WOYWW - Not very much.

 Good morning to all the wonderful people from WOYWW and all other visitors. I am afraid there really is absolutely nothing on m y desk this morning. School started yesterday for the last term of the year and I cleaned my desk after my last little bit of holiday crafting. So no desk this morning, but I am showing you the fruits of my labour. There they all are, sewing completed. Even though I was complaining about having to sew these costumes (can you tell they are doing the Jailhouse Rock?) I am actually quite proud of myself now that they are done. I am sure the professionals out there will be able to point out some mistakes, but did you see the stripes actually match? Very impressive, don't you think?

 I finally used my new Tilda stamp too. The dress form is from a local company Fab Scraps. Lace is from my mothers stash, flowers and ribbon from my stash and she was coloured with my beloved Copics, of course.

 I went to Hobby ex this last week and although I was a bit disappointed, I did manage to buy a new stamp and embossing combo from Sizzix. AND..... I blame it on all of you, I broke down and bought some distress inks! The jury is still out on that one. I prefer the one I coloured with my Copics, but it was quite fun to do.

Well, thats all folks. Gotta run, school starts soon and I have to pick up the grandies and do the school run. Have a great day and a fantastic week.

WOYWW 170 - Sewing!

 I am sewing! I HATE sewing! Remember those concert costumes my wonderful grandie1 volunteered me for? Well, I could no longer ignore the huge pile of fabric, they have dress rehearsal next week and my school starts next Tuesday (where did that months holiday go?), so yesterday I spent most of the day cutting and todat is the day those jumpsuits are going to be made. I will finish them, even if it kills me, but today is the day.
Some random family ramblings to follow, so if you are from WOYWW, this is where you can stop reading if you wish.

 I rarely post about my personal life or my family, but this weekend I was reminded of just how very lucky I am. My dear dad's side of the family started to have a family reunion 27 years ago. Every first weekend in September the whole family gets together for a weekend. He was one of 9 children, so every 9th year we (my brother, my sister and I) have to arrange the weekend. When my parents passed, I missed a few, not because I didn't want to go, but because I was just too sad to be there without them. This weekend was arranged by the two middle cousins on the photo. Susan and Hennie. Then there's me on the right and my all time favourite cousin, Susan. There were over a 100 people there! All related to us.

 On this photo are my dads surviving sisters, The oldest is the little old lady in the front, Tannie Bella, she is 86. They are fondly known as the 'oermense' (the ancients) We always have some sort of competition on the weekend and this weekend we had to do a Spring table. The whole family helped. DD1, Karin, could not be there because she had 8 cakes to deliver, so she sent the centre piece, a flowerpot cake and enough cupcakes for the whole family. DD3, Ankie, and grandie2, Hannah, helped set ihe tyable. We won 3rd prize.

 Why third, you ask? well the judges, the ancients (who are ruthlessLOL) felt that we were trying to bribe them with the cupcakes, they said that it was wastefull to mess paint on a tablecloth (I handpainted the tablecloth years ago) and that it was just plain wrong to stab perfectly healthy fruit (we made mini fruit sosaties!) So you see, its all rigged and we each get a turn to win, but it is great fun.
At one stage during the weekend I was sitting there, watching my two youngest play volley ball with the children, My grandies were off with some of the other cousins' grandies playing all over and the new babies were all laughing and shrieking with joy and suddenly my eyes were leaking (like my grandie would say) I felt so grateful, so humbled to be able to be part of this wonderful group of people that love me unconditionally, that know all my shortcomings and still love me. I am so grateful that my grandies get to experience this and be aware that they are part of so much more than just us and their parents and their immediate cousins.
Have a great week and I will try my level best to visit all of you for the 4th week in a row!

WOYWW 169 - I had a play date!

 Good morning to all the wonderful people from WOYWW and the rest of the world. I am very proud to report that I had my first play date in my playroom last night. My friend Audrey came over to scrap and we had such fun. I actually scrapped a double LO too, I can not believe it, its the first LO of grandie nr.4, Liam, and he is almost 2 already! Even prouder to report that I actually cleaned up after myself before I went to bed. So the only things you will see on my desk this morning is the completed LO waiting to be filed and some cards I needed to take photo's of to show you.

 The first two cards are digi stamps from Whimsy, Are they not just adorable? The cardstock for all the cards are Bazzil, the dp for this one has no name on and I can't remember where I got it. I used a Martha Stewart punch, the flowers are mostly from Wild Orchid crafts and of course all the images were coloured with my beloved Copics.

 This paper (another no name brand) was so beautiful, I did not want to cover it with embellishments, so I just lifted some designs on the paper and added tiny little roses/

The next photo does not show up for me, so I hope you can see it. It is a Magnolia image, dp is from Upikit, a local company, and the lace and flowers are from Wild Orchid Crafts.
Have an absolutely amazing week and I hope to visit all of you again (I am very proud that I managed to visit everybody again last week!!)

I finished the whole lot!

 I was telling you all on Wednesday that I was busy making invitations for grandie nr3, Tertia-Lee's, birthday. A whole 40 of them! They are done, finish en klaar, like we say over here in South Africa. I am so happy with them It makes me happy just looking at them all lined up on my craft table.

 This is what it looks like closed and packaged, ready for delivery.

And this is what it looks like when you open them.  All the cardstock is Bazzil, the patterned paper I can not remember (sorry, will add later) The stamp is of course one of my favourite Magnolias coloured with my beloved Copic markers.
I used: For the jumpsuit: All the Cool greys, from Coo, C03,05,07 and 09
           The reds: R17,27 and 43
           Skin colour: E000, 00,11 and R20
           Hair: Y000, 11 and 21
The flowers and ribbon are from my stash and the little ladybirds were found at a local craft store. I used a punch for the leaf and white oval, a Nestie for the scalloped oval and a freebie stamp for the the ladybirds on the ovals. The ladybirds were also glitterified with my red Spica.
I am entering this in the Copic Oz winter challenge, because I think Tilda looks as snug as a bug in that outfit.
Now its onto the next major project. My grandson, grandie nr1, volunteered me to make some costumes for his school concert. Do not smirk! I am dieing here, I haven't sewn in years and the pattern that came home is definately not complete, just random pieces of newspaper, I have to make jumpsuits, 7 of them!!!! I could do with some help over here, and I am willing to feed you well.

WOYWW - Behold, a thing of beauty!

 Just looking at the picture, makes me smile. It took two whole days, from 6 till late and a little more on the third day, . I thought my back was going to break, I had muscle pains in places I did not even know I had places, but it was all worth the effort, Just look at my beautiful craftroom. Everything in its place and colour co-ordinated too! I love, love, love just going in there and looking at everything, and working is such a pleasure!

 Another view of my beautiful room and here you can also see the reason for the post, the wonderful WOYWW blog hop. My desk where I am busy making invitations for grandie no.3, Tertia-Lee's birthday party in October. I know its very early, but when school starts, there just is no time to do anything. Everything is cut, stuck on glue dots, ready to go and has double sided tape on. All that still needs to be done is the scoring for the bases.

 I had strict instructions about these invites. It had to be a ladybird, and it had to open and have flapping wings!!! I could not think how to do that, so I had to come up with something that she would approve of. Made a protorype (Thank goodness for this Magnolia stamp!) and took it to her for approval. She loved it, so now I am making 40 of them.

 Yes, you heard right, 40!!! What was I thinking?? I do love them though and she is my granddaughter, so...
excuse me please, I have some invitations to make before I leave to go to grandie no 2's school to hear her recite a poem during their morning assembly.

This is what the invitation looks like when it is closed. I am thinking of putting the name on the red piece, what do you think?
Thank you so much to all of you for your kind comments on my blog last week. I am happy to report that I managed to visit every single one on the list and leave a comment! Lets see what happens this week.

WOYWW I am so late.

I am so very late today, and not just for WOYWW either. I was lying in bed this morning, reading my book and planning my WOYWW post when my phone started ringing. It was the chairlady of the school's Student Representative Council. She wanted  to know if I was still coming with them for the yearly outing to Gold Reef City (a local amusement park).  I told her that I definately would be there at 9, because the park only opens at 10 and it is about 30 minutes drive from the school. She said: "Mevrou, we are all at school already, we were supposed to leave at 7h30.' I nearly died right there and then, told her to give me 20 minutes and went into full scale freak out mode!!! I HATE being late for anything. I think it is just plain rude and disrespectful towards other people, so you can just think how I felt.

It  took me a whole 15 minutes to bath, wash and dry my hair and drive to school. The girls luckily had a sense of humour and were very amused to find out their teacher can be human too.

 So, thats why I could not post this morning as planned. Some of you might remember that I was 'thrown out' of my craftroom when my DD moved back home in November, well, she has since found a flat near her school and has moved out again, so I get to move back into my craftroom. Yay! I decided that all the missmatched furniture needed a whitewash to make them look the same and the painter finished painting today while I was out. The first picture is of the room that I used while DD was here with all my craft stuff piled on the floor.

 The next two pictures show my brand new (some of it very old LOL) painted furniture. I can not wait to start moving everything back in tomorrow and maybe I can even start creating by the weekend.

Remember to visit Julia, the queen of the WOYWWers and join in the fun of looking at all the wonderfully talented people the world over's desks.
Have a great week and maybe I will have something more interesting to show next week.

WOYWW - I am bacvk and freezing!!

Hallo to all. After an absence of three weeks I feel  like I should actually be introducing myself to all of you. You are here to see what is on my workdesk and I am afraid there is not much going on in the creative department over here, I have been incredibly busy with the election process of the new leaders at our school. Today was the official induction of the new group and a very, very sad farewell to the old group. After working so closely with this group of very special girls, I feel like I had to say good bye to my own children. The Mosaic cross you see in the photo was made for me by one of these girls. Bronwyn made it herself and being a crafter, I know just how very special it is to give somebody something that you have spent time making and poured a little of your soul into. I am so very blessed to recieve this and very humbled that she thinks I am worthy.

I have decided to show you what was on my diningroom table last week. Yes, I made them! Shocker to see me making things that go on top of cupcakes, I know. My poor daughter had so many orders that she had to hire a helper to help her finish all the cake orders and when I phoned to ask how she was getting on, she promptly burst into tears and told me that the helper burnt 6 dozen cupcakes and that she had to throw away all the teddies this lady had made, because they were so badly made. Now  don't get me wrong, I know my limitations when it comes to cakes, butr this was my child and I am creative (well, sort of) so I told her to bring some fondant and show me, I was willing to give it a try. I am quite proud of myself I must add, they were not too bad, at least she could use them.

This is the birthday cake she made for her sister, my youngest. She is besotted with Marilyn Monroe and asked for a black and white cake. I love it. The next cake was for one of my dear friends at school. She is the art teacher and turns 70 on Saturday! She is the youngest, hippest, 70 year old I know, so she could not have a cake fit for an old lady! This cake was a collaboration between two of my daughters. Ankie, the youngest, painted the 'canvas' and Karin the cake artist did the rest. Hazel absolutely loved it.

 This was a fairy cake for a 4 year old little girl. When the cake was delivered at the little girl's nursery school, one of the little boys came to my daughter and grabbed her leg, asking if the fairies were real. She says that is the best part of her job. 

 And just in case you were wondering about the title of my post, here is the proof! It is snowing over here in sunny South Africa!!!! Initially it was so exciting, as you can see from Ankie's face, but now, its just damn cold! I do not know how you guys in the rest of the world survive winters like this every year, I am in awe of your bravery!

Thats quite enough from me, stay warm wherever you are and remember to visit Julia and the rest of the WOYWWers.