WOYWW Week 843 : A Quiet Week

Hello WOYWWers, Followers, Everyone,

On the desk this morning is the February introduction page for this year's album. As usual, I've chosen a few photos that serve as a reminder of just some of what happened that month.  Scattered about are some bits and bobs I might add to the pockets, There's a pack of photos waiting to be dated and filed away until I'm ready to make pages with them. The book that can be seen just off to the right is one I've just finished reading. More about it later.

I've been able to not just work in the garden now but spend time relaxing in the summerhouse. I use the spotty bag to transport the memoir I've been struggling to finish since January, notebooks I jot stuff in, pencils, one of my favourite mugs and the flask containing a latte until I'm ready to drink it. 

Silver takes up residence in the spotty bag whenever it's empty. She's not fussy. Anywhere will do, even when it's been left on the ironing board. Oh, and those towels - I spotted them in Asda and just could not resist that gorgeous peach colour!

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, The Good Father by Liam McIlvanney. I love a good mystery. A couple living a normal, happy, almost idyllic life in a house on a beach in a friendly little Scottish village, Fairlie, with their much loved seven year old son and a dog. Sounds perfect until one day the son, while playing on the beach, disappears! From there the story takes us through the aftermath with some unexpected twists and turns that I certainly didn't expect. What made it all the more interesting to me is that Fairlie is just up the coast from where I am now. The villages & towns, landscape and places mentioned are familiar to me. Even the village my daughter lives in gets a mention. Although the author now lives in New Zealand, he was born and grew up in Ayrshire so he knows the area well. If, like me, you enjoy a gripping good read then I'd recommend this book.

Finally, a few of the funnies I've collected this week.

To see more creative workdesks pop over to Sarah's blog, Sarah's Craft Shed. If you don't already do so, feel free to join in the fun and show us what's on your workdesk this Wednesday. You'll be made most welcome.

Have a great WOYWW day and a fabulous week everyone,

Take care everyone,

Elizabeth

What's On your Workdesk Wednesday - Week 831

Morning Everyone,

And it is a lovely morning here in North Ayrshire.

On my desk this morning Silver. She's thinking about going out by that open window but first a few quiet moments watching a magpie perched on the neighbours fence. To the left of her is my next project. 

I've put together photos and materials for a page I hope to make later today. Homework for Shimelle's class. It's all from old stash, of course. Even the photos are dated 2022! I have unfinished albums from the year of Covid, 2020, up to 2023 so I hope to remedy that this year. 

January 2025 - Side 1

At the same time I'm working on this year's album and this is the introductory page. I'm not a great fan of pocket pages but they are the best way of beginning each month. 

January 2025 - Side 2

The photos used capture some of what's happened during the month. There will be a few 12"x12" pages following this introduction. I spent a few hours over the weekend sorting through photos taken so far this year trying to decide which to scrap. Decisions! Decisions!

Most of yesterday was spent in the garden. My daughter and SIL were round so we stopped to sit and soak up the sun. It wasn't all play though. I did check on my seedlings in the mini greenhouse, which turned out not to be as mini as I hoped. Sorry, I forgot to take a pic to show just how big it is. I also planted out a climber, Clematis Grandiflora Alba. 

We had this fabulous one in our last garden. I'm hoping for a similarly stunning display with the one planted yesterday. Perhaps not this year, but in years to come. 

I did think to grab this shot of Silver squeezing into an empty basket during a latte break in the summerhouse. She never fails to amaze me!

 

And finally, a few funnies for this week.

That's me for this week. I hope you all had a lovely Bank Holiday weekend. Just in case you missed it, there's another one in a few weeks time. To see more creative workdesks pop over to Sarah's blog, Sarah's Craft Shed. If you don't already do so, feel free to join in the fun and show us what's on your workdesk this Wednesday. You'll be made most welcome.

Have a fabulous week.

Take care everyone,

Elizabeth 

Catching Up Again - August Scrap Pages

Hello Everyone

Once again it's been quite a while since my last post. I thought I was 'raring to go' but clearly I got that wrong. In fact, although a lot of sorting and organising has been going on in the craft room, I've managed very little real crafting time over the last few weeks. The result is I have just two scrap pages completed in August to show today. 

There's still a lot of the kits I put together before we moved house waiting to be used up. That was two years ago! There's between four and five kits in each of the boxes you can see piled on the shelves above. They should make it easier for me to get down to creating pages, and would do if my get up and go hadn't got up and gone. Despite this sad state of affairs I did pull a kit out to work on last month - here's a few photos of the contents:

That last photo is of a partly used sticker sheet that I really wanted to use up completely for that reason it the kit was based on it. I was able to make the following two pages using the kit.

I chose the pocket style for this page thinking that it would be best for the three poor quality photos of an occasion from the 1990s It's going to be added to an album I've put together as a keepsake for Alan's nephew. I'm regretting the choice of pocket style because now I have to create another layout on the reverse!

This page uses one portrait and one square shaped photo. Challenging. It's so much easier to create a page when photos are the same size and orientation. I didn't use a sketch for this layout. Not that there aren't sketches for photo combinations like this available. There are but I decided that, as I was working with leftover paper scraps, it would be best if I just made it up all by myself. 

Some of you may recognise the photos from a recent Facebook post in which I mentioned that this year would have been our 28th anniversary. We married late in life so we considered every anniversary a huge bonus!

All the materials in the kit were old, 2013 being the oldest, so probably no longer available but the paper used for the base, 49 & Market's Kaleidoscope Solids Paper 2, is bang up to date. The glittery alpha set used for the title is also fairly new from Shimelle's Reasons to Smile collection from American Crafts. 

That's it from me for today. I'll be back hoping to join in with tomorrow's What's On Your Workdesk. Well that's the plan but given how long it's taken me to type up this post, I'm perhaps being a tad optimistic. 

Take care and enjoy the rest of your day.

Elizabeth