What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday - Week 533

Morning Everyone,

I'm early! Given my usual tardiness, I think that's worth noting. So another week has whizzed by. it's WOYWW day and my desk has a mess of this and that on it again - again.

The photo was taken an hour or so ago when the light wasn't as good as it is now (despite the weather forecast for torrential rain the sun is shining and all looks well in our part of the world) but I think you can see the mess clearly enough. There's a teetering pile of scrapbooky - is that even a word - stuff top right. I should move it before the sun does damage. Front right is my most recent scrap layout - I plan to file it in an album next time I go downstairs - that'll will be when I need refueling with tea. To the left of the teetering pile is a wee stack of stencilled pieces. Last week I was 'experimenting' with texture paste, paints and ink sprays, you can see them piled up on the left, for layouts so I scooped up and smooshed card scraps with the leftovers. There's also a pile of photos, behind the keyboard, printed late yesterday - the eagle-eyed will recognise that those on top are from this year's WOYWW crop. Some, all, hopefully, will be scrapped this week.

And just so you don't think those stenciled bits and bobs are wasted, here's a few cards I made with them this week. Oh, yes, it's not all scrapbooking!

The background for this one was made with Ranger's opaque matte texture paste that had two acrylic paints, Vicki Boutin's 'Blue Hawaiin' and 'Juicy Pear', and iridescent glitter paste, also Vicki Boutin, added. The stencil is an old one, That Special Touch 'Chevrons'. The topper is made with a fun stamp, 'Birthday To-Do List' from Crafter's Companion - found at The Range.

The background to this is simply sprayed with gold ink, Heidi Swapp's Color Shine. I believe this has been discontinued - shame, it's one of the best gold sprays I've found yet! The leaf, more of the texture paste tinted this time with just the 'Juicy Pear' paint, is from Dark Room Door's 'Carved Leaves' and the stamp, 'Get Well Soon' is another gin themed one from Crafter's Companion. Never let it be said I'm not up with current trends.

On this last one I've used more of the 'Carved Leaves' stencil. It's very simple but I do like those leaves as they are and without embellishment.

And now the book bit. This book is one I listened to quite some time ago but it's stayed with me - probably because I'm a sucker for any book that has a dog, or cat, in it. Kate Spicer's Lost Dog: A Love Story is about a rescue dog, a lurcher called Wolfy, her relationship with him, and the lengths she went to find him when he went missing while he was in the care of her brother. Reviews for this book are mixed. Kate Spicer is a journalist who knows how to tell a story but the prologue is perhaps just a bit too honest, describing as it does her cocaine-fuelled life-style, but there's no doubting her love for Wolfy and it's the search for him that held my interest to the end.

That's it for today. Until our next Whizzday, I wish you all a wonderfully crafty week

In A Vase On Monday - Take Two

Hello Everyone,

Apparently in the UK it's still summer until the end of August. Not so here in Ayrshire where it's definitely more autumnal - lots of mists but little mellow fruitfulness - than summery. And that means that today's trip round the garden has also been less fruitful, but I did find a few late developers and even some that shouldn't be there at all.

The sweet peas,  Lathyrus odoratus 'America', still keep coming for now though hubby's Spencer's are all but finished - just one single white one left to pick.

I recently bought several pots of dahlias, going for a song, from a local store. The labels didn't specify the variety, just the colour, and I chose white, red and pinks. It was a happy coincidence that one pot contains flowers very similar in colour to the sweet peas.

To fill the vase I've added leftovers found around the garden. There's the last of the hybrid musk rosa 'Felicia', a spray of apricot buds from the climber, 'Susie' and a tiny red bloom from the miniature 'Ruby Rambler', pink loosestrife, lythrum salicifolia 'Robin' and some pink and white verbena. This last, shouldn't be here at all. It was planted out last year as summer bedding but somehow it survived the winter to bloom again.

Now, I think I should explain why I have entitled my arrangement 'Take Two'. It's because I had intended to share this vase instead.

'Take One' - a lovely bunch of sweet peas in my beautiful white Caithness glass vase. Sadly, minutes after placing the vase on this windowsill disaster struck and it crashed to the floor. Why? We've no idea. It's a mystery. Of course, the neck of the vase is damaged - I'm hoping to find someone who works with glass - perhaps all is not lost and it can be repaired.

Linking this post to Cathy's meme, In A Vase On Monday, on Rambling in the Garden and joining with many others who share whatever they have found to put in a vase this week. If you have filled a vase today, I'm sure you would be very welcome to join in too.

Christmas Card Club - Card 17/2019 - Patterned Papers

Hello and happy Sunday to you all.

It's another Christmas Card Club Challenge Sunday and it's the turn of  Margaret (aka: Granmargaret) to set the theme - to use two or more patterned papers on our cards. 

It's a while since I used any patterned paper at all, let alone two or more, but I'm always up for a challenge so here's what I came up with.

I had this very nice pack of 6x6 papers, 'Winter Wonder' that I'd picked up, fairly recently, at The Works that I liked very much but hardly used. The paper is a lovely thickness, 200gsm, the small patterns are perfect for card-making and I like the colour mix of teal, red, cream and white - it's different. It would have been great for our last theme of non-traditional colours had I thought of it at the time! 

- the base is a 5½" square, made from cream cardstock. I used three different papers for the topper, one for the base, one for the poinsettias and there's another, a narrow strip, that's just peaking out from under the flowers. 

- I used a very old set of Spellbinder dies to cut out the poinsettias, there's four layers altogether for each flower. All the edges of the papers were inked with a teal ink pad. 

- To make the greeting, I stamped and embossed the word 'Joy' from Die'sire's Sentimentals stamp set, on a scrap of cream cardstock using crimson red Heat It Up! embossing powder before cutting it out using yet another old Spellbinder die set - I think they are from the Shapeabilities range. 

 - the turquoise mat was cut using the largest die in the set and, again, I was able to use up a scrap of card. These small die sets are ideal for using up leftover scraps of card and paper. 

- I found three enamel dots in just the right shade of red for the flower centres and also a set of cream coloured ones for the corners. 

And because there's a couple of snippets/scraps been used I'm submitting this to Pixie's Snippets Playground - Challenge #359. I've not had anything to share in the playground for some time but, happily, today I have. 

That's it for CCC today but I hope you will pop over to see what my teammates have created for Margaret's theme - you'll find a list of their names and links on my right sidebar - as always they are so much more creative than me.