A Birthday Treat

For my birthday  and mother's day this year, Katie bought me a pair of tickets to visit Blackpool Tower Ballroom to have afternoon tea.

What a wonderful surprise! We made the trip in August, although the town is a little shabby, at night the lights looked lovely.

The papers are by Shimelle, letters were a bargain holographic set from Hobbycraft.

Bluebell Woods

I took Hannah to the local bluebell woods in full flower after a long winter last year.

As ever, I took many photos including this selfie of the two of us.


Very old stash used to make the page, with an ideal woodland theme.

The fox was cut from the patterned papers.

Whitby Abbey.

Another Box of Crayons layout.  These two lovely photos were taken by Harry on  a trip to Yorkshire a couple of years ago.

 
It was nice to have him with us as we got a few lovely photos.

The weather was lovely ( for October) as you can tell...and although the papers and embellishments are very random, I do like the page.

The journalling block is cut from the 6x8 paper pad.  Third page in a day!

Spring

OK, it's March now, so I think  spring layout is called for.  The photo was taken a couple of years ago in Castle Bromwich Hall Gardens of the two of us...I'm catching up with some older photos I have dotted about my scrapbooks.

As I only had one small photo I went with a grid layout, using up a fair amount of Shimelle's Box of Crayons stash.

I am trying not to buy too much stash at the moment until I can get some of my older stuff into scrapbooks.

I made 3 pages today so feel I'm making progress.

The Ivy

I had a busy half term break, during the middle of it I went on a girls day shopping to Birmingham looking for wedding clothes and shoes.

Just three of us went along, my sister, daughter and I.

We started at The Ivy next to the cathedral for a lovely breakfast.

The food and service were both fabulous...well worth the price.

Although little was bought in the way of clothes, we did enjoy the day...

and even had cocktails back in Coventry before heading for home.

Halloween?

Catching up on scrapbooking old photos, I found these two taken in October 2017 just before Halloween.

The shop at Attingham Hall had this spooky seat for selfies, so we took advantage of it.

 I do like Halloween stash, the colours are lovely. Especially in the Graphic 45 papers I used here.

I think the stamped image is a pharmacy advert by Stampers Anonymous.  I cut it up into pieces and layered around the photos.

New Years Day

I used an old photo of me taken back in Edinburgh earlier this year as it looked really festive.

The place we went to for afternoon tea was decorated very early, but we really enjoyed our food in such lovely surroundings on our last day to the capital of Scotland.

Christmas Day

I took lots of photos on Christmas day, so there are many pages to share.

I used a variety of page sizes along with some flip up pages for additional pictures.

The catch on my oven door broke on the day, refusing to close, so a picture of the cooker appears,  Luckily, my husband and brother in law did manage to carry out a temporary repair, enough to get the turkey cooked.

I was pleased that I took photos throughout the day, from the crib in church in the morning, through the preparation of lunch, eating lunch and cocktails in the evening.

At Last..!

The end of a very long term arrived on the 21st of December.  The prompt for the day was to take a photo of how the house was looking.  I was relaxing of the sofa in my pyjamas and slippers, the perfect subject for a 'here and now' snapshot.

Not too long to half term and another break now!

La Banera

We found a lovely new cocktail bar in Aber back in May, quiet with a good choice of drinks to choose from. 

The papers and embellishments used for this page are from the Maggie Holmes Flourish range.

The title letters are gold topped foam Thickers, a quick page as I used only one set of papers, so all the things I added to the layout were chosen easily.

Altenew Class

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to attend a class run by Altenew and came away with a few cards and this layout designed by Lilith Eeckels.

The team brought along an Instax camera, so we all had a photo to add to the page.  Lillith scrapbooks in A4 size, so I added the finished page to a star paper by Paige Evans I found in my stash; it went well with the star embellishments die cut at the class.

I love the background to the page, we simply used the square ink pads and pressed them onto the cardstock. I added a doodled line around each square too.

We made  simple tag from left over card, stamping a layered flower, I put mine on the left of the tag to allow room for the journalling.  The title, tag and small words were stamped in black Altenew ink.

Grow

It is almost twenty years since I was expecting my youngest child; now he is a 6ft tall man, daily going out to work as an engineering apprentice.

In this photo I am relaxing on the beach in maternity T shirt and shorts (it was all baggy back then) on our holiday to the Dorset coast.

Another page part-made using Box of Crayons, along with lots of word stickers from the Shimelle book alongside the photo.

I used a few stamps from the recent Ali Edwards stamp set, including the one for the title.

When we Were Four

I love this photo of us taken on the harbourside in Weymouth before my youngest was born. 

I can't get over how young we look, my husband (whose hair is silver now) has black hair and both of us are in our early thirties.

Again, I have used Maggie Holmes Carousel papers, along with a piece in the background by Trimcraft, floral paper (Yes Please by Amy Tan) and a Project Life journalling card.

The title is by Shimelle and small foam letters by Paige Evans.  Where have the years gone ...sigh?

Really Old Photos.

When Kev and I were 'courting' we took our first holiday together walking in the Lake District.

The weather was so bad, we got little walking done; we managed to climb Hellvelyn. 

Loving the 80 fashions sported by us on the mountainside!  Papers by Teresa Collins, Pebbles and others that I can't recall. 

The One Canoe Two stickers were good additions to the page, along with chipboard circles I've had for a while by Ali Edwards. We are not big outdoors people now, so it was good to ue up this stash on older photos.

Friends House

The Society of Friends or Quakers run a cafe over the road fro Euston Station in London.

We decided to go there for breakfast during our visit; while there you could buy a meal for a homeless person by paying for a meal voucher (the reason we chose if for our breakfast).

The papers are old ones by Pebbles, I still like them though!  Embellishments were cut from lots of different papers, Paige Evans Take me Away, a Project Life card, and stickers from American Crafts books. 

A bit of washi tape, enamel dots and a Thickers title finished off the page.

A Day in Lyme

Harry took this photo of Kev and I in Lyme a couple of years ago in the park overlooking the bay.

I think this is my favourite out of all the Shimelle pages I made for the first of her classes. 

The doily paper (JilliBean Soup) has been in my stash for ages, and I am so pleased to see the MME chipboard banner title and pink embellishment on a page,

 I managed to throw away the 12x12 sheet with only a couple of the pieces of chipboard remaining!

March?

With it snowing again today, I thought I would make a page using photos I took back on the first of March this year.  I don't think there will be this much snow this time, but as I look out of the window the flakes are pouring down as I type.❄❆❄

I subscribed to a class by Shimelle called 'Clear the Desk' with the aim of using up lots of my stash.  This layout follows class one and is the second layout in the series.  I made up a kit and have so far made two layouts from it.  The aim is to use the kit including scraps to make as many layouts as possible.

The blue background paper is so old I have no idea what it is, wood board paper is by Docrafts and many of the embellishments are from the Starshine range by Shimelle.

I added a few stamps and a Thickers glitter title to finish off the page.  I have completed my Christmas pages, so will post these in the upcoming days.