Christmas Vanilla Sugar containers

I made these little snowmen Vanilla Sugar containers after browsing Linda Albrechts blog (how amazing is she!!) and seeing the fab little glass snowman jars she made last year.

I covered polystyrene balls with Crafters Companion glue spray and rolled in glitter. The little noses are the ends of cotton buds again glued and glittered and pressed into the poly balls. The eyes and mouth are little flat back gems and the pink glitter cheeks are using the glitter from one of those fab teeny Doodlebug jars (i thought they were just meant to sit on the shelf and look pretty but apparently you can use them as well!!) ;)

I placed the head and body together with a pipecleaner inserted into both and also some silicone glue for extra stability. Then it comes to decorating as you wish :) Cover in lots more glitter and let dry before attaching to the top of your jars with glossy accents AND silicone glue :)The vanilla sugar is made using caster sugar and a vanilla pod (scrape pod, chop and mix with sugar before filling jar) I covered one of the jar lids with Aleenes glitter snow to create a larger snowman, the other jar lid was filled with decorate toppings :) The rub ons, ribbons and papers are all Bo Bunnys new Christmas line!
You could fill the jars with bathsalts, sweets, jellies etc......even little notes of things to do in the run up to Christmas :)

Mini update...

What have i been doing since i went MIA...

Dentist..........boring....(very very painful though)...
Lying on the sofa.......boring....(but necessary to keep baby cooking nicely)...

Working out lists of what i need to do once i get up and about again......EXCITING!!
Theres one thing better than actually doing things, making lists of things to do!! LOL
Making lists of Christmas pressies i need to make!
Making lists of shopping we need...(doesnt help when most things make you feel sick but yet youre having cravings for mashed potato and gravy at 10am in the morning!) lol

Oooh we have been making cupcakes though! I can share those pics, since thats all thats left........due to my toothache i havent even had one so i guess thats a bonus! lol Cupcakes in Jars - cook the cupcake as normal, cut in half and place bottom half in jar, Cover with a good size dollop (love that word! lol) of cream cheese frosting or butter frosting. Pop the top half of the cupcake inside the jar and fill to the top with more frosting. Pop on the lid and this can then be frozen, if you are sending to someone get it out of the freezer, pop it into a box and post, it should be fully defrosted and ready to eat by the time it arrives at its destination :) We even made little teeny ones which are perfect to pop in lunch boxes etc! How cool is that!!

Ive been covered in glitter while sitting on the sofa too - what else could i do that didnt involve standing at my desk.............1 tub, 1 glitter tube, 6 polyballs, cotton buds, accessories and some glue spray...........make snowmen of course!! Wait until you see these cuties in full! :)

...and breathe...

Im back. I havent been too well and had to have an early scan today, i bled on monday so we needed to get checked out to make sure all was ok with little pod. We were gelled up and shoved around and a little heartbeat was detected, pod is 24mm and theres just the one! lol All is fine, i have a slight bleed above the sac but its nothing major and may just be part of the bedding in process - tell you something it didnt half shock me as ive never had this with any of the others!

Phew........and breathe.........

Normal service will resume soon!!

Drippy goo winner..........

Congratulations!! The winner of the Drippy Goo punch is.......

Pink Petal Designs

Picked by my little monster, please can you email me your address and i will get it in the post :D


Im not too well right now so will be back soon i hope....

Jammmmmm!

I think ive found a new passion! lol
Can jam/jelly/relish making be called a passion??
Either way i dont mind - im loving it and will probably have enough to last us a life time but at the minute i cant understand why i wasnt doing this all along instead of paying a fortune a jar at a time! It tastes so much nicer, fresher and a little more satisfying knowing ive done it myself :)
Fresh cut marmalade....Apple sauce/butter........just for the fun of it some cupcakes......yumm!! I have now put the screw caps on the jars and im quite excited about decorating them ready to store......any excuse to craft! lol
Does anyone have any handed down recipes for jams etc that i can make - i am working my way through books at the minute but theres something special about those tried and tested family recipes :)

Inspiration needed!!

Please someone help me and tell me what to put on my walls! Ive got the top of the stairs exactly how i wanted them and right now im struggling with pregnancy brain and my creativity has dried up!! Plain wood frames just arent looking right, i dont want anymore mirrors and im not keen on the red frames for photos.................see why im stuck!! LOL 3 WALLS TO FILL!! eek!! Im not a bare wall girl so something has to go there! lol

Charity shop bargains today too - Mrs Beetons make your own jelly!! How sweet is this little rabbit jelly mold!
GORGEOUS HUGE wall sconce! £3.75!! The woman even said she hadnt seen it otherwise it wouldnt have been put out! lol Mwahhhahahaha.....i bought 2 sweet vanilla candles to go on it and it will live in my bathroom as soon as its decorated :)

Little signs of Halloween giveaway!

Starting to appear around our home.. Mr Pumpkin head - TK Maxx...Wicked Treats basket ready to fill with goodies for any visitors - TK Maxx...
Cupcake cases - Lakeland....
Haunted House (approx 1 1/2ft tall!) - TK Maxx...
Favourite pumpkin cake recipe...
...so i am going to celebrate by giving away one of the Martha Stewart Drippy Goo punches (as seen on this snippit) Right now i think its my absolute favourite and due to my impatience and also the help from a lovely lady from the USA i now have a spare one which is on offer here - all you need to do is leave a comment about Halloween below....do you love it, hate it, what do you have planned etc :D I will pick a winner on Monday :)

PS. My landing is now decorated but i need some imput on what kind of pictures/frames/decor etc to put up so i will take shots of it tonight and share tomorrow...........Its VERY shabby chic/Cath Kidston!! :D

Sketches, Sneaks and Scans...

I have been playing with the Bo Bunny Gypsy range (sneak peek as its for an upcoming BB Blog project)....
and also the Kitchen Spice range and boy is it fab........so girlie and pretty!! :D You know how much i love polka dots so this is right up my street, i even used it to make the layout for this weeks Pencil Lines sketch 152 :) *cough* you may want to check out the blog again come Sunday, the guest is someone you may know *wink*
I really dont want to start thinking about Christmas until we get Halloween out of the way so i have been busy making up some goodies for the Daily Inspiration blog.........here are a couple of sneak peeks and i will show them in all their glory as soon as they go live :)

I got my scan date through today - 6th of October - it all seems so real after that first view of little babe, i wont have registered with the midwife until the same day so we get to hear the heartbeat for the first time and see him/her on the same day! *happy dance*

Angel/Monster!

lol The only one we havent had a problem with this past week regarding not wanting to go to school and its his Angel/Monster layout thats up on the Daily Inspiration blog today at Scrapbookmate!! Poor little soul has been as good as gold and not moaned once about the new routine at school - hes in year 2 now so it not all play anymore either! lol This pic was taken the morning of his operation, he said he didnt want anymore pics until his ear was sorted so this was the best i was getting! ;)

Carboot sale was successful yesterday and Kelly watched all 5 kids (my 4 and her 1) without incident - i thought i may come back to find her tied to a chair or something! LOL Thanks again Kelly xxx

Its the weekend!!!

Thank goodness for that, no early mornings and school runs....no worrying if the school is going to ring as one of them have thrown up (both eldest suffer from anxiety attacks and a whole new school has kicked Scott into a different league altogether - not pretty!) Lets hope it calms down soon!

I have a project to share which was shown on the Bo Bunny blog. We had to do our own take on the card sketch
Go check out their blog and take part - theres loads of cool projects coming up :)

Im still here, still plodding through and DH is worried there may be more than one cooking - this was me 8 weeks ago..........this is me now!! EEK!! Yes those are maternity pants already!!

Back to school, Bo Bunny and Babies....

Nana Sue this is for you - the boys ready for their first day of school. Scott ready for his start at BIG school and Ethan for his start at little school...how cute and grown up do they look!! I admit i shed a few tears this morning (which quickly went when i realised just how quiet the house can be!!) LOL :D

Go check out my first project as part of the Bo Bunny Design Team, it is such a joy to work with the new lines - they are all delicious and i assure you you will be wanting them too!! This weeks challenge was to recycle so, going through coffee the way we do, i automatically reached for one of the empty glass jars...I took one of the little tags from the In The Kitchen range and mounted it onto white card and wrote the instructions for the cookie mix on the back.
Once everything is layered into the jar it looks like the perfect gift, all the recipient needs to do is empty it all into a bowl, add a couple of little bits, mix and cook! :)
All papers and embellishements are from the In The Kitchen range from Bo Bunny!! :)
...........and a little announcement on a project we have been working on for 7 weeks which will be finished around the end of April 2010..... heres a sneaky peek ((ok so not officially mine as pod is still well a little pod right now!!)) lol
I SOOOO wasnt going to announce it until i was well past the 12 weeks but ive been as sick as a dog and missing out on lots of challenges lately etc (hence i get emails asking if im ok etc) so its only fair you know the real reason why im kinda here but not here a lot - put it this way, i hope the sickness stops at week 12 as i really cant carry on like this much longer! Ack!!

A BIG TOOT TOOT!!

This month i was chosen to be a guest on the Genuinely Jane Studio design team. The books they make are wood and so great to work with as they take any medium....paint, paper, ink etc. I made the following 2 books and was over the moon yesterday when they emailed me to say they were so happy with what i had done that they wanted to offer me a permanent position on their design team! THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL DESIGNER!! Yayyy!!
....inside pages...
This is a little book with a cauldron cut out at the front but it just screamed little monster to me - i mean....isnt that just the perfect shape for a kiddy monster!!
Lots more projects being worked on, im loving all the new Bo Bunny ranges so im really enjoying having those to play with right now!
*a little bit of inside info too - Bo Bunny have 4 new ranges coming out very soon - among them think Valentine gorgeousness and i will show some snippits as soon as we get the pics!*