So frustrating...

We are back home now in Broom, gotta tidy and clean and make everything look fantastic.. we have a guy coming round on Wednesday to see the property, and we are hoping he will take our tenancy over. It's also freezing in here STILL, the engineer can't come until Wednesday either.

What I really really want to do is go to my craft room and play. I have been looking at loads of blogs and got some fabulous ideas that I can use with quilling and stuff. But at the moment I am trying very hard to keep away from the craft room, otherwise I will just end up in there freezing to death, making myself miserable wanting to do things and knowing that time is running out and I should be wielding the vacuum cleaner and dusting.

So once the coffee has been drunk I will brave the icyness of the bathroom to shower - at least that will be warm - and then the vacuum will become my new best friend. Hopefully working in the house will make me warm, we are about to enter a bitterly cold patch according to the weather forecasters snow and allsorts!

Will post some more later, with blog addresses and other stuff.

Out To Dinner

Hi Folks, John and I have just been out to dinner at a friends house. My best freind Lizzi is a fabulous cook. she made roast beef, yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes done in goose fat - completely bad I know, but so delicious! Red cabbage, parsnips, carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, and sprouts. It was wonderful! Then we had Christmas pudding and rum sauce. I feel totally pogged! The conversation was good, Lee's dad was there, he is 90 and a great source of amusement, always got something interesting to tell you. Andy who is a musician come anything else he thinks he might want to be, including an electrician at the moment, who is rewiring my mum's house. Samantha who is fortunately getting over the upset of her fiance leaving her, and James, her 13 year old brother. We had a great time.

On Monday we are going back home to Broom, not looking forward to that, as we still have no heating, though the engineer is coming on Wednesday. It's a case of going home to tidy and clean as a prospective tenant is coming to look around the house on Wednesday also, plus the fact that Daniel is coming home too. In some ways I can't wait to get there so that once I have cleaned the place I can do a few cards to show you. I have been looking at some great blogs and I really can't wait to give some of the cards a go. Might have something to show you all then.

As for me, its nearly 1am and its time for bed. Toodleooo peeps.

Just a little something...

Hi fellow quillers and crafters, I hope you all had a very merry and happy Christmas. We spent the holiday at my mum's house in Sheffield. My 3 older sons all appeared Edward came on Christmas morning and stayed for a couple of hours before he went to his friends house where he was helping to cook dinner for bunch of em. Nick was here anyway as this is where he lives and Alex arrived mid morning.

It was wonderful to see them all. I do hope that when we move in here properly that we will see more of them. I do miss them.

Daniel is spending this holiday with his dad and step mum. Last night we got a text message complaining that he had been sent to bed at some ridiculous - his word - time. Poor lad, he has been having a hard time of it when he has been to see his dad. Helen has very different ideas from the rest of us and Daniel suffers because of that.

The picture today is a heart I made a couple of years ago, I did go through a time when I made lots of hearts, but this one is my favourite.

I did bring all my quilling papers to my mum's, but now that I have been on various blogs, I keep thinking that I wish I had brought that paper and why didn't I bring that tool, and oh I do wish I had brought my cuttlebug.

Well never mind, maybe just having my quilling papers to work with will make me do things I might not have done normally.

Ok, coffee has gone, time to work....

Brrrrrrrrrrrr

Oh my goodness, it's freezing!!! We arrived home last night from Sheffield thinking that we would come home to a nice warm house, only to find that the flippin' stupid boiler had not fired up. Aggghhhhhhh! John spent ages trying to get it to work, he just got extremely cross in the end. So I put wheat bags in the microwave and we all went to bed to keep warm. This morning the boiler still would not fire up, we checked the oil and that was fine as we only had it filled last week.
To be honest I am pretty pissed off with the Southill estate who own our house, they put a Rayburn in the kitchen but instead of it being an alternative kind of fuel, like solid fuel where we could put logs in, they just made it oil fired like the rest of the heating. So we aren't even sure that will work either.
Oil has gone up tremendously just lately. In April, we bought 1000 litres, at £350, 8 months later in December just 500 litres is now £275! Thank God we are leaving this place and heading home to Sheffield where we have gas plumbed in.
In some ways I will be sorry to leave this place, its very pretty, and is owned by the Whitbread family who have a chain of national pubs in this country, they also own Costa's coffee shops here and I dare say various other chains as well. They live in the big house at Southill Park just up the road from here.
However within the two villages Broom and Southill there are huge village politics and from what I have heard in the past 8 months some pretty nasty things have been said about various people. I don't need to be part of that, and just want the annonimity of my own large city and just my friends and my family.
Sheffield is a great place and I am looking forward to going back. Sorry there are no pictures today I do have things to show you all but may be it will be after the holiday now when I can at least get out of bed without wearing half my wardrobe to keep warm. Merry Christmas everybody!

Figgy Pudding Christmas Card

I just love this Basic Grey Figgy Pudding paper, it reminds me of when I was a child and Christmas was a magical time. Not that it isn't these days, but as you get older some of the glitz seems to fall off.

This card is for my brother and his wife, it will be the first time that they have seen a card I have made myself. So am feeling a bit nervous about giving it to them. Sue buys lovely cards, very elaborate and seems to spend a fortune on them. So I hope she likes this one.

I hope you are all finished buying presents and that you have them all wrapped up and you are ready to go...

Black and White Christmas card

Just put this together for my friend, this year all her decs are black and white, she has used lots of feathers and silvery bits, and as she likes everything coordinating, I thought I would make her a black and white card. Will let you know what she thinks of it.

Around the world at Christmas...

Hello Everyone, You may have noticed the counter on my blog which tells me the cities that people come from who look at my blog. This has only been up for a few days, but already there have been visitors from Vladivostok, Tehran, Bogor, Fort Wayne, Indianna, and loads of other places. Please leave a comment and say hello, I'd love to meet you in blogworld and make new friends with you all.

Re-done the Snowflake card

There that looks better doesn't it? Well I think so, please let me know what you think.
Yesterday we travelled up to Sheffield to see my mum and to take some more of our furniture up there for when we move in. Not been there too long when my friend Lizzi's daughter called me - she lives across the road from my mum - to ask if I would go and sit with her for a while. Poor Samantha had received some awful news that morning, her fiance had been to see her and told her that it was over between them. The poor girl was distraught and needed someone to give her a hug and listen to her cries of anguish.
I personally could kill the nasty piece of work, he chose the day very well, knowing that her mum and dad would not be there as they were taking grandpa to see the Tutankamun exhibition in London, so he wouldn't have to face their wrath.
So Sam and I sat and watched the X Factor and laughed at some of the complete numptys who think they really can sing we coped when the tears began to fall again when she saw an ad on the tv that reminded her of Rob. It was just a very traumatic afternoon.

Snowflake card

Good afternoon peeps, its Friday and it's pretty cold and dull here today. However, I am warm and cozy with my feet on the radiator listening to Steve Wright on radio 2 listening to nice music and making cards. Feel sorry for my poor dh who is busy doing a plastering course out in the cold.
Not happy with the card above, didn't realise that its lopsided! Otherwise it's ok. Better give this to someone who's eyesight is not brill then they won't notice. LOL

Ok folks, gotta take the hounds for a wander round the village then its back home for coffee and a bit of creative craft watching on tv.

Poinsettia Chirstmas card

I have been looking at loads of blogs lately, so that I can update my card making skills. My quilling, up to now, has been good but pretty old fashioned. I have been looking at sketches of cards which show you how to use different papers, where to put the sentiment, where to put the embellishment etc. These have been very helpful, and I am sure that it will help me with my quilling. Lots of people use these sketches with scrapbooking, but have found a blog called

http://pagemaps.com/index.htm which has loads of card sketches on too. So after reading this blog I had a go at my own sketches, which I will be putting up here soon.

Hope you like the card above, a very easy Poinsettia card which is just what you need for the Holiday season when time is at a premium.