A little dream come true

When I started Scrapbooking and saw a couple of Scrapbooking magazines I wondered how you got in them? I thought they would call the really talented people and ask to exhibit their work (guess I never really thought about how they would know they were talented!). I guess it had sparked the dream in me that I'd be good enough to be published one day. 

I did a layout in January 2011of my youngest son for Challenge Heaven. I got lots of positive comments about it and Shell who ran Challenge Heaven at the time suggested I submit to a magazine. So I thought why not give it a try and to my amazement they excepted to be published! 

Now I'll admit I was pretty stunned (still working on believing in my abilities) and until I had a copy of it in my hand I didn't quite believe it. Over a year later it's finally here! Volume 14 No 4!

Here's my layout.

I used Bazzill Dotted Swiss Cardstock and painted it lightly with a sponge. Added some strips of My Mind's Eye paper, some decorated chipboard, Cosmo Cricket Mini Alphas, Bella Chipboard letters and lots of buttons. Finished it off with some cross stitch using DMC embroidery cotton. I was really pleased with the result, especially as it wasn't inspired by anyone. It was all my own idea :-)

So I guessed I've learned that I can achieve my dreams, I've got to stop thinking everyone's trying to be nice by saying something I've made is good. A good lesson learned.

Surprise! I'm getting married!

I mentioned in my last post that my Sister-in-law (husband's sister) Shona sprung a surprise wedding on us. How it came about is a bit of a long tale but the short version is Shona & Ian have been together a long time (15 years or so), they live in London together and spent 6 months last year living in New York. They have been planning on getting married for a while but have never planned anything definite. They were coming to Australia for my Father-in-law's 80th birthday in February and decided that they couldn't put it off forever (we're not getting any younger!) so why not just have a simple family only wedding while they were here? Great idea except they tried to keep it a secret from all of us (except her Dad).

The secret got blown by a prospective celebrant and soon Mum knew, then because we (meaning their siblings) were being pains they had to tell all of us so we'd be there on time! They didn't tell any of their friends and just announced the good news on Facebook after the event :-)

It was great fun helping Shona put some of the last details together on the day and it was peaceful & perfect. A very special day.

Here's my DD in her flower girl dress. I made it using a New Look pattern. The fabric had a slight embroidered pattern on it and went beautifully with Shona's outfit. The two flower girls had the same dress but reverse colours, my DD's was dusty pink with a cream/bone underdress and Ian's niece had a bone embroidered dress with the dusty pink underdress.

Shona looked gorgeous in a cream camisole and skirt with embroidered jacket. It was made in London for her by an Australian lady in less than a week! Amazing! This is in her parents back yard, they live 3 hours North of Perth in a small town. Her bouquet came from Podz Florist in Kalamunda. It was stunning. She'd always had her heart set on an native Australian bouquet.

Here is Shona, her Dad and the girls. I made the girl's head bands and added net to Shona's headband to make it a veil/headband. I used Kaisercraft Sparklets on the flowers to add a bit of bling on their headbands.

And here is the happy couple toasting to their life together at Dynamite Bay, Western Australia.

A great day had by all <3