W(N)OYWW

This is more a what's NOT on your workdesk Wednesday than what's on it!

I have been shamed into tidying up. No other reason. It has been so cold here that I have been grabbing stuff and bringing it into the house to play with, then shoving it into a crate to take it back, emptying it onto the workdesk and running away again. Time came that I had to do something about it, so for probably the one and only time this year, ta ta! A tidyish workdesk.

Yes, I was watching a dvd while doing this Reach for the Sky if you really want to know.

The dinky little drawers were so cute I could not resist them. I thought they would be good for my little ink pads, but I am now thinking that the previous arrangement of the metal bucket was the better option.

I have done a swing around too, my not so tidy bits storage. Yes, I do have a few books, and yes, my ribbon storage (?) is being sick. Can't resist a nice bit of ribbon :)

The red and pink boxes hold things like metal embellishments, bling, ephemera, kajinker tool and bits (so infrequently used it is unreal), rub ons and paper patterns, the sewing ones. My Cuttlebug folders and dies are in the boxes with the patterned lids, and Promarkers live in the clear tub.

The beige boxes hold large flowers (you know the VERY expensive Dunelm ones) and crocheted ones, and I think one of them has chipboard words and phrases and shhhhhhh don't tell anyone, but a couple of them are empty!

The ink storage rack was a found item that OH gave me a while ago, I think it must have been for cassettes, but ink pads fit in it perfectly, well not the LLB ones, but they dried up so quickly I will not be getting any more of them!

I did find a couple of things that I had forgotten about, a naked perpetual calendar, might be time to do something with that, and some wooden cogs (why did I want those?)

Harrogate

I have had a fantastic couple of days in Harrogate at Art from the Heart. Two workshops with

Claudine Hellmuth

Mad Friend phoned and asked me if I wanted to go, silly question me thinks, and after she got her hearing back from me squealing in her ear, she managed to book us two places, quite a feat as places were sold out in about 6 minutes!

We were held up for two hours on the tarmac at Belfast due to fog in Leeds/Bradford airport, so a long wait with nothing to read did not improve my humour, especially as on the way through baggage control, you know the bit where you have to remove everything that is protecting you from the elements only to be told that they do not know why the darned machine is STILL bleeping when you go through it and would you mind having a full body search? STILL not to find anything and being allowed to get on the plane anyway! Those people, yes, I am NOT impressed with them, they managed to give my handmade brooch away to someone else, who apparently looked at it, said it was not hers and walk off with it anyway! May plagues fall on her head!

Anyway, arrive we did and headed off to stash our cases and troll off into Harrogate. What a town! Architecture, shops, people and Betty's!

I cheated and had coffee, but it is great in there, someone every tourist should go to ........ once lol

Dyan did us all proud, tea/coffee and crumpets/pikelets in the morning, a gorgeous pasta dish for lunch and again later, coffee/tea and homemade cake courtesy of Pat (I think) in the afternoon. How scrummy is that!

Hmmmmmmm enough of the food :) The first day's workshop was the Collage Discovery workshop, background techniques and transfer methods. Brilliant! Messing with paints has to be THE most fun. There was a lot of laughter too over English v American words, especially popsicle/lolly sticks, the others were just a tad too risqué for blog land, I know how sensitive you all are ;)

What is it about button baskets that has us all, even Claudia, grubbing around in them like children? Perhaps that is exactly what it is, remembrances of childhood, and Granny's button tin?