Some making

Well thats what emily calls it..:)

I have had the softies book forever. And this is the first and only thing I have made. Polly. For my niece. She is so soft. And i love that amy butler fabric.

Next is a change mat with pocket, that i found on one pretty thing. The pattern was easy and the whole thing was done in a matter of an hour. It to went in the baby present..:) Ps i really had to talk myself out of buying the Amy butler baby book...oh my god, its so nice!

And a card to go with the gift..:)

sorry about the pics, camera needs new batteries so its just an iphone in this house atm.

Later

Jacqui

it sounded great when in the last week of november i decided to buy us a new christmas tree. we have wanted a new one for ages but the price oh my god the price. it always turned me off. anyway enter ebay. and this lovely 650 tip 6foot christmas tree $26! i love it. its not quite as bushy as i would of really liked but then i didnt want to spend upwards of $300 to get bushy because lets face it thats a waste of money and a little silly. but the kids love this big tree..:) forgive the bad santa! topper somehwere in two moves this year i lost our lovely star

some present tags i made

im back!!

got my internet back today...after much buggering around from telstra
but ime here

backwith a real update later

MOVING DAY

hi everyone
we r in the mists of moving up the street
from monday looks like i will be without access for about a week
i will do a proper update before then..:)

toilet training

well its beginning to look like that time in toddler world!! she is over 2 and its warming up. keen to not make the same mistakes we did with lilly we decided we would not purchase pull ups (im sure thats why lilly didnt get it..what was to get it was still like she was wearing a nappy), but last time we also didnt think much of store bought training pants u know the ones with the thin foam layer...that does nothing! so i ended up searching modern cloth nappy sites thinking maybe that was what to do when i found this pattern for home made training pants http://www.geocities.com/songshirah1/?200811 ive so far made 4 pairs. we would like a dozen or so, they r pretty straight forward to make, but i will next time make the crotch part just a little wider to make the elastic casing eaiser to stitch. i couldnt get ripstop nylon out here, but its basically a shower curtain so we went with a fabric shower curtain. and i reused our old flat cloth nappies as part of the padding. this way is no cheaper than buying them, but hopefully its a better product that will at least hold one wee and last better. i remember lillys foam crunching up after a few washes and having to buy new ones hence the not using them all that much...seeing as that cant happen with these ones and they look like they will withstand lots of washing...these ones r made from polarfleece like the pattern says, but i might have to look into something more summer for dec and jan...i will report on how they go.
nothing better than straight from the oven fresh homemade bread roll. i was blowing on my fingers as i cut them open they were so hot. i get 10 rolls mediumish in size from my loaf of bread that i have blogged about before. i love that they turn out crusty...YUM...we had some for lunch but they will make hamburgers for dinner tonight.this weeks so you think you can scrap entry. had to have fabric x 2, handmade embellishment, 3 photos 2 different style of sewing and 75% had to be stitched down. well there is more stitching here than i know what to do with. 2 different materials - stems green pokadots and some heather bailey folded like ribbons with ricrac and zigzaged down. the orange blobs r french knots and there is some backstitching. the flowers r handmade.

9 days until we move..u would think i was be stressing, but no, im not living in a sea of boxes either oops..hmmm dont know if thats a good thing or not lol. we r starting to move the smaller things from tuesday but. so i guess that will help..:)

heres my apple (granny smith) in flower.
its full of flowers, in fact we will have to pick of some i guess if they all start to be apples. we have an apple tree here in the yard we didnt know about so im expecting the apple sex happened hehe....but we also have an apple tree at our new house we didnt know about too...so that willl be 3 apple trees woohoo, the one we r getting is older so i hope we get some apples off it, dont know what sort it is but.

nothing else much going on...we r going to try putting some seed potatos down in a new old style garbage bin on tuesday to see if we can get a harvest seeing as its getting late to put them down, im going with the fac tthat its still been quiet cool here until this past week and that they will be ok heh...but i know nothing im just guessing really.

scrap jack

heres my scrapjack for this month...its all on canvas...im not sure im 100% happy with it...something about the white squares...i wish i washed them yellow....but two late now. the photo is a fav even thou it was taken in low light so the quality is a bit yuck...therefore the missing eyes...but sometimes u just have to scrap the yuck pics. cause they r really not yuck. some of the stuffon this page came from last months lime tart kit.
this came out while we were in hospital...the one today card is mine...made with the inspiration of emilys first birthday last year.

and finally
on thursday emilys hospital visit went well...no drugs at all and the only thing she cried about was the tape that was on her skin..not bad really....no tape really used this week. there is still one mucky part at the top that wasnt grafted and was just left to heal...its not responding as quickly as they would like...so im not sure what that means...its wait and see that bit...i guess it could be another graft if it doesnt improve over the next 2 weeks. other than that the large graft itself is good...we now have to take the dressing down each day and rub cream into it to keep it moist which is good and bad...good that its at that point because its healing...bad that i have to deal with it in a totally visual way every day now...it takes all my guts to see it every week, but i think its partly because im wishing it to be so much better and not infected and all that...anyway i hope it gets easier to see on a daily basis. she is also allowed big breaks in wearing her plastic brace to play and use her arm and hand as well as she can...we also have exercises to do with her to get it freely moving which it isnt...but only on the second day of those and it seemed eaiser for her to do today. we r working on doing 3 exercises 10 times 5 times a day...we got it done 3 times yesterday...going for 4 times today and then 5 tomorrow!

some creative - ness!

we seem to be back to our creative stations in this house and its the best thing that could of happened.!
ive had a few people ask me for the secrets of finding to time to do so much of my own crafting, scraping and general creative stuff we do
i dont know about the secrets....but heres what we do
our dining room on any given day looks more like an art studio, or sewing room. we have a large square table i cover in a plastic cover and we all create together. some days on together things others on different things. but we r all together talking, learning and spending the time doing quality things.
today i did some sewing and the girls wanted to paint. its all too easy with water colour paints! yes the powdered discs that come in a tray. it takes no time at all to teach kids to use them, they r cheap and the powdered discs last longer, and we find the colours to be pretty bright. the most important part of this type of painting...ITS EASY TO CLEAN UP! it all just wipes clean with a damp cloth. they will sit and paint for AGES!
mix it up is my other thing. we painted today, so tomorrow we might (make soap if our things arrive) or draw with oil crayons or something different, i do have a salt dough recipe thanks to mel goodsell for giving me the idea. cooking too is a big hit in our house.
and i think my other secret is to search for inspiration....mine usually comes from mel goodsell or soulemoma...u would also be surprised what you can goggle or blog hop too.

yesterday i made the kids a loaf of felt bread. they have no requested things to make sandwiches. luckily i found a flickr group with lots of sandwich ideas to help me on my way.

ever since we moved in here i have been searching for something to put on the girls walls that covers the horrible paint in their rooms. (they need painting badly and seeing as we dont own here and wont be staying here forever i cant be bothered to winge about it to the landlord.) anyway

i joined janelle winds block of the month quilt little bluebirds in a start to putting things up in emilys room to make her walls nicer. our first block (which im nearly finsihed) came with this journal cover to make.

I have so many people i really want to send a thankyou card too after everything we have gone through, and i finally got started on them tonight.

i went searching for sketches first

these r older sketches on the cardvaarks blog. all the papers from my lime tart kit and the dictionary pages from an old one i picked up at the op shop for like 20c...i have gone for pages that had words relating to being thankful.

these cards use sketches from the hero arts blog that chris millar shared with us today...thanks so much chris it got me started creating today.

and finally....ive decided to turn my journal cover into a place to keep a few cards at hand...im going to add a pen and some stamps and use it as a gratitude folder, thanks soulemoma for the idea.
we r back off into melbourne tomorrow for another visit to the hospital

6 weeks of challenges

ive been playing with the dt search at scraploot

6 weeks of challenges that have come to an end. it started with a card and went threw to layouts with certain things and finally a life of a dt layout...i chose one by sheree http://www.scraploot.com.au/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=886 see it here

i have fun for 6 weeks, got some scrapbooking done and got to see some fantastic layouts by the other people in the challenge

thanks everyone

check this out

my card on the cover....the one at the bottom called thanks so much

love this mag

cant show u the actual cards for a while, so u will have to go out and get it.. :)

some news and christmas

no paper trends yet to show off my work...but im told it looks great...im dieing to see it but

then my friend chris pointed this out to me

http://www.scrapbookingmemories.com.au/current_issue.php

im happy to have gotten something for my efforts...its nice, looking forward to seeing this mag the work on the site looks fantastic

and congrats goes to all the other winners both masters and HM's

here i go again i will be sucked in now for next year...bugger lol

im nearly ready for christmas some last minute things to organise tomorrow hoping the shops will be quiet seeing as its sunday...crossing fingers anyway

home from work today

with a sick kid

she is in a very quiet mood

so i cheered her up with some christmas craft

thanks to ali edwards that shared her button trees making me see that lilly (4) would be able to do it herself, its fast becoming my fav blog to go and visit...and to tia bennett whom had the orginial idea up on twopeas this week

lilly has been a treasure working on her project and its so very cute

this one is lillys...didnt she do an ace job...so very cute she is of course now so tired and cranky and worn out but she wont have a sleep!

and yes i know im very into the non traditional colour atm and its only november but i didnt have the heart to put it away after miss 4 did such a good job she is so proud of it lol.. :)

heres my scrapjacked entry for this month

and apart from that im SICK of waiting to be told that masters is actually over and the calls have been made....string it out much! i dont care tha ti didnt get the call as if i expected it but it would be nice to know its all over!

more cards

again

i couldnt be more pleased to see my cards in stamping and papercraft. its fast becoming my fav place to be published

just look at how they display and photograph the work its so lovely

these are my christmas cards.. :) they r very easy esp for mass production and take very few products which i like for mass produced cards makes them that little bit cheaper

i think they r cute..: )

its prompting me to pack some christmas supplies for my small scrapbooking weekend away this weekend...a chance to work on some christmas cards and things for the low times when i dont feel like scrapbooking

there r some really cute projects in the stamping and papercraft mag out for christmas

For Keeps ET

As per usual i got all my entry back

no winning layout in there not even a layout kept for publishing which was a little sucky

here they r

im very disappointed that they didnt keep this first one just for publishing

This is emily i dont know WTF for keeps are looking for anymore used to have a bit of success with them but NOTHING for a good 12 months or more ...this is a fav of my entry all the journaling spots are about why my emily is beautiful and its all that heartfelt stuff about her personality etc..: ) and i just love that photo of her

i was also very happy with this one of lilly just before she turned 4 and again journalling all about her at this age.

went for a bit of variety with this one..moving away from just scrapping children to show a different style i guess. I like it its not a fav but.This last one i was really really happy with. I quite like it and again its that little bit different to the others even thou its about my girls
and the last layout isnt scaned and im not happy with it so im not going to bother it let my entry down and i didnt have time to deal with the problem having said that i didnt expect to win...who really would expect it but i would of hoped that at least some of the above layouts would of been published but apparently they are no good in the eyes of for keeps...WHATEVER! i think they make my album look great so in the words of bart simpson...EAT MY SHORTS! hehehe

cards

well we have been very quiet here over the weekend after our hospital visit and eventhing that happened last week, im over it all hehe...its amazing what finally getting to retreat into my scrapbook world can do for your mental well being hehe...not that i can share my work just yet

heres something i can share

my first set of published cards, i love how this mag set them up to be photographed each set is different and they all look fantastic.

so this is stamping and papercraft mag check it out.

scrapjacked

Its been a few months since i did a scrapjack, been to busy creating for other things...but when i saw this months layout done by sheree mcgee i knew i would just have to find some time to play along.

so here is my layout...iknow its nothing like sheree's but i love the way it turned out and sheree's layout was the perfect inspiration for this photo that was already bright and colourful. www.scrapjacked.blogspot.com

the photo is lillys kindy pic taken by too cute! photography, lets just say with that background im so happy we sent her in pink and green that day and not red! lol. But i do love the photo of lilly so CUTE!

ok so now im off the the sketches blog to do kates sketch this month!

GUEST DT SPOT

This month i had the pleasure of being a guest dt on scrapbooking downunder I got to work with some around the block papers and embellishments. Beautiful papers to work with.. :) Thanks to tina and her team for having me this month

This is what I created for Tina....i had the challenge of my layout being based on this quote.

Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless." Mother Teresa

my layout contains some hidden journalling for my girls to oneday find

"This quote when I thought about it , really made me think of parenting and how true it is here. We have bad days like any family but I always tell my girls how beautiful and kind they are (especially to each other), I always say they are special and tell them I love them. Aand on those bad days they have learn't adults say sorry too!"

this was a great layout to do , really made me think about parenting and how i speak to them

the photo of my girls is only about 2 weeks old too..> :)

i thinki had one of those parent/family moments today that you dream of when you dont have a family. Lilly my eldest has 3 favourite books, we must read them at bed time each and every night...Toffee in trouble, Come on, Daisy and Who sank the boat (only recently added to the list of nightly reading)

Tonight emily was awake at bed time so i had lilly bring her books out to the lounge cause if i leave emily that close to her own bed time she SCREAMS THE HOUSE DOWN!....we the nightly reading saw us all tucked up under a blanket so sweet

after i finished reading to lilly...lilly wanted to read them to me...she is 4 so i really thought she would just talk about the pictures and lose track half way through and wander off....but no she didnt...she remembers the stories by heart and reads them with the right pictures...it was the cutest thing, she even used all the big hard words and i could see her thinking about what she was saying, and the cutest thing of all...i always talk to her through the books about why toffee is in trouble...one if daisy is scared being all alone...she asked me the questions! so sweet i love this time of night!...i just had to share...i am shocked by now much she has learnt in her day to day life with what feels to be no effort on my behalf....my dh would tell u that isnt true as im always talking to her and asking her questions like what colours she is looking at or numbers etc, but its nice to now that little effort is paying off.

scrapbook creations

scrapbook creations...has been our now for i dont know how long

ive been very slack this week...2 sick kids and a sick mummy in this house has made our week start out very slow!

anyway

i had this layout picked up by sc and finally its out

i was just on their website and its a project in their project gallery as well

lilly has changed so much since these photos...about 12 months old now..: ) how time goes so fast....she will be 4 so soon...she is such a rascal and keeps me on my toes...r all 4 year olds like that??? she is really pushing limits this week and being sick i have a short fuse for it too...but am finding that if the house is clean and tidy and not in caios she behaves much better and today was great but im buggered keeping her entertained while she was stuck inside all day! thankgod for water colour kids paints...lifesavers...and dvd's also lifesavers on rainy inside all day days and for her cool little wheelie bug thingo...its a ride on toy for inside...its on casors and scoots and spins on the tiles she loves it and on a stuck inside day it uses up lots of energy i also thankgod for tomorrow and the luxury that is kindy! when i will be able to sit like a slug and get over my cold for part of the day anyway....will still have emily home

some scrapbooking

as i said been doing some stuff that cant be shared atm

but why is it that some layouts from the very start r just fantastic!! and the picture perfect copy of what was in your head...and some...are just hard the whole way and u end up not that happy with them even thou there is nothing wrong! this was my day yesterday

This is my nailed it layout. Its just what was in my head and fell together in a few hours and it was a joy. It then gave me the bug as you would expect, something i havent had all week and i had things i wanted to do.

I then moved on to the sketches blog, which was a sketch from my friend chris millar and i really wanted to nail it....its just not what was in my head but! My dh keeps telling me its fine and there is nothing awful about it but i cant shake that feeling that its not right...i think its the title up the top that lets it down its plain but everything i do to fix it looks silly so in the end at midnight last night i left it alone only to face the same question this morning...so i think its going to be one of those layouts u put away straight away so that you stop thinking about it!...does everyone have this problem please say yes lol it seems to come for me when im changing something about what im doing with scrapbooking...right now im into having bits and pieces hang off the edge and i couldnt get it to work for this layout that sent it right out the window i think for me.

Now this layout just fell together very easily last friday night. Its a layout for Scrapbooking by design my nz dt site and will be an online class next week. Kits are all avaliable at the site. And this layout is from the monthly kit of papers over there that are all Piggy tales and really very nice...liking these daisy d flowers too I will also teach this layout in oz as part of triple the fun at paper addiction next month.

what else had been going on in our little world. Emily has discovered dolls, and lilly who isnt really into dolls now is lol...oh the fun of sharing, so i had a doll in the present cupboard that i had gotten for emilys birthday...she has it already...it had been there for months and i gave in...she loves it...so my girls have been spending their days playing dollies which is so very cute.

Im still breastfeeding emily...she doesnt like a bottle at all even when its expressed me which is fine by me and i have been blessed with a year at home this time around so why stop its all to easy. Until the other day i had not thought about what lilly thought of breastfeeding. She watches, and tells me emily is having her nilk (its nilk god knows why), we talked about how when she was a baby she also had my nilk and she usually trindles off and plays. The other day she grabbed her baby and started feeding her. Well i have never seen anything so cute. I popped emily off and went for the camera of course like any good scrapbooker would of lol so funny its from her stomach

my poor baby girl was just bitten by her first wasp...3 of them in fact so we r on reaction watch right now she was so upset cause she thought it was a bee and well she likes barnarby the busy buzzzy bee from the fairies...but we showed her they were wasps and she was ok...i actually think that hurt her more than the wasp sting.

sketch blog

ive been working on my masters single layout this weekend...but thought i would share with u the sketch i did using kims sketch from the aussie sketch site

thanks for th einspiration girls

i just couldnt get in a good head space for this and even thou the photos r what i wanted to do they r not good photos at all disposable camera need i say more!

ok im going through a bit of a why do i bother moment with my blog...so if your out there reading this give me a hey!

scrap apple comp week 3

well i thought i was out of it this week as i couldnt think of anything to do

the challenge this week was to

take something from your everyday life that you would like to have in you studio and BTP it

so hard right!! im a person that doesnt have much stuff lieing around that i could use and i thought about lots of things when finally yesterday the light went on. Not the greatest idea granted but it got it finished!!!

so this is what i did

i took this plan boring book stand, that was in my kitchen holding up a book that didnt really need a stand. It was filthy too as im sure u can imagine when it was on the top of our kitchen cupboards!!

after cleaning this little stand I made a plate for the front of it and a canvas to sit in it permantly so that my layouts have some support while in the stand before going into my albums.

all the pp squares have been stitched witht he machine and all the buttons sewn in place.

here it is complete and below in use holding one of my latest layouts