Crafty Retail Therapy...part 2!!!

Ooo..ooooo.....good ol' Mr Postie has been with my order from DewDrops Craftz!!!! I am now the proud owner of a little monster stamp (I couldn't resist Eric!) a robot stamp, a Sugar Stamp and Fairy Love....all stamps designed by Valerie Wade.

I am in the middle of a secret mission but cannot wait to play....must go Amelia is attacking my Cuttlebug with her Lazy Town Magazine!!!!!!

Edwin's Snowman!

It's a wonder he hasn't melted, this card has been sitting on my desk, half done since I got the stamp on Monday! I have lost my direction and mojo...I think it's underneath the piles of stash spread all over my very messy, very unorganised craft room!

Still, the card is finished now!

I thought I'd enter this into this week's challenge over on A Spoon Full of Sugar "Sparkle and Bling!" I use glitter glue on his wings, the snowflake and the little star and not as much bling as I'd have liked but sewed on the little pewter charm as an extra. My card would almost feel naked unless it was finished with some metallic rub-ons and my Glossy Accents.

I used my new Magnolia stamp, my new mesh embossing folder and I cut the scalloped squares using my new Nestabilities. The circular sentiment is a download from Charmed!

A bit of retail therapy works wonders.

What with concerns over Amelia's school and trying to make the best decision for her and us as a family, I have bee a bit down in the dumps. I cannot say we have completely made our minds up but it looks like the best way to go will be to send Amelia to the SN school. I have fought for 4 years and no matter how legally binding a statement is, it seems the school will always do as little as they can get away with. I feel like it's been trying to get blood from a stone for 4 years now I am just so drained in trying to get the support in mainstream right. It seems now that they just want to wash their hands of her.



I am taking it all rather personally at the moment and I feel that I have failed Amelia something terribly....but saying that, the statement I fought to get her will be needed to get her a placement in the already oversubscribed SN school anyway. I need to look at it that Amelia certainly hasn't failed, she has come on in leaps and bounds and in the one and only year she has had ANY support she has jumped several P levels and is certainly not alone at the bottom of her mainstream peer group. It is the school, the LEA, the system that has failed but how much longer can I jeopodise her education whilst I fight the system and what will it do to us as a family if we have to go through that again?



All in all I am trying to de-clutter and de-stress my life a little....so what better motivation than a bit of crafty retail therapy!!!!!!! I have placed a few little orders and even popped along to a local shop yesterday....before venturing into Toys'r'us for Amelia's birthday pressies!!!



Here is what I have got so far!

A Scalloped square nestabilities set
A Cuttlebug Embossing folder-mesh
Edwin's Snowman- Magniolia stamp
A new StazOn
Some paper stumps
4 new Prismacolors
A pencil sharpener

Watch out for the next installment of Dilly Dally Dingle goes mad with PayPal!

Hmmmm....now all I need is a tiny little bit of clear workspace to try some new stash out!

BINGO!!!!

Over on Crafts by Carolyn's there is a Bingo challenge;


Today your challenge is to use a bingo call for your inspiration (you don't have to use the number - just the call) and there are loads to choose from. These challenges are for anyone to take part in and it can be ANY NEW craft item from cards - jewellery or anything you imagination can come up with. Here is a link for the rhyming calls to use http://www.expressbingo.co.uk/rhyming%20Calls.htm




Well how could I resist using the brand new stamp from Toodles and Binks.

My inspiration of course being LEGS ELEVEN!!!!!!!


It's Chris's brother's girlfriend's (LOL) birthday soon and they moved out to France a few years back, I thought this stamp was ideal all round, tres chic!

Juliet's Blog Candy!

Pop on over to Juliet's Paper Place for a chance of some scrummy candy. Juliet is celebrating a well deserved 10,000 hits, I and I can see why.

Well done Juliet.

Dottie's World - Spotty Dottie

This week Karen over at Dotties World challenged us to see spots!

"No I am not asking for a pubescent Dotty in need of a tube of Clearasil, but I would like to see some spots. Yep, today I am setting the challenge here on Dottie's World, and this is what I would like you to do:
SPOTTY DOTTIE
I want to see SPOTS. It doesn't have to be Dottie, you can of course use any of the downloads. BUT I don't just want to see a circle or two."

Well, I do love my polka dots so I dug out some spotty papers and some spotty flower dies cuts that I have had for ages and went to town with the spots.....even used some spotty brads.

Great challenge Karen, I loved this one.

Pop over to Dottie's World to spot the creations the rest of the Design Team have created, you will truely seeing spots before your eyes.

A little snippet of .....

.............the brand new nameless stamp which Kay kindly popped through my door today. Pop on over to Toodles and Binks and guess her name to be in with a chance of winning her.

I have almost finished putting together my card but it will have to wait until tomorrow now..my bed is calling.

My first Celeste card....

....is at long last finished. As soon as Amelia saw the image I had left coloured in on my desk she told me it was the tooth fairy...opening up a whole host of ideas......OH NO....I don't want more ideas yet just I want 48 hours in a day!

BUT Celeste isn't a tooth fairy today, today she is the "Snow Fairy!"

Celeste stamp by Toodles and Binks, available from Stamp Galaxy
Swirl Stamp by DewDrop Craftz
Circular Sentiment download from Charmed.

Glitter glue and silver embossing powder....EVERYWHERE!!!!!! On my desk, on my fingers, in my hair, on the carpet.........

I made this card for this weeks challenge over on Secret Crafter Saturday challenge where you need to use Blue, white and a bit of a snowflake...now I am worried that I have too much green going on in there!!LOL....oh well!

A peep at Celeste!

Putting my worries aside for a couple of hours I thought I'd spend the afternoon crafting THEN........the phone rings. Amelia is poorly and I have had to go pick her up from school. She seems pretty OK now, she was a bit warm so I have dosed her up with some Calpol and we are just about to wrap up a bit and go for a nice slow walk around the school to collect Jack.

Poor Celeste is sitting on my desk all coloured in and sparkly and no-where to go!!!

There's a whole lot of crafting going on...

....NOT!!!!!

I was up until about 12.30 last night completing Parental Contribution Forms for a Meeting held at the school today.......so I went to bed with my head buzzing and I never really switched off from it all.

Been on the phone to The Down Syndrome Association this morning to get some specialist advice regarding Amelia's support at school....it seems I am not quite so mad in thinking that a bit of differentiation is possible. We are visiting the SN school on Friday and I suppose I need to decide one way or another if I want to continue battling things out with the school/LEA or whether or not Amelia would actually be better of in a SN school.



The school are saying that Amelia is struggling to access the Year 2 cirriculum and that they cannot differentiate lessons without excluding her. Funny that the advisor from the DSA advised that there are actually plenty of schools out there differentiating classes for children with Down Syndrome and still on P-Levels, not only in Y2, but also into KS2 and even into Secondary education.

I just feel I am constantly banging my head against a brick wall with it all but deep down I know that if I send her to the SN school I will feel that the system has beaten me and that I will have let her down badly.

Anyway, enough of my waffle...........meet Dotty Dolly!#

I asked my mum if she would be able to knit a Dottie for me and I have her a few ideas of what I'd like, such as the striped tights and a dotty cardi...but the hair do was rather tricky to master.
I wonder how we could give her little nobbly knee caps too!!!

Thanks MUM, I love Dottie Dolly! xx

A challenging last minute change of heart!

Nikki decided to do another DewDropz Challenge where she said;

As we are now watching the autumn leaves falling and the colours of nature changing.. with the weather turning from warm(ish) to so chilly some days, you wonder why you got out of bed.. this weeks challenge is 'Autumnal Colours'
I would love to see all your projects using colours from autumn..

Now I got out all my rust, red, yellow and browns and started faffing around but it just wasn't coming together so at the last minute I decided to cheat. Seeing yet another wonderful Halloween creation over on Dottie's World this morning inspired me to make Amelia's birthday card a bit different this year, she is a Halloween baby after all!

Nikki, I hope this can still be included in your challenge, after all Halloween is Autumnal...isn't it?LOL, doesn't really matter I am quite pleased with the result and I have another card off my to do list!

I am also entering this into this week's Dutch Dare where this week it's "Just Cardstock!"

Here it is. I used the lovely Charlotte stamp from DewDropz Craftz..I was hoping for a gothic tone too..LOL...hmm not quite sure I have managed that.

PS, don't look too close you will see that the glossy accents are STILL not dry on the paper fastener so I have to pop a brad through it when it is!LOL.

Not a card!

Over on Dottie's World this week Lou challenged us to

"Make something using a Charmed download but IT CAN'T BE A CARD!"

Pop over there to see some of the wonderful creations the rest of the team came up with.

I decided to make a pot....it was something I was actually going to do a few weeks back when I set the geometric challenge, I was going to use it as a cylinder, BUT time, as always got the better of me. When Lou announced her challenge I just had to try it because as crafters we can NEVER have enough storage.

I took a little pot that I have been saving for a rainy day for some time.

Then I cut some BG paper to size, leaving a small amount to overlap at the seam, I inked and drew stitches around the edges before sticking to the pot.

Then I selected what Download images I would use-this was the toughest part.LOL. I chose the love birds from the Love & Marriage Collection. Coloured them in with my Prismacolor pencils then highlighted with a little pearlescent paint, gel pens and glossy accents (of course!)

Then I decided to make some grass by tearing/cutting a strip of green card ..but I wish I hadn't done this, not to sure about it but by the time I had decided that.......it was too late! I Then punched a hole in the side of the pot to attach a tag.

Made my "Potty about Dottie" tag and embellished with a few flowers and an eyelet. Never actually put an eyelet through Prima flowers before, I had to glue them together too for a bit of extra stability.

Tied on my tag with a scrap of ribbon and voila, a new little pot for my watercolour pencils.

Meet Joel!

Well after he was dropped through my letterbox Kay, you were right - I couldn't resist those eyes and I just had to try him out. Hope you like him too!

I use this brand new Toodles and Binks stamp for two challenges combined (I apologise, but still playing catch up-don't like combining!)

Lots to Do challenged us to emboss this week, what better reason did I have to use my much loved Cuttlebug folders, both for the Scalloped circle cut with a Nestabilities die, and my good ol' Sizzix snowflake, layered with a CB snowflake.

BasicGrey Challenges wants us to to do some stitching this week, faux or real....so I did a bit of both. I LOVE stitching on my cards, I think it gives such a great texture but time was against me (isn't it always) so the hand stitching is minimal. Again I used scraps of some old BG papers, Sugar Plum from the Blitzen collection.

Nice cuppa coffee and.....

......an afternoon's crafting, what more could a girl want?

It's been quite an emotional week what with the school problems we are having on top of everything else that life has thrown at us these last few weeks. Went to Speech & Language with Amelia this morning and when we arrived back home I found my doormat scattered with goodies from Kay. Amonst the Zoomz were of course two of the fabby new stamps literally hot off the press......and tied together with my al time fave....gingham ribbon!!!

HUGE thank you, coffee refil methinks...then it's my much needed ME TIME!

A quick chat....

.....before I finalise the paperwork for the school meeting, which has now been changed to this afternoon!!

I am trying to catch up on a few crafty things I need to do before my first DT stamps arrive from Toodles and Binks! these are brand new stamps and although I have only seen 2 designs so far, I am very excited about trying them.

Meet Celeste!

and her "nameless" Reindeer friend!

Pop over to the Toodles and Binks Blog, guess his name to be in with a chance of a prize.

Right a cuppa and more paperwork awaits!!! I hope you love them as much as I do!

A card...just for the sake of it!

Decided to just make a card today, no reason, no DT.....just because I wanted a break from the statementing paperwork I am preparing for tomorrows meeting at the school and the rotten emotional phone calls I have been making over the course of the week.

I don't like doing it but I combined two challenges in one card, trying to play catch up but feeling like a little hamster of a very big wheel!......................eeeek!

The first is Basic Grey Challenge where this week they asked;

Challenge 6 - Colour ComboThis weeks challenge is a colour combo challenge, we would like to see your creations using one of the following colour combos :)
Green & Red/Maroon
Brown & Cream
Blue & Gold/Yellow/Orange

The second is a sketch over at Tilda & Co Challenge. It was madness not to combine the two as I had a little Tilda already stamped, cut and coloured in tones of green and maroon. So I thought it would be a fairly quick card to make without much thought needed. I call it being lazy!

(BasicGrey Papers used Wonderland and a scrap of "unknown" both from the Blizten collection I

believe. )

Be prepared!!

Well, I do try but it never seems to pay off!

I couldn't possibly go all the way to Devon for a week without ANY crafting so I popped in a few stamps and some images I had already stamped, a pair of scissors, some card and an ink pad...there I was all smug thinking I was prepared for a few rainy days and a bit of crafty time for ME!

First night, pouring of rain, children settled, jimmy jammies on, glass of wine, chocolate...thought I'd do a bit of stamping....what had I forgotten to pack?

An acrylic block to stamp with!

Not letting a little thing like that hold me back I searched the basics in the kitchen cupboards for something I could use. I can tell you now that lids of glass pyrex dishes make a great alternative to a stamping block should you ever feel the urge!


Here's what I have to show for my efforts-over 100 little images all cut and ready to be coloured in.

Poor little Dottie looks all flush as she was already part coloured and just waiting for me to cut out!

DewDrop Craftz/Craft Stamper Card!

A while back Nikki of DewDrop Craftz asked if I would make up a card to go into Craft Stamper magazine! I don't class myself as a stamper so I panicked a bit....well quite a lot...LOL before throwing myself into the unknown!

I used the wonderful Bride and Groom stamp and set to work with some of my fav papers. I was asked to include a bit more stamping than in some of my previous cards...eeeekkkk! That's where I struggled as I didn't really have much in the way of background stamps.

Eventually after a lot of faffing around I made a frame effect using my Nestabilities.

Then I used a flower head of a Hero Art trio to make the flower centers for the die cut

flowers. To finish off I used stamped sentiments from Nikki.

In the centre of the card I hand cut a heart, embossed it in my Cuttlebug and used this as a backing for the main Bride and Groom image.

And ended up with this!! I hope you like it!

Headless chicken strikes again!!

Oh my goodness.....so much in my little brain. I am not back home and down to earth with a bump though...more like bouncing on a trampoline. I know I have lots of awful stuff still to deal with but I know I can over come that, I have done nearly 7 years of fighting for Amelia in one way or another...this is just another hurdle I will have to jump.....might fall flat on my face for a few attempts at first...but I WILL jump it, one way or another.

My crafty stuff is keeping me bouncing around and I have lots going on now that I can throw myself at to keep me positive.

LOTS going on!!!!!

Dottie's World has a new blog background and it looks stunning. It's Nicola's turn to challenge this week and as I have been away I am playing catch up later...I love her challenge so I cannot miss out. It is also time to select another Guest Designer, so submit your Dottie challenge to us by Wednesday and be in with a chance of being selected as our next Guest Designer!

DewDrop Craftz have some fab new stamps coming out by Valerie Wade I cannot wait to try a few out!!! I must also direct you over to Nikki's blog where she is doing a DESIGN TEAM MEMBER CALLOUT!!!! I believe this has been extended until midweek so don't miss out on a fab opportunity of working with some unique and wonderful stamps!

Nikki has also just released another challenge, join in with this Autumn Colours Challenge and be in with a chance of winning this cute cat stamp!!

I also have another little bit of news that I came back to yesterday!!! I have been selected to be part of the Toodles and Binks Design Team a brand new and exciting range of stamps that I have only just seen pictures of yesterday, so a bit nerve racking and very exciting stuff. Thank you so much for selecting me!

Right, I must crack on with another load of washing and I will be back for my next installment!!!

Back home....

.....from our week away in Devon. We had a right mixed bag when it came to the weather, it was just so wet and muddy for the first few days but towards the end of the week we had glorious sunshine...but thank goodness we didn't need the woolly hats, scarves and gloves that I packed "just in case!"

I took over 250 pics and haven't really had a good look at them but here are a few of my favs and some that summed up the holiday for us.

Trying to get wellies off and get in from a downpour!

Exmoor Zoo

Running around like lunatics!

Some tantrums!!!!!

...and some stunning countryside!