I have been told off

I have been bad again, not posting, so I thought that a few photos would not be a bad thing. Monday was my Birthday, so M and Miss K came down on Sunday, and we had a lovely day at Exploris in Portaferry, but as is my want, we were early, so early that we had time to go play on the ferry, Miss K's first proper trip on a big boat.  

She loved the fish, and I think it must be genetic, she is an avid photographer already! So now, not only am I not usually to be seen without a camera, she is following in my footsteps!  

Dinner was at the Thai that is becoming the place we go for  family dinners (they have fish there as well :)) The banquet is what we go for, no thinking about what to have, and what goes with what, it all just arrives!  Good food, chicken and sweetcorn soup and lashings of green tea, never before have I seen a little person enjoy green tea as much as she does!

She even has her own mini sized soup spoon!  The girls there spoil her something rotten, she was the only one to get sprinkles on her ice cream.

The ride home was just too much for some :)

I was spoilt on Monday too, lunch and shopping with friends, bits of stash were bought, then lunch and presents :)  Then more shopping and coffee at Dunelm Mill, I love that place!  The gerberas are just perfect for pulling apart and putting onto scrapbook pages and cards.

I am playing with shrink plastic again for the first time in months, it is funny how you forget how much fun, and how exasperating it is! The playing has been fun, but now I have to put it all together in a card, now that is the hard bit, the ideas I have running around my cranium like demented white mice, will just not fuse into something that I am happy with. Time to walk away and think about something else.

Wet :(

It is not nice here this weekend, I was hoping to get the garden into some kind of order whilst visitors are in Donegal, but it just is not going to happen. The weeds are starting to appear in the cracks in the concrete, the lawns are going to be a challenge for a goat soon, and as for the shrub boarder, well the least said and all that sort of thing!  Looks like tomorrows intended trip to Mount Stewart is going to be a washout too, craft and garden fair. The craft fair is normally a bit pants, but the garden bit is usually well up to standard with lots of plants to be got :) Just not nice trudging round in pouring rain.

After last weeks gorgeous weather, it is a bit of a letdown, so just going to have to craft instead. When we were in the Dungannon area, I just happened to mention that the Linen Green had a lovely cafe/restaurant for lunch, and would you believe it, a craft shop! It would have been rude not to go in wouldn't it?  So new Bo Bunny and some gorgeous papers that I have no idea who made, later, I was happy, why is it that paper shopping pleases me so much, while food/clothes shopping does not?

To add to my stock of things got to be altered, yes I know I have a lot, but three glazed shadow boxes from a Charity Boutique for £3 was just too much of a bargain to resist. I know what I want to do with one of them, so the other two will have to go into the store cupboard for a while :) I should stop going to these places, but they are like a magnet to me, I love rootling around in them.  More often than not, I do leave with nothing, but the thought that the thing I really need, but maybe do not know it yet, is just waiting there for me, is just too hard to resist.

The cards at the top of the post are the ones we did last Thursday night, as usual, a lot of complaints when making it, but also as usual, amazement and delight when it all came together, sometime I wonder why I bother!  Should I just let them all sit in their comfort zones and puddle along? Then I think about how much fun it is to get the grey matter working and the answer is a resounding NO, especially as I have not actually managed to frighten any of them away yet :)

What a Week!

OK, so what happened to my post!  I am sure I left it here this morning!

Ah well, better start again :)  What a Week!  I have had my Mother and two of her friends staying for a few days, feels like weeks! Don't get me wrong, I usually love having people to stay, but two deaf women and a moany Mother are sometimes, more than a body can stand.

The two ladies have been lovely, mostly, but having to shout about where we are and what is there, from the front of an Espace, while they are trying to hear over the sound of the engine, is not easy, but we managed :)

The one thing I do "on purpose" according to my Mother is drive too fast deliberately to "throw passengers around the car" at 40-50 mph. No one needs to drive faster than 35-40 mph, anywhere, at any time, for any reason! Try is in a car with 6 forward gears sometime, it is not easy lol.

Anyway, we have had some spectacular weather, sunshine all the way, quite a feat for Northern Ireland let me tell you :) Pictures will follow when I do the LO's.

Cosmic Shimmer

Been playing with Cosmic Shimmer Mists, what a mess!  But great fun. I think the blue one I have is faulty as whenever I try and mix it, I should go outside to do it, everything in a wide radius gets splattered!  

It does seem to be quite "blobby" too, fine for total coverage, but not so good for a fine misting, even from a distance of about 3 feet, then that gets the surrounding area too. Not too bad on a good day when you can go outside to spray, but not so good in the winter, or if like me, you craft upstairs.

I am sure that more colors are in the pipeline, but for the girly girls, there is no pink, yet. The colors suit me as I prefer the more muted palette the Aqua Lagoon is amazing, I can see I will use this quite a bit, but maybe not as much as Jazz Blue Tattered Angels.

Overall, I would say they are a hit, but I am, and probably always will be a Tattered Angels Gal!

Yesterday's Haul

I was a good girl yesterday and did some scrapping!  3 LO's in total and a few more cards.

This is 3 Bugs in a Rug paper, K&Co Amy Butler die cuts and a bit 

of trim that I got in a lovely scrap shop in Dungannon.

The next two are both Fancy Pants Summer Soiree. The first one I have not done a lot to as the paper is so patterned, I mounted the photo onto some scraps of Bazzill and added a few gems and a journaling stamp.

The second is an overlay, which when put onto the white card, did not show up the swirls very well, so I Stickled them! This too I did not do a lot more to, besides using some blossoms, anchoring the overlay and background card together with the brads.

We are off to market today, the forecast rain has not materialised, so it is off up the mountain for us today. Whoever thought that putting a market on top of a mountain was a good idea needs their head examined! It can be glorious down where the real people live, but you still need hats, coats and scarves to go to Nutts Corner Market, all except maybe two weekends a year. I have not been there for years now, but for some reason best known only to Himself, we are going there today ............ wish me luck!

BE WARNED!

I have promised fellow teamie that I will show what a slob that I am when crafting, so those of a delicate disposition, please stop reading now!

Exhibit A

I am not a tidy crafter, as I think I have mentioned befo

re, and that is the proof, I do get the JCB in sometimes, and here is the evidence, Lyn, savour it as it does not look like this most of the time lol.

Exhibit B

The day is bright and sunny here, and it is National Scrapbooking Day, will you be scrapping or crafting today? I hope to be, but M has other ideas, they are not supposed to include me, but whenever he gets involved in a spot of DIY it always does. Todays job is the overflow pipe in the upstairs loo, it is ........ well ........ overflowing! 

I have a friends number handy as for someone who trained as an accountant, my dearest beloved is not at home doing DIY, and said friend's husband is a builder lol Enough said.

Getting into the swing again

Well, I have got back into the swing of making cards again, not that I am totally happy with them, but M thinks they are good, and as class is tomorrow, they are going to HAVE to be good enough!

I have used the Create a Scene stamps, oh boy! I have to get me some of these now lol.  I love 'em! The colored one has been colored in using watered down Brilliance inks, I like the shimmer that they have, and the second one has just been left monochrome black and white, I was not sure I liked it too much, but as a technique I suppose it is fine, stamping onto the acetate causes a lot of people problems.

Naughty Blogger!

Well as usual I have been a naughty blogger and not blogged for over a week, things have been a little frantic here in Ffrogland, you think that when you have your kids up and reared that is it, but oh no, not a bit of it!

I may be a naughty blogger, but I am trying to be a good crafter, and as I have permission from Voodoo Vixen to use one of her mini books for the classes I am putting together for the Collage, I have been busy making samples. I even LIKE some of them! No pictures as yet, but as soon as I have them all done and presentable I will take some. 

So far I have the Star Book, a Flip Book, Annette's Circular Book, a Tag book, a Maze Book and now I am working on a Felt Book. There is nothing as slow as the wheels of education when you want to get something finalised! The hoops that have to be jumped through are amazing and a chain of command about 10 miles long!

Sometime soon I am also going to have to did out my craft room, why am I such an untidy crafter? The rest of the house is reasonable, the odd dust bunny and I am not that fussy about cleaning windows, but when it comes to my crafting space, I suddenly become a right slob! Drawers pulled out, bits of paper on the floor and a pile of "things" I have been using at my elbow. I usually manage to end up crafting on a space a gerbil would have trouble balancing on.

I always blame the storage I use, and am constantly trying to devise new ways of storing things so I will not get into these pickles. If I am honest I will admit that it is the "storage" part of storage that I am not good at, it implies using something and putting it back into whatever devious plan I have come up with to keep these essential pieces of craft equipment in check. It all looks nice for as long as it takes for me to use said items. As soon as the item has been used, it is put away from me and I go onto the next step, no, of course I do not put it back in the drawer/file/folder/box/tin I got it from, I am on a roll and I NEED to get onto the next stage. Even though I have numerous pairs of scissors, can I ever find one? Nope, it is under or in a pile not far from my elbow.

I am just going to have to accept that no matter what "system" I use, I am never going to be able to be a tidy crafter.

Hey Ho!

Quiet Easter

Well this has been a very quiet Easter break for us. M and the Boys helped Miss Mouse to move all of her belongings to the new Mouse House, and he managed to do his back!  Still in bed and moaning and complaining like a good 'un, so I know he is OK lol.

I did run away on Easter Sunday to take little Miss K 

on an Easter Egg Hunt at beautiful Mussenden Temple, we should not have been, but we were surprised at the greed of children nowadays. The older ones took off at a great rate of knots and filled pockets and arms with as many eggs as they could carry, leaving the smaller ones with nothing, little Miss K was so disappointed at not finding any eggs, another small child had two, so gave one to her. This was lovely, but not the point, an Easter Egg Hunt is supposed to be about finding eggs, not relying on the kindness of others, who have been properly brought up, to share.

She loved getting an egg, but it would have been even nicer if she had been able to actually find it herself.

So that she had some nice memories of the day, I took them to the beach afterwards, like me, she loves the beach, in any weather.

Rock pooling is an all time favourite of ours, I have never grown out of the fascination of what lives in these little left over pools of water. It seems that no matter what age you are, at some time in your life, if given the chance, curiosity will get the better of you, and staring into these little worlds will always be one of the things to do at the beach.

Then there is chasing Daddy to clean off your sandy hands on his clothes, this is always a good game, just how much sand can you transfer to his jeans?

I am not sure who enjoyed this game the most, her, him or me! 

I really do need to go and do some crafting sometime soon, it seems like ages since I sat at my desk, and it is need of a good tidy up anyway, I had thought that I would be a good girl and use the scraps for card making, you know the idea, use the scraps before you start to cut into more pristine paper, instead of putting them all carefully into a drawer, never to see the light of day again until you have the grand purge because you cannot get any more into the drawer. Well it is clearly not working for me, so into the drawer all the bits will go again :)

Crazy Weekend!

This has been a lovely, but crazy weekend!

Our houseguest moved out into a flat of her own, and to help I roped in my sons to help, so they brought their families down as well, so there were 6 adults, 1 3 year old, 1 baby, 2 dogs and 2 cats in the house. Noisy, crazy and GREAT fun.

Miss K had a great time with her cousin, she just loves to hold her and try to feed her, but Miss E is not always as sure she likes to be a doll. She is growing so fast now, 13 weeks old, when did I get old enough to have 2 Granddaughters?

Both of them are little posers too, get the camera out and they love it, no problems getting lots of photos to scrap with them, Miss K is even going to turn out to be a bit of a camera buff too, she knows how to turn my camera on, how to take a picture and how to view them! She also watched me downloading from the camera to the computer and showed me how to do it next time too! Just as well she loves her scrapbook, it won't be long now until she is making her own :)  

The house feels very empty this morning, just the washing and tidying up to do now, but I would have it no other way, and I do have the 200 pictures I took to keep me going till the next time lol.

More Cards!

Well here is a surprise, as it is that time of the week, I have some more cards to show you, these, as usual are for tomorrow evenings class, so you might just notice the theme here, a sort of harder card, and then another in the same vain.

This week we are going to have another go at penny spinner cards, not that hard in the usual way of things, but not that easy when there is a race going on in class to see who can do their cards first and get gone! Why , oh why does this have to happen?

Today was Him Indoors's Birthday, pity we were both suffering from rough head colds, too much so to bother with going out for dinner which is our usual thing. We have got to an age where expensive Birthday presents are not needed, so dinner out somewhere nice is what we usually do, but tonight it was dinner in, a nice Chinese dinner including duck pancakes, yummy. I did offer to get him slippers and a nice beige v-neck cardie in honor of his advanced years, wet fish and my ears were mentioned lol.

British Summertime (and a ramble!)

A Happy Summer to you all!  I hope you have all remembered to go to BST today, well those of you in the UK anyway lol.

Isn't it great, I have a follower! Thanks Lyn :)  Who would have thought that something so simple would give such pleasure, not that I blog for followers as I don't think that I have much to say that is very interesting, but it is nice to know that I am not the only one to read ...... occasionally!

Another non crafting related photo today, but isn't it gorgeous, 

daffodils at Belfast Castle, very Spring.

Mrs Dunnit's blog has been making me think, for those of us who do, why do we blog? Is it because it is a 21st Century form of keeping a diary, somewhere to sound off, networking, idea grabbing or all of the above?

I have kept a diary for many years, and in it are all sorts of random things, a lot of them I would never want to be read by anyone while I am still here, but when I am gone, it could be useful to future generations to know what sort of life I have lead, I do not presume to think that I have done anything so wonderful that the world will want to know anything about me, but as a record of a life lived, maybe.......... I will never know, even though I have told my boys that I will still be around haunting them forever lol.

So, somewhere to sound off?  Yep, some blogs are, these are personal thoughts and it should be remembered that it is only the writers opinion and not something to use to have a blast at the writer, I am not in favour of anyone using a local craft shop for convenience, then letting all know that they make their bigger purchases from well known TV programmes, or bringing catalogues into a shop to share with other potential customers right under the nose of the shop owner, the shop owner is not daft enough to think that if you use their shop, it will be the only place that you buy products from, but it is insensitive and rude to rub their noses in it. 

Then there are the few blogs that bash people just because they can, I know they exist, but I don't read them. Why is it considered necessary to bash anyone who you personally do not agree with just because they are well known?   Jealousy?

I love reading blogs because I am right nosey! I love the little peeks into other lives and craft rooms that blog hopping allows me, networking? Maybe, I have met a couple of really nice people online, yes I know that I do not really "know" them at all, but what I have been allowed to know, I like. I have had a blog for a long time, but it has only been recently that I have started to use it, there are some amazing people out there, I just have to find them.

I also use blogs to inspiration, you never know when someones fantastic work will spark off something in the little grey cells, I have even loved an idea so much that I have asked to use it "as is", never yet have I been refused, crafters are such sharing people. 

My teamies over on UKS are a great bunch, we didn't know each other when we all started, and with only a few exceptions, we are all still together, through all of life's ups and downs.

I have to say, that I blog for all of the above reasons, and I love to talk lol. DH has learned the art of seeming to be listening to me rabbit on, but I am under no illusions that most of the time it goes straight through, so this is a good option for me. If you have got this far, you have been a captive audience, and if you have any kind of feelings on this or anything that I rabbit on about, a comment or two would be nice {wink}

Lastly but not least, there is the idea of blog candy, I love the idea, but I am at a loss to know why some ask that you become a follower to be eligible to win. Going right back to the start of this ramble, I love it that Lyn had been kind enough to follow this blog, but I do not want to "buy" followers or friends, surely the idea of blog candy is because you want to celebrate? I don't mind in the least having a side bar that tells others that someone out there in Cyberland wants to share, but to want to buy my support? Not for me I am afraid.

Interesting Subject

One of the blogs I follow has got an interesting post on it. Mrs Dunnit is an inspiration anyway and should be read, but this post is a doozy!  Journalling, the 5 W's, where, when, why, what and who. 

I left a comment, but thought it deserved a better answer than I gave, so here goes.

When I started this crazy journey of scrapbooking, I wanted every LO to be perfect and in my innocence thought this also ment that the journalling had to be perfect too, so used my computer to do it, no I am more knowledgeable, I know that the journalling does not only say what the picture is about, it tells a story, conveys feelings and thoughts (hmmmmm should concider this more when blogging lol) so I now use my handwriting, even if it does look like a spider has jumped in the inkwell and run across the page!

A lot of time and effort goes into making a scrapbook, and it is personal, so the journalling should be personal too, I usually write in the first person, but this is not a "rule", and sometimes I use hidden journalling, but not because I write things that should not be read. I love elements that DO things on a page, so I often add bits that flip, twist or open on a page, and yes, I am still ashamed of my handwriting, so sometimes hide it! lol. Sometimes the story is just too long to be included on the page, so goes behind the pictures, ten there are the times that there are just too many pictures on the page to allow any room for journalling!

There are occasions when the picture is self explanatory and does not need anything extra (my boys are brilliant at giving me the sort of pictures that need nothing more than a title!)

Then there is the LO I am working on right now, the story of Puss in Boots, it is the story itself that is the LO, so there will be a lot of writing on this one.

Yes I do practice writing what I am going to say first as I want to make sure it is going to fit the space I have left, and to spell check what I am going to write, but if I still leave the odd typo, it does not send me into a tail spin, bad spelling is part of who I am, along with my appalling writing lol.

I am lucky that both of my boys love the work that I do and I hope that my scrapbooks will live on, Miss K already loves hers and looks at it a lot, but she is a vain creature and as one of them is all about her, this is her favourite one :) Perhaps Miss E will feel the same way about hers, as she is only 12 weeks old I will give here a little more time to become interested!

I Survived!

Well, I survived the class ............. just!  Something else to add to the list of what I won't be doing again in a hurry lol.  Not the most popular class I have ever done, but the results were worth it in the end, and I think they were all secretly pleased with them. Going to get them going rightly next week though {evil snigger}

Poor car has had to go to the car doctor today, one of the warning lights came on yesterday, and all I could find out about it was it was the coolant light. The manual said that this is the coolant light and it was not important unless it was lit .......... you don't say!  Nothing about what it might mean, was the car going to stop if I drove it home (it didn't) was I going to cause serious damage by driving it (I didn't) but nowt about what the problem was so off it went to the car doctor this morning.

No crafty pictures today, so I thought I would use one of Miss K with a poor appetite (apparently) doing some serious damage to a 6" sub.  She ate the lot and then wanted a cookie to finish off her lunch! This was eaten at about 11.30 in the morning AFTER downing an adults portion of porridge at 9.30!  Takes after her Daddy that one does lol.

Later on in the day I was regaled with a unique version of Puss in Boots, but that story will have to wait until I have done the lay out of it. 

I just love the way children's minds work sometimes, how do you answer them when they ask you "Why do you love me?"  I was lost for an answer.

Another Week Gone By

Ahhhhh well, here is another week gone by, and not a lot said. I have not been idle though, I have bee sifting and sorting my lovely new stash from the NEC, not made a lot with it yet, but that will come. No longer am I going to be a hoarder of papers, there are always new ones coming along that I just HAVE to have, that it seems to be a waste of money and precious storage space to keep, what will be in a few weeks, old papers :)

These are going to be this weeks cards, beautiful stamps by Creative Expressions, daffodils and a basket weave frame. No patterned paper on these cards at all, just paper piecing, I will let you know if I survive this class, but nothing can be worse than the night I got them all sewing, I thought I was going to be lynched!

I have been working on ideas for the course I am going to be doing, it is fun having a blank canvas to work on, but scary at the same time, I need to get in touch with the co-ordinator soon to see if the ideas I am working on are in the right area or am I totally off the wall lol. She has not e-mailed me back yet, so a trip to the collage is in order, and the fact that a craft shop in the next town has a sale on has nothing whatsoever to do with this decision!

Late again, but this time I do have a good reason :)  This time last week I was in Birmingham at the Craft show at the NEC and what a good time was had by all, well both of us I should say :)

Somehow we even managed to end up at the filming

 of Gok Wan's Fashion Fix!!!!!!!

A bit of evidence I hear you say? Here you go!  It was a great laugh, and hands were sore clapping at the end of it. I hope that we will not be in the bits that get to the telly, but you never know.  Showing 14 April we were informed.

I don't think that I have ever laughed so much, the things that went wrong were unbelievable, and he is a very naughty boy, but very funny :)

Here are tonight's cards, I just LOVE these Hero Arts stamps, and I got the template for the Curvy Card when I was at the show, I am thinking that I will use it a lot :)  If done 4 times it makes a collapsible cube card as well!

Oh, and I have had the news that I have been waiting for................I got the job! Not only that, but I have the opportunity to start a new class for mini books! All my own!  I will have to do the whole course myself, starting with a name for it..............hmmmmmmm...........mini books does not really do it does it?  Any ideas on a postcard please :) :)

More Cards

Another week gone by and I am still lagging behind.  Oh dear!

This week we will be doing a couple of cards that I find I quite like, one was a request from a lovely book by Truike Bron, full of page maps, and the other is another "new and interesting way to use envelopes" lol.

I do have some actual news this week, I have been for a job interview!  Not a real job type job you understand, but now I have been for the interview, I will be disappointed if I don't get it.  OK, here is what I will be ............ a part time lecturer!     In card making!   I had to take samples with me, so I took some of the ones I have done in class, along with class notes, and as I didn't have time to make all the ones I wanted to, I also took along some of the mini books I have made. These had a lot of the techniques I like doing in them.

They loved the cards, but went bananas over the books!  There was even talk of a course for them if it could be wangled, so hopefully this is a good sign?

If I am going to hear from them, it will be in about a week, so fingers and all else crossed. If anyone reads this drivel, please cross your fingers for me :)

More Cards

It appears to be that time of the week again, these are the cards I will be doing tonight for class. ANOTHER Waterfall Card and a Diamond Card that I found on 'tinternet, if I could remember who's it was i would willingly give credit, but it was when i was wandering around YouTube ........ say no more lol.

Waterfall Cards seem to give this lovely Class of mine problems, This will be the third time I have done them! I don't think it is my teaching, could be though! I hope it is just like me trying to learn some things many moons ago at school when I drove some teachers to distraction not being able to "get it" then all of  a sudden it just "clicked".

The little Diamond Card is so cute, and when you follow the instructions properly, easy to do and soooooooooo effective, and when folded down, fits into a 4" square envelope.

My poor craft space looks like the aftermath of a rather bad war. Every piece of kit that I have is out on the desk or the shelf beside it. I am trying to put together a portfolio (big word for me!) for an interview!  Sometime soon I could be a part time lecturer in card making!

Blog Land

A whole day with no appointments and no plans .............. bliss!   So what am I doing with this unexpected time? Am I getting ready for a nice day in town? Am I doing housework so the weekend will be free? Am I Crafting up a storm? 

No, I am reading blogs!  Sometimes it is nice to spend some time actually reading the blogs I follow, properly, instead of scanning them and deciding I can go back to them and have a good read later. I have even used the blog links on them to go off on a wander into cyber land, and it has been great! I know there are a lot of superbly talented people out there, but I never seem to MAKE the time to go look for them.

Now I have so many ideas buzzing around, I should do something about it, but am I going to? Probably not. Another coffee and off into cyber land again lol.

Has it been a week?

Falling into bad habits again!  Must do better!

These are the cards we will be doing this week at class, I am just so in love with Nestabilities!  At the moment, all I have are the scalloped ovals set for frames, so somewhere near the top of my shopping list are some more of the shapes. I am liking them all though, so will have to decide which ones will be the most used as the shopping list is frightening right now.

I really must do better! Indoors for nearly a week and no blogging!  I have taken some pictures though, the snow was amazing and at one stage I thought we were going to be totally snowed in, I was not disappointed when we were!

Now the snow has finally stopped, we are greeted each morning with ............... fog! It really is just as well that I have always had a "thing" about keeping the freezer well stocked.

This weekend was the great UK Scrappers Cyber Crop. I didn't get as involved as I would have liked to do, shoveling snow had to take priority, but did some of the classes and a few of the challenges

This was a lovely class by Taniwha aka Rachel, using bubble wrap to paint a background.    I love it.

I used a picture of Evie, all wrapped up for an outing and cropped very close.

This one was a

 challenge. Use lace. I think I went a bit overboard, but I sort of like it .

This one is a class by Ifa. I didn't have a lot of the things that she used, so I improvised and used hers as inspiration. I will go back and do more of this one though, with the masks and watercolouring as it was a lovely technique.

As you can see, these are real Fun-ghi's  ............. I know, 'groan'. Another one that I sort of went off track with.

Laura Godfrey was the designer for this one and she used beads for the web in the bottom right corner, I used stickles as I made a bit of a mess of the inking and had to do a rescue on it.

And finally, the one that is so far out of my "comfort zone" that I am amazed that I did it! 

Bright, bright colours and more gems than I have ever used on a LO before!

This was another challenge, use an old favourite, well I bought the paper AGES ago at Birmingham, why I will never know except that I thought it was pretty and there it has sat on the shelf ever since, so the time had come to actually use it.

SNOW!

Well, I am going to be a bit more careful about what I wish for.

Wanting a photo opportunity and getting a day of near blizzards are two totally different things. I was a bit silly when I thought that a bit of nice snow overnight (so I took take a few nice pictures) that would conveniently melt by lunchtime just did not happen. 

We woke up to a good inch of snow, and it was still falling. So being the good child I am I set to with the snow shovel and salt/grit

 mix. I had to go out, well try to go out! As I had a dentist appointment, so Katy and I braved the weather and off we went. By mid afternoon you could not see where I had shoveled!

This is the lane, actually very pretty in the summer! 

But "interesting" in a snow storm :) Nice slow driving called 

for here.

This last one is of the trees at the top of our drive, very pretty, and no I did not stop to take them, I got Katy to take them for me, clever Ffroggie!

I have been asked if I use Flicker! Up until now I have not, but I think I might go and investigate :)  If these poor tired out bones will hold me up a little longer.

I am trying to be a good blogger, so I have downloaded the pictures I took yesterday instead of leaving them on my camera until I can't remember where I took them :)

It was VERY cold yesterday, but the snowdrop walk was fantastic! We even took the time to renew our National Trust memberships, so there should be no excuse not to go to some of the lovely houses and events that I see are planned for the coming year.

The first picture was taken at the start of the Lime Walk, a run of pleached Lime trees with a drainage ditch running along side it, it was just a carpet of beautiful snowdrops.

The second picture is a shot looking down the length of the Lime Walk. M

ost of the snowdrops are not properly out yet, so when they are, they are going to be a real picture, and if we do not get the weather forecast, I might get back down again to take some more pictures as the daffodils are nearly ready to flower too.

As you do, we met some lovely walkers, one was a little cutie about 18 months old, who very seriously told me that I had to shut the gate behind me, so, alright says I, I will remember. "Good girl" says little cutie, "you go play in the 'venture park now" says she. Had me in stitches!

Here is one that Miss Mouse took of me that I did not know about until we got home, she claims that it is one that anyone who knows me will recognise! Me lying on the ground in the freezing cold to take a picture of a flower that has interested me! Well the cheek of it!

The hat was lovely and warm though lol.

One last one, just because I like it. One perfect snowdrop.

No Photo's Today

I had all these plans to actually get pictures taken and onto here, but as usual, things have gone a tad pear shaped!

Instead of being a good blogger, I am going to go to The Argory in Co Tyrone to try and take some nice pictures of the snowdrops :) You never know, I might even get some uploaded here.

The Argory is a beautiful National Trust property, and if ever you are on a visit here, you should try and fit a few of the houses into your holiday plans.

Well here's hoping that I do not get stuck in a snow storm on the way home :)

Better Tonight

Well I feel a bit better tonight, especially as I have found out that I have won a pressie :)  Some lovely Bodacious Borders from a lovely lady called Steph on her blog Any Shade of Green. 

When the postie arrived, he does not get to us out here in the wilds until lunchtime (or after) he brought me a book I ordered from America, The Art of Fabric Books, just a quick skelly at it so far, but looks good, everything from the making to the decorating, I will keep you informed.

I also had a right rummage through all of my old magazines and had a good chucking session (after removing anything I found I might use :)) and even used my Dymo  to label all my boxes of bits, no more rootling around for me.........ha ha. Organisation is happening, just VERY slowly :)

If I was not such a numpty, I would have remembered to bring my camera upstairs, but it will have to wait until tomorrow now, as I am here, I feel the need to go and tidy something else :) I might even have a go at making something :)

Sad Saturday

Not such a good morning today, I have just heard that a friends little kitten had died :(  Last week he had a run in with another animal, type unknown, and the poor little thing was on the loosing side. He ended up with  a cracked jaw, but as he was eating and drinking the vet thought he would be alright. Yesterday he took a turn for the worse and sometime during last night he went to the Rainbow Bridge. 

Play happily little Aramis.

OK, I am up for the Challenge!

Mrs Dunnit, has gone and well........dunnit!  She has put a lovely piccie of her ribbon vase one her bloggie 'specially for little ole moi! So looks like I am going to have to do one too :)

OK, not the worlds best picture I admit, and it was before just a few more were added, but not too bad for a beginner eh?

I have to admit that Mrs Dunnit is right on this one, I had tried all sorts of ways of storing ribbons, and guess what? 

This one WORKS!  Pins holding them onto cards just ripped unwary fingers open, than as it was fiddly trying to get them back on the card, they got abandoned......again! So every few weeks I ended up having to do an afternoons sorting, so that idea got squashed, then followed pots, well as I could not see into them I never knew what I was looking for or what I had, so that was a no go as well.

When I saw this vase of ribbons I fell in love and just HAD to get me one, well Miss Mouse got it really hee hee, best thing she has done this year IMHO.

So Thanks Julia, and Katy, I loves my ribbon vase :)

Right, having a go at a bit of redecorating, and it is not going all that well!  Going to have to get some advice me thinks lol.

Miss Mac is up and running!

Well, I got me this Mac you see......................

Taken me a while to find my way around her, but I think I am getting there :)

Mr PC has been banished to the other side of the room to stop me using him and to force me to get used to using Miss Mac. I have managed to transfer all of my pictures and documents, moved all of my favourites AND put them into proper folders so I can find them all again, now all I got to do is master the photo suite and I will be away with a mixer......... or the fairies lol.  No idea yet how I am going to master resizing pictures to get them onto the www as Miss Mac does not have Microsoft Paint, but there must be a way, and if I don't find it I will ask the lovely people on UKS, they are the font of all knowledge :)

Happy Girl Today

I had a nice surprise yesterday, I won some blog candy! A lovely selection of pinkly girly scrapping goodies! This is the person who always has a go, but does not usually win anything, so I am a happy girl today :)
In fact so happy was I that I went to that famous Swedish shop and got a new kitchen table and chairs :)
We spent so long there I was late sending in the destructions, sorry, instructions for tomorrows class, here is what we will be doing tomorrow

New Year, New Beginnings

I am now totally determined that I am going to be a good blogger. I have gone to the trouble to start a blog, so I might as well get to grips with it :)

Family is growing, I now have two gorgeous Granddaughters, Katy and Evie, there will probably be loads of tales from them to come. The boys are doing OK, DH is doing brilliantly and I am........well, that same as always really!

Katy does not look very happy in this picture, she could not understand why I wanted to hold Evie first! She did get a little hold of her later and was tickled pink :)

One of the things I intend to do with this blog, is to keep a record of the classes I do throughout the year. I need to be more organised! And as anyone who knows me will be able to confirm, I think the "O" word should be banned! It is a BAD word.

Well a bit of housework is needed here, These were last weeks cards. I diamond top card with ribbon flowers. The girls saw the sewing needles come out and I thought I was going to be lynched! They should have known that after my last attempts at getting them to sew, I would not do anything that would cause myself physical injury. Luckily, they all liked the finished result.

Again at last

Here I am again, it has been agws, but now I hope I have internet connection, installed by me, so anything might happen! Sort of have a house I can live in, DH is out of hospital and doing well, and I love it here!

D-Day!

Today is D-Day, I am finally getting the keys to our new house. This is supposed to happen at "lunchtime" but Irish time is VERY elastic. So much still to move, and my darling other half is in hospital, so emergency removal men have been booked, I think I was lucky to get one for Tuesday, so it will be camping for a few days, but ho-hum, at least it will get done.

Poor Mum is ironing up a storm in the kitchen as I type, and she has been keeping me fed, bless her.

It has been a while

OK, so I am still not good with this blogging lark, but I will keep trying :)

Yippee!!! We are moving house! We have bought a gorgeous house in the Co. Down countryside, complete with barns and outhouses, hopefully one of them is going to turn into a huge craftroom, so I can invite friends over to play :)