Well guess what I've gone and forgotten THIS time?!!!!

Oh boy! You really are a great lot, you know. Thank you for so many comments after my last navel-gaze. OK that sounds like I am making light of it, but I'm not really. I really do appreciate your words and I hope I've taken some of it on board. There is a lot of wisdom out there! And a lot of kindness, too....

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So! What did I forget this time?
Well, I was off to my mum's from Saturday midday-ish till Monday evening.
I took with me-

• some craft stuff (she is getting interested.... slowly.... dipping her toe in.... just.... about..... I'll get her, you see if I don't!);
• extra clothes;
• washbag;
• book;
• camera;
• umbrella (the original one, not the one we bought when I thought I had lost this one -and then lost that one the other week. Ahem.)

Any guesses what I left behind?
Scroll down to see if you were right...

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if you said "THE BLASTED CAMERA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" then congratulations, you're psychic.
And hence the gap above is not filled with pictures.

HURRUMPFFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Luckily, Luvbug has a camera so I'll take some photo's of some stuff I made and post those.
They won't be as good because my camera is better than his, but I bought his as a present and he bought me mine, so less said about quality difference the better. Ahem.

By the way, re some of the other things on the list-

• I didn't forget the umbrella because I forgot I had it and so left it safely in my overnight bag when we went out for a walk. In the rain.
• And I didn't forget my book because my mum mistook my showing it to her in a "hey I'm reading this, it's really good!" kind of way as a "would you like this book?" kind of way. Now SHE is reading it.
• And oh, actually yes, I left the crafty stuff behind as well. The camera was in the same bag. Oops.
  

I'm not getting any better, am I? =)

Feeling a wee bit adrift....

I'm pretty confused.
I'm not religious or spiritual any more. I used to be SO MUCH.
BIG reasons why I'm not now. Won't go into that here! (Although I did explain it, here...)
But anyway.... it isn't that I miss it, it's just strange, having to learn to be something different to what I was.

When your faith drops out of your life it takes a few years for the dust to settle. And now that it has, I find myself not knowing what my "moral compass" is. What is my "philosophy of life"- and do I even need one?

In my past I would turn to my religion. I would think of the Bible or some saint. Like St Therese of Liseaux. She wrote about her "Little Way" which was basically "purity of intention". She was in an enclosed convent so couldn't do much for her companions in a big way. But in her "little way" she said that if she put lots of love and meaning into the little things she COULD do, that would make them worth as much as something big.

-Basically doing your best and putting others first.
Though I've been warned, usually by well meaning therapists that this can be taken too far.
When I was nine years old I remember my teacher at school telling us,
"Always put the donkey last. YOU are the donkey."
-And I applied it even to the smallest thing.
Perhaps this was partly why I was unable to stand up to bullies.

I find myself slipping into it quite naturally even now.
I make two cups of tea, one for me and one for a guest. I spoil one of them by pouring too much milk into the cup. So I have that one, and give the better one to the guest. Even though I cannot stand milky tea. Nothing is said, nothing is noticed. It's natural, internal. So some things hang over from one life to the next, from the religious to the secular.

But when I was a Christian, and especially when I was a Catholic, if, every now and then, I felt like I needed a spring clean on the inside, I would go to God, or even to "Confession", get the "slate wiped clean" and, essentially, *start over*. It was a way of drawing a line and starting again, with good intentions to be better, etc. etc. The mental relief was outstanding. A huge weight would disappear from my shoulders and I'd carry on, refreshed. I truly think it's how the human race got by without psycotherapy for so long =)

Well I currently feel like a tumble dryer that needs its lint filter cleaning out. And I no longer know how to do it, because I don't have those outlets any more. How do I draw a line and carry on refreshed, if I don't have anything to draw the line with any more?

I have a friend who also used to be a Church-goer and regular pray-er. She's stopped going along lately. Says she can't seem to believe in it any more. I worry for her. She is giving up more than she realises. I hope she isn't doing it lightly. I have no regrets about my decision, but when it comes to advice on others' beliefs I can't give any, except to say that life with faith is a little more straightforward than life without it, not because it gives all the answers, but because it just has fewer questions.

sorry to go heavy on you all... I HAVE been crafting.... I'll lighten up next time with some photo's of what I've been working on!

Updates..... and a bit of crafting =) and trying to draw Miss Peach!

The beautiful leaf colours around tell me that autumn has finally arrived here, yet today was like a spring day. Luvbug and I went off for a bike ride in just jeans, T-shirts and jumpers. -Still no need for coats for jackets.

This time of year has a strange light in the afternoon. It makes the late flowers glow, especially the red hot pokers, which seem to fluoresce.

It was nice to cycle past fields being ploughed- with flocks of gulls following the tractor along. And passing under trees as leaves are shedding and fluttering down.... it was all very Enid Blyton! When we got back, we worked out from the map that we'd done about 8 1/2 miles. That meant huge mugs of tea =)

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Thanks for all the messages! The cold or flu, whatever it was, is out of my system now, I think.

I saw the doc aweek ago to get my test results, which were negative for everything. So no diabetes or any further thyroid problems. Hmmm. No clearer, then, as to weight gain and strange goings on in the running-to-the-loo department. As I had already noticed that wheat and sugar seem to make things worse, Doc advised I try strictly cutting these out.

So this is what I've been doing. I did it successfully for 8 days. I did fell less gurgly, less bloated, and the route to the loo was definitely less trod.

THEN! Oh dear. The "certain-time-of-the-month" demon crept up, whispering into my ear "SHOOOOOOOOOOGAR......SHOOOOOOGAR..... you MUST HAVE IT! YOU MUST!" and so on and so on till I gave in, some time in the middle of Friday night. (Sigh). I made toast- with non wheat bread- but slavered it all over in ginger jam. MmmMMmMMmmMMmm scrummy. Then, after about 15 minutes, it was HEY PRESTO! Gurgle gurgle, then orange poo. WHAT the????? I had to retreat to bed in a jumper and with a hot water bottle, as I was so cold and shivery, too.

Hmmm. A bit of a mystery, yes?

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Here are a couple of Christmas cards I made this week. The poinsettia is an outline sticker, stuck onto coloured paper, then cut out and layered up with silicone glue.
The bear stamp was free with a magazine. Isn't it cute? I coloured it with water-colour pencil, but left a lot of it as pencil rather than wetting it. I love the way the cat is clearly happy, but the bear looks a tad annoyed with having to pull the sledge!
Here are two dragons, stamped and coloured with Promarkers. The larger dragon is a Whiff Of Joy stamp. Not sure about the other, as I bought it used, on Ebay last year. Does anyone know of a "how to" video on Promarkers? I'm sure I could get more out of them than I do, I'm not too good at shading and highlighting at the mo.

Lastly, I'm trying to draw Miss Peach:I'm not completely pleased with it yet, so I'll have another go. But as the first cat portrait I've done in a while, I think it's quite nice =)
I've also been working on tag books and I'm going to do a how-to post on them soon, but I want to send off the one I made for a present first =)

I am definitely in an 'up' in the zig zag at the moment. I am doing so many things all at once!!!

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Hope you're all keeping warm and busy!
We are finally getting our central heating fixed- yippee! They start on 2nd November. This means it will be in by my birthday, the 8th. Luvbug even suggested it could be my birthday present. HAH! Nice try, buster!!!!

Not quite normal, not even for me, yet.

Thank you, everyone, for the lovely messages and emails =)

Seems I have had a bad head cold with an upset tummy. Bleagh. No joking; at one point my poo was orange. ORANGE. That's just not normal, is it? At times like that I'd love to be a doctor, the type that works in a lab and knows about stuff like what turns your poo odd colours. Weird.

I've been up and about since Wednesday night and I went out today for the first time in at least a week. Nearly attempted this yesterday but was too dizzy.

Thought I was doing well till I realised, on the way home, that I was sans one umbrella. Oops. I had left the house with it. I had used it. I definitely had it in town because I got sworn at when it nearly took someone's eye out ("I'm sorry, but look where you're going, you stupid horse!" I thought, then wondered why on earth I had called her a horse of all things.) I only noticed that I'd lost it when I saw some for sale in a shop window. No, even the rain falling on my head wasn't a clue. Oh dear. Perhaps I better keep taking the bunged-up-head pills for a little longer.

Cough, splutter, ufff...

Since Thursday I've been spending nights trying to sleep sitting upright on the sofa. I get propped up by cushions and have a soft, fleecy blanket round me. Still not very comfortable! But the idea is to try to prevent the cold from settling in my chest and triggering my asthma. It's a drill I've got used to each time I start getting a cold...

Well, ooops! I gave in last night; I felt myself sliding down into a horizontal flop and didn't have the willpower to make myself sit up again! The call to sleep flat was too strong. D'oh!

I had a nice nap of about 3 hours or so there, but knew as soon as I sat up this morning that I was going to have to pay for it- cough cough cough, deep and loud like a foghorn. Oh dear. Now I'm on my inhalers.

Might do some steam inhalation later. And perhaps I better cancel tomorrow's Art Therapy. As well as thinking I should stay in the warm, I don't really want to pass it on!

Bleagh!

2 quite different cards...

I tried Twitter this morning. I lasted about 2 hours. Sometimes you just know when something isn't for you!

I am fighting a cold. Luvbug returned to work just recently and already the screaming brats dear children in his class gave him a bug to bring home. It's mostly throaty and shivery. Do you think it could be Swine Flu? If it is, and I eat bacon and eggs, is that cannibalism? Tough if it is, cos that's what I'm going to have for lunch HAHAHA.

Here is a card I made for Alex, my eldest nephew, who reached the grand old age of 9 last week:A Penny Black mouse, instead of a hedgehog, for a change!

And this one is for his mum, who has a birthday next week:I coloured the image with my new Bruynzeel Sakura water colour pencils (much better than my Derwents and a bargain in a sale).
The stamped image is from Stampin' Up! and was a sample sent to me by a SU rep.

- put a flower inside too :)

I made that second one yesterday. It was nice to do some crafting again. I really must get stuck in. I have about 40 "toppers" ready for making into cards. (Ibeati, I haven't forgotten your order! It's almost done!)

I love my blogger friends!

Unexpected parcels! There's nothing like them! When one arrives I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve! (Which is what I haven't actually felt on Christmas Eve since I was about 12- so they make me feel young again!)

Oh boy. A lovely package arrived this week from Lorianna =)
It gave me such a lift!
Here it is:Inside the Halloween themed card (I love the crow and moon on the front!):I like the way the cat's tail was holding on to the message card:
(What a lovely message!)

Next, "Helena's Magical Cottage":I love the cat button! Look close up- he even has a heart for a nose! Some of the inside pages.... so much work gone into this....gorgeous!Back cover...I am completely stunned! So much work gone into something, just for me! Wonderful! Thank you so much, Lorianna!

Now, where's that choccie? =)

OooOOooOoo... made by Mars, yet not a bar we have over here.... wonder what it's like??

Nyom nyom nyommmmm.... scrumptiously creamy! Yum! I better get this hidden! hehe!

Now I think I'll try my hand at a Halloween card for Lorianna. I'll start with this cheeky chappy here.....Did you spot the scrumptious new Water-Colour Pencils? They're by Bruynzeel/Sakura. I bought them half price for about £7.50. The Derwent ones I bought last year were very disappointing- very grainy when wet. These are completely smooth, no streaks or gritty bits. Anyway..... I was going to make this a black cat but couldn't resist a few tabby stripes, so it's a cheeky tabby trying to be a scaredy Halloween cat =)