With a little twist...

Over at Twisted Sketches this week we have a great new sketch for you with the twist - White.

Turning 12- gang show style.

 All three of these photos are a little blurry but as they are all I have of this event I still wanted to scrap them. So by printing them small & grouping them together, they still tell the story of her birthday :)

The patterned papers - basic Grey
Alphas- American Crafts, Pink Paislee & Girls Paperie.
trims - Prima
Flower - Melissa Francis.


many thanks for looking & hop on over to Twisted Sketches for inspiration & sketches x

Cutting Machines...

Do you own any high tech cutting gadgets?

I have a Big Shot whichI've had for years since my card making days,which I love as I like to cut chipboard, material ... with the standard dies & with Tim Holtz having a range of dies too it's a gadget I use on a regular basis. Also the children have used it over the years for their work & projects as it's so easy to operate.

I used to have a Cricut & I liked the different cartridges that you could buy but it's sheer size posed problems with storage & when it was put away I tended not to use it ?!

Everywhere I look recently scrapbooking people are talking about using their Silhouette machines ?! I know it's the now gadget but am loathed to spend out lots of money to find it just collects dust on a shelf.

A very long time ago I invested in a Craft Robo but my computer skills were lacking to get the most out of it & it got boxed up & forgotten about. Well it's back, had a test run & seems fine after it's hibernation!

I'm going to try it with the silhouette software & fingers crossed you will be seeing some die cuts on my Lo's & document life pages soon. 

Do you have a cutting machine ? how do you find it ? do you use it regularly ? what can you recommend to me ?
Do let me know x

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Phone Crazy

My crew are at the ages where they now all have mobile phones! and they tend to have them in hand at every opportunity! So when my Essentially GoGo kit arrived from ScrapaGoGo featuring a cute phone dial stamp I knew exactly the type of photos I wanted to scrap first.

These pics were taken in a hotel lobby in Florida!!

Telephone Operators

I used the stamp with clear embossing ink then clear embossing powder to create the patterned background cardstock.

 I used the hybrids & embellishments from the kit to decorate the corners of my photos to complete the overall effect.

Going to play

Whilst the sun is at it's hottest today

( & I'm not moaning :D)

I'm gonna seek some shade so I can play with

ScrapaGoGo's May kit

From the desk of ...

Have you seen that oh so cute stamp?

This has to be my favourite so far

but then I say that every month x

Document Life - Feb

Another month in our lives

documented for the future

using stickers, journalling cards, ephemera

alphas, punches...

Busy month documenting:-

snow, visitors, joining love film, valentines day

polo lesson, DT weekend, retreat...

 These pages are such a great way to get the little things down on paper

& make a good home for some of the random photos I take on my phone!

Happy Mail

Today we received our Olympic Tickets by recorded delivery :)
We would have loved to have tickets to an event in London but after trying numerous times it just didn't work out.
We are going to watch Ladies football at Coventry's footy stadium.


We are really looking forward to it.
Sheena x
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With added buttons.

This week at Twisted Sketches we have been creating using sketch 151 with the twist - buttons.

Chillin'.

I immediately reached out for this photo I took of our daughter recently on a stroll at The Stairway to Heaven at Hatton Locks. Her glasses inspired me to go a little retro & round all the corners & this patterned paper had the spring look I was going for.

The papers -Echo Park, alpha & flowers - Making Memories, Tiny staples - Tim Holtz, buttons & twine from stash.

many thanks for looking.

Blooming Flower !!

As tonight I'm going to Knit & Natter I thought I'd share what I was working on at the moment.
This is the Blooming Flower cushion pattern from the Attic 24 blog. It's the hardest pattern I've had to follow to date but I'm enjoying the challenge of creating something new whilst improving my crochet skills.

After 5 rounds.

As of today, ready for the 12th set of petals.

The colours are the same as my Granny Square cushion as this is also for Harriets new window seat.

I'll keep you updated with my progress x

Are you a Project Lifer ??

For the past 2 years I've been recording my family's life in a series of albums using the format started by Shimelle, called Document 2010 & Document 2011. These albums are looked at regularly & document all sorts of activities & events plus normal every day life.

The only problem I seemed to have was keeping up to date & last year I fell very far behind :(

This year all the talk is about Project Life, I um'd & ah'd for weeks wondering if I really wanted to do this sort of project again. I looked at lots of blog posts showing completed pages & also saw all the supplies designed already for this.

Well I have bitten the bullet & I'm doing my hybrid version of project life.
DOCUMENT  LIFE !

January 2012.

This month covers a holiday, a broken finger, a Panic at the Disco concert, our move back home,
house warming gifts, recipes, visitors and much more.

 I fill 4 sides of split page protecters each month & allocate space depending on the size of the event or the amount of photos taken rather than dedicate a week per side as is the norm with Project Life.

Apologies for the shine off the protecters.

Some of the journalling cards I have printed myself from free downloads mainly from Pinterest.

I have to say I decided not to buy anything special to complete this album as lets be honest we all have enough stash, right :) so I've been shopping from my own stuff, finding loads of unused stickers & word sheets as I want to keep the embellishments as flat as possible. All the backing cards are cut from my scraps box so tend to be older papers & it feels great to be using the last of past papers & kits.

The good news is I'm totally up to date with this year & working hard to sort out last year's book too.

Scrapping me!

This photo of me was taken by Anna Bowkis

last autumn & I've finally got around to scrapping it. 

 Sparkling Eyes.

The vintage music score was the inspiration & my title.

Many thanks for looking.

10 on the 10th - Poland

Since our trip to Poland at Easter to visit friends, I've had a number of comments asking how it went & what's it like, so for these reasons I'm going to share with you 10 photos from our trip to give you a taster of the country x

1.Warsaw, Old Town ( through my fisheye camera)
Totally rebuilt after WWII but using plans & photos to recreate it in it's original style.

 2. Polish ice cream - Lody.
Very popular with locals & tourists, comes in hundreds of flavours- too many to choose!

 3. Graffiti.
Lots to be found on walls & buildings usually depicting war & revolution type themes.

 4. Palace of Culture & Science.
231 m high & has a viewing balcony on the 30th floor for a birds eye view of this city.
Luckily it also has a lift :)

 5. Train travel.
We caught a Harry Potter style train between Warsaw & Krakow giving us a better view of the flat Polish countryside planted with root vegetables.

 6. The Cloth Market.
A little bit of heaven for any shopper, lots of stalls selling jewellery, amber, linens, treen...

 7. Auschwitz 1.
A place everyone should see once...
Much smaller than I imagined but the rooms of victims' belongings will be something I'll never forget.

8. Auschwitz 2- Birkenau.

The sheer size of this camp gives you the realisation of how many people never left this place & the remains of the huts give real insight on how the few chosen to work were treated. 

9. The Wieliczka Salt Mines.

A huge tourist attraction & well worth a visit with an English speaking guide. You soon forget how far you are underground as there is so much to see & hear. You can even get married there if the fancy takes you.

10. St Francis' Basilica.

Famous for it's fabulous stained glass windows, with this one entitled "God in the Act of Creation" being the biggest of them all.

I hoped you have enjoyed our whistle stop tour of our week in Poland. We certainly will be returning to visit our friends there again & hope to discover more of this country whilst we are there.

Please hop on over to Shimelle's blog where others will also be sharing their 10 on the 10th today.

Something to celebrate...

as today is our 19th Wedding Anniversary x

On a dry but breezy day not dissimilar from today I walked up the aisle on my Fathers arm in a beautiful church in Wimbledon Village & became Mrs R.Goodness knows where all that time has gonebut when I look at our 3 children I know it has been well spent x

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Typical bank Holiday!

In true Bank Holiday style it has poured with rain here in the Midlands . So we took this opportunity to go to the Movies. lots of other people had the same idea & Coventry's Showcase cinema was packed. However we did get to see our movie of choice.

Our daughter has been reading the book & recommended it to us. She was so right, the film was great to watch, so much so that I think I'll need to read the books myself.

If you get a chance to see this you won't be disappointed x

International Scrapbooking Day / Weekend

I couldn't let this International scrapbooking weekend go by with out sharing a couple of Lo's with you.

I have to be honest & say they haven't been made this weekend as we have been busy celebrating my Mum's birthday & also out enjoying the return of blue skies and sunshine over the midlands.

These 2 Lo's feature our daughter as a very young girl, recently we have had the majority of our old negatives scanned & transferred to disc for us. Our negatives were one of the few things we managed to save from our house fire when a moment of clarity made me demand that Paul grab the box as he left the house before the smoke got too bad to see through. Anyway this has not only given me new photos to scrap, as I didn't scrap when the children were little plus it's been a whole trip down memory lane for me cooing & aahing over my brood.

Adorable.

 Pretty.

 I've used mainly Basic grey papers with a few extra bits & pieces.
Many thanks for looking & I hope it's sunny where you are too x

Bostin British Bull & Baby Jack.

On Wednesday we made a trip in to Birmingham for a very special reason but on our way there this was the site we saw!!


Birminghams Bull getting a Bostin British summer outfit!! With the Jubilee & the Olympics both happening this summer Birmingham have decided to celebrate this in their own unique way.


It didn't come as a surprise to find the costume was made by a Lady whose made costumes for Strictly Come Dancing as he is covered in sparkling rhinestones!
If you pass through Birmingham over the summer do stop by & say Hi to the Bull x

The reason for our Birmingham visit was to meet brave little Jack Wilkinson for the first time & what a cutie he is in person, with his beautiful big eyes.

 I also got a chance of a hold & a cuddle which was wonderful x

Jack is still waiting patiently for a liver to become available for transplantation whilst staying at Birmingham Children's Hospital,  we hope & pray a donor can be found soon xxx