More Christmas Cards

If you read my last post about Christmas Cards, you may know that I am taking part in a craft fair on Tuesday and so I have made what feels like hundreds of cards. Definitely a hundred cos I have made just over a hundred!! As much as I love card making it does get a bit wearying if you're trying to meet a deadline, but I am pleased with what I have done so far.

Here are the two boxes full of cards....

And, with apologies for the very poor photographs as I have yet to work out how to take card photos properly, particularly when they have been sealed in plastic bags, here is a selection of the cards that I have made.

With a close up...!

I hope to be able to tell you all on Tuesday evening how the craft fair went - I do hope to sell at least ONE card!! Anyway, a real make-and-take show and and tell that one I think!! If you want to see more Show and Tells then go and ask the teacher and she may be kind enough to let you see what other people have brought to the classroom!

Smiles

What does it take to make you smile?

I was in my car and on the way to the shops this morning when the cockles of my heart were thoroughly warmed!  I drove past what looked like a father and daughter and they were obviously out walking their dog. 

Just as I drove by, they had pulled up to the pavement opposite the road from me and were teaching the dog how to sit and stay rather than dashing across the pavement, and as I looked I could see that the dog was a puppy - it looked like a King Charles spaniel and it was just so gorgeous that I just melted into a puddle of goo!!

I think that I smiled for about the next five miles and giggling every time I thought of that puppy so eager to please and yet so excited too.  Even now, practically the whole day later, it still  makes me give a little smile!

Errrrr....

It's half past ten in the evening and I still can't think of anything to say! Except that I've been having fun rummaging around the blogs that have signed up for ICLW - International Comment Leaving Week - a monthly blogfest that means commenting on at least six of the blogs that are participating.

It's a good way of getting to see what other people are doing and spreading a bit of bloggy love!! This time around I have been aiming for Iron Commentator status, i.e. leaving a comment on each and every one of the blogs listed - with the exception of those that need passwords that you don't have and there was one of those this month, which is a shame because I did want to leave a comment only I had sign up/in in order to comment. It is also a shame because I am sure that blogs that require you to sign in will get fewer comments because people can't be bothered to go to quite that much hassle - never mind the comment verification that drives people up the wall (but not me, cos I have this on my blog so I don't mind it so much!! ;-) )

Anyway, without further ado, here is my final list for November's ICLW....

Sticky Feet
Mrs Spock
Portraits in Sepia
Just Me
To Baby and Beyond
Vintage Mommy
The Unfair Struggle
Dancing with Gaia
Elana's Musings
Building Heavenly Bridges
Who shot my stork-
Musings of a Teacher
Not The Path I Chose
Stirrup Queens

Woohoo!! I made Iron Commentator Status!!! I don't think that I'll be doing that again!! ;-)

Thanksgiving

This seemed like a good way to do a post - as seen on Chocolate on my Cranium.

And so in honour of the American Thanksgiving (and those hundreds, nay, thousands of bloggers that are writing something thankful today!), I say that I am thankful.....

Thankful that my brother is coming home from India on Sunday week, I haven't seen him for ages!

Happy and thankful for all those memories of family holidays, I don't think that there was a bad one in the batch at all!

And I am thankful that I was able to adopt Phoebe cat from the Cat Protection Society almost three years ago (doesn't time fly!), especially when she curls up on the bit of my tummy or chest that is not covered up by a laptop!!

Naturally I am thankful for all those things that mean I can live well, a job, a house, a car, and the education that got me there!

Kindness is always something to be thankful for, so thank you for those that think to help others, those that always smile and say hello in passing, those that do not expect anything in return for what they do.

Freedom is definitely something to be thankful for, particularly as it is not really something that I think about, but truly, I am free to work, free to wear trousers, free to live the way I want to, free to complain if I need to (!), and free to be me!!

Unlimited thanks are definitely required for my parents who manage to put up with me and my ways! ;-)

Last but not least, I am thankful that I can listen to Christmas music!! I finally gave in and decided to put a Celine Dion CD on in the car - "poppy" enough that it is not quite like listening to carols too early!!

And on the penultimate day of ICLW I left comments on the following....

The Fertile Infertile
Noemi
Woman Anyone
Between the Lines
Bella And Her Fella
emilythehopeless
Kicking You From the Inside
Meepit On Parade
Get Pregnant
Unquestionable Love
Birds and Squirrell
Our Own Creation
The Binky Diaries
Communique
Conceive This!

Really make sure you save it!

After yesterday's post on saving your work, I didn't expect to be writing about another potential catastrophe today! Fortunately all ended up well, but you'll never guess what happened!?

The library was being hoovered by the cleaner and was looking all nice and clean when she unplugged the hoover and caused screams to ring out in the library! It seems that she was just a little too careless in switching off the plug at the wall and managed to switch off both plugs.

Which, actually seems rather a risky design fault - wouldn't it be better to design a socket that has the two switches on opposite sides of the plate from each other - surely that would stop us from switching off the freezer, computer, whatever vital piece of equipment we have, by mistake.

Anyway, we all jumped when that poor girl on the computer screamed (luckily it wasn't the same girl I was talking about yesterday, I think that she'd have committed murder if it was!) and as I saw the cleaner walking away from that area, I knew exactly what had happened and dashed over to see if anything could be done.

Fortunately this girl had been saving her stuff on her memory stick and so when we turned the computer back on, she merely had to do a little bit again rather than the whole thing. (The cleaner wasn't even sorry as I don't think that she realised what she had done because I don't think that she uses computers much, if at all!)

But good grief....whatever next!!!

And today's ICLW comments were left on....

Heeeeere Storkey, Storkey!
Mom of 2 Dancers
The Daily Doings of Mr Silly and Little Miss Trouble
Ronda's Rants
Broken Bits
Our Surrogacy Adventure
Elusive BFP
Helping Make Sense
Hello Jello
Rachel's Scrambled Eggs
Life In A Holding Pattern
Our Box of Rain
The Saga of Becoming Fruitful
Baby Smiling In Back Seat
The New Life of Nancy
The Maniacal Mommy

Save it!!!

If you have an essay to do, please please don't just hit save and think that it has been saved!!

I had someone in tears today in the library because they didn't specifically save their work to their memory stick, they just hit "save as" and kept pressing return and simply assumed that they'd be able to find it again.

Not so. We had great fun trying to find this document again, we even had one of the IT guys down in the library trying to find this document, all without success. It's one of those things like keeping duplicate copies on a different file, we all know we are supposed to do it, but how many of us actually go to the bother of making another file?

I did feel sorry for this student and did my best to help her out, but there really was no denying that her work was gone. I have actually been in that position myself - years and years ago at university when I managed to lose some work right before I had to hand in the essay. Of course, it's a valuable (if unnecessary) lesson to learn as I never did anything so silly again!

So please! Make sure you save it where you know you can find it!

Anyway. My recent ICLW comments are...

Where's my two lines?

Chronicles of...

Waiting on Life

Mustard Seed Baby

Our Way to Happily Ever After

Naturally Knocked Up

Alicia Pieces of Me

Our Life in a Nut Chell

The Not So Secret Life of Us

Life Induces Thoughts, Mostly Random

My Life Crazy as it may Seem

The Infertile Mermaid

Maybe I will have a Glass

Hope Springs Infertile

MusicMakerMomma

Christmas Cards

Today I am taking part in a Christmas homemade-handmade bloggie carnival as hosted by Antique Mommy. I've never taken part in a carnival before, but it's a good idea as it gets a lot of people blogging on the same topic and all the posts can be found in one place. (of course, that only works if everyone joins in!!)

Anyway, I have been making what feels like hundreds of Christmas cards for an upcoming craft fair where I work and here is a selection of the range that I shall be selling!

As I couldn't possibly describe how to make each and every one as I'd be here all day, there is one that I want to focus on though as I rather liked this one. Oh, I like them all, but this one is relatively simple yet very effective.

1) Grab yourself a card blank

2) Lightly draw a circle in the top two thirds of the card

3) Stamp a greeting in the middle

4) Punch out several shapes from different coloured paper. I've gone for a variety of green paper and have used my star punch, but you could use a simple round punch, or perhaps jazz it up at bit with a snowflake punch?

5) Using glue and foam pads simply layer the punched out shapes around the circle so that some lie flat against the paper and some stand out from the circle.

6) Finally, tie yourself a ribbon, red works well with green! But it will depend on your tastes and what colours you have already chosen.

And there you have it, a little card that is quite easy to make and you could sit down of an evening and make a few of these!! Nothing too time consuming or requiring lots of colouring in or embossing, and yet, don't you think that it looks pretty?!

And by the way, some crazy woman is giving away a craft stamp every day for the rest of November!! So, go and check out Bootiful Stampz if you want to be in with a chance of winning a stamp for your cards!

Incidentally, my latest ICLW comments are....

Life with the Georgia Reiniches
An Equation of Hope
It is Tuesday, Right?
Dreams come True Sometimes
That's My Answer
Bloorb
Loving Thee....and More
Along Life's Little Journey
Ordinary Exultations
Breeder Beware
Inconceivable
Blogfight
Off my Mind, but from my Heart
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Pampers

Cats....

....know how to make themselves comfortable despite whatever you may be doing, and so for Show and Tell I am going to show you just what Phoebe did!

It is fortunate that my laptop has a built in camera cos I was able to take these few photos!!

I was in the middle of writing an email to my middle brother when Phoebe wanted a cuddle, and she clearly saw that my lap was full of laptop so she decided to climb on my chest. I was actually somewhat slumped down on the armchair as I don't think that she would have tried this otherwise!

She is still here as I type this up the night before Show and Tell and this is probably an indication of how accommodating I am and how much I don't mind if the cat sits on me!! Fortunately I can still see the screen and can touch-type so I don't mind in the least; we are keeping each other warm on this cold night when all the weather forecasters are giving weather warnings of snow and ice and all things cold!

She finally got comfortable and settled down in a suitable position (i.e. her posterior wasn't in my face!!)

And if you want to take part in Show and Tell or see what other people have got to tell us, then do go and visit Show and Tell!!

Finally - today's ICLW comments were....

Vickie Press
Nervous Breakdowns are Highly Underrated
Fighting Infertility
The Idle Mind of Beth
One Small Wish
Preheated Oven - where is my bun?
Junebug's Musings
Infertility Podcast and Blog
In Pursuit of Parenthood
Mommy Confessions
The Great Big If
From Such Great Heights

Mystery Tour

Did you know that it was possible to take a mystery tour in your own home town!?

I did one today when I wanted to drive across town from one craft shop to another and due to various reasons I don't normally visit them both on the same day and so I didn't know how to drive directly from one to the other.

I could have beetled down the motorway or driven up and around town, but why do that when there must be an easier way across town ? Well, needless to say I saw parts of town I had never seen before and I am quite positive that I still managed to take the longer route rather than the short! I kind of aimed the car in more or less the right direction and hoped that I got there.

I had no idea quite where I would pop out but I hoped that it would be close to the craft shop. As it was I ended up coming out on the bypass exit just above the one needed for the shop, so it was just a matter of driving down the road and turning off again.

It was certainly all very interesting and I was never worried about getting totally lost! How could you possibly get utterly lost in your own town anyway?!?

P.S. My laptop is behaving itself beautifully today, so yesterday must have been a momentary aberration or at least I hope it was!!

Today's ICLW comments are...

Be Still and Know
Tales of the Phoenix
The Long Journey
Blissful Body Yoga Blog
Sippy Cups are Not for Starbucks
Letting It Out
Our Journey to Baby
Getting There
BarrenAlbion
White Picket Fences
Infertile Myrtle

Uh-oh

My laptop keeps messing me about this evening, I may have to call Dell tomorrow and see what they can do for me....this may well cut short my NaBloPoMo efforts.

Still, as this is a relatively new laptop I should be able to get the problem sorted out, whatever it is. I shall certainly be making a mega fuss if Dell wont sort it out.

Fingers crossed everybody!! But at the moment, after several efforts to restart my laptop, it seems to be working.

P.S. Nearly forgot allll about ICLW - I joined again for November to poke around some other blogs and get a few comments!! I commented on these ones today.....

Peachy

Life and Love in the Petri Dish

In Due Time

My Little Drummer Boys

Gas Passer aka UUER

Stop the Train, I wanna Get Off

Journey of Faith

Trying to Make Three

ISO the Golden Egg

Seriously?

As you can see, I am attempting to go for Iron Commentator Status!!