Sunday Special! On a Tuesday??

Yep! It's me again!  I'm back! Had a wonderful Saturday Workshop at The Artistic Stamper with Kate Crane! This is my second foray into Art Journalling and I LOVE IT!

I've got loads of pictures to share:

This is a page I made after the workshop using stuff 'n' bobs from my stash of Dylusionals, Stencils and Washi's...rather pleased although Nick did say 'Looks like a pair of lungs' (What does he know!). Watch this space to see what it becomes! I also made a page for bunting using orange, yellow and red

•  Loving my purples and greens - did I tell you that is my favourite colour combination (closely followed by pink and teal/aqua - though I suppose that's really the same colours, just paler!!)
  See below for the 'finished' page!

  
  
  
  
  
  
• Love the 'Ghosting' using water technique! How cool is that!
  

I had to cover a Saxo Pot before I could start though.............

And the Birthday Card took me ages...........but pleased in the end!  This actually used the background I prepared for making the bunting!

And so to the pages I made during the work shop!Painted page work in progress! This was using acrylic paints

And an inky page using Dylusions sprays! See below for how this page was finished and what became of the page to the left....or what to do with overspray and blotting pages!!

 

       Painty page number 2

And both painty pages

And this is the left hand page of the 'blue-green' pages finished off at home.........

Oh! and if anyone knows how to rotate photos in blogger, please let me know how to do it!  These images are all the correct orientation in my EOS photo professional editing programme!!

Finally, a heartfelt thank you to Jennie and Mal for hosting and a providing a lovely lunch! And a big, big thank you to Kate for coming all the way from t'North to teach us!! Please come again soon!

 If you want to get inky get yourself to The Artistic Stamper!

Thank you for looking (and apologies for the previous edition of this blog if you saw it - Blogger decided to add multiples of the same photos and I tried to caption them all, as you do! Sorted now!!)

TTFN xxx

Oh Dear......

....It's been so long since my last blog I couldn't remember how to do it!  So, what's been happening? Not a lot! That's quite a good reason for not blogging!! Anyhoos!, exciting news is...............drum roll purlease..............I've become a Stampin' Up demonstrator! I've liked the products (ok, the white ink pad) for some time so hosted a party with Caroline. A lot of fun was had by all, and I think the phrase is '...and the rest is history'.  So here are some of my creations using Stampin' Up:

Strawberry Slush for the background and top petal, Pistachio Pudding for stem (Tape it stamps), Chalk Talk sentiment and the dotty paper in black from the Neutrals

 Two Christmas cards using the 'Neutral' set and 'In Colour 2013-2015 papers', the Mosaic Madness stamps and punch. The 'ribbons' are the 'Tape it' set.  ' Deck the Halls' is from the 'Christmas Messages' set (which I rather like!)                            

Two very simple cards which I'll be using for my workshops (I really like these!)

And Finally....................Love this!

I stamped and cut about 30 flowers so loads more cards to come!

TTFN

Sand Castles in the Air: Rejoining the....

Sand Castles in the Air: Rejoining the....: ... world of blog! Next time we go to Dover Castle: Memo to self: 'TAXIS BOTH WAYS AND FLEECES!!!' Sittingbourne Station: Tickets ...

Rejoining the....

... world of blog!
Next time we go to Dover Castle: Memo to self: 'TAXIS BOTH WAYS AND FLEECES!!!'
Sittingbourne Station: Tickets ordered on-line, collected! Sitting in the sun - lovely and warm and sunny

Get to Dover Priory: lovely! Warm and sunny
Taxi up - Fine and only £6:40!
Up there: blowing a hooley and cold to boot!

Nick decided to wear armour to keep warm!

 And added a shield for protection against the wind!

Liam added a waterproof to stop the chilling wind! (so did I, but there's no photos! I had the camera!!)

They both loved grinding corn the Roman way!

We watched two displays - one by the Horrible Histories guys with gladiators which was brilliant (Liam complained 'there were only 2 globs of blood!') then 'The Ermine Street Guard' with their display of the Roman Army and how it worked. Some pics from the displays...............

No stirrups! Very impressed!

The mighty 'Testudo'

This machine fired melons way over the castle walls in the background!!

And to finish.....Well of course....it's our own little roman soldier!

On the day we......

 Managed to eat packed lunch (which was lovely thanks to me! Although the pork pies and sandwiches were frozen, the drinks were perfectly chilled)
Walked down - that's a lot of steps and a very steep slope when you do the direct route. Got serious cramp in my left thigh and was thinking Nick would need to flag down a passing motorist for assistance! Did make it in the end!

Monday: Never again. Unless it's by train and taxi both ways!
Monday Addendum: still can't walk normal because of cramp in left thigh

Tuesday Addendum: Would definitely recommend this as a day out! (But I'm still walking funny)

I've been away.............

wayyyyyy too long!!  Holidays tend to stop me from doing normal things for way longer than the actual holiday!  It's been totally manic at work too since I got back and also very hot (not complaining about the hot!!!) so crafting has taken a leisurely break too! Anyway, thought it was about time I got back to my blog! Yesterday was spent at the Artistic Stamper doing a workshop with Georgina and very productive it was too!  We made 4 cards but I'm only going to show you one!!

This went to my gorgeous friend Christine for her birthday...She loved it! (Phew!).  And then I spotted all the other sea-side themed stuff in her house! It must have got through to me subliminally!!

And this is our garden table earlier! I've been mounting stamps!! The book is the Cambridge Biographical Encyclopaedia which Nick was browsing (as you do)

Now for some of my holiday sketches...

My favourite!

One of the bars around the Piazza

 Mountains from the Hotel

 The Duomo, Ravello

 Planter and beer - I decided to concentrate on small stuff!!

 Looking at Scala from the Piazza....

And my favourite

This only exists in my mind although all the elements can be found in reality!

I hope you have enjoyed this post! I definitely enjoyed the holiday and it was certainly the most successful as far as creating is concerned in a lonnnnnnnngggggg time!

Bye bye for now xxx

WOYWW 213....

From Italy! Another quick blog this week as I'm on my phone. Just wanted to share some photo's of my holiday journal. My sketches this year are totally different and I'm very pleased with them!
Bye bye for now peeps (I'm going to try to link up!).......


And I'm back! Using the hotel laptop for some last minute editing!

This is the view from the Hotel Parsifal Terrace looking towards the mountains.  Work in progress as I need to add lots more of the houses that form Torello, the village on the way down to Minori on the coast.

Another work in progress but this time the page on the right needs to be viewed 90 degrees to the left!  It is from my favourite bar and is a sketch of a wrought iron gate and lovely old stone wall.  The next picture is my actual desk for tonight (well, my lap was used a lot so I put everything on the table!)  This is my journal.  The front cover was done before the holiday, the back I've done whilst here - yes. I took my stamps and ink pads (carefully selected mind) with me!  The colours are Derwent Watercolour pencils with Pentel aquabrushes (why have I only just discovered water brushes?????)

A close up of the back cover:

One of the quick sketches (about 90 seconds -  I wanted to just catch the shapes of the guys while they watched Italy play Spain in the semi-finals of the Confderations Cup (the other half of the watch seemed perfect to hide Raffaele who was moving about so much I couldn't capture him!!)

I'm so  pleased with these as it is something completely different for me! I used to be a watercolour/pen and ink, quite classic stuff, but thanks to various lovely tutors at craft classes, I've discovered a whole new artistic mojo!!

He he! So much for a short blog!  Till next week, Happy crafting fellow WOYWW'ers!