Caernarfon meets Friendly Plastic

Well, here I am, in Welsh Wales!  Landed yesterday afternoon and found that the Guest house we are staying at is purr...fect!  What a lovely place but I don't think I should tell you what it is called as I might not be able to get in next time I am down here.  OK, it is called Victoria House and you will have to Google it if you want to find out more.

Well, yesterday I explored a bit of the town to get some photographs for my inspiration.  This is to save me walking down the stairs and back up again as my breathing is not 100% yet.  Not a clue as what some of the buildings are but I thought I would give you some sketching inspiration today - are you ready?

Think this is the front door

Love arches ...

... see what I mean

Rather Eastern European looking

More Arches

Another obsession is doors

Interesting shape

Breakfast is calling but if you want to use any of the photos for YOUR inspiration please feel free.

Maybe more in the morning - depends how hard Liz works us.

A Day in Liverpool (lots of pictures)

Was even better than I expected.  Why, you ask?  Because that little minx Jo had not told me that another friend was coming and so it was a complete and wonderful surprise to turn round and see the lovely Lorraine stood behind me.  Here are the three of us in Jo's "Mad House".

But wait ... there was another surprise

Jo's daughter, Claire, decided to Skype and so I got to chat with her and her lovely little girl.  It was great to see the improvement in the little one, and see how her hair is coming back, and so nice to chat to Claire who has been a face in a photograph up to now.  Maybe, one day, we will meet in person.

After a lovely lunch Lorraine went off to collect her son from school (with his three big bags) and Jo and I set off with the guys for Croxteth Hall.  What a treat that was as we wandered around the rooms:

Am hoping you can click on this picture and read the Rules

and this one shows what life was like for the Servants - not bad eh?

I found this rather interesting - sometimes a valet would have to translate for the master.  Boy oh boy, I wouldn't have liked his job - I like my sleep!

What I haven't told you is that some of the rooms have an activation beam which, when you walk in through the doorway, the characters appear to be having a conversation.  When I went in this room, for the second time to get this photograph, on my own (I found the guy on the right to be a bit spooky - his eyes never left me) I felt a bit spooked, honestly, and it was quite dark.  I had forgotten all about the voices so just as I was about to press the button on my camera he spoke.  Think the camera leaped about six inches in the air.  I certainly got the goosebumps.

This, and the one below, were two of my favourite rooms.  I loved the children chatting and in the one below there was a very interesting conversation going on between the two ladies.  What were they talking about?  You will have to go yourself and then you can find out.

All too soon it was time to leave the Hall as we wanted to see the Walled Garden and the Farm.  This is the magnificent hallway on the upper floor.

It really is a lovely park in itself and I am just sorry we did not get chance to see much more of it, but that gives us an excuse to go back again.  We have to visit the farmyard as well so plenty of reasons to go back.

Sorry Jo (and Dave) we are coming back!

And I'll be back later with some photos of the garden - for some reason Blogger was playing silly and wouldn't let me upload any more.

More Than Four Edges

A nice easy peasy one for you this week you are producing a card like I have done.  Zoe chose this theme and both of us chose an easel card.  Thanks for all the lovely entries in the "Shades of Green" challenge last week.  We do hope you are having fun but we do say no cute and no digi please and sometimes I find myself getting close to the border with cute but I do manage to pull myself back quickly, well, most of the time.

Anyway, enough of all that, here is my entry for this week, using one of my Dimension Fourth polymer stamps.  Didn't get chance to see what Roy had on his stand at Harrogate so hope to catch up with him when I am less busy by visiting his website.

Fancy Labels (two stacked on top of one another) from Spellbinders and coloured in with my Twinkling H2o's.

Looking forward to seeing what you all can do.

WOYWW 120

By my reckoning I have the number right, but then it could be anything because I am so tired.  Not a good night last night, I felt sickly when I went to bed, no reason for it, and I woke early with my hip hurting (nothing new there).  Well, let us not tarry with 'Moaning Minnie' but get on and see what my workdesk is like so that you can move swiftly on and see what  the delightful Julia has been up to and what The Stamping Ground has to offer.  Then you can link in and see what delights others have to offer.

Oh, and by the way, it is Tuesday evening so the above paragraph is talking about Monday night me feeling sickly.  The reason is that I want to need to be bright eyed and bushy tailed in the morning (Wednesday) is because I am off to "The 'Pool" to see Jo and Dave so I can return something they borrowed for me to borrow (confused?).  Jo has so much energy I need to have my battery full for the day.  We have a bit of work to do in the morning and then we are off for a visit to Croxteth Hall.  Anyway here is my desk as it is tonight and as it will be in the morning.

What you can see are lots of bags of bits and pieces (you might recognise some of them if you click on the picture) because I am preparing for my workshop at Vicky Stampers on 1st October.  Sorry but I am not showing you the one and a half samples I have to take with me, well not yet anyway.  It is going to be a busy workshop as we have 23 signed up for it, think some are going to be sitting on the roof - pity the weather is like it is or we could have had some in the garden.  Not to worry, it will be nice and cosy and we will all cuddle up (or work with our elbows in our sides).  So, Doone and Jo, not long to go before we all meet up (ok, I am seeing Jo tomorrow but that does not count)

Someone asked a week or so back how I stored my um's - well here it is - my system..

I stamp the images on a sheet of paper, A6 - laminate it and then stick my stamps on the back of it.  They are then all stored on their sides in these silver tins from "ze Svedish" place!  Each tin has a category in it, some have two tins for one category as I am a 'divil' for words and one or two other things.

Well, if you've made it to here, well done, now take yourself off to see what others have done or are doing at The Stamping Place.  See you again soon.

Shades of ..... Green

Wow, what a lot of entries last week for our Vintage theme.  This week is a nice one and should be accessible by all.

Sam's choice for this weeks Challenge over on JFF is "Shades of Green" and that fits in perfectly with a canvas I did for my friend's daughter when she got married recently.  Was not sure on her taste but did know that green is one of her favourite colours.  It is done similar to the canvas we did at ArtsyCrafty and thankfully she liked it.

Not sure if you can tell but there were three shades of Fresco Green paint used here.  The "E" and the "S" are for the first names of the bride and groom, the words are what I felt were appropriate at the time and the Fragments are only left blank for the purpose of this photograph.  Not sure that the parents of the small children would approve of my putting them on my blog so I left them off.  

In the finished canvas the photos were of (starting left) the small bridesmaid and pageboy; then the three big bridesmaids followed by the two bigger pageboys and finally the bride and groom.

All the letters, bird and heart are Grungeboard and the paints used are from PaperArtsy - Honey Dew, Guacamole and Toad Hall over Snowflake (which is white).  Crackle Paint used is also a PaperArtsy product in this new range and, seriously, is the best I have ever used.

Pleased to report that the bride loved her picture which now hangs in her new bedroom.

WOYWW 119

Well, hope I have the number right this week.  In case you don't know what on earth I am on about it is What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday time again, the time of the week when we bare our desks and let everyone see what we get up to, how tidy we are or what a mucky mess we are in.  So here I am - reporting to our glorious leader - Ms Julia Dunnit.

As you know if you have read my previous post I was away all weekend working for Oyster Stamps at Harrogate, having a right laugh with them all and selling lots of Spellbinders Dies and the Grand Calibur of course.  The only problem I have (and one which I  had this weekend) is that I spend what I have earned and sometimes above and beyond.  It's great - having fun with lovely people and coming away with goodies.

Yesterday was spent sorting things out so here is an overview of one end of my room where my workdesk is, at the far end:

You will see I now have my Vagabond on a trolley.  Got fed up of storing it away on a shelf and pulling it out each time, on the middle shelf I store my TH dies and the box on the bottom has my Embossing Folders in and the one on the floor houses my Spellbinders and normally sits on the bottom shelf as well.  Ooh look, there is my Grand Calibur in all its raspberriness.

Below are some of the dies I have been filing away - I got Anenome Flower Topper (which looks like a gorgeous waterlily to me), Bird Sanctuary and Parisian Accents.  Ooh, lovely.  (Butterfly die is out as I was measuring the magnetic paper I store them on) ...

... and these are my Big Dies (bought two more - Grand Squares ('cos I can't mount one sheet on another for toffee) and Grand Labels Four 'cos I have wanted it for ages but it has always been sold out.

At the moment I am trialing hooking each set with a D-ring thingie and putting a tag on each set so I know what it is called and which ordinary dies co-ordinate with it.  Not sure if this system will work as I only have five of these sets and already the cup hook is full.  And Leigh Show is just around the corner so no doubt I will get at least one other.

For a non-die-cutter I didn't do bad as I bought three other dies as well.  This is a card I made using two of them.

This one uses the Lacey Butterfly - ooh you should see it with glitter on it - fabulous.  There are two dies used for this one as the purple underneath is also a die which co-ordinates with it.  This is on its way to Naomi with the message that it took me ages to cut out all those little bits - I did tell her later I was only kidding,

This next one is like a Chinese Papercut and I think it is adorable.  It is called Emperor Swan and needs very little adding to it, in my opinion, as it is so beautiful in itself.

So there you have them, all the dies I bought from Oyster Stamps at the weekend.  Did buy one or two other things but haven't had time to play with them as yet - patience, there is always another day.

My last card today is for a friend who has been in hospital, who likes Asian things so I wanted to send her this little girl, who is a material motif.  I found out that last night was the Chinese Moon Festival so added a gold circle to represent the moon to this card.  Check out what happens on this night: 

http://chineseculture.about.com/library/weekly/aa093097.htm

That's it for now folks - toodle pip!

Got Back - Tired but Happy

Well, I got back from Harrogate last night absolutely full of beans because I had had such a good laugh with Tracy, Graham and the "boys" during the show.  Fell asleep watching TV later and just about crawled into bed (but it was nearly midnight).

Met lots of my internet/group friends who I normally see at this show, Janet, Alison, Diane, Kath, Liz, Susan, Val and must not forget Sue and Lorraine who were there for the two days so I got to see them lots of times.  I'll let Lorraine tell you about her "hotel" in her own blog when she gets around to it.  We certainly had a laugh chatting about it.

Then I had the pleasure of meeting up with Jaqi (check out her latest LO's) and her friend (sorry I did not ask what your friend was called Jaqi - and she is lovely too) and had to have a photograph taken.

That's Jaqi in the centre - and Jaqi, it will be lovely to be able to fit a face to a person on JFF now.

Anyway, Saturday came and went so Chas and I left the show, went to the Squinting Cat for something to eat on our way back to The Days Inn where we met up with Tracy, Graham and George.  I was rather surprised by the place we were to stay.  I knew it was on a Service Station so did not expect it to be of the standard it was.  I loved it!  Lovely bathroom with walk in shower, comfortable bed (I usually suffer with mattresses when away), the usual coffee making facilities, and a lovely new flatscreen tv on the wall.

Before long it was time to make our way back to the Showground so after a delightful Continental breakfast, which had enough on it to satisfy our appetites certainly, we set off once more for Harrogate.

Here are a couple more cards I did:

It was a little quieter on Sunday at the show (still selling Caliburs though) but I was made up when another blogger came to see me.  This was the second time she had travelled down from Grimsby to see me and it was lovely to meet up again with the talented Sam and her friend Maz, who took the photo for us.

I  am quite pleased to report that we only had one Calibur left out of a total of 26 by the end of the day.  I love mine and must use it more than I do at present but now I have some of the Grand dies (bought two more at weekend) I can get going on an idea I have had in my head for ages.  On Sunday Tom (George's twin and the one I have worked with in the past) came with Liam as Oyster Stamps needed more stock.  Now how do you cope with three 19 year old lads?  When I got back from lunch they were full of it - they had sold two Caliburs whilst I had been away - and had lined all the cards I had cut in a long line across my new cubby- holed table.

Anyway, all too soon it was 4 pm and the show closed, time to say my Goodbyes to the Oyster Stamps Family (miss you guys) - until Leigh which is on Sunday the 2nd October (thanks Paul who alerted me to the fact that I had put September - doh!).  Hope to see lots of you there - I will now leave you with Sam, my blog friend and buddy.

Must put my head up and not down when having a photo taken so you don't get that double chin.  Also must remember not to wear my badge on my sleeve the wrong way down - looks like a rather large Elastoplast.