HS:MS wild

Today on HS:MS: 'wild: living in a state of nature; not tamed or domesticated.'

As it's still raining, I'm not venturing far, so I popped my head outside the back door - to the left there is a part of the garden that gets pretty unruly at times because there's a hotch-botch of plants growing there quite wildly. There's an area more wild than that at the top end of the garden, but there's no way I was going up there in the rain, so this 'wild' will have to do:

Not much crafting

A couple of days ago I bought four new Magenta stamps and yesterday started to do some images for the swap on CBC, but a couple of the stamps were giving poor results (well, was it the stamps or 'operator error'?). Anyway, I gave up in the end and decided to come back to it fresh today. I didn't try one of the ones that were playing up yesterday, but the other one was fine today - just think I was heavy handed on inking up yesterday.

So, suddenly realising that it is the last day in April today I got on with the images this morning, thinking they should have got to Carolyn by today. When I logged on to CBC I couldn't find the thread for an April swap and discovered that this is a May swap - so I'm not late with them - phew! The brief for this swap is to use new stamps.

Anyway, in the absence of anything else much atm, these are the images:



The green leafy circle is a Magenta stamp. Jemima Puddle-duck was free with a mag I bought the other day (one of those where you need to cut away the excess rubber, but not a bad little stamp for a freebie). The funky plum flower shape is another new Magenta stamp (one of the ones that caused problems yesterday - kept getting ink in the middle of the 'petals'). The brown flower is a Papermania one that I bought at Easter and didn't use. The little black one in the bottom corner is a Basic Grey journalling stamp from a lovely set I got recently.

There has been chat recently on CBC about triple embossing and sinking a stamp into it while it's hot, so I thought this would be an appropriate card to send to Carolyn (I admit I made it quite a long while ago, but have never shown it before):



Perhaps soon I'll be back with some proper crafting - need to do some cards very soon and there are so many challenges I'd like to do, including LOs.

At least I feel a bit virtuous this morning, because I've cleaned the stamps I used (and have to confess that quite often I leave them to do them later ...)

And yesterday I did some die cuts for a swap on CBC using my cricut expression - some swirls from the Wedding cart and some flowers from the Walk in my garden - should have taken some pictures, but wanted to get them into the post quickly so I didn't.

So I suppose, although I headed this 'not much crafting' I have been doing some, but none that's got a finished result.

HS:MS dairy

HS:MS today: 'dairy: Milk or milk products. Find some in your space today.'

I was up this morning at silly o'clock because I had to go to the hospital for a fasting lipids blood test. So no cup of tea or anything else - and I was at the hospital even before the department opened at 7.30, only a few others before me. I was back at about 8.15 and I was then ready for my breakfast. So, here is my dairy - skimmed milk with my Oats & More cereal - skimmed milk as parr of my low animal fat diet because of high cholesterol - hence the blood test because of years on statins to try to bring the level down.

HS:MS weekend catch up & 'long'

For SPS for Saturday I've chosen a picture of Mum, taken last summer:



For this week's SOS, I've chosen a beach scene from our holiday in Bognor Regis last year, not because it's a good photo, but because it brings back memories of windy, cool walks by the beach:



And for today's prompt 'long: 'To measure a great distance from end to end. Find something long in your space today.' I've chosen a picture of one of our granddaughters (it's actually been shown before as part of a LO), because it shows her long hair cascading down as her dad turns her upside down - I like the plait going down the middle. I admit it's a cheat, because it's not in my space today, but it was taken in our garden last summer (and I don't often cheat!):

Re-assurance

For those who have made comments about the tidyness (and thank you all for your kind comments, not just on my craft room, but generally) - it's not that tidy now! But having a good storage system does help (although some of those boxes have 'things to be sorted' in them!

My craft room

At long last I've taken photos of my craft room. We had the room fitted out way back at the end of June (gosh, ten months ago!) and I've often thought about taking pictures. To be fair, it took a while to get the room as it is now - we didn't actually have it decorated until towards the end of the year, so we didn't have these curtains till after then.

So, because I wanted to include a photo in the new CJ for the group of Bumbleberries, I decided this morning to have a tidy up and a photo session. Straight after that I had to get on with the CJ, so the worktop began to look quite different!

The large cupboard on the left goes almost up to the ceiling, so houses quite a bit of stuff. (To the left of that is an old built-in cupboard that was already here, where we keep our coats - and it does have quite a big shelf at the top for extra boxes, but they're not that accessible - and not worthy of a photo!)



The cupboard to the left of the drawers goes into the corner underneath the bookcase - it houses a big craft hold-all on wheels (Christmas stuff in there atm) and also my 12 x 12 scrapbooks etc.



Inside the tall cupboard I have quite a few (!) really useful boxes and also quite a few of the clear plastic type. The black cabinet of drawers on the left used to be freestanding in the room before we had the fitments done, so I especially asked for a built in bit to house this - so handy to be able to shut the big doors on it all.







The worktop is nice and deep (about 30") so there's plenty of space to put things at the back and work at the front - and it stretches all the way from the bookcase that's built in to the right of the tall cupboard to the window the other end.



To the left of where I sit there are four drawers.









To the right of where I sit, there are two shelves that slide out when the cupboard door is open. My printer/scanner is on the top shelf and my craft robo is on the bottom one. And when I'm not using them I can shut the door and they're neatly stowed away.





And then there's my lovely drawers that were a bargain from Poundland. Each drawer houses at least 19 of those 'take away' type boxes that they sell 10 for a £1 in Poundland.











There is a door that opens out on to the garden (lovely in the summer - and we have an awning that comes out to shade the room) - and in the corner is our cental heating boiler - don't really mind that, because it's cosy in here in the winter.



Underneath the Laura Ashley throws that match the curtains are two 'put-you-up' beds that only get occasional use, but have to be kept somewhere - and they give me another surface to pile up if and when necessary.



Back to the worktop:





There is a keyboard shelf (I was going to use a separate keyboard with my laptop, but, although I've got one, I hardly ever use it - I prefer to use the shelf to tuck things away - WIP!



And there's even room service! This was my morning coffee delivery:



You may have wondered (although probably not, because I can't imagine that anyone is still looking this far!) where my actual finished cards are - it's simple, they are on shelves at the top of one of my bedroom wardrobes:

HS:MS twisted

'Bent, curly, inter-twined material or warped state of mind. Have you got something twisted in your space?'

I found these bits in our 'pot pourri' bowl, took the photo, then played around with it, mainly choosing a twisted transparent fade (thought that would add to the 'twisted' look):

New CJ with Bumbleberries group

Kathy is organising a new CJ on Bumbleberries - it's just a group of five (which means it won't be too long before the CJ comes home - a regular once-a-month posting).

As is often the case, although I had an idea of what I would do, I hadn't actually got on with it, so I started it last night and spent this morning doing the rest.

My subject is 'There's no place like home' and, as I wanted to include a photo of my craft room, I wanted to tidy up this morning before I took the photo - lol! So, at last, nearly a year since the room was fitted out (well, it was actually at the end of June last year) I've taken photos of the room, one of which I've used in the CJ - and the others I'll put on the blog later. (I have to confess that the room doesn't usually look as tidy as it does on the photos!)

For the CJ I used BG 6x6 sultry papers throughout, inking the edges with ColorBox chalk lime pastel and then Distress ink tattered rose - although on some of the photos you can't see this, because I somehow chopped the edges when taking the photos because I did them in a hurry in order to get the CJ in the post this afternoon.

So, here is the front cover:



Welcome:



Rules:



My DLO:





Sign in pages:





Back cover:



CJ put together:

HS:MS bathe

HS:MS today: bathe: 'To immerse ones body in water or light. Find bathe in your space today.'

Having rained this morning, it seemed to clear up for a while (I managed to get to the PO and back more or less in the dry). During lunch time the sun came out. However, just at about 2 pm when friends were due to pick us up for a drive into the country to have an afternoon cuppa, black clouds loomed and by the time we got in the car it was not just pouring, but bucketing, including hailstones. When we got to the garden centre tea place we had to quickly get out and into the dry.

We enjoyed a lovely cuppa and scone - and while we sat there, the sun came out. When we got ready to come away, the sky darkened once more and down came torrential rain again!

When we were dropped off at home, the sun came out!

So it's been the kind of day when there's been a mixture of being bathed in rainwater and in sunshine.

This is a little corner of our garden that I took since we got back - if you look carefully you can see a puddle as a result of all the rain, but shadows caused by the sunshine:



The second photo is of me coming in through the back door into my craft room with my shadow cast on to a cupboard door opposite:

Salt: Contentment

It's my turn to choose the topic for this fortnight's challenge and I have chosen:

Contentment

I was drawn to Philippians 4, particularly verses 11, 12 and 13, where Paul says:

'I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.'

I find this both a comfort and a challenge. Some of us have been, or are going, through difficult circumstances and yet God is so good and his grace is sufficient for us in the most difficult times. And when we look at some parts of the world, we are so conscious that we have plenty. In this regard I find the parable of the sheep and goats in Matthew 25 to be such a challenge.

Our team has yet again come up with some beautiful crafting for this theme and we would love to see what you are prompted to create. Please link to Salt on your blog and then leave us a comment and we will add you to our link so that others can take a look at your artwork.

For my contribution I very much wanted to depict the contrast between being content with my own circumstances and not being content to sit back and witness the injustice, unfairness etc in the world - as a Christian to respond in some way to the needs of others - certainly a challenge.







Please have a look at Salt and see the lovely artwork the other girls have come up with.

Sarosa, a regular contributor to Salt, has kindly given us an award - you can read about it on our blog.

Rain, rain, go away!

Last night I tried unsuccessfully to get a photo of the card I made for the Tanda comp on CBC, so I thought I'd have another go this morning - now the light is poor, because it's pouring with rain!

But this photo does show the colours more true to life than the scan did. The patches of 'white' aren't white at all, but are areas highlighted with matte accents - better irl:

CBC Tanda stamps competition

Over on CBC Tanda stamps have kindly donated a lovely prize for a competition that's closing this evening: 'So to win this fabulous prize you need to get some sun and..... shake off the blues and make a spring/summer themed card.'

I made one earlier this evening and I had to wait for the matte accents to dry and then I found I couldn't get a photo because the flash was just making the accents look like streaky white patches. So in the end I've resorted to a scan, which doesn't show any of the detailed embossing or the matte accents.

The stamps I've used are ones I bought ages ago and have never used - they are by Elusive images.

Everything was stamped with Versafine Onyx black and embossed with fine detail clear. Colouring was done with Karismacolor and Sansodor: