Advent Swap

November is a short month and that suits me just fine because.... the advent swap comes around that much faster!
Each year my friend Sandra and I exchange Christmas gifts in time for December 1st. There are actually 25 gifts - one for each day right up to and including Christmas.

It is so lovely and so exciting to receive gorgeous little craft and chocolate gifts each day - that's mainly what we choose as that's mainly what we both love.
And the build to it is great fun too - stash shopping for advent gifts, making the number tags, wrapping each gift and finding or decorating a pretty tote bag to present them all in.

It is very tempting to poke and shake each present to try to guess what is in each. Sandra has anticipated this and made me a label but, as you can see, it mysteriously dropped off. What can I say?! I shall just have to try to remember be good instead.

It is so exciting to have a gorgeously wrapped present to look forward to every single day and it really brightens up the wintery month ahead. End of term chaos is soothed by something yummy to look forward to each day. Sandra has kindly thought of that as well, making me a wall plaque to bring tranquillity and reinforce calm at this busy time of year:

 It is a wise message and one I am sure I shall hold dear throughout the festive season...

Tinseltown!

Hollywood came to Eastbourne for this year's retreat. The theme naturally brought out the glamorous nature of us scrappers!

As usual of course there was shopping. There were challenges. There was a film quiz. There was a shocking lack of any film knowledge and there was fancy dress. We even managed to scrap a few layouts. My total this year is nine complete layouts although Sandra maintains one doesn’t count since it has been a work in progress through 2 Saturday crops and one whole retreat. I have taken the art of faffing to new and giddying heights!

So my first layout is the one which took the longest but is actually an almost direct scraplift of a gorgeous layout by Ali. Thank you Ali xx

Most of my other layout use page maps from magazines long ago torn up and filed in my inspiration folder. My challenge layout – one based on a story board:

A double layout from a single layout page map:

A Challenge layout based on the Breakfast At Tiffany’s movie poster:

A Special Day:                   

The "Speed Scrap" Challenge.
Think pass the parcel meets scrapbooking - 2 minutes to add an element and pass it on:

The resulting layouts were all gorgeous - just a photo and a title to add later.


And finally, the Mystery Kit Challenge:

The papers in this year's kit were from the Simple Stories "Say Cheese" range and worked very well with some colourful birthday photos.

Some Cards...

A couple of quick ink brayer and silhouette stamp cards:

A Christmas one.....

and a First Birthday card: