The second item I had had trouble getting a decent photo of was my Family Triptych. I have a beautiful old Bible album full of photographs of my ancestors, trouble is no one knows who they are, just that they are on my Mums side of the family.I just love all the photos in there but chose 3 of my favourite to use in this Triptych. First I copied and printed off the photos onto good quality poster paper, not photo paper as I find that too thick. then painted the plain white triptych to match the paper I had chosen and decorated it front and back using foam stamps. Once I had stuck the photos in I then coated them in Tea dye varnish as I found them too fresh and new looking. Finishing off with few embellishments and words.

Heres two I made earlier !

I decorated my little dressmakers dummy back last year but had trouble getting it to look right in a photo, but managed it today. I painted the wooden top and bottom then the body itself with a pink metallic paint, then collaged over the top with old paper dressmaking patterns and made the skirt from book pages finishing it off with a fabric tape measure.

Still scrapping

I must be on a roll as I got this layout done of James Birthday this week. Its only been sat there waiting to be done for almost a year !

Valentines swap

I have taken part in Alternative valentines swap, make up to 3 heart shaped books and then receive a different heart shaped book form another artist. So here is mine The background id done by embossing a crackle glaze stamped image and then ink stains applied over the top. Then I collaged over the background and added fibers and tags

Boo !! It's finished !

I started this Halloween layout at the last crop, managed to finish it yesterday.I had a great time putting all the spiders on it, every time I dropped on on the page I thought wow, that looks good there, oh and there and there, in the end I had to put them away before I got too carried away ! They were just the confetti things you get to throw on the table for a party. Must say, it was Andrew who carved the pumpkin, rather well I thought !

Then of course still in snow mode I made the warm hat one, I have been meaning to make this one ever since I had the photo printed almost a year ago, knew exactly which paper I would use then Andrew took the photo for me, now that's planing eh !!

Off to play in the snow !!

As I do every year about this time, well to tell the truth as soon as winter starts, I feel the need to play in the snow !! So we are off to Austria very, very soon and of course I have all my snow papers and bits and bobs out to make my diary to take and had a play with some ATCs for this months Alternative monthly swap. So with a bit of luck that will be me on a toboggan whizzing down a snow covered hill very soon....... can you tell I am a tad excited ??

Last years Chirstmas makes !

As well as all the Christmas cards and crackers I made this year I managed to squeeze in a secret Santa swap on Alternative. We had to send a tag at the beginning of December then a handmade gift for the big day. Well here is the tag I made but unfortunately in my bid to keep my new years resolution to sort out all my photos on my computer, I appear to have lost the photo of the gift I made ! It was a bound book, ATC size,with pockets, for Pat to keep a years worth of ATCs in.

The Christmas card is the one I made to send to my Pen Pal in Australia, Trish. A few years ago someone on Alternative sent me this cockatoo stamp and I have been meaning to use it for Trish's card ever since as she is as huge a parrot lover as me and has a cockatiel of her own, this year I thought about it in time for Christmas, well about the beginning of November in order for the gifts to get to the other side of the world !!

Piano hinge book

I taught this book at Bristol Scrappers, my local crop, a great way to bind a book, its called a Piano hinge book because the spine should look like a piano keyboard when you have finished. I chose to fill mine with the photos I took of last years fantastic Autumn. All the pages inside were cut in a different way to make the book a bit more interesting.

2008 already !

I am sorry I haven't been keeping my blog up to date but I do have an excuse, honest ! Just before Christmas I went into hospital to have an op on my ankle and so was banished to the settee for 2 weeks and then could only hobble around for another few weeks, back to normal now though. I did craft though and here are a few of the things I managed to get done, just before I had the op and while I was on one leg, well had to feed my addiction !!

First, I wanted to make a set of ATCs for remembrance day, I love the way they turned out.I found the old images on the net. I wanted to include a poppy so ended up scanning in my poppy and then printing it out smaller and used a black brad for the center.