Rocking your world friday

Hello! It's Friday again and that means taking a look at all the positives of the last week, no matter how big or small. If you would like to play along you need to link up with Virginia over at her blog.

Not a lot happening this week in the Scott household, I think its the lull before the storm that is Christmas as next week is going to be hectic!

 * Here is a photo of my Christmas tree,  I posted about putting my tree up last week but had not taken a photo.

* I decorated my altar for Yule this week. Now, I am going to post photos of it because it makes me happy. In the past when I have posted stuff about being pagan, I noticed I lost a couple of followers so I don't really post any pagan stuff now. But I thought, Sod it!! It's my blog, it's who I am and if i lose followers so be it! Hopefully most people are tolerant of other peoples beliefs and if they are not I don't want them following me anyway!!

Yule or the Winter Solstice as it is also known, celebrates the return of the sun to earth. The 21st Dec is the shortest day of the year and the longest night, but from this point on the days will get a little longer, the nights a little shorter until we reach Litha, the summer solstice when it will reverse again. At Yule we also acknowledge the end of the Holly Kings rule and the start of the Oak kings rule.

 My Yule altar

 I have made five of these little sun disks for my pagan friends for our Yule Celebration next week

 I made this candle spiral for our Yule celebrations next week as well.The spiral represents the never ending cycle of life and rebirth and the candles when lit will represent the return of the sun at Yule and its growing power throughout the next six months.

 Another sun ornament I made for my altar, a wand of sunstone crystal, Holly, oak and ivy leaves

 Paintings of the holly king and the Oak king, painted on wood for my altar.

I find most of my inspiration for my art and creativity comes from my beliefs and the nature all around me. Making the candle spiral and the little suns for instance, such fun but I didn't want to post them on here for fear of what people will think. A lot of the stuff on my altar has been handmade by me, like the painting, the Goddess dolls and the clay Goddess statue and prayer beads. So now I am coming out of the broom closet and I hope I don't offend anyone by showing things I have created for my beliefs, as I would like to be able post ALL the things I make.

* We recieved a good news postcard home from Shelbys school this week for all her hard work in ICT and a good news letter for her excellent 'work of the week' in maths. Way to go Shelby, we are so proud of you!

* I have had fun playing with the gelli arts prints I made last week. I have doodled feathers on a couple of the pages..

 ...and made some mail art postcards with others. I just need to sign up for the mail art challenge over at collabor-art now.

 * An article about the group that I run has been featured in this months One Island magazine. You can read the article here if you are interested.(It is in the December 2012 edition on page 7-PDF file)

 * On Saturday I dragged my Son to St. Thomas church to make a Christmas wreath. We have been doing this for the last three years now but I was not going to bother this year until I saw that I had a comment on last weeks blog post from the lovely Janette (check out her blog to see her amazing art journals)Janette lives in the same town as me, just around the corner from the house I grew up in, but we have never met although we have been following each others blogs for a while now. She mentioned in her comment that she was going to be at the wreath making all day and was taking her art journals along to see how much interest there would be for a workshop she is running next year. Well, I couldn't miss the opportunity of meeting her and seeing, in real life, her fantastic art journals so I went along and am so glad I did! Janette was so lovely and we had a great chat about her journals and the art retreat she had been on where she took classes with Teesha Moore. I got to spend ages looking and touching all her journals, which was amazing. Hopefully we are going to meet up for a coffee and chat some more, it will be so nice to have an art journal friend in real life!!!!

 * My fairy is coming along nicely at Fairy club. She is painted now and I have started adding the clothes. I have also bought some purple hair for her. She is nothing like what I wanted to create. I wanted her to be a green lady of the forest with green flowing robes and oak leaf shaped wings with leaves painted onto her face. Instead she is turning into a mischievous fairy with a huge padded bum and great boobies! She is going to have big stompy DM style boots, a leather under corset with see through blouse underneath so you can still catch a glimpse of her boobies and hopefully dragonfly shaped wings. Menna, the lady who teaches us, says the fairy emerges as she wants to emerge and she is definitely right.Paige also said that she feels there is an aspect of your personality that comes through as well, sort of like an alter ego and I have to say-Yes! If I could dress like my fairy and stomp around the woods all day I would!

 Close up of her face and boobies!

 * I ordered this book from Amazon last week and it came on Thursday. It's nice to see other peoples work and their motivation behind it, but I found the techniques all a bit samey and nothing I hadn't tried already. Still, a great book for inspiration!

* I made peppermint melts on Tuesday for the kids to give as gifts to their friends for Xmas. They tasted yummy and looked sweet all packaged up.

* I received some lovely Xmas cards from ladies from the Wednesday Whine group on Facebook. Thank you ladies, they cheered me up!

* My hubby did all the hoovering and mopped the floors for me this week as I have been feeling a little poorly, I think I have a kidney infection. He is a star and I am so lucky to be married to such a wonderful guy.

* Finishing the last of the Xmas present shopping, it just all needs to be wrapped now.

* Watching the new series of Big Bang with the kids, always has us in stitches.

* I am grateful for my kids, my hubby, my family and my wonderful friends

* I am grateful for my heating, it is so cold this week!

Well, that's enough from me this week! I probably won't post again until after Christmas as next Friday it is Yule and I will be up at stupid o clock to walk up to the Longstone and watch the sunrise with friends, then we are off to have breakfast at Weatherspoons to celebrate my birthday, followed by a meditation in the afternoon and Yule celebrations in the evening, on the Saturday it's my birthday so I am going to chill out with family and friends and then my sister is making me dinner, on Sunday we will have to battle Tesco for the Xmas food shopping and then its Xmas eve!!

I hope you all have a wonderful and peaceful Christmas, however you celebrate and a good start to the New Year!

Blessed Be!

Sami x