The Last Day of 2011

It's always a strange feeling when one year ends and another begins, but this year it somehow doesn't really seem real. However, it really is the last day of the year, and the last chance to blog in 2011. I have not made any resolutions, as it's just depressing when they all get broken. Hope you will all have more success with yours!

I just have some journal pages to show today, once again, more or less the same as always but different....Sorry that the photos are not good; the light was just bad all day.

And here is a little story which Narda sent me; I think it is something we can all take with us into the new year.

Garbage Truck of Life.
One day I hopped in a taxi and we took off for the airport.
We were driving in the right lane when suddenly a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us.
My taxi driver slammed on his breaks, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches!
The driver of the other car whipped his head around and started yelling at us.
My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy.And I mean, he was really friendly.
So I asked, "Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!"
This is when my taxi driver taught me what I now call, "The Law of the Garbage Truck."
He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump itand sometimes they'll dump it on you.
Don't take it personally.
Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the streets.
The bottom line is that successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day. Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so:
"Love the people who treat you right.
Pray for the ones who don't."
Life is ten percent what you make it
and ninety percent how you take it!
"What lies behind us
and what lies before us
are tiny matters
compared to what lies within us."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I would like to wish you all a very happy and healthy New Year 2012. Take care of yourselves, have a good day, and thanks for dropping in!

Paint Party Friday Week # 42

It hardly seems possible that this is the last PPF in this year; where has the time gone? Thanks to Eva and Kristin for hosting this challenge.

I have made a mixed media canvas for this week, using photos of me taken at various times, and pictures of London. I grew up in London's Docklands, more or less in Jack-the-Ripper-Land, and the predominant colours were grey and black, which I have used in my painting. Many of the buildings were not only soot blackened but also scarred and damaged by the *Blitz*. I cut away part of the photos I have used along the bottom of the picture, in order to make them merge better with the background. The pictures show places with which I was familiar during my childhood and school time. We lived very near to the Tower of London, where we often played as kids.

Hope you all have a great day. Take care, and thanks for visiting!

The Same but Different....

Yesterday I made some tags to enter into a few challenges. The theme over at *Take a word* is print this week, and this was my inspiration for the tags I made. They have all been made with the same combination of a *sandwich-man* stamp from Scrollswork, and TH's umbrella man. I used tags cut from waste cardboard, which I covered with paper from an old book. After distressing the background, I stamped the motive, and added the umbrella-man, twice as a die-cut, using old book covers, and once sponged with ink using the *waste*. Although each tag is basically the same, the look has been changed each time by using different colours and positioning of the images, and different *accessories*. I am also entering the tags into the challenges at the *Craft Room*, and at * Everybody Art* and at *Sunday Stampers* where *anything goes* is on.

I started some new journal pages, too, but they are only half finished just now.
Thanks to all who left me nice messages yesterday, it did me good to see that other people care. I still feel very down, but am trying to give myself a kick in the butt to get back into my routine again, and hope that it will help.

And before I close, another joke from Narda:

An Englishman, a Scotsman, an Irishman, a Welshman, a Latvian, a Turk, a German, an Indian, several Americans (including a Southerner, a New Englander, and a Californian) an Argentine, a Dane, an Australian, a Slovakian, an Egyptian, a Japanese, a Moroccan, a Frenchman, a New Zealander, a Spaniard, a Russian, a Guatemalan, a Colombian, a Pakistani, a Malaysian, a Croatian, a Uzbek, a Cypriot, a Pole, a Lithuanian, a Chinese, a Sri Lankan, a Lebanese, a Cayman Islander, a Ugandan, a Vietnamese, a Korean, a Uruguayan, a Czech, an Icelander, a Mexican, a Finn, a Honduran, a Panamanian, an Andorran, an Israeli, a Venezuelan, a Fijian, a Peruvian, an Estonian, a Brazilian, a Portuguese, a Liechtensteiner, a Mongolian, a Hungarian, a Canadian, a Moldovan, a Haitian, a Norfolk Islander, a Macedonian, a Bolivian, a Cook Islander, a Tajikistani, a Samoan, an Armenian, an Aruban, an Albanian, a Greenlander, a Micronesian, a Virgin Islander, a Georgian, a Bahaman, a Belarusian, a Cuban, a Tongan, a Cambodian, a Qatari, an Azerbaijani, a Romanian, a Chilean, a Kyrgyzstani, a Jamaican, a Filipino, a Ukrainian, a Dutchman, an Ecuadorian, a Costa Rican, a Swede, a Bulgarian, a Serb, a Swiss, a Greek, a Belgian, a Singaporean, an Italian, a Norwegian and 47 Africans all from different African countries all walk into a fine restaurant...
The maître scrutinizes the group one by one, and bars their entrance saying, "Sorry, you can't come in here without a Thai."


Have a good day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!

Not feeling so good....

Hi everybody, these are pictures I made back in 1991, but they look like I feel today.

Catch you all again tomorrow. Have a good day and take care!

Lots of Thank You's

Hi everybody, I must say I am glad that the holidays are over and that life can get back to *normal* now, whatever that may be! I want to say thanks to all who sent me beautiful cards for Christmas and my birthday, hand made presents, embellishments and other *play-things*: Jo, Annette, Zoe, Katie, Yvonne,Cindy, Carole, Carole (Cobbly), Maria, Elvie, Carolyn, Suze, Natasa, Sara Bee, Lynne, Karen, Sue and China.

Here's wishing you all a great day, take care, and thanks for visiting!

More Journal Pages

Holiday time is a difficult time to be alone, so the past couple of days were rather sad. Well, at least I didn't have to cook for anyone, and could spend my days crafting as always....
I hate to do this to you again, but once again a song has crept into my work - *Pictures of Matchstick men* - from Status Quo, which has been going round in my head for days; now it will surely do the same for you! And for those of you who have perhaps forgotten how it goes, here it is:



I have used predominantly grey in the pages, more or less matching my mood. The pictures and images have been printed in black and white; some have been applied as dry transfers, as I like the rather ragged look this gives. Others have been collaged,and mixed with some London images. As a kid I used to call the guards *matchstick men* - perhaps because they always stood so still and straight. I have used two TH die cuts, the dress form, which has been *Stamped* using the *waste* from the die-cut, and the umbrella man.

Here's wishing you all a good day. Take care, and thanks for visiting!

Happy Holidays You All!

Happy Holidays to you all, whatever you may be celebrating, and enjoy the time you can spend in the company of family, friends and loved ones.

Take care of yourselves, and thanks for visiting!