An up-side-down Christmas...

Need to show you something C-R-A-Z-Y!! LOL! We went to a big garden centre today to look at their huge section of Christmas stuff...trees, baubles, lights...everything. And then we spotted this crazy up-side-down Christmas tree. Made to be that way and sold as an up-side-down tree....madness!! LOL!

Lots more pics from my September journal...

No owl stamp in sight yet :( Though I think with the delays still from the postal strike I guess he could take another few days to turn up.

Got lots of yummy Magnolia images from a "Magnolia image stamp swap" that I took part in, so I have plenty to make cards from and colour in should I feel like that :)

Got some questions that I need to reply to:

Jackie - I'm sure you can buy the doodling book outside the class, though I haven't seen it anywhere. These are the details if you want to search for it: "Doodling For Papercrafters" by Maelynn Cheung it's by Leisure Arts and there are two (!) ISBN umbers listed: ISBN-13: 978-1-60140-560-9 and ISBN-10 1-60140-560-X. Hope that helps :)

Debbie - the white journaling pen that I used is a white Sakura Souffle pen. :)

And here's another load of pages from my book from the September class that I took by Shimelle:

Doodling away...

Been working on some Design Team work today. Only managed to get one layout done...but still. I kinda got a bit carried away with some parts of the layout so it took a lot longer than normal. You know what it's like! LOL!

No sign of my owl stamp (plus a few others - to keep him company on the way you understand) yet...

I've been doing lots of doodling in my practice book this week. Love it!! First we were doing swirls. Now I think I have said this before, but...I'm rather impatient...so I really can't cope with doing all doodling using a pencil first and then a black pen later. It just doesn't work for me and takes faaaar too long time! LOL! The only exception I would make is if we're talking about big letters, for a title, then I really need some faint pencil lines to keep the letters at least reasonably even. :)

Anyway, we got off topic a bit. I'm not doodling letters (yet!) LOL! We were doing swirls and I just go straight in there with my black pen in my book. This means that some things go wrong, some swirls don't turn out as good as you wished etc and you just have to cope with that. But it's hard. I guess I'm a bit of a perfectionist and expect myself to be an expert at everything even if I am a beginner.

Another assignment was to look at some doodled stamps and try to copy them freehand. This was lots of fun. Found some pics of Inque Boutique stamps on the internet which I used.

...and here they are with a little colour added.

Wishing you all a great weekend!! :)

Owls...

So for the last year...maybe even a year and a half or 2, we have seen cute little birds and owls creeping onto our stash...papers, rub-ons, stamps etc. I have no idea who started this. For me it was Rhonna Farrer. That was the first person that I can remember seeing using them. Her papers with birds. I don't know why. Or even really what they have to do with most scrapping. I mean, how many times do you scrap a page that is in need of an owl?! BUT I will also say this. I think they are super cute!! Totally!! :)

I got a little bird stamp (by Rhonna as it happens!) the other day in my parcel from the US. (If you look closely at the bottom photo in this post you can see it). and I'm also waiting for this little guy from Sweden (it's a Magnolia stamp) to hopefully turn up in the next few days. *too cute*

In the meantime... I got my Design Team kit from Jackie at Make The Moment Last today. Yummy, yummy stuff! I better not say too much but it's full of fun things in autumn colours...I've got felt, chipboard, buttons....! :)

Doodle scrapping...

Been having some fun scrapping this morning!! All to do with the BPS doodle class that I'm taking. But first I seem to remember I have a question to reply to...

*goes off to check the comments*

Right, Treacle asked about the animal papers from my post yesterday and who makes them. *reaches for papers* They are by Creative Imaginations. I can't seem to find any name for the dog one (which you were after) though - sorry about that. The on-line shop I ordered it from calls it "Woof". Whether that's the official name or the shop as just used that for their website I don't know - sorry. Hope that's at least a bit of help to you.

Now back to my scrapping that I mentioned. The assignment for today was to pick a layout - any layout you liked - in the book ("Doodling For Papercrafters" by Maelynn Cheung) which the class is based on and then scraplift/get inspiration from it.

I found quite a few layouts that instantly appealed to me. Then I decided to go for this specific one by Cheyenne Clark. I really liked the look of it and it also gave me a challenge as it's a bit more "wild & crazy" than my usual style. I have to say I had LOADS of fun doing it and I will definitely try something similar in the future!! :)))

Stash used: Bazzill Hazard cardstock, Autumn Leaves patterned paper, arrows and chipboard, Zig Millennium journaling pens and lots of various buttons, ribbons and ric rac.

In Stamp Heaven...

That's where I am. In stamp heaven. Got the yummy yummiest stash order yesterday from the US. Looooove all the goodies!! Which is just what I need as we both caught a nasty stomach bug yesterday and I'm feeling rather yucky. But enough of that - not nice to talk about! LOL! I have, despite that, managed to finish my on-line October class for A Trip Down Memory Lane and got that sent off.

Due to the postal strike in the UK I only got my stuff that I was going to design with on Monday! Crisis! LOL! So I dropped everything and did a lot of planning on Monday. Then yesterday and today was spent scrapping and taking a million (okay not a million really...but about 100) photos in between every stage. And then I have had the fun (= it takes ages LOL!) of sitting down, going through all the photos, picking the ones for the class, editing, writing a supply list and finally a step-by-step class text of how to make the layout. It's all sent off now and I'm happy to have it all ready for when it should go live in a few days. :)

Okay so back to my stash that arrived. This is what I got...

Special Christmas issue by Paper Crafts. I love these special card issues:

Some Heidi Swapp things because I love her alphabets and hearts:

Funky flower papers because they make me happy to scrap with:

Heidi Grace stuff because her stuff is normally yummy:

These animal papers and epoxy stickers because...well I have no idea LOL! They just made me smile and I knew I had to have them. I doubt I will scrap with them, but I might make myself some cute little notebooks with my Bind-It-All or something:

And finally - the best thing - Autumn Leaves stamps galore!!! Love, love, love Autumn Leaves stamps and I seem to use them on sooooo many layouts (so a good investment too):

New layout for the doodle class...

I have just finished another layout for the doodle class I'm taking. Though this layout has nothing to do with the class...I just felt like making a layout with some doodles. LOL! Really enjoyed doing this, experimenting with the doodles and colouring them in etc. Layout is done using the "Lola" range by Elsie Flannigan. Doodles are the photocorner, the swirls and the scallops around the journaling block.

Busy, busy, busy day for me. I'm working on my layout class for A Trip Down Memory Lane at the moment. Figure it will at least take me tomorrow also to get it finished. So I'm off to continue...

Just a short post...

Sorry just a short post this evening. I have some more pages from the September book to share. Nearly there! LOL!

More pages done...

Well it's Saturday and I'm having a bad headache (I'm sure it's connected to my sore throat and ear ache) so I can't face any scrapping today. I have been doing some doodling for the class though. In fact, that reminds me... Kathy asked what doodling class I was taking: it's one held over on BPS. I'm not sure if they will run it again, but I would think they might if it's popular enough (which I believe it is!!)

The weather is really miserable outside. Dark, grey and rainy. However I'm going to go out for a little walk after I have posted this to see if some fresh air will help my head.

But first I wanted to post some more pages from the class I'm catching up on from September. So here we go:

Using a sketch...

I very rarely scrapbook using a sketch for my layouts. I don't know why. I guess I just prefer doing my own thing and the freedom of being able to do *anything*. But I found this blog with sketches that are really *me* a while back and yesterday I decided to try one out. This is the result:

Papers are by A2Z, ribbon...I have no idea - it's one I have had for a while, journaling block is by Rhonna Farrer and the white doodles are my own freehand ones.

...and talking of doodles, I thought I could show you some more pages from my practice book which I have done for the class the other day.

Work in progress:

Finished:

I'm also working hard on finishing the class I took by Shimelle. So no doubt I'll be showing you some pages from that during the next few days LOL!

Wishing you all the best weekend possible! :)