WOYWW

Well, well, well... another Wednesday rolls in and another chance to share our workspaces comes around with "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?" hosted by the wonderful Julia at the Stamping Ground.

Last night was craft night at Pickwell Farms... it's becoming so popular there now - apparently, someone (mentioning no names here *lol*) keeps blogging about the craft club and so people keep showing up there on the last Tuesday of each month :)

So, onto my desk... and all the goodies I bought last night:

I'm making an album for my eldest daughter - it's getting there... slowly *lol*... I keep getting distracted by the amazing papers that are available everywhere right now. I bought the A4 size Papermania paper pack "At Christmas Time"... such beautiful traditional designs (middle of the desk). I also managed to get hold of some stamps - simple wording - and they'll look great for my Christmas Cottage Mini Album (still just in my head at the moment!). I kept one of the reciepts from my purchases at Pickwells last night... I'm hoping hubby will see the £7.50 total and think that's all I spent... the other reciepts are torn up into little tiny weeny pieces and thrown away :) The reciept is on top of some of the £1 paper packs I also bought last night (bottom right)... the colours are so rich, with pictures of plums and damsons and autumnal fruits throughout.

Last, but by no means least, are the huge amount of peel-off stickers I bought! Mostly Christmas-themed peel-offs in gold and red... I used to be a peel-off sticker snob, but I actually love them - some are so intricate these days with a subtle colouring, that they look expensive and more like embossed images than cheaply priced peel-off stickers!

Of course, there's the obligatory cup of tea getting cold in the middle of my desk... I really should drink up before I end up spilling cold tea all over my new goodies!

I'm off to wake up my youngest daughter now - she's off to college today for her final interview and to show her exam results.

Hope everyone has a wonderful "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?"

Have Fun!!!

More Kittens... And More News

Oh, my... CallieCat is preggers again! She's happily blossoming and blooming... and getting very fussy with her food too! It'll be so interesting to see what colours her kittens will be this time round.

More (un-crafting) news...

Beth did BRILLIANTLY in her exams, and I'm getting letters from colleges all over, asking whether Beth would like to attend... but she's already chosen her perfect college, and she's planning her future so well.

Naomi has chosen her engagement ring - although she doesn't actually know it yet. She was picking out a few that she hoped Dan (her fiance) would choose for her... and I happened to e-mail him a few choices. He chose the perfect ring today... she'd going to LOVE it!

Kyle, my one-and-only (and therefore favourite) son is moving out. This is HUGE news for me. I'l miss him so much... but his bedroom will very soon be (drum roll here)....

A new craft room for me!!!!

Yay!!!

I am hoping to hear wedding bells from his corner soon too - he and Steph are so perfect for each other! A mother can only drop so many hints to her son before she tells him outright *lol*

So... there's my news.

 Blogger is being a pain again, and I can't leave comments :( BUT I really have been looking through and thoroughly enjoying people's blogs today... you are ALL so talented!!!

I'm just beginning to work on a project... I have FOUR planned - including a mini-album made from books, a recipe album, a Christmas Cottage mini album (that will hopefully have lights strung across the front of the outer box shaped like a thatched cottage) in traditional red and green Christmas colours, and a special mini-album which wil be a Moroccan cook-book for Naomi and Dan to help celebrate their new home (they are moving on Tuesday). Trouble is, I'm thinking about all these projects and not actually planning any properly! I really have to get sorted :)
Found the link I needed... Patti shared a mini album and stand she recieved in a swap... it is amazing! She is also a wonderful person who does reply if you send her a message - I asked about tea-dyeing... and she answered me with a personal e-mail as soon as she was able. Anyways... this mini album and stand she recieved was quite stunning... and I am planning on making something inspired by it.
See Patti's gift she recieved here.

Mad As Hell!

I'm not too well at the moment, but just popped on to catch up with a few things... and now I am really quite miffed!

I'll mention no names, but somebody has decided to make a papercarfting project that is a chest-shaped box and mini-album, and called it a Trunk Full Of Memories... sound familiar?

Yes, it was my idea and, more importantly, my name for the project!

People who make money out of paper crafting and are somewhat commercial, should at least make reference to us 'little people'...

Well, I'm off to delete people (person, actually)  from my lists of contacts.

I can see myself, after other people realise whom I am refering to, possibly insinuating that I'm an overly-dramatic whiner *lol*.... but right now, I really am not too happy about the situation.

She's So Sweet...

There's not enough hours in a day, or days in a week to do everything at the moment! I haven't read anyone else's blog for a week now - I think I'm getting withdrawal symptoms. Still, some busy and full days do have their wonderful moments...

On Saturday, I got a visit from my grandchildren. Alistair is HUGE! He's one bonny baby, and that's for sure! Liy is sweeter than ever, and as she left to go home she said to me...

"I love Nonna's house"

"Why's that?" I asked

"Because you live there" was the wonderful reply I got. How sweet and adorable is that?

I wanted to scrapbook the moment - but couldn't find the right photograph. Still, I did find a pile of photographs that I wanted to scrapbook anyway, and found in that pile a really lovely photo of Lily when we visited Romsey World Of Water. I'm not entirely happy with the layout - but I think this is because I'm just itching to do another mini album (I have 2 ideas in my head)... I decided to use a lot of blue and green instead of girly-pink for this layout...

I used a background paper from the Mariposa range... then chucked a whole load of other stuff at it - one of the new papers I had as well as leftovers from My Minds Eye, some Papermania, a bit of Prima, a lot of cosmic shimmer, a splash of bling and pearls, lace, bits off of old flower arrangments and some stickles. Oh, and a little bit of sewing :)

WOYWW #115

I'm in a rush... it's all go for today as I'm just about to become one of the "Ladies Who Lunch". I'm all dressed and glammed - though it's typical that today is the one day that turns out to be a bad hair day!

So... my workdesk is somewhat bare for this weeks "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?". Just a layout I started working on, and the basket I use to keep bits in that might go with the layout - that the cat has decided woud make an excellent place to sit in *lol*. Of course, without the added help from my furry family members (LilyDog and CallieCat) I might have gotten a bit more done this week.

Right... I'm off to lunch! I'll try my best to catch up with lots of other desks when I return home. In the meantime, everyone have a wonderful "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?"

WOYWW #114

It's "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?" hosted by the wonderful Julia over at the Stamping Ground.

Julia is working with glitter this week... something I avoid as much as I can as my past experiences with glitter have not always been pleasant *lol*

I'm still trying to find time to fill my Christmas Mini with photographs... but for some reason I've had a seriously bad urge this past week to clean my house and any crafting projects have been put at the back burner.  This is NOT a good thing *lol*

I have had time to go shopping though... craft shopping of course!

I bought the Donna Salazar "Creative Page Tabs" from Spellbinders, another dream-catcher kit for my mum (who is going to fill the centre with tatting lacework instead of the cord), and the most beautiful papers from Grant Archival - it's the Vintage Collection designed by Grace Taylor (all bottom right).

I managed to pick up some punches very cheaply - X-Cut "birdsong" circle cutter, a Fiskars lacy-edge circle cutter, the X-Cut "looped fringe" border punch and a 3" scalloped oval punch also from X-Cut. I paid less than £20 for all four!

Eldest daughter Naomi came over and done a little bit of crafting with some "Gor Guss" pyramage projects, just visible at the top right of the photograph. She doesn't actually want to keep them to do anything with... she just likes to sit and craft when I'm at the crafting table too.

I enjoy the company though... crafting can be a lonely past-time when the children start leaving home.

Well, that's all from me on this glorious Wednesday... here's hoping ALL of you have a wonderful day, and a wonderful week full of crafting fun!

And The Winners Are...

...

drawn very late *lol*

In went the numbers 1 through to 13 written on scraps of paper into my hat, and poor Bethany was forced to pick out three, when all she wanted to do was go to sleep after her trip to Thorpe Park today. Such was her tiredness,that she accidentally picked out four numbers. Ah, well... finding an extra mini wouldn't be too hard in this house!

So, without further ado, the numbers drawn were:

12

2

8 and 1 together

The lottery puts numbers in order, so it's only proper to do that here too *lol*

Number 1 is Sian - From High In The Sky

Number 2 is Toni - Misteejay

Number 8 is Debbie - Scraps From A Broad

Number 12 is Glen - at "It's My Life"

So ladies... I'll buzz you in a bit via e-mail and you can drop off the address you want me to send your little parcels to and I'll get that sorted on Monday :) If you haven't got a contact e-mail on your blog, could you drop me a line at: patchworkapples@gmail.com please? Thank you!

Oh, and Debbie... no fair to put a heading of "Manly Men In Leather...." on your blog, followed by the first line of "Back to getting dirty and grungy!", and then posting a photo of a tag *lol* Actually, it's a brilliant tag :)

***Added:
I have sent e-mails to all except Glen... send me an e-mail please? Thanks!

Christmas House Mini Finished!

Yes! I finished the Christmas House mini album today... and although I have printed out all the photographs, I haven't finished putting them in the album yet as I'm waiting on a few more papers in the post to add a tag or two (or twenty!).

I've had so many e-mails from people asking where I bought the house from, or if there's a pattern... and I'm so sorry but there isn't. I just made it up as I went along really. Apart from the windows at the front on the roof, it was really simple... and a few people have mentioned copying the idea - which I love! How wonderful that people like something I made so much that they want to make something the same?!? What an amazing compliment!

So... here's the photographs of it all finished :)

You can see that when the roof is taken off, there's quite a large 'lip'of about 2 inches over the 'wrap around veranda' - this is just to make sure the roof stays on securely, and the mini is held in place.

All that harping on about the circular tree decoration I had... and I didn't use it in the end!

I am going to add a title... "Winter Memories". I did use a tree decoration - the coppery-pink glittery swirl (19pence at The Range, January sale item)... and my absolute bargain is the spray of flowers at the very back of the embellishments. I paid 59pence for six of these sprays, and I thought they looked a little like snowdrops. I sprayed them lightly with Cosmic Shimmers (a mix of blue and pearl white), just to catch the ends. A spray of cream roses were a bargain too - at just 45pence, and the feathers were leftovers. The pink pearl sprays were a freebie gift, and the flower at the very bottom was made from a scrap of Christmas ribbon.

I added the curtain tie-back charm (blue beads) and the torn-apart tree decoration charm (clear beads) to the top book-ring, and added the pearl dangly to the middle ring. The pearls were from an old odd earring I had, and I just added these to a Tim Holtz chain.

Each page is much the same inside - with fifteen pages in all. The blue glittery panel on the front (middle) is a verse from "A Visit From Saint Nicholas" by Clement C Moore. There is one verse for each page. Each verse panel is adhered to a central 'belly band' that holds a double-photo matt (5"x7") and the holding pocket at the bottom that is just there to stop the photo matt from slipping out, has a journalling tag in it.

And, no, the baby in the photograph is NOT me. It's my big brother :)

The reverse of the page has a larger pocket at the bottom that holds tags and photo matts, and a hidden pocket at the top that hold a journal tag. The pages are repeated - just slightly different embellishments. All pages use the pink, blue, brown colour scheme (which I shall never use again for a Christmas album... it's just too hard!)

So... there it is! Hope you enjoyed looking.

And just in case you wanted to know... I shan't be sharing any more photographs for a while... not after the previous post *lol*

1972-ish

Glen posted some really sweet photographs and shared some beautiful memories too on her recent blog post (here) and I commented that it made me brave enough to post an old photograph my mum had dug out for me yesterday. Oh, how I wish I hadn't so readily made that comment, as I now have to reveal me and my brother circa 1971-2. The photographs makes me giggle... just the look on my brothers face (he's the taller one *lol*). Hubby said, when he looked at the photograph, "Have you got your finger jammed up your nse there?" I haven't, by the way. I'm chewing on a lollipop... no fingers near noses anywhere :)

WOYWW 113

I'm finally getting near to finishing my Christmas House Mini ... I'm printing out photographs and making tags, using up every piece of pink, blue and brown paper I have, and generally making a bit of a mess :)

As you can see from my desk (for "What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday?") I seem to have a little 'helper' too! CallieCat just loves to try and sit on the paper as it's coming out of the printer - daft moggy!

On a much sadder note, my mum and dads cat, Mitzy, passed on to kitty-heaven yesterday. She was 19 years old, and a tiny little cutie-pie of a cat - still looking like a kitten at 19! Her tummy-mummy was a farm cat and a rat catcher and her feline-daddy was a feral tomcat... and Mitzy was a tiny cat who stayed a little fluffball all her lovely long life, and had all the best qualities of her cat-mummy and daddy.

She was spoilt rotten and treated like a duchess... and my parents will miss her so very very much.

She had a very long (and pampered) life, and no cat could have owned better people (we all know that nobody owns a cat... it's definitely the other way around *lol*).

Irreplaceable... the gorgeous Mitzy.