Stash...

Yummy!! Got my new Scrap-Room kit yesterday and love all four kits in it!! I know sometimes there's one that you might not be quite so keen on as the rest, but this one is very "me"...all of the kits are very "me" in different ways. I don't buy that much stash at the moment so it's always nice when the monthly kit turns up. Got some very useful stamps with the kit too. Can't wait to have a play with it all...

Can't believe my Christmas journal is nearly done. Only one more page to go. I have to admit I haven't really enjoyed doing my last few pages...not as much as I should do, it's felt more like a "chore" than fun really... I guess it's because Christmas has been and gone a while now.

But on the other hand I'm really pleased that I have (well, will) finish my journal. I really didn't think I would keep going to the end since I was away for over 2 weeks of the class. My goal was always just to continue working at the one-page-a-day speed when I got back and just finish later than scheduled...but to be honest I very much feared that I would give up when I was so behind. So I feel rather pleased that I proved myself wrong and that I COULD do it...

Note to self: definitely get some new bead pliers (hand is still so sore today that there's no chance I can start on another bracelet yet)

Bead mania...

First I'd like to share the next page in my Christmas journal. I'm don't even think I like my page. Think I need to give it some time before I decide. I guess it feels a bit strange working on a Christmas journal now, so I find it hard to get in the right creative mood. Still another page is done and only 2 to go...

I love my beads!!! I have had so much fun today playing with them. And I have made my very first dangly bead bracelet. I guess the colour I would be going for was quite obvious. LOL! I can see this getting rather addictive.

I have found that my old bead pliers are not so good though. I really struggled with the cutters and it took me a lot of effort, a lot of wiggling and pain in my hand to get through the headpins. If anyone can recommend some good pliers that doesn't cost a fortune, that would be great please. I'd love to make another bracelet straight away but my poor hand is too achy from the bad cutters.

I have ordered a new bead storage bag which I hope will arrive very soon too! The way I keep them now, it's hopeless to get a good view over what you have. So I'm longing for my bag to arrive so I can sort it all and get it looking pretty (and useful!) Any good bead shop recommendations are very much appreciated...

A few things to share...

A few things I'd like to share with you...

1. A stamp I got in the sale last week. I just really like this saying. You can read a lot into it. Like you can not change things that happen, but you can try and turn them into something positive...

2. My Christmas journal. Yet another page done and finished. Not many pages left to do now.

3. My gluten/wheat, dairy and eggs free pie (or maybe it should be called quiche?) that I made yesterday. I'm very pleased to have such big success with it. Baking like that without near disasterous results is not easy.

4. And finally...my beads!! Ordered some beads late last week. Can't wait to have a play with them. Hoping to make some dangly-bead-bracelets... We'll see how it goes...

Success...

I'm so happy! I have managed to make a pasty case today for a spicy mince and white cabbage pie which is totally gluten/wheat, egg and dairy-free. And it turned out very nice!! Anyone who's tried baking under those circumstances, knows it's more likely to turn out to be a disaster than a success. It tasted slightly different to a normal one made with wheat flour etc, but certainly very, very acceptable still. I'm SO pleased!! Now I can experiment with fillings etc and have lots of fun...

...and another page done for my Christmas journal. Have to say I borrowed Shimelle's idea of using a photo of a gingerbread house. Only I went a bit more crazy and used three photos of them LOL!

Spent the day doing lots of "spring" cleaning. Hard work, but very much worth it. Also changed some colours in the livingroom so it generally looks more airy and lighter now. Feels great to have it done...

Nice day out...

Wow it's tiring to shop! We have spent all day in York today - such a cosy city! Feel rather pleased because there were loads of sales on and it's so easy to buy stuff that you don't need - and I managed to not buy a single thing in the sales. Instead I bought 3 tops/t-shirts (not in the sale) which I really needed and some nice bath stuff from Lush.

This is page 32 (ie for Jan 1st) of my Christmas Journal. Apologies for the picture being extremely NOT straight - I seem to have got into a habit of taking photos that are not straight at the moment. I experimented with making my own "word fetti" (like the Making Memories stickers) in a photo editing program. Took some time to get it nice and neat, but really enjoyed the result.

Can't believe it's only 5 more pages to do!! Anyway, the subject for the 1st was resolutions for the new year. However this is not something that I'm really used to...so I wrote about that instead LOL!

Right, I'm off for some relaxing time on the sofa...

Back to basics...

We bought two of the Covent Garden soup books the other day. They are all for doing everything properly and from scratch, including making your own stock, so we thought we'd give it a go. We picked two soups based on vegetable stock and today I have spent the morning making our very own stock! I can honestly say it's the first time I have tried that. It took a few hours but we got quite a bit of stock from it and you can freeze it, so we have some for other soups too.

(making vegetable stock)

Tonight we're going to try fresh salmon and dill soup with potatoes and white wine and later in the week we're going to make chicken soup with lemon and tarragon. At least they sound very nice. Let's hope it will be worth all the effort. Then we might even venture into making our own chicken or beef stock. But that's for another week...

Thanks to Peechy, Dale Anne and Chris for the comments yesterday. Dale Anne: I will definitely have a look at that book you mentioned and I do appreciate any suggestions from anyone regarding good books to check out (so please post more if you now of any - thanks!)

Before I go for today, here's the next page in my Christmas journal. We're now up to New Year's Eve. Since NYE is pretty similar every year for us I didn't have that much journaling to do for this page, but I still enjoyed making it and documenting it a bit...

Remembering...

The subject for the Christmas journal on the 30th of December was to remember the past year, good and bad. For me there was one major thing that stood out (both good and bad). I didn't want my page to be about the design but about the journaling. I did lots of journaling (all tucked into a pocket at the back of the photo), it felt good to write it all down, and you can read it all below:

***

Food intolerance.
It feels strange to write this down. It’s the first time I have done it. The biggest change in 2006, both on the good and bad side was my food intolerance. Between January and April I was feeling so ill. Almost constantly. I could hardly go out and we had to cancel plans many times. I kept a food diary and it showed about 10 “reasonable well days” out of 60!! It was even affecting my mood (lack of nutrients because I didn’t get to keep any food?) and my skin/looks. Not to mention how it wears you out, constantly feeling ill. In April I was so desperate that I went on a very strict elimination diet. Ross was sweet enough and did it with me - that meant so much!

After a week of pure torture I was in tears, I was still ill and didn’t know where to turn or what to do. The doctors were no help as they didn’t do intolerance tests. I knew it was something I was eating, I just couldn’t work out what. Neither was I aware of that you can react to something you are intolerant to up to 72 (!) hours after you have eaten it. During this time I had bought and read LOTS of stomach/intolerance books. Several seemed to suggest that a private IGG intolerance test was the way to go. But it cost a fortune. And would it even work? It has been on my mind for months.
Speaking to my mum on the phone in Sweden, being in tears as I made the decision to give up the strict elimination diet, she said maybe I should try the IGG test after all. If it would give me the right answers it would be worth any money in the world. But would it work?

She said she and dad would pay. This time I cried with happiness & ordered the test the next day. Waiting for the results were very scary & exciting. This was my only hope it felt like, I couldn’t think of anything else that I could try.
When the envelope came through the door I was so scared. I kept looking at it and looking at it. I was wondering if this would finally have the answers for me. I waited until Ross came home and opened it...
I cried and cried. Seeing the results were a nightmare. I kept saying “What am I supposed to eat? What am I supposed to eat?” The results were showing severe intolerances to: dairy products, gluten, wheat, rye, barley, eggs, almonds, hazelnuts, brazilnuts, haricot beans, kidney beans, yeast, cola nut etc and also “borderline intolerances” to things like maize, corn, white fish etc. I was devastated.

The next few weeks we learnt to read the ingredients of everything we bought. Have you ever thought of how MANY products contain things like gluten/wheat, dairy, eggs and yeast? Basically anything pre-made is out of the question, so is breads and cakes, most sauces, almost all candy/sweets/chocolate etc. Eating out is impossible.
Now, several months later, I have learnt to cope with it. Ross being so supportive and eating the same things I do help incredibly much. It’s not easy, it’s never easy, but I have learnt to cope. I read on everything I buy. Everything. I feel SO much better it’s unbelievable, my skin is back to normal (amazing what intolerances can do), Ross says I look so much better and healthier, my mood is so much better and I feel generally “myself” again. A feeling that is SO great it’s hard to describe.

Don’t get me wrong, writing shopping lists and finding FUN things to cook is still hard, and every few weeks I have a few hours when I feel really down about it and could kill for something like a slice of pizza. However taking the test was the best thing I did!

***

And for Chris, who asked me to recommend some "free from" books:
* "The AiA Gluten and Dairy Free Cookbook" - Marilyn Le Breton This book is aimed at children with autism, but it works great for anyone with food intolerance. All recipes are gluten and dairy free and on top of that they are all marked as "egg free", "yeast free" etc (when that applies).
* "Cooking Without Made Easy: Recipes Free from Added Gluten, Sugar, Yeast and Dairy Produce" - Barbara Cousins I just received this book from Amazon the other day, so I really haven't had the chance to get an opinion of it yet. I think it will be worth it though because almost all "intolerance" books feature ONE food intolerance only...and when you suffer from several "big" ones, they are not much use.
Hope this was of some help Chris...

Really excited...

I'm really excited!!! I made up my mind and signed up for one of the Big Picture scrapbooking classes last night. (Thanks to Sherry for recommending them!) It's called Product Playground and it's all about playing around and experimenting with your scrapbooking supplies. Buttons, brads, ribbons, chipboard etc! Just what I need as I tend to use them like I always have done and don't really "alter"/"play" with them very much. So I really can't wait and I'm really excited about it. If any of you are also taking the class, I'd love to hear about it please.

Now, today I'm making sure I'm transferrring my photos correctly to the computer from my camera, and I double-checked that the images were there before I deleted them off the camera LOL! So these are my stationery bargains I got in the sale the other day. The cats are sooo cute I think. And I love to add up what things should have cost had they not been in the sale. It's just a habit I have which gives me some satisfaction I guess LOL! I'm not sure about the price of the two purple items with the big bead on the string in the front of the photo. But the other four I only paid £4.51 in TOTAL for. If they hadn't been on sale it would have been £18.96. So I feel pretty pleased with my cute stationery and bargain.

And before I go I want to share the next page I have made for my Christmas journal. Today I, once again, came up with my own subject. You were actually supposed to go back and make the intro page. But that wasn't really good for me: a) I don't want an intro page (the cover and first page explains enough I think) and b) I really didn't want a "gap" in my book...ie no page for the 29th. That would irritate me LOL!

So I came up with my own subject. Since we always spend Christmas in Sweden, I wanted to make a page of what Christmas (or rather the run-up to it, really) is like for us in the UK. How we still have a tree and decorate the house etc a bit.

Hrm...

...took some photos of some cute stationary that I had bought in the sale. Transferred them to my computer. Or so I thought. I deleted them off the camera and then found they were not on the computer!! Must have forgotten to "paste" them. Grrr! The light has gone again (it's so dark and rainy outside) so it will have to wait until another day now. Oh well...

And I'm still battling (not in a negative way!) along with my Christmas journal. 28th of December and the subject was to write about what things you like about this time (well, not THIS time as in January...but as in Christmas/December). I thought it was the perfect subject to do in a list form.

Ooooh and I had some fun with my Slick Writers using them straight onto the photo. Bought a big box of them (mixed colours and nib sizes) and have kinda forgotten to play with them (Ross keeps stealing them to write onto CDs with though - apparently they are great for that! LOL!)...so today they came out. Wow it was easy to write onto photos with them!! L-O-V-E them!! Will definitely have to do that a bit more (before they get worn out by writing onto CDs!!)...

Thinking about signing up to one of the Big Picture scrapbooking classes. Never tried one of those before. If any of you have, I'd be very grateful if you could let me know your opinions of it/them in the "comments" section please, please!! Thanks...

Grey, grey, grey...

It's one of these days when I think it never became light outside. It's just totally dark and grey. And rain, rain, rain... Have been forced to have the ceiling lights on all day - it's just been too dark. I really hate those days. No matter how much you try and stay in a good mood, things just go against you on these days. Not sure why, they just do...

On the other hand, once it's actually evening on a day like this, and you feel you really *should* have the lights on, it can be rather cosy. So I'm hoping for a cosy evening as this has really not been my day today.

Still I have at least managed another page for my Christmas journal. I was surprised when I noticed I don't have too many pages left to do now. I guess taking it one day at a time, one page at a time - you WILL catch up and finish it after all. I'm not very good at "being behind" on something, it gets me rather stressed. So to have the little schedule of just continuing one page a day has really helped me. I feel rather pleased that I have continued, not given up and not got stressed about it.

The prompt for the 27th of December was all about sleeping. Didn't have too much to journal about so I added a cosy winter/evening picture which was actually part of our advent calendar. Thought it was rather appropriate with the starry night...