WOYWW - First week of holidays!

Good morning deskers. You will be proud to know that my playroom has had a thorough clean. It took 3 day but it is such a great feeling to work in a clean room! The desk might not look very clean, but I assure you that it is only the left overs from recent play times and most of it has been cleaned already. You will see curtain hooks from a curtain that has been finished and is hanging already. Some pink vinyl from some signs I made for mt daghter's business and no, those are not potato chipsm that is my pencil bag!

 I gave myself a family photo shppt for Christmas and those beautiful photo's sparked the scrapbooking bug again. I forgot how relaxing and fulfilling scrapbooking can be.

 The first one is of me and all my children and grandchildren. Love having those.

 Next one is of my two youngest. They are 22 months apart and after 28 years I can not remember them ever fighting about anything. They are each other's best friends and I just LOVE watching the two of them together. They make me laugh every day.

The last one is of my son with all his nieces and nephews. They juat adore their 'omie'. He gives the best gifts, he understands them and is the only single man I know that has the guts to take 5 kids on an outing and have them beg for more when he takes them home
I am off with DH to go and do some Christmas shopping. Wish me luck.
Happy WOYWW. I will visit a little later. Enjoy the rest of this week.

WOYWW - Long time no see!

 I am back after a very long absence. It is finally the official end of the school year over here and I am on holiday for the next 5 weeks! YAY!!!! It has been a VERY hard and long year, but I am proud to announce that I survived. This post is very photo heavy, so I won't blame anybody that gives up before the end

 This is my 'workdesk 'for today. My dining room table. I am making new curtains for our bedroom. Mine looks like the hair on a dogs back. Completely disintegrated in the last wash. Nothing can withstand the African sun.

 On my real desk, minus the tablecloth that is in the wash after my big start to the holiday clean up, are the images that I coloured in the last few days, waiting patiently to go onto cards.

A bigger view of the desk. A pile of kits to do some scrapbooking. I am waiting for photo's from the family photo shoot that was my gift to myself this Christmas. You can see a canvas with a vinyl design on, ready to go to my classroom library next year and for those eagle eyed among you.. did you spot the box for my external hard drive? Yes, I did, I backed up all my digital designs and photo's. Are you proud of me?
About two weeks ago, we had a devastating storm, that blew the roof with some trusses off the school across the road from my house. The wind was so strong that it blew the sheets of corrugated iron over two buildings, across the road and onto our roof! Very scary stuff. My DH went to check on Google earht and according to them it was 150 m.

 Those sheets of corrugated iron sliced through some of our trees and some landed on the fence between our house and the neighbours house.

 The tree came crashing down on the fence, taking the electric fencing with it.

 One of the roof trusses landed squarly on our roof, shattering four roof tiles that came crashing through the ceiling in my bedroom.

 All the water coming through caused serious water damage to the carpet. Thank goodness we are insured,

It has been quite an ordeal, but thank goodness nobody was injured and all the rest can be fixed.
I have really missed my visits to all of you deskers at WOYWW and can not wait to see you all later.
Have a great week everybody.

WOYWW - I cleaned!

Good morning all the wonderful people from WOYWW and everybody else who happens to pop in. I am having a busy, but wonderful holiday. I am colouring up a storm, finishing some long forgotten projects and slowly, but surely getting to a point where all that was stolen from us has been replaced. At least I have an ID card now, so the next step is to apply for a new drivers license.

As you can see from the desk, I have had a major clean. It is so wonderful to actually have some space to work!

 I have been colouring some images by Tanya OÇonnor, a local artist who sells the most amzing adult colouring books. These ladies are going onto cards soon. I am also working on some thank you cards that are going to a wedding as part of the table decorations. All cut and ready to assemble in a while.

 A friend asked me to do some family quotes for her photo wall (about 3 months ago!) and I finally got round to doing them. Good thing my friends are an understanding and patient bunch.

I did manage to visit everybody two weeks ago when I last played and hope to do the same this week, but first I have a meeting with the new leaders of our school, to plan their year of office.
Have a fantastic day everybody, I am enjoying this second day of Spring.

WOYWW - Finally!!! I have time to play!

I was going to start this weeks post by telling you why I was away for so long. How very busy I have been and how bad my life is. How we have been burgled twice in two weeks and.... and then I took these photo's. I had a good look at them and realised that I am so very blessed. Blessed to have the wonderful DH who allows me to feed my hobby and that enables me to have an incredible craft room. I call this my happy place and sometimes, when life is really hectic, I just sit there and look at all the pretty rainbows and feel instantly better.

A lot has changed since the last time I came over to visit. A local scrapbooking store closed down (yes, very sad) and I was able to pick up another paper rack for a steal. I moved my computer desk into my play room, so that I can do everything in the same place. I also got a new printer. Love it! 

From this view you can see my new paper rack and my improved ribbon storage. When my DH made the first one (the right side), he told me I would never be able to fill it, so, I took that as a challenge and had to! What else is a girl to do? DH and his friend made me another and the middle section to store my punches. The comment this time? I am sure you will be able to fill it, but please try not to. LOL!! 

With this beautiful place to play, where do I work? In the lounge, on my fold down table (that DH made for me!), next to him, so that we can chat and solve all our problems in front of the TV. 

So, you see, I do not have a bad, busy, crazy life. I am incredibly blessed!

Have an amazing week, I am on holiday and without my car, so I will be visiting everybody this week!

WOYWW Loving my mid term breaak!

Good afternoon to all you beautiful desk stalkers out there! It is very cold here, I am wrapped in a blanket while I write this post. It has been a wonderful week for me so far. I am on mid term break from school and should have been marking exam papers, but my craft room was feeling very neglected, so I decided to play a little in stead.

As you can see, my desk looks terrible, but that's OK, I had fun. 

I also spent some time with some of ,my very favourite people in the whole world. Three of my grandies went with me yesterday to see Disney on Ice. It was fantastic! The littlest grandie declared me the best granny in the whole world when she got back. She told her mother she didn't like it, she LOVED it! LOL Makes me feel rather good. 

Remember to pop in to see Julia and to pay a visit to all the other WOYWW ers out there.

WOYWW - Working like a demon!

Good afternoon all you lovely people! Since last week I have marked one set of exam papers, gone on a school sports tour and spent some time with DH over the long weekend we had over here in South Africa. Been crazy busy, but I rewarded myself with some time in my play room to colour after finishing the exams, that is why my desk is looking like a tip!  

 

The first card is one that I finished a while ago. The image was quite a challenge, but I enrolled for the monthly create and Learn classes over at Kit and Clowder and even though I thought I was quite adept with my beloved Copic markers, I have learned so much from Alyce. Easy to follow video's and written instructions to follow and best of all? She gives the most wonderful feedback when you get stuck!

 

 The next card is one done with an image I coloured a while ago. No time to make cards, but always able to find some time to colour! The end result is a mountain of coloured images and an empty card box.

 And here is the results of my reward to myself. It took a very long time, but I am loving it so far. Now for those storm clouds in the background, yikes! If they turn out half decent, I will show you all next week. Now I am off to cook and then its back to marking the next set of exam papers.

Tomorrow morning My grandie is doing her first violin exam and she was adamant that I have to take her. She says mom makes her too nervous. LOL Wish me luck!
Remember to visit queen Julia to see all the wonderfully creative people from all over the world show off their amazing work desks, most of them a lot neater and far more inspiring than mine!

WOYWW - can you say bad day?

Good 

Good  evening all! I started this post last night and then disaster struck! I got up to fetch my camera and bumped my cup of coffee. Murphy's law happened. Yip! It spilled the entire cup on my laptop! I grabbed every piece of tissue I could find and tried to get rid of all the liquid, but.... It died! 

I was distraught! Not only did I want to slap myself for being so stupid, but DH was going to kill me! I went to bed and said a little prayer. Took it to school today and asked the wonderful Vuyo from our help desk to do a miracle! Well, she did!! My baby is alive! Not well, but alive! All my files could be recovered, but she had to revert to factory settings which means all my Apps are gone. I spent the most part of the afternoon reloading them, so I am almost ready to go.

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Thought I would show you the finished project from last week, the one I nearly gave up on. Seems quite appropriate for the day I have had.  My desk is a mess as you can see and then just to gain a little sympathy, I am showing you my desk at school whith all those exam papers that need marking. 

Happy WOYWW everybody.

WOYWW - Thoughts on missing my mother.

Well hallo there. Long time no see. I have been neglecting all of you and my poor dear blog for quite some time. I really missed my weekly Wednesday fix of desk snooping and visiting over a cup of tea. But alas, life just got to me. School has been crazy busy. Family life has taken its toll and my desk became a dumping ground with absolutely nothing creative happening.

 I realised that the main reason for my bad moods was the fact that I have also neglected me. I NEED to be creative. I need to go into my play room and just be by myself for a while and play with my beloved Copics and my pretty papers and recharge my soul. So that's what I did! I got myself a colouring book for adults and boy am I having fun! I have also made some good luck cards for some of my girls that are starting exams on Friday.

This is one of the pages I am working on. Love this and plan to frame it and hang it in my class room when I am done. 

Have a great week everybody. I will be around to visit as soon as I can.

Warning: Personal ramblings to follow. Stop reading if you just came to see the desk.

This year it is 13 years since my mother passed away. I can hardly believe that it has been so long already. I can still remember the day she died so vividly. I can still feel the pain, the absolute devastation, the feeling of being so very alone without my confidant, my role model, my best friend and my adviser.
I remember asking my dad shortly after that day if the pain ever goes away and his honest answer that he really did not know. He thought it might get better after 28 years and the realisation that it was 27 years since his mom passed. So, after 13 years, I am not even half way to 28 years. The pain is not so unbearable any more and I have more good than bad days.
I firmly believe that she is always around. I often talk to her and sometimes she opens doors. There is one door in my class that opens every time I tell the girls a story about what 'The wise old lady' as they refer to her, would do or say. She really was the wisest person I ever knew and when I have to talk to the girls and give advice about things, I always seem to quote her. It has become a standing joke in class. The girls will often tell me: "Mevrou, your mom is here" and point to the cupboard door that has mysteriously opened.
These last few days have been very hard. I miss her so very much. If you are lucky enough to still have your mother, get up now, hug her, phone her, tell her how much you love her.

Sweet 7 Challenge 11 - Lucky Gold

Welcome to the Sweet 7 Challenge for March. This month the challenge is Lucky Gold. You can do anything that fits the challenge, make a good luck card, Create a leprechaun card for St. Patric's day or anything else in between. This month our wonderful sponsor Bugaboo stamps has given me this beautiful image to play with.

 It is public speaking season at school and one of my girls is going to represent our school at a very prestigious evening where she has to give a prepared speech and do an unprepared speech. I thought this little man would be the perfect image for the occasion.

  I wanted to give her a few chocolates too, To calm the nerves, so I decided to make this very cute pillow box. The box and the images were cut with my Silhouette. The image was coloured with my beloved Copic markers and the papers are all from my stash.

The Copics used were: Skin E04, E11, E21, E01, E000 and R20
The greens were G21, G24 and G28
The hat band and shoes were W09. W07, W05 and W03
The buckle was Y21 and Y23

Please join us in the challenge blog over at Sweet 7 Designs and enter your own creation for the chance of winning some super digi stamps from Bugaboo. Good luck everybody.

Sweet 7 Designs challenge #10 - Puppy Love

Welcome to the February challenge on the Sweet 7 Design blog. This month the challenge is 'Puppy Love'. I just adore this image from Bugaboo stamps, our sponsor. It is called Girl puppy love and can be found here. You can make a card or any other project featuring puppy love. 

I really enjoyed colouring her with my beloved Copic markers. The papers are from my stash. I used a die to cut the circle and scalloped circle and then added some flatback pearls from my stash. Some white seam binding from White Orchid and a gem brad finished the card off beautifully
I know that I have been very quite for a while, but as always svhool is very busy. Our swimming coach broke her foot just before school started this year and she was not able to accompany the girls on the annual tour to Natal to swim the Midmar mile. I was asked to step in and go with the girls, quite funny because I can not even swim LOL, but she is my friend, so off I went with a busload of teenage girls.
They really are a very special group of young ladies and it was a pleasure, if somewhat tiring. They all completed the swim successfully. Some very tired girls and a very tired teacher at school today, but it is at times like these that i am reminded why I love being a teacher~

Please visit thw blog and enter the challenge, we would love to se you all there!

WOYWW - School starts today!

Good morning everybody. It is very early over here on the first day of the new school year, so there is no telling how much time I will have to play and visit. One of my New Years resolutions is to make a concerted effort to make time for me and my creative endeavors this year. We will see if that will be possible, but I will die trying, because I really too strain last year from work, work, work and no play.

For al the WOYWWW visitors, I will try my best to visit as many of you as is humanly possible. Feeling very proud of myself because I got to visit and comment on everybody's blogs by Thursday last week.

 

 My desk is a mess, I was trying to do as much as I can, before school started. You will see my beloved Copics, some gold cardstock (I can not remember why I bought it, but its sooo pretty! LOL). one of my class files from Kit and Clowder and some works in progress. Actually, now that I look carefully, it really is not THAT bad, at least all signs of Christmas has been removed.

 This is one of the cards that I finished. This image reminds me of my granddaughter, Tertia-Lee and her violin, so this is a card I made for her to tell her just how proud I am of how Much time she puts into this passion of hers.

This silly photo was taken by my son. He grabbed my camera when he heard me complain that I have no photo to submit for my Design Team. Can you believe it? Obviously the selfie bug has not hit me yet. He followed me around for about half an hour and we were goofing around. Some of those 'model photo's' I will never be able to share in public, but this one made me smile.
Happy WOYWW!
For those of you starting a busy new school year, I feel your pain,.

Sweet 7 Designs Challenge #9 - Anything New

Happy New Year to all of you and welcome to the first challenge for the New Year over at Sweet 7 Designs. - this month the challenge is Anything new. We are honoured to be sponsored by Bugaboo stamps this year.
You can make a card for a new baby, new year, new job, new school year, anything new that takes your fancy. I decided to use Beautiful Fairy for my card.

 She really is beautiful and I loved colouring her. The crystal ball was coloured first and then given a layer of Diamond Stickles and then some Dimensional Glaze to make it look like a real crystal ball. Her wings were glitterified (is that even a word? LOL) too.

The background was woven with blue and purple ribbon from my stash. The flowers are from my stash too. I think the big one is a Prima one and the others from Wild Orchid Crafts.

These are the Copics I used for my image. This is my first time ever to be on a desin team and I am so honoured to be part of this talented group of ladies. Please stop by the Sweet 7 Design blog to meet the new design team and see all the wonderful creations by the team.

Looking forward to see your entries.

Saturated Canary GDT Call - A dream

In my classroom I always tell my girls: If your dream does not scare you, you are not dreaming big enough! I decided to follow my own advice and to apply for a position on the Saturated Canary GDT. Just typing that scares me, Why? Do you ask. Well, because for me it would be the hugest ever dream come true. Krista must be one of my all time favourite digi stamp designers. Her images are so amazing, I own more of them than I actually should and being able to be on the team!?  The ultimate in achieving a dream 

Thia is one of her newest stamps that are available as part of a bundle released to celebrate the new year. You can find them here. I coloured her with my beloved Copic markers. She was cut out with a circle die. The papers are gorgeous handmade papers from my stash. The ribbon is also from my stash and I have had it for a very long time, saving it for just the right image. 

As you can see, I kept the card fairly simple, because the image is so gorgeous, I did noy want anything to detract from it.

Wish me luck friends. If you don't try, you will never know.

WOYWW - playing with abandon!

Good morning all! It is my last Wednesday of holidays so I am planning a lazy day playing with stuff. Not planning anything, just playing with whatever takes my fancy.  My desk is a little cleaner, but to my horror I noticed the Christmas wrapping paper only after I took the photo. My beloved opics are there because I was cleaning them and refilling before I started working on my classes.

 

 I bought a few (OK many!) classes from the very talented Alyce from Kit and Clowder. I am busy on the skin and hair class and hope to finish it before I go back to school. For those of you that are interested in learning how to use Copics, or any other colouring medium like pencils and distress ink, Alyce's classes are just amazing. What sets them apart from all other classes I have done, is Alyce and her personal involvement in your growth. She gives the most helpful and constructive feedback on each piece of work you upload. Even though I am Copic certified, I feel like I am only now starting to be truly confident. Sorry, blabbing a bit, moving on now.

 This is my work space, for now, watching the class videos and doing some colouring. My coffee is finished, time for a new one.

 I told you I was playing. Made my own chalkboard paint and tested it on wood, cardboard and glass. Works like a charm! Also marked my file with a vinyl sign cut with my Silhouette.

 Finally, I wanted to show you the lovely card I received from my online friend Janina who lives in Uitenhage. She sent a whole lot of awesome goodies too, but this card is just gorgeous, don't you think?

I hope you have all had an amazing week and don't forget to join in the worlds biggest blog hop over at Julia's