Happy Easter Everyone..

Here are a couple of Easter ‘baskets’ (I use the term loosely as they don’t look very baskety to me, but I can’t at the moment think of another word to describe them LOL!!) that I made for Easter Sunday.

I was surprised at how easy these were to make. The only ‘problem’ I had was that the video tutorial I was following was in inches, so I had to keep using an on-line converter to convert the measurements into centimeters for me!!

I left it a bit late to get my Easter Eggs this year, and when I went to eventually buy them they had sold out and all they had left were Kinder Eggs (which thankfully my kids love). So I decided to make these cute little baskets and fill them up with mini eggs, which will get eaten far quicker than one of the big eggs will (past experiences…). I think my kids love the idea of getting the eggs, but then take forever to actually eat all the chocolate, so this will be much better.

This year, following on from the success at Three Kings (Spanish Christmas – Reyes) I am doing an Easter Egg hunt with clues to make it a little more interesting. I thought my kids would be ‘too old’ for this sort of thing, but they loved the ‘treasure hunt’ that I did at Reyes so much they requested another one for Easter.

Hope you like them. I will be posting some cards that I have made whilst I haven’t been blogging soon.

(For some reason, the photo is blurred – so you will have to click on it to enlarge it to see it better – another glitch to iron out!!)

Thanks for stopping by..

For those of you who have followed my blog… well done – unless you use Google Reader you will know that I have been blog challenged lately and have not been updating as regularly as I would like.

I hope to remedy this situation this year and update a little more regularly.  I have also (duh) changed over to WordPress as, whilst surfing blogs I admire, I liked the tabs at the top.  This would then allow me to use the blog for two purposes – Firstly to showcase my cards (which was the original reason for my blogging) and second to be able to communicate and check in with my family and friends…

I hope you’ll continue to support me in my endeavours.

Long time no blog..

Guess I’m just not the type of person who can do all the stuff that Christmas, New Year and Birthdays (all at the same time) requires AND fit in time to create, blog and post. It just didn’t happen for me this year. Hence the long absence!

This means that if I had actually built up a following they (you!) would have all given up checking in for new posts by now and deleted me from their (your) frequent visitor list of blogs. I have about 100 blogs that I check every day, and some days I only get as far as M.. so you are all forgiven for having thought that I must have surely fallen off the top of a mountain somewhere and would never post again..

So, anyway, in other news, I have finally had my Internet connection fixed at home (yay!), so I can’t blame that for lack of posts in the future (insert sheepish look).

I would love to say that whilst I wasn’t blogging I was busy, busy, busy creating lots of cards and photographing them all to post in a continual stream that makes me look really good. I didn’t. I haven’t been anywhere near anything remotely crafty since the beginning of December.

(Here come the excuses..)

You see, every time I read all the great blogs out there, in between all the household chores and the kids being sick and the general hum-drum of life that goes on in all our busy lives, more often than not you will read something along the lines of… ” was able to lock myself away in my craft room ” or “the craft room was a mess but…” or even ” my craft area needed me” or some such (craft room) musings..

Well, I don’t have a craft room (insert wistful/pitiful look) ::sniff, sniff:: I had a desk once, and a printer and a computer.. Then suddenly I had a teenage daughter. (Aha! I hear you all cry – say no more).

For those of you who have ever had to share anything with their teenage daughter – shoes (when did her feet become the same size as mine?). Clothes (although I take offence to them being called the ‘vintage look’). Well, you get the drift..

Try sharing your space with her. I mean, she’s ALWAYS doing her homework!! For crying out loud, when I was her age, I was out doing ’stuff’ – granted to get out of the way of my parents, but still!.. At this rate she’ll qualify for NASA’s training programme before she hits 16. We’re talking solving equations that have more symbols in them than the highway code! I struggle to split the restaurant bill into two – know what I’m saying..? Is there really any need? Where did she even get this studious temperament from? Not me! (OK, maybe a little bit from me, the “have to do it again if it’s not perfect” she might have got from me, I’m not totally sure.. and I can’t even help her with any (OK I wasn’t talking about the maths side of things, for obvious reasons!) because it’s all in Spanish anyway.. Super hard. I can help with the English homework (as long as the words aren’t TOO difficult – thank God for the dictionary and thesaurus – woo-hoo).. Anyway I digress.. (did ya notice??)

So, I can’t get to the space that we ’share’ together because she’s been on school holidays for Christmas and instead of doing what any normal teenager would do, and leave it till the last minute and then study like mad, instead she decided to pace herself and study a bit each day. Unfortunately it always seemed to coincide with the exact moment I would have had half an hour to start on a card.. and anyone who has had a teenager tilt their head, scrunch their brow and say “Oh mum??” (only omitting the stamping of the foot to complete the picture), knows that it is not worth the time or energy it would take to argue with the teenager.

No point in saying that they could actually read the book somewhere else or connect to the Internet on one of the other two computers in the house.. Totally not worth it aggro wise… And even if I spot the desk empty with no signs of any homework type tools anywhere in sight, as soon as I sit down and get the glue box out – poof! as if by magic – the teenager appears demanding to know how long I’ll be. Then she will check back every three minutes to see if I’ve “finished yet?” I’ve come to the conclusion that this is, in fact, a tactic to annoy me (which cunningly works) so that after the first two interruptions in the space of ten minutes, I am lead to think it’s just totally not worth it, and I’ll just come back later. As a testament to this, I have been trying to come back later since the beginning of December.. To add insult to injury, when I then check back in on said teenager later to see if they are nearing the end of their homework so that I can sneak back in for 10 minutes, I find her checking out all the latest on You Tube, and “No sorry – not finished yet”. Then just when I think to myself, ‘ll get in there later, after dinner & the dishes, for 20 minutes before Grey’s Anatomy starts that’s when I get the “Going to bed early – growing kids need their sleep”.. I mean what teenager doesn’t like to goof off, stay up late and generally be a teenager? Not mine. Hence the non-blogging since the beginning of December..

Before you all start feeling sorry for me (you know you do deep down..) I have an eleven year old son, and i totally know he won’t let me down. He is totally going to goof off, stay up late and ignore ALL his homework. I know this because, a) he is a boy and b) he’s already doing it and I don’t think being a teenager is suddenly going to change him for the better..

So do ya feel sorry for me yet? Do ya? Do ya? Do ya? Didn’t think so..

Anyways.. this year I have decided to get more organised. I actually think I’m already pretty organised, but I’m still going to try and take it to the next level. There’s always room for improvement right? I’m also not going to worry so much about not getting stuff done, as I’ve discovered that this is probably what stresses me out the most. Having a concept of what I think should be happening and then being disappointed (stressed ..ahem..) that it doesn’t.. If it happens it happens, if it doesn’t, no biggie (deep breath), which leads me onto the whole point of this post (I know, I know you thought this was just RANDOM blathering!!), Nooooooo, it’s short story long blathering..

This year, I am going to give myself a break and post when I have the time. I started this blog to share what I love to do, but it all got very stressful when I checked out other blogs and realised people were blogging and creating EVERYDAY! Yikes.. Something inside of me (the competitive me, not the normal me) decided that I had to try and keep up, if not with the blogging, with the creating at least! Well the normal me is taking a stand and telling the competitive me that I just can’t do it. For the moment the normal me is winning and the competitive me is sulking.

By the way – you guys realised there are not really two of me right??

So check back later, and see if the competitive me managed to get her way and post anything..

Sorry for the long absence bloggers.

I thought I would post a quick message to let you all know I will be posting again after the New Year when I hope to have my internet connection resolved.

I am also experiencing some problems with blogger – the header has shrunk for no reason and the helpdesk assures me they are ‘looking into it’.

In the meantime – I can still send out the Santa Letters if anyone wants one – just email me.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a Wonderful New Year with your nearest and dearest.

Thanks for stopping by..

Now that Thanksgiving is over (boo-hoo) and Christmas is fast approaching, by a stroke of luck I appear to be slightly ahead of the game (in some ways anyway!)..

I have a collection of ‘Letters from Santa’ that you can send to your little one. It comes with a personalized envelope (from the North Pole) complete with your child’s name on the front..

I have been trying to upload the letter to a free file hosting service, but have had no luck whatsoever with this, and at this rate it will take me until Christmas to figure out how to do it!

So, with this in mind – if anyone would like a Letter from Santa for their child this Christmas, please email me or leave me a comment with an email address so that I can get back to you..

I will send you an email with the letter attached along with the envelope both of which you can print on your own printer at home.. You will need to give me your child’s name so that the letter can be personalised.

I have about 16 different versions for you to print off, ranging from Letters from Santa, from Mrs Claus and from Rudolph. If I could include a link here for you to be able to choose the letter I would (so if anyone knows how to do this let me know!)..

At the moment they are in MS Publisher format. If you are fortunate enough to have MS Publisher installed on your PC, then you are onto a winner as you can have all 16 letters if you want (!) as this is the format I originally set them up in. However, not a lot of peeps have Publisher as standard on their machines and so I will transfer the letter to MS Word on a personal basis for you if this is the only programme you have access to..

Brighten up your little one’s face this Christmas with a personalised letter from Santa – believe me they will love it (and hey it’s something to add to the scrapbook!!)..

A sample of one of the letters is here (well first paragraph anyway – you get the idea!!)..

“Dear (Child’s Name)
Not long from now, I’ll be leaving the North Pole for my long trip on Christmas Eve to visit you. Even though it’s a very long journey, I am looking forward to visiting your town most of all!”

etc etc.. All the letters are different – so contact me – I can’t wait to hear from you all!!

Thanks for stopping by..

Crikey!! I was fed up with my blog background.. There are so many wonderful blogs out there and I like a change every now and again.. So I tried to change it and now it’s all gone wrong and I have lost stuff. Aaaaaaaaggggggghhhhhh..

I still can’t connect at home, so I am trying to sort it all out in my lunchbreak (which is very frustrating!!).. so I’m getting nowhere REAL fast..

I will have to investigate further and try and get back on track – in the meantime – if yours is one of the blogs I stalk on a daily basis, expect and email from me begging for help..

Thanks for dropping by..

Hi everyone – sorry for the long absence. I am having PC problems.. I can’t connect to the internet at home, so I haven’t been able to post.

I have been making cards whilst I have been incommunicado though, so if I don’t manage to get the connection at home remedied soon, I will slip my creations onto a stick and upload them later on in the week..

Thanks for all your kind messages and I hope to be posting real soon!

Thanks for stopping by..

I have received an award from Andrea – the “You make me smile” Award – thank you Andrea – you make me smile too!!

I now have to nominate 10 people. They are:

Beate
Alli
Dana
Jenn
Jen
Michelle
Charmaine
Julee
Lisa
Sophia

thanks for all your support – I am blessed.

Over on Andrea Vernagus‘ website, she is running some blog candy for two three month old twin girls, Madeline and Isabella who have both been diagnosed with cancer and are undergoing treatment for this horrific disease. You can click here to learn more about this amazing family. This is my card for the girls.

Here is my card for Breast Cancer Awareness month. I have used one of the Pink Petticoat images (she’s NOT BELLA!!) LOL!! The background paper that I used at the bottom of the card is from the Artylicious Damask Delights CD from Graphicus. Every single design on this CD (and all the others) are a delight to behold. If you haven’t used CD’s before then you must check out all the Artylicious CD’s by Glenda – you won’t be able to choose you will want them all – I did!! LOL..

The frill is from my local haberdashery shop – years old!! This is also the first card I have shot using my mini macro studio that I made thanks to a link sent to me by Renee from Stamping for Sanity. Thanks Renee!! For any of you who are having trouble photographing your cards so that they look their best, then hop on over to Strobist. It is a blog by a very good photographer who wants to share their wisdom on the advantage of taking photos with good light. This particular tutorial that I have linked is for making the under $10 ’studio’.

I have tried both using the box outside in natural light and inside with the help of a desk lamp, and whilst I am not 100% happy with them just yet (they still keep coming out lop-sided for some reason!), I can honestly say, I am much happier with my photos now than I was when I first started blogging. So progress has been made! I would be interested to know which photo my fellow bloggers prefer – so if you’d like to leave me a comment I would be grateful!! Is it number 1 (at the top) or number 2 (at the bottom).
Thanks for stopping by!