Spring really has Sprung...

What absolutely magnificent, good to be alive weather, we've had the last few days in Melbourne. Just glorious!! all be it a bit windy, but the housewife in me likes a good drying day (hehe). Everything and everyone seems just that little bit brighter.


Anyhoo what's been happening mmmmm.... On the work front all is good. I don't know whether I've mentioned it here but since May the company has been in negotiations with a major organization who were interested in buying a controlling share of uSwitch. Good news is the contracts were all signed last Monday. Now we can start marketing, promoting etc....


The new company is called choiceswitch.com.au and the launch will be in the middle of October. We are thrilled to be affiliated with such a well known trusted organization as Choice, and all that their name/brand bring to our company. It's all really exciting to be a part of something from the ground up and I'm looking forward to seeing it grow and develop over the coming years.


On the home front everyone is finally feeling good and over all the lurgy's that have been hanging around for a while.


We've dined out a couple of times this week. Gotta luv that!! No cooking always works for me.

Thursday night the three of us headed down to our local Indian for dinner. As always the meal was scrumptious. Last night about 5:30pm friends rang to see if we were up for going out for dinner. Well of course I didn't want to be rude so off we went to a Thai restaurant in Chelsea Heights. The food was good, but I have to say not a patch on the Thai restaurant in Patterson Lakes. Then we headed back to our place for a couple of drinks and coffee. All in all a very good night.


Tonight we are off to another a friends for dinner. Kate rang yesterday to say Hi and as we haven't seen her and her hubby for about 6 months it will be great to catch up. Ahhh....... another night not cooking "noice.


Neil at the moment is off on another bike ride, he's training for a around the bay in day which is happening next month. I can't even begin to imagine competing or completing that. He's always up for a challenge though.


Tomorrow night Madeleine is playing at the Frankston Art Centre with the school band (she plays bass guitar). They had an all day rehearsal yesterday down at Tyabb but unfortunately she could only stay until 12o'clock because of netball. At least she got 3 hours of practice in. So I'm looking forward to seeing and hearing that tomorrow night.


Last but not least I'll leave you with a layout I've just finished and a couple of cards made from scraps from previous Layout left overs. The photos are from our trip up to QLD back in July.

Girls just want to have fun: PP:BG offbeat; Alpha: Thickers, carollees creations and BG. Embellishments: BG stickers, bling, prima flower, heidi swapp tape and buttons.



















































Ok that's it for now, hope everyone has had a lovely weekend.

Cheers

Leeanne xxx

Layout share and blog award

Not much has happened since Saturday although I am pleased to say the gastric bug seemed to only last 48hours thank goodness.

I forgot to take any photos on Fathers day...(bad scrapper) Oh well there's always next year. Madeleine got up and made Neil bacon, eggs, sausages, mushies and baked beans on toast. That's what I call a BIG Breakie. Then later in the day made very yummy scones to take around to Neil's folks place for afternoon T. She seems to be taking a bit more interest in cooking lately which is nice and she's quite good at it to boot.

I have managed to complete 3 more layouts over the weekend this time all 12 x12. 2 using new scenic route pp I picked up last week at Debling in Design and the 3rd using a bit more of the Euphoria range from BG.

1.Super Charlie:- Scenic Route Sonoma pp ; Alpha: Lil Davis and BG alpha stickers, Bookplate Heidi swapp, Heidi Swapp Mirror bird and flower.






















2.Right Now:- PP Scenic Route Sonoma; Alpha - Thickers, Ek Success and Karen foster, Heidi Swapp book plate; MM crystal brads, prima flower, Ribbons from Fiona Carter























3. Stick Insect- This photo of Madeleine was taken back in 2004 when we went to the Grampians during the Sept school Holidays. She's grown up alot hasn't she?
PP:BG Euphoria, BG Euphoria stickers, Kaiser bling, Jenny Bowling journalling tag; Alpha - BG, buttons



































The very talented Wendy T has very kindly nominated my Blog for an award. Thanks Wendy I really appreciate it.

The rules for the award are -
(1) The winner can put the logo on their blog.
(2) Link the person you received your award from.
(3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
(4) Put links of those on yours.
(5) Leave a message on the blogs of the girls or boys you’ve nominated.
So I am nominating these gals (whose blogs I stalk on a regular basis) for the award too:

1. Helen Karanfilovski:- I've only got to know Helen's work this year and I am blown away by her talent. Her work is always stunning, fresh and funky.

2. Sheree:- What a truly talented scrapbooker she does the most beautiful work.

3. Cherie:- Cherie and I have a few things in common and I love reading her blog and catching up with her families antics. Looking forward to catching up IRL at create 08 in Melbourne

4. Jane: I love Jane's work it's always lovely and she even manages to do LO's of herself. Always impressed when girls scrap about themselves. Something I need to do more of.

5. Julie C:- I've been stalking Julies blog for a while now and her work is fantastic.

6. Janelle Wind:- This lady is not only an amazing scrapbooker but her needle work is to die for.

7. Kim Archer :- Kim has been inspiring me with her work and her absolutely amazing online classes since I started scrapbooking a few years ago.

Ok That's it for me today.

cheers

Leeanne x

A Quiet Week

Another quiet week and weekend so this should be sort and sweet.

. Tuesday night Madeleine had her first game of netball with a new team and they thrashed the other team 52 - 2.

. Wednesday Lynne and I went to see Mama Mia!! there was 4 of us in the cinema. Lynne hadn't seen it before and for me it will be one of those movies that I will watch again and again. Just pure unadultered fluff and lots of fun.

. Thursday I taught my third class at Debling in Design, had a fun night with the girls and spent my wages on the new Scenic Route collection.

. Friday night Madeleine had her hair cut and then coloured for the first time. Well it's only a semi and it's more or less the same colour as her hair. They call it a gloss so it really just makes her hair look shiny.

. Today (saturday) I have spent most of the day in bed recovering from the night before. Seemed to have picked up some kind of gastric bug so have been feeling like the proverbial since 3am when it all started.

Finally here are a couple more layouts I've completed this week. First one is of my great neice Charlie taken when we were up in QLD in July and the second is an old photoof Madeleine taken at Logan's beach in Warrnambool (VIC). The southern white whales come every year with their calves. It's amazing to watch them frolic out in the water just beyond the breakers. I love this photo of Madeleine and it's been on my to do list for a few years. Finally scrapped it the other night.

Love this face: PP: Basic Grey Eva border stickers; Alpha BG Eva ; Journalling spots- Elle's studio & Jenny bowlin. Fancy Pants felt.


















Whale Watching:- PP: scenic route, Heidi Swapp tape, Journalling spot: Scenic route, Alpha: Thickers and Heidi Swapp.






















Well I think I might head off to bed again.
Happy Father's day to all the dads out there, I hope everyone has a lovley day.

Cheers

Leeanne xxx

A Creative Weekend

It's amazing what you can achieve when you have a quiet weekend. Besides taking Madeleine to Youth on Friday night and then Netball on Saturday, we had a lovely quiet time with no other commitments. Don't get me wrong I love to go out, but on the rare occasions when we don't have anything planned it's soooooo nice to kick back and relax.

Because of the above, I was inspired to Scrap and managed to achieve 4 layouts and 2 cards. Nothing like some new patterned paper and new photos to get you going. For 3 of the 4 layouts I used the new basic grey Ambrosia line. The 12 x 12 layout shows photos from last Thursday night when some girlfriends got together to celebrate 2 of the girls 50th Birthday. It was such a fun night... so many laughs. The third snow layout I used older Scenic Route Grafton paper and Summer rage and a tiny piece of new October afternoon.

1: Snow Fun

2: Going Going GONE

3: Winters Playground

4: Celebrate 50

Thank you to everyone who has asked about Madeleine she is so much better this week except for a bit of a cough she's well again... and went back to school last Thursday. Lets hope that is it for her she has not had a good year.

That's it for me today, take care everyone and enjoy the week.

Cheers

Leeanne x

There's Snow business like Snow business

Last weekend we headed off Bright for a few days with friends. For those of you who don't live in Victoria, Bright is approx 308ks north-east of Melbourne and is located on the Ovens River and nestled in the valley below Mount Buffalo.

We had a really lovely weekend and best of all because its been so cold here, there was lots and lots of snow up on Mount Buffalo. Madeleine had never been to the snow before so she was really excited on Saturday at the prospect...and she wasn't disappointed. The weather was just superb and we spent the day tobogganing, building a snowman and having snow fights. Now tobogganing is easy but by the time you've climbed up the hill for the umpteenth time to go back down again you are pretty well exhausted. I haven't laughed so much in long time.

On the Friday we went on one of the beautiful walks at the back on the Bright township, its a lovely hour long walk through a canyon and back. The scenery is just magnificent. Then we headed off the chocolate shop for a milk shake before heading back home.

It was so nice to get away except on Saturday night after the snow Madeleine started complaining about being achy and sore. I just thought at first she was sore from all the exercise she'd been doing, but about an hour later she had a raging temperature and has been really unwell ever since with the fluey thing everyone seems to be getting this year. Poor thing she really has had a bad trot lately.

On the scrapping front I've completed a class by the very talented Helen . You can get this cool class for nothing over at Anna's Craft Cupboards Blog check it out. Except for the scalloped border all the papers are from basic grey... the Eurphoria range.

Inspired by Wendy I decided to make some cards from all the scraps. There are 7 simple cards, I always find cards difficult for some reason. One of the designs is a direct rip off of one the cards Wendy has just made.

Oh I almost forgot last Thursday there was a bit of a Dolly reunion in Frankston. Around 8 of us who used to be regulars at Paper Doll got together to catch up and say hi to Connie. Connie has recently been diagnosed with breast cancer, so it was great to see her and chat with her about everything. Keep her in your thoughts and prayers as she goes through this immense challenge. It was also fantastic to see some of the other girls who I haven't seen since the shop shut back in February. I really miss seeing everyone regularly.

I've also had to postpone my class at Debling in Design from this Thursday night to Thursday 4th September. Sorry about that girls I have a 50th to go to on Thursday night for two friends who have turned the big one recently. I totally forgot..... well I didn't actually forget both events just didn't register in my brain until Monday that they were the same day. I worry about me sometimes.

Well I think that's it for now

Happy Scrapping everyone and have a great week

Cheers

Leeanne xxxxxx

short and sweet

Still recovering from last Friday when Madeleine's school participated in the Rock Eisteddfod at Hisense arena in the city (aka vodafone arena). We had to get up at 4:30am to get her to :school :15by 5:15am to catch the bus in with everyone. They were first on for rehearsals at 7:15am. What a great experience for them all and it all went really well. They didn't make it through to the finals but a good time was had by all. By 11pm when it finally finished Madeleine had hit a brick wall she was sooooooo tired.

Saturday was pretty much a vegie day except for netball.

Sunday Madeleine and a friend went ice skating at the Olympic ice skating rink in centre rd. Now that place is in a time warp, Lynne and I used to go there as kids; her mum would drop us off and pick us up later. Nothing much has changed I must say. Anyhoo it was Madeleine's first time ice skating and she was a bit nervous, I think she was afraid if she fell over some one might come past and chop of her fingers. I think she had a good time (lol) I went along with her and sat and chatted to her girlfriends mum for a couple of hours while we watched the girls.

Things have been very quite on the scrapping front the past couple of weeks, in fact i've done nothing. It could be because I've read all 4 books in the twilight series in the past week and a half. All four books are great and I thoroughly enjoyed them all...Now bring on the movie another mother and daughter bonding trip to the movies for a good chick flick me thinkst. (hehe)

Here's the teaser trailer

cheers

Leeanne x

Heidi, Kim, Madeleine and Vampires???

First of all................ Yeah!!! I have a place at Heidi's create08 in December. I'm so thrilled to get to be a part of this, along with lots of my old Dolly friends and some new blog friends (who I'll get to meet in person). I'll have to start a countdown until the 16th December I can't wait.



Here's a layout share, this is another of Kim Archers classes. Love the texture on this one with the fabric. There is also bubble wrap stamping on this, but I didn't have any bubble wrap on hand, so I just used my making memory stamps instead. All the papers are from Cherry arte. The photos are of the girls on the Claw, from our recent trip to Dreamworld.





The only other kind of scrapping I've done is a OTP. I'm a bit of a collector of costume jewellery and for years my necklaces have just hung off my dressing table. When I was shopping with Lynne a couple of weeks ago I came across a set of four hooks that had Marilyn Monroe tiles as their feature. I knew straight off that this would be perfect to hang my collection from and I could see those Jenny Bowlin papers fitting in perfectly. So here tis....



Madeleine was presented with her Class Captain badge this week at assembly and also a certificate to say she had collected the most merit points in her grade. Merit points are handed out for various reasons. The merit points then go to the person's house. Does that make sense???




Madeleine got given a book to read this week from her friend Alex. It's called Twilight.
Has anyone else heard of it or read it? It's a kind of Romeo and Juliet story between a teenage girl and a vampire. Sounds weird I know but I thought I should read it to see what its all about and though I'm sure I'm not in the demographic the book is pitched at, I was hooked straight away. Currently there are 3 books in the series with the 4th installment coming out on Monday. The movie has already been made, and comes out in December. It's the kind of book you just can't put down and so far the second book is just as good. We are both eagerly awaiting the movie now. The guy who played Cedric Diggory in the Harry Potter movies has the lead role of the Vampire Edward.





In other Madeleine news her Basketball team won their grand final this morning. 59 - 37. It was a pretty close most of the game until just near the end. Yesterday she didn't play netball because she had all day rehearsals for the Rock Eisteddfod on Friday night at Rod Laver Arena. They're all really looking forward to that.


Since we got home from there I've been baking. I don't bake that often anymore and really enjoy it when I do. I've made a raspberry and coconut slice and a Cinnamon Tea Cake, in preperation for Neil's family who are coming over later for afternoon Tea. While I was on a roll I also made a vege lasagna for dinner.

Ok I think that's about it for now, Neil's folks will be here any minute.

cheers

Leeanne x