Phew - What a relief!

It is officially the weekend and I have finished work for the week. I repeated my experiment over the course of yesterday and today and it worked. This was such a relief as it means that the results can go in my grant application. I have been working flat out over the past few days to get a fully comprehensive first version of the grant in for review this afternoon. Fortunately I have succeeded which means that I can get on with the other parts of the grant application and other aspects of my job next week.

Alex has been the greatest of fun over the past two days keeping me highly amused with his antics...using my desk as a drum kit with any available plastic toy as a drum stick! 'Singing' along to music is another new trick of his which happens sometimes when he is in the mood. He now sits up a lot of the time, although we still get the occasional topple over and head bang. We have now bought some more gates to keep him out of unsafe areas (Study, bathroom and kitchen) as he moves so fast we can't always keep up with him. We hope to put them up this weekend. It is good to give him as much freedom as possible, but within limits!

I have done a little crafting over the past couple of days as the next three letters of the Alphabet ATC swap are due next week. P is for Parrot has used a photo that I took at the local butterfly farm about 2 years ago over the top of a green letter P and some clipart parrots. Q is for Quality Street has entirely used Quality street wrappers...the sweet on the front contains cardboard not chocolate! Finally R is for Roses used K&Co paper for the background, a freebie paper for the letter and a rose EZ rubon which I put on cardboard and then mounted using foam to give a 3D feel to the card.

I have also received some lovely ATCs in the post over the past couple of days. This set of 6 vintage ladies is from Emma Ryder, and they are simple but effective.

The butterfly and flower parchment ATC is from Dorothy Wilmot and must have taken her ages. The parchment craft is beautiful on this one, with the butterfly being especially intricate. I also love the 'Cute as a button' ATC from Jan Matthews, which is simply gorgeous. Aparently she used clingfilm to generate the background effect, although I am not sure how. I am going to ask her because I think it is really effective.

The final two ATCs are from Doreen Collins and are gorgeous. The cross stitched pansy is so cute and well done, and I love the sense fun and movement in the 'Star struck' one. Needless to say I am thrilled with all of these ATCs. We are away for the day tomorrow so I will post more on Sunday. Have a nice weekend everyone.

Love,
Caro

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