Firstly a great big thanks to those of you who travelled to Waimate on Saturday for our “Festive, floral, frenzy!”
I knew it would be a busy day but I wasnt quite expecting that busy!!!

I hope you all enjoyed yourselves and werent too dissappointed to not get finished. I did say the hall was ours until church on Sunday!!!

Mum so enjoyed meeting lots of you. Maybe I’ll be able to convince her to come cook at Raincliff!

Heres a couple of shots of the completed pages in colour just incase you would like to reference for your finishing touches

I got the impression that those little rosettes were driving a few of you to distraction, BUT dont they look great!! We completely sold out of all of these dies so I expect to see lots of lovely rosette filled layouts in the new year. They really are a breeze to use when you get the hang of it. If you were having trouble with the glue try skinny double sided tape (thats what I use and it works a treat). BoBunny have been using heaps of rosettes on their blog lately. They have made theirs with the scorpal (I stock the Martha Stewart Score board as a cheaper alternative to the scorpal) check out here and keep scrolling down for some lovely ideas.

Also, wasnt it great learning about changing the colour of the seam binding? My arm got sore measuring so many metres of the stuff.

I saw a few of you make a start on the cards and here is a colour image to assist those of you wanting to finish them off.

All in all I thought Becks did a stellar job on her layouts and especially her marshmallow christmas trees, and for this I thank her very much.

We will surely do another class next year, perhaps a bit less challenging – nah! if we don’t challenge ourself how do we learn……

What an awesome response we have had to our “Christmas Home” class!!!
almost all sold out without even giving you any sneak peaks!!!
Well here they are at last.


I am absolutely thrilled with what Becks has come up with and I am sure you will be too. If you like all things festive, with a heap of handmade flowers, there will be a creative frenzy happening here in Waimate on the 12th of November.


I especially love the fact that one of our regular ladies has designed something especially for us! we have so much talent and brilliant ideas amongst us all its inspirational in itself.


So finally some long awaited details for you.
We will be creating 2 layouts during the day, and while both have a christmas theme it would be possible to amend them to a more generic photo choice.
Also in your kit will be the ingredients for 3 Christmas Cards which hopefully we will have time to complete but if not you will have everything at your fingertips for a wee “homework” project.
Colours involved will be red, black, white and olive green.

Layout number 1:
1 x 6″x4″ photograph and
2 x 3″x4″ photographs
both of landscape orientation
Layout number 2:
1 x 5″x7″ photograph
also of landscape orientation
These photo sizes are ideal for the layouts Becks has designed, but with some creative thinking could be amended if necessary. It will be a very busy class due to the nature of the handmade embellishments involved so Tania (and her not brilliant printer) will not be able to resize photographs on the day, sorry!!

Other items to bring with you are:
Double sided tape/adhesives
Quilling tool (if you have one)
Paper trimmer/cutter
Scissors (suitable for fussy cutting)
Cutting mat

Final cost for the day is $40.00 (non refundable).
This covers full kit for the 2 layouts and 3 cards with heaps of leftovers (kit valued at $50) and includes lunch and tea/coffee etc.
Venue is Knox church hall, cnr Manse and Shearman St, Waimate. 10am kickoff and we finish up at 3pm.
Please forward payments to Embellish It, 30 Innes St, Waimate, by Friday 4th November to confirm your place or alternately pay into our account
02 0888 0069878 00
Numbers are extremely limited so please confirm as soon as possible.

Hopefully I havent forgotten anything (yeah right!) but brain is a bit fuddled from lack of sleep (you guessed it another sick child – now Rosie has the chicken pox BAD!)

Tania

Finally got the photos back from my photographer and I think you will agree it has been worth the wait.

Thanks to Nolas neice’s boyfriend????? for such a great shot. Call me biased but it looks like a wonderful day and a great bunch of ladies having a lovely time. What do you think? If you would like me to email you a copy just let me know. Already 31 names down for the next camp and I havent even announced a date!!

And of course heres the noisey table who just cant help themselves. This is Nic’s version of PLANKING!

Thanks to everyone for such a great weekend. I just love how such a diverse group of people can come together with just one small thing in common and have such a nice time. I hope everyone enjoyed the increased flexibility in breakfasts and snack breaks, it certainly made it easier on the kitchen staff. Huge thanks especially to Lisa and Becs for their assistance over the whole weekend and especially in the kitchen hope I wasnt too bossy. And Karyl who almost single handedly prepared lunch on sunday, you chose the wrong moment to be walking thru the kitchen!!! I think you stayed for about an hour.
Sorry I got a bit distracted at lunchtime on Sunday, handling the money is always a tricky time and then when I saw my little boys sick face well, it was all over rover!

Speaking of sick, you are probably all wondering where the 111 call come into it. Here we go again…..
After everyone left, my wee man was heading down hill rapidly. Nurse Janice (aka Cricut expert) and I had already deducted that he had a burst ear drum but he was in a lot of pain and as you can imagine I had a lot of tidying up to do…. so….. I told him it was time to have a sleep in Mummys bunk bed. Off he went without any protest and I was able to help out again with the cleanup. About 45mins later I was just sweeping out the toilets out when I heard screaming from outside. Off I flew and there was Charlie covered in blood. Now dont get me wrong, we have dealt with plenty of bleeding noses in our house (most of them from this child) but this was a doozey. I ran back to the bunkroom and grabbed the nearest thing (my pyjamas!!) and tried to stop it. One by one Becs, Greg and Lisa came to assist and run relay with chux cloths. BUT there seemed to be nothing we could do. It would not stop. After more than twenty minutes Mummy was getting a little worried and everyone had run out of encouraging things to say. There were 4 very worried adult faces and 5 year old screaming and I cant remember what Rosie was up to. Greg, I said, go ring somebody!!!!! Of course toll bar wouldnt let him ring anyone so eventually he rang 111.
Meanwhile back out on the grass, finally the blood clot came out and managed to completely gross out Rebecca (aka not so tough cop) who wondered if it was ever going to stop and would there be brains on the end of it.It actually cheered me up no end as usually this is the sign that its all over. BUT NO, still it continued bleeding. Greg said do we want an ambulance? finally it started to slow down but child still screaming. We said no to the ambulance. Greg ordered us ladies off the premises and sent us to Timaru hospital while he finished locking up. Me in the back with Charlie, feeling very reassured that Policewoman was now in charge and would get us there in quick smart time (she had by now recovered!!!) unfortunately Becs didnt have her glassses on and we were towing a trailer so no speed records were broken. Super organised Mummy who managed to pull off the whole weekend without too many disasters (who needed frozen yoghurt anyway?) burst into tears on sight of the nurse. Nurse must have wondered what on earth was going on, hysterical woman with flowers in her hair and grass skirt holding half naked child wrapped in blanket covered in blood……………………..

The rest as they say is history. 2hr wait even though the waiting room was actually empty and we got home about 6.30pm. Kids eh? just as well we love them.
As I type Charlie is off at the farm with Greg building some sort of worm farm (as 5 yr old boys do) and girl child Rosie is asleep in bed 2pm in afternoon. You guessed it………….. shes sick!! sore ears, sore throat, sore tummy. Oh to be a mother! I wont even tell you what I had to clean up yesterday….. thats a story for another less public forum.

On the scrapping front, I am looking at the calendar as we speak just trying to choose dates for crops between here and christmas. Calendar is rather full with gym comps (she is going so well!) trips to Auckland to see the giant rugby ball! Birthdays (my 40th and daughters 8th) Mothers moving house (yes she has bought a house here in Waimo!) and thats just what I have remembered to write down.
So I will send out an email in a day or two with dates and venues.

Something exciting to look forward to though is Embellish It is going to hold a class! The lovely Becks Caithness has put herself foward to be my official design team. Together we hope to come up with a wonderfull kit full of lovely Teresa Collins Christmas Home range of products and more. This is just one of the lovely papers we will be using. Isnt it beautiful?

The tentative plan at this stage is for a double page layout and 3 or 4 Christmas cards. This will be a limited spaces class so watch out for more details, I’m sure it will be a great day, and something a bit different for a change.

Thats it for me today. Best go handwash the dishes. Dishwasher seems to have swallowed all our crockery and cutlery and now we cant get the door open! might have to be fish and chips for dinner as we dont have enough clean plates for a proper meal. LOL.

PS. thanks for all the lovely emails and cards that I have recieved over the last 2 weeks, cant wait till we do it all again!