Five...

Friday Night Crop

It's that time of the month again (yes, that time too but that's probably tmi! LOL) and I'm off to the fabulous Friday night crop at PaperArts. Except for I'm going now, 12:51pm, not tonight. Night crop is a little misleading as quite a few of us take advantage of the fact that the shop is open all day on Fridays - in fact I'm normally there by now not at home typing up a quick blog entry.

I used to wait until the children were home from school but as Richard was coming home at the same to look after them so I could push off at 3:30pm I suddenly had a 'lightbulb' moment and realised that if he was coming home in time for the children coming home why was I waiting until then to leave? I could leave and get there for when PaperArts opened? Couldn't I? Now, I'm not saying I'm organised enough to get there for 10am but I do try and get there so I can sit and have lunch with the lovely Christine!

On my agenda to do today? A baby album for some good friends, Bruce and Suzie who have just had an adorable baby girl, Amelie Grace (don't you just love that name?) who I saw, and held, yesterday. She is adorable, just like her 1 year old baby sister Josselyn!

Box of Delights

So I succombed. To buying some of the new Elsie line. I wasn't going to. Didn't want to jump on the bandwagon of buying stuff just because it's 'cool' or 'in' but I have to say it's gorgeous stuff. So bright. So colourful. So me (I'm saying I'm bright and colourful but that I scrap pretty bright and colourful). And it arrived. This morning. Here it is, along with a couple of other things that just happened to fall in to my basket, in all it's glory:

Now I can't wait to start using it but I have to tidy my scrap room first! I just can't be creative in a messy space... 
 

12 Hour Crop

And this time I am determined to have something to show for it!

Photos have all just (in the last minute or so) been ordered from Photobox, I now have to pray that they will arrive tomorrow morning. They normally do but you can bet Sod's Law will raise it's ugly head and this time they won't.

ScrapFever: A Review

I had planned on writing a long post about this but now, quite honestly, just can't be bothered - LOL!

So instead, here's a quick summary! Donna Downey was lovely. Very down to earth, easy to chat to and a great teacher. No airs, no pretensions, just a downright lovely woman. We made and covered our own 12"x12" album made from chipboard and brown wrapping paper which we then decorated with our choice of patterned papers (which we could choose from the Willow Tree Crafts shop on site). Inside there were 12 pages 8.5"x11" in size for which we had to think of 12 words and, if possible, bring 12 photos to best represent those words. I semi cheated on this, although I would say 'thought imaginatively' and my words were: 1995, 1996, 1997 and so on through to 2006 and I used a photograph of myself and Richard from each year. Boy, did this make me realise how little photos I have of us together. In fact some years I had a choice of ... actually no choice, just 1 photo!

[I'll upload photos of the project here later today - as and when I've scanned/photographed it]

Stacy Julian's took 2 classes, the first one was a lecture on how to be 'ScrapHappy' and I really enjoyed it. It made you think about what/how/why you scrapbook and I will certainly be working on some of those and making some changes in my scrapping life. It came at quite a timely moment for me as I've been doing quite a lot of thinking lately about why I do what I do and what things I want to change. The other class was completely not 'me' as it was super quick class, creating 20 pages in less than 2 hours! Yes, I admit, they were only 6"x6" LOs but I am a slow, thoughtful scrapper and just don't work in such a hectic fast paced way. However, having said that, and having not finished that number of pages, I do think the technique/advice was useful and a great way to complete a mini-memory album very quickly, easily and painlessly so I may well sit down one day and give it another go. I can say though that I love Stacy's philosophy and approach to scrapbooking and for that reason alone it was great to meet her and very inspiring.

The other 2 classes were fab. Alison Drummond taught a very different sort of class, not a LO, in fact not scrapbooking at all - we painted! Five 6"x6" paintings on acetate and all then placed in a great frame from Ikea. I really enjoyed this, the getting out the paints, splashing it on and getting mucky - shame I forgot to take an apron!!!

[I've still to photograph this but will upload it later]

And finally to Venessa's class and yet another great one it was too. So nice to meet Venessa, who now lives in South Africa. Loved the colours for this class and I knew straight away which photos I wanted to use. The class was for a single LO (the LHS) but as I had so many photos of Noah playing on the space hopper I ended up creating and extending the design to a double LO. This doesn't always work but because Venessa's design was quite graphic it was easy to carry on to another side and I think it works quite well.

So, my overall thoughts on the weekend? The teachers and the classes were great, it was lovely to meet up with old friends and also to meet some new ones. The venue was OK, the food was OK too (despite some awful problems on Friday night but as we were compensated with 2 bottles of wine, well, I'm not complaining), my only criticism was the busy pace we had. It didn't feel like you had much time to sit and relax, chat with friends and I didn't even touch any of the photos/projects I had brought with me. But then I suppose you can say it was definitely value for money as we got to do all the classes on offer. For myself a weekend crop isn't just about the classes though, it's about the opportunity to socialise, relax a bit and, if I'm lucky, complete a few pages. But having said that I had a great time and came home with finished projects (unheard of for me!) so it was a success.

And I've just realised that once I got started I actually did write a rather long post :D

Lots To Catch Up On

But instead of whacking it all in to one post I'll spread it over the next few days or so.

First off, as promised, albeit late, the photos of my gorgeous knitted felted bag. The first one is pre-felting and the second one post-felting. I'm really pleased with how it turned but will add that I reshaped it further after I took the second photo as I realised it wasn't quite 'right'.

The Cornflake box is for size comparison!

Happy Easter everyone. The weather here is glorious and has been so for the last couple of weeks. I love Spring, I think it's my favourite time of the year. The daffodils are out, and I've also seen a few bluebells. The days have been those perfect Spring type days, starting out really fresh and crisp, with blue skies and then warming up. Perfect. The last few days have been around 15-18°reaching a balmy 20° today! Bliss - off to sip a glass of wine in the garden.

To come over the next few days: ScrapFever: A Review, The Emotion Lion, a couple of layouts, geocaching update and whatever else I can think of. LOL.

A Possible New Venture

Wish me luck. I have a meeting at 1pm today to discuss a new work venture. Don't want to say too much at this point just in case it all goes belly-up, but I'm quite excited about it.

As for other things happening at the moment, well, I'm still waiting on Sainsburys to get their act together re: my new fridge/freezer. I haven't bored you all with the saga that is 'The New Fridge/Freezer: A Tale of Frustration and Despair suffice it to say 3 delivery attempts later and it still isn't sorted!

As for other happenings lately? Well, I had a great day out with Cherry on Friday, to Bristol. Not, as you might think scrapbook shopping (although we did manage to squeeze a quick one in) but to a knitting shop. Get Knitted. Knitting within my circle of friends is the current passion du jour, although we are assuring ourselves it is just a passing faze and scrapbooking is still dear to our hearts. But what are we knitting? Bags. But not just knitted bags, felted and knitted bags. I finished my first one yesterday (I'll upload photos tomorrow) and am pretty pleased with how it turned out.

I've got my next knitting project lined up, another knitted bag, but this time using some of the gorgeously fantastic Noro wool. But what I really want to knit is one of the fabulous Noro knitted jackets, but having priced it up last Friday and realising that it was going to cost around £100 for the wool alone, well, I've put it on the back burner for a while.

I didn't think Richard would be too pleased either and wanted to reduce the possibility that he will soon put a ban on all excursions involving Cherry! After all I blamed her for my need of a TomTom One... I mean I've got to travel to Watford this Friday and negotiating the M25 and trying to read a map to see where I'm going at the same, well, it would be highly dangerous. Wouldn't it?

Which brings me neatly on to the next thing on my horizon. A scrapbooking weekend away at ScrapFever, organised by Willow Tree Crafts. There are going to be some great teachers there. Donna Downey, Stacey Julian and Venessa Matthews to name but 3. I'm really looking forward to a weekend away, not just for the scrapbooking side of it, but the chance to get together with some friends and to relax. The scrapbooking is an added bonus.

That's all for now as I've got to go press the button and order my photos for the weekend and pray that they arrive tomorrow morning!

A Couple of LOs

The first, Wide Mouthed Frog, done a few weeks ago at the PaperArts birthday crop and the other, Watch Out Watch Out There's A Dimple About, done last weekend.

They've Arrived

My 2 new Cricut cartridges that is. Fabulous Finds and Going Places. Who knows, perhaps I'll find myself going to fabulous places, LOL.

OK. Off to have a play and see what I can do with them.

The Birthday Crop

So, last weekend was the PaperArts birthday crop, held over 2 days. Friday from 10am to 10pm and Saturday 10am to 5pm.

To be honest by the time Friday rolled around I was so NOT in the mood for scrapping and it took quite an effort to get myself out of the house and enroute to the village of Brimscombe (home of PaperArts). I had a lot of work on last week and absolutely no time to get myself organised for the crop. It took all my energies just to get to grips with pulling my own classes together let alone think about what I was actually going to scrap over the weekend. To give you some idea of how busy/bad last week was I didn't take any photos for Shimelle's class until Thursday and I finally got around to uploading them Thursday night, around 11pm-ish! Quite clearly I wasn't going to be going to the crop armed with those on Friday morning...

And Friday didn't start too well either. I woke up at around 7am to the realisation that I hadn't done the class instructions for the class I missed teaching at the end of January (the one where I had laryngitis - hmmmm, that sounds like an episode title from Friends). Fiona had, albeit very gently, nagged me about this earlier in the week but I just hadn't had time to do it. And as I didn't feel that I could in all good conscience go off to the crop without putting something together 7am Friday morning found me at the pc trying to type up instructions. The problem though is that it wasn't a basic class and I knew that I would have to do a step by step set of instructions with accompanying step by step photos. Which in theory sounds simple right? No. It would have been if I had still got some of the supplies left! Cue me ripping my layout apart trying to retrospectively record/demonstrate how I had put it together in the first place - not good! To say I wasn't in the best of moods by the time I had finished and then realised it was 9:30am, the crop starts at 10am and I have yet to have a shower, pack my scrapping stuff up (and here you need to imagine that my stuff has been spread to all 4 corners of the room in my attempt to find stuff to complete the retrospective class instructions!) and I have no idea of what photos I'm going to need/take.

To wrap this up quickly, because by now even I'm bored with my typing, I arrived, somehow, miraculously at around 10:45am, feeling not a little grumpy and wishing I could have a quiet day at home. But I forgot about the power of the people, the people at PaperArts. I can count on these great friends to make quick work of a 'blah' mood - I defy anyone not to have a good time with friends such as these, not to mention gorgeous Krispy Kreme doughnuts, a couple of Shimelle's famous cupcakes thrown into the mix and fish and chips! Yum. By the time Saturday rolled around I was well in the right frame of mind.

As for the classes, I can't speak for my own and what people thought of them (people will say all the right things to your face - LOL) but I can say that I loved Shim's. I have yet to finish either one of them but that's the nature of a scrapbooking weekend when you are not only teaching 2 classes but also have the lovely pleasure of completing 2 layouts for other people as a raffle prize (although not sure if getting me was more of the consolation prize???).

Friday I taught my acetate book class and once people got over their initial shock/horror I think they enjoyed it. I must make a special mention of Cherry, whose take on the class, with her New York brown bag book, was absolutely gorgeous and I love, love, love the bags she used. FAB! I can't post any pictures of this as yet as it is due to appear in an upcoming issue of Scrapbook Inspirations but once it's been published I will scan and post it.

On Saturday I taught a class on beading. Quite an old technique but one that hasn't been used in quite a while and you know the saying, what goes around, comes around. To be honest the layouts are not my usual style (if I have a style) but I thought it would be something a little bit different - and it had the added bonus of keeping all those rowdy scrappers quiet (you know who you are!!! LOL). We used the gorgeous My Minds Eye, Bohemia range of papers and the Queen & Co, Beadifuls and I completed 2 class samples. The first was a little more simple and the second a little more complicated. I am by no means a beader but the beauty of this class is that you can keep it as simple or make it as complicated as you'd like:

Scrapping Like Mad

Breathe, girl, breathe. I must keep reminding myself of this.

Next week is PaperArts' 4th Birthday Crop and I'm lucky (or should that be unlucky?) enough to be teaching the weekend, along with the fabulous Shimelle. Obviously I can't speak for my own classes, because I'm just not that way (self-promoting LOL) but I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that Shim's classes look fantastic!

So I'm busy scrapping away, trying to produce something that won't look too shabby next to Shim and on top of that I've also put the additional pressure on myself of producing no less than 3 sample LOs for one class and another sample of my acetate book. No pressure there then.

On top of that I've got a CJ to complete (the last and it's all over, hooray!) and I do really need to get it out in the post this week. Not to mention putting together some class notes for the class I missed last month due to laryngitis. On the one hand I thrive on challenges/pressures like that, well, I say I do but I'm beginning to think that I used to but that as I'm getting older (oh, so old) I'm not thriving so much as stressing.

So, I've promised myself that as from next weekend, when it's all over with, I'm going to take a step back. Some time out. Get myself organised. Not take on too much. Part of which has sort of already been set off in motion as I've handed in my notice at work (although at the moment it looks like they don't want to accept it...) and hopefully will be the first step in de-stressing (which will please my doctor).

OK, nose...grindstone...me...later!