What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 477

The temperatures are staying high and I'm enjoying the fact that having the roof on the extension throws my desk into permanent shade! The desk will eventually move, but we're a long way from that, so I barely even consider it a reality!

I was chatting to Margaret (Glitter and Glue) about the WOYWW Crop . There was a lot of digression and she said that she hoped to see pictures of all the scrapbooking I've done recently. Well, not to keep anyone in suspenders, but here's the desk in non-scrapbook mode! Last evening I had a desire to do something for no reason at all. So  I stamped and coloured in for an hour while tea was cooking. Yes, cooking. Despite the heat, every now and then, you need a meal that involves vegetables and gravy. According to Mr Dunnit, anyway! You can see a cross stitch kit that I purchased in a sale. The box belies it's teeniness! You can't see the new readers I had to buy so that I can see the blooming weave on the fabric. Of course they are on my head, in use as a hairband. They are strong enough to improve colouring and make fabric look woven, but sure do make me stagger when I try to walk about in them! 

Forgive me if I didn't get to you last week....I hope your kettle didn't boil dry whilst waiting for me. This week will be better. And on that basis, please show what you're doing. It may well be the post that prompts others to try it.....Marit and Jan will be today's examples.

A forgiving bucket.

At the beginning of the month I went to a bucket painting workshop. I know, I can hear your reaction, it's probably the same as mine was. But it turns out, it wasn't like sucking eggs at all. And, the end product was very pleasing. Because the 'mistakes' aren't immediately obvious, and the bucket has the finished look about it. That's a good thing, because if I leave a workshop with a project unfinished, that's usually how it stays. Forever.

I popped a glue pen into it to give you some sense of proportion. Fat lot of good, huh!

If you haven't met Kay Carley (she's a name in the business you know), then I recommend you take the chance if you're presented with it. She is a sparkly eyed, patient, softly spoken young woman who, with a will of steel, will guide you into doing things her way and at a pace which means you'll finish. This is a huge skill. As I've just implied, unfinished project workshops aren't overly satisfactory, and Kay was having none of that!

In creation mode....how glad was I not to be doing it all straight onto the bucket. Now there's a sentence I never thought to say..

I'm not going to go over the workshop in detail,my memory and your patience aren't up to it. I used rice paper, stencils, dry painting techniques, stamps and wax crayons. And a scarey amount of wet glue and varnish type mediums. Stamps are by Paper Artsy, of Kay's design. Told you she was clever.

And we stopped for a proper lunch. Shopkeeper Gal was great and kept the fluids up and ran around in the heat to place our lunch orders. It was a lovely day. I'm undecided about the use of the Bucket. You may want to make a suggestion. Most of my ideas involve sweeties or pens. Well, that would be my only two ideas. You can probably do better!

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 476

Well, this is a photo taken yesterday but my desk looks absolutely unaltered this morning. And will remain that way until tomorrow! I'm not complaining about the life that I'm leading, just how it seems to compresss whole days into just a few hours!

My lovely daughter has been home for a few days and I made her go through some of the photos waiting to be scrapped (the Snapfish envelope). She had to annotate names and such on pictures of her University friends etc. Very helpful because even if I leave room on a page for her to journal, it rarely gets done! So while she was doing that, I went through yet more old photos and made a quick LO, as you can see.  The Yellow Ziploc baggie at the end of my desk contains Project Life cards that I use for journal cards. I'm never going to do PL and could smack myself for buying them to be honest. But they were pretty and I thought Project Life and I would work together so well. Nope. Not sure why. Answers on a postcard please, if you know!

The bluetooth speaker is on the iPad stand because I had it in my hand when I picked up the ipad to take the picture. It's still there and probably minus any charge now. 

Share and tell will you? It's nice to see that other desks are actually in use. I have a lunch date with a special family driving up from Wales......catch you at your desk later!

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 475

Sunshine. Sunshine will be on my workdesk after lunch. I am loving this weather! Meanwhile, my desk is groaning with the chaos of book work and scrap book work.  

I piled everything at the left end that I didn't need to help get the accounts done. And on the floor as you can just see. I work in a ring binder and an accounts book, so apart from the area where the glass cutting mat sits, I worked on top of the pens and other detritus at this end. Lazy. Sigh. Yeah. Too old to change, it's only me that has to put up with it! Just between the open jaws of my mini paper cutter at the back, you can slightly see the bucket that I decorated in a workshop conducted by Kay Carley. It was a lovely day, and I'll brag a bit more about it in a separate post! 

I dropped out of sight last week and didn't visit many desks or blog again, sorry about that. This week will be more gentle on my lovely family and things will be as normal as a wonky woman can make them! 

Join in then please, if only to take my mind off the football tonight (Do It England!), I can hardly bear to watch, but I can't look away! I think that might be a syndrome....or something! Put WOYWW in your post title so we can find your revelations without delay!

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 474

Still a glorious, sunshiney Britain. I know lots of you don't like the heat, and I'm sorry if it makes you suffer. I love it, revel in it, enjoy being in it or looking out on it, sleep like a baby and generally feel it's good for me. It hasn't magically made me any tidier though! 
The desk shows an ice cream tub full of Sharpies. Actually, possibly the most useful coloured pens I own. They live on a high(ish) shelf at left of my desk....high to stop certain male folk borrowing them. I keep ONE in a pencil pot on my desk and often found it's strayed to another home. You get my point. Under that is a piece of 12x12 from the Bohemian Dream collection from Cocoa Vanilla.  (Oh, these names!). I was going to make a LO with it, but was interrupted by the need to do real work (involving using the Sharpies) and this morning I have completely forgotten why I thought I could make that huge bold pattern work for me! The polythene boxes at left are how I store stickers and embellishments and I tend to do the paper part of a LO and then randomly sort through these boxes adding bits until I feel the LO is finished. It's highly technical.

Thought you might like a step back view so you can see why my desk is newly in permanent shade....still not obvious what we're doing, but you can see a big box taking shape with a white frame in centre top..that will be glazed (called a lantern). Other light will be gained through folding doors that will form 2 of the 4 walls. All in good time, people. So I've had Mr Dunnit at home for ad hoc hours here and there whilst waiting for paint to dry on a job in the workshop, anything that could be construed as a reasonable break time. Playing havoc with my nerves, guilt and supplies of squash and tea! 
So that's almost a twofer, huh! Show us yours now, you know how we neeeeeed to see.
Happy and peaceful and glorious Independence Day, cousins. Hope it's a lovely party!

Today, I'm wearing blue for BANA

BANA is the acronym for the charity that I turned to when I had the diagnosis of the brain tumour. British Acoustic Neuroma Association. Well, today is the day that they ask us to 'Wear Blue for BANA' to raise awareness. It occurred to me that my blog  might help!

Something I don't like to do...selfies, mirrors....but it's for a good cause. No enlarging, please, I think you'll find I'm large enough. (More interesting: the artwork on the wall is by Patsy Paterno, a Desker. I bought it from her just after the surgery - it says 'every day is a journey' and it is so true.)

BANA have a support group of fellow Acoustic Neuroma patients. We refer to them as ANs. Bearing in mind that no tumour is the same for anyone, they are called Acoustic Neuromas because they rise from the hearing tubes, usually attach themselves to the facial nerve and erm, grow. They are benign. That is to say, they are not a cancer. They are life threatening - after all, they grow in your brain, taking up room that isn't actually there, causing the brain to be squashed against the brain stem. Slowly, functions go haywire. So..you have to have it removed, one way or another. As you know, I had surgery. I joined the BANA group on Facebook and the depth of knowledge and the 'after surgery' stories frightened me to death. I very quickly made up my mind to recover and be well, and I'm very grateful that for once, I had the will power and great fortune to be able to do that.
I have side effects, but no symptoms, I am not ill. The palsy on my right side is due to the trauma the facial nerve suffered. It has improved vastly, and it might continue to do so. It would be very nice not to have half a numb face. But it is easier to live with than a tumour in your head! The palsy means though, that drinking from a can, bottle or sports cap is a very messy dribbly affair. When I come to your house, please can I have porcelain for my coffee or tea cup and a nice thin glass for other drinks? They are no longer a problem. The thicker the rim, the more I dribble. But of course, there's a way round everything. And there's always someone to help you research those ways...……

Everything looks wonky. No idea why.