WOYWW 125

Thanks again, Julia, for hosting our wonderful blog hop where we all go round spying out each other’s workdesks to see how messy and creative we are being! For anyone new to this, click on the WOYWW icon in my sidebar which will take you to Julia’s blog where you can join in the fun.

I haven’t done too much this week as I haven’t felt up to it – away from my workdesk I’ve been learning loads on Youtube about mixed media techniques and am itching to start again! Also, a friend has asked me to convert some cut files she bought, into pdfs – she hadn’t realised what they were when she bought them and doesn’t have a cutting machine. They are alphabet letters to create a word book that her mum wants to make. After getting some excellent advice from Penny Duncan (thanks Penny!!) on the software to use, I have now started on these, so she should be getting them soon. This is something I can do on the laptop with my feet up. It’s given me the idea of designing my own word book pages, but that’s on the back burner for now.

So… to my workdesk. I have made a start on the stash of birthday cards I’ve decided to give my mum for Christmas. She is 90, and doesn’t really want any more “things” as presents, and it’s getting increasingly difficult to think of anything to give her! Earlier this year she asked me if I’d make some birthday cards for her to give people, and I balked at the idea because I’m not keen to get too stuck into card making, preferring to branch out into more adventurous areas these days!! Anyway, thinking about it, I thought it would be a good Christmas present for her – I am making them all the same size, and I will make a nice box to put them in. I’m making her a dozen, and while I’m at it, I’ve decided to replenish my own somewhat depleted stash – after all, nearly all the birthdays in our family and friends occur in the first half of the year, starting on 1st January, so I’d like to make a start!

It’s a bit of a mess, but on the brown table on the left, you can see a stack of papers that I’m using – there are Core’dinations of various colours and sizes, a couple of Tim Holtz paper stashes, and various different scrapbooking papers. On my workdesk itself you can see my Cuttlebug, and some cards in progress. The dark brown one I am quite pleased with so far – I’ve chosen various bits of Tim Holtz papers to do with vintage school, as both my aunt and my cousin have been/are teachers – there’s a times table, an attendance certificate, a dictionary entry and an old fashioned ruler, which I am going to collage onto the dark background. The ones on the left are just at the stage of having chosen some card to mat and layer, and the one on the right has got a piece of Core’dinations paper embossed with a Tim Holtz Texture Fades folder, rubbed down and inked with Distress Inks, and certain parts highlighted with a white marker and Glossy Accents. So far it’s all a bit samey so I’m going to add something (don’t know what!) to give a bit more impact.

I REALLY want to be doing something else!!! – but I’m quite enjoying doing it really.

Not on my desk, but I was just going upstairs and spotted this through the landing window.

I love tortoiseshell butterflies! At this time of the year they tend to come in the house and look for somewhere to spend the winter. This one was sunning himself on the wall, idly flapping his wings open and shut. I zoomed in on him on maximum zoom (18x) with the camera resting against the window. Hope he survives the winter!

I got my camera back from being repaired last week, and it’s great! My wonderful hubby lent me his last week which was a tremendous help, but it’s really good to have mine back again, complete with a huuuuge new SD card so I can do lots of videos as well as photos if I’m out and about!