Child's Play DT call

Quick post today - I have only recently discovered the Child's play challenge site - and I really like the look and feel of the challenges they have. So I thought I would give the Dt call a go. The criteria is to make a LO based on this photo.

 

I pulled out an old photo of Matt, far more active as a baby than he is now.... 

Lots of spots and bright colours. Matt had a bubble walker like the one above but he never really liked it, he couldn't sit on it so what's the point??

The DT call finishes in the next day or two - why dont you give it a go? Amd of course Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge is having a DT call as well, come and play!!!

Have a great weekend. xx

Child's Play

I was going to apologise for the lack of posts lately but really, that's life sometimes, different priorities take over and blogging isn't one at the moment. - Unfortunately taps and toilets are... sigh, the joys of a new house - nope, not complaining, just looking forward to getting selections out of the way and the building to begin 0-who knows when, I am so very over our govts at the moment, both local and national.

Anyway, I have been digi scrapping and even have gotten as far as printing out some photos for paper scrapping, just need to add glue!

This is an entry for the sidewalk chalk entry over at Child's Play. I love that digi can recreate such things as chalk on blackboard for a Lo - chalk is one of those items that takes us back to school days I think. Back in the days when it was not questioned when a teacher pegged bits of chalk at you for not paying attention - one threw a duster once, glad I wasn't at the other end of that!

 

This is Henry at the height of his self awarenes of cuteness powers. Quite a few years ago now. 

I participated in a speed scrap over at The Lilypad yesterday, A great long list of things to include and this is what I came up with - quite pleased with it in the end.

 

 

And the finish of my wedding stories today.  I have decided not to bore you with my wedding anymore (the dead cat story and the best man's speech can wait. This is the partial story of one of my closest friends wedding's.

 I was one of four bridemaids, the wedding was in cenrtal NSW, in a small country town where the groom grew up. To say the pre wedding atmosphere and led up events were tense was an understatement. Much as I love my friend (who shall remain nameless) she was quite clingy to her fiance, they did everything togather including getting a job in the same place.  

For the bucks night, the groomsmen had organised a stripper (so tacky I know) and took photos, mostly of the groom looking both reluctact and terrified. The bride saw the photos and took great offence and threatened to call the wedding off. She was soon talked around but was not talking to the grooomen for the duration.

The morning of the wedding and the bride had second thoughts again. To make matters worse, we were at his mother's house, his mother who had made it more than plain that this was not the bride she had chosen for her beloved son, and all the aunties shuffling through the loungeroom staring at us all like we were in a zoo.

Then the hairdresser who was coming from another town was an hour late turning up - she only had five sets of hair to do after all!! She did the brides hair, lovely french plaits, suited the bride and looked timeless. Then she started on us. The two younger sister's refused to go first, so I plunged in. I will admit to complete frustration with everyone involved in the wedding at this stage. 

She did my hair, I wasn't paying much attention except to the clock, we were going to be so late. It was only when the two sister burst into tears and refused to go near her that I realised how awful the hairdo was. She had abandoned the french plaits for the bridmaids and decided on some rolly around the head do. Seriously, violence against her was considered. It was worse then a perm, only slightly better than Princess Leia's hair. But because we were so late, that was it. I turned into a tyrant at that stage and bullied the sisters into sitting down - the cheif bridemaid was in the same frame of mind as me, just get it over and done with! No redoing mine, so the others got slighlty modified varities (with a well timed nose bleed for the hairdresser to add to the whole show) and I pulled strands out to make it less obviuos how awful it was .

(didn't work)

We eventually made it, after a glass or two of champagne and they were happily married. It was a great reception.  The MIL backed off as soon as the deed was done and my friend relaxed completely and no longer felt the need to be tied at the hip.

And a side note - I was actually about 2 weeks pregnent with Matt here - a bit unexpected but makes it easy to remember our friend's anniversary - 20 years last December, still happily married, two boys and living very nearby so we see them all the time.

and sidenote #2, I went with the chief bridemaid and another close friend who was at this wedding to see 27 Dresses and sure enough, a very close replica of ours turned up in the fashion parade - and yes the bride noticed too and had a good laugh. But too be honest, I have seen worse and we doidn't mind it at the time and that's all you can ask for.

All of this of course is in honour of Another Freaking Scrappy challenge this month - scrap your wedding, come and join in, also a Dad's challenge as well. Would love to see your work! And please consider putting in an application for the Design team there - Anne and the other girls are just lovely to work with!

have a good week,xxx.

Apologies

Mostly To Anne, I didn't finish my Lo in time for the latest challenge up at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge, very naughty...

It is now done. The challenge this month is as follows -

Using sketch 11 – Father’s Day is celebrated in June in some countries – scrap a memory of your father or grandfather, or another male who has influenced your life greatly.

Using this sketch:

We also want to challenge you all to increase the numbers of people playing along with our challenges.  More people playing along means more fun, more friends and more inspiration!  So, if you convince a friend to play along in either of our challenges this month. tell them to let us know either in their blog posting or in a comment on this blog posting that you sent them to play along.  Your name will be entered for each referral you send for a chance to win our guest designer spot.   Yes, each referral you send is one more chance. And of course, each layout you enter in our challenges this month is one more chance at the guest DT spot.

 This is my Dad, happily speaking at his 80th birthday party last year. There is no problem getting Dad to speak at functions - getting the microphone back from him can sometimes be an issue..

So come and play - in Australia, Father's day isn't until the 1st Sunday of the month (usually coinciding with my birthday) so get your Father's present done early!

  And not forgetting the ongoing theme of my Wedding stories.

Today is ME!

I have been known top suffer panic attacks in crowds and when I am the centre of attention. Hmm my wedding, what could possibly go wrong???

I started feeling a bit odd when the photo session started - In the car on the way there (see previous post) my request to go around the block, I was definitely feeling a touch faint. Dad practically hauled me down the aisle, I stopped on the way to pat my bridesmaid's new baby - everyone thought I was just enjoying the moment - little did they know that it was just a stalling technique (not very good one). When I got to Geoff he looked at me and asked how I was feeling, I looked a little pale.

"Not the best, I can only see black, is that bad??"

"ummm, possibly"

"Ok, need to sit down NOW!! or Fresh air - need to go outside -why didn't we have an outdoors wedding???"

Luckily Mum and one of my other friends saw what was happening and rushed me outside, much to the delight of the crowds outside (something interesting - is she running out??)

To my shame, I blamed Mum quite loudly for making me wear layers of petticoat and a restricting bra (never mind that she actually had nothing to do with these choices - my fault..).

After a few big breaths I was fine and walked back in again. The priest decided readings, sermons, in fact most of the service was unnecessary and was all done and dusted less than 10 minutes later. Shortest Catholic wedding ever (the guests were impressed - and a little grateful).

Good thing I didn't have to make a speech or a repeat performance would have occurred at the reception.

I knew the my Nan had made my Mother throw up before she put her wedding dress on because she was that way inclined during high stress events. And then dad told me later that he also suffered panic attacks in crowds when he was younger - what hope did I have?? 

I will admit a similar thing happened a couple of years later during my graduation ceremony, but I just had to sit by myself for a while and still manged to get my award.

Everyone still talks about our wedding - memorable it was...

have a great day

PS went and saw The Avengers last night with Meaghan. Such a fun movie - cannot wait for the next one...

 

Brightest Lo ever...

For me anyway. But it is the 70's and it is ABBA - who always loved a bit of flare!!

Have found a new (for me) digi challenge site - Digi Dares and this weeks guest designer is Amy Wolff whose work I have been known to use over at The Lilypad.

All of the elements are from The Lilypad as well.

And who can resist scrapping about childhood crushes - not me certainly...

And none were bigger for me than ABBA - I had all their albums and still know all the words off by heart. My brother was enormously annoyed when Money, Money , money was #1 for so many weeks, keeping David Dundas (Baby makes her Blue Jeans talk) to #2.

And the heart rending The Winner takes it All, the most tragic film clip ever...

 I never got to see them live but I have been to a couple of cover band concerts - so much fun.

Ok onto Wedding tale no 2 (in honour of AFSC for the month of June)

The Wedding Car

My younger brother was still living in my home town, where we were to be married. Could he help in any way??  "no worries - I will organise the Wedding Cars - it'll be great...'

Ok, morning of the wedding an old white Jag turns up - looks OK - on the outside at least, best not mention the inside. My eldest brother, designated driver of this car (police rank of Seargent at the time) looks at it and enquires - how reliable is it?

Hmm, not so sure says the owner (not known for his reliability), haven't filled the tank in a while, actually haven't driven it in a while -oh by the way - it's NOT REGISTERED.  eep.

OK...

Eldest brother makes decision, it's only around the block to the church,and a bit over a kilometre to the reception. We'll risk it. My request to go around the block twice to calm my nerves (more of that next time) was rejected outright - quite tersely for some unknown reason (hey, not my fault I would have been happy to walk). He declared it the biggest pile of junk he had ever driven and considering his personal car history including one Datsum Leyland that only drove once before dying - that was some statement. He needed a few ales to calm his somewhat jangled nerves.

We made it and ended up taking our own car back to the motel, The Jag got left in the reception car park.

And Rob (youngest brother) will never be allowed to forget. He claims total victory though as we never ran out of petrol (failing to mention the illegal status though).

So come and join us At Another Freaking Scrappy challenge with your own wedding tales, lots of fun.

oh and one last scrap page I did for my friend Alicia who recently had a gorgeous baby boy.

which gave me the perfect excuse to use this kit by Sahlin Studio. so cute.

Have fun day. xx

seriously slack..

Ok, haven't been blogging for a while, just too lazy at the moment - sigh. But I have been doing quite a lot of digi scrapping, seems to be easier for me to manage that paper scrapping lately - I will get back to it now though as we have unexpected time on my hands (plans knocked back, don't ask, still living with cardboard boxes everywhere...).

Anyway, I have been playing, and come up with this for Get Creative. The challenge is too use the sun somewhere in your Lo. My sun is more a crocheted doily but the sun is implies (I think). We'll go with that anyway...

 

This was the summer that never was. The kids braved Nan and Pop's pool purely because it was January not due to any great temperatures. I did not.

 And last week we had high winds, it was really pretty scary when surrounded by trees you know are going to be removed within weeks. This one was rotten and we were lucky that it fell exactly between the fenceline and the power lines.  Very much looking forward to the day the rest of it is removed!

 

And lastly the freebie template over at Sahlin Studios is up for this month. Such a good way to get into digi scrapping and I love the way this one has turned out.


I am now off knitting patterns (I cannot beat the chicken holding man from my last post so I shall not try) and in honour of the wedding theme happening at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge, I shall attempt to entertain you with stories from my wedding (part1).

The Divorce.

Because where else would you start a wedding tale?

One of Geoff' sister's (who it has to be said, insists on being the centre of attention no matter what) decided that our wedding morning would be the perfect time to leave her husband and tell her family. Not leave it for, say the next day, to let them enjoy our wedding, or even the week before to let them get used to the idea - no that would be too much. Not saying she should have stayed with him but her timing could have been slightly more thoughtful.

Geoff's mother came up to him half way through the night and told him that she had something very serious to discuss with him later but didn't want to ruin the wedding by telling him now - hmmm a bit too late...

It has to be said my family were thoroughly enjoying themselves. very loudly (and maybe quite drunkenly) and the contrast to Geoff's family table was obvious for all to see.

Whatever honeymoon we had planned (nothing major thank goodness) was then taken over by his sister as we had to gather all her belongings and move her, her 1yo and her dog to live with her mother. We left all our wedding presents behind at Mum and Dad's (only a six hour drive from our place) to accommodate her. Matt threw up on her (and I gave a silent cheer..).

Did I mention the ex husband was violent and had access to guns?  

Am I bitter about the whole thing years later - hell yes! But it adds another layer to our wedding tales.

To even it up, one of our friends met his future wife on the way to our wedding and they now have two very cute kids as well. We'll claim that one!

Funnier tales form the wedding next time (involving dead cats, passing out, illegal wedding cars to name a but a few).

A wedding Lo and something special for Lizzy!

I just spent half an hour on this post and it disappeared on me so you are now getting the shortened version...

Over at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge, their is love in the air - wedding theme time

.June is a popular month for weddings – how about scrapping yours?? If you have not married, scrap a photo of you as a child and how you dreamed it would be for you when you married.  If that does not suit you, then scrap your parents wedding, or someone close to you.

 

( And I know June is not a wedding month here in Canberra unless you love knitted dresses and furs, but it is a great time to stay inside and scrap..)

This is the first wedding photo of mine that I have scrapped. In my first post I had a long winded (but funny) account of all that happened at our wedding, it had marriage breakups, new  beginnings, me passing out (!!) to name a few but now it will have to wait for the full version on future Lo's , will become a series I think....

And now on special request from Lizzy, who loves her knitting pattern man eye candy. I have asked Geoff which one of these he prefers and he thinks he is needing both, although we both are in love with the second one -

Sigh - What is a man without a chicken??

And on a happy note, I was chosen in the top 5 at Lasting Memories this week - they are a lovely bunch of ladies I have to say!!