Book Review - It's a Kind of Magic by Carole Matthews

Fantastic Fiction Review: When Emma's boyfriend Leo turns up at her special birthday dinner unforgivably late and horribly drunk, embarrassing her in front of her family, she decides enough is enough. Why can't someone just wave a magic wand over him and bring him back refurbished as a proper boyfriend and save her the trouble? But when Leo meets Isabel and starts changing before her very eyes, Emma realises she should be careful what she wishes for...

Before reading this book I had only read one other book by Carole Matthews and that was some time ago so wasn't entirely familiar with her books. The inclusion of magic and fairy in the story made for a very witty, fun, light hearted read. The characters were likable and believable. Reading the book was, I felt, like reading a screen play and could easily imagine this book being made into a film.

Stamperama - Retail Therapy

Yesterday, despite suffering from a heavy cold, Lara and I popped along to the Stamperama Rubber Stamp Show at the Stevenage Arts & Leisure Centre. Although advertised as a Rubber Stamp Show there is always loads of other paper crafting goodies for sale and yesterday was no exception.

Having tightened my belt and bought hardly any scrapbooking goodies for ages, I had a little splurge yesterday and came home with some nice bits and pieces.



I particularly liked these packets of Organza Roses from Mei Flowers at only £1 a pack. What a bargain.



These charms, also from Mei Flowers, were also a great buy and I plan to use these on cards. The enamel handbag charms are gorgeous.



On The Hobby House stand I picked up these lovely teeny crochet flowers and more charms. The die cut flowers are from Craftwork Cards .



Having new stash makes me want to get crafting!

P is for Punching your 'art out!

This month at Scrapology we scraplifted a layout by English scrapper Laura Buckingham. The layout featured lots of punched paper strips.

Here's Laura's layout and the sketch.





And, here is my layout. I used papers and stickers from the Echo Park 'Summertime' collection, some punched butterflies and BasicGrey letter stickers.



You can see all the design team layouts at Scrapology and if you have a go at scraplifting Laura's layout you could be in with a chance of winning a prize. Also, if you visit this post and leave a comment and follow the blog before 12th February you could also win some amazing blog candy.