Catch-up

Hi folks!  Thanks for dropping by.  Am I glad it's half term, last week was complete madness!  I am so looking forward to a calm, quiet week.

Thank goodness the snow is starting to disappear,  It just looks horrible and dirty now.  I have to say that all the ice made me spend last week worrying that Edward would slip over and break something before we got him safely off on his skiing trip.  I know that sounds neurotic, but it's just the sort of thing that would happen.  Anyway, I am pleased to report that he did get off safely on Friday afternoon, and I have heard from another parent, that they arrived safely.  Edward didn't take is phone, so it's going to be really difficult for me having no contact with him.

Emily and I had a great night out on Saturday at the O2 Arena, watching Snow Patrol.  It was absolutely fantastic and it did my heart good to see Emily having such a good time.  Emily and I are huge Snow Patrol fans, and they are a great live band.

Yesterday I went to the Stamperama show in Stevenage with my mum.  I wasn't intending to go but the lure of a craft show was too strong!  I paid a little visit to the Craftwork Cards stand to see what was new (may have made a little purchase or two!).  I was fairly restrained at the show and we only stayed for a couple of hours.  I did buy a set of heart Nestabilites, as well as a couple of stamps from Little Claire's, and some scrapbooking paper for Emily's book - see, not too extreme!

I'm waiting for my February Stampin' Up order to arrive, it's so exciting!  I've already planned for March - I am well and truly hooked.  Also looking forward to my Sale-a-bration goodies coming.

Anyway, I did manage to make a few cards last weekend.  They are all from the Secret Garden Project of the Month kit from Craftwork Cards.  As I said before, the colours are so soft and subtle, with just a hint of sparkle, gorgeous.

Well, I'm off to make Mark a Valentines card (nothing like leaving it until the last minute!). Have a good day.

Michelle x x

Birthday Week

Another week, another birthday, this time mine. I reached the grand old age of 43 on Tuesday. My birthday was like the Curate's Egg, good in parts. All my family had clubbed together to get me a new laptop as my other one had died, and I have had it for about a month, so I didn't expect anything else. So it was a lovely surprise to get some little gifts from Mark and the children, and a bagful of crafting goodies from my parents (more of that in a later post - I haven't had time to take any photos yet).

At work my fellow teaching assistants surprised me with a voucher for a beauty salon and I am planning on having a much needed shoulder and neck massage, and maybe a pedicure. The two teachers I work very closely with were the only staff members in the whole school to forget my birthday, so that put a damper on the day - made me feel under appreciated - apparently it was too much trouble to even wish me a happy birthday. Anyway . . .

Mark and I had a lovely meal out at Prezzo, they do a divine chicken ravioli, and the gin and tonics went down really well!

I did make rather a lot of cupcakes to take to work - 3 dozen for the staff and 30 smaller ones for the children in my class, and like an idiot I forgot to take any photos. Which is a shame because I bought some really handy cardboard cupcake carriers and they looked so professional, they would make a great gift. Needless to say all the cakes disappeared in record time - my headteacher confessed to having three!

I had to make a 50th birthday card today to go in the post tomorrow. No time at all to think of a new design, so I went for the tried and tested one that I have made so many of this year.

The papers are called Sugar and Spice and are from the Dovecraft range. They are really pretty and were perfect for this card. I popped into The Range this afternoon and saw that they do embellishments and rub-ons to match (no I didn't buy any!).

I'm looking forward to finishing school in three weeks. I am starting to get some ideas together of things I want to achieve during the summer holidays. There will be more of that later. At the moment I just need to get through the next few weeks, because at the moment I feel like I'm pedalling backwards!

Have a good week.

M x

Busy Week

Well, I hope you are all coping with the heat. It's a bit of a shocker after all the rain this week, but it's so lovely to finally have a bit of summer.

It's been quite a busy week and I haven't achieved much in the card making department. The only cards I have made were for Thursday. The first was for a friend's daughter who was sixteen. I used the Craftwork Cards range of Fruit Scoop. It's quite bright, so am definitely adopting the "less is more" approach.

The second card was for my daughter Emily who also turned sixteen on Thursday. I can't believe where the time has gone, it just doesn't seem possible. She's a massive Mighty Boosh fan hence the pictures. She really loved it.

So the week was spent getting ready for her birthday, preparing for the family party yesterday, taking the dog for her training etc etc. Work has been a bit rubbish again, roll on the end of term.

Today I have been making lots and lots of cupcakes to take to work on Tuesday for my birthday. I always make life more difficult for myself by making some for my class as well as the staff, but they do appreciate it, so it makes it worthwhile.

I have realised that this is my 200th post and am thinking of having a little giveaway (if I can work out how to do it on blogger - any help greatly received). I will have a little think about what I can do.

Hope you all have a really good week.

Take care

M x

P.S. Started a new crochet project even though I have a couple still on the go, just couldn't resist! Watch out for some photos soon :)

P.P.S Booked my Harry Potter cinema tickets for Friday 15th July - can hardly contain my excitement :)

Ta-dah!

After many weeks of decorating and unpacking boxes, I finally had my ta-dah moment to my family and friends on Sunday for Edward's birthday party. The house (well downstairs!) has never looked so tidy and probably never will again! I'm so proud of it and Mark for all his hard work.

(Note craft shelves in the corner!).

Obviously it wouldn't be a party with a couple of dozen cupcakes - chocolate at Edward's request and Emily chose the mauve colour for the vanilla flavoured ones.

My mum made Edward's birthday cake - the only thing he stipulated was that it had to be chocolate! It's the biggest chocolate cake I've ever seen! It's got Smarties and mini marshmallows around the bottom - yum!

Here's the boy opening his last couple of presents - money from his Godmother and cricket stumps from Grandma. One very happy 11 year old!

And finally - again at Edward's request - the chocolate fountain. It's a lot of fuss for melted chocolate, but the children enjoyed it. Even better, Mark cleaned it afterwards instead of me (it's a bit of a pig to do - result!!).

A happy day!

Enjoy your Wednesday. Take care.

M x

Happy Easter

Hope everyone had a lovely day today. Thought I had better get festive, so I made these Easter cupcakes. We had a day of decorating - what fun!!

The children have gone to stay with my parents for the week so that we can get the living room finished. There's so much still to do and it worries me that we have bitten off more than we can chew.

I'm having severe card making withdrawal symptoms - so hopefully I can get going during the second week of the holidays. I haven't even been able to play with my goodies from the Stamperama show at the end of February.

Take care.

M x

Mother's Day (Part 3)

Final installment today. I've been a bit of a busy bunny and made quite a lot of cupcakes. The chocolate ones are for home but the others are for work as I feel everyone needs a bit of cheering up.

It's been quite a busy day today and I've been awake since 6.30am so am feeling a bit pooped now. Mark is busy cooking us steak for our dinner which I am looking forward to. I've had a nice day - not as restful as I would have liked, but that's life isn't it!

Have fun!

M x

Round 9 completed

I set myself a task this week to finish the 9th round of my hexagonal blanket - and I did it but wow my hands are still aching. The hardest part was sewing in the ends, which doesn't help as my fingers always go tingly then numb when I sew for too long - dratted trapped nerve in my elbow. Anyway, look, I've done it and if I do say so myself, it looks great!!

Still got a very long way to go though. I reckon I need to do at least another three rounds before I can even think about straightening it to make it rectangular - that's nearly 200 hexagons!!

I made another batch of cupcakes this week, green with stars - very nice but not too many left now!!

I spent yesterday making cards with Edward - he really loved it. He made three Christmas cards and nine birthday cards with cupcakes on. He coloured them in beautifully. I managed to get some cards made too which I will hopefully be able to post tomorrow. I need to get on with some more birthday cards, as well as a Mother's Day card and a 21st birthday card for Mark's Goddaughter. Busy, busy!

Enjoy your day.

M x

Happy Valentine's Day

Hello - hope everyone is having a "lovely" day today! Here is the card that I made for my husband (yesterday!!). It's not the greatest of photos unfortunately - it'll look better when it has been scanned. The large heart is red shiny card, the middle one is glittered and the small one is red shiny embossed card (more about that soon). I have written around the hearts with a silver pen and the circular message says "thinking of you". He loved it.

My daughter Emily is going to a Valentine's party tonight, so I have made some special cupcakes for her to take. At least someone else will be eating them this time - we have had cupcake overload recently.

I used lots of glitter - red and silver, as well as mini marshmallows, silver balls, white sprinkles and pink hearts - cool!

Hope you have a day filled with love!

M x

A weekend of family, friends and food

It's been a really busy weekend, but enjoyable. At times, a little stressy trying to get everything done in time, getting Emily where she needs to be, when she needs to be there (teenagers - no sense of urgency!!), getting Edward to do his homework, not to mention all the housework that really needed doing, but we got there in the end.

Saturday evening we had three friends round for dinner. Mark cooked a lovely meal - pork fillet in a port and redcurrant sauce with dauphinois potatoes - yum!!! It was really delicious. Our friends are off to New Zealand soon for three weeks and we won't see them for a while. Am very envious of them and hope they have a fab time.

Today was about family. My sister, brother-in-law and nephew and niece came for lunch, and for my brother-in-law to work his magic on Emily's computer which is slower than slow! He has managed to really sort it out and now it is responding so much quicker. I cooked today - Neapolitan meatballs in a tomato sauce (from Gino D'Acampo's book Buonisimo - I recommend them as a good family meal - if Edward eats them, they must be OK!!).

I made a double batch of cupcakes in anticipation of them coming, and used my new sprinkles and some new colours. The lime green ones are a bit jazzy, but still delicious.

I think the mauve ones look very classy - love the chocolate brown stars.

I think I may have to invest in a new icing set. The one I'm using is a plastic one that I have had for years (from Bettaware I think), but it is starting to crack. I've seen a metal one on Lakelands, so I may have to treat myself - or drop big hints for Mothering Sunday!!

Am feeling pooped now after such a busy weekend, so maybe it's time for a cupcake and a sit down - need to be chilled before another busy week at work - but it's half term the week after - 5 more get-ups!

Have a good week everyone.

M x

So Exciting!

I'm really happy today because I have had my first comment on my blog. Thanks so much to Vanessa at Coco Rose Textiles, whose blog is one of my favourites. It's really good to know that I'm not just talking to myself (and my parents who follow my blog!) - you never quite know if anyone out there is reading your posts. I have been too shy to comment on all the other blogs that I read - apart from when Lucy at Attic24 had her baby recently - but I was very excited by the beautiful mugs on Vanessa's give away, and it galvanised me into action. Fingers crossed!!

Today I have received an exciting box of goodies from Cake Craft Shop - new sprinkles for my cupcakes - pretty hearts, flowers and confetti, as well as some silver and gold balls. I've also ordered some stars and butterflies from another supplier - Cupcake Style. This will keep me going for ages (or so I keep telling Mark!!). I generally make a batch of cupcakes each weekend - the children love them so much and I try to vary the colour scheme each time. Lots of scope now.

Gosh, this week is going slowly. It feels like the end of the week, not Tuesday. I think it might be because the weekend was so hectic and we didn't really have much time to recharge our batteries. This weekend isn't going to be much better unfortunately, and there will be precious little time for card making - I'm really going to have to make up for it at half term.

I'm off to watch a new series - Vampire Diaries. I've read the books, they were OK. They're no where near as good as the Twilight Saga and the Sookie Stackhouse series though. We shall see.

Until the next time.

M x

Sunday

Only one Christmas card today - other commitments took priority. I have used more Craftwork Cards products that I have had for a while. I've lost count of the cards that I have made this week - I think it's over 40 though.

This is a birth congratulations card for a colleague at work who has had her baby this week - simple but effective.

Another batch of vanilla cupcakes - Edward chose the colour this time, green being his favourite. When I've got time (??) I would like to try some other recipes from The Hummingbird Bakery cookbook, but these cupcakes are so lovely and such fun to make that I don't do anything else. I'm desperately waiting for payday this week so that I can treat myself to some lovely new Sprinkles I've seen and some new colours. Also we love the edible glitter - it's so pretty!

I probably won't have time to post much this week - hopefully it will be a normal week at work. Although I do have something exciting to show you - an early birthday present! I just haven't had time to photograph it yet. Watch this space.

Have a good week.

M x

More Christmas Cards and Cupcakes

I was planning to post these photos yesterday, but time ran away with me as usual. It's been a funny old weekend, and not very relaxing. A weekend of duty and jobs - never mind it goes like that sometimes.

I made these vanilla cupcakes yesterday and Mark chose the colour - quite jazzy.

Here are the latest batch of Christmas cards (as of yesterday). These are more traditional in their colour scheme, but with a modern design. Can't remember the name of the range of papers but they came from Craftwork Cards as usual.

I'm hoping to post again later this evening to show you what I have been up to today. Here's a little clue - it's more of the same!

See you later.

M x

(Inspiration - Craftwork Cards)

Colourful Crochet and Cupcakes

Look at my colourful little pile of stars. Talk about planning ahead. I saw a lovely Advent Garland that Lucy made over at Attic24. There was no chance that I would make it for the Christmas just gone, so I'm planning ahead. I have to say that these little stars are addictive and they take no time at all to make. I'm using the Patons DK Cotton that I am using for my hexagonal blanket as the colours are so lovely. I've made 15 so far, so not too many more to make. Aren't they sweet?!

Yesterday I made another batch of vanilla cupcakes. I decided that I rather fancied Sky Blue. They look a bit wintry with the silver balls and white chocolate chips - my celebration to the fact that the snow has finally gone!

I'm looking forward to payday when I can pay a little visit to the lovely cake decorating shop in my town and buy some new colours and decorations - another addiction!

Mmmmm delicious!

M x