Ooops! Late Again!

Despite having a whole month to do it, I still managed to miss the deadline for Di Hickman's monthly sketch - sorry Di! Will try harder! LOL. It's not that it wasn't finished but more a case of I've not had time to breathe let alone blog in the last few days. I'm actually gonna be teaching this layout in our HOTP Personal Shopper class tonight - so fun. Each month I create two layouts from the current kit & all the local subscribers come along & have a couple of workshops - This kit is the October 2007 one, exclusive in the UK through my store.
So here's the story: In the hundred years or so that I've been scrapping, I've never done a layout of me & my four boys - and mostly there are no photos of us all together, save for the odd group photo at weddings etc., (and they always have loooooads of other people in them too). So I picked my fave photo of each of my lads & one of the few photos of me as an adult (there are few photos of me - full stop!) This is the result.
You may notice that me & my lads all tend to prefer darker colours, black mostly, which is great for putting this page together - it makes it so much easier to pick your background colours. I love these autumn shades & the blocks, stripes & jade give it a sense of fun I think. It did go against the grain a bit cutting strips for the woven background (I'd usually use scraps!) but I wanted to have a bit of fun with layering - both the papers and the embellies. The felt flowers are from a strip of Queen & Co. Felt Fusion, which cuts apart beautifully. I've used a strip to underline my title & individual flowers as accents. If you click on the picture you can get a better look at the two embellie accents: the layered flower at the bottom & the sticker embellie in the top right. I don't often use stickers but they were in the kit, Daisy D's ones (to die for) - so what the hey! LOL
I also got to play with my newest acquisition - white Sharpies! This is simply the best white pen I have come across - fabulous for journaling & stays soooo white - I guess I'm gonna be using it alot! LOL. Can't imagine how I managed so long without one.