Spring cleaning, naked facts and how not to sort the laundry....

Yesterday I had to go out to do a few errands. It was freezing cold and the wind was biting. I went to the post office to buy a stamp, ususally not a big problem. But for some strange reason they had closed at 12:00 for lunch, an hour earlier than usual. So I decided to try the stamp vending machine. The screen is so dark, you have to practically put your nose onto it to read what is on offer. You can buy stamps for 1 cent, 2 cents, 3 cents etc. What the hell does anyone want with those? Are you supposed to put 55 or more of them on your letter? And an assortment for 5 or 10€. Didn't need those, either. Then there is a possibilty to choose your own denomination. As long as you want 5 cents or 10 cents no problem. After struggling with small change and a sign which kept telling me *not available*, I managed to get an assortment of stamps to the value of 1.30€. The next problem was finding room on the envelope for so many large, freshly printed stamps, and getting them stuck on by arctic temperatures and a boisterous wind while worrying if they were going to freeze onto my tongue....OK, they didn't, and I got the letter posted after 8 minutes of deep-frozen time. Got back home and warmed myself up with a hot coffee. Then I decided to tidy the bathroom and bedroom, which I had left in the usual mess after getting up and taking my morning bath. Wanted to put my nightdress into the laundry basket, lifted the lid and let it drop in. How lucky that I do not usually flush the basket. I had dropped it into the toilet by mistake. Quick hunt for the elbow length rubber gloves. A blue bin-bag, eyes closed and a quick grab to put the nightdress into it. No, not for the old-clothes collection, this needed to be put into the garbage bin, straightaway - yuk! I never did like that nightie, anyway.
After recovering from tidying up I needed to make some mess again, so started on a layout. Used a photo of T when he was about 2 years old, *helping* - helping to make a mess, as usual. Love his outfit! I used coordinating papers from the SEI *Bridgeport* stack, 2 as background, and 2 sheets which have been cut out to make the flowers, butterflies, vines and alphas. After cutting them out - by hand! I glazed them with sparkly mod-podge and decoupaged them to give it more depth. Was fun making it, but now I have to clear up again....

ATCs

Made some ATCs in the past few days, it's a good way to use up some of the scraps which get left over when making bigger projects. I used lots of different techniques - stamping, embossing, distressing etc. Was fun making them!

Cardboard and loo-roll mini BIA-tag album

Made this album using a lot of recycling materials - cardboard for the covers, loo-rolls for the pockets and cream coloured packaging for the tags. The buttons have been *rescued* from old clothes and stored in my *treasure tin*. The cardboard for the covers was distressed and inked with T.H. inks in weathered wood, brushed corduroy and lettuce, then sprayed with *My tattered Angels* glimmer spray in wheatfields and garden fairy, powdered with some *perfect pearls* and given 2 coats of glimmer mod-podge. The loo-rolls have been flattened with my *Big Shot*, covered with 2 different papers - I think from K & Co, and also coated with mod-podge. Tip -after covering them I put them through the Big Shot again so that the glue bonds better and doesn't cause air-bubbles. Used 1" BIA O-wires to bind it, and then decorated the little album with lots of bits and pieces from my *treasure boxes* - ribbons, wool, flowers, magic mesh, cut-outs, die-cuts, some *bling*, nostalgic pictures, plastic animal stickers from the toy-shop, animal transfers, clock-faces etc. The tags have been distressed with T.H. inks in the colours used above, and patterned using a T.H. *Scroll* mask. Each one has been stamped with owl pictures, and I added some quotes about wisdom and owls. Was great fun making it, hope you enjoy looking at it!

Mini BIA Album

This album has chipboard covers and mini envelopes to hold the tags. The envelopes have been distressed with Tim Holtz inks in broken china and brushed corduroy, and then stamped with archival ink in black. The small stamps are from *Sousan Design*, the large clock from *My tattered angels* For some I have used masks from Tim Holtz. The Tags have been die-cut using the packaging from the T.H. masks. I used quotes about time, printed on to brown paper. I kept the embellisments sparse, some words, notes, clocks and owls printed onto overhead transparency foil, a few flowers, some clock face cut-outs, some ribbons, string and paper clips. The paper-clips have been covered with coordinating papers. The covers have been covered with paper from *Graphics 45*, and embellished with a T.H. *dog-tag* and a watch face, fitted into some clear plastic packaging cut to fit. The two labels at the front are from other products and have been distressed and stamped, the smaller one has an added die-cut from grunge board. Was fun to make! The quotes used are:

Love makes time pass
Time makes love pass

Time to remember

As if you could kill time
without injuring eternity.
Henry David Thoreau

Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.
Louis Hector Berlioz

Time goes, you say? Ah no!
Alas, Time stays, we go.
Henry Austin Dobson

Men talk of killing time,
while time quietly kills them.
Dion Boucicault

Time heals all wounds

Sunday is Muffin Day

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

My First Card from 1951

While clearing and tidying one of my drawers this week I found this card that I made in 1951 for my Mum. I was 4 1/2, so I think it was an achievement! It's been written on rough post-war paper using pencil and coloured pencils. I remember making the card and that my brother picked wild flowers from a bomb-site nearby, which we placed in a cup for Mum.

Rest in Peas....

Well, they've gone. Soon they will be winging their way to their last resting place. They have been my loyal companions for 2 years now, have kept my feet warm in winter, slept next to my bed at night, were always waiting for me in the morning when I rolled out of bed, or when I came in out of the cold world outside. I feel lonely without them, and cold. Then I had to dispose of them - my wonderful sheepskin slippers. The problem was - where, and how?? In Düsseldorf, garbage is collected by the Awista. They give us bins for everything. Black bins for household garbage, brown ones for *bio* things which can be composted. Blue bins for paper. Yellow bins for plastic and metal. Containers spoiling the view on every corner where you can throw in brown glass, clear glass and green glass. Containers for old clothes (packed and bundled) or shoes (tied together in pairs, please!). Once a month they collect old furniture. We have a recycling yard round the corner where there are giant containers, not only for all these things, but also for garden rubbish like leaves and branches, for scrap metal, for small electric appliances (like toasters, coffee machines etc) but NOT for computers, TVs or LARGE things. These have to be taken to other specialised recycling yards. And once a month they have a special collection at the yard where you can take DANGEROUS things like old paint tins, batteries, acids, chemicals and old oil cans, to name just a few. Our garbage gets treated very well here, then they earn money with it. And the monthly, compulsory fees for their services are also considerable. Once a year we even get a free calendar which tells what you can put where and when. This was the problem. Where to put my sheepskin slippers? Normally, I could have bundled them and taken them across the road to the old clothes container. I mean, they are not worn out. It's just that I had to dispose of them because every time I took them off, the smell of decaying sheep was sooooooo strong that I nearly fainted. I had thought of trying to extract the gas they were giving off and marketing it as an anaesthetic for minor ops. Or would it have been more suitable as something for biological warfare? This was the problem. Did I have to take my slippers to the monthly collection of dangerous goods? Or could I dispose of them in the black bins? This morning I made a decision.
The offending articles were packed in a small bin bag, tied well, and I sneaked outside in PJs (the grey-pink striped ones) and my leather biker jacket and put them in the black bin. There they came to rest, not on a bed of roses, but on a heap of veggies, mostly peas, which were in the bin. As I said at the beginning - Rest in Peas!!