No, your eyes haven't gone funny.
Snow is falling ... on this blog page ...
Clever, innit?
Dear FOQ
This fortnight, I have mostly been ...
still ... but I make no apologies.
I've also been writing.
Listening 🎶
to Christmas songs. Almost non-stop. And now you can too:
Watching 📺
Paddington
with Natalie; Paddington was adorable and I regret demonstrating such cynicism towards it before now.
Then basically working through an entire catalogue of Christmas films:
Love Actually (for the thousandth time)
And yes, before now I thought it beyond credibility that the President would be such a sleaze ... Ahem.
Animal Attraction (Someone Like You)
Home Alone
While You Were Sleeping
National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation
It's a Wonderful Life
... for the first time.
(The shame of it!)
and
Meet Me in St. Louis
... again, for the first time.
(The double shame of it.)
And because I will always love Ms Judy Garland singing, especially this song ... let's just have a soft-focus YouTube moment, shall we?
Tiny Margaret O'Brien is properly adorable, isn't she.
Hanging out ... 👧👧
with Natalie
for an evening that was intended to be our own little Christmas shindig but due to the cancellation of two consecutive trains 😠😠 I ended up cadging a lift from Natalie herself all the way back to Redhill where we popped into ÜberSainsbury's for emergency snackage:
and rather than make our intended candy cane cocktails
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| {via here} |
ended up taking it super-easy and watching Paddington while eating curly fries and Pringles!
We still managed our traditional fry-up in the morning, mind ...
Celebrating ... 🎄
... with my Work Lovelies at the Christmas meal at the Guinea in Tunbridge Wells (which used to be the Guinea Butt).
We had our own, gloriously decorated little section of the pub to ourselves, and a rather splendiferous spread – I opted for a pâté starter, traditional roast dinner for main and waffles with caramelised banana for dessert.
The wine did flow, which is the only way I can possibly justify some of the facial expressions in the later shots plus the singing in the taxi on the way home:
Oh and workmates, a word to the wise: best not leave your phones unattended when Maz and I are on the loose ... #justsaying
... Yehhhhs.
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| {Arty shot of bubbly glasses | taken by Maz, I think} |
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| {Nice array of baubles} |
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| {Baubles from another angle ... OK, enough with the baubles already} |
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| {Juan and I keeping it cheesy} |
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| {Serious faces now} |
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| {Emily and Olivia looking very demure} |
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| {Posse! From left, Emily, Olivia, Sophie and James} |
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| {Bonkers Charlie} |
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| {I hereby present ... May and a sprig} |
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| {Serious model stylin' from Emily} |
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| {Juan with some lunatic in the background} |
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| {Things got heav-eee ...} |
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| { ... and then they got bada$$} |
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| {Emily never travels anywhere without the lolling head of one of her colleagues ...} |
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| {Luckily Megan and Chloe kept things classy} |
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| {Approach this trio with caution} |
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| {Even more dubious from this angle ...} |
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| {...} |
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| {Me and me 'work-sister' Maz, in those five minutes during which we were quite sedate} |
Celebrating ... 🎄
... with my Voicerox Lovelies at a little pre-Christmas get-together at the Black Horse, Hookwood. Public transport was not my friend but with the help of Ms Jessica I made it there eventually for a wondrous evening of love, laughter and foodage with Charlie, Jenny and Jess.
And let's just have a moment for my fondue dessert ...
Decorating ... 🎅
And actually surprising myself by executing these rather marvellous copper wire wreaths:
These were made using two different-sized wire wreath frames (from HobbyCraft) and two sets of copper wire lights (Sainsbury's), mounted on wreath hooks from Wilko.
Hours were then spent wrapping the battery pack end round and round the wire ... (!)
But I'm pretty pleased with the results.
Jury's out on the modification of the Blue Peter advent crown, mind:
but hey. I am fully embracing the copper trend, and it's very unlike me to embrace a trend until at least three years after it's passed.
Prior to this notably festive festoonery, of course, I had to engage in what I can only call the ...
ÜberCull
With the help of Ma QB (who now bears witness to the fact I can indeed go up into my loft and back down again without self-maiming), we cleared – wait for it – over twenty boxes out of my loft.
Twenty-five to be exact. I know this because I have a spreadsheet detailing the contents of all of those boxes.
Five of these contained, well, things that a childless 39-year-old really ought not own at her age (items which come in useful for animation purposes, let's just say).
The other twenty, with the exclusion of two boxes of Christmas decorations which have now been squished down into one, have been emptied.
The loft is now a barren landscape.
(And wasn't technically mine to begin with ...)
Liberating.
Not Animating ... 😧
Sorry.
No animation this year after all.
Time has been sucked into some sort of cruel, creativity-smothering vacuum.
Maybe next year.
In the meantime, please visit my sister page here and enjoy animations of Christmases past.
Pinterest Pins of the Fortnight 📌
Fortnightly Web Finds 🕸
Serious 😐
• Chris Riddell on why artists need to protect their work | on iNews
Silly 🤡
Warning: this is heavy on the Malinda Kathleen Reese/Google Translate Sings ... content so if you're not into that, scroll right on, my friends.
But if you are ... here are the gold, frankincense and myrrh of musical mashups:
1) An honest Christmas song
2) The Christmas Song according to Google Translate
3) Google Translate Sings ... Christmas
I'll try to curate a few more links for the next Summary (in the New Year, if I don't fit in a jammy NY Missive) but chances are I might just abolish this section altogether.
Will any of you miss it?
Shall I just sprinkle in a choice animal GIF from time to time?
Well. It now only remains for me to wish you all (my six loyal readers, including you, Ma QB) a very
qb xx
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