What's On Yor Workdesk ? Wednesday 443

A daylight shot! I took this on Tuesday because I wanted you all to see the change that has occurred. Post Marathon tidying up and trying to find a home for all the cardstock that dear Mary left me has caused me to do a lot of rearranging. On Sunday, you couldn't see the floor for boxes, emptied cupboards and piles of stuff. I was close to despair! Mr Dunnit said to just do it to the exclusion of anything else so that it could be finished and over with. So I did. He repurposed a set of shelves for me. 

Although the new shelves haven't altered the amount of sorting that was done in cupboards, they have already lifted stuff off my desk and generally created a feeling of more space, which is lovely. Not having the scrap box at immediate left is OK for now..I have to work with this arrangement for a while before I know if it's to be permanent! My actual desk shows remnants of a quick 'try this' session with a friend yesterday; an opportunity for her to practice embossing and getting to know the difference between stamping a wood mounted and a clear stamp. Basic, good stuff. When you show a beginner, it reminds you how many tips you know!  Share and tell then please, have been fascinated by the progress towards Christmas on your desks. More! More!

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 442

Not my workdesk this week, but a view of Sharon, Elsy, Mary and Sally's table top at Sunday's Marython. This was the first card, so only about 10am. Believe me, that busy desk changed into a very busy desk by finishing time! You can just about make out paper angels (the most obvious is in front of the roll of kitchen paper). Each angel was holding a small banner with each attendees name on. Aren't they sweet. And to hold them up, they had a sweetie shoved up their skirts! They were cut from one of Mary's dies. The stamps came from the selection that Mary had bequeathed to us. We sold them after the event, and combined with a raffle to which everyone contributed very generously, we raised £200 to donate to the Hospice in Salisbury where Mary worked for years. It was a great day, and I feel that Mary would have thoroughly enjoyed and approved! My workdesk is still covered in detritus from unpacking and sorting, so it'll keep for next week, to be sure! Show us yours then....it's probably for the first time eve, not to crass a generalisation to say that the majority of desks are starting to reflect a festive ambience!
Please put WOYWW in your post title, and link your blog here. Great stuff.

Spoke too soon....again.

Saying that I had finished with Christmas crafting is, it turns out, just a rush to get bragging rights. After a conversation with Shopkeeper Gal about next year, workshops, expectations, bookings and blah, we talked about the December workshops. Because bookings are traditionally low in December, and because we workshop conductors are as busy as the workshopeers, we've taken the decision to cancel December workshops. How does this affect my bragging about having finished my Christmas crafting? Well, in two ways. The first would be obvious. Clearly I hadn't planned to do Christmas cards for a mid-December workshop. Too late, I must have thought. I know at some point I had thought about doing some thank you or New Year cards. So now I don't have to think too hard.

According to the number of kits used, this was the most popular of the cards I made for the Marython. 

The second way is more roundabout even, than the first. See, like all of you, I have presents that need to be posted, and/or taken with me on visits prior to the big 25, and that means wrapping quite a lot of stuff sooner rather than in the middle of December. Let me set the scene - a glass of wine, perhaps a little bowl of olives or a mince pie, some wonderful festive melodies on the gramophone, a large flat uncluttered space to work on and all the twinkle and sparkle you can summon to give you an all round perfect wrapping environment and experience. All your presents are either perfectly shaped or already in a box so that wrapping is a pleasure. You never run out of tape, ribbon, curly stuff or tags. 

Wait, what? 

Is it like that for you? For me it's a slog, a job to be completed and completed alone....my wonderful Mr Dunnit will not get involved. I don't blame him really. Despite resenting the time it takes, I still want it to be done my way. Which isn't always his way, and certainly could cause, well, toe and ribbon curling language.

And then there's the supplies. I haven't made the tags yet. And I certainly cannot, can not, no way, buy tags. Because all year the state of my scraps box has been semi-excused by the 'I'll use it for tag making' line.

And this, for reasons of erm, disclosure, was the made the least.

So that clearly is what the December workshop would have been - a free for all with scraps, embellishments and tag shapes. It would have been fun, inspiring and jovial. Now I have to do them on my own, and like all these things, I need some jolly soon. It seems the desk will be forced back into festive mode. Hope forcing the festivity means excellent production, after all, there's already a deadline, and despite hating the truth here, deadlines are inspiring! Watch this space, as I've said so many times!

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 441

I feel that I may have missed a chunk of days!

It's all glitter! Here actually is the last card I've made for our Christmas Card Marython, which all of a sudden, is on Sunday. For reasons best known to the house fool, the iPad stand is holding a packet of fabric stars and the iPad is wedged under the box lid at left. That little red box really is a box of socks - four pairs of cute baby socks - really too cute not to make your ovaries do a bit of a ping. I have a very dear friend who has become a Nanny for the second time. The socks are for the baby - Nanny and Papa will get a large Gin when we next see them! This is it for me, Christmas card making is officially over. This desk will be privy to a lot of wrapping, but no more crafting for Christmas. To be honest, I'm incredibly relieved!
Join us will you, share and tell about your lovely work space, whatever it is, we wanna see it. Put WOYWW in your blog post title and link your blog here; easy as that.

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 440

Bad light. But I can't let that stop play. In fact, I've decided that in daylight hours I will match and determine, and in the dark hours when my eyesight lets me down, I'll assemble and collate. Yes I have a daylight bulb in the lamp and it does help, but it's still not enough. I need a floodlight, I've decided!

I bought some new dies last week, so am having a play with them. The distress stains tell you how I coloured the cards you can see. At right, between glass mat and glasses is the handle, nut, washer and allen key from the broken bigshot. Cannibalised prior to disposal to help another damaged machine! Gotta love access to spares! The syringe at left is my silicone glue applicator (just in case you were thinking otherwise) and the slightly weird patterned piece of kraft card is a not very good attempt at some foil transfers. I had an idea and it didn't work. Will stick to their original use!
Show and tell then, will you, like what I have just done. Put WOYWW in your post title and link your blog here. Too easy!

Requiem....for an inanimate object!

Ah, the lovely blue Big Shot is dead. Mr Dunnit took it apart, reckons the bearings are worn. This wear causes the rollers to depress less effectively. In this case, they won't squeeze together closely enough to emboss or cut a full 3" margin. Useless then really. Also, Mr Dunnit suggests that the work involved in accessing the bearings for replacement may well cause destruction anyway. We are not engineers. By the time he's done that, and I've driven somewhere to fetch some new bearings...well, I might as well buy a new one. Mr Dunnit was quite amused by my motivation to get going, source a replacement and generally not live without a die cutter for too long. He felt, I think, that I was exaggerating the pleasure of owning a Big Shot.

I had no idea how often I turn to cut a die or emboss a piece of card before I couldn't. No wonder the blue one wore out; count the day to day hobby stuff, then the workshops and Marathons, the odd multi-cut as a RAK - and countless times I've embossed paper, card, foil, stuff. whew. The blue one did well. Four years or so of excellent service. And when it went, it went...I haven't spent the last few weeks having to shim or re-cut and blaspheming over it. It just, well, gave up! 

Lovely Mary to the rescue again. Just as if she were still alive to offer it as a loaner, her bequeathed stash contains a Big Shot. This is wonderful on so many levels. Am thrilled to be using and employing something that was Mary's and that I know she enjoyed having. Am thrilled that I don't have to do any waiting. 

You can see that I haven't even bothered to dust this replacement before putting it to work! A couple of trial cuts and we're off. I can't promise to do less, be more fastidious about paper and card thicknesses and etc. It's got to be a working tool. But I can promise that every time use it, Mary will pop into my mind. Especially that laugh. And that, above everything, is the pleasure a little black Big Shot.

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 439

Well, good practice didn't last long! I've been overtaken by events and as usual and quite rightly really, the hobby stuff has taken a slide on the old priority list. There's the makings of a card for the Marython. The lovely mini tote that Jan made me is full of stuff that I take to Crops. It's on the desk surface because it was on the chair and I needed the chair to put a Big Shot on. I needed to put the Big Shot on the chair because the space where my Big Shot lives is taken up with a Big Shot. Of course there's a story. Mine has broken. And I seem to be unable to take 3 minutes to make the replacement feel at home! You can make out the bag full of new badges at the back too...out to remind me to get a move on with sending them out. There's a finished card on the deckchair, but you can barely see it. I'm off to visit the facial physio gals today, am thinking this may be my last consult! 
Please share your desk and doings...link your blog here, and please put WOYWW in your post title.