Champagne Corks.

On the 7th June our very, very good friends Christine & Tony's eldest daughter Alice married Mark in the lovely Devon countryside, the Yurt Camp near Newton Abbott.

I was so looking forward to it, of course Mum was as she has seen Alice grow up, I nearly have as I am older. The boys were looking forward to it as it is a day out and they haven't been invited to a ceremony before, just one other evening 'do'.

Louis isn't quite as tall as me, but we are talking nano-millimetres now. I shall stop feeding them now to stunt their growth as I cannot condone such events.

So Tony was there to meet us and he looked resplendent in his waistcoat and Ali's eyes lit up when he saw him as Tony had hurt his knee and was using a stick to help him walk. I am not talking a walking stick with badges from towns visited; I am talking a Gandalf staff. Now anyone that has been around here for a while will have heard me tell of Ali's obsession with pokey sticks, (you can read about it here) and this was the best he had ever seen. "I have got to get me one of those!" he said immediately (and grammatically incorrectly ;-)).

We soon started moving down to the ceremony area which was lovely, set in a nook, a thatched building, benches for us to sit on with billowing sails for cover and a wooden walkway. Louis wanted to use the DSLR and he took some great photos of the wedding party arriving.

The ceremony was a humanist service (they had the 'legal' service a couple of days earlier at Exeter) which I found really moving and full of their personality together as a couple. As it was coming to an end the faint sound of champagne corks popping in the distance sounded like celebratory fireworks and was just perfect.

The boys were so interested which was great to see.

After the photos had been done it was time for champagne, canapés and chat. The Yurt camp has an adventure area with a zip wire so they got changed and headed off before lunch and then we had a scrummy dinner with loads of great speeches from the couples friends and family who are obviously great supporters of them, full of love and humour.

Alice & Mark's Wedding from Jennie Hart on Vimeo.

It was such a beautiful day, full of fun and love. I wish the happy couple the very best of everything forever.

Oh and if you are ever in Scotland, they are running The Inn At Kippen and they are doing great things there, I can't wait to go.

Of course it is scrapbooking gold and I have thoroughly enjoyed reliving the day while I have created my pages today. I made a 12x12 layout, 2x 6x12 layouts and a pocket page.

The papers are new Maggie Holmes Vellum and old Prima that I have been saving for a special occasion.

I used Jen's great challenge over at UKS, good better best. You take a photo after each stage to take it from good to better to best.

So here it was as 'good'

'better'

'best'

6x12
 
6x12

and the accompanying pocket page


Many, many thanks and love to Chris, Tony, Alice & Mark for inviting us to their special day.

Tune in next time for the coastal walk layout, it is done, just needs posting. Have a great day :-)

Summer Bucket List: Intro Page

This will be our second year to compile and complete a Summer Bucket List (for details see here and I saw the original idea here). The basic idea is that everyone in the family contributes to the list which consists of things to do. This dovetails exactly with what I discussed in my last post about how I like to plan to do things to make sure we do things, enjoy them, record them and then document them with pretty paper and embellishments.

Some items on the list are exactly the same because they were awesome, some are similar in idea and some are new. Sadly some didn't make it, there is after all only so much summer available and a budget, so, no Ali-we can't go to Disneyland and Australia.
Now that is a bucket list :-)



So the list this year comprises:
1. Harry Potter Studio
We have heard good things about this tour so that will be our big treat.

2. Learn to sew
We have started, not well, but we have started.

3. Harry Potter Movie Marathon Day
PJ Day for a rainy day.

4. Make a Teddy
This is ambitious, see no. 2 

5. Blog Series 'Snapshot'
This is something I am considering for the blog inspired by other blog series I have seen

6. Plymouth Aquarium
The rest of the family have been over the past few years, but I haven't.

7. Stargazing Exmoor
This was utterly magical last year, we went ill-prepared as it was a little spontaneous and in April last year so it was very cold. We will be much better prepared with a disposable bbq, marshmallows for s'mores and dunking in hot choc while we marvel.

8. Daytime Coastal Cruise
We went in the evening and saw Dave the Dolphin last year, completely serene and lots of fun. We are going to go in the day and go the other way along the coast, see if we can see Sammy the Seal.

9. Make Chocolate Ice Cream
We have a great recipe for vanilla and for lemon, now the boys think we need one for chocolate, who am I to argue with that?

10. Coast Path & Geocaching
This has endured through the other amazing seasons and we will continue this summer.

11. Tunnels Beach
5 minutes from us we have a set of smugglers tunnels and a natural pool and beach, it has all been renovated and civilised with the addition of a play zone, excellent coffee and sunny outdoor seating.

12. Bodyboarding
I am not sure if I will still be brave enough to go on my own once the children have gone, but I think I probably will as I adore it and so do Louis and Lauren.

13. Rinda's Photo Scavenger Hunt
I have looked on at others completing this for a couple of years and this year I am joining in. If you haven't heard of it you can find out more here.

14. Catch a crab from Ilfracombe Pier
Recreating a childhood memory for and with Alex. 

14. Make Ginger Beer
Last year it was lemonade and you will see why we will need it for the next and final activity.

15. An Old Fashioned Picnic in an Old Fashioned Place.
We think it will be Dunster Castle and we are going to get out the proper picnic hamper (rather than the cool box and bag for life we normally use ;-)) make all the proper picnic food from scratch and wash it down with lashings of ginger beer.



Here we go! 

We have been out on the coast path already, also we have taken some photos for the scavenger hunt and we may have caught a crab, if you follow me on instagram you might already know :-) So hopefully I will be back tomorrow or the day after with one of those tales.
Thanks for coming by.

6 Days and counting...

The monthly challenge over at UKS has a great sketch to follow.

I used it for one of the 12x12 layouts in project life this month. It has been manic at work for the first 13 weeks of the financial year; we have had an extra job to do and that has been emotional, hard and boring all at the same time. Now that the project has just about come to an end we are all relishing a bit of an easier work day. On top of that we are still decorating and sorting the house out at home and it has been a big adjustment going back to work full-time after my lovely few months away from it. I decided that Sunday was going to be a scrapbook day and catch up on project life, well, in between playing moshi monsters.
It was lovely to catch it up and because of the way I am approaching it this year it feels less daunting when I do slip 'behind'.

 A couple of weeks ago I completed my first 10k run for a long time. I hadn't trained as much as I would have liked and I knew the course had a hill so I wanted to be in as good a place as I could be so I had a super healthy week. 

Porridge, Salad, walking, running and swimming.
It was a good week and the run was better for it, at the very least in my mind!

 Love the Maggie Holmes paper from Crate, I die-cut the circles and mounted paper behind them and then embossed off-set circles with turquoise zing powder. 
The run was enjoyable, apart from climbing up to the cliff path!! I only managed to run up a third and then I thought I might explode.
I took this snap as I went along the cliff path of the coast and woolacombe beach that I had just run along and would have to do again :D

I am training now for Race For Life which is half the distance and so I am training to try and do it faster than I normally do. Which is slow. So slow. At this point on the run I was at about 4km and I could see the winners finishing, ahem. :)

UKS Blog Hop prize winner!

Thank you to everyone that left such lovely comments on my post for the UKS blog hop.

So without further ado the winner of the lovely Simple Stories Vintage Bliss Paper Collection is...

Tracey

"Lovely los, thanks for sharing. Very clever use of the QR code. I have been dabbling with some divided pps too but not gone for whole hog with Project Life yet. I enjoyed your video, very helpful, felt more like seeing it all in the flesh.

UKS - mumof4girls"

So congratulations Tracey, if you email me at jennie.hart.1@gmail.com with your details I will get it in the post to you :)

UKS Blog Hop.

Welcome along to the UKS blog hop, you may have arrived from Scrapdolly and her beautiful accordian album, it is just gorgeous; if not and you fancy joining in then you can go back here to the start to get the full list and start from the beginning. There will be fantastic blogs to see and there is a prize if you follow the hop round.

I am excited to be giving away a prize too, this is from me personally as a thank you for reading my post. I hope you enjoy it and the details of what it is and how to join in are at the end of the post.

======================================================

I wanted to show you how I am incorporating my traditional 12x12 scrapping which I love and my project life type scrapping in divided page protectors which I also love. This post then becomes almost the start of a serial of posts I am writing about my experience of project life and how I got to where I am; which is with one album at a time with all my types of scrapping in it. 

I know you are eager to get on with the hop, but if you fancy learning more then you can see my intro post here. Which explains all the influences I have had around this change over the last couple of months.

So my scrapping is about this year's annual Easter egg hunt. 

I concentrated on getting video footage of it as I have only been able to record footage over the last 12 months so I am capturing as much of what is left of their childhood as I can, which they really enjoy ;) This did mean that I didn't get brilliant still photos though. 

So I edited and uploaded the video and then turned it into a QR code to print and add to the page.

I then decided which was going on the 12x12 layout and which was going on the 6x4 scrapping and how much journaling was needed to go with them.

I looked at which papers I used in the album in the pages before these ones will sit and decided whether I will use them or move into new stash and if so how they will fit together best. In this case it was the start of the second album of the year and I finished the last one with Amy Tangerine's 'Yes, Please' line so I went back to that, which was no real chore.

Once I did that bit I cracked on with the 12x12 layout. Love this bit, I like to find a challenge or a sketch at least to guide me. In this case it was Suzy's great challenge on UKS a couple of weeks ago.

(I must just mention my poor child's chest, he had been poorly with a nasty cold and then d&v over 3 weeks, he isn't well covered at the best of times but I can reassure you that those bones are covered again, not much but they are covered!)
Since I have adopted this approach I have not worried too much about getting all the journaling on the 12x12 and now add them to a 6x4 which is scrapped with the leftovers from the 12x12. I add the date and a comment where to find the journaling if it isn't going to sit directly opposite.

I then use some more of the papers to add to the slots opposite the 12x12.

Here you can see the QR code in the top left slot so that as a family we can scan and watch any accompanying videos as we look through the album. (Feel free to scan it yourself and watch the hunt, or you can click the link here.)

A photo and journaling of the chocolate haul he found on his hunt are below that. (of course the chocolate haul helped with the bone covering as well :) ) 

On the right I used a 6x12 off-cut of paper and split it into 3 down the right hand side. Ali wrote on one and I stapled in one of the clues for the hunt. (Thank you to Susi for the lovely post-its, they are very useful and pretty :) )

I have also included a video of me showing the album if that helps to see what I mean any better. If not you will at least have a laugh at my country bumpkin accent :) I did not write a script, I have not edited due to time constraints so let's suffice to say that I am especially proud of how I call it 'The Easter' and also of the funny noise I make when I mention seeing the sun! This is my first video where I talk so please go gently, pretty pleasey-weasey?

Project Life: April from Jennie Hart on Vimeo.

Ok, so thanks so much for visiting my blog on the hop, to qualify, as I am sure you know by now, for the UKS prize you need to leave me a comment.

To qualify for a prize from me which is a Simple Stories collection - Vintage Bliss- *fans herself over excitedly*

To enter: Please tell me in the comments whether you think the video illustration is helpful? That's it, then you are entered for my prize too. 

Entries close at 20:00 GMT Sunday 21st April 2013.

I will then pick the winner from a random generator and announce the winner on my blog. Full details on how to claim your prize will be given at the time.

Next stop on the hop is Soojay's fabulous post, enjoy the rest of the hop and thanks again for stopping by...

Weekly Challenge: July Week 2/Shakespeare.

So where was I with Shakespeare?

Reading Macbeth. Enjoying it, I have watched the programme that Ethan Hawke made for the Shakespeare Season on BBC. I downloaded a support book to help me through it a bit and I have read a bit more. It has been a difficult week at home and will continue to be so, so the only chance I get to read it in the peace and quiet my dull brain needs is at break time at work as I have described before, but they have been few and far between.

I had a lovely friday evening making a layout for the weekly challenge over at UKS.

I used a Nigella recipe for Jumbleberry Jam for my first foray into jam making. I liked the recipe as there was no faffing about with a thermometer that I don’t own! It was brilliantly easy and it was good jam. I did this in early March to take to our retreat. We finished the jar at home this week so am looking forward to September and making some more.

The layout was on started on white cs, I don’t seem to use anything else very much apart from the odd Kraft. I painted on some stripes of pearly paint once I knew where my photos etc were going. I used Shimelle’s 4x6 Photo Love class for September last year. I used it for the first time to scrap a lovely break to Legoland we had that month.  I posted that layout here.

I adapted that challenge as this challenge wanted some white space. I cut down the photos to 4x5 and matted them on to pretty paper from BG Nook & Pantry.

So happy to finally use some, I loved it at the time I bought it but didn’t use much of it. Then matted them onto neutral cs, added a washi tape tab and then tucked them into the acetate pocket I made.

The acetate pocket uses the same washi tape to secure it and there is a strip of my new pp Simple Stories Summer Fresh underneath the pocket and securing the bottom of the pocket. A few embellies and the journaling and twas done

 Thanks so much for looking

Monthly Challenge: Nostalgia.

As I went through my reader a couple of weeks ago I was surprised to see Storytelling Sunday over at Sian’s From High In The Sky. I’m know it is always the first Sunday in the month but still! I was feeling nostalgic as I read Uncle Dave’s post and started thinking about what I might write about.
My mind skitted upon the Run To The Sun we did to Newquay many moons ago-when it wasn’t all about the drinking! That immediately linked to The Verve and their Bittersweet Symphony. (I am listening to it now as I write this and still finding such emotion and joy in it). The album came out the day we drove down there which is why it resonates and is so tied up with that weekend.
We worked at sea for P&O European Ferries and five of us hired a VW Sharan when we disembarked–’The Bus’ we called it immediately and shouted at every car to get out of our way “We Have A Bus, We Go First!”. We were all used to driving Renault 5’s and Fiesta’s. It even had aircon, AirCon!!!!
Such silly, such happy 22 year olds we were. We stopped everywhere to see if they had it stocked. We finally tracked it down at Exeter Services and we didn’t stop listening to it for a week. I still listen to it regularly.
I also remember hysterical laughter as we drove through a sleepy part of Devon (yeah, I know most of it is quite sleepy, and still is, I love it) and seeing a tourist attraction sign, you know the brown ones, advertising ‘Barometer World’, well as we dissolved in helpless laughter (Matt was driving and he had to pull over) someone quipped, “What’s next, ‘Thermometer Kingdom’…?” That was it-just paralysed. Those are the things that you find hilarious. It still makes me smile now, and I drive past that same sign, now and again.
So what a co-incidence when I came across Sian’s post for Saturday (in the same Google Reader catch-up!) where she discusses nostalgia and the photo is of cassettes of music. So well done Uncle Dave you managed to make me nostalgic simply from your post and you sent me down a nice memory lane this morning.
Were there ever any photos? I don’t think so. It seems strange compared to now when I never leave the house without a piece of equipment that will take a decent photo ready to document our lives.
There are photos from that year though, this post drove me to find them. They were of a cabin party on board for my 22nd birthday.
Firstly, Paul & I sharing a moment. So many things to tell you about this photo.

Firstly I must tell you that however suggestive this photo might be, the reality is much more innocent. For some reason Paul’s nickname on board was fathead…I cannot remember why. But I do remember it used to wind him up. One of the entertainment crew had made the balloon man of Paul for me (with a fat head balloon for his head) and he wasn’t particularly happy but we teased him to vaguely smile and he was brandishing it at me here.
Paul and I were very fond of each other and had some nice times, he was a really sweet person and treated me so well. We also shared a weird experience. Our maternal grannies died within 24 hours of each other, I clearly remember comforting him as we travelled to Le Havre with him knowing that he couldn’t get off until we had turned the ship around “turnaround” and returned to Portsmouth, I then got the call from shore-side on our return journey to Portsmouth that my Granny had had a stroke and so I went to pack to get going too. I am sure that as we were an item there was scepticism about it, not for us though, we went our separate ways at the train station and my Granny died a few hours before I got there. Paul’s Granny had died when he heard.

On one of our watch weeks (for those that don’t know, and I know KathiJo does because of Zac at least.) we worked a five week system, one week at sea, one week off, two weeks at sea, one week off. This meant that we didn’t spend much for 3 weeks out of 5. Brilliant. I paid off my student overdraft in about 10 weeks. I remember being so relieved that the £1000 was gone. I know it wouldn’t be that easy for anyone today.
It also meant that those of us on the same watch or on a ‘good’ overlay watch could arrange breaks away. We went to many places of which Newquay, Dublin and Skegness were highlights A few tales to be told from each!
So back to the birthday party I so wish there were straighteners in those days and my hair wasn’t so fluffy

This was just before the previous photo when Paul discovered me dancing with his ‘fun balloon’ doppelganger.

And then later on when it all got so much more drunken and crazy. How many people can you get in one tiny cabin?

I just had to make a layout of it so I used the monthly challenge sketch, a lovely one from Sue and stretched it to a double as the photos are so big. I used my fab new eclips to cut a doily big enough and cut it in half to use on both sides. I was also really happy to use up the final scraps of the Summer Days papers that I am sure you are fed-up of seeing on my layouts. What a lovely few hours I had reminiscing.
Thanks for looking it over xxx
PS I have just noticed in the post that the hexagons have slipped on the bottom left of the pic, straightened them now, wish it would be so easy to do that to my hair!

“and be you blythe and bonny.”

It is my first time setting the weekly challenge over at UKS this week. With my recent interest in Shakespeare it had to include a Shakespeare themed challenge. I decided to scrap this photo of Lauren that I took on her birthday last November.

I do love the photo, but also it matched one of my favourite quotes so far from Shakespeare.
From Much Ado About Nothing:
“and be you blythe and bonny, converting all your sounds of woe into hey nonny nonny.” She has a lot of woe, and she does look on the bright side of life and I wanted to encourage her to carry that on into life.
The thing I mostly have been reflecting on is despite how powerful the writing is and I am still enjoying break-time reading with the complete works, this line was brought to life by Emma Thompson half-reading half-reciting this to music in the film version that I mentioned I loved here.

He wrote them as plays and should be performed as such, so I will carry on reading but also watching as much as possible.
I recorded The Hollow Crown on Saturday night, it was Richard II, I had already got into bed, fully intending to watch it on Sunday. However, after watching the first scene, I was up out of my bed and did some scrapping whilst I watched. It was fantastic, Ben Whishaw was brilliant as all the rest were, I, felt prickles on the back of the neck as Patrick Stewart as John Of Gaunt gave the Act Two Scene 1 Sceptered Isle speech. Can’t wait until the next one on Saturday, Henry IV Part 1.
Anyhoo, here is the layout.

I took lots of inspiration from all over the place, Two Peas, mainly for the negative title, layered bunting etc. I used the brilliant papers from Echo Park Summer Days, I have nearly used it all up now as well which makes me happy
Thanks for looking xx

Monthly Challenge/‘Christening’

I found the colour combo challenge this month on UKS quite tricky as the colours were all so rich, but as I decided to just get on and do it for the points, I realised that I didn’t have to use lots of the colours, so I didn’t.

Some gesso, some croco paint in bronze, some cosmic shimmer mist in lava red and distress stain in fired brick, generally splattered and sponged with a few pieces of papers from my scraps box and it was done.
Although looking at it, I think I will go back round the strips with a fineliner to outline them, they look a bit too floaty random.
The photo was as the title suggests from mine and Rich’s christening. Mum still cannot believe that she managed to get two different kinds of red for us to wear. I still can’t get past our haircuts

The service was at St Helena’s the church on Lundy where we lived, there have been so few children to live on the island that Mum suspects there may not have been any christenings there since, or at least very few. I think I might try and find out more about that.
Co-incidentally, talking to my boss this week, his great-grandad was the stone mason that built St Helena’s. Small world.
The Olympic Flame is coming to town tomorrow. We are all excited. I am at work so I shall walk up and watch it go past as it is only in my work village for 5 minutes. My Mum and the kids will be having a party as it is staying 2 hours in our town and everyone is going to the sports fields for all sorts of Olympic themed fun. I didn’t really get a great deal there!

Up, Up, Up-Weekly Challenge

Climbing up to the top of Hillsborough was a lovely hour with Ali.

Up.
We weren’t going to go so high but Ali suggested we went up to the top and this was so surprising and so spontaneous of him that I readily agreed.
He really likes to stay home.
This was about a third of the way up. You can just see the harbour behind him. We used to live at this end of town when I was a teenager, I remember playing Foxes & Hounds all over this hill. I also remember a wet afternoon at primary school when we all dressed up in costume to go up there to look at the remains of the bronze age fort, which was the first evidence of settlement in Ilfracombe. I do not have fond memories of that day

Up.

Up.

To The Top. (Yes, the song is Catch My Fall, to reflect the terror I felt the whole time he was up there )


I also would like to draw your attention to Ali's pokey stick in the video. I posted about his love of pokey sticks here. 
I have just bought the divine Up & Away papers from Basic Grey as a 12x12 pack and I challenged myself to only use the pack to make the layout, I have never done this before, I much prefer to gather kit from all over my stash. I didn’t enjoy the process nearly as much so I probably won’t do it again, it also isn’t my favourite layout…but I do love the papers.

Up, Up, Up To The Top.
The challenge from the Inky Minxes was great, I loved the sketch this week.