Budding gardener

Beautiful weather this afternoon, so we were all in the garden. Caitlin was filling plant pots with soil and helping me transfer the chilli and basil seedlings into bigger pots. Then we were weeding the flower beds and removing snails (52 at final count!) All while Tim mowed the lawn and dug out the last of the turf from the new veg bed. Hopefully we'll have that finished tomorrow so Caitlin can plant more seeds. Must take camera out with us tomorrow, been to busy just enjoying gardening to take any piccies, but it would be nice to have a couple of our budding botanist.

Did manage to take these two cute piccies of daddy and daughter curled up on the sofa this morning though. Caitlin had been sat on Tim's chair but the minute he sat down on the sofa she insisted on sitting with daddy and watching TV, definately daddy's little girl day.

Well one more essay down, one to go, have week to do it, hopefully my head improves so I can work more than an hour at a time.

Been to GP today blood pressure still too high, so have to have whole load of blood tests done and an ECG. Until they decide why I have high blood pressure can't have beta-blockers as it masks symptoms. So stuck with headcahes and migraines and this overwhelming tiredness. Role on week on monday when they should have all results back.

In other news I took Caitlin's first gluten-free prescription to the chemist today and spoke to receptionist at GP and went through a whole load of other stuff to add to the list too. Caitlin will be pleased her favourite bourbon biscuits are on prescription.

Latest creations are mobile phone/bag charms, first time I've tried them, but quite pleased with the outcome. The pink one has pearl beads, the green one has shell beads and the topaz one has chips of blue topaz. These are all going to someone else, but I have got bits to make some more, going to do purple one next.

Special wedding

Well congratulations to the new mr and mrs Saxby! They'll be in US on honeymoon now. The bride looks so stunning the cape was amazing and the embriodery on the dress beautiful. The groom looked pretty good too in his velvet frock coat. Tim and I were honoured to be their witnesses. The day was fab, Dalhousie castle is a beautiful place and the perfect backdrop for Flo's princess day. Tim brushed up pretty good in his frock coat too. We even got a few piccies of the two of us together, which was nice. Have to say I probably drank more over the weekend than I had the previous year, between thursday night with Marianne and later Matt, then dinner at the castle with the grooms family and friends, then the wedding day. Hey hum, guess I have to make the most of Caitlin free times. She had plenty of fun with her grandparents, who spoilt her rotten as ever.

Days 10 and 11

Have been fighting a run of migraines last couple of days, so rather sapped my creativity, but manged to catch up a little so I'm only one day behind.

It was last day before the Easter break at uni today really ready for an Easter break even if I have got three assignments to complete in next three weeks. My options are all sorted for next term, so I'll be doing community OT, and young adults with neurological disability, so looking forward to that. Even better I get monday, wednesday and alternate thursday/friday at home, so plan to have Caitlin home on Mondays and have long weekend, really looking forward to spending more quality time with her, just the two of us. As much as I love university and know I'd be a basket case if I was still a SAHM I still miss having so little time with her, so long weekends wil be fab for may and june.

Day 9 - I don't have to be perfect!

Ok, so I am a perfectionist, or maybe I should say a failed perfectionist. Whatever I do it never seems quite good enough and I feel like I've failed, all adding to my lack of self esteem.

Today's quote really spoke to me, rather than thinking I have to be perfect from day one, I should be challenging myself to improve slowly each day, not to be too hard on myself and let my skills grow slowly and be positive about the little steps and improvements along the way.

Day 8

Here's day 8 page. Really felt today was about me accepting nothing will change unless I make it happen, regardless of the love and support I have.

In other news Uni have finally given us groups for our options for after Easter and mine clash both same times on tuesday:( Was lucky to get my second and third choice, community and young adults with neurological disabilities, which was fab, would have been happy with any of my 4 choices to be honest, but short of spliting me in two can't do both. So now have to wait and see if they can swap me with someone in the second group of neuro which is on friday. Just hope I get an answer this side of Easter, would be nice to make some sort of plans.

day 7

Took advantage of Caitlin and Tim going for afternoon nap to do my page for today. Lots of text, not so much art today as I wanted the page space for journalling, kind of a reminder of my challenge to myself at the end of the first week. Used white pen to colour in the lettering round the circle.

Day 6

So here's day 6 now it's all dry, Strong, capable, smart woman. Made the beaded flower then filled centre with diamond glaze and added few beads. Used MM rubon letters and drew on the flowers.

Had another morning in the garden, was doing some sweeping and tidying on the patio and Caitlin came up to me and asked, 'when are we doing gardening mummy?' so I asked what she wanted to do and she promptly replied, 'plant some seeds' so we did. Tim changed another light fitting, not more bare bulb in the bathroom :) eventually anyway, turned out to be interesting wiring in our lighting ring, why am I not surprised?!! Nothing in this house is ever straightforward or simple there's always some complication.

April Showers

Well April has arrived and with it the showers, Caitlin and I were assembling one of these plastic plant houses for all the seedlings in the garden and one minute it was blue skies the next minute it was raining. While we were in the garden Tim was redoing a light fitting, getting rid of the horrible tacky faux gold one we inherited when we bought the house. One more little step to making it our own.

Later we were planting seeds, Caitlin loved filling all the seed trays with compost, even if she did get it everywhere. She proved remarkable adept at transplanting marigold seedlings with us too, each time she pulled one up we expected her to snap the stem, but she didn't damage one, not sure if the marigolds are remarkably resilient or she was being more gentle than it looked.

Later in the afternoon when the showers started again we made some easter cards while Tim cooked tea, she still loves anything crafty, just like her mother, I hope she keeps this interest as she gets older.

Have got my day 6 entry almost finished, but the diamond glaze is still drying, maybe tomorrow by the time it dries. Between Tim swearing at computers (his motherboard has overheated and died, so now trying to adapt the second machine) and me cursing at MM rubons the evening has just vanished.

Day 5

Well here's day 5 entry, did a paper one, but didn't like the end result, so resorted to digi instead, papers and ribbon from ShabbyPrincess.com

Becoming a mother was not something that I expected to be, I was told in my late teens I had a million to 1 chance of ever becoming pregnant and even less of being able to carry a baby full term, so when we found out I'd fallen pregnant naturally it was somewhat of a shock! Caitlin is our little miracle, the day she was born was the start of an extraordinary journey for us all.

Part of my 21 day challenge was to value what I have and who I am more, so this was a gentle remindered to myself of just how blessed I am to have my little family.

21 day challenge - Day 4

Well afraid I got distracted from university work, made the most of my creativity before it vanished again, since last year my scrapping mojo has been very fickle. But this challenge is really making me do something creative each day. I think I kind of hoped that doing the 21 day challenge would encourage me to do something creative each and every day (well within reason).

'Doing, being, becoming' is a very occupational therapy phrase and it fitted with today inspiration, so I based my entry round the phrase. I am doing my degree, being a student so I can become an occupational therapist.

Spring is finally coming

It's the very end of March and it finally feels like the warmer weather this last week has woken nature up. My garden is now full of daffodils, with their cheery yellow flowers and I can see catkins on the trees out the train window on way to university.

Have finished day 3 for 21 day challenge, every quote so far has spoken to me, I love the choices Rhonna has made. Off to have a look at day 4, before tackling my critical appraisal for uni assignment, even if crafting feels far more appealing.

21 Day challenge day 2

Another fab quote from Rhonna.

Have gone digital today. The stitches are from Keep Em' In Stitches
Part 4 kit by Lisa Carter at digitalscrapbookplace.com, the lettering in the heart is from lettering delights 'passion pen'

I'm finally beginning to have a chance to fulfill my dreams with the support of Tim. It makes me happy that I now have the chances that haven't been possible in the past.

Rhonna Farrer - 21 day challenge

Completed my first days challenge (for details see here) I've decide as my overall theme for the 21 days to try and value myself and what I have. I have this fab scrapbook paper from Sweetwater which says celebrate where you came from, celebrate where you are and celebrate where you are going. At this point in my life it seems appropriate, It seems that everything has changed in the last few months with me going to university and Caitlin growing up, Tim's role at work developing and his growing responsibility. It's all positive stuff, but it's sometime easy to look at the negatives. So I'm going to spend next 21 days Celebrating what I have, a beautiful daughter, loving partner and opportunity to better myself.

First day was about goals, so took this quite literally, used the quote around the edge, background is a shabby princess digital paper.

Kirsty's Challenge

Still not got a picture of me for Kirsty's challenge, so I improvised. Took pictures of various pieces of me instead, resisted the clevage shot LOL! Anyway, pretty pleased with the result. Managed to include some primas courtesy of Caroline's little packs of them. I did some doodling in bronze colour, both round the title and over the bird,which unfortunately doesn't want to photograph, but never mind. Being a beader, also did some beaded doodling for the swirly bits. Even wrote on the LO in the bronze colour and I hate my writing, but I guess Caitlin would like to know what it looked like.

I called the LO 'Reaching My Potiential', as that's how I feel about me now, after years of just doing a job for the money, getting out of violent marriage and other stuff, then being either Tim's partner or Caitlin's mum, I'm at university making the most of my skills and using my brain to get my degree and being known as Emma, I'm finally able to do something for me that I want to do, although hopefully it will benefit the family in the long run. None of which would be possible without Tim's suport and help I hasten to add.

I love this basic grey paper, the bird taking off just seems to symbolise where I am. Tim looked at the LO and suggested that I was, 'More than the sum of my parts', which I thought was quite inciteful. Have written a letter for Caitlin explaining my feelings, which I've put behind the LO, so if anything happened before she grew up she could read about how I feel now. Anyway thank you Kirsty for challenging me to scrap myself, even if I've not quite got to the whole face picture.

We took Caitlin out to the tropical butterfly house, wildlife and falconry centre yesterday. Had lovely day. Caitlin had a bag of food for the hens, geese and turkey and loved throwing them a handful, then giving us some to feed the adult goats, who were a bit big for her. Then she got to give a baby goat it's bottle of milk, she thought it was great fun. Didn't managed to get any decent pictures because of the number of people around, but it didn't matter, was nice not be be wielding the camera for once and let Tim have it. Meant I could just enjoy the moment more. Sometimes as a scrapper it's all too easy to be focused on getting that elusive perfect photo that you miss out on all the fun.

Spent yesterday at Carolinez Craftz lovely to see Caroline and her mum, it had been a while. Had nice chat and tied lots of bows round boxes. Treated myself to some patterned paper, a new xyron 150, (being as I finally killed my old one with help from Caitlin) and these lovely buttons. Yup I have a thing about buttons, so couldn't resist buying a few.

Still feeling exhausted after this cold, so didn't do much today, having a go at kirsty's challenge, but pottering really, still haven't got decent piccie of me, so have had to improvise. But at least I'm actually scrapping with paper.

Spent most of day doing SPSS for university, took practice test online and got 10/10 so bit less panicky about the assessed test I need to do any time in next fortnight, wil try to do asap while it's still fresh in my memory though, maybe even tomorrow if I can shift this cough, can't imagine it would be popular in the quite study area of the uni library.

Tim not well today and at home, he managed to fall on the stairs and has very nasty looking bruise on his big toe, not sure what he's done, bit difficult to tell with the shape of his feet. But very painful, just hope he hasn't broken it.

Spent evening playing with digi LO of the photo Tim took at weekend, very simple, but whenever I tried anything more intricate it just looked over fussy and I really wanted the photo to shine through. The grungy edge was from www.digitalscrapbookplace.com and the button and string bow were from Heather Ann designs, but I've changed the colours. Definately my favourite photo of Caitlin this year so far.

She looks so adorable in this photo, unfortunately like most 2 year old she can throw the tantrums from hell, like this evening, she ended up not only on the naughty step, but in time out in her room (very rare occasion) but she would not stay on step. Oh well I guess that's what we get for having a child as stubborn as me and as perverse as Tim. Thankfully she went off to sleep ok, leaving Tim and I to recover.

Not the only jewellery maker in the family!

Well been good day, went out to Doncaster to the Clarks outlet and found shoes for wedding and new pair of boots to replece my ones that are dying. Even better boots were an extra 40% off today and were less than half RRP to start with. Then went through to Adsa where we not only picked up a whole load of new t-shirts for Caitlin, but finally found the georgia pacific cardstock in earthtones I've been after for ages. They do the white card which is fab for journalling and pages for mini books, now I have another 4 colours to play with.

This afternoon Caitlin got to play with some wooden beads for the first time, bought these a while ago from ELC, but she was too little to use them. She loved making necklaces and made one for each of us. The look on her face had so much concentration on the task at hand. Caitlin made her's first with Caitlin on and choose the other beads. Then she insisted on making daddy one and mine with mummy.

Spent the morning at Old Moor, an RSPB nature reserve nearby. Caitlin loved playing in the playground, so much so she ran out of steam before we'd managed any real walking. But I did get Tim to take a few photos, this is my favourite one, not a bad photo of me. The whole playground is themed around nature and the like, so this one is a snail, the slide was a frog, so Caitlin bounced round the playground being a froggie going ribbit. Sometimes it's just exhausting watching her!