Sunday Stampers Happy Heart

Wooo! Had a great day at Port Sunlight yesterday with Sarah, met up with lots of old friends and bought...well, just a few new goodies! Few!!!LOL
So, last night after flopping on the sofa to watch Casualty went off to my work table to play with some of them and made most of this page which made me very happy - lovely zingy Dylusion sprays and mask along with a fern mask from Crafty Individuals!

 Having seen Sarah's journal IRL I was inspired to draw with ink, not with a stick but with the bottom of the tube for the nozzle. To see Sarah's fantastic stick drawing see here - and while you're there have a look at some of the other amazing stuff she's produced!
Of course being the impatient type I couldn't wait for the spray to dry so ended up with a few splodges! I still went to bed feeling very happy!
So I get up this morning and see that Hel's Sunday Stamper Challenge is only "Happy Heart"! Hels has made a fantastic tag with some serendipitous wording. So out came another of my goodies from yesterday - some word art from the amazing Jenny of Artistic Stamper - mixed two stamps up added some painty circles and a bit of stamping from an old Elusive Images stamp - Oh Yes! - very happy!!
Thanks for looking, Chris

Another page from my journal

Yet another greyish day and I was talking to someone this morning who said there's more to come -Oh! No!
Still tomorrow I'm off to Port Sunlight for a day out and at Happy Stampers with my friend Sarah! 

Just thought I'd show you another page from my journal

The image was from Digital Two for Tuesday and it just seemed to fit in with a song in my head.The background was already in my book and I coloured the image with distress markers. Then, strangely, while looking through a quotation book two or three days later I found that this particular part of the lyrics(sung by George Harrison) were originally by no other than Lewis Carrol! 
So, lunch and then off to shop - can't leave hubby without some treats tomorrow!
Thanks for looking, Chris

Whats on your workdesk wednesday

I've often looked in envy at others workspaces and thought ...one day...so here I am in our new flat with not just a work desk but a work room! YAY! Only thing is, that although I have a space to work, sadly the rest of the room shall for now remain a bit of a dumping room for all the boxes that we still have to either find room for, unpack or throw out! Want to see them? - no way!!!He!He! But I will show you where I am at the moment.

I found these unfinished atcs while I was organising my storage boxes(I'll show you these sometime)so thought I may as well finish them. 
As you can see everything sits on a piece of oil cloth that I saw one day as another lady was buying some - well, I just had to have some didn't I? On top of that is my cutting mat, rulers and cutters. On the left you can see my little box of mop ups which give you a clue about my favourite colours, on the right my monster pencil case that goes back and to the caravan with me, you can also see my glues, in an old jam holder from a present waay back, my two favourite pairs of scissors and right at the back my jewellery box that contains beads from all over the place including some of my Mums that I couldn't bear to send to a charity shop. Okay, you can have a peep inside!

You can see my Primark specials here on the right - little bundles of bracelets that I use to decorate parcels and bags.

Now I can keep things out (instead of sweeping them up from the dining table) I'm hoping (crafting) life will be easier, although we still have a long way to go with those darn boxes!

Hope to get to see a lot of work tops today all linked from Julia's blog here 

Thanks for looking, Chris

A great job!

I can hardly believe a week has passed since hubby and I got up early and headed to Blackpool Zoo for him to be zookeeper for a day! The staff were fantastic and gave him a chance to have some really interesting experiences throughout the day!
We started in the elephant house where he had a chance to wash an elephant!

The zoo have a policy that they no longer have direct contact with the elephants so that it gives the elephants a choice, they use a target stick and the elephant can follow instructions. It was fantastic to see an elephant back up to a hole in the fence and put it's feet up in turn to be inspected and washed.
Next it was off to the penguins, as official observer I was allowed to to in too!

I stood well back near the pelicans

Those beaks looked dangerous!

Zebras were next

It's a dirty job but somebody had to do it!

These guys waited patiently! 

By this time the rest of the family had arrived

We were delighted when the keeper attached to the tapir and giraffes allowed the youngsters to take part in the feeding

Then off we went for lunch, Granpa was allowed out to eat with us!

Sealions were next but booh! hooh! we only got to watch through the glass

Final job for the day was feeding the squirrel monkeys and the lemurs - hubby's face was a picture!

handfuls of grubs 

My monkeys watching the monkeys

Yes, I was jealous! Lemurs are my favourites

Hey! don't forget us!

We had time after this to see the rest of the animals in the zoo before they shut

The kids had a great day, lots of lovely puddles to splash in, while the rest of us avoided them. 

We all loved being part of this day and at the end hubby was presented with a certificate and some lovely goodies to keep as souvenirs. 

Must dash, Downtons about to start!

Thanks for looking, back soon, Chris

Just a journal page

This page was started ages ago but finally finished while I was away! 

The beautiful image is part of a download from Astrid's Artistic Efforts and I used my NeocoloursII to dribble down the page. The quote is from a book. I have written some more private thoughts underneath the larger words.
I'm not really sure whether it's finished yet, but I think this will have to do.
Thanks for looking, Chris

Playing in my journals

We have just had a lovely break at our caravan and although we got out and about - including my hubby's zoo keeper day(I will post some photos soon!)I had time to relax with my journals. I took my little moleskine with me but did little more than start a few backgrounds. I also took my very first journal which has been sitting waiting for me for some time as I tend to use a mixture of different journals - mostly A5 and smaller, all with different types of paper. It is a pink pig A5 with watercolour paper that my son bought me waaay back when he was a student(he's just coming up for 30!)
This page is about my fantasy cat - I drew him in the back of one of my smaller journals ages ago following a dream I had.... 

I don't know where he came from....had I seen him somewhere in a book or was he totally imagined? I really don't know, but I do think he deserves a journal page of his own!

This page in the same journal was prompted by finding this picture on a leaflet in a bank in Carnforth while waiting for hubby.

I'll be back soon with more. Thank you for looking and I would love it if you would leave a comment, Chris

pitstop post!

Been dashing about so much lately, feel as though I only have time to refuel and then we're off again. I think part of this comes from the fact that after all the waiting we had to do we feel free! We spent part of last week up at our caravan and out and about around there - Windermere(beautiful!), Kendal(shopping!), Morecambe(a windy walk along the prom!) and gardening - and getting bitten in the process!
The weekend came and went, with visits to the Southport Airshow with our eldest grandson, and then a day out with the family to celebrate a birthday at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park -one of my very favourite places to visit and the best thing was.... there was a Miro exhibition!
I did sit still long enough to prepare my September pages properly

and we saw the most beautiful sunset

I think this was the same sunset that Lindsay saw from a little further south along the same coastline.
I have also been making cards but then Doh! forgot to take photos!
I've also been making a few journal pages...

still working on this

and this

...but now we're off again - I'm hoping to catch part of the Tour of Britain and the weekend will see my lovely hubby being zookeeper for the day at Blackpool zoo - it's going to be a family affair as we're all going along to see him enjoy his birthday/retirement present - we kept this a secret until we were at the sculpture park and he had no idea - he had said he didn't want presents or a fuss for either event so both of these were very low key...but of course by then we had already had other ideas he! he!
I'll be back with more pictures when I've caught my breath!
Thanks for looking, Chris 

It's September!

Only thing is....this is all I've done so far! By the time I'd cleared a space on my new work table I realised I couldn't lay my hands on much else so with some Whisper pens I scribbled on to a CD case, spritzed, then dragged it across the pages. I quite like the unintentional wiggly effect on the edge of the page!

I love this calendar challenge run by the amazing Kate -see here if you want to know more - it has really helped to write down the progress of our move this year. We finally heard late on Friday that the sale had gone through and we handed over the keys at about five o'clock. We are slowly getting through the mountain of boxes that we piled up here just over a week ago (see here) As you can see we packed quite a lot into August(as well as goods and chattels) including a fantastic break in Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire as well as going up to the caravan with our grandchildren and out and about with them!

 I must say it's lovely to have inky fingers again!

Thanks for looking, Chris