ArtyFartyAnnie

Ooops I forgot to post this page last week - but better late than never! CSI Case File #73 over at CSI was a really fun one to solve - unusual colour combo and lots of ideas for design elements and journaling. Here's the Case File (click on the imange to enlarge it) Yet again, Debbi Tehrani , CSI Mastermind, has come up with an intriguing Scene for us to investigate. From this image she has taken Colors, Stories, Inspiration and come up with lots of clues for us to follow in order to solve the Case. You must use All 5 colours in the Scheme At least 2 items of Evidence At least 1 piece of Testimony You can also download the CSI Coordinates to help you - the talented Michele Singh designs a new set for each case and there's a whole library of them available to CSI Members - they are images, quotes, journaling spots and patterned papers which you can either print out to use on your pages, or use them for digital designs if you're clever enough (which I'm not...

Hi everyone, Well, after a very very busy bank holiday weekend I have finally Tidied My Room - with a lot of help from my lovely hubby John. We got started clearing the room on Saturday morning and finished on Monday evening, by which time we were limping around like a couple of old crocks hurting in places you wouldn't even think of! Here is a reminder of how the room looked before we started - check out the original post It's amazing how the contents of that one small room managed to fill the entire bedroom and the bathroom and somehow it took a lot longer to put it all back! And now I can shut the door and everything ... Would you like a peek inside? This unit has sloping paper shelves, plus 1", 2" and 3.5" drawers. On top you can see box albums and a head full of hats The storage units came from Storage4Crafts - see details on previous post  - to my huge relief they fitted exactly where I had planned and we are delighted with th...

OMG!!! My long-awaited workroom storage units were delivered this morning - in TWENTY FOUR BOXES - they took up half the FEDEX lorry! Ever so slightly worried that all my measurements were in the wrong scale or something as my workroom really is very small. But anyway, here they are all stashed in the garage ... ... all we need to do now is clear my workroom (see previous post to get some idea of what a Big Job that's going to be); carry this lot into the cottage and up the teeny winding staircase; assemble the units; put them in place according to my Master Plan; and put everything away (the fun part). That's my husband's exercise bike in the back of the garage - he can't get to it, but I don't think that's going to be a problem as he won't have any time or energy left for any of that this bank holiday weekend! It will be an interesting test of our nearly two years marriage to see whether we can get through it without falling out, especially as we...

Case File #72 at CSI  was right up my street - a gorgeously soft but bright colour palette  - here it is (click on the image to enlarge) CSI stands for   "Color, Stories, Inspiration"  and as always, the amazing Debbi Tehrani has found a brilliant Scene for us to investigate - from this inspiration image she has taken the 5 colours , as well as ideas for design elements and journaling prompts . In order to solve the case, you must use the following clues All 5 colours in The Scheme At least 2 items of Evidence At least 1 piece of Testimony To help you, there is a new set of CSI Coordinates for each Case File - these are fabulous printable downloads which are designed by the talented Michele Singh and they're free to CSI members. The Coordinates for Case File #72 weren't yet available when I made my page ready for the reveal, but they are all archived so I can use them another time. Here's how I solved the case . These wonderful photos show...

Great excitement - my long-awaited delivery from Storage 4 Crafts should arrive next Wednesday wooHOO! This is my shamefully messy desk as it is today There is just about a two foot square left in the middle of the room for me to sit at the desk and it's becoming very difficult to find anything, even though it started off quite organised and I do tidy between projects and have a blitz from time to time. Here's another embarrassing picture This workbench is just to the right of the desk and there is stuffed piled up underneath it and stuffed into the gap between desk and workbench. A little further to the right are these shelves, as well as tubs of stuff and a pile of "useful" cardboard Continuing to follow the room around you can see some more shelves, some over-stuffed drawers and some cardboard storage boxes collapsing under the weight of too much patterned paper This comes full circle back to the left of my desk. These pictures don't really show ...

I gave up trying to sleep and got up at 4.15 this morning - and by 5.30 I had this spelt loaf made from scratch and out of the oven to cool! It smells deLISHus - today is definitely NOT a fasting day. My Dad gave me the recipe last week and this is the second one I've made. I can't tell you how well it keeps because we ate all the first one within two days! It's densely-textured, nutty-tasting, crisply-crusted and SO easy to make. Here's the recipe if you fancy having a go yourself 500g Spelt flour pinch salt 10g fast action dried yeast couple of generous handfuls nuts/seeds 500ml warm water Stir all the dry ingredients together with one hand, throw in all the water at once, keep stirring to combine everything. Plop the resulting mud pie into a greased loaf tin and bake for one hour at 200c, then take out of the tin and place directly on the oven shelf for another five minutes to finish. That's it! Enjoy :o)

Wot a Picture! Wot a picture, wot a photograph! I've had Tommy Steele singing in my head for days, thanks  to Case File #71 over at CSI this week. Here it is (click on the image to enlarge it) Every week, CSI mastermind Debbi Tehrani finds a new Scene for us to investigate - from this image she draws inspiration for colours, design elements and journaling prompts. In order to solve the case, you have to use the following clues all five colours in the Scheme at least two pieces of Evidence at least one piece of Testimony As this is the second week of the month, we also have a fab sketch from Emma Stafrace to follow. Lucky lucky CSI Members can download the CSI Coordinate s to help them solve the Case - a new set of Coordinates is designed for each case by the talented Michele Singh - they are FABulous! :o) So here is my solution to this Case Just this once, I'm using my CSI Detective Frame - partly because the page just looks better in it and pa...

This is a very Exciting Week for me - my CSI Detective Debut ! - and I was away for my first big reveal, so of course one of the first things I wanted to do when we got home was to fire up my PC. The line-up looks amazing and I am so proud to be part of it :o) Here's this week's Case File No. 70 (click on the image to make it bigger) CSI Mastermind Debbi Tehrani comes up with a new Scene for us to investigate every week. From this image she draws inspiration for colour combinations, design elements and storytelling and these become our design brief - the clues we need to follow in order to solve the case. Use all five colours in the Scheme Use at least two items of Evidence Use at least one piece of Testimony CSI members can also download a new set of CSI Coordinates for each case - these are printable images, journaling spots and pp designed by the lovely Michele Singh - they're so cool! Here's my solution to Case File #70 It shows a...

Hi everyone, John and I just got home from a long weekend in London and we must be very righteous indeed, because the sun shone on us all weekend! On Monday, we enjoyed a wonderful hop-on, hop-off tour of the city on an open-top London bus - not that cheap at £28 each, but I would totally recommend it as the best way to get a great view of the sights in comfort, without getting sore feet or having to worry about pickpockets! The ticket lasts for 24 hours and during that time you can hop off to find some lunch, visit a museum or whatever, then hop back on again. You can choose a bus with or without a guide who points out all the sights and gives you titbits of history and background information. The price also includes a river cruise (which we didn't do because of my slightly reluctant relationship with water - I think John would have loved to go but he hid it well!). If you ever get the chance to do one of these tours on a sunny day - go for it! Another highl...