Retreat Roundup Continued

As promised, I am back with more layouts from the Wicked Princesses retreat.  I have only been back at work for two days but it feels like it was months since I was sitting with 'my girls' scrapping the days and nights away.



Layout 1: Best Buddies. Love the simplicity of this layout in which I have used a mix of new and old October Afternoon as well as My Mind's Eye papers, not to mention my favourite Crafter's Workshop template and mist.

A close-up of a Purple Pumpkin Doily and a My Vintage Blossom available from Wicked Princesses ;-)

Layout 2: Happy Boy.  I think this is one of my favourite layouts I created on retreat.  I often struggle to scrap photos of Mitch - mainly because our personalities are so similar.  I was determined that the first layout I completed at retreat was going to be a layout of Mitchell.  I busted out some of my new October Afternoon 9 to 5 papers on this layout and more Purple Pumpkin.

Yet another close-up.  Love recycling clothing tags like the RM Williams tag I have used on this layout.

Layout 3: I love this Boy!  A super simple layout of Lachlan using some of the papers included with the now SOLD OUT He's Savvy kit from Scrapbook Savvy.

Layout 4: Must be Love. Another wedding layout from our wedding way back when.  I lifted a layout done by the super talented Donna White.  I love scrapping with this girl.  Not totally happy with the butterfly effect but it is another layout done for the album.

Layout 5: Blessed.  This is my take on the May 15th Sketch over at Stuck?! Sketches.  Again, a super simple layout but I love the colour combinations, especially the orange tones. 
So that brings me to the end of this round of retreat show and tell.  Almost at the end of the retreat roundups, one more and I think we will be done.  Happy Friday to everyone tomorrow! Yay for the weekend.
Take care
S xoxo

Retreat Roundup Part One

Yes, there are going to be some epic posts in the coming days.  Why for you ask??? The answer is simple - I have been on a scrapping retreat with the team at Wicked Princesses.  Four days filled with nothing but scrapping, laughing and spending time with a great group of like-minded scrapping souls.  This was my second time at a WP retreat and have already started planning on how I am going to make it to the next one.

Over the course of the four days I managed to complete 13 layouts - somewhat of a record for me considering how much I fluff around with my layouts (I know, I know how can layouts so simple take so long lol).  I am not going to bombard you with them all now otherwise you might not come back ;)

Layout 1: Doing What he Loves - used a combination of Crate Paper, Echo Park and October Afternoon embellishments on the layout.  Oh and the tag is comes off one of the cotton tarps over at the shed - why? Because Tony grows cotton and this photo of him is taken in the cotton crop before it was ready to be picked.  I loved using the tag as it has the name of the farm on it - something to remind us in our old age lol

 Layout 2: Almost 7.  Yep you guess it, this photo was taken just before Lachie's 7th birthday.  More cotton here again - this time the cotton was ready to be picked.  In fact, this photo was taken the day our picking started.  The layout is based on a sketch but I can't remember which site :o

 A close-up of the banner and misting - love my Crafters Workshop Chicken wire template.

 Layout 3: Dreams.  Love this picture of Mitchell and totally loving how October Afternoon's Sarsaparilla line has worked here.  Also loving all my friends' pins on pinterest - which is where I got the quote!

Layout 4: a TOTAL lift of this layout by the super-talented Tara Coles.  I love her style and totally wish I could think of this myself and scrap like this!!!  Thanks for the inspiration Tara.  And while some of you might laugh at this, this layout actually took me the longest to do at retreat.  Don't ask me how but there was a long nanna nap involved in there somewhere lol.

Well I think that will do me for now.  I will try and come back tomorrow with another catch-up, otherwise it will have to wait for the weekend.
Thanks for stopping by.
S xoxo

Moving Forward

Don't stress, I am not going to go all Julia Gillard on you (for those readers not from Australia the 'moving forward' phrase refers to her catch phrase from the 2011 election campaign) but it is a time for moving forward. Just over twelve months ago I had to made the very hard and sad decision to put our much-loved Charlie Cat to sleep. To be honest with you, I really didn't want to contemplate having another pet; however, over the last few months listening to the boy's stories about how much fun they had with Charlie and how much they missed having a cat made me realise that I wasn't the only one who was hurting. So last weekend, we surprised the boys with Miss Millie.

She is very cute, even if I do say so myself. The boys certainly were shocked and there were more than a few tears shed when Lachie realised that she was here to stay.
In scrappy news, I managed to create three layouts today, all for the regular monthly challenges at Scrapbook Savvy. I still have one to do but there are lots of days left in the month ;)
Layout One: Tara's Quote Challenge (using the quote 'I myself am made entirely of flaws, stitched together with good intentions.' A tough challenge for me as I rarely scrap photos of myself, especially ones this close-up :o

And some close-ups.  I found this awesome idea for twine and buttons on Leah Cameron's blog - thanks for the inspiration Leah ;)

Layout Two: Sara's Sketch with a Twist Challenge.  Not 100% happy with this layout but it is another layout for Mitchell's album :-) I loved October Afternoon's 'Happy Holidays' Collection from 2011 - nice and bright, yet still Christmas-ey.

Layout Three: Kerryn's Manufacturer Challenge (Need to use at least 80% of the selected brand. This month's manufacturer of choice is Echo Park.  I have used papers and stickers from the 'Happy Day's collection in this layout.)

And just when you thought I was done, I remembered this layout from last month that I wrote about but never got around to blogging.  Totally inspired by a layout created by Tara Coles - so much so that it is pretty much a straight lift :o  This was my take on Kerryn's April Manrfacturers Challenge - this time using Pink Paislee. 

 And another closeup:

 Anyway, that is it from me for now.  The working week is starting a day late this week as we had a public holiday today - so it is off to bed for me. 

Thanks for stopping by.

S xoxoxo