ladies. we were envious of the group that had the bumpers up!! Today I visited the beauticians and WI market for some lovely scones.

As well as going out a few times, I've also been quilting up a storm. I have fully quilted my red, white and black pinwheels quilt and I love the all over feather pattern. I didn't have to decide on a colour for the binding as I found some red already cut, presumably for this quilt, who knows. The binding is stitched to the front of the quilt and I just need to slip stitch it down. This is an ideal evening or quilt group activity so no rush to complete it, however I've already done one side so it may be finished this week.

Once I finished my quilting, I actually put both of my sewing machines away and cleaned my work table and the window sill. They look so neat, shame about the rest of the room. But it's a start and I hope to get a little more tidying done tomorrow and also get another quilt top pinned together for quilting.

On my own

But having fun. In my mind I'd planned a big tidy up this week, but I think that is unrealistic, but it's amazing how little extra mess one person makes compared with four.

I had a lovely e-mail from Nichol Magourik this morning to say I'd won a place on Shimelle's latest class. A great start to the day at 5.30am before taking the rest of the family to the airport.


Today I've been quilting my pinwheel sampler which I finished piecing about 4 months ago. Hopefully it will be mostly finished tomorrow. Then I'll need some help to choose the colour to bind it in - red, red/black stripe, black, but probably not white. I even managed to fit in a few hours caching with Jane.

Zip Wire Le Conquil

Another variation of an Allison Davis sketch. Thank you to Lorraine for the perfect tree die in two sizes. Finished the layout perfectly.



I'm going to have to do some cache maintenance later this week as people are logging that they've found the Le Don Carlyle cache, but not in the official logbook. If you don't find the logbook, you haven't found the cache. Simples really.

Pool fun 2010

I finished this second crop layout this morning with some dymo tape journalling. Another Allison Davis sketch with one more to come.

Saviboats

We had a lovely crop yesterday with just eight of us. A nice size as it covers the rent and doesn't get too noisy. Three of us were using sketches by Allison Davis. You can download the sketches for August and September for free, .http://allisonrdavis.blogspot.com/p/downloads.html

I had left one of the sketches at home and it was only once I'd finished that Judy said I could have borrowed her printout. Never mind. Several of us also had a play we Jenny's WRMK Sew Easy tool fresh from QVC's TSV. I loved what Liz did on her Blue Ridge layout http://jersey-scraps.blogspot.com/2010/10/monthly-crop.html.



I have two more almost finished layouts using Allison's sketches. One needs journalling and the other needs journalling and some die cut trees.

Marwell

A quick layout using an Allison Davis sketch, some kraft cardstock from SU and leftover patterned paper from one of the Gogo classes. I think this is everything I did now from Sunday as I spent hours punching holes in sketches to make a book.

Back to school

I bought this kit from Scrapagogo on Saturday. Joanne made a lovely LO with formal photos. I changed the pink ribbon to turquoise and the fancy buttons to pale blue and used some back to school photos from 2010. What you can't see is Matthew's feet which are bare as he leaves for school much later than Lizzie.



I still have two more layouts from Sunday to share. Once they come to the top of my pile I'll photograph them. I have started a tidy up of my craft room - not before time, but I fear it'll be some time before anyone else can see an improvement. Then I have 100s of layouts to file.

Gogo take shape

Another lovely day with Gogo in Jersey. Looking forward to them returning in 2011. Here's my four completed layouts for today, one more to finish at our crop tomorrow.

AN2

My first layout in about two months and I found some pages already kitted up which I can use on Sunday at our post Gogo take shape crop. This is from Kirsty's cybercrop last night. Took me almost as long to upload the layout to Facebook as it did to put it together.

Baby quilt

Here's a quilt / mat that I made for Sirens WI friend Amanda. Her baby is due on 24 September ad then she's due to go back to England in October. She will be missed.

Paper Proposals

Today sees the unveiling of the week 3 challenge at http://paperproposals.blogspot.com/ And this is the week that I was invited to be a guest designer. So without further ado this is my layout.


Thank you to Lorraine for most of the stash in the layout: Tim Holtz music paper and measuring tape, also the brad and top, Bazzill stitching template and thread. You may not be able to see but I've stamped around the edge of the cardstock to give some extra texture with a Tattered Angels texture stamp by Heidi Swapp in antique linen. At the crop on Saturday we couldn't find just the right purple cardstock to put in the brad, but I had a leaflet for the festival with me so I punched a top from the leaflet and it was a perfect match.

Flying the flag

At the Beaulieu fete last month, the Crafty mums had cute bunting on their stall. The book stall I helped on looked a little naked in contrast. So I ran up some bunting this morning. I thought I had more of the bias tape so there's only one string so far. However if anyone has any surplus bias binding in any colour, do let me know as I have made enough pennants for at least one more string of bunting.

Happy post

I ordered two issues of Sketches for Scrapbooking by Debbie Sanders and Allison Davis. Must finish tidying my desk before putting my feet up and flicking through them.

Desk tidied and returning from Lorraine's I asked the parcel man if had a parcel for me and he did. It's my silhouette flocked paper and rhinestone starter kit. Yummy.

Twilight Eclipse

Yesterday was the film preview and I bought the tickets at least a month ago ready for Lizzie's party. Apparently Jacob is hot enough that you could fry an egg on him according to Ellie. And here's my second layout of today for the Scrapagogo 6th birthday .Gogo birthday challenge You don't have to be a kit subscriber to join in the party.



The idea for the stitched string for the bunting came from Allison Davis' blog and I used the Banana Frog bunting stamps. All items from the May Scrapagogo kit once again. I love how the bottom of the umbrella on some patterned paper becomes a scalloped edge on the bunting

Challenge layout

Using the May Scrapagogo kit again as it's still out from the crop, here's a layout for the first challenge at Paper Proposals.


You may not be able to see that I've stitched a border around the whole layout and zig zagged the numbers to the page too.

June crop layouts

Both using the May 2010 Scrapagogo kit.

Hearts

One of the quilt groups to which I belong makes heart quilts when one of our members is very ill or has suffered a bereavement. This is the block I've done for the latest request which is for pink, lilac, mauve on cream. The pattern can be found here.