Encouragement Consequences Night

We had so much fun last night.
Encouragement Night with a bit of a fun twist:-)

We all loved our goody party bags with a few extra surprises inside and each turned up with a small gift for each other and had written a verse or some things down about how we that person encourages us.
I was very blessed to get a lovely candle, some dusky pink icing colouring and some lovely notelets! I also had some very encouraging words written down to go with each gift, that I will treasure, use and try and put the words of life into good practise in my life!
After we had shared our gifts and verses and thoughts with each other - and eaten cake and drunk tea - we played our game of consequences - with an encouraging twist!
We each wrote one line or so to answer each question and then folded it over and then passed it on to do the next. We wrote each of our names on the bottom of the paper so that we didn't write on our own!

There was a lot of sniggering, laughter, giggles shared, exchanged and enjoyed.
Here is the list of the questions we did for our Encouraging Consequences Night!
1. what qualities and strengths does this person have
2. name a funny moment you had with them
3. describe this person in 3 words
4. what famous person does this person remind you of
5. what colour do they remind you of
6. how does this person make you happy
7. what animal would they be
8. what would you say this spiritual gifts are
9. what flavour cupcake would they be
10.If you could spend a day with them, what would you do
11.say something random about them
12. if they were a sport what would they be
13. write the first object that reminds you of them, that comes to your mind.
I have some amazingly encouraging friends, do you?
How do you encourage your friends?
Maybe you would like to encourage one of your friends...?
Have fun playing Encouragement Consequences!
I did x

Getting Ready for Encouragement Night

Tomorrow night is Encouragement Night for us ladies.
I can hardly wait!
We meet each Thursday and eat loads of cake and laugh til we cry at the stories of our lives for this past week but this week is extra special! Every now and then, we try and actively encourage each other, nurturing the gifts within us such as laughter, creativity and encouragement.
It helps us celebrate and enjoy life and our adventures, mis-haps and to affirm each other for how we see each other's gifts, skills, talents and value our friendship.
We try and be creative!
One time we did it as pass the parcel, where we each wrote out a favourite verse and had a wee gift to go with it. All the wee parcels were wrapped in between layers of paper. You pass the parcel round and when the music stops, you undo a layer! The prize for that layer is revealed, then the music starts again and the parcel continues to pass until the music stops again.
Get it?
It is a classic British childhood birthday party game!
We love it!

So, in our variation of pass the parcel, the encouragement cards and gifts and verses formed the layers of the parcel.It was a bit random and surprisingly, no-one got their own verse. The one I got was a real encouragement to me: about God binding up the broken hearted. The verse was written on a cloud in the shape of a heart and came with some funky plasters with words like OWW, or OUCH!

Other times we have picked names (out of a teapot) and prayed for that person during the week and written it down in a card for them. This encouragement was the verse about the Son shining on the righteous, complete with some rather yummy smelling body lotion called: "Righteous Butter"

This time, we are doing a bit of a game based on the childhood game of "consequences". With a twist of course!
In the original game each person has a piece of paper and writes an answer to a question, for example favourite holiday place, most embarrassing moment, boy's name etc. After each category it is folded down and then passed on to the next person. It can be done with drawing people, with each fold being parts of the body like head, neck, etc.
When every one has had their turn the paper is unfolded and shared/admired/read out etc making no snese at all for the snetences, or for the drawn figure, producing lots of laughter.
Tomorrow, we will do things like write down the funniest thing the person has done, what verse reminds each of us of them, bringing an object/gift/homemade craft for each person to encourage them.
Oh, and I almost forgot.
Party bags!
We are each having a party bag that by the end of the evening will be filled with Encouragements for each of us.
We have written a list of things to write/bring to go inside during the evening!
I can't wait.
More news to follow- of course I can't spoil the surprise, yet!
How do you encourage your friends?

A Bit Of A Hen Do - Part 2!

So the presents for the Bride to be arrived in one piece.
Phew!
We went out to eat here:

Eat as much as you like.
Buffet style.
Hummus, crispy duck pancakes, curry, mint mouse, cheesecake and sweets and fruit.
Delicious.
Yummy food.
Stuffed.
Too busy eating to get some pictures of the food.
Sorry.
The Bride to be(my niece):

loved it all.
A lovely Girls Night Out!
I wore my lovely posh shoes, of course.
I teetered and tottered, bravely, pretending I was "fine" and tried to keep up with everyone who had worn sensible shoes, convincing myself that I was walking eligantly and not going at a snails pace.
The Mother of the Bride to be(my sister in law) couldn't walk in her shoes either...
but they do look great don't they?

It was lovely spending time with my "ex-family", whom I love dearly and remain close to, perhaps surprisingly, despite being divorced for many many years.
It doesn't generally follow a break-up to maintain good friendships with the in-laws, sister-in laws etc, but this family has a special place in my heart and they would say I the same in theirs too, I think.
It is fun to break the rules, anyway isn't it.
We love to laugh and see people's faces when I am introduced as "the ex-sister in law". We wait for the cogs to turn in people's heads and then say "Oh," and still look perplexed.
We just giggle.
It really is a story of mourning into dancing.
Maybe I will tell you one day.

Joining in Just for Fun

I saw this idea.
It seems to be going round bloggyland.
I also found it happening here and here.
They found out about it here but it might have started somewhere else. Was it you?
Look at your photos and find the 8th folder. then pick the 8th photo in that folder to post.
Just for Fun.
so, I am joining on, just for fun.
My 8th photo from my 8th photo folder is this one.

What's yours?
Where did you first see it?

All Star Thursday Night Creations

Ooh, I had sooo much fun on Thursday Night at Rachel's with the girly cake chicks.
This week, it was Rachel's turn to share something creative with us all to learn.
She taught us (or tried to teach us) to make star books!
We each had 3 sheets of double sided scrapbook paper. Gorgeous shades that Rachel chose for us from Basic Grey and 2 squares of thick cardboard and some yellow ribbon.

First though, tea, coffee and this delicious yummy cake that Rachel made.

Now, I won't pretend that the evening was easy. Competition was fierce, as was the laughter when one of us rushed ahead, or got it wrong, or misunderstood. Rachel kept saying to us, this isn't a race and it isn't a competition.
Harsh words.
Tough lessons learned.
Did we listen to her?
No.
Did we learn?
The hard way.

The things that went wrong, typically, were when we were asked to cut out 5x rectangles in 3 different sizes for our book pages. Abbie cut some of her rectangles with the plain titled edge that is along the basic grey 12x12 squares. Oops.

A few of mine were perhaps not "exactly" measured. More the "ish" variety.
Anna claimed to draw lines to cut and then cut along completely different lines. Abbie folded her rectangles in half the wrong way.

Anyway, after we had cut out our 15 rectangles, we sorted them into our favourite colourways and cut a square out of the 5 smallest rectangles.

They look like the top of a pinafore dress. Then fold them into "W" shapes. Then use loads of double sided sticky tape and stick the outside edge of the smallest to the middle, and then the middle to the largest. The small and middle stuck rectangles will now look like a "w" and the middle to biggest rectangles will now look like a "v" shape. Do this 5 x times.

I got carried away with all the double sides sticky tape and in my eagerness to make my star book, having seen a picture of the star book displayed in all it's beauty in a complete sphere,stuck my pages together in a complete spherical star shape. With tape. Without all the cardboard book cover . Or the ribbon.
"Ta Da!" I said, proudly admiring my creation.
"Did you stick it?" Rachel said.
"Yes" I said.
"Did you already do your book covers?" she enquired.
Oops.
That would be a No, then.
Everyone giggled as Rachel pointed to my 2 as yet unused bits of cardboard and ribbon, just lying there.
Everyone else was, by now, making their book covers and their "stars" were merely star shapes in folded form, loosely tied with their ribbons, so their creation could either be a book or a star.
Theirs were not stuck, fixed, securely, like mine, with the 5 sets of rectangles fastened with the last 4 edges attached with double sided tape to form an albeit a perfect spherical star. A beautiful decoration, yes, but not a star book.
So much for it not being a race.

Thankfully, Rachel is a whizz with a scalpel knife set and my "book" was quickly restored from it's brief "star-stuck" glory.
Phew. Thank you Rachel for coming to the rescue with your tools and skill.

And here is my star book.


You cold stick photos in in before sticking the pages together and without folding it into the "w" shapes, or we thought you could hang words on ribbon like star/beautiful/unique or record some of your "star" moments in your star book.
Thank You Rachel!
You are a star!
For more fabulous ides, check out Rachel's blog here.

Thankful Girly Cake Chicks

During this last week, my friends (the Girly cake chicks) and I have been focusing on being thankful. We meet together every Thursday as we are a house group, as part of our local church. There is always cake and laughter, sometimes tears and often something creative to share.

I wrote my list on being thankful on my blog, so I had my laptop for my show and tell!
Read it here
Here are some of the things the lovely Girly Cake Chicks, are Thankful for:

First up was Jen to share. She couldn't make it so she sent it to us!
She said she was thankful for us! (Aww!) Friendship is powerful isn't it!

Emily had an interesting choice, including loo roll!!!
Her list of Thankfulness had begun with the inspiration for the book: Love Mercy, about a lady and her journey from following the "American Dream" to discovering the Kingdom of God.
So she was very thankful for Loo Roll and flushing toilets.

Abbie shared her top 10 favourite things to be thankful for and included this book that had helped her. The book that inspired this was " If you want to walk on Water, you need to get out of the boat" by John Ortberg.

We still eagerly await hearing from the lovely Rachel and Anna, who also couldn't make it.

We did have plenty of time to eat cake! my party political Election Night Cupcakes.


Isn't it great to have a chance to take a fresh look at thankfulness?

Want to share your thankful list?
Post it here with this link.

Eggstra Special Easter.

Last night we girly chicks had a bit of an Easter Extravaganza! however, the winner of our Easter Egg hunt was not me! 34 mini eggs, 4 creme eggs and 3 big eggs was quite a find! We each decorated these wooden flowers photo frames I spotted. We used metallic paints and then used deco pens and gems for the finishing touches. There was plenty of time for cake, of course. I had a go at making some tiers. My first attempt. The bottom tier is white chocolate cake with white chocolate butter cream icing. The top 2 tiers are polystyrene dummy cakes! I am having a trail at this balancing art as I am doing my niece's wedding cake in June! she wants fresh flowers round each tier, so I thought I would use some pretty Easter colours for this one.I used a cupcake filled with a few mini eggs and a chick with some raffia for a nest as a rather cute cake topper. Happy Birthday Abbie! I made Easter cards too! A bit like the Easter bunnies I made, they apparently could have been done by a 3 year old! They are fun and cute though and set our Easter table off nicely filled with chicks and mini chocolate eggs. My last Easter decoration is my Easter tree! It is a bit wonky in the glass vase! I tried stuffing oasis in the bottom and adding raffia around the edges and that was when I realised it was my wonky Easter Tree. I placed a few mini chicks in the nest effect and hung my Easter decorations on the heart branch I picked up from the garden centre this week. I added a glass painted egg, a bird, a fairy, a heart and a hen and a beautiful embroidered felt egg.I wish I could say that I had made it myself but I bought it. I love it. I love it all. My very own wonky Easter tree. Have an Eggstra Special Easter!

Encouragement Night with the Girls

It is great to encourage each other isn't it? We girls look forward to our encouragement nights very much indeed! We try to do them as something special and fun regularly as part of our weekly gatherings every few months. Sometimes we do a pass the parcel game with a favourite verse and something as a reminder like a small gift to go with it. This time we decided to do individual encouragements and picked our names from a teapot! We had to do it several times because some people kept getting their own name! We prayed for our named person during the week and asked God to remind us of the things about that person that we are special to us and perhaps a verse from the Bible to go with it to encourage them. We then wrote it out in a card and if we wanted to put it together in a creative fun way to share with them the following week.
We were all very encouraged. I love the verse that Abbie had about God shining on the righteous - complete with some righteous body butter that smelled fabulous! Flowers for Emily for God bringing colour and vibrancy, The word Joy on a card and I loved my card from Emily for me. A beautiful handmade card with a heart and things growing out of it. An encouragement for me that God's blessing does not depend on happiness but comes from His heart of love with the verse from Psalm 86 v 11 and 12:
"Teach me your way, O Lord and i will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that i may fear your name. I will praise you, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify your name."
we love Encouragement Nights and there is always plenty of time for the usual tea and coffee and cake! This last week we had Cheese and even individual cheesecake cupcakes! Yummy!
Do you do Encouragement times with your friends?
I'd love to hear your ideas!
This week we are doing an Easter egg hunt around the house!

Getting Eggcited!

I am beginning to get excited about Easter this year.
Are you?
I have started making several of these Easter Bunny Baskets for an Easter surprise for the girls for house group.
They are cute!
I got them from here.
Yep, I cheated and brought them as a kit.
Apparently for age 3+.
Hahaha x
Who cares if a 3 year old could do it?
Not me.
I had fun - and wouldn't let a 3 year old anywhere near them!
(or the chocolate eggs that might just go in them!)
I love them and hope you love them too.
They were quite fiddly and some of the packs seemed to be missing one or 2 wiggly eyes. Poor bunny! thankfully i have some spares - if a little bigger eyes - so some bunnies have eyes like saucers!I also found I used a bucket load of glue dots!
However, they were a cute bargain for a pack of 6 to help with an Easter egg hunt to do with my friends soon!



Enjoy getting Eggcited about Easter!
I am!

Happy Mother's Day!

Today is Mother's Day here in the UK.
Happy mother's Day!

I love this photo!
It was taken of me and my Mum in the garden in the summer with our family dog, Sue, all in the hammock when I was 20 months old. It has always been one of my favourite photos. I don't know if it just seemed to be a happy day memory or that I remember the hammock being such fun swinging in between the 2 pear trees in the back garden or quite what evokes such a happy smiley memory of me and my Mum and the dog.
I remember choosing this photo to stick on my first book I did when I first went to school when I was 5.
I dug out this first prized and still treasured wallpaper covered book this morning from my memory box and took a photo of the photo stuck on the front for you all to see. It's a bit gubbed and gnarled now but precious all the same.

I also found this picture I coloured in for Mum in my memory box. No idea how old I was when I did this, but I guess older than 5 as I almost managed to stay within the lines! Presumably, I decided that yellow was more joyful than purple for these "violets". Either that, or I had no purple! From a young age I have always tended to think out of the box and break the moulds and constraints that said rules like violets should be only coloured purple.

Thank you Mum for choosing me to be part of such an amazing family with you and Dad and my brother and sister. Thank you for accepting me and loving me despite what the authorities and powers that be wrote and said about me when I was first born and when you first met me as a baby. Thank you for loving care and for nurturing and teaching me in all the ways I could go. You have been an incredible influence and role model that has shaped me into the woman I am today. I know I wasn't always soft play dough to mould and shape but at times a bit like concrete needing a chisel, but your love and perseverance seems to have paid off. I loved making and racing those funky turtles from walnut shells with you, by the way. Good times!

I got these flowers today for Mother's Day at church.
Can't help but think about the 2 Mother's I have had in my life.
My first Mother, who carried me, secret and hidden and bravely chose to have me, probably surrounded in shame, choosing to give me life and to bring me into the world. I have always known about you and how special I am to my family, I just never knew you.I recently discovered that you named me when I was 3 days old, tiny and premature. Thank you for wishing me to be in a family. Your wishes came true, against the odds.
I am very blessed to have had 2 amazing Mothers in my life.

Happy Mother's Day.
xxx

project 365 week 7

A great mix of rest and play this week as it has been half term.
Let's see, what have I been up to?
So nice to kick back and take it easy!
February half term!
Monday - day 46/365
Lazy morning, meeting my sister for lunch and then finally got to finish the ironing!

Tuesday - 47/365
Pancakes for Lent. Thought about what to give up - more of a re-aligning, focusing. I am going to give up channel hopping. I gave up TV the other year. It nearly killed me - although the fruits of this sacrifice were amazing. Am hoping to still achieve great things to satisfy and fulfil in the gaps left without channel hopping time these next 40 days.

Wednesday - 48/365
A really lazy day!
You wouldn't believe that this cute kitten, Tudur, woke me up at 3 am with a thud on the door and lay on top of me purring, would you? When I ignored him, he biffed me on the head repeatedly. The discussions about this went on til 4.30 am. He won. I got up and he ran downstairs and hid. When I found him, I shut him in the kitchen and slept peacefully. We became friends again, later and we have had a lovely chilled day. Tonight, he will sleep in the kitchen. He has cooked his goose with freedom of the house at night. I guess I win.

Thursday - 49/365
A day of discovery. My sister and I met with a lady who told me a little more of my history. Amazing what has been hidden, secret all these years. A great day of surprises! More to be revealed!

Friday - 50/365
I love the way this little elephant is making a run for it in the snowy rain at the zoo, when I visited today!

Saturday - 51/365
Scrapbooking Day with friends from church. I got a chance to use my new photo cutters that my niece sent me from Boston, for Christmas. Thank you Rachel - and thanks to Diana who helped me learn how to use them - and the all important see through guides... that I nearly threw away! Oops.

Sunday - 52/365
Snow joke! Woke up to snow - the slushy and crunchy kind, so it was definitely a day for wearing wellies to walk/skid to church! I love my wellies!

Back to work tomorrow!
How long 'til Easter?

Going to the Zoo!

I finally went to the Zoo today!!I have lived here for 5 years and this is my first time to visit here, can you believe? I think I had seen some zoos in the past that just seemed to be caged animals and a bit cruel, so it didn't seem to be anything I would want to do - and they are not a cheap day out, either, are they?
Those are my excuses.
My reasons for going are that I have learned that this zoo is one of, if not the best zoo and high on conservation of animals.
I also learned that I can become a member!
No, not a resident!
An annual membership fee and I can go as often as I wish.
I thought about it last year, but my friend Rachel said I needed to get better first as it is quite a trek round and therefore not a good mix with post viral fatigue!
Over the last few months I have been building up my walking and now I have a job too, funding my membership made this a viable option.
So, today was my first trip to this zoo.
I have been looking forward to it all week.
Well for months really, since Rachel first started telling me about it.
As the snow started falling in quite big flakes this morning, I wondered at the wisdom of going. It soon turned to rain.
Yippee.
Off I went.
I didn't need to follow the signs or the map though, as I was personally escorted around by my friend Rachel and baby Daniel. This family go very regularly, so I just chose the animals I wanted to see today and off we went as they knew the way.
The luxury of it all.
I was like a child in a sweet shop.
We saw monkeys, red pandas, okapis, butterflies, giraffe, elephant, tigers to name a few.
Oh and lunch and coffee and cake too! (No surprise there!)
The photos of the animals aren't the best as it has been snowing and raining today, here! In the UK that combination makes photos a bit grey and dull or too dark.
I loved the tigers but it was hard to get a good picture through the wires but as Rachel said, better the wires be there! That's for sure!

The elephants braved the outdoors whilst the giraffes made a run for it from the snow!The rhino were already safe inside.
Thank you Rachel, for a lovely day.
I will go again soon.
Who will come too?

Pastels and Pancakes.

Today is day 2 of my half term break.
Loving It!
Met up for lunch and shopping with my friend Canev, who came to see me today.
We did afternoon tea too.
I re-confirmed my suspicions that the reason I like vanilla slice is because of the layer of icing on the top.
I did eat all of it, just to make sure!

I came home and had fun with my new pack of pastels.

Remember my thoughts on Sunday, Valentines Day?
the line from a hymn, If with His love He befriend me has been tumbling through my mind and heart these last few days.
So I did this.

Then I made and ate pancakes!
With lemon and sugar.

I suppose, tomorrow will bring my next challenge.
What to give up for Lent?