Corrie Kinkel

We have a word in Dutch that more less means the same but I wouldn't have dared to use inexpressible because it is a literal translation from Dutch. I learned from experience that it can be tricky to literally translate something. Often that's ok, but it can go rather wrong too!

P = Potatoes

F = French fries

Sue I'm with you on this topic. My husband and I have only be to a McDonalds when our, at that point, young children insisted we had to go there. It was once, although nowadays we have a McDonalds in our village we have never been there. The only other time when I was in Switzerland visiting my daughter we had a quick salad and that's it. I do like fries but not with vinegar, here we eat them with mayonaise or tomato ketchup. Mayo for me.

I know Jannette, but for instance in Switzerland, the eastern European countries and I think Germany too it is just a normal thing to go and collect mushrooms from the woods.

Thank you Doska and thank your hubby too. I only knew the name in Dutch (groene knolamaniet) and it is a highly poisonous mushroom. I looked for the translation to German and it is: Grüner Knollenblätterpilz oder Giftgünling and in Latin: Amanita phalloides. Hope your husband agrees and my advice don't eat it!!!!

Helen good to hear from you, I had noticed that you were inactive. Glad that it is improving and I know from experience that the assistance of a loving husband makes a lot of difference. Take your time and get well soon.🌺

Thank you, I too had to look what ineffable means and I'm lost for words with all the praise I got for this layout. For me it just started with the photo I took last Saturday and from there it has grown. I have said it before, besides all the scrap related things I'm expanding my knowledge of the English/American language too, so thanks to everyone who helps do that.

Lovely, it gives instantly a feeling of summer, which I can use because as Jannette already said we have autumn weather which over here means, rain, wind and fog but the temperatures are still rather mild for this time of the year. It's a pity that with this compression the leaves on the background are almost invisible.

I took some time out from the scripting curse to make this layout. The mushrooms are growing a plenty at the moment thanks to the still mild temperatures and lots of rain. Although I live in a village the mushrooms are on every piece of grass around the trees. One day there is nothing to be seen and the next it's full of lovely, nice and crisp new ones. I had a photo of autumn leaves and used it as a background with a big blur and some blendmodes. I made a co palette from that photo and all the colors are from it. The plaid is made using the script cass-plaid 3 and the big brown leave in the righthand corner is done with cass-embroidered patch. I have one corner lifted out of the frame and I have always a problem doing this kind of things, because my hands are not stable enough anymore, but in the end I got something acceptable. Al the other leaves come from my stash and again with blendmodes to tone them down. Fonts are Madelyn Calligraphy, Bavire and Leaves Baby for the leaf dingbats + Arial.

I'm in too and very glad we do another one this year. It will be my 4th time and I have made a lot of different ones as gifts. This year I will use the flower photos from my trip to the States. There are a whole bunch of flowers we, over here, don't know or only have as houseplants. A friend to whom I send some of the photos was already speculating: "a new calendar?" So no pressure.............. I have them in a separate folder already and I'm ready to go.

Ladies you make me so envious; to have all that nature at your doorstep. I live in the Netherlands and we are a small country where it is impossible to find a spot without light pollution. Noise is another issue because we have roads and railways almost everywhere and our nature is more like a big park. Of course it isn't all bad and I can hear the little birds sing early in a spring morning. And the sparrows have their evening coming together for spending the night in the trees. I was born and spend my youth in Rotterdam, a big city. Nowadays I live in a nice enough village with the possibility to go for a walk outside in a bit more rural setting of farmland and a small woodland park. But it isn't advisable to go there on your own as soon as it is getting dark or in the twilight. I have been to visit my family in the States 3 times now and while there we did a couple of short roadtrips that at least have given me a glimpse of the vastness, when you are riding for hours without seeing very few cars, only grassland and some farmbuildings in the distance. Hopefully next year I can go there again and if I come somewhere near one of you it would be great to meet in person. At the moment I don't have concrete plans, it depends on my daughter when it will be a good moment to come over and my home situation must allow it too. In the meantime I enjoy all the stories, the photos and layouts that are posted here.

D = Doomed

Awesome to see those vast almost empty stretches of grassland with that herd. I can see why you love it so much and it is great to get a glimpse of it through your photos.

I take it and the NEXT WORD is: ORANGE Halloween isn't for me but pumpkins are. Almost every autumn I make a display on a small table in my patio with pumpkins, dry leaves, chestnut etc. Here I used a fall background from my stash with 3 different overlays and different blendmodes; one with autumn leaves a freebie from Corel, one with more leaves from InkyDeals and a frame. A mask from digitalscrapbook on my photo with a small frame and the font is Michalina. Some pumpkins at the bottom, after all the word is pumpkin!

I left Zwarte Piet out too because of the opinion in some parts of the world, the US in particular, that are complaining about it and accusations of racism. Think of all the commotion we had and the US ambassador who filed a protest with our government, even the UN had something to say about it.

I left them out because my story was rather a long one and there was the sugar animals and little Sinterklaas puppets of chocolate too in their colored foil as well.

Thanks and yes you can use the eraser brush and it gives a cutout effect to the punches; however you can use a regular brush too and that gives the effect of painting on a layer. Look at the difference in the shadows on both layouts. What I wanted was the cutout effect but I was so tired I just didn't saw what was wrong. I like the 2nd because that's what I intended.

I redid my layout for this challenge, because Sue was very kindly suggesting that I had used the brush tool for my cornerpunch and yes I had done so. I myself wasn't very happy on how it looked, but was to tired to see what was wrong. Therefore I redid it with the eraser brush and now have the cornerpunch as it should be. I have already told Sue that I appreciated her comments and so also here thank you so much Sue.

We have "Sinterklaas" - Santa Claus in America, Canada, Great Brittan. Sinterklaas has his birthday on December 6th and the evening before it is celebrated. In the older days is was just for kids, who could put their shoes by the stove or mantelpiece and then found some small gifts in or next to their shoes when they had been behaving themselves. When I was young this had evolved to giving each other gifts and make surprise gifts. Mostly my mam made little notes with our names on it and folded them, then we had to draw one of those notes and for the person whose name was on the note you had to make a surprise. In this surprise came a little gift and it was all about making something great and tease the recipient, but in a nice way. It also had to have a little poem also making fun of that person or use something funny that had happened in that year. My grandparents always came too. Later we did this with our own kids and sometimes I made a paper trail through the house and they had to go from the garage to the kitchen, their rooms, look under the bed and every time there was a new hint. In the end of course there was a gift, this worked very good for an impatient child. When the kids were young they believed Sinterklaas and his helpers had concealed their presents and wondered how he new the bad or good things that had happened. Later when the kids were older they made gifts and surprises on their own and it was a couple of weeks of: do not enter papers on the doors of their rooms, cries of where are those scissors, glue, tape and mam I need more tape, paper , pencils and so on. And on the evening of the sinterklaas party there was a feeling of expectation and can we start now please. I remember a gift my son made for me that I still use today. He crafted a wooden box for those little post-it papers and it was packed in some sort of primitive computer, because we were in the days of the first home computers. Sadly the poem that came with it, got lost over the years. In school this was also celebrated and every pupil made a surprise gift for a classmate who's name was on the paper. Every one always hoped he/she had the teacher, because it was a legitimate way to make fun of their teacher. The shops had great and lovely displays in their windows and the X-mas deco came after Sinterklaas had left, but nowadays it has become not so important any longer and we already have X-mas displays and commercials everywhere.

Mary this is becoming a great album and so coherent! I love what you are doing here.

Between all the scripting lessons with the super script-along plus all the normal weekend activities and a husband who got ill, I have managed to make something for the 1-2-3 challenge. Luckily I had most of the requirements already done another time. I only had to adapt the colors to the colors from my photos and Sue I nicked your idea of a big cornerpunch. The last nice ones are on my wish list. I had to renew my subscription for the campus and buy the scripting course and that's enough for now. The background is from the photos with a very big blur. Last week we needed something from the gardencenter and there I noticed these little butterflies that were still active. It was a bit difficult to get decent photos of them, they were only for a short moment on a flower and then moved to the next. And of course they were sitting still in places that I could reach. Therefore I have no photos of them with their wings spread out. The fonts are Michalina and Arial.

V = Vault

If that is ever to happen I'm in too!!!!

R = Revenge