The Trinket Tree

Neil calls this my Trinket Tree he bought if for me a few Christmases ago (well i saw it and made him lol)Isn't this photo he took of it amazing !

My Fav Decoration spots

Her name is Mary

So proclaimed her gorgeous tag,this mannequin was a present from my dear friend Linda.
I just adore her work she also made me a wand that says Wish upon a star" Like all good wands it is smothered in glass glitter.
The Stocking you can see Hanging behind her was one of my gifts from artist Shannon over at PaintminePink website and Blog.
Thankyou girls i love you both,ick im sounding like sugar syrup these days and really im not as sweet as i sound lol

More Christmas

Isnt this cradle the best i got it from Sue at Junk it Junction and i adore it,Of course it turned my house upside down to fit it in my bedroom that was already crowded but i NEEDED it badly.See i knew you would all understand how one can need a vintage cradle even though one doesnt have nor want another baby unless the word grand comes in front of it.


Well my home is finally Company ready.Oh how i wish it was as tidy as you all seem to think it is.Alas i am a girl with a creative mind and always i make mess.I create i assemble i pull apart and rearrange and this is NOT a tidy process.I am my own worst enemy as i like to have order and tidiness and can be manic about a clean house.But i collect stuff i arrange stuff i create stuff and my home is full of STUFF and worst thing of all i LOVE my stuff.So you see the problem here dont you IT'S ME !!!
Anyway it is tidy so here is the rest of the xmas pics The bedroom only has a few decs my swap partner and friend Petah did the stocking and my friend Cherrie did the cute hanger that is embroidered "Brambly Cottage" which is the name of my house.
Shannon did the Angel and i have a little tree with pink ornaments.The rest is just to show you its tidy lol.

The spirit of Christmas

Gotta love Matchboxes
How sweet are these the small one i made myself and the larger one was made by the very sweet Lisa of Lisa Laughs blog.Thankyou Lisa its so sweet and filled with soooo much stuff.You would never believe these are Just matchboxes.


I have felt like an elf in my workshop lately,look at some of my organized disorder.

Here is a table decoration i made my old schoolfriend Debbie,she wanted it for th xmas table and reminiscent of childhood.It has two sides and has a box beyween them to fill with lollies Christmas Day !

Here are two of the MANY bears given to me by my Aunt who is moving just after Christmas.Dont they already look at home.

Quote of the season

My Favourite things

How sweet is that view,funny when you look at your house through someone Else's eyes,usually all i see is the pile of stuff that shouldn't be there in the corner.The cushions that aren't in place etc but when i saw this pic i loved it.






see what effect blogging has on me i saw someones glassed in noticeboard i wanted one,i bought one off sue from junk it junction (who is to blame for a few things round here lol) There is is just as i pictured although next year i will do a plain backing as the toile is too busy.I love to scatter bells around at Xmas.

The joy circles are from me friend linda of Raspberry Roses blog.Linda and i have similar tastes and i always adore what she makes me.

And then theres more folks -Memories that is !

With me there is always more
Here is my mantle with a little village ,itts only tiny as my mantle is so narrow
that village appears different places different years.
sometimes its on the china cabinet another time on the treadle sewing machine.I have many pieces but i dont use all of them every year,The huge santa head is mache i love it my Aunt bought it for me last christmas !

The little gingerbread man tree sits on the litchen butchers block,Daisy my friend from england sent the ginger gar;and a year ago and the twig basket is filled with xmas scented pot pourri courtesy of Linda my school friend.




I love this tree its filled with my oldest most treasured ornaments teh close up shows a real birds nest and egg (abandoned ) it goes well with teh blue glass birds swent by my friend Laurie in Alaska,The little pocket watch on the tree ontains my dads pic and i hang it with the gift tag i made and never got to use the year he dies.Its a memory tree.My friend Desley whom i lost to cancer used to get me decorations every year and now i think of her too as i put them out.

Episode 500 in which she goes crazy

Christmas crazy that is !And to think i have toned it down this year.Here is the country part of Brambly cottage.The front is my posh part and then the kitchen famiily room us my country,primitive part.i love them both.


I realised years ago the folly of putting the billion santas away each year only to
have some break etc as some are very old.So now I close the santa cupboard doors during the year and fling them open wide for xmas wala instant display.

I said to my husband the glitter hater this pictuure makes the family room look cluttered,he just gave me the look/You know the look,the one that says it aint the pic love.Ugh why do i have to be me.I love to be neat but i just love my stuff.

I rang an elf in Alaska

I rang Alaska i really did,well i was impressed.I mean do you know anyone who has rang Alaska cause i sure don't.I mean do you know anyone that even knows anyone in Alaska ? Okay i apologize ot all you Alaskans who i found out don't all live in igloos and guess what they have houses and they decorate and they have Internet and also a huge craft store named Michael's and some of them actually do craft.Umm i guess what i am saying is since Laurie joined Prettychic i found out that Alaskans are pretty much like you and me (but a whole lot colder).I also found out that yeah they do have to go to school and work and do the chores when the long dark winter days come.I have learned that moose can be very stubborn.That bears can hurt your friends.That yes it can be 40 below and you can still live (not always happily)
Umm i learned if someone or something dies you hope its in summer so you can bury it.As you cant dig ground thats frozen solid.I learned taht even in Alaska neighbourrcan be from hell.That keeping warm is hard work chopping wood loading wood ,carting wood.That the northern lights are magical.
That snow mobiling is fun.That there is more than one North Pole.And i have learned that friendship and kindred spirits can be found no matter where in the world they reside and that the colder the climate sometimes the warmer the heart.
And the last thing i have learnt is that sometimes email isn't enough.
Look at the wondrous swap Laurie sent me too too much.Everything was exactly me her and petah and linda all know me well.

I did a blog post once on how bunting made me happy,cause it does you cant be sad looking at bunting.Laurie made me gorgous bunting its going up soon and yes it made me happy.She knows i have a penchant for bluebirds along with my sister (laurie i am sharing just one with her lol) So you can see now why i had to ring.
Her daughter answered the phone and i said its Jullie from Australia thankyou for my peg butterfly (she made me a gorgeous butterfly with painted wings and a peg middle)
she said is it really,Laurie and i talked for half an hour laughing talking at the same time,i knew she grew up in Texas and then moved to Alaska after being married,but know what i never thought of her having an accent.of course i don't have one myself,im an Aussie.I treasure my friendship with Laurie she is my very own pocket sized Alaskan,i just want to keep her in my pocket she really is an elf.I have suspected it for a while now.I think she is in Santa's witness protection program so please don't tell anyone!

Petahs pink and pretty parcel

Ahh gotta love my pretty chic sistas ,Pet ah and i were partners for the
PRETTYCHIC CHRISTMAS STOCKING EXTRAVAGANZA (CAN YOU TELL I NAMED IT)
i WAS THE GREAT AND POWERFUL SWAP MASTER HMM OR MISTRESS BUT THEN THAT MAKES ME THINK OF WHIPS AND CHAINS SHEESH.
Anyway there was an odd number so i got two partners (oh its awful i know but someone has to do it hehe)
Petah was my Aussie partner and she sent me the sweetest parcel swathed in pink tissue packed in a Christmas mailing box.She made my stocking in the nicest pink patches and i am hanging it on the end of my bed to give Santa the hint.
There were other lovely goodies i tried to take pics of all of them.I just loved the china collage and the fact that you picked things i loved.The calender and sachet are just my style.The pink measuring spoons wow i love em and the tickets 2 shillings a ticket and you wonder what would that have been to,a movie,a ride.O love anything vontage liike that so thankyou so much you know you are an angel .
I fellt bad as the stocking i sent were from lincraft not my sewing machine but really if they saw my sewing they would know i was being kind lol Thankyou thankyou Petah

Home for the holidays -Take two

I had two partners for the home for the Holidays swap,This partner is Linda also a dear friend and longtime swapper pal from the prettychic yahoo group i am in (see our blog).Linda is fabulous and so talented i adore her tags especially i have them hanging all over my house.The glass ball contains an altered art pic with my son alex as a baby ,she stole it off my blog how sweet .The joy banner she made me is to die for,the tiny cup says Love the giver and know what I do.

Hold on I'll just google it

Wow i am wayyyy behind folks in showing my many wonderful swaps.
This is one of the many ways blogging and the Internet have changed my corner of the world.I often think how lonely i would feel without all of you.I just pop over to a few blogs if i am feeling lonely and read the latest gossip,get a decorating idea or maybe be inspired by someones crafty pursuits.Drool over their work spaces or in Reading how someones space is a shelf in a closet just be grateful i have my little room here (albeit shared with the glitter hater)
The phrase i will google it slaps off the tongue so easily.I even told the specialist my son sees that i knew all about him as i had googled him.I'm sure he went home and googled himself later.You don't know a scone recipe just google it,wonder how to make a button fairy find a tutorial.want to research that vintage op shop find -yep google it.Strange swelling on the third toe google it,find out it could be a simple insect bite or perhaps a life threatening flesh eating bacteria,so you can worry all night.Nope you survived must have been the mossie bite! See how it changes our life.Wanna find a house , a car, a smurf t shirt,a husband a long lost friend or just a life yep it all there.So without further ado its onto the swaps.

Home for the Holidays swap

This gorgeous stocking and some other vintage treasures are from Carole Boatright
she doesn't have a blog yet but I'm sure she will soon.This is from a flickr vintage ephemera group swap.Called "Home for the Holidays"Thank you Carole i think you were so clever to make that stocking it just looks so darn sweet.

Santa was a friend of mine

Here is my brother and I Christmas 1965
I have always loved Christmas ,from the letter written to Santa in November through to the cotton wool snowmen we made at school and the Christmas lolly baskets coloured in and stapled.To me it was all unadulterated Joy.
Sitting on his lap in your new Christmas outfit was just the height of happiness.I was usually a very good girl i had no doubts he would come to our house.But the joyous agony of the wait and the horrible feeling on boxing day that it was all over for another whole year.We had a lovely aluminium tree and the usual decorations.i have bought many that i remember as a child for my own tree.

Christmas spew

Well my friends it seems to be almost that time of year again.
And right now there looks like a tinsel monster was slaughtered in my living room.
And just before he died he spewed baubles all over the place.
My husband is on late shift,he will freak as you all know glitter and tinsel to him are like kryptonite to superman.Unfortunately he married me and therein lies his problem as i shall NEVER give up my glitter and tinsel its the magic i tell you.
So after posting this i am gonna start mopping up the spew and trying to uncover our home beneath the shambles.Most of my ornaments are treasured vintage ones.some are out and out retro ones to remind me of my 60's childhood.I am a child at Christmas its in my heart its in my hands when i create.But oooh the mess.I mean face it i love the bits of tinsel that drop off the tree as i love the purple carpet on the lawn left from the jacaranda tree.One side of me is miss neat freak the other is the creative messy bossy one who usually wins.Thank god i have both or i don't care to imagine.Aww well better go clear a path before superman gets home!

Heaving Bosoms and Blog awards

I have been awarded the Marie Antoinette Blog Award by Not one but two amazing bloggers who since they both picked me seem to have amazingly good taste hehe! Thank you so much for passing it on to me and for the honor!
Thankyou thankyou both

Ms Barbara

and

Ms Rhonda

for such an amazing award,(her massive boobs heave in her thrift bought strapless awards gown)I am so overcome with emotion(she blushes and her bosom heaves making those in the front row nervous)
She curtsies low (a little old man in the first row has a heart attack)and she leaves the stage.


Ok!! Here are the rules:

1. Please put the logo on your blog

2. Link it to the person from whom you received the award

3. Nominate at least 7 or more blogs

4. Put the links of those blogs on your blog

5. Leave a message on their blogs to tell them
The people i chose all mean something special to me and have
enriched my life and my blog
hugs to you all and to Rhonda and Barbara too

And the winners are:

Carol at Sassafras and Lulu

Shannon at Paint mine pink
Glenda at Sweet Daisy Dreams
Kellie at Papercat designs
Sue from Junk studio on Karabah

Lisa from Lisa Laughs Blog
Dionne from

Cherubs wishes

I hope you will stop in and visit each one! Have a great weekend everyone!

Identity crisis and Christmas drips

I think i maybe an elf
Am I ? Is that why i am 4ft 10 and is that why i am always covered in glitter.
I personally know an elf she lives in Alaska.But am i one i wonder.I have been
very very busy and Christmas is dripping into my craft room one drop of glue and glitter at a time.I have been making things that just pop in my head and out my hands.It happens this way to me a lot ,i wake up and think ooh i must try this.
That what i love about craft.You think of something and then there it is!
Well sometimes it doesn't turn out exactly like it was in your head and sometimes it turns out nothing like it and that can be great too.Many a happy mistake i have made.Here is this months treasures,the little dioramas came from an idea i got thanks to my aunt.She gave me a lovely decoupage book and one picture was of a Victorian child's pop up page so thats the small and large box i did.i changed the snowman as the Victorian snowman looked enough to give any child a nightmare lol.
To see the diorama better just click on it and it will enlarge
The medium sized one is totally one i made up from a few images.The pop up cone deccys were inspired by a similar toy my son Tim had as a baby.