Dolly's Dreamings

Feeling scrap happy

It's been a scrap happy day today. There were lots of challenges around and I have fun taking part in them. I have managed to scrap loads of pages and it has been good de-stress therapy after a busy week.

One of the challenges that I did manage - in the nick of time really - was the weekly challenge over at UKS.

It had a sketch to go with it. I am getting quite used to adapting the sketches now as they are always 12 x 12 and I don't often paper scrap in 12 x 12 anymore.

This was my creation for the challenge

 

 

 I broke into my new Portobello Road papers as they were justr ight for this series of photos.

London was awfully grey and drap but the reds were real splashes of colour. I printed the bunting from Dawn's Fever Pitch kit (I have used this so much)

 

 Typepad is being a nightmare and you may well see this post with no pictures as it really does not want to play

 I have taken a picture of the day and it is of 'the other cat' - the one people tend to forget. The two Bengals are such characters and yet we also have the very special Boo. She is getting on in years now, is almost completely deaf, has cataracts and we think also has 'brain clouds'or feline dementia (and yes ... it is a real condition) . Old she may be, and definitely a little bit mad, but we love our Boo.

 

 

Today I am thankful for

• Lovely scrappy days
• having three cats who we love and who love us back

And I have a cute cute video to share that Tink posted today.

It's called 'How to stop a nightmare'

Enjoy

 

 

A birdy busy day

It's been all action here today. We started off with a walk as it was lovely and sunny.

We decided to walk through Poole and then go across the old Poole lifting bridge to Hamworthy and then come back along the new Twin Sails Bridge. It turned out to be a good walk of about an hour and we times it just right as the Twin Sails opens at 11.30 so we watched that too.

This is the old bridge.

 

and some lovely old boats. Poole is such a perfect mix of the old traditional fishing and shipping port and the new sleek home of Sunseeker with  all the huge expensive cruisers.

 The area is still very much under development

This is the view from on the bridge by one of the barriers

and in this one you can see the split where it separates when it opens.

 I love the twisted spiraled metal that looks like waves

 

 and this is it open

and, if this works it will be amazing.

For the first time I used the video on my i phone and it is the bridge opening and a boat going through.

Let's see - not the greatest video in the world but kind of neat to see it opening.

 

 

Well for a first effort I don't think it is too bad. It was a bit windy as you can hear.

This second clip is a boat that had been waiting taking its turn and going through

 Photo of the day

When we came home I wanted to scrap but we have spent a lot of time watching the birds and saw our first greenfinches today.

But we also had a problem. we have a gorgeous cat (who has a death wish on our road) down the road. he is a grey Burmese I think but he is very naughty. I glanced out of the window and screamed as he was on our lawn with the blackbird in his mouth. We both ran out - me barefoot  - and he dropped the bird which, thankfully, flew off. We then chased the cat out of the bushes and drenched him with the hose. I would never ever hurt any animals, especially a cat, but i have no worry about soaking them. Our aim was to try and scare him so he felt our garden was not a nice place to be and didn't come back.  We have now done that three times so far this afternoon. He is a tenacious little cat! Our cats have never hunted - they don't go out often and never had cats that go out at night. I know it is only nature for them but i feel so guilty as we have lured these birds into our garden and I would hate to be responsible for them being killed. Consequently I haven't done much other than watch out of the window to protect the birds.

The little robin family are very tame though and even came to say thank you whilst we were out there on cat duty.

We also found an empty half egg shell. I think it may be a pigeon as it is was white and the others all seem to lay pale blue or speckled eggs. It looked like one that had hatched rather than been raided.

 

 These are my last two challenges for Shimelle's crop

This was the one to use a sketch and I used this one

and this is my page - another for the Austria album

The couple in the photo were two people we made friends with on the tour and ended up sharing quite a few meals and trips together. It was funny as they had a daughter my age called Karen and she was married to someone called Nigel. How bizarre was that!

Finally my last challenge is the one to scrap in 4 separate quadrants. I couldn't make it work with 4 even sections so here is my effort, about our obsession.

 
I used Linday Jane's In the Forest collection from Pickleberrypop

Today I am thankful for

• the lovely birds in our garden
• enjoyable walks
• saving the blackbird - I so hop we don't loose any others.

Finishing the challenges

It was glorious here this morning - a little chilly out of the sun but very bright. So we went for a walk at Sandbanks which was lovely. It looked like it was going to rain but keeps perking up again.

How glorious does the beach look and how lucky we feel to have this on our doorstep to enjoy whenever we want.

We have had a great time today watching the birds in the garden. We have a lot of permanent visitors now who take it in turns. There are a pair of robins who are almost always visible somewhere in the garden, a pair of blackbirds, a pair of great tits (possibly two pairs but we saw one feeding the other today) a blue tit, a small brown bird that we can't identify and an extremely overweight pigeon who appears to eat most of the day!

I have been catching up on challenges for Shimelle's crop today and have one more left to make so am quite proud of myself for - hopefully - doing all 16.

This is another which was to use up scraps from the other projects. It is another for our Austria album.

 and this was another challenge to use a printable by Little Mussings which was lovely and pastel and inspired this page.  The photo is my other god-daughter (I am blessed with two and love them both to bits)

I also have my photo of the day which is probably one of the most bizarre I will have this year.

There was a man - very nice as we stopped to talk to him - who was walking his pets on the beach. Nothing odd about that - we are still in the season when dogs are allowed on the beach. They were well behaved and stopped to be fed treats, even sitting down when told. They were are harnesses rather than leads and were ....

....

...

...

well

 

...

 

....

 

....

PIGS.

They were loevely but I have never seen anyone walk pigs on a harness along the beach before.

I asked if I could take a picture and they both sat for a treat. How cute was that.

 

A friend also flagged up this new place about to open (with lots of freebies on offer at the moment too)

Free to join and an incentive programme - so worth a check out

 

Creative Market

 

Today I am thankful for

• a lovely Saturday
• strawberries for lunch
• scrap time

and my one minute devotional calendar page today is

MYSTERIOUS WAYS
One night, I tucked my 21-month-old daughter, Julie, into her crib, kissed her on the forehead, and went to the living room to begin my usual routine: picking up the toys from the day’s play. I always put Julie’s favorite toys in her bedroom closet, keeping one of the sliding doors open so she could see her beloved dolly, “Mrs. Beasley,” when she woke up.

But as I turned to creep back out, something stopped me. Close the closet doors, a voice seemed to say. Close the closet doors. I’d never felt or heard anything like that before. It was too strong an urge to ignore. I made sure that the doors were tightly closed.

That night, I had a restless sleep. I dreamed Julie was calling out … Mommy! Daddy! I snapped awake. The alarm clock read 2:30 A.M. “Mommy,” I heard. I wasn’t dreaming anymore: Julie was calling out. I got out of bed and sluggishly headed down the hall. Why is it so hot in here?

Smoke! Coming from my baby’s bedroom. I ran down the hall, reached into the crib, and grabbed Julie. Gray smoke filled the room, but I didn’t see any flames. Carrying out our daughter, my husband and I fled out into the frigid Minnesota night and called 911 from my grandparents’ house down the street.

The next morning, I stared in horror at the burnt remains of our home. The fire chief expressed his condolences and handed me a copy of the fire report. I didn’t want to read it. What did it matter how the fire started? We’d lost everything, hadn’t we?

Not everything, I reminded myself. We had all survived. I read the report, finally stopping at the fire chief’s conclusion. “The fire began in either the electrical panel or the hot water heater,” he wrote. I gasped.

The location of both? The closet of Julie’s bedroom. The closet a voice had urged me to shut so tightly that night, holding back the fire just long enough to save my daughter’s life.

Father, thank You for protecting the treasures in my life that matter most.

—JONI WRIGHT

No reason why it can't be you!

I have thoroughly enjoyed the challenges that Shimelle has been running on her blog. I really have. They are reasonably simple - which is good for a simple scrapper like me - but inspire me so much.

This is my take on challenge 6 which was a sort of scraplift challenge. It was about taking a page, keeping some elements the same but with a twist to change the style of the page. You could scraplift anything or anyone and so I chose to scraplift a scrapper I know quite well .... very well in fact.

I took one of my pages and scraplifted that - with a twist.

I chose a page I didn't like - how bizarre is that. It was a page made for my 2011 album and really isn't me at all. Way too bright and busy.

But I liked the basic design. I liked the three pictures and the stitched edge and border and the central roundel.

So this is my take on changing it but keeping it the same if you see what I mean.

Hopefully you can see the inspiration. The three photos are there with the same placement, the border at the bottom is there, the stitched frame is there and the roundel too, but it comes over as simpler, cleaner, more streamlined and Oh my goodness, much less 'in your face!'

 

And this is another challenge page which was to use those less than perfect photos. Shimelle used the example of those faded orangey coloured pictures. Mine were not even in colour let alone fading colours. They are very small very scratched little pictures of me and some friends at a 4th birthday party. Poor quality pictures great quality memories.

 

I used one of Dawn Inskips templates plus Lindsay Jane Designs Outdoor Play elements which are a Picklebarrel special until the end of today at just $1.

My photo of the day today is of my little boy monster who loves to sit on top of the kitchen cupboards - mind you he was so full of chicken I have no idea how he hauled himself up there!

 

Today I am thankful for

• interesting days
• Nigel going hunting and finding my favourite yoghurt. I have to recommend it to you  because it is delicious. Muller Light Greek Style coconut yoghurt. Yum

And this is my one minute devotional page today

“This is the captain speaking. There’s a lot of weather around the Denver airport, so you might want to buckle up early as we try to land.”

Whoa! What was that? Try to land? I dutifully fastened my seatbelt and attempted another article in the in-flight magazine, but no chance. We were beginning the roughest reentry since Orville at Kitty Hawk, bouncing around like a Chihuahua on caffeine. Finally, the runway came into sight. We were still all a-jolt, but at least we were on the ground.

Wrong! The pilot aborted the landing at the last second, and we went screaming skyward. After a few minutes of top-notch roller-coaster action, the pilot informed us that we were going to Colorado Springs. Some people applauded. No one complained about the abrupt delay; phone calls were made, plans changed, meetings rescheduled. Once we were on terra firma, I was tempted to kiss the ground.

I cannot tell you how many times my life has met with rough weather and bumpy rides, and usually without the warning to buckle up. Birth, death, joy, sorrow—they pop up like a sudden thunderstorm. Sometimes you land. Sometimes you try to land, then take off again. Sometimes you end up in a completely different place, and there’s nothing to do but call on the Almighty and ride it out.

Finally I have to share this awful story from our local paper. I KNEW I was right to be afraid of spiders.

Ok so the article does say this was an unusual extreme reaction, but still. Read at your peril

http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/9652335.Woman_nearly_loses_hand_after_bite_from_false_widow_spider/

9 Amazing Years for the CFH

Today is a special day for us as two members of our family are celebrating a birthday. But I am sure we have been involved in some sort of time travel experiment that we are not aware of, as there is no way that 9 years have passed since the CFH were born.

It seems like such a short time ago that we made the fateful decision to add two Bengal kittens to our family.

They were born on 17^th April 2003 and were special from the word go. The breeder, Jamie, owned both their mother, Mojo (Millenia Junglebeat) and father (Otis Redding) and they were two of a litter of 6. Their mother had an accident when they were just a few days old and broke her pelvis and she could not keep all 6 kittens. Jamie had to try and hand rear three, who did not make it – and she kept the other three. There were two boys and a girl.

When we first met them when they were four weeks old we were smitten. We knew we wanted two kittens and I desperately wanted a boy. We had only had girls before and Nigel would have preferred 2 girls. Until we saw Fiki that is. There was no question we wanted Kira as she was the only girl. The other boy was identical to Kira, much darker, a more traditional brown spot colour. The other boy, who was to become our Fiki, was smaller, had runny eyes, was quiet and withdrawn and was the most amazing colour. He had inherited from his prize winning grandfather the very prized rufus gene and was, even then, a very russet colour. His coat went on to become a deep rich mahogany and he is also blessed with glitter, another prized gene. He was, however, clearly the runt and the kitten you should never buy. But we were already smitten.

Eventually, after a health check and a long conversation with the breeder, both were to be ours. We do still wonder whatever happened to the other little boy and I hope he had a happy and caring home too.

We visited them again when they were 6 weeks old and then collected them early at 12 weeks and brought them home.

We had no idea what a difference in every sense they would make to our lives.

They have been such joy – and such stress too- with their very unique characters and beautiful loving and devoted natures. They have caused us endless laughter, a few tears and a fair bit of shouting. They have had their accidents and their health issues, especially poor little Kira, but they have enriched our lives. Bengals are not to be adopted lightly – they are unique – but we love them. Fiki, the little run who weighed exactly half of his sister when we brought them home, is now a massive 21lb cat with the naughtiest most loving and adorable nature ever. Kira, who has eye problems, allergies to pretty much everything except air, Fiki and us, is a much smaller but equally devoted little cat who follows us everywhere. They both just want to be with us constantly.

This is our handsome boy

and this is our beautiful little girl

How have 9 years gone by in such a flash? Maybe, now he is 9, Fiki will stop being quite so naughty. Maybe not – I fear!

Happy birthday CFH xxxx

It was fitting that I should finish this page made for another of Shimelle’s challenges today. It was made for Challenge 5 and takes the inspiration quite clearly from the examples given.

 

and it is not her birthday and she is not a Bengal and she did not come to us as a baby but I cannot leave her out ... this is our beautiful Boo who is now a poor old thing who is deaf, has cataracts and is a grumpy old thing but just as beautiful as her siblings

 And I also made this for another of Shimelle's challenges - this one for the 'use the same photo twice'.

Photo of the day today was snapped by Nigel this morning. They have cattle grazing on the heath now and this morningt hey were right by our fence so here are two pretty meadow ladies.

Today I am thankful for

• all of the cats who share or who have shared our lives and our hearts but especially my little - well big actually - CFH.

 

Barb you asked yesterday if we have Michaels here and no we don't but I make sure to shop whenever we visit the US.

You also asked if I had any photos of my dolls house -  If you looks at the subjects down the right hand side border and click on Dolls House that will take you to all about that.

 

My one minute devotional today is

My wife, Julee, and her mom, Wilma Cruise, were extraordinarily close. No matter where Julee was in the world—and it could be anywhere—she called her mom in Creston, Iowa, every day without fail. Even after Wilma’s capacity for speech was pretty much wiped out by a stroke, Julee was the one person who managed to carry on conversations with her. The nursing home would call Julee when they couldn’t figure out what Wilma wanted; somehow Julee always knew.

Wilma died this year, very peacefully. I did everything I could for Julee as she sank deeper into mourning. I tried to get her to eat, to exercise, to make it to her doctors’ appointments. I told her that God was with her no matter how alone she felt, that He was really there, closer than ever. I sat up with her late into the night, sometimes without even talking. But still she grieved.

Finally, in frustration and despair, I told a friend there was nothing more I could do. “I feel so inadequate,” I said.

My friend looked at me for a long time, then said simply, “It’s death. We’re supposed to feel inadequate.”

We humans can overcome just about anything, but we can’t overcome death. And the deeper we love, the harder we grieve. Finally, we come through the other side, as I know Julee will, when our love becomes acceptance—perhaps of our own inability to let go of people all at once. We don’t want to let go, so we let go in stages—imperfect, painful, not always pretty. And each and every step of the way, God takes hold of what we have let go.

Back to reality

School holidays are not reality are they. They are a lovely luxury but eventually they have to end and we are back to work and back to reality which, let's face it, for most of us means a full and hectic day of work. Even poor Nigel was back to work today and the garden looks fabulous and the outside paining looks good.

I obviously won't have the chance to scrap much now, but have lots of new pages I haven't shared yet and the first page I want to share today is another made for the weekend fun at Shimelles.

This was made for the challenge to use three different patterned papers from three different collections. See, this is where that trusty scrap box pays off. I am busily scrapping pictures of our trip to Bath and this is another for our 2012 album.

We love our miniatures and have a wonderful almost complete Georgian doll house which we both enjoy being creative with. Bath is a city filled with spectacular Georgian buildings and to us many of them were like dolls' houses.  In fact much of what we saw has inspired us with ideas for our dolls' house, including what to do with the basement garden we have not tackled yet.

The three different paper ranges were Basic Grey for the background, DCWV and then a third paper which I think was from a very old stack from Michaels years ago.

 

I have a photo of the day as well which is my new school bag.

These days I find I don't carry quite so much stuff too and from school every day as much of my evening work is electronic. So I fell in love with this bag in the holidays and figured it would make a nice school bag. It is smaller than I am used to but may mean I don't keep so much junk in there. It will still hold my planning file and an A4 file. It was from that very exclusive and expensive shop Primark!

 

Today I am thankful for

• useful work to do
• coming home

And my one minute devotional calendar page is wonderful - I did enjoy it today

The help-wanted ads leered at me. I’d sent out countless résumés to no avail. Still, every morning I prayed: “God, help me find a job that will make me smile.”

I saw one I never would have had the guts to apply for if I hadn’t been desperate. “Ordinary people wanted for a two-day fashion show in the shopping mall.” Hmm, I sure fill the bill on that one, I thought.

By the time I got there, I was quite hopeful. “The manager will see you right away,” the receptionist told me.

After that warm welcome, I was astonished when the man gave me a three-second glance and brusquely waved me away. “No,” he said, “you won’t do.” His head was already down reading his magazine.

Feeling sure I’d been led to answer his ad, I boldly asked, “Sir, may I ask why?” At his startled look, I plodded on, “Your ad did say you were looking for ordinary people.”

“Oh,” he exclaimed, “you got it wrong! We’re not looking for ordinary people. We’re looking for models who look like ordinary people!”

He went back to reading his magazine. And I? Well, I managed to stifle my laughter at the absurdity of the situation until I left his office. And on my way home, I passed a bookstore, went in, filled out an application, and have been happily employed there ever since!

When I’m down in the dumps, God, remind me that even there You can give me something to smile about.

—LINDA NEUKRUG

 

Shimelle's Scrapping weekend

Shimelle's fab starting points were just what I needed to kick that mojo into it's last ditch effort before term re-starts.

I have had a lovely scrappy time and have done many of the challenges and plan on completing them all by the deadline of next weekend.

The ideas have been simple but inspiring.

This page was made in response to the challenge of using stamps you should use more often.

I have lots of stamps - a serious number - and I use maybe a tenth of them. Mind you, those I use I do use a LOT.

However, I made this page for the challenge.

 
The word Abbey is straight in reality - it is a scanned image and there always appears a bend somewhere

Anyway stamps ...

The camera stamp is one I bought - and I blame Shimelle totally and utterly for its purpose. I was going to use it over and over. It would appear on most of my pages. Um ... I used it once. So out it came and I do still love it. I stamped it twice, once on the green and once on cream and cut bits of the cream out and put it onto the green using foam squares to make it dimensional.

 

I also used a set of stamps I love but always forget I have which are a Banana Frog alphabet set FT Rosecube so it made me rediscover them.

Finally I also used a set of stamps I have become addicted to this past week. They were a tiny 99p set and I totally love them. They have teeny flourishes and little borders and I have been using them over and over on the Bath mini book I have made. So I couldn't resist using them on here too  

As it was an old abbey the page has lots of distressing and stitching.

I will upload more challenges when I have scanned them, but I am loving the challenges. You can play along too at Shimelle's place

This is my take on challenge 11 which was an extremely scary challenge for me. I don't do pattern. I do bland. I do simple. Two heavily patterned papers - yikes.

And yes - I ended up with a lot of layering to try and calm me down!

And my final challenge for today is Challenge 10 - scrap two photos on bold paper. Well that red is certainly bright and it is bold for me.

 

I have a photo of the day to share from yesterday and from today.

yesterday was our final meal out for a while. Back on the sensible eating plan now

 and today my last Starbucks for a while. We have loved having our daily fix but our waistlines and our wallets will be happy this is an occasional treat rather than a daily hit for a while.

Today I am thankful for

• a lovely easter holiday - well Ok the first week or so was hell, but at least it was hell at home. If it had been term time I would have been off for a week and I have never been off for more than a day and a half so it would have been dreadful. I am glad it was in the holiday.
• the generosity of people like Shimelle who share so much with the crafting community for no reward save sharing their passion with others

I am getting slow!

I tend to attack life at 100 miles an hour. I just get going quickly - and at times would be far better being a little slower and thinking things through first ... well according to Nij anyway.

But I dow ork quite quickly and I usually scrap quite quickly. So either I am losing my mojo or age is catching up on me as I am STILL working on a mini book for Bath. OK so the construction took a while but I seem to have spent ages just faffing around. The book is almost complete - and it is nothing special - but I have had enough for now and so have put it to one side. I haven't done the cover and if I do it in the mood I am in I will ruin the whole thing - so best left for another day.

I was begrudging doing it as I wanted to play at Shimelle's fun weekend of scrapping.

I have made another page - this time for the challenge which was to use grey and yellow and another colour. The other colour I chose was purple as the colours of yellow and purple just went with the spring flowers that ended up not even appearing on the page. OK so you get the sort of day I am having.

I decided to scrap the Jardin du Luxembourg as another page for the Paris album. The gardens were full of spring flowers and yellow and purple dominated. I started the page, I changed the photos for photos of the building itself, I lost the flowers and the yellow and purple suddenly became redundant! Oh well. the intention was there.

Anyway here is the page. I used Moonrise Meadow by Jumpstart Designs at Pickleberrypop and also a photo blend by Anne Aspnes.

 
The fact I used yellow is amazing as it is a colour I am not keen on - I like daffodils but that's about it. We have no yellow in the house, I have very few scrapbook supplies that are yellow and until two or three weeks ago  I had no item of clothing that was yellow or had yellow in it (and I bought - on Nigel's recommendation) a bright yellow t shirt. mmmm - we'll see.

I plan on doing more of the ideas later on.

No photo of the day yet as I have not taken it thus far. It may yet end up being the Bath book.

 

Have now taken photo of the day but not uploaded or rather downloaded yet LOL

But have had a fast scrapfest night and made several pages and I can share this one - another for Shimelle's challenges using a style not my own

I admire the overly contrasty and bright black and white images I see in so many places and thought I would have a go. OK so it didn't work, but I did at least try and my subject, the ever gorgeous Alice, was beautiful.  The papers and elements are Jumpstart Studios Dude-a-tude from Pickleberrypop

Today I am thankful for

• Fiki seeming to be back to his old self. He has had a few very quiet days where he has not been himself. It is their birthday next week - they will be 9. How did that happen!

 

My page a day calendar is a good one today again. Nigel and I often comment on how we feel things happen for a reason even though we may not see that reason at the time.

I am so pleased so many of you are enjoying these inspirational stories.

A new page drops into my in box every day and I am loving having this page a day calendar to see me through the year.

Some of the stories are amazing. Anyway - here is today's.

MYSTERIOUS WAYS
Iawoke to my children calling for me. “Mo-om, it’s freezing!” Cassidy cried. “Yeah, Mom, I’m cold!” said Christen. “My head hurts, and my tummy,” Caitlin, my youngest, chimed in.

I rolled out of bed, setting my feet on the cold floor. It was chilly, even for a 170-year-old house. And Caitlin wasn’t the only one with a headache and queasy stomach. What a way to start the morning. Especially with my husband away on business. I had to deal with this all alone.

I went to turn up the heat and saw the front door wide open, a frigid wind gusting through the house. Strange, I thought, closing the door. I swear I locked up tight last night.

While my girls got ready for school, I checked the thermostat again. The heat wasn’t kicking in. Ugh. Must be the pilot light, I thought. I didn’t even know where the pilot light was on the furnace.

I called Mr. Thompson, my neighbor. “I hate to bother you, but can you help me relight the furnace? Vince is on a business trip.”

“Sorry, Sheri,” he replied. “Any day but today. I have something I absolutely have to take care of.”

I got the girls to school and went to work, feeling more alone than ever. On my break, I called a furnace installer and repairman. He promised to stop by the house and take a look. He called back right away. “Ma’am, you have a crack in your furnace,” he said, his voice serious.

“Okay,” I replied. “Can you fix it?”

“No, you don’t understand,” he said. “You have deadly carbon monoxide levels in your home. This is one of those things you see on the news. Most people would just relight the pilot and never see the crack. I don’t know how you made it through the night. I’ll take care of this right away.”

I hung up the phone. All at once it hit me. The open door airing out the house. My too-busy neighbor who would’ve missed the crack. Turned out I wasn’t so alone after all.

Lord, the world is full of hidden dangers, but I thank You that nothing is hidden from You.

—SHERI BULL

Easter Monday

April showers - Oh yes. But then again maybe not. Aren't showers meant to be short and not last all day?

Anyway, it's been a bit grim weather wise, but we have still had a lovely day.  Went out to get the daily Frapp and a bit of a mooch round, including going to look at some driveways as we are contemplating a new drive - though we are guessing when we gett he quote we will suddenly fall in love with our existing driveway. We'll see but we are expecting tomorrow's quote to be beyond our reach.

I did take a picture of the day though which was of Holy Angel's church and we both loved this.

We have a little woodcarving just like this that we bought from Oberammergau when we went to the Passion Play.

 

I also have to add my photo for yesterday which was our Easter dinner. Well actually Nigel's Easter dinner as mine had fewer potato and more veg. Oh and no gravy - never been a gravy girl.

I managed to do the weekly challenge on UKS today too - which involved different types of paper, nursery rhymes and animals.

It is another page for our 2012 album and pictures from Monkey World on Good Friday.

I confess to already being addicted to the little stamp I bought on Saturday - tiny little border stamps that I can see being used again and again.

Today I am thankful for

• lazy days
• time to just chill out
• unexpected sights that move us

 

My page a day calendar today is

 When my husband, Lynn, spent his first night in the ICU following surgery to remove most of a malignant brain tumor, he couldn’t sleep. In spite of some strong medication, he appeared agitated, especially as he tried to absorb the meaning of the news that he had brain cancer. I kept talking to him, gently trying to calm him, but in listening and responding, his blood pressure kept rising.

“Why don’t you go home and get some sleep,” a nurse kindly suggested at about 11:00 P.M. “Then he might fall asleep, too.” Reluctantly, I left.

The next morning, Lynn seemed much better. “I couldn’t fall asleep after you left,” he told me. “I had too many frightening thoughts running through my mind. Finally, a nurse came in.”

“What did she say to you?” I asked.

“I don’t remember that she said much. She just held my hand.”

Over the next several days I learned about the holiness of that simple gesture. Sometimes, in our adjustments to difficult realities, we get all tangled up in words, trying to fix each other’s pain. Sometimes, in those hard moments, the most profound way we can comfort each other is by simply, silently, holding hands.

Father, You express Your love and mercy by holding us in Your hands. Help us to communicate love and mercy as we hold each other’s hands.

—CAROL KUYKENDALL

Easter Sunday and a freebie

Happy easter Sunday everyone

I hope that you have all enjoyed a wonderful  day on this special day.

I shared this freebie before but figures it might be nice to share it again

download here

I have had a lovely crafting day making a  project I am thrilled with but can't share yet as it is for a post on IACW - but I love it.

I have also had fun making a very different page for me for the Scrapology challenge this month. It was a very busy design for me and used lace which I rarely use, but I figured it was worth a go.

The page I have made is for my Austria album and I used new papers, letters and flowers all bought yesterday. see, I knew I needed to buy them.

I also used a lace doily die cut (but covered most of it up, and lots of paper lace.

and I almost - not quite but almost - managed to avoid butterflies, but gave in at the end LOL

I had fun making it up.

My photo of the day will come later as I know what I want to take but just can't take it yet!

Today I am thankful for

• first and foremost all the blessings of Easter
• a 'not getting dressed day' We haven't had one of those for ages and ages
• a tidy cupboard and drawer - yes I tackled 'the dump drawer and cupboard' in the kitchen. My my I keep some junk!

 

And finally, as I am still playing catch up posting these, this is another of my 365/6 pages. This time it is week 11 and I used two of Dawn Inskip's templates combined.