My secret's out!

Why not pop on over to the Craft Island blog to read my first ever blog post as a member of the Craft Island design team. You'll find a layout using one of my favourite collections - Baby Steps by Simple Stories AND some exciting news and the reason why I am going to be sans craft room come the Summer...

When Life Gives you Lemons...

... scrapbook until you learn how to make lemonade.

Life has thrown me a curve ball recently and I admit, I am not quite dealing with all that entails in the graceful, calm manner that I would have wished for. But I am working on it. Meditiation CDs at the ready! But, I am somewhat scrapping my way through it (or should that be scraping my way... ;p).

Last week Disney Scrappers (re)launched their Disney scrapbooking challenges. You must sign up if you are a Disney scrapper as there are bucket loads of talented Disney scrappers over there with oodles of inspiration. It couldn't have happened at a better time for me and gave a nudge in the right direction to return to my honeymoon album. Only 4 years in the making, not bad eh?

I really wanted to have a bash at the first two chellenges: Under the Sea and Caution! You May Get Wet! but I didn't feel I had the right papers or embellies and nothing really took my fancy online (who knew!?!). I am still on the look out for a cute water themed collection? Although Bo Bunny Barefoot and Bliss has caught my eye. How cute is the title? Never mind the collection!

However, having just bought some Bo Bunny Zoology, challenge 3: On the Wild Side was perfect for me!

I dragged out some old animal themed papers and embellies, mainly Bo Bunny's U Bug Me and some Making Memories animal prints and set about selecting some photos from our day at Disney's Animal Kingdom.

We had planned to go to Universal Studios the day we went to Animal Kingdom but when we looked at each other as we went to leave our hotel we realised that there was no where else for us to go but Disney's Animal Kingdom. We looked like we were going on safari!! As a scrapper our colour co-ordinated khaki attire has made for some really handy photos to scrap :) It wasn't planned, honest! But next time it will be! Here we are in all out green and brown glory...


Part of the challenge was to include animal print and the Zoology tiles were perfect for this. I wanted to make this page really busy. I got a huge kick out of using two (old and new) Bo Bunny lines together. And felt quite smug when some very old metal embellishments and an old wooden dragon fly worked well with the page. The metal Mickey clip fitted with another part of the Disney Scrappers challenege to include a Mickey head. Yay. I added some yellow netting and some stickers from both ranges, along with the leaf pin to add some detail.

I topped it off with some Thickers for the title. I'm so pleased to have restarted my honeymoon album and even more pleased to have rehomed some supplies from gathering dust in my craftroom to centre stage in one of my albums. I'm even more pleased to have lost myself for an hour or two in the magic of Disney and scrapbooking :)

I have another Animal Kingdom layout to share with you soon...

Stand on your two left feet...

...and join our Raggy Doll chums. I have no idea why I have the Raggy Dolls theme tune playing in my head. I think it is pretty safe to say that cabin fever has finally set in. I've been snowed in for 11 days now. I am so over the snow it is unreal although it has made for some very pretty festive pictures.
Suddenly the soundtrack in my head has switched to 'the weather outside is frightful'... being stuck indoors has meant that I have had lots of time to work on my Christmas journal.
Thanks for stopping by. Kx

Journal your Christmas

Happy 1st of December. Today is a really happy day for me, firstly it is my 3rd wedding anniversary, it's the first day of advent and the first day of JYC.

Like everyone we have had a lot of snow these last few days and I can't help but wonder how we would have felt had the weather been like this 3 years ago on our wedding day. Would our wedding guests have made it through the snow?, would we have braved the elements for some winter wonderland photos? Would we have made our flights from Edinburgh and Gatwick to Orlando? I do know that am thankful that the snow stayed away until now.



Today my little man opened his first advent calendar. This is his 3rd Christmas but he was too little for chocolate on his 1st Christmas by his 2nd Christmas he had been diagnosed with a milk intollerance. This year he grew out of his milk intollerance and this Christmas he has chocolate in his advent calendar for the first time and a selection box under the tree. Well he would have a selection box if we hadn't broken into it today. Did I mention that we are snowed in? :p



Today's prompt for JYC asks us to consider what we want from JYC. What do I want from JYC 2010...? Hmm... I want to make a little book that documents OUR Christmas, OUR traditions, what WE do at Christmas time. I want to create something I can add to over the years maybe all in one album or several - I'll just wait and see how I get on. I want to remember the little things, the small things that make Christmas, Christmas.

Things I want to remember about today:

• We are snowed in and have been for 4 days
• It's our 3rd wedding anniversary


• It's the 1st of the month and Jack opened his first advent calendar


• Charlie Cat has sat around all day looking miffed at being stuck indoors
• This is the most snow we have ever seen


• This is the first time that we already have the Christmas decorations up (we put them up the first day we were snowed in)

I don't intend to do something crafty everyday but I am hoping to be able to blog my thoughts of the day and use them at a later date to create my JYC album.

Happy 1st of December!

Addicted to Soap

I haven't scrapping in what feels like ages. I haven't even sat in my craft room to play never mind actually create something. I am not sure why. Although I can think of one factor that might be responsible for my lack of time - soaps!

Hello, my name is Kirsteen and I am addicted to soaps. I watch 4 of them; Home and Away, Emmerdale, Cornation Street and Eastenders. I don't even want to tally up how many hours a week that actually is but just off the top of my head, it's 10 hours a week at least! Yikes. I watch via Sky+ though so I must be saving some time fast forwarding all the adverts, that's good right? Should I ditch one? Should I ditch two? What ones would you ditch? Are you a soap addict too?

Back to School - Day 8 - Home James

I've always thought that my two hour round trip to work is a little excessive. A huge waste of time just sitting in the car doing absolutely nothing when I could be doing other more productive things. That is until yesterday when I was chauffeur driven to work by my husband. We were going in the same direction and it seemed like a great idea. And it was a great idea why take two cars when you can go in one. However, I learned a a very important lesson - I like driving, I love my chillout time, I love singing along to my favourite songs and I love having that time to switch from work mode to Mummy mode. It's nice to be chauffeur driven every once in a while but I'm glad of my 'drive time' three days a week.

Back to School - Day 6 - I love Monday's I Do

Monday's rock!! I already knew that but I wanted to remind myself. Monday's are known as Yummy Mummy Mondays in my world. OK, so I'm playing fast and loose with the word 'yummy' but Mummy and Monday are all true ;p Monday is the only day that I get my little man all to myself and I love it. My lesson for today is: never forgot how special Yummy Mummy Monday's are and make the most of each and every single one :) Love you little man, Mummy xx

Back to School - Day 5 - Take Notes

I learnt a very important Learn Something New lesson yesterday... I must write my lessons down as soon as I think of them!! I can remember thinking at some point yesterday ooh that is a good lesson for LSNED but today I have forgotten it! d'oh! I can also extent this lesson to my WW diet as I've been struggling latey and guess what? I haven't written a thing down. Here's to a day of writing things down today :)

Back to School - Day 4

Yesterday I learnt that it is going to take a very, very, very, very long time to paint our garden fence, along with our shed, the little man's swing, our table and four chairs plus the little man's playhouse. I haven't even ordered the playhouse yet even though there are only four weekends between now and the little man's 2nd birthday! I guess my lesson is that there just aren't enough hours in the day :)

This is the playhouse the little man's Grandparents and all his Aunties and Uncles and Mummy and Daddy are buying for his birthday in October. I can't wait to see his little face when he sees it :)

Back to School - Day 3

It's only 11am but I am 100% sure that I have already learnt my lesson for today... I do not NEED to buy any more scrapbooking supplies. I hereby declare that I am not only on a Weightwatchers diet but a stash diet as well. Who's with me? Weightwatchers, stash, both? :)

I won't share any pre-diet photos but here are some of the scrapbooking goodies that will be winging their way onto pages very, very soon. No more shopping!!! ;p

Lots n' lots of lovely ribbon

Cropper Hoppers and magazine files full of stickers, patterned papers and cardstock

Left handside of the top drawer - the one with all the tools; inks, chalk, adhesives and punches.

Right handside of the top drawer, there lives; jar of ribbon, 5 compartment boxes of embellies mainly brads, eyelets, charms and bottons, some Sizzix dies and other tools too

Left handside of the middle drawer, photos on the left, chipboard and wooden embellies, Disney Sticker collection, blooms and some sparkles.

Right handside of the middle drawer, blooms, sparkles, alphas, part of my collection of Disney stickers on the left, more embellies and a whole section for metal embellies ;p

Messy bottom drawer

Thanks for stopping by Kx

Back to school - day 2

Yesterday I learned that it is possible to walk PAST the vending machine on the way to the carpark. It seems I didn't need the crisps, chocolate and full fat Coke for the journey home after all :) Me - 1, Vending Machine - 0

First day of school

Yesterday was my first day of school or day one of Shimelle's Learn Something New Everyday class. I really struggled all day to pin point something that I had learned. I was starting to fret that I would be the dunce of the class, that I would be sent outside to sit in the corridor when it dawned on me that that was my lesson! Trying too hard can sometimes be a hinderence. Sometimes I should simply let things happen and go with the flow and that is what I learned yesterday. Thanks for stopping by Kxx

A.C. Winner!!

Omgosh!!! I won the DCWV A.C. Moore competition!! omgosh!! I'm so excited, pleased, delighted to have won a DCWV prize!! I've just done a happy dance around the livingroom :)

How cute is this?!? I love how Erin Madsen announces winners :)

I'm off to happy dance around the livingroom some more :) I'll post piccies of my Once Upon a Time mini book tomorrow once I've come down off the ceiling ;) Thanks for stopping by Kxx

Home Sweet {Disney} Home

The first time we went to Orlando we were a little wet behind the ears. We booked a package with our local travel agent and didn't put much more thought into it. Shocking - considering what a 'Disney planner' I turned out to be! If only I'd known about ADRs and Dollar Express then... This is the first villa we stayed in. It was a little off the beaten track in Kissimmee but lovely all the same. There were no bells and whistles (I've since found villas with pool tables and games rooms and jacuzzi's!) but if you said I could go back to Disney tomorrow and stay there I so would! We had out own pool and it was lovely just to chill out after a hot day at the parks.


By the time we made our second trip I'd let the Disney planner within me loose and I booked a split stay at Disney's Port Orleans Resort and Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge. Riverside is a beautiful resort and we'd stay there again in a flash. This is the view of a quiet pool from our room at Riverside.

Now, you may be thinking that the photo below doesn't look much like the Animal Kingdom Lodge and you would be right. A few months before our honeymoon the Animal Kingdom Lodge started building work on their new DVC (Disney Vacation Club) villas and we were bumped to Disney's Grand Floridian Resort and Spa!! Talk about pixie dust! :) I love, love, love this hotel and would love to stay there again, one day...
I hope you've enjoyed my little stroll around 'The World' ;p xx

5 pages I have not made but feel I should

1. My friends

2. My Grandad and my Great Aunty Peggy who passed away in 2006 and 2007

3. Trips to my Aunty Peggy's in Oulton Broad

4. My Gran's old photos that are still stuck in one of those awful adhesive albums

5. Wedding photos: - my own wedding, family and friends weddings.

Thanks for stopping by. Kx

My 5 Favourite Pages

The final challenge on Saturday night at http://www.shimelle.com/ was to share your 5 favourite pages so here are mine and why...

My little man is 18 months and I've only just created the first page of his first scrapbook, after months of collecting papers and embellishments, jotting down ideas in two idea books and lots and lots of planning in my head I finally got the courage to make a start - so scared that I would do something wrong. I'm so happy to have made a start and I love this page too.

{Photo is missing in action}

This is a page that I did a couple of years ago. It was the first page I did that I think of as proper scrapping rather than my early scrapping of photos placed pretty much as they would be in a standard photo album along with a few stickers ;p

This page is special to me as I love the musical Beauty and the Beast and couldn't wait to see the version shown at Disney's MGM Studios. I'm pleased to have used those lovely Karen Foster papers and stickers that I have had for years too.

I love this page as is was my first attempt at 6x12 scrapping, a size that I now love. It also reminds me of the first day of our honeymoon and of all the gorgeous christmas decorations and music at WDW in Dec.

I just love this page as it's just so blooming colourful!! ;p Thanks for stopping by. Kx

What's in a name?

I've picked the name 'it's all about me' for this blog because... when I ask my son Jack (18 months) what it's all about he says 'me, me, me' although it's more like mi, mi, mi. Watch this space for some crafty goings on.