A Disney weekend

The boys' had Monday off school last week due to teachers' training. This date usually coincides with H's birthday so we try to go away for a long weekend. The weekends have tended to be a surprise for the boys. One year we loaded up the car with bikes, went to school to pick up and told the boys we were going for a bike ride. One hour later, J said, "This is a bit far for a bike ride" as we drove in to Elveden Forest.

This year we went to Disneyland in Paris. Initially we booked to go on Eurostar but due to the fire in the tunnel, we had to drive and took the ferry instead. (It wasn't a suprise trip though because the boys now have very eagle eyes.)

This is a photo of us at Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. The show was very corny but fun. We thought Annie Oakley's character was a waste of space though. Disney layouts to follow...

Big B little b

I bought a Dr Seuss' ABC from Oxfam last week, I love the cute drawings. The letter B was perfect for this old photo of my boys. The photo has been sitting on my desk for many moons as I found it quite challenging to scrap busy, pre-scrapbooking photos. Pairing a page from the book and white(ish) background created a light overall feel to balance the photo. And I added red, baby blue and grey because those are the colorcombosgallore colors ( I should say colours ) for this week.

My baby is ten

Can't believe how time has flown but H is ten today. Here's a card I made for him. I'll try get a birthday photo after school...hope he is still in a good mood. This morning he was one happy bunny or should I say, one happy packed mule. I made some cupcakes for him to take to school so with 1/2 size cello, sports bag, school bag, he was fully laden. He cheerfully said, "I'll manage mummy!" Hope the cakes stayed upright.

Some "WET" layouts

I shared some layouts from the summer holidays with you last week. Now, let me share with you some "wet" LOs.

The first (very pink LO ) is me enjoying a water ride at Efteling in Holland. I have always loved the water rides at theme parks and this time was especially fun to experience it with the kids. The boys think I am bonkers the way I shout and scream. You can't do theme park rides without screaming, can you ? I also did this layout for the ColorCombos blog.

The second shows some of our friends sitting down to a village barbeque under umbrellas. This is a annual event and after five years, this is the first year we were rained on.

Linda's CJ

The title of Linda's CJ is Flower Power. What a perfect opportunity to print off some photos of flowers from my garden. I love photographing the flowers in my garden. After all, where else can you get some uncomplaining subjects that will stay still ( wind permitting!) whilst you practise your photography skill ? Hope you like it Linda.

Basic Grey Offbeat

This is my favourite Basic Grey range at the moment. I love the slightly old fashioned patterns and the bright colours. I am not usually keen on all the patterns in one range, especially with Basic Grey who has a large set of over 10 patterns. But this range has been very versatile for me, as you can see below. I think I am going to endorse the Basic Grey Offbeat range as being, "suitable for a range of applications!".

This first layout I did for Scrap.n.Crop for Hari Raya/Eid Fitri at the end of this month. There are some other gorgeous layouts in SnC gallery to celebrate this occasion so make sure you take a look.

The photo is a precious one of me and my siblings back in the 70s. We used to visit the grounds of the royal palace (Istana Anak Bukit ) on Hari Raya. The photo is precious because I have so few photos from our childhood.

The second layout shows J learning to sailing. My boys spent a week learning to sail and completed RYA Level I & II. They were in different age groups though. J's group sailed in Laser Picos and looked really competent. H enjoyed the capsizing exercises the most and regale us with tales of how many times he capsized!

I did this layout for Color Combos Galore #88. I have enjoyed seeing Suzanne's LOs on UKS and have been promising to try the combos and I finally did it. I love the unusual combination of colours these girls get us to try.

And last is a photo from our trip to Venice. I think the neat freak in me drew me to photograph these neat rows of gondolas in Venice.

I am so happy, all 3 layouts have just made it onto the Basic Grey gallery. This is the first time I've uploaded. So what do you think ? What is your favourite range this release ?

SBM Issue 32 is out

A little bird told me the magazine is out. I haven't had the opportunity to acquire a copy. Here's one of the layout I did for my article in this issue. In this layout, I started using cuttings from Marvel's comic. I've got a bit of a thing for comics at the moment and have gone out and bought some off Ebay. The family is outraged at the blatant ripping up and cutting out of these collector items. What do you think ? Is it sacrilege ?

Have you been to Practical Publishing website recently ? I was delighted to see that you can now get digital edition of the magazine on subscription for a princely sum of £15 for 1 year ( 6 issues ). How cool is that ?

Dreadful weather

What dreadful weather we are having in the UK right now! Did you have flooding in your area ? If so, my thoughts are with you. We are fortunate that our house is on higher grounds here but our village has been known to be completely cut out due to flood water. Here's hoping there won't be a repeat this year.
My little boy has just started doing rugby at school. I guess at the mention of rugby in school, I need to qualify that with "contact". He has played tag rugby before now but in Year 5, the school starts the boys on the real rugby. Last week lessons concentrated on falling safely to the ground and included rolling in the mud. He had rugby on Wed, Thur and Fri and we didn't have enough time to clean the games kit every day. So what do you do ? I sent him to school covered in muddy jersey! This week he starts rugby after school club on Monday as well. EEEK!
I am going to leave you with some layouts from the summer. I guess these photos might seem like long-gone memories but we were fortunate to have some good weeks.

First of September, first of many things.

Did you remember to do the "first day of school" photos this morning ? That is if your kids went back this morning. If not, then this acts as a reminder for later on in the week. My boys went back this morning and now the house feels empty ( and very quiet! ). I managed to get them to stand in this very same spot for their photos this morning. They didn't grumble too much either.

I try to get the photos done at the same spot because the bricks also act as a marker as to how tall they are getting. In the one above from the last school year, the photo on the left was first day and on the right, last day. See how the over-large uniform has grown on him! I had to send him to school in the same blazer this morning as the 2-sizes-larger blazer that I ordered is still in transit with Royal Mail somewhere.

So what have you got planned now the kids are back at school ? I have many projects planned in my head and so many photos to scrap. I am also planning on pulling out an "old" quilting project that has been work in progress for more than 13 years. Maybe this year I will finish it! But more achievable will be going back on Wii Fit. I have had a long break since our Wii had to go back to Nintendo for a spot of cleaning(of the laser head ). The cleaning didn't take long but school holidays followed...

Today is also my first day on the http://www.scrap-n-crop.com/ Design Team. I am really excited about making new scrapping friends in Malaysia and South East Asia. This will also provide me with the perfect opportunity to scrap old photos from back home.

It is also the first of Ramadhan, so happy fasting if you are. I really miss being able to go to the "warong"s to buy food for "buka puasa". I will be blog-stalking some Asian friends to see what food they are serving up.


And lastly, not quite from today but yesterday, we hid our first geocache...yay!