woyww 311 - long but you don't have to read it all

Got all muddled and thought it was the great ATC swap today.  Doh!  Still time to do some more.

Well, what a busy time I have had of it, travelling around.  First Spain, then home for three days and off to my friend's house for a few days and a trip to another friend straight afterwards.  Then home for two days and off again to Nottingham to see my lovely friend Liz who is going through chemo at the moment for breast cancer.

What a wonderful lady she is.  It was so good to see her and reassure myself that she is still, kind of ok, and the little tinker had gone and made us some biscuits (I had made some buns to take down with me).  Well, Liz has discovered zentangling and what wonderful work she has been doing.  You can check it out on her blog here because she has now posted some pictures of some of her work.  We had a wonderful time with me trying on her hats, she has some amazing creations and they are so comfortable to wear.  Anyhow it is the 'tangling' I was going to mention, I am digressing.

Liz is convinced I can do it (me not so) and as she pointed out, it will be good with the journalling that I have been doing of late.  Imagine me doing my own borders.

Well, she set me off on a hunt for a couple of books she recommended.  One was available in supermarkets - err, supermarkets?

After visiting quite a few and then ringing other branches of Sainsbury's/Tesco/Asda/Morrisons I gave up.  Chas finally found one of them on a bookazine for me and I duly paid up and was ready to receive it tomorrow when I got an email telling me they had refunded the money as they did not have any copies.  To cut a long story short I am now paying over the odds for it via ebay.  Guess what? Chas was in our local tiny Morrisons today and he rang me to tell me they had it on the shelf!!!  The one place I had not checked ... ah well, woe is me.  I don't need two and the order is on its way.  Roll on Thursday.

Anyway, here is my desk, complete with a journal page that needs some doodling on:

Observant followers of WOYWW will notice that I have a little room to the left of where I normally sit - I have cleared a bit of space by moving some drawers along.  Much better for me to work.  But look what I got today

More Dylusion stamps.  Have waited ages for these and am now raring to go in my journal with some more images.  There are some new stencils underneath too.  Doing a (Helen) Happy Dance.

I am so tidy because as outlined at the beginning I have been away rather a lot and today my niece came with her adorable baby boy.  She is a beautiful girl, both inside and out, and as a result she has a very happy little boy who has the most beautiful blue eyes and is so so good.  I would love to post a picture of them but am always wary of posting kiddie pictures on the internet and would not do so without her permission.  You just have to take it from me, they are both beautiful.

Can't leave this post without telling you about last week when I went to see Liz.  We stayed at the Eco Hotel (De Vere) in the grounds of Nottingham University.  Fabulous - will go again.  Everything is "green" and the rooms are quite minimal but to a high standard.  Comfortable in every way - and I am hard to please about beds!

The restaurant was good, we had a lovely three course meal in the evening and a super breakfast next morning.  Staff are very nice and extremely polite and helpful.  All in all I can recommend it for a good night's stay.

Shower

Bathroom with lovely toiletries

Bed

Desk & TV

View from our window (floor to ceiling window)
Just to show how modern it is in design

Iron, ironing board, hospitality tray, safe, hairdryer (all tucked away in the wardrobe with a full length mirror and lots of coathangers).

Just wish I had taken some photos of the reception/bar/restaurant areas - everything sparkling clean and modern.

hotel entrance looking from side

(see the apple)

Hope I have convinced some of you to give it a try, it is very moderately priced.  The next day we went to Newstead Abbey, but that will have to wait for another post.  Must get over to the stamping-ground to see some pictures and hear the news about the crop last weekend.  Hopefully next year ...

WOYWW 310

Well, I am off again.  Came back from Nerja a couple of weeks ago and had three days at home and then went down to stay with Wendy for three nights and off to Liverpool to stay with Lorraine for one night so I could go to Port Sunny on the Saturday.  Back home and now off to Nottingham today to see my lovely friend Liz.  Life has been a whirl just lately.  Consequently nothing much happening on the crafting front but I have been doing some atc's ready for the big swap.

The garden is looking a bit of a mess too, the weather has been conducive to "weeds" and they, and the chives and bluebells, have sprouted everywhere.  A little weeding has been done but a lot more needs doing plus our gardener is off ill at the moment so we have a huge lawn which is going to be a meadow before long - and we don't have a mower!

Anyway, here is my desk - didn't buy a lot at Port Sunny, spent too much time chatting - so no point in showing you.  On my desk is a card (left) that Pat made me for my birthday.  It was a bit late so didn't get shown with the others but it is lovely and well worth waiting for.  Consequently I am trying to make a similar one for my friend Liz and that is what is on my desk.  Twinkling H2o's and cut out butterflies etc.  Just in front of my iPad are my atc's for the swap - yeah, I have got some made.

That's got to be it for now as I am running late (it's Tuesday night) and will be midnight in a short while and I am nowhere near ready for bed.  So run along and see what Julia and the rest of the WOYWWers are up to - thanks for stopping by.
xxx

Challenge 80 Artful Times - Hot Pink & Orange

Wendy chose the theme for this challenge and it fit perfectly into my busy schedule as I had just done a workshop with Dyan using her Dylusions Paints so I was 'hot pinking' it in great style.  Not many finished pages in my journal as yet but this one had to be completed for the challenge and so here it is

I used Lemon Zest, Squeezed Orange, Bubblegum Pink Dylusion Paints and then did a bit of stencilling and some spritzing with the same colours.  Finished off with picking some bits out with a white pen.

I did try some fancy work around one of the squares but didn't like it and thought it would be too too much on them all so I decided to use a frog to cover it.  That decided me on everything else on the page and the figures are painted with Twinkling H2o's.  I thought there was a quote something about 'a frog' and 'kissing' but couldn't find it so I just wrote my own.

So there you have it - my page and my contribution to our penultimate challenge.  Hope you find time to join in with us.

WOYWW 309

My desk is exactly the same as it was before I went on holiday.  Pristine clean - in fact I didn't tell you that I had actually dusted my window sill and shelves before I went away.

Came home Friday and then had a Pacemaker check up appointment yesterday and straight away I set off for my friend Wendy's and that is where I am now.  A girly week!  So once again - no mess on the desk as I didn't have time to do any crafting over the weekend after I had put my shrink plastic stuff away.  You have me sussed too - this is a scheduled post again.

Not wishing to disappoint you though I will show you some "Glitter" cards I made at the last but one club meeting.  I have actually mounted them to make them into finished cards - apart from a greeting which I prefer to leave until I want to use the card.  You know me, I am so not into "glitter" but I did enjoy making them and I know my friend, Mary, in America just loves them so I now have three cards lined up for her (providing she does not see them on here first).  All made with peel-offs stuck on card and then glittered before colouring.

Just so Julia does not think I am not adhering to the rules here is my desk - boring or what?

See you over at the Stamping Ground later - adios!

Cream Crackered - Can't Stop Sleeping

Well, we got back from our holiday on Friday evening at 7 pm UK time (would have been 8 pm where we had left so as we set off from the hotel at 10.30 that morning it had been a long day - 9.5 hours!).  We had left a very very hot part of the world and returned to a very very cold and wet part of the world.  I could not get warm when we came in.  However, after good night's sleep and the heating having been on all night I was much better the next day.

Set off for our club meeting where we were revisiting Shrink Plastic and Pat, our tutor for the day, had made lots of things for us to see, had conducted lots of experiments with the various inks and things so there was lots for us to do.

I took some of the shrink plastic things I had made in the past and I made some bits whilst there:

The jewellery pieces on the right are what I had made previously and the three 'lady' pieces at the bottom were from printed images I already had.

On the way home I called at a well known Pharmacy for some lotion with Aloe Vera in it which Lynne had recommended.  Three applications later and my legs are not looking as red as they were

Still sore though and the right foot is still swollen when I sit with it down so a cushion on the stool is the order of the day.  Hopefully it will be better for tomorrow when I go to stay with my friend Wendy.  Whatever it is that is causing this redness (varicose eczema or blood pooling?) it obviously does not like the sun, maybe the pooled blood started to simmer?

Well, I am certainly catching up on any missed sleep, woke at 6.30 this morning, made a cuppa and slept until 9.30 am.  This is so not me - and I had slept most of last night in front of the tv.  I guess it is doing me no harm at all so I will just enjoy dreaming.  Got to do my reviews now on Trip Advisor - especially for the best burgers ever - Momo Burger in Nerja (and I am not addicted to burgers).

WOYWW 308

Only a few days late - but I could not let the week go by without joining in with WOYWW.  I did have a good excuse - I tried to do a post via BlogPress but I could not get it to upload my photograph. I even had super sleuth on it as well and he could not manage it (and he was a programmer) so very frustratedly I gave up and sulked.

Anyway - here is what you missed - my desk

As you can see I was busy journalling on the balcony overlooking the sea ... but where was I?  It was hot I can tell you that much.  In fact I have two badly burned legs but then that is another story and it was not from sitting in the sun.

As you can see I have a bottle of Diet Coke there, looks as if Spencer had stripped off because that is his t-shirt to the left of my journal and behind it are all manner of things.  A pencil case that contains loads of pens, my Caran D'Ache little travel box of watercolours and my favourite sticky stuff, Cosmic Shimmer.

Here are a couple of clues to where I was

A peep across the bay

Perfect clear water

This should give it away

or this beach may

Didn't go down to this beach as it was quite steep and involved more walking than my poor legs and feet would do.  In fact I had a very chilled holiday with very little walking involved.  Just ate some fabulous ice cream, had some lovely meals out, read a lot and did a bit of journalling.  I was ready to come home after eleven days of sunshine (hot) but when I got to Manchester early evening today (Friday) I longed to be back in the heat.  Is there no satisfying me or what?  Why can I not go on holiday, beam myself up (as Scotty) check on home and then beam myself back again?

Right, must go and see what other WOYWW'ers have been up to and visit our leader, Ms Julia, to see what important news I have missed over the past two Wednesdays.  

Artful Times - A Bit of Finnabair

Here we are with Challenge no 79 - a bit of Finnabair - we mean for you to look at her work and use some metal pieces, lace, flowers - whatever takes your fancy and see what you come up with.  Here's a link to her blog to get you started:

http://tworzysko.blogspot.co.uk

I just love her work and I so enjoy going to her workshops.  I think I have become a bit of a 'groupy' as I have been to several now and am hoping to go to another two this year.  Oh dear!  I have featured some of the things I have made in her workshops and there is a link on the right hand side of this page if you want to see some of the things I have done.

For this piece I was left entirely on my own - had one or two wobblers but eventually came up with this.  The photo is of my mum and my gran.

You don't have to have photographs in your work, it doesn't have to be a canvas or a book cover, you can just do a card.  I have made some cards and used some of her stamps in the process so I could easily have used those but thought I would attempt a canvas.

top left corner

and bottom right

Now should I put some stamping on or some lines, some torn strips of paper?  Oh dear, what shall I do?

Pop along to Wendy's blog and see what she has to show you and then please join in and make something for us to feast our eyes on and enjoy.