WOYWW 81

Morning all. This week I've decamped to the kitchen table again. That's because there's been messies going on. A couple of weeks ago I spotted some Christmas decs that I liked the shape of but didn't like the colours. The photo doesn't quite do them justice, if you know what I mean !

So I decided on a makeover, and got out the gold spray. I held them over my big stone kitchen sink to do the spraying and then left them on the craft sheet to dry between sprayings. I put Diamond Stickles on the dove on the left below, and on the reindeer and at first the gold bits showed on them, and then there seemed to be some sort of chemical reaction with the paint and some parts became tinged with green - a sort of verdigris effect which I rather liked. I put some Golden Rod Stickles on the other dove and that didn't react with the paint. When they're completely dry, I'm going to attach some gold ribbon. The white wooden shapes I painted with gesso and then with white acrylic paint mixed with an iridescent medium, but there's not much shine to them, so I'm going to try covering them with Terra then doing some stamping and painting on them.

The secateurs, cones and holly berries are still left on the table after my session making seasonal wreaths for back and front doors and some indoor arrangements. I'm lucky that only a hundred yards from my back door there are firs, holly trees with loads of berries (lots left for the birds), a pine and plenty of ivy some of which has the characteristic leaves, and some that has grown in light over a wall and has glossy oval leaves and seed heads.

Well, are we going to have a white Christmas? It looks as if we might. This is a shot from the kitchen window. This is the front garden robin as opposed to Robbles - whose photo I've posted previously - the back garden robin. A bit out of focus, and I will try to do better next time. I've left the camera by the window as I'm keen to get a shot of the most beautiful but shy mistle thrush that visits.

To join all the others having a pre-Christmas snoop round the workdesks of the world, nip along to Julia's. And a very Happy Christmas to all WOYWWers.