What's on You Workdesk Wednesday 4th January 2012

Happy New Year!!  I have been a bad blogger... I sort of disappeared into Christmas and having Chris home and haven't even played at my desk with anything so had nothing to say that would be slightly interesting to folk!!

Tom-Tom looking slightly bemused with the amount of wrapping paper and ribbon to play with...

and Pandy checking out the goodies that may be available to steal when I am not looking..

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a lovely New Year and I know that many returned to work this week.  My decs are down and put away and I am trying to get used to that bare dull look of the lounge which is the after effects of removing all the bling and twinkling lights.

The only thing on my work desk is my Christmas Journal.... and oh ye of little faith... all my little tags fit!!  Just some writing up and maybe a bit of tweaking here and there to do!!

Oh and it is my birthday today!!  Another year older and hopefully wiser...  I plan to make a trip to my local scrap store who give you a discount on your birthday... yay!! ;)

These are my present from Chris... $50 gold coins... one for each year I have been in Canada.  I have just reminded him that I spent 5 years in South Africa and Krugerrands are quite pretty... ;)

Don't forget to check out the linky list to crafty desks held by our wonderful leader, Julia!!

What's on Your Work Desk Wednesday - 14th December 2011

A big fat mess?  Not totally, I am working on my Journal Your Christmas book... 

I have been making these little folders to slip into the pockets of the Christmas tree... I know... this is going to be amusing as I don't think there is enough room between the pages to make them all fit!!

and this is what my floor was like a little while ago...all those white spots?  Glitter... lots of glitter... a certain little fur person stole a packet of glitter off my desk and had a lovely time with it all over the carpet...

then went to bed and pretended it had nothing to do with her...

Don't forget to check out Julia's for the linky list of desks... you'll be amazed at the wonderful stuff you find!

Journal Your Christmas

Wooo Hoooo!  I am ready... bring it on... I am normally still putting my journal for this together at midnight before it begins on the 1st December... and that means I am behind before I get started.  This is not a good thing, as I am then playing catch-up and it means when something crops up I get even further behind!!
Not this year... this year Annette is taking the KISS route...(KISS = keep it simple stupid)  anyone who has seen my journals of the past will know that they get bigger... and fatter... and nearly explode with being stuffed like the Christmas turkey.  Nope, this year I am going to have a skinny latte of a Christmas Journal and what is even better is that it cost me almost nothing!!

It is made from the free magazine my supermarket gives away... and this is the seasonal version with all sorts of Christmas recipes and ideas in it.  Perfect for the base of my journal.

I added chipboard covers to make sure that it would stand the test of time but used the covers of the magazine to keep it as original as possible.

I have wired the two chipboard backs together and attached metal jingle bells down the seam so when you pick it up it makes a lovely Christmassy sound.

I took each folded page and cut a pocket directly into it so that I can slide the tags into place.  OK... that was a bit of a faff and it took me ages to do but I know how fat these journals get and I am trying my best to be thin this year!! ;)    All I need to do is dates to the chipboard circles at the bottom of each page and slide the tag out... make my journal entry and slide it back... voila!!  

WOYWW 29th Dec and JYC

All that preparation and hard work and there it is gone.... Christmas is over for another year and here we are doing another What's on Your Work Desk Wednesday... the last one for 2010!!

I am still plugging away at my journal pages... still way behind but if I could get a couple of hours of good scrapping time in, I am sure I could catch up!! LOL

I finally finished the weather page... it took me two days to find those little thermometers... you know when you have something but not a cookin clue where you have put them?  I looked in every jar and box in the scraproom and finally found them in a tub on the shelf but I think they are perfect for this page!

and my gift wrap page is completed - I love my gift wrap from this year... it is double sided!!  yep, double sided Christmas paper, I found a huge roll of it in Costco this year but as its 45 metres long I may have it for a couple more Christmas' yet!! ;)

Here is Pandora on the high ledge with one of my Christmas presents next to her... a wire dress form to go with the bird cages that live up there.

Tom-Tom also had to inspect the new item on the ledge.... 

Don't forget to check out Julia, AKA Chief Inspector Dunnit, for the complete list of desks to snoop at!

JYC December 7th

I needed a nice easy one after yesterday and this is nice and slim (well, slim-ish) to go inside the pocket. I have to admit I am not normally a list maker.... I go supermarket shopping without one and seldom come home without something I need, I keep all sorts of stuff in my head like birthdays and appointments... in fact, Chris knows that as soon as I start making lists that I am stressed out and need help!! These events are normally after he has informed me that we are moving country... and I have to make arrangements for the house, the house to be, the passports and medicals, wind up my old life and get ready for a new one... so Christmas is a piece of cake... as long I remember to get the food in, send the cards and buy the pressies... LOL

JYC December 6th

I have faffed about all day avoiding this prompt... so at least the laundry is now done and the house is tidy so I guess something good came out of the avoidance!! LOL

Remember a good Christmas and remember a not so good Christmas.... so I have made two pockets on the page and two tags, one for each memory.

A Christmas too far...
It was Christmas of 1991 and it was the Christmas that changed my life, a point when I was so down that the only place to go was up – and I have not looked back since but maybe that is cowardly and to review that Christmas is another way to bury it. The relationship I was in was awful and it had been for a long time but I trudged on through the years until that Christmas morning... when my 4 year old son came down to open his gifts and his father couldn’t be bothered to get out of bed and watch him doing it. It wasn’t the fact I chosen the gifts, it wasn’t the fact I had paid for the gifts, it wasn’t even the fact I had wrapped them.... all I wanted was him to enthuse and make a nice Christmas for his son... and he couldn’t be bothered. Once he had gone to the pub and not bothered to return for the Christmas dinner I had spent the day cooking I decided that it was the last Christmas he was going to spoil for me and Christopher... and it was, by March we were gone...

A Family At Last
2000 was the first Christmas that Chris, Christopher and I had as a proper family in our own home, it was a massive undertaking as Chris was overseas and Christopher and I moved into the new house the 7th of December – and I worked full time so it was a miracle I managed to get everywhere unpacked, sorted, the house decorated for Christmas, the shopping done and we were ready for Christmas by the time Chris got back from South Africa on the 15th December... and what a great Christmas it was, we were a family, celebrating in our new home.... definitely a Christmas to remember.

JYC December 5th

Today's prompt was advent calendars with the request to incorporate numbers onto your page to represent the countdown to the BIG DAY!! It took me a while to figure out words that would add up to 25 so that I could hide the numbers behind the letters. Santa Claus is coming to town! also has 25 if you count the exclamation mark... LOL - how sad am I???

I am not sure I have finished with today, I may add some journalling and a photo to a tag to go with this... but the book is not looking any thinner... so maybe I should just leave this as a thin page!! ;)

JYC December 4th

Well, I am suitably impressed with myself, I am still up to date, by this time last year, I was already lagging behind and playing catch-up at the weekend!

The prompt for today was to think about our perfect Christmas... and I found this image on the web which is so much how I would like my Christmas to look!!

The photo opens to reveal the hidden journalling which might be a bit hard to read so here it is:

The Perfect Christmas... I think as women we try and create perfection, and because we cannot succeed in replicating the image in Good Home or whatever magazine is our particular poison, then we are disappointed and feel as if we have failed or fallen short of expectations. Like the line in the Sunscreen Song says – ‘do not read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly’ ....
I would love to have my home looking pristine and decorated with gems and beautiful objects in just the right niches, a 12 foot tree that looks like the one in the shopping mall, family and friends sitting about in suitably matching attire with smiling faces, the Christmas tablescape honed to perfection with crystal glassware and shimmering candles, the food cooked exactly right and on time... but with age comes wisdom and acceptance that these things may happen but not all on the same Christmas, and the best times I’ve had were the times when I forgot to serve the shrimp starters and we ate them for high tea with laughter over my forgetfulness, being relaxed and couch potatoeing on comfy sofas with people I love, watching people’s expressions when they opened gifts with an eyebrow lift that says ‘what on earth were they thinking?’and everyone joins in the laughter.
This year, once more, we are far from home, far from family, my first Christmas without my son, in a place where Christmas isn’t a national holiday, but I will fill my home with the guys who can’t get back to their families for the holiday because they have to work, with neighbours, new friends who have never done Christmas without their mothers... and I will try to make it perfect..