My New Mantra

For the last month, I have been doing a different job at work.  It's called "holiday relief", and let me tell you, it will be a relief for me when it's over.  It's not that I don't know how to do the work, it's just that it's outside my comfort zone a lot of the time.  So when the telephone messages and referrals start piling up, I start to feel a little panicky, like I'm losing control over the situation.   To settle myself, I have starting chanting this little mantra...."Keep Calm and Carry On".    It does help somewhat, although the mountains of paper are still there, and the telephone keeps ringing. 

I decided to make this to put in the office.  I may leave it behind for the regular gal when she gets back from vacation.  The words and background were made using my Silhouette.  The paper is plain black cardstock and Basic Grey Marrakech.  It's pretty bright, and a little goes a long way.  The butterfly is a metal thing I picked up at Micheal's.  You can't see it, but there are Stickles in the flower centres.

This weekend I'm going to an all day crop.  I'm very excited about it.  I'm planning on working on my Mexico book, provided I don't forget to bring my photos.  I always seem to forget something.  I'll tell you about some of my great faux pas sometime.

Until next then.....



A New Use for an Old(er) Die

 I was working on my Mexico book (in fact I had scheduled a "play date" my friend to get some pages done) when I realized that the photos I needed were inconveniently glued into last years Basic Grey Calendar.  Not sure how that happened.  Anyway, I dragged out my yarn, and crocheted another pair of slippers  to keep myself busy while my friend merrily cut, glued and created cards.

Once completed, I thought they looked a bit plain, and needed a little flower or something.  I was tired of crocheting, and suddenly realized that I could die cut flowers from felt, using my Big Shot and Tim Holz dies!  I think it took almost as long to DECIDE what flowers to use as it did to crochet the slippers.  These are the Tattered Florals.  In the centre is a button from Basic Grey, secured with yarn.  I had so much fun with this, that I cut out some Hello Kitty faces with some Sizzix dies for a pair of slippers I made my daughter.  That was a little harder cutting the felt.  The bigger, thicker dies definitely work better.

These things are always a learning experience, and here is what I learned.  There are more yarn colours that felt colours, so choose the felt flower colour first, then get the yarn to go with it.  Either that or crochet your flowers!

Now not to worry, this is not turning into a knitting and crochet blog, I now have my Mexico pictures, and will hopefully be starting on that again.  Unless I get distracted, of course.

Until next time...



Meanwhile, back in Mexico....

Actually, these phots were taken at Sea World in San Diego.  We had a few days in California before we got on a cruise ship to Mexico.  Ahhh, memories!

So it's hard to see here, but I was quite daring with this page, and got rather experimental, which is not something I usually get.  The paper is Graphic 45 (you were expecting something else?!?), from the Boardwalk collection. 

Experiment #1 - the large flamingo is covered with Glossy Accents, and then ultra fine glitter was sparingly sprinkled over top. 
Result - while the flamingo looks quite stunning, the rest of the page warped. 
Conclusion - Glossy Accents is best left as that:  small accents created separately and then glued on.

Experiment #2 - I really jumped out of my comfort zone, and cut an image out of a photo because the background wasn't very nice.  It  was hard for me to cut around my image in the photo, because I'm a straight lines kind of girl.
Result - well, I kind of like it, although I hope the flamingo doesn't poop on my shoulder.
Conclusion - I may try this again in the future, but I will be more careful with picture placement.

Until next time....

UFO Update

I am very pleased to report that I have completed a couple of pages in my Mexico album (photos to follow in a day or 2 or 3, depending on how things go).  However, I have also been looking through some knitting projects, and pulled out another forgotten creation.

I started this dog sweater a long, long time ago for our dog Lucy, pictured here looking like she would rather be somewhere else.  Since I was in a finishing things up kind of mood, I sharpened my knitting needles, and got right to work.  I did run into a couple of snags.   I had no idea where I had left off, so had to guess where to start.  Also, because doggie sizes are a little like human sizes, and nothing quite fits like it should, I wasn't sure what size I was making.  I had to to just plunge ahead.  One other question I had was, What was I thinking when I chose these colours?!?

I was so happy about finishing this sweater, that I decided I was going to USE UP my yarn scraps, and make some crocheted slippers.  Can you see where this is going?  I had a pattern, but the wrong size crochet hook to get that oh-so-important tension correct.  While I was in the store, I thought maybe I'd get the yarn suggested in the pattern.  (I did some other shopping, but we won't go into that).

After successfully completing a pair in dark blue, I thought maybe I'd use up the partial ball of red yarn left over from making fingerless mittens at Christmas.  One and a half slippers later, I discover I am out of yarn.  So now I will be going back and getting another ball of red to finish the pair, leaving me with yet more scrap yarn.

And this is just the problem with using up leftovers.  Somehow, it always ends up that I'm back at the store, getting more yarn, or paper or ribbon, because I need more of whatever it is I'm trying to get rid of.  How can this be?

On a more upbeat note, I see that the CHA has been going on, and many blogs are all a-twitter about the wonderful new products coming out.  Wouldn't it be grand to go to the CHA?  I feel a bit like Cinderella, wishing she could go to the ball!

Until next time.....