Trick or Treat

Bag Idea

I personally think that this design has a lot of possibilities for Halloween, my original idea was that it would look great on a trick or treat bag, either printed onto paper and adhered securely onto the paper bags themselves ( the kind that you can buy in bulk at the craft store) Great if you want to make a large quantity of them for a party

Or you could print the reverse of the image onto transfer paper and iron it onto calico and sew a small simple tote bag, which could then be used year after year.

Please feel free to download from the Freebies page.

Panic, less than 90 days till Christmas !

Just kidding, not about it being less than 90 days till Christmas but about panicing, what’s the point.

My philosophy goes a little like this, what gets done, gets done, what doesn’t we will have to live without !

I would love to be one of these people who is organised and has everything done or in place and doesn’t spend December running around like a chicken with their head cut off, but I am not.

I should start buying gifts in August, making cards in September and starting to buy food supplies in October, but I am not.

The only year I was that organised was 1998 and I had no choice, I was due to have my first child on the 5th of December that year so for me everything was done in October and November.

Needless to say I have never been that organised again !

Well today in my neck of the woods its long sleeves long trousers, hot drinks, windows closed weather !
apparently tomorrow and for a few days afterwards possibly until next Monday, it is going to be shorts, t shirt, cold drinks windows open weather !

Autumn has been nearly as topsy turvy weather wise as Summer was.

The trees around here are all turning those gorgeous shades of Autumn, red, orange, yellow, green, leaves are starting to fall, apples are being harvested, we are talking about what to wear for Halloween, maybe planning for Christmas ( but not me obviously)

yet by Sunday its projected to be 75 degrees and sunny !

Don’t get me wrong I am not complaining I am so not a Winter person, dark mornings and dark afternoons and having to have the heating on all make me really SAD

I think my pooch agrees

TUNE IN TOMORROW I AM DOING A TRICK OR TREAT BAG DESIGN GIVEAWAY

International Swap

Hi there I just wanted to share today some information about I swap I am going to participate in. Firstly let me start by saying that I don’t normally do swaps, I did a couple when I first started scrapping in 2004 but after a couple of times when I got questionable swaps back I decided that it wasn’t for me.

SO what has made me change my mind – well this swap is being organised by the very lovely Monika Wright and her Swap Buddy in France Sophie Charlotte Chapman
The two ladies decided to do a scrap swap with each other but then thought how great would it be to open it up to their blog readers and make it an international swap. The way it works is you leave a comment HERE on Monikas blog or HERE on Sophies blog stating your name, location and email address and you will be paired up with a French Scrapper to swap scrap goodies with.

So what are you waiting for, get on over to either Monika or Sophie’s blogs and read all the details and sign up.
You have until the 4th of October to put your names on the list.

Start of the week again !

No matter how often I remind myself that there are only two days in a weekend, I am still shocked when Monday rolls back around, I feel like I have been caught napping, I didn’t do nearly as much of my to do list as I had planned and that leaves me feeling hopelessly behind already. YUK

Here is my to do list as it stands right now.
1. Mow Lawn
2. IRON ALL Laundry
3. Decide on dinner options, check food stores and cook
4.Pick up Children
5. Buy car paint
6. replace school stationary supplies (Already ! ?)
7. WORK
8. Hoover
9. walk dog
10. Do wedding acceptance

OK, I have decided that I am sleeping too much if I am running out of time to get things done so I am aiming to sleep less (yeah right) at this rate I will be getting up at 4am and going to bed at midnight.

just incase you are interested here is the design I did for the wedding acceptance

Thank Crunchie . .

. . Its FRIDAY

busy week, now looking down the thin end of my favourite day of the week !

looking forward to catching up on my LSNED this weekend, so many entries to do, at least ten, with an “at home” weekend planned it should be a piece of cake, just the Mt Everest of ironing glowering at me from the corner of the room to overcome first, an evening session with a couple of good films should take care of that.

HOMEWORK, now that’s another bucket of sludge entirely – need to organise the kids so that all this gets done, planned, prioritised, nearly 8 weeks without homework, it is going to be a culture shock.

OK it is official I have started thinking about “that holiday in December whose name must not be uttered” I bought some chocolates this week, I have decided that I am going to add a couple of items of holiday food and drink to my weekly shop so that by the time I get to December I will only need to buy the essentials, plus the cost won’t be so overwhelming.

Sad weather

Why oh why does the change in the weather make me sad !

Don’t get me wrong there are plenty of aspects of Autumn that I like and enjoy, returning to school and routine (that’s a like and a dislike), the cooler weather (only applicable when we have actually had a summer !) the colours and the abundance of all the berries, needing the quilt on the bed at night to be cosy, wearing socks again and Halloween

But I have to say that there is more that I dislike, not necessarily about Autumn but what it heralds, dark nights and dark mornings (major YUK) the wind and the rain, grey skies, piles of coats and shoes (I don’t have any convenient storage for these items)wet paw prints on the floors, the christmas countdown, planning and making hot meals every night, cold weather illnesses.

WOW I am in a Bah Humbug mood aren’t I

So Halloween – each year I am tempted about this time of year to make plans to throw a themed party, I usually manage to talk myself out of it pretty darn quickly, the thought of a dozen 9-12 year olds making spooky mayhem in my house is enough for me. I always feel less like celebrating when it falls on a week day too

But I do love to see all the new seasons Halloween products surfacing, as far as scrapbooking is concerned it always seems to fall into two catagories, the cute stuff and the slightly scarier vintage stuff. I tend not to buy any of the themed stuff but appreciate it from afar.

Some images from the web that I am inspired by for the spooky season – I may even do some designs myself to share !

Love this guy !

Ten on the Tenth

Ok – for some reason I am feeling quite subdued and a little bit melancholy today

WOW that was a little bit dramatic for me

so my ten on the tenth was going to be regrets, but that looked a little morose so I went with WISHES instead

1. I wish I didn’t live so far from Home

2. I wish I hadn’t Waited til I was in my thirties to have kids

3. I wish I had, had more kids

4. I wish I had been more financially aware

5. I wish I had done a different degree and or a teaching post grad

6. I wish that I was more socially comfortable

7. I wish I had NEVER started shaving my legs

8. I wish I liked exercise and hated chocolate

9. I wish I was more self motivated

10. I wish I lived in the 1950′s

LSNED 4-6

YAY me, I managed to complete the second page of my LSNED album

Entries 4-6 non of which are Shim’s prompts but still all little lessons from my everyday.

I am using a script font as I don’t do handwriting and I am getting used to the more journal-ish feel of this project, I have stopped worrying about the fact that I haven’t used photos on every entry, like a typical scrapbook album and how I would normally work.I like the way that all the separate entries are mixing and over lapping.

LSNED title page and days 1-3

Ok, a camping holiday and an ensuing rubbish cold, sore throat and sinus infection have conspired to keep me from starting my album.

I am “soldiering on” and have managed to complete the title page and entries for the 1st-3rd. This was after a major re think about how I was going to add my pages.
When I saw the 12×6 album I was excited to work in a format that I hadn’t used before but I fell at the first hurdle.
I had cut lots of paper and card to size ready to go in the album but when it arrived I was disappointed by the size of the ring binders, they are only 3/4 of an inch in diameter.
A string of expletives were uttered under my breath whilst I cursed the disadvantages of shopping online.

SO – I would not be doing a page a day as I had intended as 30 sides of, even minimally embellished, paper would simply not fit comfortably in this album. I opted for a 12×6 title page and then entries that will either be 6×4 or 6×6 depending on how much I have to say, so that 2 or three entries can then fit per page.

Right so without further ado I leave you with my title page and my entries for days 1-3
just in case you were wondering I am only going to follow Shimelle’s prompts directly if I get stuck.

Simple title page, scraps of patterned paper, some very old 7 gypsies gaffer tape, my own word art design on a paperchase luggage tag, a really really old paper ticket and an arrow photo turn.

First page 1st – 3rd still not sure about this it looks entirely too busy to me, too many words, but as I explained I started this task “sans camera” for the first few days!

Thanks for looking

UKS

I have some A5 paper designs as freebie downloads over on UKScrappers today, get over there and sign up if you aren’t already a member.

There is a choice of two designs in two colours brown and blue, they would be great for mini albums or smash books or even as accent papers on those inevitable back to school layouts.

enjoy and share with a link in the comments if you use them on a project.