Sunny smiles!

Firstly I must apologise for missing Annie's smiles last week, but I had a good reason... my parents were in Sheffield for the first time in ages!  They collected Alex from school on Friday and took him down to the park for an ice cream and a walk before joining us at home. We had a wonderful weekend exploring Yorkshire sculpture park

admiring the various sculptures

and exploring the estate.

We also took them round Millstones Edge

which involved a fair bit of scrambling led by the intrepid Alex

before we finally found a millstone!  They also treated us by helping to clear parts of the garden, and taking me dress shopping.  It was a wonderful weekend. 

I hope you are all enjoying some sun today...Alex and I had a lovely time out in the garden after work this evening and he had a picnic tea outside.  That's all from me for now.  Have a great weekend.
Love
Caro
x

Celebrating 4 years of WOYW!

Yes, it is 4 years since the world-wide blog hopping phenomenon known as WOYWW (What's on your workdesk Wednesday) was conceived by the amazing Julia. I have joined in with it faithfully almost every week since discovering it 3 years ago. As a result I have made some on-line friends and  have enjoyed nosing around everyone else's creativity, gaining inspiration as I went. As a result I couldn't resist making up a little poem (definitely not my forte) using the acronym as the basis.  I would love to know what you think!

Here is my desk for this week's entry.  At last (after about 2 months!) those acrylic paints have been put away and the chaos on my desk consists of my smash book and the things I have been making my ATCs out of, namely prima flowers, stamps, and distress inks. The piece of orange card that has my dodgy hand writing on was the first version of the poem... scribbled down late last night so that I didn't forget it! My mug of tea is half-full but going cold as I have been side tracked by making the ATCs. My desk guardians (octopi family) are still protecting my stash for me and you can also see the lovely dangly charm that JoZart made for me and my WOYWW badge.

I have completed another page of my smash book (only 2 months behind!).  This one is of Alex's 6th birthday.  We had a family day with presents in bed, a treat breakfast and a trip to the Yorkshire Wildlife park.  I thought it would be fun to put the photos into the 6 shape and decorate the background with distress ink and doodles. I am entering this into Kaboodle Doodles 'anything goes', Cupcake Craft challenges 'boys' (this is all about a little boy!) and  All Sorts 'Happy birthday' challenges. 

For those of you who were asking how my weekend went, it was wonderful.  Alex and I had a great time with Mum and Dad.  We had some wonderful walks, they helped weed my garden and plant some new flowers, and we even managed to fit in some dress shopping. That is all from me for now.
Have a great week.
Love,
Caro
x
P.S. I do have a few WOYWW4 ATCs going spare if anyone is interested...they will be given out on a first come first serve basis so let me know in the comments if you would like one.

Clean and tidy (WOYWW)

Well I have been busy this week getting the house tidied up ready for my parents coming to stay at the weekend. The only problem is that my hoover has broken, which is somewhat frustrating! All this has meant that I have done very little crafting, although on Tuesday evening I did manage to do a little to my smash book again as you can see (this is my entry for WOYWW). To the left of my desk is a little clutter and mayhem in the form of thank you notes, notices from church, scrap paper, those two paints (STILL!).  In the middle is my smash book and my trusty mug of tea and on the little shelf just above the mug are the new inhabitants of my craft room...a little family of knitted octopi!  Please see my previous blog post for details of the family.

As you can see I finally got round to finishing the double page layout in my smash book - I showed you the left hand page a few weeks ago, but having had a few disasters on the right hand page, it took a while to find a way around them.  The end result doesn't look too bad fortunately!

And to finish, I thought I would share this photo of Alex off to his first ever beaver camp at the weekend. He came back filthy, happy and exhausted having had a fantastic time - the best bit was the mud slide followed by the water fight! That is all from me for now.  Have a great week everyone.
Love
Caro
x 

Octopus smiles!

 For my entry to Annie's smiles this week I just had to share something that arrived through the post yesterday and put a huge grin on my face.  I have a dear on-line friend who I have never met in person, but she shares a similar love of crafting and a wacky sense of humour. Following a rather daft conversation about smuggling an octopus into a museum she decided to knit a little octopus and I fell in love with him.  Before I knew it she had knitted a whole family and sent them to me so I thought I would introduce them to you.  This chap is Ollie Too, the head of the household, and descended from a long line of Ollie's. He is currently wearing his deer stalker hat but has ditched his scarf because he has decided Sheffield is warmer than Carlisle!

This is his wife, Octavia.  She came complete with her rather large collection of interesting hats (one is hiding behind her)...we think she has a bit of a fetish!

This is their son, Olliepus minor who is a curious young chap, and as you can see is looking forward to playing with Alex.  He has apparently decided to have a name change since arriving here...he has named himself 'Headstarterpus'.  I have no idea why.  Maybe it is a trendy teenager thing!

Finally this is Grandmother Ophelia, my personal favourite, although she can apparently become a little crotchety if left on her own too long.  Having originally anticipated a single Octopus I now need to go and enlarge their new living quarters.  Have a nice weekend everyone.
Love,
Caro
x

Happy Wednesday (WOYWW)

Well I am very happy today...Alex swam without arm bands for the first time  and he got a Golden Certificate at school for sitting nicely during carpet time (something he has struggled with all year).  This morning he spent some time making a card for his new girlfriend who was delighted with it when he gave it to her in school!

This is my desk this evening as my entry to WOYWW...fairly empty with some water colour paints left over from making a background for a card, the church newsletter, the stamp Alex used this morning, my ipad and yes, those three pots of acrylic paint left out from months ago!  My trusty mug of tea needs a refill. 

This is the card I made for Quirky Crafts challenge this weekend (no chance to blog until now).  There is a new challenge there which is to use paint and mythical/fantastical images.  I used watercolour paper and covered it with a wash of blue watercolour paint before stamping the dragon (Crackerbox Palace) onto it in distress ink broken china to make the background paper. I then layered the sentiment (Crackerbox Palace) for the centre of the card, then decoupaged the corner dragon and coloured it in using promarker pens. I finished the card by adding peel offs!  I am entering this into CCC 'lots of layers' (there are 5 including the base card), SSSS 'a little paper' (I used watercolour paper that is A6 size for the background - perfect card sized) and CTT 'something blue'.  That is all fo now.  Have a great week everyone.
Love
Caro
x

Bank Holiday smiles!

Well it is Friday and time for another round of Annie's smiles so I thought I would share some nice smiley photos from our bank holiday weekend.  Last Saturday we had to go into town to and while we were there we came across this clown who Alex played with.

He then had fun playing with his balloon in the fountains before we went to the Botanical Gardens for an ice cream.

On Sunday afternoon we went to Chatsworth Farm and Adventure playground where Alex got to hold and stroke a guinea pig

and had a great time going down the big slides

and digging a pit in the sand for the water with other children.

On Monday we went to a butterfly farm where we saw a parrot display and were able to feed various animals and birds

including the rainbow lorikeets, terrapins, goats, porcupines and meercats

We finished off the day with an ice cream at Our Cow Molly (these were the smallest ice creams they had on offer!). All in all it was a great bank holiday.

Crafting wise I have made a birthday card for my Mother using 7 gypsies stamps and papers with prima flowers and a gem. I am entering this into SSS 'Things with wings', Kaboodle Doodles 'for the ladies' (this is for my mother), Oo La La 'vintage' and DCM 'ink it up' (the images are inked and then edged with distress inks). That is all from me for now.  Have a lovely weekend everyone.
Love,
Caro
x

Sunny Spring WOYWW!

Well the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the bulbs are flowering, the blossom is starting to come out and it feels like Spring!  This photo was taken in the Botanical Gardens here in Sheffield at the weekend... don't you just love Daffodils?  They really are my favourite flower.

Here is my desk as my entry to WOYWW.  It is looking relatively tidy as I had to clear it to take the photo of my art journal. At the back of the desk there are some cards which are for my next DT challenge going live at the weekend, and the pile of stamps beside them is also for this challenge.  Although the challenge involves paint I have to confess that those are the same paints that have been sat on my desk for weeks!  My trusty mug of tea is missing because my darling husband is currently filling it up for me.

Here is a close up of that journal page which was for the mid way reminder of the 'dark and light' Quirky Crafts challenges. It was made using the Butterfly profile digital stamp from Stitchy bear coloured using promarkers. I used the dark brown of her hair as my dark colour, and orange as my bright. The background was generated using spiced marmalade distress ink with masking, stamping, quotes and highlights with sakura stardust and an orange glitter pen for added interest. I am entering this into SSSS 'inspired by' as I was inspired to start an Art Journal and to try this style by various of my on-line blogging friends including the fabulous Daire. I am also entering this into PTW 'anything goes', CTT 'come fly with me', Fussy & Fancy 'anything goes', and All sorts 'add some sparkle'.  That is all from me for now.  Have a great week everyone.
Love,
Caro
x

Party smiles!

This week for Annie's smiles I thought I would share you some happy photos from Alex's belated birthday party last weekend. We hired a softplay centre for 2 hours and he and his friends had a fantastic time.

The ball pool was a big favourite with everyone...I kept having to dive in and resuce children from it so was somewhat stiff afterwards!

The birthday boy insisted on wearing a party hat and pulling silly faces while eating his party food

and enjoyed everyone singing happy birthday to him.  All in all it was a great success with lots of happy children, and one very excited little boy who had loads of lovely presents to open afterwards.
That is all from me for now.  Take care and have a nice weekend.
Love,
Caro
x