Christmas Greetings to my Crafting Friends!

Wishing all my Blogging friends every happiness at Christmas time and into the New Year.

Happy, healthy Crafting year ahead 2009.

Warmest wishes
Alison xx

Coughs and Sneezes

Oh dear! I am feeling sorry for myself. I have succumbed to the current round of germs circulating in my office. I am never normally someone who takes time off as I normally feel better as the day goes on, but I have to admit, this one has got to me! It is making me feel like all my joints and muscles are aching like mad. I have been in bed all morning and have got up for a few hours so that I don't completely ruin my body clock and sleep pattern. I felt very poorly at work yesterday but thought an early night might get rid of it, but no luck. So its just a question of letting this awful bug take its course :-(

Over the weekend I was able to do a bit of work on my sampler, here is the latest WIP photo - its starting to shape up nicely don't you think?

You may recall a few postings back, I mentioned that I applied to the Woodland Trust (following a promotion in the UK National newspaper The Daily Mail) and purchased a couple of trees as Christmas presents. These saplings have now been planted in a plantation in Wales which will grow into a forest in years to come. I received the gift certificates to give the recipients, so I decided I would mount them onto stiff card and embellish with some decoupage in the style of An Edwardian Country Lady's Diary, which I think is a perfect style as it depicts authentic botanical flora and fauna.

My Treasured Squirrel

Hi everyone,

I have really been looking forward to posting this week, but things have been sooo busy with my projects at work (integrating 2 big information systems and creating a database for statistical analysis!) that time has sped by and still no blogging. But, here I am, finally!

One of the reasons for my excitement is that I want to proudly show something to you that I received a gift in the post earlier in the week. As you can see from the photo above, it is an adorable and cute red Squirrel, complete with an acorn! This was made by my very wonderful friend Margaret. When I opened the parcel, it gave me a very warm feeling to know that she has so obviously gone to the trouble of making the gift especially with me in mind which makes the gift doubly great :-) Thank you so much for your thoughtfulness and friendship, Margaret it means all the world to me. Now that I have your new address since the 'Big Move', I have sent you a little "quelque-chose" to enjoy (something I have made for you!) and a hand-made card which I really enjoyed making! So watch out for your postman in the coming week. I only posted it today, so it may take about 3 to 4 days to reach you.

This weekend I have been invited to a birthday party for my friend's daughter, who wants us to dress up in ball gowns, glitz and glamour! So I'm looking forward to putting on my best party gear and a good excuse for a dance and chat with some friends I haven't seen for a while, and of course celebrating Holly's birthday!

I will look forward to posting again over the weekend!

Much love and crafty-ness :-)

Alison xxx