I've been tagged !!!

Oo er missus. The highly talented Lou, aka Louly, has tagged me I've just found out on my visit round my fave blogs, starting with hers. It's my first one ever. Thanks Lou, so here we go.

4 places I have worked

Alliance Building Society Head Office when I first left school
Barclays Bank various branches on the south coast for 15 years. eek!
Southampton City Council,
Hampshire County Council - school lunchtime supervisor

4 places I have lived
Brighton
Southampton
(nowhere else so far.)

4 places I have visited
America
Sweden
France
Austria

4 favourite foods
Roast beef and all the trimmings
Mexican
Chinese especially duck pancakes Yum
Italian

4 places I would rather be
New York - shopping
Sweden
Colorado - skiing
Anywhere with better weather all year round !!!!

And now to tag 4 blogging buddies. (I don't have many so if you've been done already - sorry XX)
Sarah
Mum on the run
Tee
Karen

Where does the time go?

Haven't had a lot of time this week to do much crafting. Spent 3 afternoons in my daughters classrooms to help out. Mad or what and for free !!!! Enjoy doing it but glad I don't do it as a job though.


Did manage to complete my LO in the next CJ to arrive from my local friends circle, and on the day I received it. It wasn't meant to be mine until Friday but I got it Tuesday and began it as soon as I got home. Even whilst I was cooking dinner I was playing with papers and sorting out what I wanted on the LO. By midnight Tuesday it was all done.


The subject was my favourite things and wasn't allowed to be scrapbooking so at first I wasn't sure where I was going with it. I sat and went through my photos and printed out several pages of small photos that were possibles. In the end I had so many for my American holidays section that I had to make 2 mini books for everything. Then the objects / things I put into 2 vellum envelopes on the opposite page. Well the answer is that I have lots of favourite things after all.



Paper from Doodlebug, Prima flowers, BG Gypsy letters, various stickers from colorbok, die cuts K & Co and Papermania sticky gems.

CCC Challenge Altered Art

On the Charmed Cards & Crafts forum it was Sarah's turn to set the challenge. She chose to get us altering.

Okay so challenge is to decorate a paint tin or a milk tin...you know those old school milk tins??? any shaped tin as long as it isnt a small one anyways you can do what ever you like with it, it has to has some form of ribbon or fibre on it and that is it the rest is up to you.

Here is my effort. I found it harder to cover than I thought and wished I'd gone with a round tin or jar. (Note to self go with that next time. LOL.)

Papers are K & Co. Dress it up buttons Prairie flowers and dragonflies (? I think) Papermania domed stickers and various letters & ribbons for the handle.

I put the word Shapes on a loose piece of paper so that if / when I change the contents, I can easily change my sign.

CJ with school friends.

Here is DD2's LO in a CJ about The Younger Years

Her attention span isn't always great but she stuck it out and had more input than normal. Most of all she is happy with her work. Always a good thing. Stange in some ways that she went for such pink paper given that she isn't the most girly girl.

DD1 is a little older and therefore has a few more ideas of her own of how she wants something to look. I have to help tone it down sometimes but she didn't need any help in that department this time. I think they both did very well.

All papers were from DCWV. DD2 added MAMBI minis and colorbok stickers, sticky ribbon, a button and a BG photo anchor. DD1 used a piece of torn white vellum for her pocket to put her journalling tag in, 2 buttons, flower from MM and Tinkerbell stickers from Sandylion.

More from my crafty corner

Well this was a fairly busy weeekend in my kitchen as far as crafting went. Both the CJ's we had to do were done and on top of that I made some cards. *eek* more card making from me !!!! Well the reason for it is a bit strange. Having finished my supervision of my DDs for their CJ LOs, I didn't want to do any more scrapping. !!!!! Even thought the photos were sitting there asking to be added to paper and something more made of them. As my friend Lou says, 'I couldn't be *rsed'. Oooh.

I can't show one CJ on here as the owner might see it, and we can't have that but the other one is safe to show.

First though the cards. Having made a card that DD1 liked so much that it became her birthday card for next year, I thought I'd better make one like it for DD2. I'd run out of BG Mellow die cut people so made do with what I had left. I like the results though and I showed it to DD1 (before it was fully finished) and she liked it, so just have to hope that DD2 will like it too.

Then I made some Christmas cards for them. Made one for DH too but it's not quite finished so you will have to wait for that one.

Papers, stickers and embellishments are from Papermania. Peel offs from Anitas, for these Christmas cards.

CJ time

Here is my CJ that I am doing with some friends from school and a teacher, who left the school in July. 2 of us also have daughters (3) adding LOs to each of the books to fatten them out a bit more.

My chosen topic is My Most Prized Possession. I chose (sadly my DH says) my Papermania tote. I love the way I can have everything I need at my fingertips. Although I must admit that some things have gone in here and been forgotten still, but I do have a lot of stuff in there.

This is the front of the book and here is the inner cover and welcome page.

I used peel offs and coloured them in with my Whispers pens then to soften the image I covered the page with a white vellum. Papers & ribbons used were from DCWV - Far East.

My LO is very pink to go with my tote. Papers DCWV, large flower Papermania, small flowers MM, buttons from Dress It Up.

DD1 chose her beloved Ipod Shuffle. Papers again DCWV, Prima flowers.

DD2 chose her much loved Eeyore. Well cuddled and travelled. (here on his way to the Isle of Wight)

Currently we are working on The Younger Years CJ. Mine reflects my childhood memories and as a child of the 60's my papers are just a little retro !!!! (Don't look at the dress I have on or the state of my hair. Harry Potter thought he had it bad!!)

Well that should keep you entertained for a little while. More this weekend I hope.

Oops

Well as a friend pointed out, it's been a week since I was last here. (Thanks Juliet lol). I have been busy but not all of it crafting I must admit. There's a house here somewhere and it needs serious finding.

I have made a couple of cards and done one of the CJs I have to do. I can post the pages here as it is my local friends one and none of them know about my blog so they won't see it. I need to get the others done this weekend and with my DH off to an airshow I can get it done in relative peace and quiet. The girls have pages to do in both CJs so we will be busy all Saturday. No need even to shop as it's arriving between 6 and 7pm tonight. Yay!!!!

So on to the work. This is a card I played around with last night then when DD1 saw it and liked it I decided that it would make a good birthday card for her (next year - May. Early I know but I'll be ready lol)

The second card is for a work friend who will be 40 later this year. Both these cards use lush Basic Grey - Mellow papers and the Mellow die cuts. Love those little people and dogs.

The stickers on this card are from Papermania.

Birthday wrappings

Not your usual style of wrapping for a birthday present but this is for a friend who is a scrapbooker. The stash will be the K & Co Sparkly Sweet goodies, newly arrived from Karen's online shop. http://www.charmedcardsandcrafts.co.uk/acatalog/K_and_Company_Sparkly_Sweet_Collection.html My friend can strip the box of ribbons and prima flowers to add to her collection, but she just might keep the box for a while if I know her.

Not a parrot

Some people have parrots that sit on your shoulder, we have a guinea pig that climbs up and sits there. She belongs to my youngest DD and is called Cindy. With the noise she makes I think Squeaker would be a better name. I can hear her squeak from indoors better than I can hear my doorbell ring from the garden. She's always hungry and eats all sorts of fruit and veg. Does better than us most days too. Kind of cute though. Daughter's not bad either lol.

Yay I've got a CJ

That lovely postie brought me the next CJ from the 3C's forum circle to do. I have Kelly's now. Title - One Wish. Brief to use black, white, grey or silver with a splash of colour. Hmmm now what do I wish and what shall I do.

I really like doing the circle journals and it's sad in a way when they come to an end. Great to get your book back and see everyones fab work. But for a while nothing to look forward to. Still after our first one it only took us about a month to get the new one going and it is whizzing round now, mostly quicker than intended. (Just remembered that my friend still has my Disney CJ to use as a guide for making her own book for our local friends circle. I'll have to sort her out !!! If I don't forget that is LOL.)

I'm supposed to be doing the housework but here I am trying to create extras for my blog. Juliet suggested a neo counter so I went for a look and now I have one. Not sure if I've done it right but help is always at hand with my friends. Actually I have a load of washing in, and have put one out on the line, so technically I am houseworking too. !

The next thing to learn is how to upload photos on here to show off, I mean show some of my work off. So that is my challenge for later today. Wonder how long that will take me?????

Must get on now before the next CJ turns up for me to browse and want to work on instead of all the things I should be doing. Oh well !!!

Okay today's accomplishment was to add a clock to my blog. Thanks Karen. What shall I add tomorrow? Will check my friends blogs to see what they have that I want. LOL.

It was back to school day today for us. The girls were all excited to be going back. DD1 is now in year 6 and DD2 is in year 4 but both of them are now in mixed years. That means that the oldest is in year 5 6 and the youngest is in year 3 4. Not sure what impact it will have for DD1 as she is working on the year 5 curriculum this year, she covered year 6 work last year. Hmmmm all sounds back to front to me.

I had to go back today too. Lunchtime supervisor assistant or whatever the title is now. I have 3 badges with 3 different titlesall for the same job, not to mention the one I have when I cover as an LSA. It flew by for us and was largely uneventful thankfully. Can see we have a few feisty new entrants in the latest intake. Always interesting to see what we have, and to take notes on the ones to watch out for. Found out I have been put forward for a manual handling course in October. Full day 9-3 and I get paid. (well I wasn't going to do it for love - as if.) Not too suyre about the reasoning but there we go.

Have a CJ to post today for the circle I'm in from charmed cards and crafts. I also received a CJ from a different circle today, (we are all friends from school.) I'm hosting this one and it only has 4 of us but with 3 children adding to it. None of the others have ever attempted anything like this before. Should be good. The first book I have received it lovely.

Oops, time to go and get the girls from school and get to the post office. Later.

Progress so far

Finally!!!! I have managed to get a photo of me on to my blog. Only taken me about 2 1/2 hours. Not bad. Still working on everything else. LOL! Hmmm learning curve comes to mind here.

Today I impressed myself by making 16 Christmas cards. Nothing very challenging, just matting and layering and adding 3D stickers to them. I like them though and moreover so did my family so that's impressed me. Still have lots of bits left so can do some more tomorrow. If I can work it out I might even post a photo of them for all to see.

Also made a birthday card for a friend who is 40 soon. Hope she likes it. I think I do. Might need to tweak it a bit first though. I really need to get some dies for my tag a long and my QK. Can't do much with a couple of alphabets and some shapes really. How long until my birthday and Christmas???? Hmm Long enough!

Tomorrow is the last day of until half term as it's back to school for us on Tuesday. Both my girls are looking forward to it. Me, well if somebody paid me the same amount to stay at home, then I'd jump at it. Well it's at least another 2 hours crafting time. Talking of which I feel the need to craft. See you later.

It's a start

Well the girls on charmed cards and crafts forum keep asking when am I getting my blog up and running, so I thought I'd give it a go. Not sure what I am doing .... yet, and have nothing to add to it ....so far, but it is 9.45 pm! Don't know how often I will remember to update things here either lol. But I will give it a go. Maybe I will even improve. (Fingers crossed) I know where help is if I need it lol.

Going to do some exploring on here now so that's it for tonight.