That was quick

Where did the week go?

Saturday - did the gardening at church. I hate weeding. Especially pulling weeds up through cracks in gravel. The Open Doors evening was really interesting. We heard something about life in North Korea. It is grim. The person who gave the talk was there in a group of 6. They were put up on the 43rd floor (out of 46) in the tourist hotel in the capital. They were the only guests... At night, in the capital there are no bright lights, no cars, everyone is at home. The visit was very strictly regulated.

Sunday - the Salvation Army farewell service was FAB! I really enjoyed marching from our church to their newly refurbished one. I was at the front behind the flag. If it wasn't for the fact that female officers have to wear skirts and heels I'd be tempted... their building looks amazing and is v. high tech. There are cameras everywhere to help record services and the boys in the AV room were having fun zooming in on unsuspecting people!

Monday - a tiny bit of crafting but more of it spent with DS1 buying a suit in Lakeside. I love Lakeside. Not. But we had a bit of chat time and managed to get him an el cheapo Primark one which ALMOST fits. In the evening we watched "Oceans 12". There was a tricky moment as the film gives away the twist in the Sixth Sense - which Emrys was to watch in school as a GSCE assignment (when did English get to be THAT much fun, shouldn't be allowed). Fortunately he had already seen the first half and like me (smug) had guessed the twist straight away. I enjoyed Oceans 12. The fact that the plot was good was a bonus but quite frankly Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Matt Damon in a film together and I don't really care about anything else.

And then it has been mostly work since. I did sneak in time to make a few cards like this using my new stamps. The corner stamp did come out a tad smudged but I wanted to send the card off and so decided to leave it like that (oh the shame!)
I have stamped and cut out loads of the flowers like this so I can make some quick cards for the church fair. I think black and cream is quite sophsiticated, n'est pas?

And I managed my layout for Salt.

GIVE THANKS

(with a grateful heart)

Isn't there an abundance of things that we can be grateful to God for?! For starters - sending his son Jesus to die on the cross for our sin, so that whoever believes in him will not perish eternally in hell, but live with Him forever and ever and ever in heaven- praise God!

Ok so it might not be easy to thank God in the hard times, but lets not forget all the blessings he has given to us and be thankful for them! Amen?!

After wondering what to do I decided that the thing I most had to give thanks for was the cross - everything else comes from that - my life, my family, my hopes and dreams, everything.
The photo is from Scripture Pics. The papers all from my MME pad. I love the colours and becasue the papers are quite thin they are so easy to distress. I used a Technique Tuesday tile as a template then got messy with Making Memories paint and Heidi Swapp masks. The butterflies are to symbolise freedom and new life. The layout also features a Heidi Swapp stamp embossed with white emb. powder, a Rhona Farrer stamp coloured with distress ink, some brads from a Costco kit, flowers cut with punches, nesties and a Quickutz die (hello old friends), another QK die was used to cut some grungeboard which BROKE my cuttlebug B plate!!!! American Crafts thickers, a peel off(!), lots of different stickles and doodles and I wrote on some self adhesive lace tape which is rather hard to read from a photo!

The blurb says
"I could write of my thanks for my family
or for all the gifts you have given me
but my grateful heart knows that even they are as nothing
compared to my thanks for your cross"

Sadly this week we have had to announce the loss from our team of Gillian and Casey who have been - and will continue to be so inspirational. May God keep blessing all that you do!