MY YEAR IN 365 CALENDAR PAGES

A quick run down of all my 365 Calendar Challenge pages for 2010...I am so chuffed with myself for completing this project and well done to everyone else who finished it...I think my favourite one is September as I tried to copy how my blog looks....I have loved every minute of it.....So, who is doing it all over again next year????

We are having Allan's sisters and the kids round for a meal and then probably (quite a few) drinks afterwards - what are you up to??....

All that's left now in the final hours of 2010 is to wish all my friends, family and followers a very HAPPY NEW YEAR AND ALL THE BEST FOR 2011.....

A LITTLE CYBER CHAT AND A CANVAS...

A couple of weeks ago Darcy asked me if I fancied joining in with her and a couple of friends for a little Cyber PJ Party....sounded like a great idea...so I thought while I was chatting I would make something as well and this tutorial popped into my inbox the other day from Scarlett Lime....I didn't follow the tutorial exactly, in fact I veered quite a bit off-course...Darcy's friend Rosie joined us and so did Sonja...Wine and chocolate mandatory...lol..we had a great chat about all sorts of stuff and had quite a few laughs as well...I had a great evening...thanks girls... I am really rubbish at remembering to take stage photos when I am making projects so this is the only one there is...for full instructions see the tutorial...I decided that I didn't want to do a Christmas Tree as I wanted to keep mine up all year round so I opted for a house theme...First of all I stuck down various papers with gel medium and then I used a couple of Tim Holtz masks(btw, does anyone know how to clean the back of these so they are sticky again...one of mine is all gunked up) and sprayed with Dylusions Sky Blue ink...I then used some white paint with my brayer and rolled it up from the bottom...I don't think the ink was quite dry tho as it smeared a little but I did like the effect this created...

Sorry that's where the stage photos stop...lol... I enlarged a couple of Dyan's Downloads house shapes and a few of the other little doodles that were round them..stuck them all on and then started adding rub-ons(I don't have many rub-ons that are not alphabets but I found these hearts and lines of squares which I thot were quite sweet...I also have a sheet of 'fuzzy' white ones which I think are fab...these were used on both of the roofs...

I printed out 'HOME IS THE PLACE TO BE..." using my dymo label maker...

I also stamped this little Glitz bird(from my Simply Create DT stash) onto tissue paper and adhered it so it goes of the from and down the sides of the canvas...I love this technique as it means you can 'stamp' anywhere...

I finished of with a line of glitter down the edges of the roofs but unfortunately you can't see this in the photo...I am very pleased with the end result and maybe I should drink a bottle of wine everytime I craft...lol..

DECEMBER 365 CALENDAR...YES YOU DID READ THAT RIGHT...

Well who would have thought after just finishing November I would have had December all ready and waiting...but shock - horror - gasp - here they are!!! It's the last month of this fabulous challeng wich was started by Kate over at the Kathryn Wheel...why not start your own one since the New Year is just around the corner...it was great fun... These are quite straightforward pages this month - scraped on some Holly Berry acrylic paint and then scraped some gold over the white spaces that were left...I then used a piece of non-stick cooking mesh that I picked up in Poundland for...well a pound and sprayed though with some Pomegranit Dylusion Ink...gives a fab effect don't you think!!!

I had in my head that I wanted to use Christmas baubles for my days when I remembered I had a pack of Christmas Blonde Moments papers lurking in my paper store so I cut them out and arranged on the page (they are a little small so in hindsight I should have maybe scanned them and enlarged them)...I used another Blonde Moments sheet and cut out the santa, reindeer, snowman, trees and Christmas pud and edged them all with gold embossing...I think I am in need of a new Versamark pen and a new Stazon pad as both seem a little dry... The rosette in the corner was done using my new Hougie Board which is great for this...I was going to buy the Tim Holtz Rosette die but then I seen a YouTube video using the board and I thought that would be better as you could make different sized ones rather than just the one size from the die...it can also be used for loads of other things to so all in all I think it was a slightly better buy...

I stamped the numbers using Autumn Leaves Messy Dates and the words using MSE Multi Retro...

All done and ready to start next year!!!

WOYWW...1st DECEMBER 2010

Well folks here we are at Wednesday again...it's been a b****y awful week weather wise here in the NE of Scotland and I think pretty much the whole of the UK has the dreaded white stuff to some degree...I have just been out and measured in the back garden and its up to 18"..WOW!!! (see my post of a couple days ago for piccies but it's much worse now, our kids have been of school since Friday and it's not looking good for going back tomorrow as it's been snowing quite heavily today on and of)... Anyway onto WOYWW...the little stars and gingerbread people are for a new friend Emma...go across and visit her wee_tootie shop selling allsorts of gorgeous hair accessories for your little ones and big ones alike!!! I also have some gold embossing powder and my heat gun out as I am working on my December pages for the 365 Calendar Challenge...It has been a great experience doing this and I fully 'intend' going on with it next year if anyone fancies joining me...

These are the pages on this desk - a work in progress - I am hoping to have these finished by the end of the day(hopefully!)...that's all from my desk today but why not pop over to Julia's blog and catch up with everyone elses...xxx

NOVEMBER 365 (and on time too!!)...

This must be some kind of record on my part...lol...finished this month on time... I think there is about 5 layers of paint on here in my quest for the perfect colour of icy blue...wasn't happy with it but in the end but after scraping on some white paint with an old credit card it looked better...I then had the idea that I wanted to do sequin waste squares for my days but after cutting out a stencil from the Cricut and overlapping it with the sequin waste and daubing all over with my splodging tool and some distress ink this didn't pan out the way I had hoped so instead I cut out squares from a huge sheet of white tissue using my paper cutter (very slow and tedious) and glued them on instead and then I 'stitched' round them with a black pen...you can just still see the inked dots thru the tissue paper...

I added lost of swirls round the edge with Versamark at the top of both pages and embossed them with Kaleidoscope embossing powder but this didn't show up too well with the Versamark..

I used a Tim Holtz stamp on the inside edges and embossed in white and I also stamped and embossed various snowflakes in the same way...

November is stamped using black Stazon and the same kaleidoscope embossing powder and this shows up much more sparkly than with the versamark...I think I may need to get a re-inker for my stazon tho as the powder didn't sick very well to some parts...I borrowed these stamps from Sonja who got them when she visited NYC recently (lucky moo!!!) and I just love them..have been on ebay hoping to get myself some but to no avail...will have to keep looking...

This is a better view of the versamark/kaleidoscope stamping and embossing....as you can see from my squares the children have been very busy this month and I have been very busy running them around...lol...that's November finished then..have started prepping December pages and the question is will I finish them in time for tomorrow...Can't believe there is only one month left of this wonderful year long challenge by Kate over at The Kathryn Wheel...wonder who will carry it on into next year???

SNOW DAYS....

Well it had to come sometime right???...couldn't it have held of another couple of weeks???...just wondering how long it will last???... This is the view from Niamh's bedroom window at 9.42am and there has been a lot more snow since then...

This is our cars in the drive...at the beginning of the year when we had snow for almost 5 weeks one of them didn't even move out of the drive and we were about 3 weeks late in getting it MOTd...
These are the peaks on the conservatory roof at 10.20am...

and these are them at 11.36am...so quite a bit of snow has fallen this morning...

Allan should be on his way back with the kids from school now (they will be delighted - they can go outside and have snow fights til they are so cold they will be coming in begging for hot chocolate!!) as it closed at 12.30pm today...at the moment in Aberdeenshire we have 107 school closures and dancing this afternoon is cancelled as is Morgan's football match tomorrow...The Fyvie School Christmas Fair is also cancelled but she has said that she is going to re-organise it as a Spring Fair so watch this space for further details...so wherever you are in the country I hope you are keeping warm and snug indoors..take care...xxx

WOYWW.....

It's Wednesday again...yayyy...but I do not have anything crafty to show this week...think I am still burnt out from last week's last minute craft fair frenzy....all that is on my desk this week is a few buckshee practice tags, a clear stamp on an block that I have not put away and a pile of notes from school, Brownies and Rainbows that need my attention....Oh there is also another paper wreath like last weeks but using my leftovers from last month's Simply Create DT stash....

Not very impressive I know but what's a girl to do....lol...if you are wondering what the heck I am blethering on about have a jump over to Julia's blog Stamping Ground to find out and have a nosy at desks from around the world....

I have got a couple of sheets of Unity KOTMs to file away in my system of laminated sheets but it is quite time consuming and also quite tricky trying to fit the whole sheet onto an A4 piece of cardstock....So that's it from my desk this Wednesday...hopefully it will be more exciting next week...see ya...xxx

CRAFT FAIRS...

Saturday was the Kintore Primary School Christmas Fair....Susan came along and helped me on the day...On the whole it wasn't too bad and although sales did get of to a slow start they did pick up and I was quite pleased with how much I sold on the day...

I was quite surprised at what sold and what didn't...I sold all of these tag garlands which although simple and effective take quite a lot of time to make...

I sold most of the plaques and hearts that I had but only a few tag sets and none of the mini cards... I did meet the lovely Emma and her Wee Tooties and she gave me some tips on selling on Facebook and have now added a StorminavintageTcup page to my personal page and I will be adding events and updates regularly (I hope!)...

So it will be onto the next one on Saturday which is at Fyvie Primary School from 1-4pm...why not pop along and say hello!!!Tomorrow night if you have nothing planned why not come over to Simply Create in Alford and have a go at making this stunning wreath which I am teaching...very simple and not at all complicated...If you would like give it a whirl please call Jacqui or Anne at Simply Create on 01975564010 to book your place...xx

ANOTHER POST - LIBBY'S BIRTHDAY (JUST FOR MANDY!!)...

Last Thursday (11th November) it was Libby's birthday...now Libby being Libby couldn't decide what she wanted til the last minute so she still hasn't got her main present of a bike which is sitting at Tesco waiting to be collected and I can't go for it as I have to wait in today (between the hours of 8am and 6pm, don't these delivery people know we have lives to lead!!!) for some new furniture for her bedroom to be delivered.... Here she is first thing in the morning...
her new watch...

a little birthday treat for breakfast...

her birthday cake (excuse the mess of the tablecloth, they had tacos for dinner!)...

blowing out the candles...

On Saturday I took some of her friends to Simply Create in Alford for a crafting birthday party, would thoroughly recommend this as they had great fun and all came home with the book they had produced...

Here is Jacqui in action showing them how to peel the back of double-sided sticky tape...

Another birthday cake...

and last but not least the gorgeous (huge) scrapbooking kit she got from her friends Dasha and Alina...she got lots of lovely stuff from all her friends but I think this was her favourite...and no doubt I will the queen of double-sided sticky tape soon...lol...xxx