Lovely as a tree

The challenge on this week's Tuesday Taggers is to take our inspiration from a poem. Given that I love trees, I couldn't fail to be inspired by a poem about that very subject - "Trees" by Alfred Joyce Kilmer, an American journalist, lecturer and poet. "Trees" is probably his most well known poem.

I printed the poem on to a shaped cutout from the Artylicious Essence of Nature CD rom and composed my card around it. The base of the card is covered with matching paper from the CD. I stamped an Elusive Images tree on the top part and mounted the poem along with two tree images from the Crafty Individuals Miniatures book Nature's Beauty.

For the stopper, I cut a branch and leaves from Grungeboard and coloured them with Promarkers.

Here's the finished card. I really enjoyed making this one!

Well, I'm back

Had a great week up in Dumfriesshire. My daughter's house is in a rural area, overlooking fields. Just down the road there's a loch with a ruined castle. Buzzards and geese fly overhead. It's really peaceful and quiet, and the air is clean and fresh. I love it there. Not so quiet and peaceful inside the house, of course! Ewan, my elder grandson, who's 5 (going on 25!) will be starting big school this week.

We took him to buy his new school uniform, and I managed to persuade him (with some difficulty!) to model it for some photos so that I could bring them back home to show his granddad. He looks so grown up in it.

His little brother, Andrew, aged nearly 19 months, wanted in on the act, so he put on Ewan's school cap and had his picture taken too!

We had a trip to the Glasgow Science Centre, which was brilliant. There was so much to see and do that we couldn't get round it all in a day. By mid afternoon we were all suffering from sensory overload. Ewan's favourite thing was the model crane which could be operated just like a real one. He went on that several times.
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Andrew loved the tunnel slide.

I liked the magic mirrors which made me look tall and thin (well, ok, thinner, they were magic mirrors, not miracle mirrors), but I didn't get a picture of those. It was a great day out. Ewan said it was his best day out EVER. A return visit will definitely be on the agenda.

At the weekend we went to a farmers' market. There was a woman there demonstrating needle felting, something I've never tried before. She had done some lovely pictures and cards with it. I was dying to have a go. My daughter bought me a kit for my birthday, which isn't until October, but she said I could use it now. (So watch this space!)

Have done very little cardmaking over the holidays so far, and I'm getting withdrawal symptoms, but am determined to finish my craft stuff reorganisation. Not much left to do now. I have managed to make a bit more working space on my desk, by finding somewhere else for my printer to live, and a few other bits and pieces. I'm sure that my disappearing mojo of late has been due to the fact that I've felt constrained by the lack of space (not to mention falling over the stuff on the floor every time I stood up!) so I'm hoping that my new arrangement will kickstart it again.

Today Sally and I had a get-together with Lesley (Craftimamma) at Sally's house. It was lovely to meet Lesley for the first time, and we had a great afternoon, showing and telling, and having a good old natter. It felt as though we had been friends for years. Sally gave us a delicious lunch, with one of her fabulous coffee and walnut cakes. Yum! Lesley and I were very good and managed to resist a second helping, but only just.

Well, I didn't intend this to be such a long post, but it's so nice to get back to the blogging. I'll try & catch up with everyone else's over the next few days. I can't believe how quickly the holidays are going. Only a week and a half left before we go back to school. I really must make a start on the kitchen before then....

So that's where my desk is!

The decluttering is going well. Most of my craft stuff is stored in the spare bedroom, as my work room is too small to hold much and still leave room to work in. I can now see the spare room carpet, and the bed! Three bags of rubbish went to the tip (yes, three!). Old magazines and stash I no longer need went to fellow crafters. Strangely, there doesn't seem to be any more room in the cupboards, but at least everything is tidy now and I know where it all is. Not quite finished yet, but enough done to make me feel a lot better.

I have also managed to make a bit of space on my desk, just in time. A friend who has recently had a bereavement asked me to make her a set of thank you cards, and she needed them quickly. So yesterday I made 15 cards, which must be a record for me all in one day! She asked me to deliver them through her letterbox, so not knowing how far they'd have to fall I thought they'd better go in a box to protect them. Didn't have one suitable, so I made one.

The brief was: Irises, shades of lilac/purple, black borders, and MS doily lace punch. Not having time to do lots of colouring, I used a printed picture of irises from the Dreamy Flowers CD by Hinny Bop Designs, and a Penny Black iris stamp. The sentiment is a very old one from Make Your Mark. I covered the box with some wrapping paper bought quite some time ago from Ikea.

My daughter and family are coming to stay overnight tonight on their way back from holiday, and then on Sunday I'm going up to Scotland to stay with them for a few days. After all my hard work of the past few weeks, I'm really looking forward to the break. Not that it will be a rest with my two young grandsons around (aged 5 years and 18 months) but we always have lots of fun. Because they live so far away we don't see nearly enough of them so any time spent with them is precious. They grow up far too quickly.

When I come home, my next job is to make a start on decluttering the kitchen. Hmm.....