Hugh's birthday and a few days away

So, Hugh celebrated a big birthday last Monday. And big birthdays deserve big celebrations!

So we started with a family meal last Saturday evening - my Mum and Dad joined us, as did Ben, Amy and Penny.

We had a lovely and fun meal together and embarrassed Hugh when we sang 'happy birthday' and the whole restaurant joined in!

Monday was actually his birthday and we celebrated in the evening with his favourite meal of 'party pork chops' (a family recipe) followed by a cake made by Penny of course!

The cake was shaped like 2 pasties as Hugh said that the food he was missing most from doing Slimming World was pasties! However, he was thrilled with a coffee walnut flavour shaped pasty cake! (And he got to have a pasty on our trip away!)

On Wednesday Hugh and I set off for him to partake of his birthday present from me - a two day Steam Engineman Course at the West Somerset Railway in Minehead.

We arrived Wednesday evening and had a lovely meal out before retiring to our B&B which I can highly recommend- Glendower House - it was spotlessly clean, had a lovely tea tray with a wide assortment of drinks on it plus Fairtrade biscuits, super toiletries in the bathroom and a full cooked English breakfast to die for! The owners were incredibly welcoming too.

So, on to Hugh's course! The first day he spent on the theory side and got to visit the engine sheds, signal box etc. The second day was an early start at 7.30am to prepare the engine they would be using. There were 5 of them on the course and they spent the morning learning how to control the engine, shunting up and down the yard.

After lunch they each took it in turns to drive the 3 miles to Blue Anchor and then be the fireman on the return journey. Hugh thoroughly enjoyed both roles! And I was lucky enough to get to ride in one of the coaches on his journey - the line is not open to the public when these courses are running and they don't always let accompanying family travel. 

And so what did I do? Well on the first day I found a guided tour of Higher Minehead which impound download to my phone. It started at the beginning of the South West Coast Parh where there was this splendid sculpture. 

The climb was quite steep but with it for the views and also to see The Church which had some 14th century chained Bibles in. I took LOADS of photos, these are just a taster!

View from the Church door.

Looking back up at the Church. I met another wife on the second day and we just clicked and ended up spending the day together, having lunch, taking photos of our husbands, exploring the shops and having our ride behind the train. The course ended at 6pm so Hugh and I then jumped into the car and drove to Cornwall as we were only a couple of hours away. That meant that on Saturday morning we were able to go and visit Hugh's Mum who had also just celebrated a birthday 96 years young! Sh was thrilled to see us both and we stayed for a few hours before returning home. 

Hugh said that his present exceeded all expectations which made me really happy. He wants to go and do the next course now!

Not a favourite of Hugh's!

This is a layout I completed a couple of weeks ago. It's a scraplift from one I had seen on a blog, but as per usual I have forgotten which blog! On the one I saw there was stitching on all the paper segments, but as it is not easy for me to get to my sewing machine I did 'pretend' sewing'! I actually pricked holes round all the edges of the paper pieces and then joined them up with a fine black pen.

I quite like the effect, but my thumb and finger were really sore by the time I had finished pricking all the holes through!

Hugh didn't pose for this photo. I knew what raki tasted like and knew that he wouldn't like the flavour so was waiting with the camera poised to photograph his reaction.... and it was a classic one!

Looking forward to this weekend as Ben is home for an unexpected visit and I will be relaxing after the past four weeks and celebrating my release from my job! Hope that whatever you are up to you have a nice weekend.

Using my kits

I recently received an email from Quirky Kits Ideas Blog and just loved the layout which was being shown. You can see the layout here on the blog here.

I had received my latest kit from Noel Mignon and in it was some Distress Ink. I immediately thought of that and how I could use it to scraplift the above layout.

It was only when I had finished the layout and went to put it in my album that I realised I had already scrapped a very similar photo from that walk with almost identical wording! Oh well, I had great fun creating it!

And so I decided to create another page, this time from an earlier kit and using photos I KNEW I hadn't scrapped before from our trip to Wales last year.

I had kept the tickets from the railway journey for just on the year and I was so glad that I managed to find them to put on this layout!

So, after a few weeks of no scrapbooking I am making quite a dent in my stash as I am on HOLIDAY for a week! Really enjoying some time for me and taking it easy.

Scrapping my five favourites from February

And so quickly, before the month ends, here are my layouts using my five favourite photos off my phone for February.

Loved this 'I am' paper which was in one of my Noel Mignon kits. Also loved fussy cutting all the flowers out to create the embellishment cluster.

Saw a sketch using a circle and as I had this paper with pre-printed circles on decided to go with it! Loved piling on the embellishments here!

And my last layout uses two photos as they really go together! The stamps from the latest Noel Mignon kit were really apt for Penny's chosen profession!

I am really enjoying scrapping my favourite photos from my phone each month! Do come back later this week to see which photos I have chosen from my March batch.

I forgot to share these!

I thought that I had shared these pages I made back at the beginning of March, but looking back I only shared them on the Noel Mignon Facebook page!

I used her kits to create these and actually scraplifted this layout from .... oh, I can’t remember! If it was you, please let me know in the comments below!

The photo on this page was also taken at Penny’s birthday celebrations at my Mum’s last year. Ben and my Dad get on so well and are always messing around together and this perfectly captures their relationship.

These last photos were taken on our holiday to Wales last year. We really felt as if we were walking in Middle Earth from Lord of the Rings!

I am sorry that the quality of the photos isn’t great. I took them using my phone as I didn’t have my camera handy. At least I have been able to share them though!

 

 

Recuperation scrapbooking!

Whilst I was recuperating last week I managed to squeeze into the conservatory and make a couple of layouts.

I bought this collection of paper with the intention of using them for all my summer pages and then promptly forgot I had them! I was looking through my papers last week and found them, so decided to use as many of them as I could on the layouts.

I had bought quite a few of the printed vellum sheets, so cut them up and used them on this layout. The papers are all Websters pages, either Ocean Melody, or in the other layout below, Strawberry Fields.

There were also some Project Life type cards on a sheet which I also cut apart to use up.

I've still got quite a few sheets left, so watch out for more layouts being created using them in the future!

I really like these lines of papers, but actually find them quite difficult to use! I am hoping that now the conservatory is back to normal I can find some plainer papers to mix with them and use them all up.

Do you like photo realistic papers or do you find them difficult to use too?

Love this moment

This is another layout I did at our crafting evening a couple of weeks ago. Again I used the Hey Girl kit, but this time the photo is from our holiday to Crete last July.

When I heard what the kit was called I was worried it would be too 'girly' to scrap male photos, but in fact it is perfect for any photos! I have loads of it left and just need more time to do some scrapping!

The circle with 'love' in it is actually a rub on, as are the two green splodges. I don't usually like rub ons, but these went on well and I like the effect.

A walk in the woods

As I mentioned in a previous post, whilst we had our week off, one of the things we did was go for a walk in Norsey Woods. One of the reasons for the walk was just because we love going for a walk in the woods when the weather is nice. The other reason?

And here is the full layout I did.

Although it doesn't look it, the sun was actually out for some of the time we were walking. However,  it was VERY muddy underfoot as it had been raining a lot, and Penny and I were really pleased that we were wearing our wellies!

I did this double page layout with some of the photos. I liked the idea I saw on a Paperclipping Video of enlarging a photo and then putting the title onto it. I really liked the 'photo' gold rub on and am pleased with how it looks on the photo.

I had picked up a gold Sharpie pen at Lakeland and used that for the journalling.

And I literally spent hours cutting out the leaves from a sheet of paper to make the flurry that runs across the second page.

Have you done any autumn scrapbooking this year?

Early Autumn Kit Round Up

Well, I have nearly used up all my Early Autumn kit from Noel Mignon. I have one full sheet of patterned paper and one of card and some bits and pieces. I will make something with them as I like to try and use them all up!

So here I am sharing what I have made this month with the kit. It was very 'autumnal'. However, by using the 'B' sides of the paper I have been able to use the kit for many different layouts, showing how versatile the kits can be.

This is a layout all about the trip Penny and I took on her birthday to see Pentatonix in concert. The library card holder was great for all the jouranlling.

This layout is with photos from June, on Father's Day. I used the white rub ons in a couple of places on this layout - they didn't go down particularly well and I ended up drawing bits in with a white pen!

I took LOADS of photos when we went on the Harry Potter Studio Tour for my birthday and I have hardly started to scrap them! I liked this layout by Becky Williams on the Noel Mignon blog and used it as inspiration for my layout.

I don't do much for Halloween, or have many autumnal photos these days - there were a lot more when the children were small! However, at work we celebrate Halloween with a pumpkin carving competition and dressing up, so I was able to document it and add the spider which I had had in my stash for ever and a day!

Now the next two layouts I simply LOVE! I knew when I opened the kit that I needed to find these photos of the children taken 20 odd years ago! I scanned them in and printed them out so I kept the originals. I really enjoyed scrapping these and they will go into the 'Ben and Penny when they were little' album!

I enjoyed fussy cutting the leaves out of the paper and sticking them down onto this layout. Great fun!

And then there are these two layouts which I have already shared with you!

So that is the end of this kit - well apart perhaps from a couple more with the scraps! I have already received the next kit and if you pop onto the blog you can see what I have received - the video is here. It is autumn related again, but I think I can use it all up using 'B' sides again!