Long time no blog

Wow, where has the time gone been such a long, long time since my last confession, blushes profusely :)

Made sooooooooooo much since my last post in August so I will be uploading those over the next week or so too :) Inc child friendly, healthy, fat free vitamin boosting Ben 10 soup and my new obsesion crochet and tons of sewing and papercrafting makes. Beware, theres LOTS LOL

Got some delicious Laura Ashley fabric destined to be made into something divine and some fab 1950s dresses to make, will blog them in due course :)

Also been sketching again :-0 I know, I was ACTUALLY WORKING, truly :)So I am going to add some freebies to the blog also for your papercrafting or embroidered delights :)and finally get the website up and running I am such a lazy, lazy mare, hangs head in utter shame.

Time to get my 'arse' back in gear and hopefully a lot smaller 'arse' in a couple of months time thanks to the wonders of Slimming World’s Food Optimising :)

I am a woman on a mission and now back in the 'zone' so to speak. So I shall be whining and whinging, celebrating and no doubt at times crying on here for all to see in the coming months. Hopefully it won't be such a bumpy ride, crosses fingers, toes, arms, legs and everything else crossable…

I have made some delicious things over the past week if I don’t say so myself and photographed them too hurrah :)so when I finally track down the camcorder upload wire that has somehow magically morphed into 'the teenagers' iPod wire I'll upload them :)

I intend on being a good 'her indoors' and cook everything from scratch. Even get some Body Magic in with some…. with some…. with some …1950s stylee (almost faints) housework, scrambles to scoop ‘gob, upeth floor’ LOL. The fact that I have just gone Vegetarian seven weeks ago after a visit to the Chapel of Rest (RIP Nana) and living in a house full of carnivores is going to be a challenge in itself! So my recipes will be a mix of Veggie/Vegan meals and adapted carnivorous meals. Basically the same meal split half way through adding meat for the carnivores and meat replacements pour moi :)and lots n lots of 'sweet stuff' :)

The ’young un’ is still off with the Chicken Pox (been over three extremely ‘trying’ weeks now) as he decided to catch them just before returning to preschool after the two week half term break! Not very considerate is it…only joking…ish ….LOL. So I haven’t been getting my usual 40 minutes of walking Body Magic in. This normally saves me from a gain on a Tuesday evening despite the sweet tooth. So I really, really must address this. Jackie @ my local SW group swears that a bit of ‘how’s your Father’ is this best type of Body Magic going. I suppose she may have a valid point and you wouldn’t even have to leave the bed let alone the house then tuck into a nice Cadburys creme egg (9 Syns)

Now according to my calculations a creme egg has 173.6 calories and according to the self professed ‘most accurate calorie counter’ here you’d have to be a blinking nymphomaniac to burn that many cals.

In fact my ‘most useful information snippet of the day’ today is in direct relation to ‘said counter’ and it is;

5 mins of backpacking uses 5 times more cals than foreplay and almost twice as much as 5 mins of sex! So there you go, now you know :)


So my advice for the day would be. If you fancy treating yourself to a couple of creme eggs (as one is NEVER,EVER,EVER ENOUGH) and are running a little shy on the old Syns front and are looking to work in some body magic to work it off then try this for size, wink, wink :) (5 mins each unless otherwise stated)

Fein a headache, have a 5 minute nap (6 cals) , take a shower (31 cals), brush your teeth (18 cals), get a guitar out and play a catchy ditty (23 cals), slow ballroom dance (22 cals) yourself to the kitchen to cook a 5 minute omelette (19 cals) (with a third Superfree don’t forget, wink), wash the dishes (16 cals), do a spot of ironing (16 cals) then get a bit of 5 minute tailoring in (19 cals) and cut yourself out a nice 50s style pinny and hot pad to go with your new 50s stylee lifestyle (patterns and instructions to follow in a future confession), weave a quick cloth (27 cals) to make into a shiny new duster, use duster for a quick 5 min dash around (21 cals) on the way to the front door, making yourself presentable by the hallway mirror coffering your hair into a 50s style peak of utter perfection (19 cals), talk on the phone (7 cals) to your pal to arrange a meet up on then heading on your merry way, rake the lawn (29 cals), after washing the car (33 CALS), walk (20 cals) to the tennis club for a game of tennis doubles (31 cals) ending with a quick 3 minute game of billiards…..RESULT!

Thew I am knackered with a capital K after just reading that maybe Jackie’s suggestion is worth considering after all?

Will be back later to upload some recipes and my ‘Tuesday night weigh in confession’, thanks for visiting :)

Cheers ears
Rachel-Louise :)

Kevina does it again :)

Afternoon everyone :)

Sorry for being such a bad, bad blogger, hangs head in utter shame. I promise to do better in the future :)Been soooooooo busy. Kevina has done us proud again with one of her random cake baking jaunts. Details and piccies below :)

I hope you are all well I have been sooooooooooo lazy. I am still in my jammies at almost 4pm. Pickles must have known his Dad was off work and let us have a lie in. I still woke up b4 9 though, that darn body clock. Got my OH up at 9.30 to watch the cycling on the Olympics. Totally lazed and grazed all day. Can’t honestly remember the last time we did this. We don’t even get a lazy day at Christmas lol. Watched the TV and read and just devoured a gorgeous man sized portion of a sticky lemony toffe steamed pudding Kevina made. Pure torture as it had to boil for a couple of hours and it smelt gorgeous.





Guess I’d better go and get dressed. Not even done any housework yet. We were hoping to go out for the day today with my OH being off for a fortnight but the weather is really icky. Hopefully it will improve by tomorrow. Off to get dressed and go blackberry picking now. Catch you all later.

I hope that everybody is well and having a lovely day and (hugs) to those who aren't or can't :)

I shall be popping bakc on later to upload some cards :)

Cheers ears :)

Chuckle Monkey card :)

The slideshow above may take a minute to fully load and display :)

This was one of my first ever Chuckle Monkey cards. It took a while as all the images were handrawn (they are now available as stamps from Spiral Whisper, see posts below) They were then coloured using Derwent watercolour pencils and watercolour paints :)

With my OH getting back from working away at last and having a good nights sleep,oh and I sooooo needed it. I will be able to buckle down and make some more Chuckles n Giggles cards this evening. Including images you HAVEN'T SEEN YET, wink, wink, nudge,nudge. Off to supervise the watering of the chillies, tomatoes, cucumbers and some other strange things growing in the corner of the greenhouse now (cheesy grin) Not going any where near it until I can be sure that hugggggggggggge dinner plate sized spider has gone, filthy dirty crawling manky creature thing that it is. Urggggggggggggh.

Cheers ears :)

PS I'll pop back on later with my creations and to pop some of the workshop in progress photos on :) 'n' photos of my new yet to be named beloved, already dressmakers dummy I got yesterday :) I'm hoping to catch up on some sewing tonight as well as cardmaking. I have some lovely Laura Ashley fabric I have been dying to attack LOL

Sneeky peek of some of the stamps :)

You can buy your Chuckle Monkey and Friends over at Spiral Whisper here.

Apologies, having another blonde day again today (I am a natural blonde so I can say that b4 peeps think I is being blondist!)I have popped some of the stamp previews on for you below. I'll be popping into my craft room when my OH finishes work he's still holed up in a server room winging about being hungry! To make up some samples using these and other images that should be added to the Spiral Whisper website in the next few days. So please keep on checking back :) Ok here goes.........

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh firstly where it all began. This first stamp is of Chuckle Monkey and Friends famous banana tree. It has been done as a stand alone stamp so that you can easily fit it into any other Chuckles and friends scene or just on it's own. Apologies for the missing bananas though (blush) Chhhuuuuuuuuucklessssssssssssssssss, ouch that hurt my throat. He's no where to be seen I think he must have slipped off for a sly smooch with Giggles (cheesy grin)




This stamp is depicting a very typical lazy day for Chuckle Monkey. He is such a tinker. I am surprised that hammock hasn't collapsed with him in it. Look at all of those bananas he's filled his greedy face with LOL




Meet Giggle Monkey. Giggles is the ever doting girlfriend to Chuckles. You will be seeing lots more of her and them both together :) She can be adapted to cards, scrapbook layouts and other crafting projects. I’ll be making a card with her tonight and can't wait to get started.



Meet Boozy Chuckles. This Chuckle Monkey stamp would be great for a Birthday, Christmas or New Year celebration card/scrapbook layout and other projects. This pose was captured after a night out on the lash at his local watering hole. Oh the embarrassment (blush)



Hopefully I'll be back on later popping my samples on, catch you all later.

Cheers ears :)

Arggghhh was supposed to be going strawberry picking

Firstly I have been awarded these three lovely awards by the fab Emma from Elf Creations. For being nutter of the week. Thanks Emma, ermmmmmmmmm I think LOL. I shall pop back on later to nominate three people to pass this award onto to and the ones I recieved the other day. As this is just a quickie post :)





Well Pickles started screaming about the curtain monster again! at 4 o'clock this morning and then 5.30 and then 6.30. I sandwiched my head between four pillows in an attempt for the noise not to wake me up. As I am one of those people that no matter how tired I am if I am awoken from slumber land I just can't can't back to sleep. My OH was working away last week, so I decided it was his turn and gave him a swift kick each and every time Pickles started yelling.

Just popped downstairs to make a cup of cha and ended up on here. My OH and the kids are watching the Disney channel in bed as we now have free weekends until September. Hurray as my DD's stage school classes have finished now for the summer. Argggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh though something always has to ruin things when I try to be organised. We were supposed to be going strawberry, raspberry, gooseberry, currant etc etc picking I think you get the picture. At our local fruit farm today. Not blinkin likely now it's chucking it down. I wish people would cut down on their blinkin carbon emissions so that this awful global warming that's taking place can have chance to recover somewhat. It was roasting beyond belief here yesterday and now look at the weather. Last week it chucked down one morning with bits of hailstone and then all of a sudden stopped and the next second it's was too hot to sit out in. Oh don't get me started on this subject I'll be here forever.

So I don't know what we'll be doing today now. We did load of tip runs yesterday getting rid of rubbish at the bottom end of the garden so that we can pull the old shed down and build a new workshop there and build a playhose for pickles birthday. It's such a disgrace down there. Luckily we can't see it from the house as the garden is spit into two halves. The bottom garden has the greenhouse, shed n veggie patch on it. Talking of the veggie patch I have been munching away on the most delicious mange tout now from there from over a week. With food prices being what they are I think I am going to grow much more next year. Regretting giving my allotment up now (sulks) At least it's had chance to grow as we haven't seen chicken pie and his hoppos for a while. There is a dirty great big spade waiting just in case we do though, only joking, only joking honest. Move away from the phone no need to call the RSPCA honest (blush, scampers off)

So what to do today then. Well I won't get away with sitting in my craft room all day I'll get moaned at (rolls eyes) So with it raining I think it'll probably have to be the Albert Dock in Liverpool or the Trafford Centre in Manchester then. As my DD still needs shoes, jewellery, bag etc for her prom. Picking her prom dress up today as it has been at the tailoresses being taken in. Then some cardmaking samples I think and some more drawing and hopefully some sewing tonight.

Oh know I have done it again and rambled on and on. Anyhoo a bowl of porridge and spenda beckons me now. So I'm offski, later :)

Cheers ears :)

Sneeky peek samples

Just popped on to thank everyone who has been visiting my blog and big (hugs) to those who have left such lovely comments :)

Just on my way out now to go to the dress shop in the village for a prom dress for my DD's prom. When we get back hopefully Pickles can 4get about the curtain monster for long enough to nap today so I can get on with my drawing. Also hoping to actually get down to making some sample cards etc over the next few days or so of my stamp images. Hoping to pop some new free images on my blog again very soon too :)So please keep on checking back :)

Got behind with my digital art stamp site because I have been so busy so I need to get back into that too. So I can hopefully launch it in the next few weeks. My OH is working from home today, so Pickles will probably not take advantage as much and I can get on. Got tons of washing and housework to do too and gardening. There just aren’t enough hours in the day.Anyhoo......... I'll hopefully be nipping back on here later, so see you then :)

I hope that everybody is well and has a lovely day and (hugs) to those who aren’t or can’t :)

Cheers ears :)

New digital art stamp website to launch very soon

Oooooops knew I 4got to mention something. As some people may already know I have been thinking about setting up my own website selling digital art stamps, digital scrapbooking and card kits, 3D decoupage, templates and CD ROMS etc for quite a while now.

Don't worry I will still be providing free images too :)

Well the kogs have well and truly been put into motion and it is almost ready to launch. Which I am utterly ecstatic about. I will be releasing some more details regarding it and some sneeky peeks when I am a little more compus mentus over the next week or so LOL.

If there is anything in particular that you would like to see us provide to suit your digital crafting needs then please drop us an Email


Now I really AM going to bed.

Night, night all, don't let the bed bugs bite :)