Time for Tea on Tuesday, the day after Boxing day!

This isn't crochet related so it's on the Cazzytime blog.

On the subject of Quirky Crafts, we are hoping to resume challenges soon, but we need a couple more people on the team to make it work so please contact me if you are interested.

This was Sooty when he heard he was to get a pre Christmas bath. Legs turned to jelly lol and hiding in the corner furthest from me as the door was shut so he couldn't dash down the stairs!

 NOOOOOO, I don't want to go in the shower...

 this is horrible....

 ..getting dry is nice, I love rubbing all round the bed and furniture afterwards, and even like the hair dryer...

 ... all fluffy and dry, time to play with Pooh bear!

Sooty and I took a holly wreath up to the grave, but the new stone isn't there yet so only Shaun's dad's name is there, RIP my darling, and thank you for the beautiful card and present you must have arranged before you died, I wasn't expecting it and it had me in bits on Christmas day xx

I have another funeral to go to, my lovely aunt passed away after battling dementia for many years following the death of my cousin, RIP Auntie Margaret. It will bring it all back again.

Frogging with my niddy noddy (I love saying that).

Meeting friends on our walks....

 ...this one is a little shy....

 ...his friend isn't shy!

 Sunset, it wasn't actually dark but shooting at the sun did this, and blinded me for a while!

This crazy friend wanted his photo taken but never keeps still so it is blurred!

Boxing day - decided to get the clippers out...

...well they said it was mild....

...the reaction to the clippers was the same as the shower, but there is no escape...

....if I sitz on it she can't clip it.....

....whee, feels better now, and she has stopped! (As for mild, it was really cold out and has been frosty and icy since).

You were wondering where the tea was, well here it is, tea and turkey salad. Well it is T for Tuesday at Elizabeth and Bleubeard's place!

The best way to trim the underneath of the paws and to clip the nails - only possible with much bribery!

Sooty's daily carrot!

The good news is that Luna will be with us at the weekend, the hard work starts then! If you don't know who Luna is read the last post!

Cazzy Hookin' time: Time for Tea on Tuesday, and exciting news!

Cazzy Hookin' time: Time for Tea on Tuesday, and exciting news!:  The last project I finished was these fingerless gloves from the Furls Crochet Along . I loved doing them, took three attempts to do the...

Cazzy Hookin' time: T on Tuesday on my crochet blog.

Click the link below to go to the post on my crochet blog, lots of photos of Christmas grotto! Cazzy Hookin' time: T on Tuesday on my crochet blog.: So sorry I haven't been round and commented on anyone from last week, I really appreciated all of your lovely comments - but the wee...

T on Tuesday and the new unit is here!

You can't see it but I had fruit tea with a healthy lunch of melon and cottage cheese with nuts and cinnamon. I'm showing you this because it is time for T on Tuesday at Elizabeth and Bleubeard's gaff!

Last Friday was a sad day but a relief too, my husband's ashes (and 4 dogs ashes) were interred into his father's grave with a small family ceremony. It brought back sadness but relief his wishes had been carried out. There is a new gravestone to sort out as a final thing to do.

Today I had a phone call from one of Shaun's friends who ( very generously together with his 90 year old mother who didn't know Shaun) wants to donate some money to Dorothy House via my Just Giving page, and the badminton club that Shaun belonged to also want to donate. The page link is in the sidebar at the top, and another page for the RUH forever Friends cancer care appeal.

New squishyness.

Gorgeous hand dyed gradient squishyness!

Two little "helpers".

Surrounded by  Really Useful Boxes, ready to go in the new unit.

The big box of hanging files is not for the unit but now holds my crochet patterns.

YAY! The unit arrived at last!

WIP, I put some of the castors on and my son did the rest.

The shelf pegs were really tricky to get in the middle section which is under the overhanging desk, you really need a 4 year old to do it! This went quite well until he declared his head was too big and went on strike!

Nearly finished, just a few more shelves to go in.

Here is the finished unit, I haven't finished filling the boxes yet! The Salcombe Petite unit is from Storage4Crafts, and comes in different finishes. I went for maple and plain doors. I think this is going to be really really useful! It takes less room than the old big desk when closed, and is going to be able to hold so much stuff! It is on castors so can be moved about, the two side sections roll open when needed and it has a soft notice board that takes velcro and has elastic to put things in to keep to hand.

I will be able to sew and papercraft on it, and I am sure I will get the papercrafting bug back once I sort more of my stash into it.

T on Tuesday, I'm back!

 Well I've not joined in for many months at Elizabeth's and Bleubeard's place for tea on Tuesday, but here I am with my hot chocolate in the foreground surveying heaps of boxes.

I had to clear out my craft room when my husband was supposed to be coming home, and I had a hospital bed and equipment installed in here ready, which meant a lot of boxes of stash were relocated upstairs and to any available space. After (my husband died in the hospice) the equipment was collected I decided that I didn't want the table that was in here with all it's messy boxes underneath.

(I should mention here that my husband passed away in August, in case you didn't read the last post linked below which is on my crochet blog, as several people assumed he was still alive, sorry my fault.)

Instead I would buy a Really Useful Storage unit called The Petite Salcombe from Storage4Crafts. This is a folding unit that holds lots of different size Really Useful Boxes, and the plan is to sort my stash back into the boxes and they will be stored out of sight when it's folded and easily accessible when working.

I'm currently rethinking which stash will go in the boxes, a lot of what was under and around the old desk was yarn and that won't necessarily work with this system because it would totally fill and and maybe some of the boxes aren't big enough for yarn stash.

What I might do now is to clear out some drawers of stash that are currently under the bench down the side of the room. Then I might have room for the yarn boxes, and even buy a few more under bed storage boxes for yarn if I need to. Not sure what I will do with the drawers yet - unless the yarn can go in the larger ones!

I'm also thinking I can maybe clear some of my shelves and store things that didn't fit on them.

This 35l box will not fit the unit, not sure where I will put it. I bought two that hold hanging files, the first one is 19l but I wasn't sure one would be big enough, and I decided to use this one instead for all of my (mostly printed) crochet patterns in the same place and labelled into types of pattern so I can find them easier, except for those (now probably vintage) ones I have in a folder, and the crochet magazines. I have sorted all the loose patterns into here now. There is room for more when I print them too! Some of the magazines I buy digitally and only print the patterns I really want to make one day......not sure which one day!

I just heard two pieces of news, one is that the unit is arriving tomorrow (will need assembling but I am quite good at that) and my visitors are arriving during the day tomorrow (panic) so I need to clear a space in here for the boxes with the unit to fit, and to have space to assemble it (will have help now lol). I think once I can fit the boxes in I can really get stuck in to tidying and maybe I can start paper crafting again! I also need to get some stuff done before the visitors arrive, move all things an 11 month old will get into, clean the floor, make beds etc.

Also Sooty has a check up tomorrow, he had a bladder stone removed last week. He seems much happier now, we just need to get back to normal walks - and the furniture is piled up with objects to try and stop him jumping on it, he wasn't allowed to jump up. Nobody can sit down right now without moving something like the laundry basket.

Here's Sooty just after the operation, wearing his pink lampshade and Alfie's jumper because he was shaved quite a lot. He really liked the home cooked chicken and rice, I had to keep it going for a week to get the antibiotics into him, and he looked a bit disappointed when it stopped but it did make his beard very smelly!

Cazzy Hookin' time: Hooking catch up post.

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Cazzy Hookin' time: T on Tuesday, heatwave maybe?

My T on Tuesday post is here: Cazzy Hookin' time: T on Tuesday, heatwave maybe?: This evening, and here is my mug of hot chocolate - or to be more accurate - hot raw cacao with a little coconut sugar, cinnamon, ground...

Cazzy Hookin' time: T on Tuesday, by a bad blogger!

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Cazzy Hookin' time: T for Tuesday and for Two CALs

To see the T for Tuesday post on my crochet blog - click on the following link: Cazzy Hookin' time: T for Tuesday and for Two CALs: It's time for T on Tuesday, and as long as you show a beverage you can join in with the lovely people over at Elizabeth and Bleube...

Quirky May Flowers follow furry April Showers.

I'm late, can't seem to get anything done on time at the moment. This lovely image is from Ike's Art and is called Greek Window. You could win a $15 voucher to spend on Ike's Art images if you enter the Quirky Challenge and you have until 28th May to play along.

We are also sponsored by Delicious Doodles and Bloobel Stamps and I will be making another card with Bloobel Stamps soon.

I coloured this digi with Promarkers, die cut it with Spellbinders and heat embossed the stamped sentiment. Mum is recovering from a major back operation so I think she needs a little cheering up.

I added some red polka dot chiffon ribbon to finish the card.

I hope you will hop over to Quirky to see the other gorgeous examples and to play along and maybe win a prize.

Challenges entered:

Ike's World - embossing (Tues)

A Gem of a Challenge - flowers (May 27th)

Crafts Galore - Anything goes (May)

Quirky May Flowers

The May challenge at Quirky Crafts is all about flowers, simple! We have three new sponsors, and this digi is Love in a Mist from Delicious Doodles. I have this growing and spreading in my flower borders, and just had to have the digi!

I coloured the digi with Chameleon pens, having a little trouble with some of them where they won't lighten and I have hardly used them so they shouldn't be dried up already. The grey I wanted to use as a light shadow would not lighten so I used a Promarker instead. 

I made sure there was enough space to die cut this shape with a Spellbinders die, and Just for You is a Tonic die, I found this perfect linen texture blue card stock and decided to keep the card simple.

Delicious Doodles, Ike's Art and Bloobel stamps are our three new sponsors for May which is really exciting, and I hope to make a couple more cards to show you soon, or for the reminder at least!

Unfortunately this will be the last challenge for Quirky Crafts for a few months, and maybe forever if we don't get some applicants for the DT. After May we will be down to three on the team, and two of us have very sick husbands, the other has health issues of her own, so we cannot continue unless we get some healthy people who can boost the team back up!

Hop on over to Quirky Crafts to play along with our pretty challenge and maybe you will win some digis.

I have entered the following challenges:

Incy Wincy - CAS (Mon)

Creative Fingers - #108 anything goes (Fri)

Crafts Galore - anything goes (May)

Delicious Doodles - April Showers bring May Flowers (snap) (May)

Challenges won:

Crafty Gals - #69 anything goes (Wed)

Quirky reminder, It's raining cats and dogs!

I just realised I posted the reminder on Quirky and forgot to put it on my blog, so here I am! For my first card I used Cat on a Window and Kitty Cat Birthday from our sponsor Crackerbox Palace.

I love the Kitty Cat birthday sentiment and I hope my Mum will too, she has a Siamese cat but used to have a blue grey Persian - both rescues. The Mum stamp is a Papermania one and I stamped and heat embossed it.

There is a lot of detail in the Cat on a Window image which I coloured with ProMarkers, there is lots of depth as a result. The red polka-dot ribbon is from Crafty Ribbons, fish bones charm from stash. I die cut the sentiment and scalloped frame with Spellbinders rectangle dies.

Challenges entered with the kitty cat card:

Love to Scrap - #75 The Big Bow theory (Mon)

Passion for Promarkers - bingo, embossing, image, die cuts (Tues)

Tuesday Throwdown - #289 Use your die cuts

Crafty Gals - die cuts (Wed)

Fab n Funky - #300 Girly and Pretty (Wed)

Simon Says - Let's do the Polka (Wed)

Cute Card Thursday - hand made embellishments 

Crafts Galore - April anything goes

Show us your pussies - Furrything goes (April)

For my second card I used Dog Sidney and Dog-gone Special.

I love this cute puppy dog image in his too big collar! I kept it simple and masculine, and added some  of my favourite ribbon by Crafty Ribbons. Again he is coloured with Promarkers and both the image and sentiment are die cut with Spellbinders dies.

Challenges entered with Dog-gone card:

Passion for Promarkers - bingo, ribbon, image, sentiment (Tues)

Crafting with Dragonflies - Masculine (Sat week)

Creative Fingers - #107 anything goes (Fri)

The Ribbon Girl - April any image (April 30th)

Cazzy Hookin' time: T for Tuesday

Go to my other blog for the T for Tuesday post: Cazzy Hookin' time: T for Tuesday: I took my lunch and peppermint tea out into the garden today, it was such a lovely day, warm while the sun was out anyway! I made a pra...

Quirky raining cats and dogs!

It's challenge time at Quirky Crafts.First of all the challenge is sponsored by the Quirky and funny Crackerbox Palace who are generously giving all three prizes. The theme set by Marg is Quirky Raining Cats and Dogs, and all you need to do is show us your projects with cats, dogs or  cats and dogs on them!

My card is one from 2013, because I have been ill in bed all week with a nasty virus, and I'm still not well but the show must go on! I used the rubber stamp of Peeking Cat to make my card (you could win the digi), and Papermania papers, and some ribbon to look like a parcel opening. I used Papermania and Imagination sentiment stamps and die cut the panels with Spellbinders dies.

As for Quirky, we changed to monthly challenges this year to take the pressure off, I recruited a new team and most of them have had health problems forcing them to leave - or in one case not even get started!
Because of my own circumstances, caring for my hubby is taking up a lot of time and emotional strength, and running Quirky takes a lot of time. O.K. it is less than when it was fortnightly, but for each challenge this year I have ended up having to write the challenge, or take over the challenge, and what I really needed was a strong team who could get on with it after an initial bedding in period, write their own posts and get on with making projects for each challenge and reminder. I am willing to teach, coach, help people until they get to the stage that they are confident to get on with it unaided.

Unfortunately and very sadly, our latest addition to the team Kelly Patricia injured her wrist and never got started, she hoped to join us properly this month but on medical advice has now had to give up crafting, blogging and facebook which is devastating for her. I wish her all the best.

This leaves us with an active team of 4 including me (and I am busy with the admin as already mentioned), and we really need two more team mates at least, or lots of one to two month guests.

I have put out several DT calls during the March challenge, on our Facebook page and anywhere I can but there has been no response, I know a lot of teams also have DT calls on and I think that is why nobody has even enquired about joining the Quirky team so far - but I hope we will get someone now, even if they only want to guest for a month, which means two projects minimum using the free digis from our sponsors which you get to keep and use afterwards.

So if anyone does want to have a go at guesting, for a month or two, just to try it out I am happy to do that, and who knows - many 2 month guests have gone on to join the team in the past!

May is going to be a very special month because we have three new and exciting sponsors, tempted yet?

Hop over to the Quirky blog and contact me via email, or the contact form if you are interested.

I am not entering any challenges because 2013 is serious back posting!

Cazzy Hookin' time: Happy Easter little ones!

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Cazzy Hookin' time: Birthday infinity scarves.

Cazzy Hookin' time: Birthday infinity scarves.: For a week I dropped the Persian Tiles blanket and instead I made birthday scarves (one each) for my brother and father.  Here the den...

Happy Birthday Dad.

Dad's birthday is tomorrow, but he won't see this (because he is a technophobe) and spoil the surprise!

Remember the grumpy penguins card? Well this is the other half of the background I made for that one on watercolour paper. I stamped the Katlekraft water drops with Versamark then heat embossed with white embossing powder before spritzing the paper with water and sprinkling on Brushos.

These birds are also a Katzelkraft set which I bought from That's Crafty, I must be bird crazy because I have the Tim Holtz ones too - but these are half the price! I don't think there are dies for the stamps, so I fussy cut them.

Happy Birthday is a Hero Arts stamp and Dad is a Papermania stamp, both from clear sets and stamped in Indigo Versacolor ink and heat embossed with clear powder.

I got my Faber Castel Gelatos out, first time using them and the set I have is brights. I blended blue and yellow to make green mainly because I started with blue and realised the birds didn't show against the background so I added yellow and blended it (using my fingers and a sponge) - which is the beauty of Gelatos. I found it hard to use round the detailed areas, and the left hand bird ended up with a green eyeball which I went over with my Sharpie Paperwhite pen. I guess I should have masked the eyeballs in hindsight. 

I hope Dad likes it!

Challenges entered:

Brown Sugar - Spring (well we have had a lot of rain) (Fri)

Craft Stamper - March take it make it, stamps (Wed)

Crafting from the Heart - #104 anything goes (Mon)

Love to Scrap - #74 anything goes (Mon)

Creative Fingers - #105 anything goes (Fri)

Glitter and Sparkle - anything goes (Sun)

Delicious Doodles - Show us some green (March)

Happy Little Stampers - Mixed media challenge theme water (March)

Graph'it Markers - Spring Delights wk9 (1st April)

Love to Create - #6 anything mixed media (10th April)

Quirky reminder, yee haw!

Amazingly I am here on time for the reminder post for the Quirky Crafts challenge! The challenge is masculine and must use ribbon or twine. I used both on my card.

We have three wonderful sponsors, Bugaboo, Crafty Ribbons and SLS Lines.

The digi is from Bugaboo and is called Wee Ones Cowboy - Horseshoe, which is very cute and easy to colour too. There are lots more cowboy digis to choose from.  I coloured him with Promarkers and die cut him with Spellbinders dies, using the "outside the frame" technique because the perfect size die for height was a little narrow, so the horseshoe is slightly outside the frame. The papers are from a DCWV stack called All About Boys, the horse silhouette ribbon is exclusive to Crafty Ribbons. It comes in several colours and with different animals - even dinosaurs! 

The twine is Tim Holtz paper ribbon, and the horseshoe charm tied on to it is a random odd one I had.

I rounded the corners of the card and biggest paper layer.

If you want to see more examples, play along with us - or join the DT, hop on over to Quirky Crafts now.

Challenges entered:

Crafting from the Heart - #103 anything goes

Passion for Promarkers - for a child (Tues)

I love Promarkers - Men at Work (Wed)

Inspiration Destination - #77 anything goes (Wed)

LMMS challenges - #133 anything goes (Thurs)

Simply Papercrafts - #25 anything goes (Fri)

Catch the Bug - Bingo (Sat) 3 layers, die cut and sentiment.

The Ribbon Girl - use a digi (Sat)

Glitter and Sparkle - #180 anything goes (Sun)

Coffee Chocolate and Cards - Use ribbon (Fri 18th April)

Creative Fingers - #105 anything goes