Forgot to add this layout

This layout is for No 8 Wired the New Zealand website. This weeks challenge (challenge number 45) was to do a layout based on the sketch that was put up on their site. And this is the resulting layout that I did, entitled, New years Day 2008. We were up at Kelvin Heights for New years eve and new years day. Very quick one this time and using up lots of Nanas/mums old buttons :)

Happy mothers day

I hope all you mothers out there got spoilt today. Jake made me this awesome layout below. He went away, punched cut to his hearts content then added "To Mum from Jake. Happy mothers day. I love you."

I didn't know he had done it, he snuck away and made it and then managed to hide it in his bedroom. It is the most treasured scrapbook page I own. And to be honnest it has really brought home to me why I scrapbook. To preserve these precious memories for generations to come. And Jenny, I think you are on to something with your guess :) But my lips are sealed LOL

Been a delay

Just to let you all know that the parcel hasn't arrived yet. Andrea has ended up in hospital and has been in Intensive Care and only just out into the general ward today, so she has been one sick lady. Hopefully she is on the mend and gaining strength back and will be back with us very soon.

Just to let you know (well actually Jenny, its specially for you). I have some Little yellow bike papers coming. They look absolutely divine. Some Sassafras lass papers, and I also have another toy coming, which I am not going to tell you what it is. I love keeping people in suspense. When it all arrives, I will post a photo of it all for you :).

Well this week has been a busy one. Jake and Lionel started Karate on Monday and absolutely loved it. Olly didn't want to because he thought that you had to fight, but he is going this week. Then on Wednesday, my Street wise course started, it is like a self defence but it is aimed at ladies and gentlemen. The tutor said that more and more males are being targeted and this course will help you defend yourself. So look out. Then Wednesday night after my street wise Lionel is doing mixed martial arts, which is a lot more physical than Karate, it is fighting on the ground as well as standing. Apparently if you learn Karate and they get you on the ground then you can be in a bit of trouble so this will be good for him and later on maybe the boys too. For the whole family to go it costs us $50 for the whole term and we can do all four courses, (Karate, MMA or mixed martial arts, Street wise and Thai chi) for that cost if we want too. I couldn't believe that when he told me. Next term I wouldn't mind looking at Karate too but at the moment the one will do LOL.

Today we had Rugby in Balclutha. Well Jake did and Olly was in Lawrence (but they were meant to be in Tapanui, so the two Lawrence teams played each other LOL). This time I was with Jake and Lionel with Olly. Jake played really well I thought. He is actually tackling now instead of running beside the players and he is running through them with determination now. So I was really wrapped as you can imagine. They lost 8 6 I think it was. And Olly tells me he got 6 tries in their win against the Blue Lawrence team (Olly is in the yellow team).

I'll be back when my parcel arrives ;)

Holidays are nearly over

Only one more sleep and the boys will be back at school. Sad really. They have flown by so quickly. Didn't get half the stuff done I had planned. I'd been meaning to go and catch up with a few people and haven't visited anyone. So to make up for it, I'm off to visit two people tomorrow. One is new in the district so I'll take something up to her and introduce myself.

On the scrapbooking front I've been doing a few BTP (beyond the pages).

Scrapbook outlet have had a few competitions running and with yesterday being international scrapbooking day things were busy on there as well as most scrapbooking sites, to celebrate the occasion. I didn't get much done at all for it, but some of the competitions run until Friday night, so I've still got time (I think ). I have won a prize on SBO but am not sure what it is, it is arriving hopefully Tuesday. I will share with you later :)

These two are for a altered note book challenge. You could alter one or you could make one from scratch. These two are altered and when I get a new toy (Hopefully Tuesday) I will be doing ones from scratch. (I will post a picture of my new toy when I get it, after I've had a play) .

The first one is a altered 3B1. I've always got note books around me and the kids always try and say they are theres, so this way there is no doubting it ;)And this one is a cheap spiral bound one from The Warehouse (I think they were 3 for $1.00). It will be handy to keep in my handbag. I always seem to be looking for a piece of paper to write notes on so will be great).

No guessing what these are for. Again it is a competition on SBO. The card was made using my cuttlebug and a heart die with a embossing folder and then inked to give definition, and also the back ground has been put through a embossing folder too. (I love my cuttlebug and folders and of course the dies). For those that don't know, dies cut and folders emboss, giving it the raised and recessed pattern which you can then ink or leave as is.

Mum doesn't like anything for mothers day, so I just altered this eclipse tin and made butterflies to go on it.Then I made this small tag album with quotes on it to fit inside. So that is it from me. Till next time

Closer up

Just some closer up pictures of the letter "B" that you can't see very well from the photo. Some of the pattened paper is cut out and lifted with foam to give it dimension and also glitter and beads have been added.Also this layout that I did for scrapbook outlet challenge. We had to (well didn't have too, could choose too) a layout on music, Layout with fabric and a layout scraplifted from some one else of the outlet. I didn't get a round to doing the fabric layout and I wasn't happy with the music layout so here is the scraplift layout. Scraplifted off Delys Cramm. I do appologise for the photo as it is terrible, but I photographed at night (to get it in, in time for the competition) and I had to take it at this angle so that there was no harsh flash light on it.

Just some off the wall are I have been doing

Iv'e been busy doing some wall art. Chris Millar made these and had one in her gallery over at scrapbook outlet . Thanks for the inspiration Chris :). One is for Abbys room as she has been wanting something to go on her wall (it is going to take a bit to compete with her big trucks wall paper LOL) We are going to re-wall paper it in time LOL.
You will have to excuse the photography as it is a bit hard to photograph them in their frames and do them justice. The frames are from the Warehouse (two for $20).
This one is for Abbys room. She is funny, she sits there and tries to work out which papers belong together (for the double sided papers). And yes, the one butterfly is meant to be on a angle. :)
This one I did before I had the butterfly punch and I have put it on the wall in our lounge (Lionel loves it :) )

This letter I did at my very first scrap camp with Nic and finally I have a frame for it :)Thats it for now. Hopefully I get some more layouts done soon to share with you all :)

Snowing here today

I can't believe it. 18th of April and we had snow this morning. The kids were so excited seeing it snow. They thought that there might have been a day off school so they could build snowmen LOL. Unfortunately for them and fortunately for us it dissapeared with in 5 minutes of landing. It is just too early for that really. It is still cold though and we have a fire on tuked up inside after being to music this morning. (Glad DH had bills to do and had the fire going so it was nice and warm indeed.) Me and a friend went out for lunch also as it was her daughters 5th birthday the other day and she was sick so we never got to go to Dunedin. I made this cool wall hanging for her birthday. It is one of those deep photo frames (can't remember the proper name of them). I put a photo of the birthday girl and Abby and called it best friends. Also had a flower etc in it. Unfortunately I didn't get a photo so I can't share it with you.

Now some layouts to share.

The following layout is for scrapbook outlet . It is based on Trinas sketch for this week (12.4.08). It is a great sketch and I enjoyed doing this one, using the grungeboard (arrows) and Felt for the first time ever (title). Also used my new star punch that I won through Fiskars. I love it, nearly as much as my new fingertip knife :)

This layout I did for Laras challenge on scrapbook outlet . To do a "harvest" layout. It was due a while ago and I never got it uploaded in time, so here it is for you to look at.
And this one just because. Photo was taken a while ago. The photo actually lifts up and there is journaling underneath it.Well I'm off to put some more coal on the fire. Take care

A quick layout I did

This is just a quick layout I did for the number 8 wired NZ dares competition this week. There was a add that you had to base your layout on and this is my interpretation of the add.

Last night we went to a Karate evening down at the local hall. There is a gentleman who teaches Karake, Mixed Martial Arts (MMA), Tai Chi, and also a self defence course. We'd talked about getting Jake into Karate for quite a while now and we were going to have to take him through to Milton (20 to 30 minutes away) and we got a newsletter to say about this. So last night they had a informal get together and he showed us what each one entails and we could see for our selves what we wanted to do. So for the last 27 hours I've had two boys doing their interpretation of Karate/mma/Tai chi/selfdefence. Trust me, it isn't pretty LOL. Any way we came home and now I think there is going to be four of us doing something LOL (Only four because AJ is too young LOL). It is very resasonable and run during the school terms so it certainly fits in with us. To make it even better we just go to the bottom of the hill (all of 5 minutes drive). So we will just take it term by term and see how it goes. Personally I'd like to see the boys to Karate for two years and then onto the MMA, but time will tell.

Till next time :)

Forgot to mention. I had my computer in at the computer Dr last week. What a difference it has made. I now have a external hard drive (don't know how I lived with out it) (160gb). All virus are gone, all spy ware has gone. I didn't realise how bad Nortons was, I've now got a better one and best of all it is "free". I had 200 odd spy ware on my computer plus all the virus's. And I thought it was going to be clean. My computer doctor lives down the hill so it was very handy and he is very reasonable. Not only that but my computer is now 100 times faster, so look out :)

Quck update

Just some photos to share of Olly in action at the rugby last weekend. Tomorrow they have their first round of the draw. Only problem is

Jake is playing in Balclutha and Olly is playing in Herriot. About an hour apart and playing at the same time :) Luckily we now have two vehicles so we can go in opposite directions LOL.

I had Abby in the car with me after being at Mainly music and after 1o weeks they get to keep their chart with stickers on to take home and put on the fridge. Anyway I was driving along and Abby was trying to tell me about something on her chart. I said I can't look I'm driving. To which Abby replied, "Oh thats all right mum, you look at this and I will tell you when there is a corner coming up." Thats a bit scary.

Lionel had a appointment at school yesterday, with the lady who was observing Jake. he said it was great and got this 4 page write up on it all. And they have discussed things and she is coming back one day a week until it is all sorted, even if it takes 3 years. So that was great to hear.

There is a big scrapbooking retreat happening in Queenstown at the end of June. Click HERE for more details. It is going to be a fantastic weekend with lots being organised behind the scene. All the money raised is going to a Nominated charity. So if your interested follow the link there, or through scrapbook outlet .

I had a fantastic parcel arrive on my door this week. It was from fiskars (a prize I won) and in it there was the fantastic squeeze punch (star shape Large), scissors and the new fingertip knife. To be honnest I wasn't sure on the knife when I first saw it, as it looked a bit different. Well I guess it is different. It attaches to the underside of your finger and you hold it like a pen, but it is attatched to your finger instead. The accuracy of it is amazing. It is my new favourite tool.

Well that is about it for this post. Hope everyone is behaving ;). And be careful.

Oh yea

Forgot to mention. The layout in the post below this entitled " through the generations" that I made at scrap camp for nz dares website. Well with it I was selected as being their guest designer. Unfortuanately with the computer problems I was having, I didn't find out until the night before it needed to be in. I managed to get a layout done and really enjoyed doing it. The hardest thing was finding a photo of a favourite child hood memory. Once I'd done that it was fairly easy. But anyway, here is the layout that was a result of the panic.

Thankyou to everyone

Who either left a comment emailed me or rang me with regards to the school bullying. We have finally made some ground. The principal was telling us that we were over reacting and the bus driver was too. But after a day observing we got a phone call from him with a big appology saying that he didn't realise the problem was as big as it was. They have called a lady in to observe (which probably won't do much after a huge bollacking from the principal and the other teachers.) But she will come back with a report that she will bring to us and ask us about and then take to the principal and other teacher. So it is promissing. and I have to admit that Jake is enjoying school now. It has brought huge changes. We are now taking them to school (about 8 ks) and we leave now at 10 to nine instead of the usual 7.30 (they use to be at school at 7.45) and we are home by 3.10 instead of after 4. That has made a huge difference and the kids love it. But in doing this we have had to buy a new car. The Falcon has over 200,000 ks on the clock and if something happened to it we couldn't get the kids as you have to go across the main road. So we have brought a 2000 Mazda 626 with 62,000 ks on the clock. It goes really well actually and the kids love it because it has a CD and tape deck LOL.

Any way moving on. Today we had the opening 7 aside tournament (rugby). Only Olly was playing and boy he did well. He scored 6 tries and came away with the fair play award. They were going to give him POD but they said that the fair play award only happens at tournaments and they thought that it was more honnorable. The coach came up and said to Olly that they couldn't believe he hadn't played before. He said " you might be a All Black one day" to which Olly replied deadly serious, " No, I AM going to be a All Black." The coach said " well don't forget me when your playing for them." Olly said " Na, I won't" LOL, don't ya love the confidence of it all.

What else has happened????? We have been busy shearing agaiiiiiin. It does get fairly tedious. Monday Abby and I are off to Dunedin with a friend whos daughter is turning 5 the following Monday. They are going to the movies and chipmunks. Only 3 adults and 3 kids are going so it should be a ball. Other than that there hasn't been much going on. So till next time.

I'm back

Well scool camp has ended and so too has my scrapping weekend :(

School camp was really hard for Lionel. Jake was picked on the whole time by the kids (even with Lionel there) and made to feel left out through the whole time away. Lionel said if it hadn't been for Olly going then he would of brought Jake home as he felt so sorry for him. And Lionel couldn't do much or say much to the other kids. The teacher sorted a couple of the kids out, but it was so hard. Its been really hard for us to deal with, it actually feels like someone has ripped my heart out and jumped all over it. Weve been trying to think of ways to help, he never says anything about it, probably because he can't really put a name on it. And of course its not really one little thing, it is all the little bits adding to make it large IYKWIM, and of course Jake being the quiet shy type hasn't helped much. The teacher tells us he is happy most of the time and wants to play on his own (I wonder why). Weve been busy trying to work out ways to help him. So if you have any ideas do let me know please. Of course this before scrapcamp made it quite hard for me being away. In fact I nearly didn't go, and probably shouldn't have considering the way I was feeling. But I did and really enjoyed it when I wasn't thinking about everything Jake has been through.

SCRAPCAMP
Well for scrapcamp I had the privelege of sitting beside Andrea and Janine, (thankyou ladies). These ladies are awesome, and what a great location the camp was. There was 21 of us scrapbookers and room for lots lots more. There were lots of prizes donated by fiskars, up2scrap (the New Zealand scrapbooking magazine) and make and takes donated to the retreat weekend by Andrea at scrapbookoutlet and Meg at scrapbook essentials . There was also alot of work put in by Lara and Nik . All your work was very much appreciated. Over the weekend we had quite a few challenges. I came away with 11 layouts and two minni albums and one card. This one entitled "is this how ladies behave?" was for my no paper challenge.

One that we did was write down on a piece of pp a product and the other was a a technique (I wrote down paint and distressing). We all put our bits of paper in and later on pulled one out and we had to use that technique on a layout. I pulled out paint and eyelets. This layout is the resulting page.We also had to scraplift a layout from someone else at the retreat. I chose a layout done by Lara This challenge was an interesting one. We had to pick a photo and papers and start scrapping. After 7 minutes it was passed on to the next person, and then again after 7 minutes until it was finneshed. And this is what I ended up with. A little piece of everyone at the retreat. Aint it gorgeous?And this one, we were gived two pieces of pp, journaling page and three buttons and had to produce a layout, we could include anything else we wanted but had to include some of everything we were given. The resulting layout "Loved"This one was done for Leannes challenge on NewZealand dares . A layout that had 200 words on it "throught the generations" Then there is this one of Jake on the mechanical bull at the Local rodeo

And this one just because :)

Three more sleeps

Oh I sound like a little kid waiting for Santa to come down the chimney don't I? But there is only three more sleeps till scrap camp in Queenstown. And yep, I'm having sleepless nights.

School sports was cancelled on Monday due to the fact that we had 90mm (360points) of rain over the weekend. So the school decided to go to camp a day earlier so that. Originally they were going on Monday but with the area school sports it was postponed for a day. This wasn't a bad thing, unless you were unorganised like I was. Sunday I got asked for a roast mutton (cooked) so I had to rush around like a headless chook, specially after the phone call to say "we are going tomorrow". Any way it got cooked (I think LOL) and Jake was off to camp on Monday and Lionel went up in the afternoon after getting lambs away and going to a clearing sale. We did buy a mountain bike at the clearing sale for Jake. He had been riding Lionels (he likes the gears) and it was a tad big (23 inches, after all Lionel is 6ft 2 inches). So we picked a avanti up for 50 with helmet, lock (this will be another hit for Jake). So with camp he hasn't seen it yet. Look forward to the look on his face when he does though :).

Last night I went to print some photos off, but the mouse on my puter wasn't working. I kept telling my self, don't pannic. So this morning I rang the computer expert down the road. (my computer needs abigger memory put in too). He said not a problem, but it will have to be Monday, (he is up in Northland) WHAT, this couldn't be happening. So I pulled the mouse to bits checked everything, wobbled everything, trying to think, I know what I am doing. (yea right). Plugged it back in, and hey presto it works. I have absolutely no idea what I did, but since then I've been printing photos off, etc.

This moring I did some baking, for Olly to go to camp tomorrow and to feed the hungry hoards when they return, and some for scrapcamp :)

I also took some photos of me for my dear friend. I've tried emailing them but for some reason it won't accept the photos (darn computers). So here it is. I've been growing my hair since last July, probably can't really tell from this photo.

Well next time I come back I should have scrapcamp layouts to share :).

Till then, remember

"Perfection is over rated."

Yehaaa

I can't believe it. I have just won a RAK (Random act of Kindness) off the Fiskars website. I'm so excited. When it arrives I will be posting a photo of it here to share with all you lovely people. Wahooo, :)

Well on a different note, here is some photos as promise, of the Teddy bears picnic. This is of Abby and one of her wee friends :)

This one is a photo I just love. Isn't he just a wee honey. He belongs to a friend of mine.

Ollys appointment went really well. Got a good report and still doesn't have to wear a eye patch, so that is great news. In the afternoon we had swimming sports for Olly. The poor kids, the pool was so cold for them, they had a egg and spoon race and were shivering so much they could hardley keep the "egg" on the spoon.

Well that is it for now. Hubby is off to see Nigel Latta (he is the guy on the "into the darklands" that profiles murders on TV.) The local plunket has him down for the evening and apparently he is a fantastic speaker. Will be interesting to see what Lionel has to say. So I might get some photos printed off for scrapcamp. (Only one more week, I'm starting to have sleepless nights :) )

Busy schedule coming up

What a busy couple of weeks we have coming up here. Only 10 days to scrapcamp yahoo. But before then we have Ollys eyes checked on Wednesday in Dunedin, at quarter to 9 in the morning then he has swimming sports in the afternoon, Friday Jake has swimming sports. Monday athletics, Tuesday to Friday (well it is going to be Thursday for our kids) there is school camp for Jake and Olly goes for a night on Wednesday night then there is also the usual activities in between. Today I took Abby in for her 4 year injections. She did so well, didn't cry at all. The nurse said that it will sting a little and after the last one, Abby said to her "it was a little bit more than a sting." The nurse didn't know what to say LOL.

Last week we had a teddy bears picnic at a reserve up the road. The kids had a great time. One of the ladies had hidden 10 teddies and when a child found one they got a lolly pop. When the older ones got theirs they would help a younger one. I will get some photos reduced and share them at a later date.

I've done two layouts. The first is just because I wanted to scrap them and had to do something before scrapcamp. It is down at the river. I couldn't find cardstock the colour I wanted so I painted a piece of white and left bits showing through for a bit of a rough look.

The second is for scrapbook outlet sketch that Trina put up for this week. It actually contains 7 photos if you look closely.

Some photos to share

I've been down sizeing a couple of photos to share, (But in reality I'm putting off doing housework :) ).

Today it is a bit cool (actually have the fire on). We had 23 ml (92 points) of rain on Friday Saturday and it has all soaked in. There is some pretty happy farmers around here at the moment.

Friday and Saturday night we had a friend come and stay from North Otago, who we hadn't seen since we left. He was going to the shears in Gore to get in some practice for the Golden shears in Masterton in a fortnight. He is in the New Zealand team that is competing there so has to get in as much practice as he can. Lionel went down with him for the day and caught up with alot of old mates. I actually think he would of liked to had his gear with him and have another shear, not that he would tell you that.

Now the photos. The first one is Jake riding the Mechanical bull at the local Rodeo last weekend. He did very well with it and thoroughly enjoyed it.

These ones I took when I was on the trek up the Maungatuas last weekend. The first one is looking back towards Outram and from where we had come from.This one is along the top. Some of us continued to the repeater station and I stuck to the back so I could get some photos.This is my latest layout. It is for a challenge at scrapbookoutlet . The February challenge was to do a no person challenge. Then I added my own personal challenge to it by using bright colours (they are alot brighter in real life). But I am pleased with how it came out. Tells the story of our hens and the eggs :).

Yayyyyy its been raining.

We really needed it to keep our winter crops going and now we have just had 52 points (13mm). Very much needed and now my hubby has a real spring in his step.

I had a really busy weekend. On Saturday we had the local Rodeo which was great, specially as a cousin of mine and her family came down for it, it was just unfortunate that I had one of those weekends. After the Rodeo I took Molly (my horse) over to a friend of mines as we were away on a Trek on Sunday and it was going to save alot of time if both horses were at her place and I met her at the bottom of the hill. Then after that I had a catering job for the local Playgroup. We were catering for a wedding at the local hall. I didn't get home till 1am then I was up at just after 6.00 to make sure I had everything organised for the Trek. I met Jan and Molly at the bottom of the hill at 1/4 to 7 and we were off. We were on a trek through the Mangatuas (not sure on the spelling there sorry), which is just out of Outram, near Dunedin. It was a great trek and Molly was very well behaved. She wasn't as excited as last time and took it all in her stride. Luckily the day wasn't very hot, as there was a few steeper climbs. Met some lovely ladies and it was great as we all had alot in common. Afterwards we had a bbq and a few drinks and dispersed when it started raining. As you can imagine I was in bed fairly early that night to catch up on some needed sleep.

The Hens have slowed down a little in their egg laying (5) but Lionel tells me in a week they will be back up to 10 and 11 a day. When he was a kid they use to have 500 hens so he probably knows what he is talking about (I'll give him the benefit of the doubt this time :) ). I haven't taken any photos yet Lara, oh and I call myself a scrapbooker, must get my act together. I have some ideas just got to get onto it :)

Till next time, chin up :)

10 eggs

Yep. Our tally of eggs for the day is 10. We have some happy children running around and I would say we were lucky to get them all inside in one piece with out there being scrambled eggs. At least if that happened I could take photos and get a cool scrapbooking page I guess :).
Been a hot day here again today (32 oC). And we have been in the woolshed all day belly crutching lambs. Not the ideal place to be on a hot day, but at least our woolshed isn't hot (its made of bricks), so is alot cooler than most tin sheds. I'm off to sort out some more photos for scrapcamp. Getting closer all the time :)

Valentines cards

Well I have been doing a couple of wee challenges. These are only card challenges (I've been saving the sketch challenges for scrapcamp).

The first one is for scrap camp and it is a valentines card challenge.

The second one is also a valentines card challenge for New Zealand dares , but this one had to include a photo on it. So I used a photo of Lionels and my hands when we got married ( soppy I know). As some of you know I am not really a Valentines girl and neither is Lionel, but this year is different :). The second card I think I will use for our wedding anniversary as we are married 10 years this year and we don't usually do anything for that either. I am really pleased with this card actually. Came out better than I imagined. :)

Today is Waitangi day so the kids didn't have school, which was awesome. So we went to Roxburgh and brought some hens. We packed a picnic lunch, bacon and egg pie and a settlers pie and we ate it at the park there. It was fantastic and what I loved about it all was there was 8 families all doing the same thing. They all had a packed lunch (some even had a thermos) and the kids were all playing at the park. It was an awesome sight actually.

We went and picked up 23 hens (15 for us and 8 for a friend). Brought them home and they are happy as wee sand boys. Haven't got a egg yet, but no doubt there will be three excited kids running out to check so they can have eggs on toast for breakfast.

Will be back for an update tomorow on the hens :) Till then