I usually do a little bit of scrapping or designing every day, but last week I decided to give myself some time off and just make the most of the last few days of the summer holidays before my baby started “big” school for the first time - sob! I was fighting back the tears in the playground as she marched off to class smiling and waving goodbye, my big brave grown up girl. Here she is in all her schoolgirl glory (I have to say that this page is rather messy, even for me - I think I had to cram a fortnight’s worth of element explosion into one layout. When I showed it to hubby he said, “Blimey, that’s a mess”. Nice.)

Full credits are HERE

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I was tagged by Amy, Amanda and Rachel with this tag that’s doing the rounds at the moment:

Here are the rules:
1.  If you’ve been tagged, you can put the logo on your blog.
2.  Link the person from whom you received the award.
3.  Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4.  Put links to those blogs on yours.
5.  Leave a message on the blogs you’ve nominated.

Here are my seven tagees:

1. Michelle: with love, by mushy - hybrid inspiration heaven
2. Jakey: Just Jake - UK scrapper who does clever things with paper and makes me laugh
3. Misty: Misty Cato Designs - always interesting, a great mix of new products, scrap news and family life
4. Kirsty: 12×12…8×8…6×6 - a paper scrapping, digi designing, photo snapping, all round entertaining read
5. Catherine: digiscrap-cafe - eye candy galore, I want to scrap like her when I grow up
6. Emilie: AmyPunky - possibly the sweetest woman in digiland, loads of beautiful simple layouts
7. and finally Kate: What Katie Does - I just discovered this blog today (through the similarity to my own online nickname) and it’s fab. And she has an etsy store and now I neeeeed to buy THIS print and THIS print and THIS print. Yum.

Hope you are having a lovely weekend, I’ll be back on Tuesday with some $1 bargains

Ready for a loooong post?! Don’t worry, there are lots of pictures and not much waffle This is what it’s all about, a lovely big Back-to-School / Labor Day (some American thing…lol) sale starting today and running until Monday:

See those magic words - “New Designer“? I am SO excited about this, I have admired Kaye Winiecki’s work for a long time now so I’m a very happy bunny now that she’s hanging out at the LilyPad. Check out her section of the store for lots of fun and colourful goodies like these:

And see those other magic words - “Free kit with purchase“? THIS is what you get FOR FREE if you spend over $15 this weekend (just fill your cart up and add it in, no coupon required):

And did you notice that other bit that says, “New guest designer” and “New BYOC“? Our guest this month is another of my favourite designers, the lovely Amber Clegg. She has these amazing papers and stickers for this month’s BYOC:

And speaking of BYOCs, thank you to everyone who entered my little giveaway! The random integer thingamy has been at work again:

And this is what they won, my BYOC products this month (if your name is here but you didn’t receive an email, please let me know!) :

I even scrapped with the BYOC! I love the retro almost 70’s feel these colours have, I need to find my old family albums (ie I need to find the packing box they are still in, 18 months after we moved house…) scan them and scrap them with this lot. But because I’m too lazy to do that tonight, I grabbed another template freebie by Michelle Filo and scrapped some pics of Matthew stalking autumn leaves in the garden instead:

Full credits are HERE

You can see more layouts using the BYOC and Kaye’s goodies on the LilyPad blog, I think this post is image heavy enough already! LOL

And finally, (I promise I’m nearly finished, stay with me, stay with me) did you notice this bit, “50% off retiring products“? I’m having a BIG clear out of some of my older products so there’s lots of stuff on sale at half price for the weekend (including the Funky Junky collabs):

Phew! Time for a lie down now. Hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Thanks for all the get well wishes! I did lose my voice for a while (much to everyone’s entertainment - “Pardon? What did you say?”, “Squeak that again”, “Did anyone hear a bat make a noise just then?” etc etc) but it’s almost back again now, I just sound a bit husky and like Mariella Frostrup (well, I probably don’t at all but I like to think I do). Apologies for not replying to everyone’s comments as yet, I’m still playing catch up with my overflowing inbox!

A little while ago I posted about how I make my doodles and was surprised by the number of people who said something along the lines of, “I didn’t realise you made them by hand, I thought you were using a tablet”. Sooo, when I came across this blog post by illustrator Rachelle Anne Miller I thought I’d share it here to show you how a true professional does the job armed with nothing but a sketchbook, a graphics tablet and Photoshop:

You can read all about Rachelle’s full 8 step process and see more lovely examples of her work on her blog HERE.

Here are a couple of re-releases for this week’s TT - firstly the doodles I gave away last week, and some school themed Wordy-Bits I made with lovely Tiff:

And then I thought, “Why not add a few more?” and flung in my Hearts and Flowers doodles and Newspaper Alpha (Funky) too.

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And finally, tomorrow night is the last chance to be entered into the draw to win my BYOC stuffs:

and with that, I’m off to doodle some BYOC doodles! Until Friday

Bleugh. We are all full of horrible summer cold here, the kids got it last week (I blame the HIDEOUS wet weather we’ve had all flipping summer long, sulk) and now hubby and I have it. About 10 times worse than the kids did, of course. DD is relishing the hope that I might lose my voice (am at the alternately croaky then high pitched squeaking stage which sounds like my voice is breaking….) - the child has mischievous plans for such an eventuality I’m sure. I can see in her face when she asks me if I can still talk and then thinks of some new clever scheme she can get away with if I’m not able to tell her to stop it, the world’s cheekiest smile spreads slowly across her face…. I’m scared.

Anyway, the point of this rambling is to explain why I have no new layouts or products this week, I have been far too busy feeling sorry for myself and lying around on sofas watching the Olympics. At least I have been saved from the horrors of normal daytime TV, phew!

Instead, I’m resurrecting some older school related doodles I made last year for a collaboration kit. You can get these little doodles FOR FREE if you are a member of my mailing list, or if you sign up for the list in the next few days. I’ll pop them into the store next week but they are free for the taking until Sunday night

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I also want to say congratulations to my lovely boss lady Amy for winnig THIS which follows hot on the heels of her also winning THIS - she is a scrapping superstar!! I’ve had a bookmark to Amy’s gallery in my favourites right from when I started scrapping and I can’t tell you how much I envy her ability to leave a layout alone and not fill it up with crap! LOL Anyway, many many congratulations my white space loving pal, it makes me so happy (and proud) to see you winning everything in sight!

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Finally, just a quick reminder that tonight (Friday 22nd) is the deadline for entries for the Best of British Scrapbooking contest, you have until midnight tonight to email your entries in (full rules are HERE).

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Thanks for all the comments by the way, it’s lovely to know I’m not talking to myself, makes me feel slightly less bonkers I’m off to dose up on decongestants and attempt to make something for the BYOC giveaway I’ve been running, it’s not going to be a very impressive prize to give the winners…. ermmm….. nothing. LOL  Until next week!