Blythe!!!!

They're here! I have started a new blog for my Blythe ramblings, although I'm sure they'll make their way over here from time to time.

SakuraBlythe - this is my Blythe blog. Come and take a look :)

Studio Calico - I think I love you!

This is the very peculiar bag that my kit box arrived in - was very worried to start with - thought it might have been damaged or something. But it was ok! As this is probably my last kit for a while I documented the process - have photos of the box being opened etc. Yes I am obsessed!

This was the beauty within. I got up at 4.45am last month to get the 2 add-ons I wanted. No, needed! This was possibly my favourite kit ever. Really looking forward to scrapping with it. I'm hoping that my stopping buying kits for a while will not only help my bank balance, but also get me using the kits I already have.

Yesterday I discovered a new obsession - Kokeshi dolls from Japan. Not the new ones, but the beautiful weathered vintage ones. Ruth collects Momiji dolls, which are a kind of modern version, but these have so much history. If you do a search on Ebay you'll find some from sellers in Japan.

I'm tired now - its been John's day off so we've spent the day not really doing much, so not sure why I'm so tired. We did walk to school and back twice I suppose, but its not that far. And I do need the exercise if I'm going to fit in these jeans by next week.

I don't know what Ruth's been eating, but she must have grown another couple of inches. She now comes higher than my shoulder. Will have to get John to take some photos. Alex has swimming and tennis tomorrow, so he'll be tired when he gets home = grumpy. He loves tennis though - we've spent most of the evening today playing with plastic rackets and a foam ball in the hall. Que great hilarity as the ball bounced off doors, walls, our heads and basically anything but the rackets.

Creativity

Seems like my new crafty space has been an inspiration. I made this card for my Grandma's 80th birthday. The photo isn't fantastic but I was quite pleased with it - I'm not much of a card maker these days. The flower was based on a tutorial over at the Studio Calico blog.
I also made her this necklace using a glass square kit from Etsy. It was the first one I made, and it came out rather well too.
And these are two little (tiny!) cushions I made for the kids. The stitching's not perfect, but the kids love them. Alex had been asking me to make them for weeks. They're only about 4"x6" and the pictures are Adirondack Paint Dabbers through Stencil1 stencils. I'm not sure why he wanted them to be so small but they're certainly cute. And got me using my sewing machine :) I have lots of gorgeous fabric, patterns and craft books which I'd been too scared to do anything with, but now I might actually get on and make something more ambitious.

Transformation

Yes, so I know its a tip, but we have recently moved (like weeks ago), and my scrap space was not exactly a prioity. But now the rest of the house is mostly done, finally I was ablt to put my desk together and start unpacking!!!!!

So this is what my scrapping stash looked lik 24 hours ago......

....... and this is what it looks like now. Not 100% finished, but mostly there. I'm so happy to have my scrappy space back. Really makes me smile everytime I walk in the living room.
This si my desk - love the cake stands :) I have punches on the small one, and stamps, adhesives, buttons and other bits and bobs on the tall pink ones.This is a close up of the ceramic cake stand. I found the ceramic rose when I was buying curtains. Can't remember the name of the shop, but it only cost £1 (the curtains were a LOT more!).

So all in all, (inter)national scrapbooking day well spent I think. May even get to scrap tonight. Whoo hoo! Have to make my Grabdma's 80th birthday card and present too. Hoping my new space will be inspirational.

And all of this was inspired by Scarlet over at Studio Calico, with her NSD challenge - maybe not finished in time, but thanks for the kick up the backside to get it done :)