The Days like This Page

A post with a page and a pogo.

So I decided to make a page about Tuesday's post; and with the help of  Studio Calico's Sunday Sketch I came up with this:

For fun I used my little Polaroid Pogo printer because, at 3x2 inches, its pictures were exactly the right size. If you are going to give this a try, plan ahead a little bit and see if you can get everyone in similar coloured outfits - I think it helped to pull the photos together. Oh, and don't forget to keep out of the sun, so you aren't squinting (obviously we didn't).

A couple of people have asked me about the Pogo; and, yes, it's fun and handy and would make a good gift.

• Shop around because the price varies a lot site to site
• The best video demo I have found is here
• And there is another good review here
• It's easy to get it to print from your phone BUT it won't print from an iphone. Shame.
• Because it's instant gratification, you aren't going to want to edit your photos a lot so think before you shoot
• The little prints don't show off close ups or fancy crops to their bests. Your subject needs to be easy to see and easy to identify.
• Any questions, please ask!

Today I'm Loving..the thought that new sunglasses might not be a complete waste of money after all. Here's to a sunny May Day weekend!

Days Like This

We had a bit of fun yesterday when the sun finally came out. On Sunday I had spotted in the paper a selection of photos by Jan Von Holleben. He takes pictures of fairy tale scenes staged around children lying on the ground, like this:

and I wanted to use them as a starting point. But it was Monday morning and I couldn't quite conjure up a fairytale fantasy, so I scaled back my ambitions and asked if anyone was interested in choosing a few objects to represent their week.

Well, we ummed and ahhed and fetched and carried and sorted and arranged; and this is what we came up with:

The poor Accountant has a bad back at the minute. He said getting down onto the floor would be do-able; but he couldn't guarantee to get up again before next Christmas, so we let him shout encouragement from his place of pain instead. I hope he'll be able to join in next time, now that I've learned that lying on the ground makes your hair look strange and your eyes go funny, because it turned out to be a really nice way to record what we are getting up to in a week which is going to go like this:

• Me: lots of knitting for my friend Helen's appeal here; coffee with a friend; birthday cake baking; blogging; trying a new recipe or two; reading a new book; ignoring Horsey; getting up at 2.00am to wave my boy off
• The Tall One: Big week here because he left this morning for a prize trip to Strasbourg (say hello to the European Parliament);  cricket and exam revision when he returns
• The Small One: Birthday anticipation (all week); dancing; revising; reading her new magazine; and going for a milkshake (she hopes).

Something for everyone, then. I hope you've enjoyed it..I've got to run because I've talked about it, photographed it, blogged it. Now, I need to live it.

Moving Forward, Looking Back

We all like to take photos. Lots of photos. Some of them we use, some we delete; and some, for me anyway, stay in the "I'm not quite sure why I took that" pile. But remember the days before digital?  When every photo on a film had to count? It meant thinking before clicking, saving the last couple of shots in case something really good came along. And yet: sometimes you wanted to take a photo because something inside said you needed to, that the picture you wanted - which wasn't of anything really special - was going to be important in the future. Did you ever have that feeling?

I can think of a couple of times. Once, when The Small One arrived home from nursery (not yesterday then) and jumped out of the car into a big pile of leaves. She kicked and crunched and I ran inside for the camera and took one picture which I loved, but which sat in a photo album for years until I started scrapbooking. Then I made a layout and it was published In Scrapbook Inspirations and what pleased me the most was that I had always thought that photo was meant for something special. That doesn't sound too fanciful, does it?

It happened last week, too, when I spread out this month's Studio Calico kit and saw the 7Gypsies Avignon paper and the colours which went it. I thought at once of a photo I had taken on a day trip to France - oh, it must be seventeen years ago now - before the children were born. I took it and filed it away because I knew I'd end up doing something with it. And here it is. Two children, two houses and several cameras later. Something is telling me that I'm not an "in the moment" scrapper at all. It's as if the story has to grow before it comes out. I've a feeling I'll be coming back to this idea..

Today I'm Loving...Geek Crafts. Crocheted Daleks, Einstein softies..It's a bit of fun.

The Past Is A Foreign Country

The dressing up clothes are all over the floor, said The Small One, casually draping herself in a length of sparkly chiffon and perching a pirate hat on her head.

I was looking for a doctors outfit, I replied, and then I found all these..

It was true. I had started to pull things out and they had brought back so many funny memories. The Poison Ivy costume (felt leaves on net) which I could see coming back in an even shorter, even more poisonous teenage version. The Pink Princess dress (the sewing machine broke down and her long suffering auntie and I sewed it by hand, together). The Harry Potter Halloween party (Hagrid's wig moulted). The Charlie And The Chocolate Factory party (Willy Wonka recycled Hagrid's wig; but the Oompa-Loompa's orange paint went everywhere)...

Oooh, look! shrieked The Small One, interrupting my reverie by waving a toy pistol in front of my eyes. Horsey's not having this one..

That reminds me. I said. I found an old photo of your Grandpa G, dressed as a cowboy. Would you like to have a look? It's there on my desk. I'm sorry I can't tell you anything much about it. I don't even know where he was living at the time. I wonder..do you you think that might be a real moustache?

Probably not, The Small One shook her head. It's drooping too much at the ends. I wish I could have met him. Do you think he would have liked me?

Yes, my love, I said, looking up. I think he would have liked you very much indeed.

And that's where we left it.

Today I'm Loving..this stitching project. It sounds like a good one. Oh, and if you want to read another story about my dressing up, there is one right here

Running Out Of Random

We're all shivering under a grey and cloudy sky here today. Could it be the effects of the volcanic ash? Maybe. We've been learning about irony, too. The Tall One is only recently returned from the Easter school trip to Pompeii and its bracing walk up Vesuvius. He brought his sister back a present. What do you think? It's obvious really..a big lump of volcanic sulphur to add to her collection of chemical curiosities, of course. She loves it. He, though, (as my old Grandma used to say) is feeling a little bit "diddled". He paid good, honestly earned Euro for that sulphur; and now he's thinking that if he had waited long enough, a bit might just have dropped out of the sky and into the garden. Mmm..

Lucky I headed over to Alana's Little Blue shed, then, and found myself a cheery Kreativ Bloggers Award. Thanks, Alana! I'm running out of random facts, I think; but this one requires creative facts so I think I can manage:

1. Today I'm working on painting this chair cream. I love painting things cream. I've got a big tin of paint and I'm not afraid to use it.

2. Yesterday I was working on a new scrapbook page and it's nearly finished:

3. One of the first things I ever made in school was this picture about my trip to London. I entered it in a competition run by the local library and I won a beautiful book about Shakespeare.

4. I also made this rag doll when I was about 10. My mum showed me how to cut leather boots from an old shopping bag; and I've been recycling ever since.

5. I  made all the curtains in our house myself.
6. I love making fancy dress costumes and once made a santa suit and matching elf outfits. The photos for that one are safely locked away.
7. Before we got married I knitted The Accountant a jumper for his birthday. I started running out of time, so I got my mum to knit one sleeve. Which seemed like a good idea until it was washed: the sleeve I knitted sagged and stretched but the other one didn't. My Mother-In-Law is a knitter. She worked it out. But it wasn't a deal breaker. She still let me marry her son.

If you fancy an award, please have this one with my very best wishes. But, remember, I do want to hear those creative facts. Especially the ones which didn't quite work out. We've all got them. Haven't we?

Today I'm Loving..Sharyn's made-at-home Clip It Up Very clever. Very cool.

Shimelle's Crop Party

Hurray! I've managed to fit a bit of scrapbooking into my weekend and I really didn't think that was going to happen. But you know Shimelle..she's kind of persuasive and kind of inspiring; so I wasn't all that surprised when I found myself heading over to her blog to check out the challenges. I've finished two so far:

This one:

for the cupcake challenge. It gave me the perfect opportunity to use a lovely felt cupcake I received in a swap last year on UKScrappers. It came complete with cupcake recipes (isn't that a neat idea?) so I added the original (crumpled because it's been used) to my page. And of course it's 6x12 so it can go in my "Celebrate Life" album.

This one:

is for the bunting challenge. You can see there is an empty space where the journalling should be and I will finish it. I just need to decide how I'm going to pull together the threads: it started as a page about The Small One's yellow coat, which made me think of sailing, which made me think of the phrase "stars to steer by", which made me think about guiding lights and school and friends and, well, all sorts of things, really. But you can see where I'm headed with it, I hope, and I'll let you know when I get there.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

Strange Days Indeed

So there I was on my way ready to go to the supermarket, thinking that if it wasn't beside a whole mall of shops no one would think of asking me to run extra errands and I could get straight to the food, when it all started to go A Bit Wrong. With my car. I tried to unlock it and the wipers started up. I turned over the engine and it cut out. Then the headlights came on all by themselves..

I phoned The Accountant at work. I don't usually do this, even in an emergency, because I think it's a bit girly and helpless to be honest; but I was actually feeling a bit girly and helpless, so I called and he phoned the garage who said I needed the AA. I made that call myself and the nice lady told me to wait by my vehicle until help arrived (madam) so I went inside and brewed some coffee.

When the AA man arrived I (yes) went a bit girly and helpless again; but he seemed fine with that because he got the car started, offered to follow me round to the garage and then organised me a hire car. And I got a lift in his cool big AA van. Sorted.

Except that it isn't really because no one can find out what's wrong with my car. I'm off to phone them again now. I hope it's good news. They've lent me an Astra which reminds me of learning to drive in the 80's and makes me want to channel Gene Hunt in Ashes to Ashes. He fires up his Quattro. If I say I'm off to fire up the Astra one more time, someone in the family might take me off the road permanently..

And because it's not a blog post without a photo, here is a page I did yesterday:

Play It Again, Sian

What's the quickest way you know for cranking out a page? You know, when you've got one in your head and it has to come out?

I was looking at my Killer layout again, and enjoying its vintagey feel when into my head popped an image of my Grandma in a pre-war style dress and necklace. I wanted to write about it and I wanted to create another period look. But quickly. Without any fuss. So I decided, for fun, to take the same basic sketch and play it again. Same design, same feel. different look. I've added more of the lovely paper girls cut from Cosmo Cricket's Material Girl and another Studio Calico wood veneer shape; and yet it still looks different. When you aren't thinking so much about the design, you get to spend more time thinking about the theme of your page and the feel you want to give it. And because you are thinking about the theme, you are thinking, really thinking, about the story you are trying to tell. Now that's scrapbooking.

Please Welcome..

The Small One's Guest Post

Hello! Today I have taken over the blog to write about the happenings of me. But first I would like to thank everyone who took the time and effort to share their shoe stories with us. I think Mum appreciates it an awful lot; though as she types with two fingers it takes her quite a long time to say thanks or write something interesting. I can type with all ten.

As you already know, my name is The Small One and I am 11 years old. in recent posts you heard that i am very small (hence the name) and so my feet are too.

This is a picture of me and mum last summer when I have just caught her up in shoe sizes. That was a good day. But I am always wondering if I will ever make it to a size 4 (I'm not sure what that is in America). I bought black ballet pumps yesterday for the summer term at school (if I don't get caught because we're not really supposed to wear pumps) and they were a size 2, but my (killer) heels were a size 3. I'm a bit confused about the whole shoe size thing. Why can't every shop just measure in the same way? I'm not really sure about the answer to that, but maybe I'll figure it out one day.

Today Mum would also like me to thank Sandi for kindly giving her this award

I think you know quite a lot about my mum by now, so I will give you a list of 10 things that make mum happy!

1. My Dad
2. Nice weather
3. Lying on loungers in the sun
4. blogging
5. Me (!) (and my brother)
6. Christmas
7. New shoes (!)
8. Holidays
9. Family outings
10. My baby cousin

Thank you for reading my post today.

The Ties That Bind

The Small One and I have a bit of a thing about shoes. It's a wish fulfillment thing, really, because (and maybe you've heard me talking about this before) most shoes simply don't fit.My feet are a size 2 (4.5 in the U.S. I think). The Small One caught me up when she turned 11 and we are wishing, pushing, urging her feet on even just a little further so that she reaches an adult size 3. Shoe Nirvana. Oh! the possibilities! I don't need high heels much these days. I spend most of my time in kids sneakers and flat boots with extra socks; but a girl can dream. And sometimes get lucky..

The Small One recently spotted her hearts desire: shiny, patent Mary Janes. They were in the teenage department, so a size 2 was theoretically achievable. But they were out of stock. Now, I've lived with this for years and sometimes enough is enough. I took a deep breath and said Today, dearest daughter, we are going to say I can instead of I can't. I let her buy the size 3. They are too big, to be sure; but she's getting to be old enough to learn how the world works. Not everything is always what it seems. If you can't make it, as they say, then fake it. Buy the next size up and buckle 'em on as tight as they will go. I've done it before and I'm sure that I'll do it again. She doesn't really have a need for high Mary Janes any more than I do. But we had fun buying them and we talked about saying yes I can when you've set your heart on something. And I hope that's a good thing.

She said her shoes were killer; so that's what I called my page. And when I looked at it and saw that it kind of had a Bonnie and Clyde feel, I thought yes, I'll stick with that and here it is:

Out And About

We managed to find a bit of a break in the clouds at the weekend and we took a trip to our very favourite Garden Centre. Usually when we do this one of us finds he has other places to go and people to see; one of us looks forward to the cafe with its cakes the size of dinner plates and its cool little glass bottles of coke; one of us takes the job seriously and actually shops for compost and other essentials; and one of us plays about with her iPhone:

Today I'm Loving...the incredibly generous Cate who sent me a fabulous parcel of magazines and chocolate all the way from Australia. Just the thing to keep me going through a wet Easter break! How kind is that?    

Easter Sunday

Wherever you are and whatever you are doing, all of us here would like to wish you

a day full of peace and joy and everything you love. Happy Easter.

99 Things

What an inventive (and responsive) crowd of blog commentors you are! I have been enjoying all your Easter holiday stories. Ah, the Good Old Days..I wasn't the only one who put on a play in the garage, then, or produced my own magazine. I never got to play guess-how-many-you-can-fit-in-a-beach-hut, though. Now, that's my kind of entertainment Amanda!

And as Ruth said to me the other day, isn't it grand when we reveal little bits of ourselves and our lives blog post by blog post? I was thinking about that when I came across this questionnaire on Carrie's Through The Camera Lens. I think it's a great one because it works both ways: if you run through the questions and discover you've done more things than you thought you had..well, that's a cause for celebration. And if you discover that you haven't crossed off very many..well, hurray, life still has a lot of excitement in store! You can't lose. Here's the list. The ones I've done are in bold. I'd love to see what you've done, too.

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyworld
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightening storm
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of The Statue Of Liberty
18. Grown your own veg
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you're not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinnydipping
27. Run a marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Tower Of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo's David
41. Sung Karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful
43. Bought a stranger a meal in a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower
50. Gone scuba diving
51. Kissed in the rain
52. Played in the mud
53. Gone to a drive-in theatre
54. Been in a movie
55. Visited the Great Wall Of China (would love to do this one)
56. Started your own business
57. Taken a martial arts class
58. Visited Russia
59. Served in a soup kitchen
60. Sold Girl Scout cookies (although I have eaten some)
61. Gone whale watching
62. Got flowers for no reason
63. Donated blood (although I received it more than once. Thank you whoever you were)
64. Gone sky diving
65. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
66. Bounced a cheque
67. Flown in a helicopter
68. Saved a favourite childhood toy
69. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
70. Eaten caviar
71. Pieced a quilt
72. Stood in Times Square
73. Toured The Everglades
74. Been Fired from a job
75. Seen the Changing Of The Guard in London
76. Broken a bone
77. Been a passenger on a motorcycle
78. Seen The Grand canyon
79. Published a book
80. Visited the Vatican
81. Bought a brand new car
82. Walked in Jerusalem
83. Had your picture in the newspaper
84. Kissed a stranger at midnight on New Years Eve
85. Visited the White House (though I've toured Boston State House)
86. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
87. Had chickenpox
88. Saved someone's life
89. Sat on a jury
90. Met someone famous (Princess Anne)
91. Joined a book club
92. Had a tattoo
93. Had a baby
94. Seen The Alamo in person
95. Swam in The Great Salt Lake
96. Been involved in a lawsuit
97. Owned a cell phone
98. Been stung by a bee

Now clearly, this is only 98 things. I went back and checked the original..and discovered it had no number 49. But I think that's plenty for one day, so let's leave it there. Think it over!

I'll leave you with a quick iphone photo. While we are busy cutting and creating here's one we made earlier. A Mad Hatter Easter hat The Small One and I put together for a school competition a few years ago. I'm off to see if anyone wants to join me in a go at 3 legged roller skating. Thanks for the suggestion Anna