Catching Up ...

So, here I am catching up - again!!

I have been poorly with a flu type virus. Oh my goodness, I knew I was poorly when I had no energy for either making cards or online shopping!

These cards are some of what I have been up to during the last few weeks.

I have been tagged by Gloria this week too.

1.) Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog.

2.) Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.

3.) Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.

4.) Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

7 facts about me~

1. I have blue eyes that change to turquoise in the summer sun.

2. I have a degree in art, textiles and technology - ha! electronics and metal work - like I've used these skills in my life :lol:

3. I love to wear stripes

4. I am a hopeless cook - if I have to cook then I make sandwiches :lol:

5. My favourite country to visit is Italy - sun, sea and ermmm..... pizza!!

6. I am incredibly shy

7. It's taken me all week to get this far, my brain is boggled thinking of 6 so number 7 has been abandoned!

I tag:

Annette

Clare

Cindy

Kate

Jacque

and anyone else who reads this and wants a challenge :)

A Little Bit Spooky ...

Kate Hadfield is my hero! Have you seen what she has been busy creating over at the LilyPad?

I also wanted to share my exciting news. My hybrid mini book that I made for Scrapbook Inspirations Magazine has been published this month (which was exciting to start with) but even more exciting - it made the front cover!! It's down there on the left hand side with the photographs of the flowers

Busy Busy

Life is pretty busy up in my corner of the world, I can't believe how fast September is disappearing and already in the shops in town I am witnessing the arrival of Christmas departments. Yikes!

Anyway I've been busy with work and trying to make time to craft. I did spend Saturday at a crop down in Middlesbrough and would you believe that there is a Cadbury's chocolate factory shop on the way home :) Yum Yum! Next time I'll have to stop at the chocolate shop on the way there!

My lovely friend Kelleigh has opened a digital store selling templates for cards, they are great and I've had some fun this week playing with them.

I also wanted to share this sweet little fire engine card made with some of Jacque Larsen's paper pieces.

And we're into September ...

This year is just speeding along and it's September already! I'm back at work, really enjoying it, so my crafty time is seriously reduced. I did manage to make a few projects at the weekend although it's taken me a week to get them onto my blog.

Today I have some Kay Miller projects to share.

I used her new Blooming Crazy kit to make this card

(Credits here)

I loved her Doxie Moxie kit and used it to make this card

(credits here)

Okay, just a quick post today as I need to go and catch up on a whole load of stuff!

Andrea x

The LilyPad Weekend Bonanza and a Giveaway ...

********* My Mam picked 2 winners tonight by the time old method of closing her eyes and scrolling up and down and then stopping!!! She picked debsdesignz and *crystal*, girls hopefully I've contacted you both just now xxx **************

There are some super fantastic things going on over at the LilyPad this weekend, August 29th - September 1st, read on to find out how to win a giftcard for Jacque Larsen's store worth $5 to spend after the sale.

So what is happening then? First off is the back to school, back to scrapping sale with 30% off storewide, you don't want to miss that.

Also, Nancy Comelab is sadly retiring but - check this out!!

Then of course is the collaboration kit that the designers have put together which is free, yes FREE!! with all LilyPad purchases over $15.

And if all of that wasn't enough, as it's the start of another month we have the new September BYOC (build your own collaboration kit).

These are a few of my favourites but there are tons more new kits in store that can be used as stand alone sets or that co-ordinate perfectly together.

I fell in love with Kate Hadfield's Woodland Whimsy doodles, especially the hedgehog. He was just calling out to be made into a shaped card and I made him lovely and spikey by printing several copies and cutting and layering them and curling his spikes so they stuck out slightly

And, and, and we have a new designer debuting too! But you'll have to go visit the store to find out about that one!

So, does anyone want a giftcard for Jacque Larsen at The LilyPad? Worth $5, good after the sale, leave me a comment on this post and I shall draw a winner on Sunday. (I have comment moderation switched on so you won't see your comment straight away but I will check back regularly to publish them xx)

For more chances to win LilyPad goodies check out these girls' blogs: Manda, Mabel, Anso, Heather

Happy Thursday...

Don't you just love Thursdays? It means that tomorrow is the start of the weekend!!

I'm hoping for a spot of sunshine, keeping my fingers crossed :)

Today I wanted to share a card I made for Sweet Shoppe Designs.

I used this gorgeous kit by Kristen Cronin-Barrow, Berry Patch guaranteed to make you think of summer :)

Happy Post ...

My lovely postman brought me lots of lovely post this morning but the best was a parcel from PaperCrafts Magazine. I have 3 cards published in their latest magazine and they kindly sent me a few copies of the magazine as well as returning my cards. I have been so excited as this is the first time that I have had anything published from across the pond. The magazine itself is great, I subscribe to the regular PaperCrafts and always like to buy the specials too, especially the Christmas special.

So that is the first of my exciting news snippets, the second is that I have been invited to join the BellaScraps Magazine Creative Team which was a lovely surprise and the third is that I am finally going back to work on Monday. Although this is exciting I am also more than slightly scared, I've been on sick leave for so long (10 months) but I know in my head that everything will go just great - it's those enormous butterflies in my tummy that don't understand!!

I've spent this week trying to settle back into being at home. I had some design team projects to
work on. It was a public holiday here on Monday and it rained so I spent the whole of the afternoon and evening sitting at my kitchen table surrounded by a sea of paper, flowers, buttons and chipboard. Watching the movie channel and playing, I had a lovely time.

This card was for the LilyPad blog challenge on Monday, to use some of the weather symbols and weather related kits. I couldn't resist this cute snowman - even if it is August!!

I used the snowman from Jacque Larsen's Whatever The Weather kit

Talking of the LilyPad - check this out. This is a sale you don't want to miss out on

The final project to share is a luggage tag using my very talented friend Kay Miller's latest digital kit. She's now selling over at Sweet Shoppe Designs which is so exciting for her

I used her All Aboard kit to make this cute luggage tag

I have some more projects to share but I'll leave them for another day - need to go get some beauty sleep!

Andrea xx

Poor, neglected blog ...

Poor blog, it came way down on the list of priorities to sort out after coming back from Italy but I'm giving it some love now :)

Italy was wonderful, as it always is. We've never made our own way there, we usually go with a tour operator but this year we had loads of fun as we needed to change planes at Amsterdam airport. There was a sign beside our flight on the departure board that said 24 minutes - would you believe that is how long it took to walk from the centre of the airport to the gate! That place is enormous!! It's a shame that we spent 2 hours sitting on the runway after that as the engine conked out and we had to transfer onto another plane.

So Venice was lovely and hot, we spent most days by the pool but had a couple of adventures into Venice itself on the ferry. It's not every girl who has a ferry named after her!!

We managed to eat quite a few ice-creams :)

And just what you need after a day spent looking at the sites - a cold beer and a large pizza :) We went to this pizzeria behind our hotel as we'd stayed in Venice until late so we could cruise down the grand canal at sunset, which was very nice but we'd missed dinner in the hotel.

We also spent an afternoon in Burano, one of the islands in the lagoon. I've already used some of the photographs from that adventure to make a mini album.

I had a really lovely time and my back was better than any of us had imagined it would be, it still hurt etc. and I spent almost the whole time either lying on my sun lounger getting a tan or swimming in the pool and we had the two days out having an adventure. I was really pleased with how things went and I'm really looking forward to going back to work next week!!!

Taking a break ....

This blog is taking a holiday. I'm off to Venice, Italy for some sunshine and to finish off my recouperation as after 10 months I'm hoping to go back to work. I'll be back in a couple of weeks

Andrea xx

Organising Your Digital Supplies...

If you've been tempted to try any digital or hybrid craft work you'll probably be developing quite a collection of digital kits. Whilst there are several computer programmes for tagging and organising kits I've found the easiest method or organising the files and folders that I have is a system of folders on my External Hard Drive.

I have a folder for each of the main digital stores that I buy from or designers whose work I collect. For stores that sell work of several designers I have sub folders for each designer within the main store folder.

My system has been working fine since last year but there was something that has been bugging me for a while. When I viewed thumbnail images of my designer/store folders some had pictures of the kit preview but most didn't. The files that had a preview image were great as I could at least get some sort of idea of what they contained. Well this week someone on the Sweet Shoppe community forum told me how to change the preview picture of my folders and I thought I would share it on here.

Explore your computer drive with the digital kits stored on it.
Right click on the folder you would like to change and select properties
Select the customize tab and then select picture
select the preview or folder file of the kit or an appropriate file that represents the kit
Click on open, then apply and okHey presto! An organised and very pretty looking folder of digital kits.

I thought this system might be useful for organising your folders of photographs too.