Presidents Day 5 in 1 Challenge

One of my favourite challenges over at scrapbook.com are the progressive challenges ( http://www.scrapbook.com/forums/showtopic.php?tid/1528139/tp/1/ ) hosted by the wonderful Stacey (Ms.Schwiet ~ http://ohschwietscrap.blogspot.com/ ). My good friend Stacey always throws in plenty of new techniques & fun things to try along the way. One of which was sanding over the top of something textured. I used a chipboard sticker to sand over to make a circle pattern on my page. Not only did i try this technique but i tried a little mosaicing too. I love how this page turned out. Here are a few close ups just for sharing of the finished page.

Also involved in the 5 challenges are another progressive challenge, a sketch challenge, a presidents challenge & a scraplift challenge. I am hoping to get these done over the course of today. 5 Layouts in 2 days could possibly be a record for me.

Here is my sketch layout:


Progressive Layout #2

Sneak Peak

I recently submitted to become a design team member at a new scrappy space. http://divascreativas.ning.com/ I am still waiting to hear back from them. But here is a sneak peak of the layout i created especially for them. I'm not sure if i can post the full layout yet or not so here are just a few close up shots of some of the elements on the page. Also this is my first layout in 2010 & i am happy to say my mojo hasn't left me during my break from scrapping.

I finally found a New Years Resolution I can stick to. A scrappy one! I wanted to try & make my own sketches, so I have & I am going to continue to. I even turned them into a challenge over at scrapbook.com. http://www.scrapbook.com/profiles/478379.html

I was sad to see the end of 52Sketches.... 52weeks & this inspired me to create something similar.

So far ~The Sketch Pad~ has 40 members & is growing everyday. I am hoping to provide other sketch lovers like myself with fun & inspiration. I hope it will be successful & time will tell. I thought i should blog about it as a marker of the start of a new adventure.

HoHoHo - Tis' the season to be jolly!

I can't believe how fast this year has passed me by. Here we are in our new home, tree up & just the presents left to wrap. I still have a couple of boxes to unpack but I am almost done. I want this Christmas to be the best ever for my family. 2010 is going to be even busier for us. My darling husband will be off sailing the seven seas & experiencing his new life on the ocean waves in full for the best part of it. The kids are settling into their new schools well & I am especially proud of them. So what will 2010 bring for me i ask!? My New Years resolution is already decided. I wont sit here & stare at these four walls everyday. I have started to work voluntary at the local school if nothing else it is getting me out of the house. I want to do things that i never had time for before. I plan to be more organised with my housework leaving me more ME TIME! I want to get back to having my hobbies to keep me busy too. Although i didn't start this blog as a showcase for what I can do creativly i may start to post some of the projects I complete over the coming months. Who knows, 2010 is a fresh start for me & it can't come quick enough.

So it's been awhile....

So it's been awhile & things have gotten crazier than ever round here.

I'm proud to say that my darling husband just finished phase 2 of his training & is now a fully fledged marine engineer. I am so proud of him & i know his hard work will pay off for our family in the long term. Meanwhile though we have a house move just around the corner, leaving me feeling excited & stressed out at the same time. So much to do & so little time or funds to sort ourselves out. So the battle plan is to tidy, sort & condense our belongings as much as i can, thank god for eBay & car boot sales. I never realised how expensive moving to the other end of the country would & NEED to start saving fast.

Trying to stay positive who needs a spring clean when you can have an autumn clean. I have cleared a lot of stuff out since we moved here but I'm really going to go for it now. Wish me luck because I'm going to need it......

Motherhood

Today has been a long day I found myself in A&E with my 4yr old son without much explanation of why I was there only that my GP thought it was better to get a paediatrician to check him over. I couldn't help feeling an overwhelming sense on deja vu.

When my eldest was around the same age he picked up some bug or other my GP at the time was worried about meningitis and rushed us straight off to the hospital. He was admitted & kept in for 5 days and had numerous tests carried out on him. Because he had a slight temperature he was isolated in his room & was miserable. I too was feeling pretty glum, worrying about what was wrong with him & missing my husband who was serving in Iraq at the time. Stuck for 5 days alone in a foreign hospital where i barely spoke the language. So naturally my first question this afternoon was 'How long is this going to take?'. I had visions of him being admitted & ran every worst case scenario through my mind whilst i waited for someone to see him. Fortunately, the doctor appeared quite quickly & before we knew it we were heading for home again.

Motherhood is hard work at the best of times never mind at the worst of them. I have met a wonderful group of mothers through a forum recently & I read their posts about there families & jobs, of how hard it is to be a mum & I realise I am quite lucky. I think I have the hardest job in the world being mum to my 2 boys. But I take my hat off to these ladies who are working & raising families. All of their stories different but a lot of their experiences the same. Some of these ladies have 4, 5 or more children some of them less. They go out to work everyday & come home & are brilliant mums to their youngsters. I find myself barely able to cope with my 2 boys & my part-time job. I am just not cut out for it. I have become so tired, stressed out depressed even trying to juggle my life that I handed my notice in at work & only have a couple of weeks left to go. I am going to be a SAHM (Stay At Home Mum) again & to be truthful I am looking forward to it.

Childhood

As I left work yesterday I walked along looking at the sea and the air smelt so salty. Memories of gritty sandwich's and jumping waves came rushing to me. I thought about how pretty our coast can be and how I have never really taken my boys to the beach. They have been on school trips and with family but never with me. We have never sat down together and eaten sand filled sandwich's or investigated the rock pools. This led me to memories of jumping waves, being soaked up to my chest, laughing and splashing having so much fun and it occurred to me that I probably wouldn't let my children go rushing off into the sea like i used to. For one they can't swim and secondly my thought was God only knows what filth's floating in the water. This set me to wondering just how over protective am I??? I don't think I am at all yet found myself thinking no way would I let them do that. So my aim for this summer is a proper family day at the beach, gritty sandwiches and all. We will be jumping waves together and I wont be worrying about germs or wet clothes..........