Happy Birthday Mumma!

Although today is Halloween and everyone celebrates that, we have even more of a reason to celebrate! It's my wonderful Mum's Birthday.....and this year is no ordinary birthday, its a big one! Its extra special, just like she is!
So Happy Birthday Mummy, I hope you had a super special day yesterday sharing it with everyone and I hope today is a really lovely one for you too. I am honoured and very lucky to be your Daughter and we all love you so very much....xxxxxx

p.s. please don't beat me too hard for sharing these photos LOL..xxxxx

My Mum, her parents and 5 of her 8 siblings ( she is the little girl on her Daddy's lap)


Here she is with 6 of her brothers and sister's........she is the youngest girl in the middle of the picture ;). Don't they all look so smart in their Sunday best!


Looking cool in her dark shades with one of her older Sister's...I just ADORE the clothes from this time.


With my little sister.....what a little cutie.xx



See! Even I was quite cute....once....a LONG time ago ;) !

Going away for a holiday with 7 of her brothers and sisters and their hubbys and wives.....I don't think the Isle of Wight knew what had hit it LOL.

Having a little cuddle with her first Grandchild. Not only is she the best Mum, but she is the Best Nanna too!.xxx


On Holiday with Nanna and Grandad and visiting the Blue Pool.

All the girls together.....now that looks like a kitchen full of trouble LOL.x

And to finish....my Lovely Mum and Dad.......
Happy Birthday My Lovely, wishing you the best day and looking forward to spending it with you......xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Scrapology DT Card 2#

Just a quickie post....
Here is the 2nd card I made for this months Scrapology card challenge, which was to use eyelets :)

I used some left over bits from making a layout using the BoBunny Garden Girl range ( which is just LUSH!)
I just added some Stickles and eyelets.......oh yes and some bazzill cardstock.



Why not pop over to Scrapology and check out what the DT have created and hopefully you might like to join in the challenge. You have a few days still left to :)

It's a Family Affair.....

As soon as I saw these papers 'For the Record' by Echo Park I just knew I had to have them! I have fallen for a few of their collections in the time that they have been trading, but I def think this is my fave so far. I taught this as a class early this month at Cardinal Colours
and I think all my ladies enjoyed it.




The collection packs are great and in each set they bring out you get an alpha sticker page full to the brim of different alphas, border stickers and some other bits and bobs.

The papers are all double sided and with the variety of patterns there are always some bits that you can cut out to make your own embellishments....just add a few foam pads and thats it.


I think I can see a few more layouts( not class ones though lol) coming using these papers.....YUM!

It's Pumpkin Patch time again! **warning** VERY photo heavy!

Yep! It's THAT time of year again.....when we go and visit the local PYO and Pumpkin Patch at Sharnfolds Farm and Shop.
Unfortunately we totally missed the boat this year and ALL of the pumpkins appear to have been picked ( well, we did find 3 still on a patch not far from the shop, but nothing like we normally have the opportunity to see.
So, as the warning in title says, this is a VERY photo heavy post....escape now if you feel the need lol.
I wouldn't fancy trying to carve one this size....would you?

We met up with my Mum and my Sister and her little ones. Perfect opportunity to snap a photo of my Mum and all of her Grandchildren ( plus the South Downs in the background). The weather was absolutely glorious, we were soooo lucky!
Normally there are a whole lot more pumpkins than this, but they still got a thumbs up from the kidlets.


At the front of the shops there were various tables with a selection of pumpkins, squashes and gourds. The reminded me of cottage loaves......or space ships!!!


When we went for a stroll down through the PYO fields I was amazed to see soooo many strawberries still there for picking(Lauren did sample one just to check they were still nice to eat.....and they were :) )


She found this mega strawb, we think it was a siamese triplet!

Chloe had fun climbing in the trees and just generally hanging about.....just like the monkey that she is!


More tasting sessions.....this time in the raspberry patch and aptly named Autumn Bliss!

When we passed the strawbs and I saw this BIG number 4 I just had to take the opportunity to snap my sis and her 3 little ones.....plus #4 who is cooking nicely and is expected to make an appearance towards the end of January :) :)

2 Lovely ladies taking a few mins out on a little bench in the shade.



Lauren very kindly impersonated a reindeer for me and looked rather fetching with the antlers....

Look at this handsome little fella, he was quite fascinated with the cob of corn that he found....and broke in half!
I adore Autumn, its my most favourite season, I love the colours, the smells, I love the chill and being able to snuggle up in warm jumpers and fleece blankets. And when I saw these gorgeous leaves I just had to take a photo......along with the big daisy that Chloe had picked.


In the play area there is a small tractor which was a perfect prop for some photos.....so I got Chloe and Holly and we had a little photo shoot. I hope to scrap these at some point :)


I think Holly looks a lot older than her years in this photo.....she is only 7!


Another shot of Chloe, this time she was relaxed back on some giant tyres that have been fixed into the ground. They make a great frame for the kids to clamber across.

Hmmmmm.....here is the END part of our visit lol.....I still maintain that these would look better with foil wrapped round them and a few roast veg ;) he!he!he!

So, if you are down this neck of the woods then you could pop along to Sharnfolds and have a wander around yourselves. They have a well stocked farm shop and a tea room and a nice little play area for the kids, plus a few animals and a farm trail that you can wander along.....well worth a visit if the weather is nice......PLUS it is only a couple of miles away from a fabulous scrappy/card making shop....yep, that would be our lovely friend Jill at Cardinal Colours, it would be daft to be THAT close and not visit wouldn't it :D

Warmest wishes Anita..xxx

October Card challenge at Scrapology

Over at Scrapology the latest card challenge has been set! This time we have been challenged to use eyelets by Sue ( Doogle007).
Here is my first of 2 cards that I created for the DT this month. I have used an image called Allura Von D ( saucy little number isn't she!) by KennyK and coloured her in using my Promarkers. The chipboard '16' has been coated with a silver and also a pink nail varnish and the sentiment is by Craftworkcards.


The metal flower is one taken from a necklace that I purchased in Primark and I just added the hot pink crystal in the centre for a bit more bling.



I will pop by another time and post my other card, but why not pop yourself along to Scrapology and see the fabulous cards that the rest of the DT and have made and hopefully you might like to join in the fun with us, we would love to see what you create :)
Warmest wishes
Anita..xxx

Unflippingbelievable!

****warning***** rant coming up!
You know as a parent, you want the best for your children......and you bring them up to know what is right and what is wrong. You encourage them to go to school, do their best....you drum into them the importance of going to school, not skiving off and wasting their opportunities to learn as much as they can. You buy them the uniform they need ( as set by the school rules).....and they wear it....every day ( even though they are not keen on parts of it maybe, but they wear it anyway cos that's the rules!!!!)......
I bet you are thinking this is leading to me ranting about one of our girls getting in trouble for skiving or uniform abuse right???????
WRONG!!!!
At the weekend Lauren developed a horrendous, multi-layered blister on her toe, it was really awful, horribly deep and incredibly painful bless her. So, because the only footwear she could wear that was not excrutiatingly painful was either a pair of flip flops ( totally unsuitable or safe for school) or her black trainers, I allowed her to wear her trainers to school yesterday....WITH an accompanying note explaining that I had given MY permission for her to wear them as it was the ONLY footwear that meant she could actually walk in with the painful injury that she had....and that it would hopefully only be for 2 to 3 days at most....( I was doing the responsible thing.....right????)
so you can imagine my amazement, that rapidly turned to disbelief and then ANGER when about an hour after school started I received a phonecall from the Head of House, telling me that the Principal of the college wanted to exclude Lauren from college because she was wearing trainers, even though she had read the letter I sent, it was against school rules and that was it! I asked if she was winding me up....of course the answer was no! They really did want to exclude her!!! I argued the point, said what sort of a mother would I have been if I had kept her at home for 3 days because of a blister????? I thought I had done the responsible thing making sure she still went to school. So eventually the Head said that Lauren could maybe sit in her office for the days that she needed to wear the trainers and do her class work in there, in confinement......well that was like waving a red rag at a bull! I was livid and told her EXACTLY what I thought about their suggestion and then pointed out that Lauren has always been a very concientious (sp?) student, who regularly attended school AND wore the correct uniform, also the fact that they were black trainers.....NOT bright white or in your face fluorescant orange, like some of the ones you get, nope, good old black ones. That she is wearing them because of a temporary painful disability, a medical problem and NOT just because she fancied it for a change.
'Well it is still against the school policy' I was told.
Ok, I replied, so get the Principal to call me then and I will tell her EXACTLY my thoughts about the school policy....oh yes and whilst we are at it, how about the fact that the education authority are obviously always promoting the importance of children going to school( which I fully support) and are very hot on catching the ones who play truant and they like to fine the parents of kids who do not attend school, yet they are happy to exclude a child, whose only misdemeanor is that she has worn some black trainers which then allowed her to attend school in the least amount of pain.

-------------------------
20 mins later I get a call back from the head of house again saying she has spoken to the Principle, told her how I felt about it ( yeah RIGHT!!!! I bet she diluted it a LOT) and that they have decided that it IS in fact a medical problem that has caused this situation to happen( no shit sherlock!!!) so Lauren can indeed wear the trainers for 2 or 3 days if it helps and she won't be excluded.....
and then the line was quiet....I guess this was where I was supposed to shout Hurrah...and sound grateful????? Jeeeeeeezzzzz!!!!!!
ok, so rant over.....thanks for listening/reading and if you got this far...I hope you don't have blisters on your eyeballs.


Anyway....enough of all that, I have uploaded a few pics....that I should have done several days ago :(. on Oct 1st , our beautiful daughter, Lauren, turned 16 years old! Really not sure where those years have gone, they seem to have flown past. All I do know is that we have watched her grow from a beautiful, happy, bright little girl into a gorgeous, wonderful, warm, kind hearted, compassionate young woman, who we are very, very proud of.
So a belated Happy 16th Birthday to you Lauren, our gorgeous girly.....and I will leave you with a few photos through those 16 years..

One of her first cuddles with her Nanna, at only a couple of days old.

Aged 2 and happy to pose. LOL

Aged 3 and with such a wonderful smile and BIIIIIG personality


Becoming a very special Big Sister at 4 and half.xxx


Just after starting at school in the infants, aged 5

and jumping forward to now........beautiful, confident and 16 years old.....
Hmmmmmm, sometimes I guess they just never grow up....and she has had a good teacher as you can see LOL

Enjoy being 16 Sweetheart...xxxxx we love you so much....xxxxxx

Fun In The Sun - with Echo Park

This was my 2nd class that I taught at the recent retreat with Cardinal Colours
I used the beautiful, bright and zingy papers from the 'Summer Days' range

The class was quickfire class, held in an hour and was aimed at using lots of layers and stickers.

Thanks for looking:)

October at Scrapology....B is for Borders!

For October the Scrapology design team chose a layout designed by Georgia K Keays.

Please see Georgia's blog ON MY MIND for more of her beautiful layouts. As you will see from Georgia's layouts, many of them feature narrow borders around the page, patterned papers and photos. And so it is this idea that we would like you to use in your scraplifts for this month.
Here is my layout for the DT this month.
I used some older papers from Cosmo Cricket Delovely Range, Black and white Bazill, AC Thickers, Cosmo cricket mini alpha stickers, hot pink acrylic paint, organza and bead blossoms and some resin flowers.

The photo is of me, taken at Drusillas ( our local small zoo park). They have recently opened a new area called Lory Landing, an enclosure that is amass with beautifully coloured ( and very VERY noisy!!) rainbow Lorikeets. You can buy a pot of nectar and walk amongst them, feeding them.

Here is Georgia's beautiful layout that totally inspired us in the first place.

And this is the sketch that the DT worked from.



If you would like to have a go at this challenge, pop over to the Scrapology Blog and find out what you need to do and to see what the rest of the design team made. We would LOVE to see you join in and send us an image of your layout.
Once again we have also been incredibly lucky and have been given a prize( on display on the scrapology blog), for one lucky person to win, from our lovely friend Jill of Cardinal Colours, thanks again for your generosity Jill.