HAPPY NEW YEAR

Happy New Year to you all!

All artistic creativity has been put on hold for what seems like ages!  Christmas, family, numerous events and several nasty bugs and illnesses have taken up all my time!

It's now time to get creative again - I just need to kick myself up the backside and get into my studio - it's harder than it sounds!!!

I am linking up with Mosaic Monday over at the Little Red House.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Christmas is nearly here and I am loving all the wonderful Christmas colour schemes and displays that are everywhere I go!

Here are a few of my decorations - my colour scheme for one of the trees this year is red, green and cream.  I have a second tree (an old tatty one) that I put up in the dining room each year - it gives the room a bit of sparkle during Christmas dinner!

I would like to wish everyone a happy, colourful, creative and sparkly Christmas.

WOYWW #184

Well, it's been a while since I've taken part in What's on your Work Desk Wednesday, mainly due to the fact that I've had very little going on on my work desk!  But in the lead up to Christmas I have had to get busy - tags, cards, small gifts etc etc - so here is what is on my desk this week, and I hope no-one will mind me returning after such a long break.  Why not nip over there and see what other people have on their desks this week!

I have been making some cupcake toppers - some are going to a friend, along with a little cupcake book, some will be used over Christmas when I have friends and family round, and some have already gone to relatives who provided a wonderful lunch for us yesterday!

In the background are some tags I'm making - I shall be stamping images on plain brown paper to make matching gift wrap - that's the plan anyway!

This is one of the cupcakes that went over to relatives yesterday - I was going to use white cases but found these spotted ones a couple of days ago - I think they match perfectly!

WINTER LANDSCAPES

Winter seems to be well and truly here - we've had several frosty mornings and the woolly jumpers are out!

I used a Kim Klassen texture for this photo of the New Forest - I love the warm, rusty colour of the dead heather at this time of year.

Appropriately, the last two themes for Tag Tuesday have been 'Keeping Warm' and 'Winter Landscape'.

For 'Keeping Warm' I decided to crochet a small panel using different wool and yarns that I have made scarves with over the years.  I love knitting and crochet but I don't do shapes!  I added buttons to give a 'wrapping up warm' feel to the tag - I rather like the natural colours in this and think I might make a real scarf using these same left over yarns.

For the 'Winter Landscape' theme I decided I would carry on crocheting and I made two small trees which I attached to tags - the first tree trunk was stitched using dark grey embroidery thread, and the second was a piece of black satin ribbon - I think the trunk would look better with a thinner ribbon, but unfortunately that is all I had!

I am linking up this week with Colour Me Weekly and Mosaic Monday.

TAGS AND BIRDS

Our garden has been full of sparrows lately - we are filling up the bird feeders daily, and it's lovely to see them.  They are such sweet little birds and with their numbers declining I am so pleased we seem to have a permanent group living near us.

I am linking up with Color Me Weekly and Mosiac Monday.

For Tag Tuesday the last two weeks themes were 'Sepia' and 'Music'.

Here are my two offerings:

 For the theme sepia I decided to look through some old photos that have passed down through the family to me, and I came across this one - the couple have been in our family for years but I don't know who on earth they are!  I think the girl was a childhood friend of my father, which puts this photo in the 1940's, which also ties in with her dress style.  I was intrigued about what their situation was - is he going away, has he just got back home, is it war time.  I've never been able to throw the photo away in case I ever found out anything about them.

I liked the idea of him being away from her and carrying a memento - did he have a lock of her hair or a scrap of a letter - I've collected little precious pieces and clipped them in front of the photo.

This tag represents the theme music.  I distressed and stamped a background pattern onto a manila tag and a scrap of sheet music.  I added some lace and what should have been two Song Thrushes - however, I had to use artistic licence as these are Field Fares!

BLUES AT THE BEACH

 I had forgotten how wonderful old beach huts are - the more run-down and tatty the better the textures to photograph!  

I am linking up with Mosaic Monday, Color Me Weekly and Blue Monday.

A WALK IN THE FOREST

It has been a wonderful autumn so far, with plenty of opportunities for walks and wonderful trees and foliage.  

A few days ago we went for a walk around Rhinefield Ornamental Drive, one of my favourite parts of the New Forest - I grabbed the opportunity to take some photos while the sun was shining.

I am linking this to Color Me Weekly and Mosaic Monday.

TAG TUESDAY - MOON AND STARS

This weeks Tag Tuesday theme is anything to do with the moon and stars.

I made two tags using a wonderful old book from the late 1800's that I found in a charity shop, about the Heavens.

The splodges on the right hand tag are gold leaf flakes - I just could not get them to look gold and shimmery in the photographs!

In keeping with the Tag Tuesday theme I photographed the face of our old grandfather clock - I rather like the sun and moon dial (although only the stars were visible when I took the photo).

I am linking this to Color Me Weekly.