Scrapping again...

and it's been a while since I completed my last page.  I could tell that, because when I got the box and album from behind my settee I nearly screamed the place down when a huge spider crawled out.  It must have been 6 cm at least (okay 6 mm but it's easy to get confused when you're in a panic).  I dropped everything and made a run for it.  Luckily so did the spider cause when I finally picked up the courage to come back to the box it had disappeared.  Very sensible, in view of the fact that I had my shoe off ready to sort him out!

As you can see it's more photos from Brazil.  I've made it quite hard for myself as I had these photos developed at Tesco and they are all the same size.  Makes it hard to ring the changes and also I would have preferred a larger size photo in the layout above, but needs must and no scanner so can't alter things in that way.

All the photos are of Shelley.  Bless her - she posed all over the hotel grounds for me so I could get lots of shots with my then new camera.  The background paper just seemed to fit the scene perfectly.  It was in my stash and I think it may have originally been from a DCWV Photostack pad, but I'm not sure.  I've a lot to learn about scrapbooking, but I'm chuffed with myself in the way I've cut the slits in the grasses to slide in the photos.  Think that's an effective touch.

The flower was made using my Cricut for the base layers to get the size and then a Marianne flower die for the top finished off with a Dovecraft gem brad.  I was going to use one of my Prima flower centres that I won the other day, but the one in the right colour fell to bits when I got it out of the packet.  Hmmm, won't be buying them in a hurry.  Very disappointing!

I'm hoping my flower embellishment means that I can enter my pages for these challenges...

• A Spoonful of Sugar - Floral Delight
• My Time to Craft - An Extra Special Person (Shelley, my youngest daughter is certainly that!)
• Alphabet Challenge - Flowers

I was tempted to enter this into the Die Cut Dreams challenge of 'angels' but seeing as Shelley has just acquired a horrid huge tattoo of a skull she doesn't qualify on that count anymore.  Better start saving up for the 'removal of monstrousities' operation that's sure to be needed in a few years time!

Have a fab day all.

Ann xxx

Monkey Business...

Wow more scrapping!  My daughter and I have just had 3 non working days at the same time and it's been great getting the photos out and working on our scrap books.  I bought this DP ages ago from Capture the Magic (a great scrapbooking store a friend told me about) and as the actual tree design is so fabulous I didn't want to cover too much of it with photos.

The photos I'm using for my Brazil album are Tesco prints so they are all the same size and quite small.  I can't print anymore as the originals were lost when the hard drive crashed on the last computer we had.  It's only when you start using the prints that you realise things like the monkeys all looking the same way and it really effects how you can position things and what you can create.

To bring some size variation to my album on this double page spread I've cut one of the photos into a circle and on the second page chopped four photos up and then repositioned them to create a larger image.  These 12" x 12" pages are quite a challenge, but I'm so enjoying myself, which is what it's all about.

Here's a close up of the first page showing the Marmoset close ups and the skeleton leaves.  Yeah, I knew the pack of 100 leaves I bought about 5 years ago would be useful at some stage - only another 98 to use now.

Thanks to blogging buddies pointing me in the right direction I've found some great Scrapbooking Challenges out there so I'm entering my Monkey Business layout for the challenge at Practical Scrappers where the theme this week is Patterned Paper.  Hope my tree background counts.

Just realised my pages are also perfect for the challenges at...

• The Crafty Calendar Challenge - The Great Outdoors
• The ABC Challenge - unused stash (the skeleton leaves)

Have a fabulous day everyone.

Ann xxx

Dare I post this...

Okay I will! 

For ages and ages I've wanted to scrapbook my photos.  I must admit to doing one or two pages a year or maybe more ago, but never seemed to get round to doing more.  Bought the albums and papers and was at the ready, but just never got going.

Well all that has changed!  I've made a start and had a lovely time scrapping with my daughter the other day.  It was just great to play alongside each other and it brought back so many happy memories too.  

So here is my first page of a scrapbook celebrating a very special holiday quite a few years back now.  It's a plain page up to the wonderful embellished pages I've seen around, but I'm happy with it and that's what really matters.  Only another 100 or so photos to go now!  

Sheesh better get busy!

Materials used...

• Papermania 12" x 12" beige card from Earth tones pack
• gold border peel offs
• palm tree punch
• Plantain Schoolbook cartridge to cut lettering for title
• computer generated journalling
• gold paper and stardust white

Thanks for looking everyone (if you have!) and if you know any good Scrapbooking Challenge Blogs please let me know as it feels so weird not to be adding a challenge.  Not that I'm obcessed with challenges or anything.  LOL!

As always enjoy your day whatever you're doing.

Update - thanks for the lovely comments everyone.  I will certainly check out those sites and as Ann suggested I'm entering this for her 'anything goes' challenge at Crafty Ann's.  Think I may have already entered this challenge, but hey it will keep her DT on their toes!!

Ann xxx