LOAD 213 Bloghop

Hey there - you found me!!! I've got to say I'm just a tad intimidated and very proud to be following on from our very own Scrapper on the Street - the fabulous Dani! She is sooooo cool - if you are new to LOAD - you are going to love her daily videos and I know she has something extra special lined up for us this time - which I am super excited about!!!  Anyway Im going to stop being starstruck and say a huge big - Welcome to LOAD 213!!! Well OK we havent actually  started yet and it is 7 sleeps before we do - but I have to ask - Are you excited yet? Have you been shopping yet? Are you like me ............. hoping to make a dent in that stash mountain? Are you thinking that unless you do LOAD, and maybe a few more classes, its going to take several lifetimes to shift all the stash you have been hiding all over your craft space already? Hey! no innocent 'who me' looks - I can see that mountain from here, love that collection pack and sticker sheet just behind you by the way!!!!! Do you have a massive pile of photos ready? Is your freezer groaning because you have been cooking for weeks - so you don't have to cook during LOAD? Great!!!!!!! YOU ARE AMONG FRIENDS!!!!!! 

But just a minute - what's that - You're worried you wont keep up!  You're worried your pages wont be perfect! And was that somebody in the back who hasn't read THE BOOKS ..................... Ooops me too!!! Well we'll just stay in our craft rooms an extra hour and give ourselves a scrapping detention - shall we????? Seriously .... Are you just putting yourself under too much pressure?


Does every page have to be a masterpiece?   NO
Does every page have to use the latest products?  NO
Does every page have to take all day to complete?   NO NO NO NO NO!!!


Sooooo, lets just PAUSE A MOMENT, lets just have little reality check shall we? The theme of this LOAD is Scrap Happier! The thing is, we are all here to check out of our crazy lives for a little time, every day for one month, to do something we love doing and have a good time!!!! Its really really that simple!!! You can even break the rules,  Lain hasn't expelled me from Scrap Happy, or  stopped joining in this or future LOADS on account of my being a rebel! Well not yet at least!!! So the first thing to do, is take off all the pressure you have been putting yourself under - grab your favourite drink, comfy chair, deep breath ......................breathe out .................... hmmmmmm and again ...................... ok and RELAX - EZ VOUS!!! Doesn't that feel better? 

Right hold onto that calmer mindset - You've signed up for LOAD, so that Lain can inspire you to scrap more, and for one month (and its the shortest one of the year),  we are going to be thinking about our......................

Mondays        GOALS
Tuesday         RELATIONSHIPS
Wednesday   SCRAPBOOKING 
Thursday       THE WORLD AROUND YOU
Friday            SENSES
Saturday       ALL ABOUT YOU
Sunday          POSSESSIONS

You will scrap things you never imagined you would scrap, and in ways you never imagined you would scrap them! We all love encouragement - so visit the gallery upload photos of your completed layouts and please leave some love for other members of the group! You don't have to leave a comment on every LO - but I love to look at how others have interpreted the prompt anyway - and because I always get a ton of inspiration from my uber talented fellow LOADsters - I also love to jot down ideas to scraplift. Im big on sketches but I always add a note of whose work it is, so that if I upload it here or anywhere else - I can properly credit the person who inspired me -  which only seems fair really!!!

OK so preparation wise I shared what I do during the last blog hop - you can find it here if you weren't around last time or just want to refresh you memory! There's a ton of links to other good stuff too - if you have a little free time in the next week to browse!!!!
http://scrappinginsingapore.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/scrap-happy-load-blog-hop-1012.html

If you don't achieve the upload every day - don't worry! I haven't yet and this is my Third LOAD!! Although on my first LOAD I did manage to do a LO every day!!! I'm unlikely to win any prizes - but the motivation for me is getting more pages done than I would without LOAD. I'm looking forward to  spending the next month with you all, and that is what will make my scrapping happier!!! I cant wait to see what you do and look forward to seeing you in the gallery and on the message boards!!!! And just remember - it really isn't supposed to be stressful - your doing LOAD for fun!!!! Thanks for stopping by - please come again and visit soon!!!! Missing you already - I'll see you on the message boards because I really dont think I can last 7 sleeps before we are able to hang out together!!!!

Heather Dubarry: http://noexcusescrapbooking.com

Alison Day: http://adayinthelifeor5.blogspot.com/

Danielle Taylor: http://scrapperonthestreet.com You came from here

Alison Charlton: http://scrappinginsingapore.blogspot.com/ You are here now!

Christy Strickler: http://myscrapbookevolution.blogspot.com/ You are heading to Christie next!!!!

Lynnette Nagle: http://sassyscrapper2010.blogspot.com/

Julie Shepler: www.sheplerfamily.com

Joy McHargue: http://www.studiowowjoy.com/

Kelli Panique: http://scrapbookgirl71.com/

Cathy Holiday: pikespeakscrapper.blogspot.com

Leslie Smith: http://lcsmithsaved-outofthemire.blogspot.com/

Lori Martin: http://Www.chaosandcraziness.com/   <<<<<<<<<<------- website change!

Connie Hanks: http://ClickyChickCreates.wordpress.com

Betsye Erazo: betsyerose.blogspot.com

Marcia Fortunato: mfortunato.blogspot.com

Regina Huminski: http://ginabeth1.blogspot.com/

Beth Soler: http://www.scrappingwonders.com

Kristie Sloan: http://kristiesloan.com/blog/

Danielle Hun<scraphappier slide-1.jpg>

PPP - and Im Distressed!!!

OK this is the last distressed LO I have done for this prompt and I think its my favourite of the party so far!!!!! It only took me 45 minutes too!!  I used cool dawn colours and a flash or orange to tell the story of Wat Arun - The Temple of the Dawn in Bangkok - Not only did I use another 'Say it With Crystals' embellishment on this one, I also used half a pack of special Prima flowers too! Im not sure what came over me!!!!!

 

PPP - Still Partying!!!!

Im really enjoying this class and today I had another moment of  pure magic - to some people this might come as a total shock, but today I actually let myself use some of my extra special stash (and not just a bit - this was a serious stashbusting level of special stash usage). If you havent read Shimelle's story about the Special Paper you can check it out here http://www.shimelle.com/paper/261/the-story-of-the-special-paper/ Well I have the same thing with my extra special Prima supplies and bits of vintage jewellery I got to go on Layouts - I love them still - but I love them so much I couldnt bring myself to put them on a layout  - until today that is!!!!

Ive been working on a distress theme in PPP the last day or so, and I have made two LO's - both about my Aunt, who is now 87 - please dont tell her I told you - she doesnt act, look or feel a day over 65! Anyway I want to do a scrapbook about her as part of my heritage album collection and have decided it would be fab if she would do the journalling on the pages for me! When I go back to England next Im going to take the almost completed pages for her to do, and Im hoping she'll agree!

When it comes to distressing I love the work of Nic Howard - she is the queen of distressing and shabby chic as far as Im concerned - you can find her here http://nichoward.typepad.com/my_weblog/ so my first page was an exercise in me getting in back in touch with my distressing tools and toys and breaking out a few new things! I actually sprayed glimmer mist on both of these LO's - Im normally too scared - but my all but forgotten bottle of sand glimmer mist has been shaken up more than a two year old on a trampoline - and used as intended - thats real progress!!!


So here's the first LO - Auntie's wedding photo from 1951! Please note the extra special flower bottom right -

Today however I looked over Nic's gallery on her blog, and scraplifted her Love - Friends LO from her 2012 gallery - I used Prima Paper, Prima flowers, a WHOLE say it with crystals embellishment and some bits of vintage jewellery - as a tribute to May Flaum's tatoo (dont ask) suffice it to day it was part of the prompt :lol: She's certainly a lot braver than me!

So, on to LO two! To be honest, if this layout was any more distressed it would be on the phone to the Samaritans! I really like this one - I even took the photo in my posh vintage 12 x 12 frame on the balcony rather than just on my desk! I should definitely do this more often!!! This photo is from about 1930 - and is of my mum's two older sisters!

 Seriously a WHOLE say it with crystals on one LO - I might need to lie down a while!!!!

As an homage to Nic, I added a tag which is also very very distressed too!

Other LO's I have done in the last day or so, are a combination of dots and stripes  so if you'd like to take a peek - they are right here! Im busy gearing up for LOAD as well at the moment, so hope my scrapping mojo keeps on the go until the end of February - I wonder how many more LO's I'll have done by then?

PPP The Story so Far!

I love Shimelle's classes and have taken a ton of them! If you are the only scrapbooker who hasnt met her yet you can find her at Shimelle.com! Im busy doing her Pretty Paper Party class at the moment and Im loving it! Its fair to say Im not a fast scrapper by anybody's standards - Im the girl who can go to a crop and make nothing more than a mess! Last night something amazing happened through the jetlag - I scrapped 10 pages in 4 hours!!!!! Now for some that might not be remarkable, but for me that is completely unprecedented - wanna take a peek - they are all below!!!!!

Your Story Matters Bloghop

Welcome welcome welcome to my little corner of cyberspace in beautiful sunny Singapore!!!!  Im thrilled to take part in this bloghop to celebrate the creation of Your Story Matters - which is now available for purchase and immediate download - there is even an introductory discount and I'll tell you how to make sure to get that, when you pick up your copy of the e-book before Monday 21st January 2013. So please read on and dont miss out!!!!

As a scrapbooker and genealogist I know that everybody's story matters to somebody, so I was thrilled to take part in this scrapbooking inspiration project recently, with some incredibly talented ladies in the ScrapHappy community (http://www.scraphappy.org/). The end result of this collaborative project is a fabulous book Your Story Matters with 55 amazing pages of scrapping inspiration brought together by Danielle Taylor and Lain Ehman.

I truly believe that everybody has a book inside of them, or at least one scrapbook album! I'm sad when I hear people say that there is nothing about their lives that people would find interesting or nothing they feel future generations would like to know about them! I would love to know what things I have inherited from my ancestors and would love to know more about them and their lives, and how different their lives were from mine - as a scrapbooker who wouldn't?

Although I scrapbook all the time and I love recording details of the places we visit and the things we do, like most scrappers, I sometimes I get scrappers block, and that's when I'll be looking at Your Story Matters because there is a ton of inspiration in there to wake up my scrapping mojo and get my scrapbooking back on track over and over again!

There are a whole host of themes and ideas beautifully and thoughtfully put together, and a fair number of pages that you might never have thought to scrap! My page was about a guilty pleasure - and it could so easily have been a page about chocolate, lie in's, or watching trashy TV, having a pedicure or buying shoes or handbags and I could probably fill an album or three with those guilty pleasures alone, but my greatest guilty pleasure is time out with my husband! We don't get a lot of time when we can slip away, take off somewhere lovely and just relax together - like many people life is hectic and busy - our family and three children live on the other side of the world - they come here or we visit as often as we can, my husband works long hours, there is always  something we feel we should be doing, and its rare that we get chance to have a couple of days away just the two of us - but just occasionally we do manage it and when we do its magic and we feel totally indulgent and spoilt - the ultimate guilty pleasure for us - so that's what I scrapped! I'm sure in time I'll get to the chocolate and handbag stories too! 

As well as the themes of the pages, I love the different styles the other contributors have used - Im going to be scraplifting page layouts and turning them into sketches for sure - there's plenty to keep my creative juices flowing, and of course throughout Lain challenges you to create your own take on the theme - in the way that only she can - dont miss your chance to  pick up a copy of Your Story Matters for only $5.00 USD before midnight on Monday!

Getting your copy of Your Story Matters couldnt be simpler - just head to http://www.layoutaday.com/ysmebook/ Go to the bottom of the page and add the book to your cart! The introductory price is $7.00 USD but if you hurry and purchase by 21 January you can pick up an extra special $2.00 USD discount by using the discount code HOP and updating your cart before checking out! 

Better still - leave a comment for your chance to pick up a copy ABSOLUTELY FREE!!! Three lucky people will be chosen from comments posted across the blogs taking part in the bloghop. All you have to do to have a chance of winning is to leave a comment to tell us which story you feel  its essential for every scrapbooker to document by 19th January. The winners will be announced on the layoutaday blog on Monday 21st January and must be claimed by Wednesday 23rd January? Oh and if you win the prize and you have already purchased - not a problem, Lain will simply refund your payment!

Thanks so much for visiting my blog - please feel free to come back anytime - or subscribe - you're always welcome here if you feel the need a little sunshine or inspiration! Dont forget to leave that comment to be in with a chance of your FREE copy of Your Story Matters - you can do it now in the comments section below, before you head off to see Heather!!! Good luck and thanks for stopping by!!!!

Just so you know where you've been, where you are and where you are going next..........

Lain Ehmann: http://layoutaday.com

Leslie Smith: http://lcsmithsaved-outofthemire.blogspot.com/

Alison Charlton: http://scrappinginsingapore.blogspot.com/  You are here now!

Heather Dubarry:  noexcusescrapbooking.com  You are going to Heathers blog next!

Danielle Hunter: http://ecoscrapbook.blogspot.com

Cathy Holiday: http://pikespeakscrapper.blogspot.com/

Monica Bradford: http://scrapinspired.com/

Alison Day:  http://adayinthelifeor5.blogspot.ca/

Paivi Eerola: www.peonyandparakeet.com

Lynnette Nagle: sassyscrapper2010.blogspot.com

Kelli Panique: http://scrapbookgirl71.com/

Danielle Taylor: http://scrapperonthestreet.com

JYC 2012 - Remaining Pages!

Gosh Happy New Year - where did the last month go? On a bright note - not only did I manage to do JYC but it was finished on 7 January and covers the period up to 6th January - so Im feeling quite pleased with myself!!!! I also achieved my goal of using more photographs this year too!

My last post on the blog was the LO for 15th December, and the biggest lesson learned for JYC 2012 is not to head back to the UK so late - I left myself too much to do and ran out of time - I threw out our old and tatty tree last January in a fit of decluttering and by the time I got back to the UK this year - there were only the bald and puny ones left in the real tree department and the artificial trees that were left were of the tacky variety so we did without!!! On the bright side we did catch up with all of the family - but very few friends - again largely due to the fact that we didnt have enough time!

So here are the remaining pages from JYC 2012


As a child I used to always go to the local Panto with my Auntie - it gave me a lifelong love of live theatre! Im not sure who enjoyed it most me or her - but its a very happy childhood memory and I journalled about the excitement of going to the theatre and the thrill of a live performance!!!!

This year was not my most organised Christmas - somehow I really never caught up with myself - so my note to self for next year reads - GET ORGANISED EARLIER! You might need to remind me of that nearer the time - OK?

Food does feature pretty large in our Christmases! I have gained 3 kg somehow! Im hoping most of it is fluid retention after a long flight back from the UK to Singapore - then again, it could be three weeks of bacon croissants for breakfast and a ton of chocolate I ate on the basis that I needed the extra calories to keep warm - which clearly I didnt!!!!

On the 19th I talked about Santa and the thrill my son had when he was sure he saw a flash of red disappearing as he carefully descended the stairs as a three year old too many years ago! Oh the joy of having a child around who believes!!!!

My DH and I had our Christmas on 20th as we were apart for Christmas Day itself, he collects stamps and this year I bought him a penny black - he was thrilled with it - unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of it in the excitement of seeing him open it!!!

A special treat - I flew back to the UK and did my first trip on the A380 in Business Class - which was a very pleasant experience!!!!

I have had much kindness shown to me this Christmas - but my son's decision to spend Christmas with me and my Aunt as my husband wasnt going to be there was simply the best news I could have had as I headed back to the UK!

After Singapore the UK in the middle of winter was positively arctic! I headed up North on 23rd to pick up my Aunt, drop off presents and then drove back home and got warm as quickly as possible! Its always good to see family though and although I love living in a warmer place its my family I miss most!!!

Having my son and my Aunt with me on Christmas Eve was lovely, although the jet lag saw me head to bed at 18:00 on 23rd, my son stayed up and woke me at 01:00 so we could go and do the food shopping in the early hours before most people were about! We timed it perfectly and missed the rush - arriving home at 03:30!

Christmas Day lunch - a small but lovely gathering and dinner was delicious! We have had a few Christmases where there was just my Aunt, my son and me - I missed my husband and the rest of our family but we still had a lovely day together!!!

My son left us to visit his Dad, and we had a quieter day - it was freezing cold but we enjoyed having a bit of a duvet day at home!!!!

We did the sales today! I was carrying too many bags to take a photo, so this is the only other gap in my album!

At last my DH was back in the UK too, he was shattered but we were both really happy when I met him at the airport!!!!

My DH and DSS went to the football - it was Leeds at home and they won 2 - 0 In our house that makes it a very good day indeed!!!! If you don't follow Hull City it wont mean much but since the whole family do - and Leeds are our local rivals - it couldn't have been much better!!!!

We went up north again together and I collected my stepdaughter - the boys followed after the game!!!


Another Christmas Day - our third! Everybody loved their presents felt a bit like groundhog day doing it three times in a little over a week!!! Maybe because we had three Christmas Day's was the reason I wasn't organised, or maybe I just wasn't organised - cant be sure though!!!!

New Year's Eve - we spent with our neighbours - my DH was jetlagged and tired, we did manage to stay up to see the New Year in - but we were pleased to go to bed afterwards - or it might be that we are just getting old!!!!

January 1 is always another football day and no words are needed to say how cold my DSS was in this photo - Blackpool in January - freezing - we went shopping to the Sales again and DSD spent her birthday money, Auntie got a new coat and amazingly - for me - I didnt find anything I wanted to buy!!!!

My best memories of Christmas are all about having the family with us, and spending time with them and our neighbours! We didnt spend as much time as we would have liked with our friends sadly, but we simply ran out of time!!!!

We have a few traditions worth a mention! They include football on Boxing Day and New Years Day, Baking with the neighbours kids, my brothers Mississippi Mud Pie - always deelish! The German Christmas Market, the British Association Christmas lunch and a Terry's Chocolate Orange in my stocking! This  year we managed everything except the German Christmas Market!!!!

Remember for next year................. Go back to the UK a bit earlier - I ran out of time this  year!!!!

 The 5th is my birthday and my son was down again for a few days - It was a lovely day shared with all the family except my DSS who had to work!!!!

My Aunt and DS left on the 6th - it would have been her 62nd Wedding Anniversary! We had a few more days in the UK - catching up with more family and seeing our closest family again before departing! This year will see many changes for us and as we prepare to move away from Singapore for pastures new in Texas - I know that whatever life throws my way - Im blessed to have such a lovely family and husband - who made this Christmas special! Even if we didnt get everything done we did spend time together and enjoyed the time we shared! I just have to loose the 3 kg I gained whilst we were having that good time!!! Happy New Year one and all - May 2013 bring all you wish for!!!!