Something else I've learned about my crafting habits over the kerjillion years that I've been doing it - I prefer to do single pages for the scrapbook and if possible, I want to do one photo at a time. I didn't actually realise this until quite recently; some of Miss Dunnit's friends were looking through the albums. (which they seem keen to do, a humongous contrast to Miss Dunnit's interest levels in all the albums that are mostly all about her!) One of these charming teenagers was asking me about scrapbooking and as she turned the pages she said "and is it a rule to do one picture per page?" BONG dropped the leaden penny! I think this is about comfort zones again, so am going to try a few sketches of multi-photo layouts, although I'm not sure I'm going to go back to two page spreads or anything rash like that. It's probably a speed thing. One page seems to suck up a ridiculous amount of time as it is! The amazing Kirsty said recently on her blog that she sometimes works on five layouts at a time, it stops her getting bored with what she's doing. Good grief 5, five, cinco? I love scrapbooking, but even one page at a time is known to cause me some anxiety; it certainly doesn't come naturally enough to me to consider multi-LO-tasking!

We have beautiful bright sunshine here today, so my intention is to ignore the bitter north wind and visit my local craft shop. I need something. No idea what; tell you later when I've found it!

Tha Friday challenge over at Daring Cardmakers is to make a card in an Oriental style, without resorting to black and red as the colour way. Now, Oriental is waaaaayyy out of my comfort zone. I know as a theme for cards and in rubber stamp sales it must be one of the biggest, but I don't do much of it. I always love what other people do, I'm drawn to images, particularly landscapes, and in my 15 years as a stamper, I've owned quite a lot of unused stamps on an oriental theme! So here I am trying desperately to work, never mind think, outside the box! This card pretty much shows off my entire collection of stamps that could be considered oriental, a fern by Stampendous, a rub-on that's meant to look like a strip from a fortune cookie, and thank goodness, a piece of 12 x 12 'Inspirables' by EK Success. I don't know how oriental it really is, but I loved having to think about it (it took me two days to come up with!) I'm generally over myself now; I know what I'm drawn to in terms of themes and can at last resist buying the stuff! Previously I've felt almost obliged to have a go because it's on trend or because I ought to be able to do it - loads of 'styles' that I just can't do with any enjoyment...then they end up just being derivative and bland. Now brace yourself interweb, I'm going to talk about some really wonderful styles that I can't do. It may well sound as if I don't like these styles/themes, but I assure you that the opposite is true; I love them. It's just taken me forever to know my limitations! There's oriental - too refined on too many levels. Then there's really cute - LOVE IT love all the potential that can be done with it, but always end up sticking a cute image on something really plain to sort of dilute it. How about the shabby chic stuff that Tim Holtz is the master of? I long to be able to do it, but I can't......my stuff ends up looking like I've worked in mutliple shades of weewee. And then there's the whole altered thing...I can't quite get my head around all sorts of aspects of that. But I think I'll tell you about that some other day, the hole I've dug this morning is deep enough for now! Oh and we did crop yesterday and I did do some stuff, but as Ginny is expecting award winning photography, I have to play with my light settings dahling! Yep, looks like I might have to RTFM!

Invitations finished: check
Invitations posted: check
Crop project prepared and supplies packed: check
Photos for crop printed: check
Supplies for crop chosen and packed: er..........no, BUT I know what we're having for supper and I've tidied the workroom and the desk is clear! Oh my, I have focus! But I can't photograph it for you because the light is pants and now I'm an award winning blogger I need to make more of an effort. Standards y'all!
Miss Dunnit has had her 5th day off school and finally, finally completed the Art coursework for her GCSE...oh child o' mine, why is working at home so hard? From whom do you get your alarming 'last-minute-Annie' attitude? So tomorrow's a crop day for me and I'm very much looking forward to it. Despite venturing out everyday to trudge through snow and pretend I like it, I'm suffering cabin-fever and need to meet up with my fellow nerds. I'm doing Shimelle's Everyone Has A Story album class and of course, will be catching up with that tomorrow. I also have a plan to make a mini-book, but more on that if it materialises! Have a happy weekend. And hello Ginny and Sally-Ann, thanks for your introductions!

Ahem..unaccustommed as I am....

My friend and UKS teamie Caryn has a fabulous blog and is one of my 'encouragers' in this world of interweb and technological crafting. So encouraging in fact, that she's awarded this blogspot a Lemonade Award - a gee up for sharing the craft ideas and stuff.

Thanks so much Caryn - sometimes I post a (bad, always bad) picture and wonder how much detail to go into about the how and the who; I figure none of you will be afraid to ask if I miss some detail you'd like to know!

Also, in the best awards tradition, I wanna take this chance to say how fab it is to get your comments, I know dear interweb, how big and how time consuming this blog reading habit is, so I really appreciate every last contact. And if it takes me a few days to respond, please remember that sometimes, in my excitement, I forget how to work the buttons!

Now because crafting and talking needs more than one, this award is to be shared, and here are my nominees: I agree with Caryn here - as I read about a kerjillion blogs daily, picking 5 is hard!

http:www.my5BratzCreations.blogspot.com
http://www.lovetodoodle.blogspot.com
http://www.keepitsimplemakeitgreat.blogspot.com
http://www.stampingqueen.com/blog
http://www.dailydeliberations.blogspot.com
Now these 5 lovelies all share ideas and stories like mad, and somehow manage to motivate me - to at least ask myself why I get so little done whilst these women are powering through their lives! I've given URLs because I don't know some of them well enough to link to them by name - ashamed to say that I often just lurk on their fab sites. I'll probably make myself known a little more from now, huh!

Sunshine!

There's a bit of a thaw going on around here; a drip drip dripping away that has changed the colour of the light through my workroom window. In the last 10 minutes, that turned to sunshine. Lovely! So I thought I'd brave up and show you how the sunshine looks when it hits my table. What a shambles - start with the fact that clearly the window needs cleaning - because otherwise everything would look shiny and the picture clarity would be outstanding, right? Mmm. Yeah. Like my friend Sandie who posted before and after pictures of her wonderful scrapbook nook, I think I'll have a jolly good tidy and show you around properly. Soon. At least when the 3 important projects on my desk are off my desk and where they belong - in the hands of the postman!
Miss Dunnit and I ventured further afield than the village this morning because despite last night's huge amount of snow, the thaw set in quite early. We drove (!) to the next village; of course we went to the craft shop. Tracey, the owner, had heroically slid and slipped her way to open up - the pavements are treacherous. Naturally I did a little shopping while I was chattering (my number one and two skills). Got me some more of the smaller Papermania cardstock alphabets and finally some ribbon to finish off the Golden Wedding Invitations, and some adhesive to use at the Crop on Saturday. Planning. Finishing. Good words. Stop blogging and Just Do It. More good words!

Thwarted = card making!

Well it's been another day off school; and it's been some years since any of Miss Dunnit's friends came to the door and asked 'are you coming out to play?'(they did, really..ah, not so grown up for 15 after all!) Of course, my sentimentality over this is lost on her, but she has returned unbroken, with red cheeks, flat hair and soaking. And a bit miffed: apparently some of the girls wouldn't have a go on the bin bag sledges that help you achieve maximum velocity down the sides of the moat at the old Castle! They didn't want to look silly or break their nails or blah blah. Perhaps we have managed to instil a bit of the 'seize the day' mentality after all!

So I've made a list of things/projects I want to see come off my work table this week, because I seem to be swimming in ideas rather than focussing. Why is that? There are times when I can go days without a single idea or desire to start anything. Perhaps it's the stunning white light that the snow throws into my workroom. Or perhaps that's what makes me get on...with anything but the projects on my lovely fresh list! I've been working on Golden Wedding Invitations for my beloved parents, they are as finished as they can be for now, so I set those aside to start on preparing for a workshop later in the week. And that's how I managed to make 3 rapid Valentines. The workshop involves a chipboard book and some Basic Grey papers, but clearly, I had an urge to stamp a little! Not much though, as you can see, these cards are pretty minimal!

The black card is pre-printed (Papermania - impressive, huh!) - all I've done is add a choccy heart and the 'Love' text by Inkadinkado. The text on the cream card is by Inkadinkado too, this time the heart is a punched shape wrapped in red foil...which was of course, 5 minutes earlier, wrapped around a chocolate heart. The pick up truck and hearts cargo are by Stampin' Up and the text is Hero Arts.

So maybe tomorrow I'll tackle the list. Maybe if Miss Dunnit goes to school, I'll feel like I should actually be working. Who knows, perhaps it's HER fault. Certainly isn't mine.

Thwarted by the Thnow

I decided that I'd spend some time today doing some much needed clearing out. Of Miss Dunnit's bedroom. It hasn't happened though, her school has been closed; of course I have no idea how long the motivation to do it will take to come back, as it's such a hideous job it'll probably be ages!

This fresh card is for a workshop later in the week at my LSS. It's based on a sketch that my colleague came up with, one of four for this workshop. In a handful of weeks, another workshop will involve the 4 cards that she has made from the same sketches. Can't wait to see if they're amazingly different or a bit too close to make people want to come to both workshops! Oops! Mine are real interpretations of the sketches though, with lots of what was once called 'artistic licence'. (Gawd, that sounds pompous, sorry!) I've moved stuff around of course, and reduced element numbers and blah, but I think they are still basically true, which for a workshop to introduce the idea of sketches is probably a good thing! What I like about sketches is that they are such a great springboard, particularly when you're in the mojo-less department of crafting. What I don't like about sketches is the gallery that always comes with them. They are fabulous of course, and intimidating, but they cost me money because I always need at least one of the products that someone else has used!
So if you like this card from a sketch, have a smile, for free, on me.