Jeudi Journal - Idiot

Rosie was a sweet and somewhat pretty young girl but she had an unnatural desire to always wear huge roses, as befits her name, in her hair.  You, the dear reader of this journal page would be forgiven if you thought the words "I'm sorry I called you an idiot.  I thought you knew" referred to Rosie in some way when in fact they refer to the two little birds who had nested amongst crown of roses she was wearing today.

"Caro, 'the canarblary bird' was a very unusual bird indeed.  She loved to flit about and find the most unusual places to rest, or even, sometimes, to nest.  In fact she had just flown all the way across the water from Germany, resting on a ferry boat whenever she could, where she had been spending the day in Balconia by the Rhine visiting her favourite hooman friend and chatting about different coffees of`all things.  She had rested once she returned to England, having a few days in the sunny south before heading up north to meet up with her family and friends.

It was whilst she was flitting about that she saw this young girl sporting a crown of roses in her hair.  Caro thought that would be the ideal place to settle for a while and so she perched high on the young girl's head, being ever so careful not to disturb the petals of the beautiful flowers.  Caro was extremely light and so the young girl, who we know to be Rosie, was not aware of the fact that a bird had nestled on her head.

Caro was extremely happy sitting there, the scent of the roses and the delightful shampoo Rosie used wafted up to her nostrils and sent her into a kind of dreamy haze.  Imagine what a shock she got when the 'nest' she had made for herself began to rock slightly.  Opening her eyes Caro saw her cousin, Sully 'the spotoobler bird', perching on one of the roses looking at her.  

"I thought it was you, only an idiot like you would perch on someone's head" said Sully as he fluffed up his feathers and twitched his tail.  "Didn't know you were back in the country" he continued.

"Who are you calling an idiot?" asked Caro, "It takes one to know one.  Besides which I was always way above you in all the classes we took at school.  I seem to remember I was the brainy one and you were the one always in trouble.  I got my wings long before you did."

A heated clucking ensued and the two of them got so twitchy that Rosie shook her head from side to side and up and down and the two of them had to fly away.  As they did so Sully shouted "I'm sorry I called you an idiot.  I thought you knew."

Caro decided not to reply, she knew what an idiot he had been at school, seemed as if he had never changed.

I pondered, after writing this, whether to turn it into a dream but thought a bit of nonsense might appeal to one or two readers and so I left my journal story as it is.  Hope it makes you smile.

To begin with I did a bit of reverse stencilling with Twisted Citron Distress Ink and my Aall & Create Stencil.  Whilst it was drying I coloured my images with my Promarkers and then decided to make a brick wall for Rosie to stand on.  

Out came the Heavy Gesso and another Aall & Create stencil, which, when dry, was brushed over with Gathered Twigs Distress Ink.

So that is me for this week, joining in with Matilde at Art Journal Journey and her challenge which is 'Birds'.

WOYWW 675

 It's Wednesday again, and that means time to meet up with Julia and her band of merry bloggers here.  If you want to join in just follow the link and give it a whirl.  There is nothing at all on my desk at the moment and so it's a bit of a set up.  I have been sat in the lounge practising my pencil colouring skills (which are nil) to the accompaniment of a class I took in February with the brilliant Tracy Scott.  This time I think it is sinking in and here are a couple of practice sheets I have done this past week.  Not much to show but it has not been a very productive week craft wise, apart from my journal page which is ready for tomorrow (with a silly story this week - nonsense).

Sorry it is so dark, I had to turn the light off to get a shot

At the front you can see a couple of new images from Vera Lane/Janet Klein which I rather took a shine too, mainly because the hairstyles were different to a lot of the others and I love to swap heads to make new characters.  These are called 'wanderlust' and as you can see they are all about travel with one holding a camera and the other a map.

Well, that is it for this week - shock horror, it's a short post - I did also make a card but as the recipient has not had her birthday yet I can't show it in case she pops on here.  See you with it next week.

Jeudi Journal - A Challenge

 "Percy had been to the zoo with his class from school.  It was the usual end of year trip and the teachers had decided that it would be both fun and educational.  The children could learn all about the animals whilst enjoying the open air and they could do some projects on the animals they had seen when they returned to school after the summer recess.

Percy was a lovely young lad, easily led by his peers but lots of fun and a very likeable child in many ways.  His mother was very understanding of his mischievous streak but she did her best whilst her husband was away serving his country.  Percey was proud of his dad and wanted to be just like him when he grew up.

There had been a lot of giggling on the coach back home but the teachers had not seen anything to worry about and they knew that the boys were all good pals and did behave silly when together - perhaps they were laughing about the antics of some of the animals they had seen.  

The coach pulled up outside school right on time and there were several mothers waiting for their offspring, including Mrs Bunt, Percy's mother.  Mrs Bunt was glad to have her son back in one piece as she had been worried he might fall into some pit with an animal or something and so she hurried him along to the waiting car.  

It wasn't until they got home that she noticed the knapsack he had taken was moving on its own!    What have you got in there, she asked.

"It's a present for you mum" replied young Percy.  "All the other kids were buying presents for their mums to take home but I thought you would like one of the exotic birds" he said as he pulled a rather bewildered looking bird from his knapsack.

(sorry its a bit skewift)

"Oh Percy", said Mrs Bunt, what am I going to do with you, you are going to be in big trouble, in fact sometimes I despair, you can be trouble with a capital T at times."

Percy looked at her with his big eyes and said "I'm not trouble just a challenge".

This is based on a story I was told when I went as a representative of the Girl Guides (Girl Scouts in America) in the UK, to an International camp in Denmark, many many moons ago.  Now how true it was I have no idea but the (mature) lady who told it was a teacher from the north east and I had no reason to disbelieve her.  I have heard it as a funny story since so who knows?

I am entering this into Art Journal Journey where the challenge this month is "Birds" as set for us by Matilde who hails from Poland.  You can see her work here and I am sure you will love her inspiration page as much as I do.

WOYWW 674

A scheduled post because I am probably not going to feel up to posting early in the morning tomorrow.   I didn't want to miss, don't think I have ever missed posting since I joined way back in goodness only knows when, so I am showing you my latest bit of crafting.

It's ages since I did any of these pointy cards and to be honest I had forgotten how to make them so the trusty computer had to come out for a refresher course.  Thank goodness for You Tube.

That's my little Artisan Explorer you can see on the left - the footprint is only 4.5" but it is a powerful little machine - all metal inside!  The pot with the yellow lid holds my tablets for the day and there is a glue sitting on top of it plus a large one at the side of it.  The circles were what were cut from my circle cards and then I used them to cut the ovals for these cards - that's the scrap.  Along with the bits on the right hand side.

I have also been making more of those circle cards with the crafty things on them - these are mainly for members of the stamp club but none of them come on here so no danger they will see them - they still want names adding in the circles but i did make six.  One went a bit wrong as I stuck too much on and could only fit 'happy' on the circular bit so the 'birthday' will have to go across the centre instead of a name.  These were done a couple of days ago when I wanted my mind occupying mindlessly.  

No two are alike because of the images stuck on

There may yet be other cards in the making - all for club members but not all for the club I go to - some for my internet club friends.

Well, that is me for the moment and so I will link myself to Ms Julia and the WOYWW'ers for the weekly desk hop/snoop.  Why not join us, it's all good fun and your desk can be tidy - messy - or in between.  

Jeudi Journal - Time

 Well, linking to Art Journal Journey proved very difficult with the quote set by Wendy for this week.  The quote was "There's not enough hours in the day for all the stuff I'm not going to do" and the closest song I could come up with was by Chicago - "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?".   A tenuous link but the best I could come up with for Alison's challenge which I really wanted to link with.

I did try several songs about laziness, idly lying about but when you examined the lyrics they were not at all suitable being drug related or even worse.  So I settled on the song by Chicago, at least I could write a story.

"Patsy was a crafter.  She was always busy making things, buying new products - you name it, her whole life was about crafting.  She had a lovely dedicated large craftroom, filled with shelving and a huge table in the centre of the room.  Dotted around the perimeter were also a couple of smaller tables where she could work on the different disciplines, such as her die cutting station, her 'dirty' area which was where the large old Butler's sink was for the messy projects she loved to do, and the clean area which housed her sewing machine and bales of fabric which she could not resist buying.

She had a TV mounted on the wall just beyond the doorway and that was linked to her computer so that she could watch You Tube demonstrations whilst she got on with her current project, whatever that may be.  In short Patty was missing nothing in her life.  Her husband was a quiet mannered soul who was quite happy to let her get on with all the things she enjoyed and he was quite happy to help with the housework as and when necessary.  If truth be known he did most of the cooking these days and was becoming quite the accomplished chef.

It was a lovely sunny morning when the two of them were sat having breakfast together on the patio.  Breakfast had always been Patty's thing and she had made two perfectly poached eggs that day which, along with some crisp toast, had been a lovely start to the day.

"What are you doing today my dear?" asked Henry.

"Oh I don't know" replied Patsy.

"Surely in that wealth of You Tube videos you have saved you must be able to find something" he answered.

"There's not enough hours in the day for all the stuff I'm not going to do" she replied, with a smile on her face..

Henry sighed, sometimes he wondered what on earth went on in Patsy's world.  But he didn't say anything, he loved her so much he just wanted her world to be perfect."

WOYWW 673

It's Wednesday and that means it's WOYWW and time to join Julia and her merry band showing their desks.

First of all I want to show you the local church when we visit the area close to The Lakes we enjoy so much.  I was particularly pleased so see that not only had they a cross displayed on the gates for Easter but one beside it which I presume was in support of The Ukraine.

It was another lovely weekend with the weather being very favourable and on Monday I posted about our day in Sizergh which had the most beautiful gardens - I so enjoyed wandering them and seeing the designs of Susan Rowley, the Head Gardener there.  You can read and see all about it here.

Now I have stopped waffling here is my desk.  As you can see not much activity but there are my new stamps featuring Miss Dee, the latest character from Janet Klein. Not too sure whether I will get as hooked on them as I have done with her little characters.  Miss Dee is fun and outrageous but I can't see as many opportunities for using her as I have had with the other little characters.  Maybe one or two insulting cards??  Let's just say I have not ordered the next set as yet.

On the left are my JK images neatly filed away in number order - these are the small A7 stamps - the others are in a drawer.  You will notice they are in Felix boxes from when we fed the cats next door.  Then the fours stamps just bought and the images cut out ready for colouring.

Sorry about the glare 

These are the actual stamps showing you the words

Here she is Miss D with a bit of colour

There are some little bts still to cut out, mainly arms on hips have a space and I notice I missed some heels on a pair of beach shoes.  Not quite sure what I will do with her/them as yet but watch this space - inspiration is, hopefully, around the corner.  Now to link up early.

Sizergh - I fell in love with it

What a brilliant weekend I had.  We went to Sizergh Medieval Manor on Sunday.  What a lovely place to visit.  We didn't manage to do the house as my back was bad and I could not face the stairs but we watched a short film featuring Henry Hornyold-Strickland, 8th Count della Catena, which was very interesting and informative.  Well worth watching.

Afterwards we started looking at the gardens and I was surprised just how beautiful they are.  Quite impressive and, to my mind, one of the nicest gardens I have seen.  The Head Gardener is female, Susan Rowley, and what a fabulous job she has made of the planning of the gardens.  I could have spent all day just wandering about and looking at the names of all the plants in the various gardens.

We started off in the Stumpery - and I just loved it.  The planting was done around various stumps of trees and gave a lovely backcloth to the many plants and their foliage.  I thought this was going to be my favourite part of the gardens and had to have a photo of me besides one of the sections.

I just love how they have used these tree stumps and built the beds around them - I have a fascination with wooden pieces whether raw or finished in some way.

From there we went to the herbaceous border and on to the kitchen garden.  I could kick myself for not taking a photograph of the ingenious way they have built the fencing from cherry blossom.  It looks so pretty - maybe we will go again shortly!

Despite loving the Stumpery I fell in love with the Rock Garden.  I cannot describe it and can only say it is well worth a visit.  Despite the meandering pathways and little bridges I just had to wander around and soak up the beauty of this place.   I just loved this view and as I walked towards it a guy with a telephoto lens came towards me and said "Fantastic".  He too, just loved the view before us.

this is by the water in the rock garden

So striking from a distance

The Mirror Lake

Back of the Manor

They ask you not to roll (roly poly) down the banking (above) as it is home to solitary bees and other insects so they don't want you squashing them.

From there we went to look at this topiary and we were treated to a lovely song by a solitary bird sitting on top of one of the pyramids.

I had to shoot into the sun for fear of disturbing it

And then it was time to return to the gift shop where I bought a delightful bud vase before we wended our way home.  A lovely day out - we will definitely be back.