The handmade pledge

As you can see I have tried to add the handmade pledge badge to the sidebar but I can't get rid of the text around it! I am not very handy with the old PC!!!! Any tips?! But I have joined the campaign to support all handmade industries including trying to make more of the gifts I give to people from now on. As a scrapper that shouldn't be too difficult should it?...or are you all like me, and once you have made something and feel pleased with it, you want to keep it yourself so you have to go off and make another one?!!!!! It is hard getting down to tidying up all the christmas papers etc ready to start a brand new scrapyear. I have to really throw out so much old stuff that I have no intention of using..........have gone off...............style has changed...........need to replace as it is too dated......................don't like it anymore....................all those excuses in order to justify buying NEW!!! I am dying to see what the new paper lines are going to be for 2008, and I am definitely wanting to get my hands on the grunge stuff asap. But I digress. Alesha won Strictly which she deserved to do but I felt more than a little sorry for Matt and Flavia who had to stand there with nothing. There should be a second place prize!!!! And a third for Gethin!!!! But it was a good show, and despite feeling very tired when it was all over, Ann and I managed to see it through to the bitter end, wondering what we are going to do with our saturday nights from now on!! There is hopefully a new season of MASTERCHEF coming up??? Tim and I love that one! And there is the search for an Oliver and a Nancy for a new production of Oliver Twist to look forward to ...but I am still a huge fan of the version starring Ron Moody and Oliver Reed ( fabulous) so am not too tempted to see this show at the moment. Could all change though! BUT! What I wanted to do now was wish you ALL a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS & A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

tonight's the FINAL!!!

So this is it! The nail-biting final of Strictly Come Dancing. Here are the two final couples from last weeks semi-final, looking gorgeous....but who is going to win? I really can't decide which pair will get my vote when it comes down to it. I love Alesha and Matthew but I am dying to see what Matt and Flavia can produce on the night. If they prove to be amazing, they could win. When it is down to a matter of votes, there is a real chance that it can go either way, so I think for the first time it is a real unknown outcome. Ann has already mailed me to see whether I am getting nervous! But it is only now that I have done all the chores for today, and am sitting here with little else to occupy my thoughts, that I am thinking about it all. So like possibly the whole of the UK, we will take our places shortly to watch a most incredible competition come to a dramatic close, and await the announcement of the winner later on tonight with apprehension and maybe, by then, an idea of whom we think did enough to win the glitterball trophy. Place your bets here!!!!!

West Friesland in the grip of frost!

I took these photos this morning before the lovely frost disappeared. The first one is of our church here in Westwoud, then the other two were taken as I was walking around the villages. The temperature was -2C at the time but by this afternoon it was above freezing and everything was returning to green...aah! Anyway, these will be great to scrap, and I hope my friend Ineke will take on the challenge to digitally scrap one of them for me!!!! She enjoys all the challenges she takes on via internet sites etc for digiscrappers and usually does very well with her layouts, so I think she will create something lovely with these. I will have to do the same and we can see what both of us come up with!! How about it Ineke?!

ITS SNOWING!!

At 10.36am the first snow started to fall here!! Not much, but it is here! I love it!!! Camera at the ready then today, as it might be the only chance I get to photograph the snow.

Shortest day of the year!!

What a strange feeling it is not to be rushing around getting the last minute christmas shopping etc! I feel wonderfully calm and unstressed....but I am missing all that SOoooo much!!! I have done Christmas for our family for so many years ( can't even remember how many) that NOT having to cook this time is kinda odd. Usually I am knee-deep in my Delia cookbook and old magazines which I dig out every year just for the recipes, re-making lists and adding new ones, polishing the silverwear, getting the table decorations ready..........playing the carols, drinking the sherry............its not normal!!!! It will be really nice being with other people this Christmas and we are all really looking forward to it a lot,so I am gritting my teeth and letting someone else have all that stress!! It is a white, cold world out there this morning. I was up at 6.30am adding the icing to Tim's traybake for school today, and it was dark then. Now it is around ten am and it is gorgeous! No snow yet, but it is getting closer. The sharp frost is the reason all is white. Lovely spiders webs out there which I have photographed of course, but am now in need of coffee to warm me up before I do anything with them! It is also sad to think that really I can start (thinking about) putting the christmas scrapstuff away for another year........ which is so sad! On the other hand it WILL mean that I need to visit the scrap shops for NEW STUFF!! Which I am going to do in January. First of all I am going to buy the wool for my 2 patterns which I am desperate to start knitting. Having looked here I have decided I need to buy that in England as I cannot find what I want for it here. Maybe in Hoorn there is the chance of finding it, but who knows....where is the shop?!! Oh no, the worst christmas song has come on the radio and I refuse to listen to it!

Sad to see her leave............

If everything went ok with the train journey Becci should now be in Schiphol checking in!! I took her to the train at 4pm and although I think she would have preferred me to drive her there I am so glad I didn't as the traffic jams were huge! Her flight is at 6.40pm so she has just enough time to eat her sandwich and wait for the call to board. She is excited to be seeing Roy again this evening as he will be home for Christmas as well. I took this photo of my children whilst she was home. Tim is 14 and very tall and Becci is 20 and very small!!! They enjoyed seeing one another again although Tim was at school all week and not really able to spend much time with her. Hopefully Becci and Roy will visit us in the spring...........

Brr, it is SO cold here at the moment! It hasn't got above -1.5C all day! We have discovered that our two bedrooms over the garage are NOT insulated at all and they are freezing cold!! I think we will wait until we want to remove the existing laminate flooring to re-insulate them though...we are lovely and snug up on the second floor even though we have no radiator etc.

I am about to make the dinner which will be left-overs from yesterday and then I will make the traybake for Tim to take to school tomorrow, watch Strictly and probbly make it an early night. I am waking and getting up around 5.30am at the moment which is not through choice but I am awake so it is difficult to just lie there listening to Peter snoring!!!! Isn't it sad about Gethin going out?! I can hardly bear to talk about it as if Kelly had been able to stay in the show he would have probably made the last 3 for the final, and now it is only two!! I feel he and Camilla deserved to be in the final over Matt. I stand by the fact that it is a dance competition and he is better than Matt. I wonder how Matt will fare in the final with 5 dances to perform including the show dance.................it is tough! Ann and I will be watching with bated breath but I now hope that if Alesha and Matthew really dance their socks off, that THEY WIN! That would be the right result don't you think/agree?..roll on Saturday!

Almost Christmas!

Listening to the radio playing a christmas song almost every other tune is quite nice really. Takes one back to ones youth thinking about the discos and parties etc we used to love! And of course I am from the era when we had SLADE; MUD; WIZARD etc ( even lived in the same village as Roy Wood once....) so they bring back vivid memories from the '70's...aah! Happy Days!!! Last night we had our christmas dinner with Ann and Arjan which was great. Felt really English!!!! The boys were excited about the fireworks for New Year and Peter found our stash from last year in the garage so it was 'share-out' on the floor time after the meal. Can't see it myself as I am not a lover of fireworks apart from fantastic professional displays (naturally). Since getting sick, I cannot go outside because of the smoke etc, so I only look at them from the window these days. Yesterday morning Jeanette was here for a workshop. She and Becci made beautiful stars for Christmas and I think it was a really nice morning. Jeanette is getting married on 28 December so she is going to come and make her album in January. Then it was cooking and preparing for the evening in the afternoon. It always goes so fast when Becci is here..............and she is going home today. Roy finishes university today so she is looking forward to being with him this evening. We are going to make a photo frame for him this morning after dyeing our hair!!!!! So I will go and wake her up now: me, I have done the washing up from yesterday, made a birthday card for Jackie, got Tim off to school, fed the cats, written my blog, put everything away, turned the dish washer on, tidied my room, and all before eight thirty am!!!! Time for a well deserved coffee!!!

fantastic blog!!!!

http://www.timholtz.typepad.com/ Just been looking at Tims blog and his 12 tags of christmas!! Wow! They are extraordinary. I love the distressing which is something I have yet to get in to really; looks like a lot of work and a lot of NEW tools etc!!!! (cue, ideas for presents Santa!!!) and that hammer is groovy!! I am not good at getting messy and dirty when I work but I know Loes is also keen to distress herself (ha!ha!) so I guess we are going to have to try it in 2008. Maybe that is what we should start the year off with: a list of what we plan to make and what we need to make it....and when we are going to do it!!! I am absolutely broke right now, and need to start doing more work in January but until then I can look, right?! It was great seeing all those different techniques all in one place so I recommend that you all take a moment to check Tim's tags out. And a goodnight to all.

Gethin to Win!!!!

Ok, I am finally naming my winner...........since it is the semi-final this coming Saturday there is no going back; Gethin and Camilla get my vote!!!! He has had the most incredible 'journey' in the series and is now stunning on the floor. Just goes to show what a little extra determination and a great acting coach can do for you!! So, GO GETHIN this weekend, Ann and I will be watching with bated breath! So, I have got a lot of cards made today and I have added the little bell circle to the ivy in the hall - looks sweet. I saw the idea in a shop recently but have taken it a step further and scrapped it in a funny sort of way...will take a photo, maybe. I wanted to make it myself so that I could remember it again when we want to make items for our Christmas shop next year! I still need to refine it and add the other sort of wire etc. and then it will be perfect. Just been browsing some other scrap blogs and there are SO many talented scrappers out there. Wonderful creations, but I want to say that I feel it is so important to stay true to ones own imagination and style and not to be tempted to copy (too closely) what one sees on the net. The ideas are there to be looked at and learnt from, if it is about a new technique etc. but the stuff that is in ones own head is always the best. Have the courage of your own skill, ideas, talents and colours and CREATE!!!!!!!!! Whatever you make will be a one-off unique creation made by you!