Five faves for April - the photos

So here are my five favourite photos for April.

The first one was taken on our flight to Berlin - on my way to have the migraine surgery. I was so NOT worried about it and so excited that it was actually taking place and I just love this photo as I think that shines through.

And number 2 is me just after the surgery. I'd been in recovery for about 20 minutes and Hugh was there and I asked him what I looked like! As we had a phone he snapped a photo for me and I'm really glad he did as I want to document the whole procedure from the op to full recovery. 

These flowers were totally unexpected and from my family in Cornwall. It was such a lovely surprise to receive them and they lasted for ages!

Long before I got the date for my op I had arranged to meet my two best friends from school for afternoon tea at Luton Hoo. The date happened to be the first weekend after my op so Hugh kindly drove me there and I wore my sunglasses to hide my eyes from the public! I had a wonderful afternoon though with these lovely ladies. 

And my final photo was taken right at the end of April. We went to visit our good friends Peter and Maggie who moved to Rhos on Sea about 2 years ago. It was the first time we had managed to get there and we spent a fun weekend with them, visiting Aber Falls and then going to Llandudno where this photo was taken. 

So there we are! I'm looking forward to scrapping these and will be back with them when they are done!

Thanks for looking!

Five faves for March - the layouts

My blog has seemed to be taking a backseat recently. Life, convalescing, family and friends have been taking more of my time and if I am creating I want to scrap rather then blog. So I have decided that for the time being I will just be updating this blog twice a month. I want to keep it ticking over so I will be uploading my five fave photos each month and then the pages I have scrapped.

I may do additional posts now and again but I don't want to put myself under the pressure to get them done. 

So, here are my five favourite photos for March all scrapped! I actually finished them by the end of April and they have been sitting waiting to be blogged. 

This first one is a scrap lift from Jen Schow who has a YouTube channel and one of the playlists she has is 6x6 Paper Pad Love. It was great to use up some 6x6 papers which sit in my stash and are looked at and rarely used!

 Another layout using 6x6 papers and scraplifted from Jen.

 As I was on a roll with 6x6 papers and enjoying the series I scraplifted another layout!

 My final layout scraplifted from Jen and using 6x6 papers. By the time I finished this one I'd  actually used up a 6x6 paper pad which made me very happy!

This last layout was scraplifted from Inkie Quill - I have spent quite a bit of time whilst convalescing watching YouTube on my iPad as I could hold it close to my eyes to focus and I couldn't see tv or read books!

 All the butterflies were fussy cut from some patterned paper and then stuck down using a hot glue gun which gave quite a bit of dimension. I'd not done that before but it is definitely something I will do again. 

So there we are. My five favourite March photos on layouts. I have chosen my five for April and I'll be back with them soon. 

Thanks for looking!

Five Faves for March - the photos

So here we are in April already! I am really enjoying scrapbooking this year and am looking forward to scrapping my holiday photos from our recent trip to Lincoln as well as these five photos which are just some of my favourite photos from March.

This is me with Penny and the wonderful angel food cake she made me for Mother's Day.

And Ben came home on the weekend of Mother's Day to spend the day with me which was lovely. 

Penny snapped this photo of me and Hugh whilst we were on holiday in Lincoln! We had had a busy day lol! I think it is so funny that I asked her to send it to me for me to scrap!

Penny and I have been exercising a lot getting ready for our Colour Run in July. This was snapped after a 3 mile walk/jog whilst we were on holiday. 

And my final photo for March was this one I snapped in the car on our way home from Lincoln. We had stopped for a quick break so I decided to take this one to end our holiday. 

So there we are. My five favourite photos from March. It was so difficult to choose this month! Thanks for looking!

Five faves for February - the layouts

Thought I had this scheduled to post yesterday but turns out I must have dreamed it as I hadn't even written the post lol!

This month I have actually done 5 layouts as I felt each photo deserved its own page.

What can I say - a very silly cat! Loved digging through my stash to find some old papers and embellishments to use.

Used up some kit papers I had to do this layout. I liked the fact that the background paper was wooden boards as the photo was taken when Hugh helped Ben to lay his new wood flooring.

These papers are from an autumn kit I had, but the colours went perfectly with mine and Hugh's jumpers and it got some more kits used up!

This is my favourite layout of the group. Love the papers, the embellishments and most of all the photo of my Mum and Dad messing about.

And so to the last layout about my Botox injection trial. And now I can let you know that the trial worked and I will be going to have the operation on Monday 11th April! It is a bit more complex than I thought but I will let you know all about that on another post before then!

Thanks for looking and yet again thanks to Jo for the idea to scrap your 5 favourite photos!

Five Faves for February - the photos

Funnily enough although I had a busy February I didn't seem to take many photos. However I have managed to find five which I can scrap!

This was taken just after I had Botox to see if it will work to stop my menstrual migraines. The bruising only,lasted about an hour and this month the treatment was successful. If it is successful next month then I will let you know and also let you know where I go from here. 

I have a serious and lovely photo of Mum and Dad taken when we went out for a meal with them, but just love this one with them messing about. Dad was puckering up to give Mum a kiss. 

This was at the same meal and Mum took it. I rather like this photo of me and Hugh. 

Ben took this selfie of him and Hugh after they had successfully laid the laminate flooring in Ben's study. 

And I was a bit stuck for photo number 5 then found this one of Arwen in Hugh's suitcase. He had spent quite a bit of time away in February and Arwen didn't want him to go away again!

So there are my five. I am looking forward to scrapping these and using some page kits which I have made. Have you hot any favourite photos taken in February? If so ... scrap them!

Five Faves for January - the layouts

So here are the layouts for January - just before February ends!

This was made using the last of a Noel Mignon Christmas kit from 2014! Glad to use all the bits up and rather pleased with how it came out. 

Love this photo of me and Penny on one of our walks. Shimelle papers from her first collection - had run out of the letter 'u' and 's' so improvised!

This is scraplifted from Sheree Forcier from the Jot Team this was made with some old stash and was also for the challenge on the Facebook Group 'For the Love of Pretty Paper' to use a song title. 

And finally the layout which will be the first one in my 'My 50th Year' album. Used some texture paste on the background and some Nutcracker soldiers rescued from a Christmas card. 

So there are my five gave photos from January on 4 layouts. I will share my 5 fave photos from February next week. 

Five faves for January 2016 - the photos

So here we are with my five favourite photos from January. And the first one up was taken on New Year's Day when my friend Wendy spent the day with us. Although I say 'my' friend I have known her for so long now that she is a friend of the family! Used the selphie stick for this one!

 

My next two photos will go on the same page - my trip to see The Nutcracker. Just loved this Christmas tree of ballet shoes.

And then as we were walking back to the station we stopped and took this selphie!

Penny and I are working towards doing a 5k in July - I will power walk and she may run it! This was a lovely Friday afternoon walk - it was bitterly cold but so nice that the sun was out and we had blue skies after all the rain!

And lastly this one of Hugh! He was helping me with my photo a day for the #sistersphotochallenge on Instagram. One of the prompts was ice and when we went out to Slimming World one Saturday there was ice on my car so to make it obvious he drew a face in the ice and then grinned inanely in the photo!

So there you have it. My five favourite photos for January. I need to get them printed out and then I can start scrapping them! Hoping to spend some time on Sunday afternoon. Hope you all have good weekend.

Five faves for December - the layouts

Although these photos were all taken in December I didn't want to use Christmas papers for all of them. It was also nice to use non-Christmas papers after having spent a month doing my journal!

I was pleased that these papers had just the right orange in them to go with the flash of orange in the poster. 

As this was a Christmas meal I caved in and used Christmas papers! They and the embellishments were gathere from my stash where they had been sitting for quite a while!

And again, having found some old stash and as it was on my desk, I used it for another Christmas meal photo. 

My final layout I reverted back to 'normal' papers and used some embossing paste through a leaf stencil and then rubbed distress ink over the leaves. Bo is my nickname and what Hugh calls me most of the time. 

And so that is the end of my five faves for 2015. Really looking forward to doing the same again in 2016 especially as I don't intend to do a monthly project life spread this year. 

Five Faves for November - the layouts

Well, I have actually completed November and December's layouts, but today I will share November's - just sneaking in before the end of January!

Now I know that I have used an owl on a layout about a kitten, but I had no kitten embellishments and this owl was just too cute not to use!

This paper was perfect to use for a layout all about visiting the Stitching, Sewing and Hobbycrafts Show with Wendy and Sue.

Not one of my favourite layouts, but the photo has been scrapped and the story told and that is the important thing!

And this is probably one of my faves - my two offspring with me!

I will be back very shortly with my layouts for December, but before that I need to choose my five fave photos from January as I really do like this idea and think I will carry on in 2016.

Five Faves for December

Yes, yes, yes, I know! I haven’t even scrapped my five faves for November yet! I promise that I will get around to scrapping them and sharing them with you soon. Just need a few Sunday afternoons to spend in my crafting room.

So, how do you narrow December down to five favourites?! I had great difficulty, so decided to choose photos just from my phone and none from my camera. I tend not to scrap so many photos from my phone so this is a good reason to use them. I still had trouble though as I seemed to take loads on my phone over December!

We got the waitress to take this photo when we three crafty girls went out for our Christmas meal. Although we meet every month to craft and had been out for day trips we had never been out for a meal together before. We had great fun and plan to do it 3 or 4 times a year now.

Another Christmas meal! This time with the ladies I work with. We don't get much time to chat at work so it was lovely to spend time really getting to know each other. 

Hugh, Penny and I try to have a trip to the cinema just before Christmas and this year it was the Star Wars movie which I was pleasantly surprised to find that I really enjoyed!

Christmas Eve afternoon saw Hugh, Penny and I playing board games. We usually go for a walk but the weather was foul! We had a lot of laughs playing the games though. 

And the final photo is a selfie of me wearing the beanie hat I knitted from a kit Hugh's mum gave me for Christmas. I turned it black and white and really like it that way!

And so there we are. A year’s worth of photos will definitely be scrapped. Not all have been single photo layouts, but I know that I have created well over 60 layouts in total in 2015. Thanks to Jo for this great idea to get those 5 favourite photos scrapped every month. I think I may try to do it again in 2016!

Five Faves for October the layouts

At last! Here are my five favourite photos from October now finally on layouts!

Hugh and his Mum. 

Haven't used flowers like this on a layout for an age, so this was fun!

The striped paper here was perfect to go with my dress!

My Noel Mignon kit from October was very family oriented which was perfect for this layout. 

A few splashes of Heidi Swapp Color Shune finished off this layout and means I can now scrap my five faves from November! Also need to do my Project Life November spread, but at least I am up to date with my JYC which is always my main aim at this time of the year. Still need to photograph those pages and put them here to share with you. Enjoy this short week leading up Christmas. I am now on holiday and not back to work until the 29th. Bliss!