Sketchy Thursdays 3.25

Here's my latest for Sketchy Thursdays, my Father with his first flavoured coffee. I think he secretly enjoyed the fact the cinnamon syrup made it so sweet and yummy! I wish I could remember where we are here... hmm... must phone the Parental Units and ask them.

Oh, and it may look like he's holding a bunch of twigs, but they're actually decoration the counter top behind him... didn't notice them when I took the picture.

Bijoux Belles Retreat Album

Basic Grey Luggage Tag Album featuring the Bijoux Belles on Retreat in early March 2010.

The Importance of choosing the Correct Wine Box...

Hugging Super Susi!

Kay and Sal and my early attempts at stamping and embossing.

Learning some metal work at Linda's on our first night together.

Food!

Jo and Little Ru.

Kay and Curly.


Lulu, Sal and the very odd Petrol Station in Olney.
"My" Bathroom! As opposed to the other bathroom or the toilet we failed to find...

Brian the Oddnidod! :)

Our Tally Chart.

Maria and one of her many glasses of wine!

Just for Fun

Not made a layout for fun in a while. They're usually all UKS entries or part of a sketch challenge. This one is just me finally deciding to use up the last bits of the gorgeous Stomp.

Summer School 2009, tired out geology students at Hartley Bay looking at rocks.

Although I was using Stomp I had to add on the Archaic dinosaur that was one of the first things I embossed.

Mojo Jar - March Dip

This month I had one of Sue's and her challenge was a Pencil Lines sketch. Here's the result:


An old picture of my mother and I in Spain. I want to say this is El Torkel, but I might be wrong. It also looks like a great place for carbonate geology, but I didn't care about that back then! Possibly I'm sitting on shells and corals... oh well.

I tried to match the papers to the colours in the picture and the flowers match the outfits that my mum an I are wearing. I loved that garish stripey jumper and though you can't see it in this picture, I'm also wearing bright red shoes and neon pink socks! Oh yes!

Twisted Sketches #42

The Twist this week is Flight. I guess this is technically "landing", but we were just flying. I'm in the basket with my mother and I think this is the early 90s, but I'm not too sure about the date. We're at the Lorraine Balloon Fiesta in Metz, France which is held every two years.

As I've just discovered the joys of Distress Inking and embossing I'm doing it on every layout that crosses my desk. I just need some more inks now as distressing with one does look a little odd.

Sketch Thursdays 3.11

This is my first attempt at creating a layout on fabric...


I've based it on a piece of fabric, which I inked a little and covered in green net, which doesn't show up! The photo is on fabric covered in grey net. I've also used ribbon and fabric flowers. Thanks to various Teamies for those!

Decided to add on some hard embellishments as well, especially after realising that pinning the photo layer on was easier than sewing!

The picture is me at our recent Retreat tucking into a Danish. The main elements of the layout are made from a Quirky Kit.

Twisted Sketches #40

{click to enlarge}

This week the Twist was "staples", so I have stapled netting to the screen print paper.

Castle Rising and Blaise Castle (balanced on my hand...)

Loads of new stuff for me on this layout. I've used my Quirky Kit - Resolutions for the first time. Never used net or strings of sequins before, so that was fun! The title I made using my shiny new Provence stamps by Technique Tuesday. I still totally blame Maria for making me buy them, but I think she was right. I've embossed them, which is a new technique for me. AND... the cardstock is Coredinations, something I've not used before. Much sanding fun.

After all that I still have to take wonky pictures on top of the living room radiator to get any daylight!

March Week 3

{click to enlarge}

Challenge set by those Crafty Magpies!

To do a layout based on the men/man in your life, to include a bird, use the sketch and the colour green. I nearly forgot about the green, but I added another bird with a green wing and green highlights!

A couple of pictures to show that he's willing to go along with my crazy ideas. The photo on the left was taken in Cardiff, in Roald Dahl Plas were Torchwood was filmed. We're standing on the slab that goes down to The Hub! It's Boxing Day a few years ago and they were doing repairs - hence all the crud behind us!

I think you can see where the second photo was taken!

Skipping!

Me in junior school, skipping my way across the line. Can't believe I
could ever get away with wearing a leotard...

I do remember loving those socks!

Moody Teen!

Here I am with dodgy hair, dodgy glasses and an Alice band. Mmmm...

I did like that sofa covering though.

Sketchy Thursdays - 3.4

This is one of the layouts I made on the Retreat last weekend.

The photo was taken on a girls holiday to Ibiza in October 2001.

Retreated

These are a bunch of the layouts that I made our Retreat last weekend. I only took BoBunny papers, so they all match!

InterTeam Challenge during the Retreat, to scrap a black and white of another Teamie. I did Susi, who is, indeed, Super!

Hard at Work 2

The other side of the table!

Hard at Work!

Kay & Curly

This should be on Melman's blog really, but I'll do that later!

The fire

The lovely lit and cozy warming fire.

Watching Eastenders!

Settling into the living room! :)

Giraffe #1 / Giraffe #2

EDIT: I won!

{click to enlarge - and to read the poetry!}

This is Melman on holiday in the Isle of Wight. He's found a pirate ship and is rather excited.

I have chosen to use a couple of short verses about giraffes by Spike Milligan. I love Spike's verses, some of the only poetry I can actually recite from memory!

And here's my reasoning on my hidden journalling.

Project 12 - February

As usual, I'm having photo-taking difficulties, it's getting boring! Still, I'm continuing to plonk them onto the radiator by the door and getting as much light onto them as possible.

Think I might stop fretting about it!

{click to enlarge}

February was about John taking Melman to America with him and my Mum and I having some fun on day trips around Cambridge. We didn't celebrate old Hallmark-Valentine's, we stayed in and had Chinese food because it was also New Year (of the Tiger). John bought a cake stand and the Winter Olympics were on in Vancouver.

Although we didn't really do Valentines, I have chosen to use Valentine's papers on this layout. These are the latest ones from My Minds Eye and were part of the February Gotta Craft Kit.

Also included a flyer from the Cathedral in Bury (luckily it's the same colour as these papers!) and the train ticket from our trip to London (which doesn't match!).

Twisted Sketches #38

The Twist this week was for "stripes", which I've done. I'm not happy with the way this came out. I wasn't fond of the huge expanses of patterned paper, so I doodled some swirls on in gold pen. Of course, you can't even see it in the picture and it's not very clear in real life either!


The picture is yet another from Road Trip 08 (they keep coming!). This is the cabin in the woods, the nice-on-paper Jacob Lake.