And Christmas resumes

Good evening

I have another batch of Christmas cards to share with you tonight

I bought a lovely 8" paper pad from the Range last year and these Vintage style papers have been a joy to work with

The Christmas tree stamp is by Stampin' Up and the little wooden reindeer was bought in The Works last year

I seem to have amassed a great deal of DL sized envelopes so tried to use a few up this year

The house die below is an old Spellbinders die, the poinsettias are Marianne, sentiment is Stampin' Up and the trees were made using deckle edged scissors as I didn't have dies small enough for these trees

This next lamppost is a Tim Holtz die, sentiment is once again Stampin' Up

I thought I was almost through sharing all my christmas cards, but checking my camera tonight I still have a fair few to blog. I hope I am not boring everyone with them

I am not sure I will be able to keep this blogging pace up once all the christmas crafts have been shared, but I must admit to having found my crafting mojo lately, so, who knows, maybe next year will be more creative

So, what do you do when you lose your mojo, hit a wall, lack inspiration

Here's 5 ideas to kickstart your creative flow

1. Use the internet for inspiration, join sites that post photos of the crafts you enjoy

I love 

Pinterest

Scrapbook.com

UK Scrappers

2. Connect with other bloggers, create a reading list on your preferred device of creative bloggers whose style makes you want to reach for your supplies

3. Reorganise your crafting space and supplies. Oftentimes, just reacquainting yourself with your bits and bobs is enough to spur you into action, have your favourite colours and styles to hand and make your crafting space comfortable and easy to use

4. Join a class or club. Sharing ideas with your fellow members and taking a course can help you to think outside your creative box, trying new techniques and sharing them with others is inspiration itself. My favourite part of running my classes when I had the shop was "show and tell", I loved it when class members brought in their makes from home and know they inspired me as well as all the other class members

5. If all else fails GO SHOPPING ! Treat yourself to a new piece of equipment, a magazine or a book of ideas. Something as simple and as inexpensive as a beautiful sheet of patterned paper, some pretty ribbon or a new die is often enough to create a little spark of creativity 

Pretty in pink

Hello

It has been a little while since my last post

We have joined a gym, Neil and I

Neil for physio reasons, he's trying to strengthen his knee after his op and to regain some of the lost muscle on his left side and therefore hopefully regaining a little of his strength and co-ordination

And me, well, I need to shift these pounds before I get to the big 50 or I fear they may never go

I am eating fully vegan now, for health as well as ethical reasons, many thanks to Amy and Ben for all their help and advice and their inspiration in the first place, love you two xxx

I lost just over a stone by going vegan and then a plateau hit and so Neil joined me at the gym as part of my christmas gift, thankyou sweetheart xxx

I have to say I have had gym memberships on and off for years, but this time it just feels right. I love my gym - Snap fitness in St Austell, the staff are lovely and helpful, the gym is brand new and immaculate with absolutely tons of equipment, it is bright and cheerful and I actually look forward to going - that's a first !

We have been working out for a month and I didn't weigh myself at all in the first four weeks. To my dismay I lost only one pound when I jumped on the scales this week, I was gutted, I had worked bloody hard, weights and cardio, five days a week for four weeks

Neil urged me to measure and to not get hung up on what the scale reads, I was sceptical but did as I was told

I had taken my measurements at the beginning of January and when I repeated them I was gobsmacked

All in all I have lost 12 inches in total - 12 bloody inches - wow !!!! that's 30 cm, 300 mm, you get the gist - I am pretty happy with that

The scales have now been consigned to their hiding place under the bed, and, from now on I am just going to go by the mirror and my measurements

So that's the reason I have fallen behind with my blogging and cardmaking

But the upside of all this exercise is, at first it nearly killed me, I was sleeping for England, but now I have more energy, more motivation and my sleeping has returned to a normal pattern once again

I feel motivated to do more, more of everything, exercising, cardmaking, crafting, even cleaning, literally everything !

Woohoo, go me !

So, enough of the update, I am sure I have bored you all to tears

I have a card to share, I made this for my lovely friend Gillian

I used a Martha Stewart border punch and a lattice Nestability die to create the whitework

The leafy scroll is an old Marianne die and the flowers were made using a Stampin' Up stamp and punch set

The sentiment is also Stampin' Up as is the punch I used to cut it out

Gillian is currently nursing a poorly shoulder so I am sending her all my love and hoping she feels much better soon

Love and lost inches

Tracey

xxx