Naturific!

How flippin' cool are these? PolkaDotPotato are having an end of summer sale at the moment (I am trying really hard not to give in to the temptation to buy yet more stash), and if you spend $10 you get these lickalicious overlays for free! What are you waiting for? Get over there and get shopping - these are just far too gorgeous to miss out on.

Lucky, lucky me though - Ashley gave a download link for this to Denise to pass on to us CT girls so that we could have a play with it, and I could hardly wait to get my grubby paws on it. I've only managed two layouts so far - my scrappination (scrapping imagination) is sorely lacking at the moment. Somewhere in the deepest darkest recesses of my brain there are some really great ideas of how to use these, but it seems that at the moment my brain is keeping a firm hold on any creative genius thoughts.


So this is my beautiful niece, Niamh, taken at her First Holy Communion not long ago. I deliberately kept it simple because I think the overlay takes away the need for any other embellishments.

Totally irrelevant to you all as it will be, I just need to make the observation that she is the spitting image of her Dad - she's definitely got the look of the Martins about her - even her teeth are just how I remember Sean's being when we were young (just to confuse you, my elder brother is Sean, and my eldest son is named after him).

Moving on to tonight's feat of creativity, this layout is of my Aunt (Dad's sister) who (gonna confuse you again) married Mum's brother. Believe me, our family tree is a bit of a nightmare - not only did Dad's sister marry Mum's brother, but one of Dad's other sisters (who is a fair bit older) married Mum's Uncle. Anyway, as I was saying, this is my Aunt, looking young and gorgeous on her wedding day.


Credits: Background paper and stitching - Grandma's Kitchen kit by Suzy Nunes
Overlay - Botanicals 1 by Ashley K at PolkaDotPotato
Beads - Grounded Elements from the Personality Collection by Meredith Fenwick
White vellum alphabet - by Miss Mint at Peppermint Creative
Font - CK Cursive

Again, its a simple page, but I didn't think it needed anything else.

Speaking of Suzy Nunes, as I was making this page I was thinking about what fab stuff she designs and thinking that the girls on her CT are really lucky. Then I log onto DST to discover that she's doing a CT call! Then I got to thinking that, you know what, I'm on Denise's team and with the demands of work, the kids, the house, and the two millstones around my neck (the businesses), can I commit to anything else realistically - and the answer is probably no. I was going to apply for the recent CT call for the Element Team at SBB, but ultimately decided against it because I knew that no matter how prestigious it might seem it would probably be too much of a commitment. Despite feeling that I can better promote Denise's fabaroonie designs if I am just a one-team girlie, I think that I should probably give into the urge to apply for Suzy's team, just for the hell of it (and in the almost certain knowledge that she wouldn't pick me anyway - just being realistic!)

By the way, have you noticed how I'm jumping around my subjects like a mad woman here? Blame alcohol - I succumbed to temptation and bought a bottle of Stone's Summer Cup, which is sorta like Ginger Wine, and I had a couple of big glasses tonight. I very rarely drink, but I was really tired today and am starting to feel like I need a holiday (I am conveniently forgetting that if I had got my act in gear and got my passport sorted out we could all have been relaxing at Col's Dad's house in Germany) ... so I had a couple of drinkies and now I feel more relaxed.

Going back to Denise, I don't think I showed you the layout I did with her gorgeous new kit called Celebrating Fall (if you go and put that in your shopping cart NOW, you'll be almost halfway to spending $10 and getting the fabulous Botanicals freebie). Okay, so I've tried to load the layout, but Blogger doesn't want to play, so I'll either create another post now for it above this one, or leave it until I next blog. Anyway, go and buy this kit - it's awesome!