No Regrets

I try to live my life with no regrets. After all, you cannot go back and change anything. What's done, is done!

This week's challenge from 52 in 10 is to scrap about Life's Lessons - what life has taught you and the advice you would give to your younger self if you had the chance. And to include a quotation in your journaling.

It's a difficult subject. To open up your inner thoughts for everyone to see. It's not easy for a private person like myself, but here goes...

I do have one regret, an event that I should have handled differently as it has coloured my whole life.

I was very young, probably 6 or 7 years old and at Nanny's house. My cousins were there too. When it was time for them to leave, my Aunt told my cousin Roy, one year older than me and someone I idolised, to kiss everyone goodbye. He dutifully kissed everyone on the cheek until he came to me. He refused to kiss me and turned away. Of course everyone laughed and they left to go home.

A minor, silly incident, but it had a major effect on me. I learned that day that I was not a pretty girl. I grew up very shy and lacking in confidence. Throughout my teenage years and beyond, that one event changed me into who I am. To this day I do not draw attention to myself, hate meeting new people, and have a very real fear of making public speeches. At work I am a different person, hiding behind my profession, but I actually enjoy meeting patients and talking to them. In my home life I will go to any lengths to avoid unfamiliar social situations.

The advice I would give to that young Me would be to ignore my stupid cousin! - what does he know? - and to be confident in myself and my abilities. To make the most of the looks I have been given. Not to be shy, but to put myself forward at every opportunity and experience life to the full. Most importantly, not to accept second best because I believe it is only what I deserve.

Because of the page format I have chosen, 12x6, I cannot include more than one Life Lesson really, so this is the one I have scrapped today. The journaling is hidden behind the photo which I have hinged so that it can be lifted to reveal 'the story'.

And the quotation I chose to include?

'All things are difficult before they are easy' Thomas Fuller, MD.

WOYWW

Not a very interesting craft table this week maybe, but if you want to see others in this Mad Group who post a photo every Wednesday of their work area, hop over to Julia's Stamping Ground where you'll find them in ever-expanding numbers!

Hello All. What an awful couple of weeks weatherwise. Too much snow, not enough grit, no buses, no way of getting home from work etc. etc. Anyway, I did get to craft a little on Sunday, only to have a phone call from work to say there had been a pipe burst on the roof overnight, the roof had fallen in and the scan room was flooded!!! Argh!

Needless to say, this photo was taken very hastily as I packed up my Stash. I couldn't concentrate on anything after a message like that.

Back to the photo.... there's the front cover and first page of my 12x6 album for '52 in 10' in the making. The 'necessary equipment' on the table includes a corner rounder, American Crafts ribbons and Thickers, hole punch and box of Tim Holtz inkpads. And I've caught myself out again by leaving something on the table for all to see! The TV Remote this time.

OK, I admit it. I often watch TV as I craft. Preferably murder mysteries, sometimes cooking shows (not such a good idea as they make me hungry!) but on Sunday it was the news channel to watch the weather forecasts. I had to be sure I would be able to get into work at 7.00am on Monday to sort out the flood chaos. I just can't seem to escape the effects of the bad weather!

52 in 10....Late Starter

I admit I'm a little late in posting these photos but I do have an excuse. I've had a bad week with no buses running here to get me to and from work, so I've had to sleep over at the hospital twice more this week. I am fed up with the snow and fed up with sleeping on a trolley! But it looks as if the thaw might begin this coming week - fingers crossed. End of whinge!
I'm taking part in 52 in 10 as I have pledged to take part in more Challenges this year. Here is my first week's entry. I decided to make a mini album (although after 52 weeks it won't be all that mini!) and chose a new size of page for me - 12x6. The first week's prompt was to review the past 10 years. My journaling lists the main things that have happened over the past 10 years, that I can remember. I never think of things in terms of decades though and I needed to think hard about events that had happened. And the start of a New Year is nothing special to me either, it's just another year, but I saw this challenge as an opportunity to keep me scrapping throughout 2010!

Above is week 2 where I had to think of the year ahead and what I want to achieve. I have listed my Crafty Goals For 2010 and tucked them behind my photo. The sharp-eyed among you have probably spotted that this is the reverse side of Week 1 as the punched holes are on the right-hand side this time. I was challenged to include stitching on the layout, but with Week 1 already completed, and not wanting to make holes through the paper, I drew faux stitching instead.

For the mini album itself, I was limited by my Crafty Goal number 2 of not spending on Stash this year, so had to use what I already had. I chose papers by Bo Bunny and My Mind's Eye and cut them in half for the 12x6 format, punched the holes and used book rings to keep it all together. It's easy to disassemble every week when I need to make another entry, and I can also swap the pages around at the moment if I prefer to use a different pattern for each weekly prompt.

Finding the time to craft with a full-time job is never easy, especially when I have to get everything out of the cupboards and put it away again the same day, but having made a start on this Challenge, I'm hoping to see it through to the end of 2010.