Back from uni :D

Hi.... it's been so so long, how are you all?

I have a few crafty things to share with you, it's been 8 months since I last posted but I don't have that much in the way of crafts to show for it! University and scrapbooking didn't really work together, but I have thousands of memories and photos to scrapbook in the future!

Before I show you, here's a quick review of my last 8 months.... 

Well, I am home again, my first year of university has come to a close! It's flown by! I've just read my last blog post, it's interesting seeing what I wrote before uni, how I found it a daunting prospect. I can now honestly say it's been an incredible year, better than I ever imagined. Bath is a stunning city, I've been lucky to have the best set of housemates I could have been put with, and the course has been great. I did a couple of exams in January, I've been doing lots of coursework throughout the year and have just done my final exams of 1st year. I think they went ok, just got to wait and see now. I've been working hard, but having lots of fun too, it's been fantastic.

So here's a few things I've made since my last post. I've been using holidays and brief trips home to craft when I can :)

I've had the pleasure of sharing this last year with someone very special to me. Soon I will have been with my boyfriend for a year. We have been at school together for many many years and have known each other for a long time. We only decided to be together just before going our separate ways for university (our unis are 6 hours apart by train!) but I am thrilled to say that we have made it through our first year at university and remained together.
I made him this scrapbook page for Christmas, with many little pockets for notes, tickets and anything else we have been collecting from travels together. I tried to keep a theme throughout the pages, with pastel colours, washi tape and kraft.

This year was also my first of making and sending a proper valentines card. So, as you can imagine, I was bursting with ideas! As I mentioned earlier we are far apart at our unis, so this sentiment I found when searching through mum's stash was perfect for the card.

Most gifts I give nowadays have some form of creative aspect, so valentines gifts were not going to be any different! I made this ticket booklet using My Favourite Things dies and stamps. It was great to be able to personalise it, you can buy some pretty distasteful versions online so creating your own is the best way in my view. Here is a view of the inside tickets
(none of them have been used yet, he doesn't want to pull them out of the book! :D)

So, enough lovey dovey stuff now, sorry!

This year I have also been able to try something I have wanted to do for a long long time ... Ballroom and Latin Dancing. Yep I am a strictly come dancing fan, yep I looked around for classes after watching the first series and yep they were expensive and hard to get to. Going to university really is the best chance to try anything you want, it's on your doorstep and is often subsidised.
I am so glad I went for it and tried dancing this year, it's been a great experience and I shall carry on with it next year. I took a Bronze level medal test in Ballroom last week and am just waiting for the results now. The club needed cards as a thank you for our superb teachers, so I offered to make one. Here is what I produced

It took a while, but I'm pleased with it, and so were the teachers :)

Thanks for popping by again, sorry I've been absent all year. I have a busy summer, so I can't guarantee many posts, but I do have a lot of photos from the last year to scrapbook now :)

Until next time, thanks and bye,

Hannah x

Catching up

Hello everyone,
Just thought I'd report in to say I'm still here.
I am in the middle of A levels at the moment, I have done 3 exams so far and have two to go. My last is on the 22nd June, and after that I am free!!!! I have many things coming up that I am really looking forward to, but for today I thought I would just share with you all of my creations from the last few months. :)

One of my brilliant friends turned 18 a month ago, and they love jelly beans, so I made them this cake :)

This is the birthday card I made, using mainly digital scrapbooking elements

I made a few of these cards for my Maths teachers. 

Yesterday was my final official day at school, we had a brilliant day, and as the theme for the day was royalty, I decided to paint my nails with Union Jacks.

So that's all of my crafting from the last month or so. I have some crafting planned soon, I have a couple of amazing trips abroad this summer so need to get my travel journal sorted before I go :)

Bye for now, thanks for looking :)

Hannah

Poor little neglected blog

Hi all,
This is Hannah here, do you remember me? :)

Don't let anyone tell you that A levels are getting easier and people don't put in much effort for them anymore. It may be true in some cases, but definitely not in mine :) I have been working hard recently, with my final A level exams gradually approaching. It's the Easter break now, so lots of time to get some good revision done (well, that's the plan, I shall aim to keep to it :)

Hopefully I shall find a little time to craft over Easter. I have been crafty, but only a tiny little bit, in order to make items for mothers day. So, I'm here today to share them with you.

This is the card I made for Mother's day. I had been given inspiration for this card a long time ago, unfortunately I cannot find it now, but it was on Amber's blog 'Damask Love'. I was quite pleased with how it turned out, and Mum liked it which is the most important thing :)
I also decorated cupcakes for Mother's day this year. We had a cupcake night at my Ranger's, specifically planned with Mother's day in mind, and we had great fun making icing and decorating the cakes, oh, and making a mess too :)

Here are the cupcakes I decorated. I rolled out and formed some flower petals prior to the evening, so they would support themselves and look realistic when placed on the cupcakes. They didn't last :( Unfortunately by the time I had got around to taking photos and giving them to mum, the moisture from the cakes and icing had caused the petals to flop. I really loved making them though, I think I may make some more for Easter :)

So, that's the extent of my creative side over the past 5 weeks that I've been absent from this poor little blog. I do have other news for you though. I now have a job, which is another reason my creative time has been lacking. I have a weekend job at our local garden centre, which is brilliant, I am enjoying it and it is great to be earning my own money for the first time :) I work every other weekend, so it fits perfectly with my school work, and so far I have found time to keep comfortably up with both.
I have other news too, and this is the news I am most pleased and proud of. I resat some of my Math's modules from last year in January, and have been given the results back. I am very proud to tell you that I have now achieved an A* in Mathematics. I was so so chuffed :) My offer from Bath of A*AA now feels so much more achievable, and they do not mind if you have resat to achieve the A*, so now, I need 2 A's and I should, hopefully, very hopefully, get into Bath university :) It's a lovely weight off my shoulders, although obviously I haven't let myself slack now, and am working my socks off to get the other grades. I also sat two maths modules that count towards my further maths A level, achieving 100% in one of them and 95% in the other, which I am very pleased with :)

Ok, so that's my little update, hopefully I shall be back during half term sometime :) Thanks for coming back and looking at my blog again :) Sorry I haven't been able to look around at all of your gorgeous blogs and crafts for a long time.

Bye for now,
Hannah :)

P.S. Thanks again to Katherine (Sutty) for passing on a lovely blog award to me, it means a lot to know you like my work  :)

Thanks

Hi all,
Sorry once again for being absent, I have meant to pop back and let you know how everything has been going, but it's so busy here that I haven't even had chance for that. Today though, I will make time to update you all.
First up though, it's time to say thanks to TPV. At TPV, the current DT are nearing the end of the time with the challenge, and that unfortunately includes me. Boy has it gone quick!! Team B have 3 more challenges left, and today I am here to share one of those, so now it's down to 2!
This week's challenge

Thanks and Thankful

At TPV, this weeks challenge is to use 'thanks' or 'thankful' on your paper project. Share a little thanks, make a project and link it up to TPV. The prize on offer for this challenge is:

A lovely set of sentiment stamps from My Creative Time.

I look forward to seeing your 'thankful' projects.

My card was made to thank an amazing group of people that I spent my half term with. During the half term week I had a week of work experience with the NHS, working with one of their IAPT groups. I had a thoroughly brilliant time, I learnt so much, met many great people and enjoyed experiencing Psychology as a profession. I really hope they liked their card, I just had to make one and send it, I had appreciated the work experience so much.
Here is a close up 
I got inspiration for this card from one of Mum's card magazines. I had seen it a while ago and loved it, so knew what design I would use for this card. I used a mixture of papers and ribbons for this card, then stitched white zigzag lines along the edges of each. I hope you like it.

In my last post I mentioned my entrance exam for Oxford. I had to sit the TSA exam which is for those wishing to study Psychology, Economics or Philosophy. I was the only one from my school taking that exam, so was sat in a little room on my own. The test was hard, very, very hard, although I wasn't expecting anything else, they have to make it hard as at the end of the day they only want those with the highest ability. I don't think it went particularly well, it really didn't, but I have to wait until January to get the results form the test. I should hear back from Oxford in the next few weeks to find our if I have been short-listed for interview, so I shall just have to wait until then. The exam was bad, but since I have made myself be positive, I tried my best, I worked hard to practise as much as I could before hand, and I shall just have to wait to hear back from them, I can't change anything now. I shall let you know when I hear anything back.
My application was sent off just over a month ago, and I have so far heard back from one of my University choices making me an offer, which is very exciting, I'm pleased to know they've received it and that someone likes the look of my application :) I'll keep you updated.

Since the entry exam I have felt like I can breath a little more, although I have since devoted myself to my A level subjects as I have modules in January and I've let them slip a little whilst preparing for my entry exam. So, it's work work work here, hence me being so quiet, but I don't mind, I know that the effort I put in now will be beneficial and it'll help me get where I want to be. :)

So, I've updated you up to the current day. I'll try and keep you posted, but for now, thanks for reading. I hope to see your entries over at TPV this week, and I shall be back here soon. :)

Bye for now,
Hannah :)

Little forest friends

Hi all,

Today I have a few things to share with you.
First up, today it's team B's turn again over at TPV.

Today the challenge is...

Create a project that includes a forest friend

You have already seen a sneak peek, but here is my full project :)

I made this card for a friend, who's birthday it was this past weekend. My friend loves animals, especially little cute pictures of them, so this suited her perfectly, and I had to use this cute little hedgehog. 

The image stamps are from Little Clare, which I have stamped and then coloured using Mum's coloursoft pencils. I have then cut the images into 4cm squares, and cut three squares of the same size from some of the  lovely October afternoon Modern Homemaker papers. I created 2 coordinating flowers using a small punch, outlined with a pen to match the design of the images, then have sewn around the edge of the patterned squares using a sewing machine. The sentiment used is one of the gorgeous Paper Smooches sentiments, and then I finished the card with a wrap of twine.

This week we have a great prize for you from Scrap-friendzy kit club, 

Look at that yummy kit, and all of that can be yours :)

So, head over here to the TPV blog to see the rest of the DT's cute little critters and also link up your own entry. I'll see you there :)

I hope you like my card. My friend liked it, but she loved her gift even more. I created these for her

(Taken using our 50mm lens at f/1.7 - I decided to play with it and take this after being inspired to use it more by the brilliant Shimelle's camera school posts)

(Taken using the Hipstamatic app on Mum's iPhone -  I LOVE this app and seriously want an iPhone now)

She loves sushi, and these earrings really appealed to her. I have created them out of Fimo, following instructions from a superb little book I bought a while ago. I was so pleased that she liked them, there is something really  special about being able to give gifts to your friends that have been handmade, especially when they love them.

So, I am now back into the swing of sixth form, with a lot of work and deadlines to keep to. I have my TSA entry assessment rapidly drawing closer for my Oxford uni application, so am busy at the moment juggling subject work with practising the many different required skills for the entry exam. I am also continuing with my driving lessons, I've managed roundabouts, dual carriageway, slip roads and a bit of manoeuvring now. :) I'm afraid this means crafting is taking a bit of a back seat, I will still be doing it when I can, but it may be a bit less frequent. 

So, from me, bye for now, thanks for popping by.

P.S. I was very thrilled to be a featured project at The Colour Room last week with this LO. Very chuffed. Also, congrats to Katherine who had her great work featured again for the second week in a row :)

Hannah :)

Playing with stickers

Wow, so our TPV blogaversary is finished. It was a great week, I hope you agree Have you seen who the winners were for all of the challenges, if not pop across here :) So now, TPV is onto it's second year of challenges, and today we are bringing you the first of those.

Today we are asking you to .....

USE STICKERS

Flat stickers, 3D stickers, cardstock, chipboard, sentiment ..

if it's a STICKER it's fair game!

Here is my card.

This week, we are sponsored by the fabulous company SRM.

We were all very surprised when we heard that SRM had been incredibly generous and supplied our entire DT with stickers to use. Thanks so much to them for their generosity. So as our token of our appreciation, the majority of our DT have created projects this week, using the supplied stickers, and not just the correct team for this week.

They were brilliant to use, the stickers are really lovely. I often steer well clear of stickers as I've come across some very poor ones before, but I had heard that SRM were very good so gave them a try. I can say I was very suitably impressed :) It very conveniently happened that the circle sentiment sticker fitted exactly onto one of the Stampin up punches, which is superb. I have cut the felt flowers using multiple dies, then hand drawn stems and used washi tape strips as a base for them.

So, use stickers, pop over to the TPV blog and enter your project. If you do, you will be entered into the random prize draw, which this week is a prize package from SRM. I really don't think you'll be disappointed.

Thanks for popping by,
Bye for now,
:)

The day we've been waiting for...

...has arrived!!!
It's the 7th September, which means it's
TPV's blogaversary!!!

Welcome, this will be an amazing week full of brilliant challenges, and of course, brilliant prizes. My fellow DT members have some incredible projects tucked up their sleeves, and as some of you may have already found, some cool giveaways too :)

So, this week, it is all about our 'favourite things'. One of our favourite things at TPV are challenges, so we're bringing you five, one each day. Another is our fabby prizes, so once again we're bringing you five, one each day, to reward you for your brilliant work and participation.

Are we ready, then let the celebrations begin!! :D

We are kicking off the celebrations with a fun blog hop and for our first challenge we bring you a brilliant sponsor .... My Favorite Things !! :)

If you have come here from Kylie's blog, then you are in the correct place :) If you haven't, then head over to the TPV blog, where the fun begins :) Be sure to hop to all 12 designers blogs to be inspired by their creations, plus many of us have blog candy for you :)

Our first challenge this week is to ...
create a paper project using stamps - clear stamps, rubber stamps, image stamps, or sentiment stamps, any form of stamp
My Favorite Things is generously giving a random challenge winner a $25 gift voucher to their store!!

How cool, you'll have to play along as that prize just cannot be missed. Check out their store to see all of their fabulous supplies.

You have until Tuesday noon (EST) to enter your project here for a chance to win that spectacular prize.



My Favorite Things generosity is sooo large, that they provided the entire DT with stamps to use on our projects!! I know, so generous :) So here we go, my stamping project.

I have created a card using their 'Meet me at the Cafe' digital stamp. I love their 'Who's that girl?' range of stamps, they're so beautiful to work with.
So, how have I made it.
Well, I've printed the digital image onto white cardstock, then masked the edges of the image and stippled blue ink faintly onto the image, to provide a realistic sky. I have then printed the image many times onto lots of different pieces of coloured card and paper. Having carefully cut each layer out, I have then decoupaged the image, giving each woman a unique outfit. As you can see in this close-up, the layers are stuck directly on top of each other, but still have a lovely dimension to them.

If you've never tried working with digital images before, then I would recommend you try it, they are very versatile and saves the storage space of rubber stamps.

I have then finished the card by matting and layering it onto an A6 card base, and adding a vellum strip with the sentiment on.

I hope you like it as much as I enjoyed making it :)

Now, I have something else to share with you. Something quite exciting. It is, of course, my giveaway :) I have loved my time so far with TPV, it is such a brilliant challenge blog, with such a friendly community, so I have this giveaway to celebrate it's birthday.

Seeing as the Blogaversary has a 'favourite thing' theme, I have compiled a collection of a few of my favourite things, to give to one of you.

So, to be in with a chance to win this collection of stash, answer my question with a link in your comment. It is not a condition of the giveaway that you have to become a follower of my blog, but if you'd like to, I'd be delighted. The giveaway closes at midday Monday 12th EST (5pm GMT) and I shall draw a random winner and announce it here on Tuesday 13th September.

You do not need to enter a project at TPV to be in with a chance of winning the blog candy, the giveaway is just a bit of fun. However, I do hope you decide to join in, remember, that $25 voucher for My Favorite Things could be yours if you play along :)

Don't forget that we will be hosting other challenges with more brilliant prizes until Sunday at TPV, inspiring you to use your favourite things :)

There is also a giveaway on the TPV facebook page so don't miss out on that. Come and join in the excitement and fun :)

Now, after a very long post (sorry) I shall pass you over to Nicole's blog to see what beautiful project she has created with MFT stamps :)

Thanks for visiting,

A Juicy Fruity Summer

Hi,

Well, I thought it was summer .... until today. It hasn't been too bad, it's been grey and drizzling finely for most of the day, but I'd still rather be enjoying sun. Although, this is England, and this is our typical summer!!

Anyway, I'm here today with some fruity crafts.

First up, a card for this weeks LIM challenge which is

FEELING FRUITY

I am really pleased with this card, it is definitely summery and warm. I have made the watermelon slice myself, from layers or fabric, felt and card, and using nestabilities, 2 circles and a scalloped circle. I have then used Gunmetal stickles to create the seeds. I have kept the other half of the circle to create another of these embellishments for scrapbooking :)

Staying on the Watermelon theme, I have also made these, what do you think?

I made them for a friend as part of her Birthday gift. Her birthday was back in May, in the middle of exams. We had a very late birthday party for her a few days ago, when she was presented with her very late birthday present. She straight away put them on and they hung just below her short hair style, and I must say I felt very pleased with them, they looked great on her :)
I've recently started to have a play with FIMO, after buying a great little book on how to make tempting treats from the modelling clay. It's quite an interesting medium to use, I guess I was expecting it to be a lot more pliable as I am used to working with sugar paste, but it's great fun. :)

And staying on the sugar paste theme (anyone would think I planned it to flow like this!!!), I have been cake decorating again.

It is my another of my friends' Birthday today, and I went on Monday to decorate a birthday cake with her. We hadn't a clue what we were going to do on the cake, so just decided to have a summery feel, and started from there. This is what we ended up with.

The strawberries are created using a heart cutter, which was then moulded into more of a strawberry shape, and the flowers are circles, with little snips in, then moulded and made to look like a flower :) I was quite pleased with it, considering our limited time to plan and create. She really enjoyed watching me create, it was great fun to teach her, and she loved the cake, bless her :)

Ok then, I think that's all for today, so much fruit!!!  I have a layout to share (no fruit this time), so will be back at the weekend :)
Bye for now,

Tic-Tac-Toe at TPV

This week, TPV's challenge is a brilliant Tic-Tac-Toe grid. These are so much fun to work with, and it's great to see all of the different possible combinations. Just pick a row, column or diagonal and there you go, your 3 components. Pop here to see the challenge and the design teams amazing work :)

So, to the grid, these are your choices

For my project this week, I decided to use the middle row, and here it is,

A card (obviously!!), a water theme (well, that's obvious too) and buttons (I LOVE those cute novelty buttons, they suited this card brilliantly, isn't that little rubber duck adorable?!!). The bottom section of the card is stamped faintly with a bubble stamp, then I have raised it slightly and drawn faux stitching.
This week, there is an amazing prize on offer. A $20 gift certificate for Freehand Scraps, a gorgeous kit company (and I mean gorgeous, I have only just discovered this company, and wow, look at those kits, soooo nice :)

And how about this, your getting a sneak peek here at the August kit!! This is one of the kits you could purchase using the voucher :) To see other kits, visit there website, they're so nice, unfortunately they are that nice that many of the past kits have sold out :(

So, pick which row of the grid you will use, and I'll see all of your lovely creations over on the TPV blog, just link your project up, I'll be sure to visit, plus you may win that prize :)

Bye for now,

Birthday thanks

Hellooo everyone,

Long time no post, I know ........

'Anyway, I shall now be enjoying a bit more freedom, I shall not be having to do work every night, so expect to see me here a bit more :) '

... and what happened to the 'more freedom' I spoke of in my last post. I can't believe how hectic my last 2 weeks have been. Photography course assignments, 2 university open days, lots of little bits at school, a global student forum conference, that's where my two weeks have disappeared!! I'm not complaining though, they have been a good 2 weeks, just no relaxing time at all.

First of all, it was my birthday on Friday, I'm now 17 :D I had a great day, I had to go to school, but my friends made it fun, tying balloons to my bag, so EVERYONE knew it was my birthday, people I'd never even spoken to before were saying happy birthday. I had some great gifts, clothes, money, a new D-ring scrapbook album (they're brilliant, I've not really looked into them before, but now my pages have become more layered and embellished, the post albums just don't have enough space)

So, yesterday, I finally had some freedom and time to relax and craft. So, as the good girl I am, I set to making my thank you cards for my friends. I made them to follow this weeks LIM challenge, which is Shades of Blue, and here they are, well, one of them.

I have used Mum's Waltzing Mouse stamps, in 2 shades of blue. I just need to finish the last few, and then I'll have a set ready to fill out.

So, as I said, I've been exploring universities the past few weeks. I've been to look around 2, Bath and Bristol, and it's all so exciting :D I really loved Bath, the course looks really good and the campus is lovely. I shall keep you updated as I visit more and make all the big decisions :)

Ok, well I think that's all for now, I shall be back in the week :) Thanks for visiting :)

CAS-ual cards and handmade jewellery :)

Hi everyone,

Today I was back at school after my weeks off for study leave, and boy do I feel tired, it's strange just how tired a day at school makes you feel, even though I've only had 2 lessons!! I still have 2 maths exams left, which I'm still busy revising for, but yesterday afternoon I found time to have a little break and craft.

I love this weeks CAS-ual Friday's challenge, so have created a few cards for it. First up, a card ready for Father's Day.

I needed to make a card, so I made it to tie in with the challenge, and used buttons, embossed and die cut. This week, the CAS-ual team have created a tic-tac-toe board, and we have to choose a row of three and create a card using those components.

Then, I had the inspiration, so made another. This follows the buttons, flower and twine row.

I really like both of them. I hope you do too.

The flower on the second card is handmade, I have been inspired recently after finding many tutorials for flowers, so, as I said I would in my last post, I sat down in the week and tried a few of them out. Here are some of my handmade flowers

I'm looking forward to using them on my LO's, I shall post links to the tutorials when I use them on projects.


Oh, and just one other thing, I thought I'd show you a couple of bracelets I've made and a necklace. Well, I didn't really make the necklace, I bought a necklace made of many felt balls a while ago and loved it, but didn't wear it as much I'd like to as it was short and I prefer long necklaces. So, I changed it. I cut up the necklace, salvaged the felt balls, threaded them onto a strip of fabric, and tada!!

I love it, very rough, with the fabric fraying and uneven spread of the beads, but that's what I love about it :)

...And the bracelets, I have seen paper beads many times before and liked the look of them, so last week, when we were trying to think of something we could do with the guides ( I help as a young leader) , I mentioned making beads, so that's what we're doing. I'd never tried it before, and felt it'd be a good idea to give it a go before I try and teach the guides, so I did, and here is the result :)

I really love them and shall be wearing these quite often, I'm very pleased with how they looked, and hopefully the guides will like the ones they make too.

Ok, I think that's enough for today, off to do a little revision before dinner, thanks very much for popping by, I really love receiving your comments, they always make me smile :D

Bye for now,