A death in the family

My granny passed away on Wednesday. She has been ill for a long time and it was not unexpected, yet it still caught us all off guard (as Death always does). I will be MIA for a bit till things are back to normal.

Granny Lulu’s “wall of remembrance”

Granny Lulu never liked photo albums – she wanted to see her photos! So she would stick all her favourate photos on the walls of her bedroom with Prestik, and over the years her display has grown quite a bit One of her favourate things to do was to point to a photo on the wall and tell you all about the special memory associated with it. She was also always writing down Bible verses, quotes, lists and thoughts on bits of paper and in small notebooks. That yellow piece of paper is just one of many.

This layout is basically a small “wall of remembrance” in memory of her, and it will go on the cover of her funeral letter.

Aquila Scrapbook Convention

Wow, did I have an amazing, scrapful weekend!!! The short and sweet of it is that we were +- 100 ladies who spent 3 whole days in the company of Jeri (BoBunny USA), Andria (Reminisce USA) and Erika (Aquila SA, representing Hot Off The Press), making AMAZING paper-thingies!

And here is the layout I made especially for the convention competition – it got third place:

“Precious” (click image to enlarge)
[photos © Appel Photography]

The only rules were that your papers and stickers had to be from one of the 3 represented companies. I used Hot Off The Press papers (and BoBunny ribbon, because it’s gorgeous). The rest are from all over, and mostly from my existing stash. The only stuff I specially bought for this layout were the flowers, blue brads and blue card stock. The list of supplies are at the bottom of this post.

And here’s me with the really awesome teachers:

Me and Jeri (from BoBunny)

Me and Andrea (from Reminisce)

We made a LOT of scrapbook layouts, as well as cards, mini-albums, chipboard books, and then some! I have not made that many ‘things’ in such a short time! The most hilarious part was how fascinated these Americans were with Afrikaans (which was spoken by 98% of the attendees) and the South African culture. It gave them hours of amusement making lists of the differences between their English and ours – all the “strange words” we use for common objects (like calling traffic lights “robots”… yeah, weird I know) [Andria even made a game out of this on her blog!] But it went both ways – they kept us amused by learning some Afrikaans words and then using them in the classes – Jeri quickly got “sakkie” (pocket) because she could remember the Japanese word Saki, and eventually also managed “strepe” (stripes)… but everything else kinda got lost in translation and laughter :-p Not to mention Andria’s attempts to try and make sense of rugby… (she has my fullest sympathy)

Well, that was a long post, but it was the highlight of my year so I’m not apologizing!

“Happiness”

This layout won the first round of the South African Talent Search 2007, and it was published in the Creative Reflection #15 magazine. {This is a digital layout}

"Mamma"

I made this layout to tell my mom how much she means to me. I gave it to her as a birthday present in 2006.
{This is a digital layout}

Translation: My mom is the softest and strongest person I know. She is my example of how to give and love unconditionally, of patience and self control, of being a woman and especially of being a mom. From her I learned how to give my everything, I learned of true happiness and sorrow, and how deep a woman’s heart can be. She taught me to look for the good in everything, and that a soft spirit is the best weapon to fight with. Her deeds spoke stronger than a thousand sermons ever could. She is our super glue, our pillow, our pillar of strength, our encouragement. She is my pride and joy. Mom, I love you.

“Smile!”

I just love this photo of my two sisters!
{This is a digital layout}