It's been a while...

Well just for a change it's been a while since I last blogged. I think about it often though... so it's not a fully neglected blog, not just yet!

So what's been happening in the Stevenson house since I last updated?

My grandad (mum's dad) got taken into hospital as his cancer had got worse.

My (and I use the term very loosely as I really do not consider her to be part of my family) Nanna reported my mum to the police for harassment.... twice! The two incidents of harassment being

1, knocking on my grandad's door (when she knew his wife wouldn't be in) to see him. As t turned out he was in the hospital, but a neighbour reported that mum had been there.

2, sending a card to my grandad at the hospital.

Now I don't know what was more outrageous, the fact that Nanna actually reported this as harassment, or the fact the police turned up at my mum's house at 11.45pm on a Friday night!!! Like, seriously... do Nottinghamshire police have nothing better to be doing on a Friday night!

To cut a long story short, mum refused to sign a document agreeing to stay away from Grandad, thanks to a really lovely sister at the hospital, she got to go and see him outside of usual visiting hours. They both got to say goodbye to each other, and make their peace with each other alone, without the interference of malicious family members.

Grandad died a week later.

After posting a comment on my cousin's Face book status basically saying R.I.P. Grandad, I got

some hate filled messages from my so called Nanna, basically saying that Grandad never loved me, why would he when he had two other grand children that were his whole life... blah, blah, blah!!!

One good thing that has come out of this whole sorry mess, is that I got in touch with my cousin for the first time, and got a lovely message from her. Even though we grew up in the same small village we don't know each other as our parents do not speak to each other.

Anyway enough of the doom and gloom! I have had some fun too!!!

I went away for a child free weekend with the Sarahscards DT to Bottomhouse Barn.

Same place we went to last year, and we had a fabulous time again... in fact it was better this year, as we all knew each other better, and more of us stayed for 3 nights instead of just 2.

Here are a few photos stolen from Rachel's blog....

and some other stolen from Rachael's blog....

On Saturday night we played with sparklers.... what a talented bunch we are... look what we did...lol!!!

Clever Gemma, took the photos and arranged the montage.

I only managed 4 LOs over the weekend.... but to be fair, we did do a lot of Twilight watching, so there's only so much paper shuffling you can manage with distractions like Edward Cullen!!!

This LO was done using the current sketch on the Sarahscards blog.... make sure you play along and leave a link to your work for a chance to win a £10 voucher for the shop.

I used mists on this LO, but instead of spraying with them I unscrewed the lid and used the tube to drip it down the page like blood. Not as messy as you'd think and I really like the result too. The papers are My Mind's Eye Haunted, and are so gorgeous. If you haven't got them, you need to... they are flocked with black velvet and are just divine to touch. They are so much better in real life than on a computer screen. You can find them HERE.

This LO was created using the same papers, and the same drippy mist technique... one trip pony, yeah yeah yeah!!!

This was also done using the My Mind's Eye papers.

This LO was the first I did at the retreat. It doesn't have a title, but I don't think it really needs one. The photo is of Drew and his buddy Sam. Sam is the son of good friend Jen.... who doesn't blog anymore!!! Sam is actually 4 months older than Drew... not that you'd think that when you compare weights!!!

I used a mix or Indie Girl and Webster's Pages... both of which are just scrummy.

This LO was a mix of all sorts, and didn't really come together until the last bit was glued into place! Photo of Harry doing his first stomp off to sulk when he doesn't get his own way. I'm not saying he didn't sulk before this, but this was the first day he deliberately walked off to lean with his back to us, all because he couldn't go on the horses as we had to go and book in!!!

I was sent the Crate Paper: School Spirit papers to play with, and here are a couple of pages I did... using Maya Road mists and Prima masks too. I am just loving misting right now... the only problem is when you do a page without misting it just looks so wrong!!!

Lastly... I'm really getting into ATCs at the moment. I did some a few years ago, but didn't really take to them all that much. After playing around with mists and scraps, I've found that I love the speed and ease of ATCs... here are a few I did the other day.

My plan is to do loads and have them framed in a big frame for in my bedroom... just got to decide if I want a theme/color scheme/random collection.

These ones were done for Oliver, because he complained that all the others had been too girly!!!

PHEW!!! and breath!

Well, that's all for now folks... no doubt I'll be back with another monster catch up in a month or so ;)