28/04/13 This week I received some bad news about my health. I am having a CT scan this morning and will find out on Wednesday what treatment I am having. It has been a really difficult week for me. While this is going on I will cut right back on the swaps I am doing. I will only do swaps where I have what is needed in my possesion allready. I wont be going shopping for anything. It will probably be mostly postcard swaps as I have lots of them allready and they can be written and sent quickly.

UPDATE 4 March 2013

I have changed my address today back to my home address as my parents think that I am overworking their postman. It emerged the other day that they had felt that they needed to tip the postman at Christmas because of the mail I was getting. I will still be using the address labels I have with their address on as I dont want to waste them. If anything has been sent to their address I will still receive it.

I live near London. I am a nurse and I work on a womens surgical ward in a local hospital. I used to be a nursery nurse. I have 6 nephews and 2 nieces, the oldest is 17 (this makes me feel old) and the youngest is a baby born in October 2010..

I have an allotment. I cant say that I am good at gardening but I do enjoy growing my own fruit and veg. I also enjoy different crafts and cooking. My favourite colour is blue.

I am a Christian and go to my local baptist church which is right next door to where I live.

I am also a member off postcrossing and sometimes do swaps through their forum.

I always send my swaps and would never sign up for one I would not be able to do. If you should not get one from me please let me know so that I can resend. I will normally message you before the 2 weeks are up to find out whether it has been received. This isn't because I think you wont rate but because I worry about my swaps arriving and dont want you to think I havn't sent.

Please remember that I am sending from the UK and while my post to other UK addresses can only take 1 day to other countries will take longer. Postcards and small envelopes seem to arrive quicker than larger envelopes.

what I pledged

I have been a big fan of the Osmonds since I was 11 and have met them many time now. Their music is my favourite but I also like Billy Joel and Cliff Richard.

I also like music by Don Francisco, Keith Green, Graham Kendrick, Aled Jones and Michael Card

I love reading all kinds of books, some of these are:

The Bible

Cookery books (Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, Delia Smith and many others.

Gardening Books.

Christian non fiction books.

Childcare books.

Books by and about Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Biography's

History of nursing books.

Childrens books that I have read to my nephews and nieces - books by Shirley Hughes (I love Dogger and Alfie and Annie Rose) Harry and the bucketfull of dinosaurs.

Heidi, Tom's midnight garden, Winnie the Pooh books, The Secret Garden, Black Beauty, Carrie's War, Thursday's Child, The Little Princess (so much better than the film) The Borrowers, The Children of Green Knowe, Roald Dahl, Fairy Tales, the list could go on.

I also have fond memories of ladybird books from my childhood and buy secondhand ones whenever I get the chance.

I also read a lot of nursing text books but I cant really call them favourites.

My favourite television programmes include:

Gardening programmes (Gardeners World).

River Cottage.

Come dine with me.

Casualty.

Any cookery programmes

I like trying all kinds of crafts. I will give anything a go. At the moment my favourites are cross stitch and candle making and in the near future I am going to try and make lip balm. UPDATE - I still have not made any lip balm allthough I have everything I need.

Since joinning swapbot I have joined a few ATC swaps but I am still very much a beginner.

I would be very happy to receive any craft goodies.

I would love to receive anything handmade, especially ATC's and filled matchboxes so that I can see how they are meant to be.

If anyone knows how to make swap cards and can make me some I would love some. Also address stickers for my envelopes.

I collect postcards. I like all types but my wishlist would be:

Lighthouses

Sea

Snow

Christmas

Castles

Windmills

Map cards.

Disney

Cards from Finland.

I also collect stamps, especially Christmas stamps.

My item wishlist is:

Something traditional for Christmas in your country.

Small doll in traditional costume

Wooden shoe souvenir from Holland

Souvenir from Iceland

Souvenir from Switzerland

Souvenir teaspoon

A Viking souvenir.

Souvenir from Japan.

Souvenir from Finland

matryoshka doll items

Souvenir from Lapland.

Souvenir from Norway

Souvenir from Sweden

In fact souvenirs from any country.

Something traditional from any country.

I live near to London and Windsor so can send souvenirs from these places.

I am a big coffee and tea drinker. My favourite teas are those that I call 'real teas' teas like English Breakfast, Dargeeling or Earl Grey that I drink with milk. I also love mint teas and camomile but will try most other teas.

Christmas Swaps

I love Christmas swaps. I love the religious side as well as the secular side and would love to get nativity scenes or other items (I must stop using the word 'love' so much)

There are also many other things that I collect that I would love to receive. Those that I can think of at the moment are:

Magnets, Keyrings, Bookmarks, candles, dolphin and lighthouse related items, anything Disney. I love manatees since I saw them in Florida.

I am currently trying to build a dolls house from a kit. Not a childs toy dollshouse but a collectors one - I may need to get help from my sister with this. UPDATE - The dolls house is still waiting to be built

I would love to take part in a swap for Bento items, I cant buy them in England. If you can get them let me know and tell me what you would like to swap.

I would love to take part in swaps for my nephews and nieces so I will list some of their likes.

I have 4 nephews between the ages of 9 and 16 who are all sport mad. They are football mad, they play, watch and live football and are all going to be famous footballers playing for England and look after me very well in my old age! They all like different teams and these are Liverpool. Manchester United, Arsenal and Tottenham but they also like other teams and many foreign teams such as Real Madrid and Brazil (i'm afraid they are the only 2 teams I can think of at the moment, i'm not very sporty but they like lots of international teams). Apart from football any other game played with a ball they like. I know that they would like any sports souvenirs, books or magazines (suitable for children please) from different countries. One of them loves to watch American football. In adition the 15 and 16 year old like Top Gear and the 13 year old tells me that he likes every sport there is. They also all like computer games and Dr Who. The 9 year old likes Lego, Harry Potter and Star Wars. They all like baseball caps.

My 2 nieces are 9 and 11. They like make-up and other girly things, anything crafty, and reading. The 8 year old goes to Brownies and gymnastics and the 11 year old loves going to girl guides, some countries call this girl scouts. She also collects keyrings.

My 5 year old nephew likes to be active. His interests are always changing but at the moment he likes 'Toy Story' and its many toys and other usual 5 year old interests. He also likes football and says he supports Arsenal because his dad tells him that he does! Stickers are always a great hit. He is very easy to please.

I also have a baby nephew born October 2010 and he likes anything he is given!

My mum loves sewing, she does a lot of cross stitch and collects tea towels.

My dad loves watching sport on television, football, cricket, motor racing and bike racing. Sometimes he goes to watch motor racing. He would love any books or magazines or anything else related to this. Liquorice (in fact he loves any type of sweets or chocolate. He loves his car and possibly has the best looked after car in the world.

I like most things but those that I wold not like to receive are:

Anything with nuts in (we have allergies in the family) Coconut, I hate coconut. Marzipan

Coupons

I dont do anything for haloween and would rather not get anything sent for haloween (actually, haloween isn't widely celebrated in the UK despite what the shops would like us to believe who have obviously realised that there is more haloween merchandise for children to spend their money on than there is Guy Fawkes merchandise. Last year I had no trick or treaters coming to the door and the year before I only had 1).

I haven't taken part in tags for a long time as I joined a few when I first joined and then lost track of them and I have no idea whether they were sent. I am trying to go through my messages but I have thousands of them as I haven't until now deleted any. If I owe you anything or you know I owe anyone anything please let me know, I dont want anyone to miss out.

I am going to take part in a few tags and forum games and keep track of them here.

Santas Helpers tag game: Tag going to @1Scrapper Received from @hippysherree

October RAK going to @ChesterSarah @momto2girls @MichelleWillow and @tifftastic Received from @tifftastic @donnasaurus1

Advent Lovers WTA #3

Disappointments

Flakers:

@alicearisu for Museum goodies #2

@SIEN for Pick 10 scrapbooking swap #9

@beavertondeb for ATC's fro everyone who is afraid to make one

@artsygirl43 for Bunnies lucky parcel

@suchawoman for Castles

@suchawoman for Christmas Fairy This was angeled by the lovely @hippysherree

@scrapkween for Craft me a Cross

@Majki for Its a Disney Christmas

@Majki for Its all about the word CHRISTMAS

@Treksek for Europe Quick Stocking filler swap

Non Raters

I feel quite sad when I am not rated or even thanked for what I have set.

@hjshort72 for Childrens Valentine Swap

@KI4IYE for teatime-delights

@suchawoman for castles

@Debil for Handmade Christmas Decoation - February