Gift - cards

I'm working on some sewing stuff at the moment so this was something that I made for my aunt as a gift, she likes to have a selection of handmade cards so I made this little card holder for her and the sets of cards with a large scallop square punch (not mine sadly!!) and some lovely pp. and buttons as embellishments. Liked how it turned out so I made some more of them for presents for teachers at the end of June.

Here is a card that I made for the Confirmations that we had earlier this year - and I found the sentiment from a card on Triple the Sketch blog ages ago and liked it so dug it up and printed it off for all my religious card needs....

Thanks for looking! Ta M

Scrapbook for a woman celebrating her 100th Birthday

Presentation box - lace trimmed and satin bow with tassles

Last year I was asked by a friend Karina to make a Scrapbook for her granny as she was just about to celebrate her 100th Birthday - she gave me all the old photos that she had about her granny and a quick run thru who was who and what was happening in her life. I scanned and repaired all the photos and used copies for the scrapbook.

The whole thing was daunting - doing justice to the book, I had never done vintage beofre, the presentation, how I would lay it out, what to use? Ah, the only way to stop worrying was to start it and get on with it. So I took it one double page at a time, and worked when I could on it. When it was finished I thought it needed a box to keep it in and keep it safe - so made on with the bits leftover.

The lady had a big birthday celebration, and when she got this gift she cried with the memories and the thought that went into the gift, so well done Karina for all the leg work, and I was proud to be part of ther celebration.

Front cover - finished after the Birthday Party as we wanted the Birthday Girl!
Hand written note from my friend to her Granny and the first picture of her as a teenager.
Early photos.

There is a hidden tag with the story about her promotion to being a nurse Sister and then being asked by her husband to get married and she had to decide between career and marriage as you could not work if you were married back then.
Wedding days - her's and her sister

They have 5 children and a tag for each one and their dates of birth and names

Thanks for looking....

Something a bit older

My friend Elaine was 40 earlier this year, so I planned to make her something, but as I had made another friend a life scrapbook, and did'nt want to do the same thing again. I was stumped and I saw something that gave me an idea in the Scrapbook Trends "Homemade" magazine and I decided that I might try and make her a Scrapbook Quilt for her wall... Made with MDF and carboard, there are 9 tiles with each one showing a photo of Elaine and other people in her life and times in her life.

Not too sure if she liked it, but I was happy with it, have to keep the ideas for 40th presents coming as they parties keep coming....
Back of the scrapquilt - with personal notes from family and friends....

A book for Layla....

This little book I made for baby Layla to hold the photos that I took of her the day she and her mum Lara came over. The book was finished at my crop on Saturday, but just has sat in my bag and I must now get it off in the post to her. Hope she likes it. Most of my work is now up to date, only have some thank you cards to make for Millie's mum and some for me too. After that I have no other things that need to be done, but need to start thinking of my Christmas card photos.

Sorry meant to add - I got this printable custom stamp from Regina at the Cutting Cafe - wow what a lovely stamp and I think would make a great gift to other crafty friends.... you can get it here if you want, great service from Regina, I have a few of her digital stamps now....

Thanks for reading - have a scrapbooking class and crop tomorrow night - can't wait!

Ta M

Knitting....

It's been ages since I took up the needles but I found these really sweet patterns using Sublime yarn, a mixture of Marino wool and Cashmere, which is just soft and lovely to knit with.
The little cardi's were easy to knit and fast, about a week of evenings each - but they turned out lovely and my friend was thrilled with them. The little booties are just fab and I can't wait to see them on Millie's feet. If you do buy the patterns and like the knit them, the hat is different from the pattern, did't like their hat so I adjusted the pattern to suit my taste.

I also was given the OK by Millie's mum to post the photo of her, the little bean slept from midnight to 8am for them on her first night home.... (I am secretly disgusted as my foster baby never slept and I was up all night most nights and days and the crying nearly killed me, but hey ho!)

More to post tomorrow - so will be back then....

Ta M

weekend fun...

I had a lovely day on Saturday with my crafty friends at our local crop, only a 5 min walk from my house. Instead of taking the class, I decided to work on the all bits of things that I wanted to get done and had a lovely few hours of crafting, shopping and chatting (thanks to Julie and Marlen for keeping me company!). I worked on finishing a book for baby Layla (see blog posts below) and I started a book for my DD who just started school with a page per school year to mark all her teachers and photos of her each year.... Will post soon both as soon as I clear my camera down.

I also visited my friend who just had the most adorable baby Millie on Friday morning. Wow what a stunning baby, will ask her if I can post some of her baby photos that I took at the hospital on Saturday night, but wow what a little stunner... Above is the card that I made for her mum with my homemade wings, not sure if they look like wings but they worked for the card.


On Sunday the sun was shining and I got them all out of bed and we headed into town for a walk along the river Liffey and had brunch before we headed off for DD (age 5) birthday party. The grumpy nearly-teenager was in a strop and took off and I snapped this one of her "Walking the line!" on the new Luas tram tracks. We found out that this section of the tram track opened yesterday just as we arrived, so the first tram was just about due when she was walking on it.


DD got a new bike for her Birthday, and OMG what hard work it is getting her to ride it, she has a few issues and this makes this sort of skill hard to do, but DH was on hand to provide her a steady hand and with time she will get it - just adding to her bruises on her legs, she really looks like a boy who has been playing football all day long!
On the way back to the car we stopped by CHQ to have a look in the expensive shops that these nut and bolt monsters and robots were on display. They were just fab to look at but the little ones did not like them at all, I just snapped and snapped but won't bore you with all the images, but these ones were just the sort of details that I love - wow to be able to make stuff like this out of junk is quite a skill, something that I would love to be left to do someday....
Knitting like mad at the moment, hand feeling better and now that baby Mille is here, have to have her gifts ready for her, so hopefully will be able to share all my crafty stuff with you tomorrow.

Ta M

Lisa's Parents Ruby Wedding Anniversary....

A few months ago I was asked by my friend Lisa if I would take some photos of her parents and the party for their 40th Wedding Anniversary celebration. It was ages ago, and as the days approached I had some real concerns that I may not be able to do justice to the event, the only photo training I've had has been via CJ and the online classes, and the Masterclass - I've learned lots via CJ but my confidence has not developed yet.

The girls put on an amazing party for the parents, nothing was missed, beautiful room, lovely flowers, fab food. You girls really should be proud of yourselves.

I took nearly 350 photos on the night and drained the battery to the last photo. The only problem was that when I uploaded the photos to the laptop and edited half of them, the next day the laptop had developed a fatal error, and is now not even repairable. I had also started to delete the photos from the camera so I lost the first 30 photos.... Hopefully not forever - as we hope to get the photos from the hard drive, there was not much on it anway and it was DH laptop!!

The family were really happy with the photos and my gift to the newly-weds was a book of the photos all printed and bound for them.

Thanks for reading....

& more.....

More Layla Jayne

Meet baby Layla - 4 weeks old...

I had the opportunity to photograph my cousin Lara's new baby girl Layla who is just a real charm. I have a real thing for new borns and just love them to bits - makes me want to take another one but DH not happy as we tend to foster the ones with "issues" -

As part of the masterclass we needed to show the images and the converstions. Most of the baby photos I took of Layla look so much better in B&W in my opinion. Second image has been adjusted with a bit of "glow" added.

More to come....