Sunday Scrapbooking: July Project Life

I have loads of Project Life spreads to share. These are from July when a certain baby turned one and we threw him a pirate party.

Since my talented sister, Gem, was taking the photos I kept the layouts simple to just keep the focus on the stunning photos.

These were some of the first spreads that I did and I didn't have much product so I just tried to find any black, white or red cards from the few part kits I had.

This stamp was a great find in the £1 bin at Hobbycraft and I used it for a lot of the small touches at the party - like the napkins and signs on the buffet table.

I used wrapping paper and some of the larger Project Life cards to fill these bigger pockets. This is my least favourite size to work with but I had purchased the variety pack and these are what I had left to work with! 

Again stamping was the main embellishment and I used it to provide minimal journalling to enhance and tell the story of the day.

The front side of the top layout and a similar approach. I included the invite to tell some of the details of the day.

Lastly the helium balloons which helped everyone to find our house as we had just moved a month prior to the party. 

A close-up of the smartie cookies which were a hit on the day - again thanks to my talented sister Gemma.

So that is my Sunday scrapbooking shared and in the meantime I will bask in smugness that I have actually managed 23 days of blogging in a row. What have you been creating lately?

52 Saturdays: Birthday celebrations!

Today we headed into a very festive looking Leeds. We instantly regretted it when the crowds were closing in on us and I had run into too many peoples' feet with the pushchair! Who goes into town so close to the big event?

However, as shopping was not our purpose we headed to the top floor of Harvey Nichols to our fav lunch spot in Leeds. The Belgian got to chose where we were eating as it was his birthday and so He chose Yo Sushi, a firm fav of ours (cue link to previous blog post and layout) and it helped that when you sign up online you get a third off voucher on your birthday. 

We treated ourselves to dish after dish and some filling miso soup for a very reasonable price. The Baby had pineapple and mango coconut water and plain noodles. He also enjoyed playing with the emdame beans and charming all of the ladies in the queue. As usual! He was also a lot happier out of his highchair and sat on a big seat next to daddy.

Afterwards we went to check out the Lidl outside of town as I keep seeing gorgeous kitchen toys that I am after for a certain Baby's stocking. However they weren't stocking them and so we just indulged in some of their Christmas treats. The chocolate Santas are for celebrating Saint Nicholas on the 6th.

When we arrived home the Baby pottered around. Played with some at dough and sensory bits and watched the footy with daddy.

Then dinner time, bath and bed so that mummy and daddy can watch some Netflix and do some sofa surfing! 

Did you brave the shops today? I have decided that I will only Christmas shop on my days off or online!

Friday Five: Five Happy Memories with the Belgian

In the spirit of Friday Five and the fact that it is the Belgians' birthday I will list five happy memories we have shared together:

1)  Night markets, sunset cocktails, lots of noodles (even for breakfast), five star glamour, karaoke and sight seeing on honeymoon in Malaysia

2) Dodging jellyfish, eating lots of delicious ice-cream, historic tours and our yellow bus setting on fire on holiday in Malta

3) A Californian road trip: three weeks of huge portions, town hopping, kayaking with tiger sharks, staying in some questionable motels, climbing the steep streets of San Fran and Jelly Belly World

4) A romantic mini break in the historic town of Budapest with visits to the night market, lots of selfies and lots of lounging around in saunas

5) Him holding our little baby is his arms for the first half an hour of his life whilst I was being sewn up. You were so supportive and he was the most gorgeous baby either of us had ever seen!

Happy birthday to a great husband and father!

Difference between men and women...

So tonight I had parents evening (yeah I know on my day off!) and so the Belgian was in charge of dinner, bath and bed time all on his own. 

I arrived back at 8:30 and can you imagine what I found?

The top picture shows the bath which had toys everywhere and was still full of bubbles. 

The Babies' clothes were strewn across the floor along with a just stepped out of wet nappy.

Dinner dishes were strewn across the kitchen along with a half eaten pizza.

Toys littered the floor in a car, block and duplicate explosion.

 The Belgian was no-where to be seen, but was finally found asleep in bed.

Who says that men can't multi task?

Workspace Wednesday: Favourite Product

So I turned to the #blogvember guru to help me stay on track with blogging every day in November. The prompt was your favourite product right now. Since I am no fashion or beauty blogger I shied away from sharing any fabulous make-up or beauty products. (Let's be honest half te time I use Johnsons baby shampoo as it's all we have in the house and whatever moisturiser is on special at the supermarket!)

So in my crafty time lately I have been loving my Heidi Swapp Interchangable stamp. It is perfect for adding a little sentiment to project life cards or adding embellishments to layouts.

I have mainly been using it just to stamp on a card but have also stamped and then cut around it and added it to a layout with a pop dot to add dimension. I can imagine embossing the image wod work quite well and you could even try stamping in a different colour if you don't mind getting too fiddly with it.

At first I wasn't getting a perfect image, but then I found this video and found the tips very helpful. 

What is the one crafting product you are loving lately? What is the one you could not love without? 

Cake smash step by step layout

So what is more shocking - that I have blogged every day in November so far or that I produced an actual scrapbook layout?

Bit of both I guess. But I had some time on my hands (umm...not really) and love, love, love this photo from the Baby's first birthday (which I still need to blog about actually!) of his cake smash. He really got involved. I love the pose and the wrinkled nose and the conviction of this shot.

He is his mother's son for sure.

I was also inspired by the gorgeous layers on this layout and so I cracked out a 12 by 12 pad and got building.

I started with this bright yellow polka dot print as it reminds me of the sunshine that day...

I built some layers with other papers and washi tape and a day of the week sticker.

I repeated the date stamp and the 'SO SWEET' stamp in alternate black ink and coloured ink.

I inked all of the edges to make it pop and built some more texture in with the wood veneers.

I added the photo with pop dots and built some more layer by cutting the sentiment out of a 12 by 12 sheet.

I added a banner and the number 1 in blue polka dot - both cut out from one of his birthday cards.

There you have it a layout created in about thirty minutes and I might be reverting back. Or switching it up a bit more. After all you can't create such impressive layers in Project Life can you?

Me on a Monday

It was a woolly hat wearing, soft playing with gusto, rejecting the toddler section, forcing mummy to follow me down the rainbow slide, meeting up with a friend for a play date, daddy sanding doors, watching series ten of Grey's Anatomy, church attending, lovely Sunday lunch at our friends house with lots of yummy roast potatoes, book marking and target setting and cookie gorging kind of a weekend!

And how was yours?

52 Saturdays...

Today started with a lovely lie in for mummy whilst my two boys went for an early morning swim. Breakfast was toast and pancakes for the Baby - swimming always makes you hungry. I did some dishes and other fun jobs like laundry. 

I built the bricks into towers and he pulled them apart whilst daddy had a snooze. We played with his cars and trucks. He loves anything with wheels nowadays. 

The baby napped for a record two and a half hours. I made a scrapbook page of his first birthday after being inspired by Jill Sprott's colourful and vibrant layout. 

The Belgian and I had pumpkin soup and salt and pepper crusted white bread. Then he headed to the garage with he sander whilst the Baby and I headed off on a play date.

We ended up at a huge soft play centre and the Baby was in his element diving and climbing and dancing and driving and whizzing down the slides head first!

We had hot dogs and baked potatoes for tea. We read some books and then had bath time where the Baby decided it was fun to throw all his toys out of the bath! He was pointing to the sink and making noises and I realised he wanted his toothbrush. I wouldn't say he brushes his teeth but he likes sucking on it!

The Belgian and I pigged out on donuts and Chips Ahoy popcorn cookies whilst watching three episodes of Greys Anatomy in a row.

How did your Saturday look?

Five Thoughts on Project Life

1) Washi tape is everything

2) Repetative stamping is a simple and effective way to embellish 

3) Cutting up 12 by 12 papers makes great cards as you never get enough of the big ones in a kit

4) Orange, grey and black is a great colour combo

5) Simple is best

#Pinwin

 

Are you addicted to pinning?

Do you find yourself spending your creative time just pinning things for the future?

Do you never get around to actually making all the things you pin?

Do you ever make anything you pin?

So, most of the time my answer to all these questions is yes, yes, no, no but today was a Pinterest win as I actually made two of the things I pinned.

1) This delicious pumpkin cheesecake trifle as we had friends for dinner and pumpkin purée aplenty in the freezer. It's my kind of dessert as it was largely whipping and assembling. Try it! You'll like it! If you like pumpkin...if not don't follow my Pumpkin Everything board.

2) On my Fun for Toddlers board I pinned lots of baby sensory activities so today I raided the stationary section of our local Asda Home and got some stash. We had fun creating monsters - even if the Baby got distracted trying to eat the googly eyes!

Have you had any #pinwins recently?

Wicked Wednesday: Brownie Brat!

I turn my back for one second and discover my sixteen month old

just casually hanging out on the table with a brownie for breakfast.

What's the problem mum?

_________________________________

Linking up with the lovely Brummy Mummy for #wickedwednesdays

Where we live

So we recently moved to a new town and although it is only ten minutes up the road it wasn't a place we had explored much. 

So it's been fun finding and trying out the new shops, cafés and parks. Since the Baby is now allergic to his pram we've started taking him on Sunday walks in the forest behind our neighbourhood. 

He loved exploring in his little wellies and splashing in the puddles. It got dark very quickly and was quite marshy and so he had to be carried some of the way. He gets quite heavy nowadays! 

There is a railway track running alongside the forest and the Baby likes to listen to the trains going past. He likes picking up sticks and banging the bushes. 

We got photo photobombed by a dog! The baby is very curious about dogs but gets a bit scared when they bark at him. He likes them from a distance shall we say. Similar to his mother!

Where do you like to spend your Sunday afternoons?

Me on a Monday

It's been an up at the crack of dawn, super organised and prepared for a big pressure day at work, obsessed with target grades, pushing, coaxing, encouraging, offering baby wipes to a Year 10 boy with his girlfriends lipstick, literally, on his collar and this question from a Year 7, "can I draw someone being hung?" Gorging on custard filled donuts and a peruse round the supermarket as a special treat for a stressful day at work. Then back to the grind with marking and planning. Roll on my day off... This cheeky face at bath time helped a lot!

One Photo Twenty Words

Have you ever seen the Friends episode where Joey wears all of

Chandler's clothes?

Turns out the Baby has too.

__________________________

Linking up with the lovely Abi over at Creating Paper Dreams

52 Saturdays

I saw a really cute notebook / diary in the gorgeous stationary department at Salts Mill called 52 Saturdays. I was racking my brains over who I could buy it for. When I realised sadly that I just wanted it for myself.

It made me think though that Saturdays are so rare and precious that they should be recorded. Imagine if I had documented my Saturdays in my single days compared to nowadays with my little family. How different they would be?

So today started with a lie in. Normally the Belgian takes the Baby swimming at 8. So after I've packed their swimming things I get to go back to bed. No swimming today but I did lie in till 9.30 and woke to a freshly cooked pain au chocolate. Ohh la la!

The Belgian did some web surfing whilst I  finished last nights dishes and cleaned the kitchen. I built towers for the Baby to pull down and we played with his favourite thing right now...cars.

We made play dough monsters with some autumnal coloured sensory play. He started eating the sequins and tipping the tray up so we put it out of reach for a while. 

He napped 12.30-1.30 then had cream cheese on toast, pear as raisins for lunch. During nap time I made a start on my mountain of marking and planning. I  being observed fake Ofsted style on Monday and needed the peace and quiet to get my head round things.

We tried a new cafe in the next town for lunch. It's Italian and the Belgian had a panini and I had a flat bread pizza. We were really impressed as it's all cooked fresh to order and you can choose three of your own toppings. They also had different drinks like San Pelligrini which makes a nice change from the usual. The Baby had a chocolate milk in a glass bottle and drank from a straw and looked very grown up. I didn't take any pictures as we were so hungry. I will be back though and may do a review of it for fellow Leeds folk.

We wondered round the charity shops with the Baby holding both our hands, again so very grown up. 

We headed home and just chilled for a bit. The Belgian and the Baby skyped his grandparents in Bruges whilst I baked some pumpkin and cream cheese puffs with some pastry that needed using up. They were pretty tasty.

The Belgian and the Baby headed out, with the pastries, for a fireworks display and bonfire at our friends house. We rescued the baby carrier my dad used for me from our garage so that the Baby wouldn't go near the bonfire! 

Cinderella stayed home and did more planning and marking with several episodes of Parenthood on in the background. I seriously love that programme and it routinely makes me cry. As does marking and planning, but in an entirely different way!

My boys returned home later than arranged and I my momma heart was upset to hear that my little baby screamed for the whole display. I felt guilty, like I should have been there, or he should have been wearing ear muffs! 

I snuggled with him and read him a few stories before putting him to bed. The Belgian and I watched x-factor with Brie sandwiches and cooking chocolate. Cos you know sometimes a girl just needs some and it's all your have in the house!

What has your Saturday looked like?