Out with the Old, In with the New .......

A rather belated Happy New Year 2010 to you all !  After a quiet Christmas at home, with family and friends, and being snowed in for a good part of the time too (impossible to get the car out of the drive for several days due to all the ice), I started the New Year off by wrenching my back - just one of those daft things, bent down to pick something up and ended up pulling a muscle!  As a result, I've been hobbling around for the past three days, not able to do very much at all, plus the damp weather triggered off a bout of arthritis in my wrists, so I've not been able to type more than a few lines or do any sort of craftwork - so frustrating!  I think I'm over the worst of it now and I hope you've all had a better start to the new year than I have.

Mia certainly enjoyed her first Christmas as part of our family - here she is surrounded by goodies, definitely in the mood for a party .......

I received some lovely crafty gifts from my family this year and here's a picture of what I got ..... a tag punch, TH distress embossing powders and rubber stamps, Cosmic Shimmer spray and pigment set, Viva Croco crackle and precious metal colours and a big pad of Fabriano art paper ..... lots to play with .....

So, it got me thinking about what to start the New Year off with by way of a little challenge, and I came up with the idea of combining the old and the new.  I'm sure we all have lots of bits and pieces lying around in our craft area/room/box, the leftovers from other projects, too useful to throw away, but you're not sure what to do with them - even a quick rummage in your wastebin might reveal some interesting bits that you've discarded - or what about all the leftovers from Christmas - tinsel, wrapping paper, ribbons, tags?  We have probably also got something stashed away that we bought some time ago, but have never yet plucked up the courage to use, or maybe, like me, you received some new crafting goodies for Christmas.

So ...... what I'd like you to do, if you fancy taking up the challenge, is create THREE ATCs using at least three "old" items to embellish each card and one "new" item - anything you like that you've not yet used in your art - could be a stamp, paper, ink, paint, its entirely up to you.  You can also create your ATCs in any theme or style you like.  How about it?  Just a little bit of fun to kickstart the New Year and get us all in the mood for creating over the next 12 months.

If you're interested in joining this swap, just send me an email to let me know (details of the swap are in the sidebar).

I'd love to have you join in this little challenge and hopefully there'll be plenty of you to make this a really good swap.

A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL !