WOYWW134 lonely and abandoned

hi world,
I hope your Christmas was wonderfully fun and festive. mine was!!! if a little hectic

All back to normal in workdesk world, assuming Julia has survived the festive season and snuck away to her desk too. desk world head teacher

The last thing I made were 2 cards I made for my Mum (yes, of the Ironing fame!) and my Mum- in- law.

The cards are to put their Panto tickets in and to invite  them to afternoon tea afterwards
We have brought them tickets for the last few years.

I also made a lot of these Calendars for friends and family and can finally show them, they were fun to make.

My desk has been a bit abandoned these last few days and very messy as you can see. 
The naughty little Christmas Elves have left stuff everywhere.

Some of it is new stash (thanks to my lovely family for that) especially the Inca Gold which I have been wanting for a while. Look out for all things covered in it in the coming weeks.

I dont get many homemade pressies as I do the making in my family, but daughter no 3 (she became engaged on Christmas Day ...yey!) Mum to my gorgeous Granddaughter, made me this lovely wall hanging to put inmy kitchen.

She still has a house key and  crept into my craft room when I was out and liberated some of my stash, but I think she did a grand job.
So did Erin
Well I'll be seeing you in your place soon . . . .Here's wishing you a Happy and Peaceful New Year

janet
 aka fairy thoughts

WOYWW 133 Ironing update

Hi Wednesday peepers,

Wednesday again so soon, time to blog hop over the worlds desks under the leadership of head hopper the very chatty Julia Dunnit.
This is my desk on Sunday evening, sadly abandoned mid making because of present wrapping commitments and the ironing, well someone has to do it !!!

Talking of the ironing; 
A couple of weeks ago I posted about my Ironing and the things my mum thinks I should be ironing, which varies greatly to my ideas Share my Pain

Well the other day she and I were having a conversation about it, apparently I should not only iron my handyman's (my husband ) pants, but my tea towels and dishcloths .... yes dishcloths!..... why?

Well, my mum is a grand old bird of 84 who does all her cooking from scratch, bakes her own bread, shops, walks the dog, drives, surfs the internet, knits, sews, makes  her own greetings cards and irons all things fabric.
Moral of this story. . .  If you want to live a long and fruitful life. . . 
. . .  Iron your dishcloths
Here is the Christmas card she made me

I have a lot of comments about my drawers, so here is a little rummage through them,
They are wonderfully useful as the things I use most are right to hand.

They are all from 99p and £1 shops, they still sell them but now they only have 2 drawers.

Well I've shown you mine now it time to look at yours but first I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and peaceful New Year
janet

WOYWW132 is that my mess?

hi world
Not sure who made this mess on my desk but i dont think it was me 'coz I have been downstairs in the kitchen.
No I confess, this is the mess I made not working at my desk yesterday. Pop over to head peeker  JULIA DUNNIT 'S blog to see some more interesting desks.

I have been working in the kitchen this week (no, not cooking, although I made a mean batch of flapjacks on sunday). Sewing! I made a stocking for my granddaughter, so santa could leave her some pressies

She went to see him at the weekend.
Cute eh! I dont think she is very impressed.

This week I have been busy making some new decs for our tree ( handyman amazed me by announcing that he is going to decorate it this year , so that should be interesting).
 These were inspired by Mollie Makes magazine (not Kirstie Allsop, more on her later)

The heart shapes were cut on the big shot.They are simply decorated with cotton Perle thread, stuffed and finished with a button and ribbon. I'm enjoying making these, even at 3 am when I cannot sleep. Dont ask!!
Kirsty Allsop make a heart shaped garland on her homemade Christmas programme the other night. so I cleared a small space on the desk.

And made these...... not for Christmas but to put over the window in my craft room..... they still need decoratring  and I had to ask myself why I was making them when I still have a lot of Christmas stuff to do. . .  the answer... why not.

hope to see you on your desk later . . . after work. . .  and shopping. . .  and dinner. . .  and washing up...... so much to do , I still have a huge pile of wrapping too!!!!!!!!!!!
janet

101 REINDEER AND A MUPPET

Hi world
oh my goodness it's wednesday again so quickly,
 I'm sure someone is stealing my days!!
 What is so special about Wednesday? see Julia Dunnits fab blog hopping phenomenon here http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/
Anyway another busy desk today I have tried (and failed) to finish my card making.
On the left you can just see the mad reindeers I am working on..... lots of them   (I love this stamp). Not quite 101 but It certainly feels like it.
On the right is a small empty box. I am well know to my family and friends for being a bit of a muppet, I often say the wrong thing, forget things and am sometimes just a bit 'dippy' I freely admit it!
 But on Monday I suprised even myself. It was Christines 50th birthday, she didn't want a fuss or any presents (I remember being the same 50 is not funny when you hit it). Anyway I took her a present I made, when she opened it there was just an empty box . . . I had forgotten to put the pressie in, DOH! But  she thought I did it on purpose, it was very funny!!!
Poor Christine I will give her the real present on Thursday, hope she likes it.

Here are a couple of pictures from the weekend showing some sneak previews of some Christmas presents I have been working on, can you tell what they are yet
.

This is how my handyman left my messy side desk on Sunday. It's not so much that he left his tools here, but more that he left them on top of my mess too.
He was making up my wooden letters (they will be decorated later, probably much later lol) so I had to forgive him. But I might 'borrow' the odd tool that looks useful.
Anyway I might pop by later so here's lookin' at your desk too
janet

WOYWW130 10 shirts and a hankie, share my pain

Hi peepers
I normally take my desk photo at the close of 'play' on Tuesday (my day off) just before my handyman gets home from work. I only craft in the afternoon.
This week I was a bit crafted out  so I did the ironing instead, yes that's right . .  the ironing !!!!! 
Normally I am a believer in smooth and fold. My mum thinks I am terrible for not ironing my handymans socks and pants etc !  . . . who does that?
Anyway, I have run out of shirts for work and as they pay me I thought I really should make the effort, so I ironed 10 shirts and a hankie.
 I remember it wasn't so long ago that I used to have at least 20  shirts a week to do so maybe it's not so bad for two weeks
Here is my desk just before. I'm not sure what Julia will think of my defection to housework, dont think she will approve, Why am I talking about my desk find out here  stamping-ground.WOYWW

Anyway it wasn't all work, work, work today, here is some other stuff I made this afternoon

A birthday card (I didn't do the cross stitch today that has taken a few weeks).

A grungepaper case for a make up mirror (Christmas pressie) the stamping doesn't really show up, it's the Eiffel Tower and a post mark.

8 Christmas cards similar to this one.
The snowflake is embossed on wood and the label is inkjed with DI and sprayed with water and cosmic shimmer and then stamped with Stazon............
So it wasn't a completely wasted afternoon.

I went back to my desk after dinner (yes, I did the washing up etc first)
I did some some inking on tags for some more cards.

Now i have really inky fingers for work tomorrow but at least I have a lovely ironed blouse !

Later this evening (after work)I am going to start with desk no 1 and see how far I get, sorry if I dont make the whole list. Happy WOYWW
janet

12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS 10 lizards leeping

Hi world

It has  been a very busy but productive weekend. Yesterday, handyman and I did the dreaded Christmas pressie shop. I am still suffering with my cold (2 weeks !!) but we did very well until the crowds got too bad and we gave up and came home, heavily laden with parcels. I dont 'do' crowds!!

Anyway today I made quite a few pressie (cannot show for obvious reasons), but there are a few clues in the photo. A sort of whats on my workdesk Sunday!!
I was very pleased with what I made and I have crossed a few thing off my very long 'to do' list.

 I also made some Christmas decorations for daughter no 2 as it is her first Christmas in her flat with her fiance. She will have to buy  a tree to hang her 10 leeping lizards.
She loves reptiles, especially Gecko's, hers is called Tango, she has a orange pattern down her back like the ones I have made. I stamped onto felt with stazon, which actually worked quite well. the glitter is stickles and silver beads on the eyes.

I hope she likes them.
janet

WOYWW129 This is not what i intended to do today

hi desk hoppers
 Wednesday again, time to hop around the world with the chatty  Julia Dunnit
On my desk is the remains of my grungy monday piece for this week. studiol3.
 It didn't turn out as I planned at all, but not in a bad way.
I had intended to decorate one of the S M I L E letters I brought at Ally Pally.
The technique for this week was using  embossed metal foil and alcohol inks.
See Tim Holtz amazing altered pumpkin timholtz.-great-pumpkin-challenge.

I made a brick wall piece which I was going to wrap around the letter L (for leaf) and decorate with leaves.
I thought this would be quite quick and I would have time to make a couple of C pressies as well.
 I liked the effect but it was too big to wrap around so I decided to put it onto a canvas as an autumn collage.

 I die cut lots (and lots ) of small leaves using my new tattered leaves long plate, some are metal, most are yellow paper, which I inked with DI, some are sprayed with cosmic shimmer and some have crackle glaze on.
The word autumn is made from some old scrabble tiles with alcohol ink on.

Yes Vicky! the quote is from the birthday card you made me last year... it was just perfect so I took it off. Sorry!
All this took a lot longer than I intended (housework??)
 Christmas stuff will have to wait. I did manage to tidy up a bit,  This is TIDY(messy) side! lol

I must admit it was good to have a break from Christmas 'stuff'.
This is now on my desk as my next project (Christmas pressies). On the right are some fab Ginko leaves I found in Winchester at the weekend, love these leaves.
Housework will still have to wait, housework????? no sorry not yet!

Well time to see what everyone else (as many as I can manage anyway).

WOYWW 128 I seem to have lost a week

Hi world
gosh is it really wednesday again so soon. Time to blog hop around the world under the leadership of Julia Dunnit. stamping-ground
Not much on my desk except mess. I am sorting my Christmas stamps, I seem to have lost my mojo!!
 Lst weekend was really busy for me as I had a family wedding to go to, my handyman's birthday and family visiting for the weekend.
 On the up side I had to work on saturday, so I missed the cooking marathon that was dinner for 9  (also known as WW3 as it happens) whoever would have thought my 3 daughters could cook a big meal together.
 (I think the answer is they couldn't). It all turned out ok in the end.
 All this activity didn't leave any time for crafting .
I had intended to spend my extra day off on Monday crafting, but as with all the best plans I decided to have a stinking head cold instead (actually not by choice!!). whats the next best thing to crafting?. . .  craft stash shopping.... I did that instead!! I brought some new masks and christmas pressies.... for me.
I did have a go at making some Christmas Papers. . . . .I dont think they turned out too bad, you cant really see the embossing in the photo.

Here are the said stamps, which to use? could not concentrate enough to decide.
I had a look at grungy monday but couldn't decide on that either. grungy-monday have a look it celebrates the techniques of 'lord' Tim Holtz 
tim holtz.

I did make a few very simple cards for my craft sale next weekend. I think I have lost the plot for that.
Still I think I have a bit of time to peek at a few desks before i look for my mojo!!
happy WOYWW
janet

all sorts of stuff on WOYWW126

hi  world
I'm down to one post  a week now ..... too much to do.
This week i am going to my nephew's wedding and left the card making to the last minute as the wedding is on Thursday. I spent a long time designing and eventually making a fascinator to wear (not finished yet I still have some colouring to do !!! ). I will post another day if it works out

 I also wanted to make something for Grungy Monday and Mojo Monthly I decided to make them altogether. Also here is my desk too. What's that all about see here    Julia Dunnit is in charge of the worlds desks so  pop over and have a good nosey.  stamping-ground
On my desk is the last card I am just finishing (well, I have to make dinner sometime! and a girls gotta eat).
This is the first card I made .... for the grungy monday challenge studiol3.   which is all about masks and Tim Holtz wonderful masking techniques see here timholtz.com.

I quite liked the look of this card, the heart is the mask. The heart stamp is from Papermania.
 I like the way it seems to 'pop' off the card, however I dont think the colouring is quite right for a wedding card so this fitted with the Mojo Monthly idea of changing faces.... ie using the same stamps for different styles. my-mojo-monthly-november-changing-faces.

This is the 2nd card.... much simpler. I simply embossed 2 hearts with copper powder, cut 1 out and then layered it on top of the 2nd.  I embossed the initials with the same colour and added the ribbon.

This is a tag I made a while ago ( another grungy monday piece I think), but it is using the same stamp and looks completely different.

This is the last card I made. The heart is embossed in red.

 I didn't intend to make it into a Christmas card .... it just happened, just by adding the appropriate ribbon and some green brads. I think I might give it to my handyman, it is quite lovey dovey !!!

This card is also suitable for the stampman challenge of collage the stampman challenges.

I just have sometime to look at your desks now Happy peeping on WOYWW .

I am also entering the following challenges
catchthebugblog.anything-goes.

WOYWW126 and an addiction to magazines

hi world

At this time of year my desk is not going to be anything but busy. In the middle you can see my next batch of 'using up stash' cards. I'm doing quite well, not too much left now. . . . .  mostly ribbon.
Pop over to see desk moniter and general nosey parker Julia Dunnit stamping-ground.

I dont know about you, but at the moment I seem to be addicted to buying craft magazines, mostly for the wonderful free gifts. I hardly ever make anything from them and sometimes don't even manage to read them.
 But no more, today I decided I would make at least 1 item from each mag I buy OR I'm not allowed to get another one. There's no point in trying to use the back log so I am starting now. This is a card from Novembers issue of Craft Stamper (probably my favourite). Sorry the light is terrible so not a good picture.

I die cut the appetures on the big shot and backed the window with some 'snow flake' acetate that I brought at Ally Pally. Through the windows you can see lots of embossed snow flakes.

Also I am in the middle of knitting a shrug from knitter magazine and making a beaded necklace from the beadworkers guild journal from last month. Not doing too badly , don't know how long I can keep it up (especially as the knitting and beading are not going to be finished before the next magazine pops through the letter box !! oops. It's all part of the 10 year plan lol.
I have just got a bit of time to see some of your inspiring desks. Happy WOYWW
janet