A Vintage Day

Thankfully, after the torrential rain that fell non-stop on Friday and resulted in the route of the Olympic Torch through Blackpool being diverted with celebrations brought into the Tower Ballroom rather than outdoors on the new Tower Headland (not having much luck with that venue at the moment - Elton John's open-air concert to open the Headland last weekend had to be cut short due to heavy rain and high winds!), Saturday dawned brighter and Lindsay and I managed to stay dry for our visit to the Vintage and Handicrafts Fair in town.

The Fair was held in the Winter Gardens building in the centre of Blackpool.  A programme of renovation and restoration began a year or so back, to return the Winter Gardens to the splendour of  its Victorian Days.  It was the first time I'd been inside since this work had been done and I must admit the entrance hall does look splendid !

(Apologies for the Ladies Toilets sign slap-bang in the centre of the pics - I tried to persuade Lindsay to stand in front of it but she was having none of it)!

 I absolutely love this shade of blue that's been used to paint the metalwork - just gorgeous!

There were lots of stalls offering a variety of vintage, handcrafted, antique and collectible goodies, along with some rather too noisy music on stage - a young lady with a guitar whilst we were there - the sound system was too loud and we felt rather sorry for the poor sellers whose stalls were directly beneath the speakers.  A section had also been set aside with comfy sofas and a stand offering tea, coffee and cream scones served on vintage crockery.

There were several stalls selling vintage clothes with vendors even dressing the part themselves ....

..... but one of our favourite stands was run by a lady called Wendy Moore whose wonderful fantasy creations of fairies, mermaids, mirrors and shells really caught our eye ..............

Lindsay especially loved these fairies hanging in the tree .......

 .... and we both thought the "blingy" mirror and decorated shell in the photo above were gorgeous too!

Another stall which attracted our attention was this one, selling individual pieces of vintage/collectible crockery.  Maralyn and Robert (trading as One Vintage Lady) run a china replacement service searching out those broken or lost pieces of crockery that you might be hunting for.

Lindsay had been on the lookout for pretty cups and saucers so decided to treat herself to this sweet Teacup Trio ............................

 I was very good and resisted buying anything, though I was tempted once or twice ......... this stall had some rather attractive painted wooden boxes for sale in a faded vintage style ........

 ....... and I was almost tempted by the Siamese cat kitchen roll holder (though I'm not sure what Mia would've made of it)!

Although I didn't spend anything at the Vintage Fair, Lindsay and I spent a few more hours shopping in town and I treated myself to a couple of new tops from M&S and couldn't resist buying two new books for journalling in - the covers were just so appealing.  The smaller book has Tiffany-style covers with ruled pages, ideal for "spill writing" (picked that one up along with another for Lindsay in the Discount Bookshop - only 99p each) and the larger one has plain pages, fairly thin, but will work well for art journalling especially if I glue some of the pages together for added strength.  This came from the TKMaXX store - they always have a wonderful selection of hard-to-resist notebooks and boxes (Lindsay treated herself to one and she may post a picture of it later on her own blog).

Came home rather worn out after a long day in town with poor tired feet, so am having a "chill out" day today - I may even get round to doing a page or so in my art journal (well, it's about time I started "arting" again, particularly since I've acquired even more books to work in) and this evening I'll be glued to the TV watching the England v Italy Euro2012 Quarter Final match (a bit of football over the summer to keep me going until our own Championship campaign begins again in August - here's hoping Blackpool makes it back to the Premier League this season, having just missed out by a whisker at Wembley last month!

Chakra Pages

It's a horrible wet and murky day here and the farthest I've been is down to the supermarket this morning to do the weekly shop! Just popped on line to order some trainers for my son's birthday so I thought I'd do a quick post and show you the remaining two chakra pages that I did back in April for my Art Journal.

 Third Eye Chakra

The background was created by spraying on "Rum Raisin" Glimmer Mist.  I drew the eye freehand and adhered it to the page - the letters are punched out stickers from a Basic Grey alphabet sheet.  I added some stamped acrylic circles, freehand writing, charms, gems and a "gypsy" image, and finished by rubbing in a little Distressed Stickles.

Crown Chakra

I gessoed the white background for this page, adding some light silvery scroll stamping and a torn piece of paper doily for texture, with some pewter coloured metallic rub-on over the top.  Again, the page was completed with a couple of images, cardboard lettering covered with a Krylon silver pen, stamping, a charm and my own handwriting.

I remember I felt quite pleased with the results back in April, but understandably since then I haven't felt much like being creative in the least. Hopefully, I can gradually start doing a bit of artwork again, dig out those inks, paints and stamps (!) and take time out to relax a bit.  

Planning on visiting a Vintage and Handcrafts Fair on Saturday with Lindsay, so keeping my fingers crossed the weather improves a bit by then - looking forward to it and hope to pick up a few bargains (what, I don't know yet, but I'm sure something interesting will catch our eyes)!

Poppies for Remembrance

It's been a long time since I last posted and it's only now that I feel I can start doing so. My sister Lindsay's husband, David, was diagnosed with terminal cancer at the beginning of May and very sadly, lost his battle with this awful disease on 29th May. Thankfully, he died peacefully at home with Lindsay by his side, rather than in hospital. A beautiful funeral service was held for him last Friday, 8th June, at St Chad's Church in Poulton. Lindsay and David had been happily together for 36 years so it has been a devastating shock for us all and at the moment we are just taking things one day at a time.

David - In Remembrance

I took these photos of poppies in our garden a day or two before David died and it seems appropriate to show them here in remembrance of David (who never liked having his photo taken)

As you may appreciate, I haven't felt much like crafting in recent weeks and in fact, the last art I created were the last two chakra pages for my Art Journal back at the end of April.  I'll post pics of them another day.

Time Out

Sorry I've not been around for a week or two - unfortunately, at the moment I need to take time out from my blog due to family illness which has taken priority over any crafting.  Will post again when I'm able and upload pics of the last two chakra journal pages I did - I've not got around to May's challenges yet.  

This and that

I finally sorted out my browser/blogger issues by downloading Google Chrome (not without an afternoon's hassle mind you - nothing's ever straightforward is it?) to use as an alternative browser to my old Internet Explorer (thanks to Sioux for the suggestion, which confirmed what I'd been thinking).  So the problems I was having with Blogger have gone away (fingers crossed), though (like Lindsay) I'm using the old format to put up this post.  

Yesterday, the plasterers came round to sort out our kitchen ceiling so I decided to escape all the chaos and go spend the day with Lindsay instead, taking my camera with me so that I could help photograph some of her newest creations (not for public viewing just yet *LOL*).  I was supposed to be assisting Lindsay make some extra cards, etc, for her demos this weekend, but I think I was much more of a hindrance than a help.  Here's a picture I took of one of the cards Lindsay had already made:-

The stamped image is one of Lindsay's "Off the Wall" designs (Emily) and the text stamp is one of Andy Skinner's.  I have a "thing" about harlequin diamond stamps and stencils at the moment, so I really love the stencilling on this card too.

I took some photographs of another card that Lindsay created during the day too and this, along with the one above, will be on display I believe on Sunday when she'll be demonstrating her 'arty-crafty' techniques at the Strikes Garden Centre in Weavervale, Northwich (check out her blog for details - she'll be in Leeds tomorrow as well).

 Inking the card edges

 Black card sprayed through an alphabetic stencil with Perfect Pearls Mist

 Steampunk Sarah - one of Lindsay's new stamp designs

The card completed 

Whilst Lindsay was working on her laptop, I was very honoured to have Tara (originally our parents', now one of Lindsay's cats) jump up and sit on my lap - however, I think it was just so she could get a better view of the computer screen, maybe hoping that Lindsay was putting in a big shopping order for all her favourite food treats (chicken, salmon, ham .......... for starters!)

During the day I was getting updates from home about the progress on the plastering - all sounded pretty horrendous as apparently at one point a large chunk of the ceiling fell down and (despite dust sheets everywhere) created a huge mushroom cloud of plaster dust which enveloped everything!  Lovely!!! Eventually, I could put off going home no longer (and was also feeling slightly guilty by then about not helping my menfolk clear up the mess) - and yes, dust was everywhere and it took another couple of hours to clean every surface and make the place look presentable again.  Last job of the night was washing the floor down and we'd had enough by then.  However, it was worth it - no more ceiling cracks, now we've just got to get it all re-painted - more mess and disruption (I can't wait)!

I've still got to finish off the last two chakra pages for my journal, don't know when I'll get round to doing them, but will post pics here when they're done.  Thanks for the kind comments I received all ready about the pages I posted last time.

April Journalling ...... etc

I've been in trouble with Lindsay this week for not "blogging" for a while - guilty as charged, but the days just seem to fly by and merge into each other at the moment - so I thought I better do an up to date post, only to discover from reading Lindsay's blog last night that Blogger has changed (!) - as a result it looks like I'm going to have an almighty problem posting too, never mind uploading pics.  Everything has changed, the screen I'm using to type out my post is too small but is also covering up the Blog toolbar so it's making things very difficult.  Part of the trouble is because Blogger apparently no longer supports my Browser - so even more hassle.  Aagh, why do they have to go tinkering with everything all the time!!!!  Grr !!!

I hope everyone had a lovely Easter break.  Life was a bit more eventful than we'd wanted around that time though - we had a big leak in the bathroom which resulted in a cracked kitchen ceiling and lovely soapy water (courtesy of Max having a shower at the time) dripping down into the pan of eggs I was cooking at the time!  As a result (and due to the "cowboy" job done on our bathroom some years back) to find and cure the leak, our plumber had to remove the toilet in order to remove the fascia in order to remove the cupboard in order to remove the bath - what a job!  Thankfully, we were covered by insurance.  So now we are waiting on the plasterer coming (Thursday) to re-plaster the ceiling.  Will feel a lot happier then.

This is what the ceiling looks like at the moment!

I've been working on my journal pages for April and have found them quite challenging - they are the seven Chakras and I've created five so far (with much struggling, so I'm not altogether happy with them) - only two left to go.  Here are my five chakra pages (fingers crossed I can upload pics):-

Root Chakra

Sacral Chakra

Solar Plexus Chakra

Heart Chakra

Throat Chakra

Typing this post has been an ordeal and I'm giving up on it for the time-being.  I may have to look at downloading another browser before I post again, what a pain this is!

March Journalling

I've finished my journal pages for March with days to spare (that's a minor achievement for me at the moment!).  I created four pages, each with a separate theme around the word "dream", as instructed - with mixed results.  Not altogether happy with what I've done, but there you are, never mind - it's all about the playing with colours and words, images and inks, getting messy and losing myself for a short while.  I hope that, as spring is upon us and we head off into summer, I might lose some of the gloominess that's been hanging around for far too long and have some fun instead.

Dream Definition

On this page we had to add a definiton of the word "dream" - I know what I was trying to do with this page, add random images all over to illustrate the bizarreness of our dreams, where nothing is linked but then again it is - I used water-soluble wax pastels, inks, Glimmer Mist, stamps, Stickles, Dimensional Pearls - ended up far more fussy looking than I intended.  Plus I'd written all over the page as well and toned it down with some gesso, but still not happy with how it shows through - I don't like my writing (must do better next time!)

Dreams of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

We had to add the words Dreams of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow to our page and then write about something for each one.  I began my page with a coloured background using the water-soluble wax pastels again (a new acquisition that I'm enjoying playing with at the moment).  I adhered some torn out sheets from an old diary to the page and blended the edges with more wax pastels; I could then write about the dreams on these.  Added some stamps for illustration and a silvery moon with a sponge dabber.

The Dreamcatcher

Ali asked us to create a dreamcatcher on our page plus add an image to represent the dreamcatcher.  I cheated a bit (well, a lot really) as instead of drawing out or beading my own dreamcatcher, I dug out an old earring I had in the shape of a dreamcatcher (the other one has also been used in another art journal I worked on).  I've been wanting to use this image for quite some time as she looks to be such a wise old woman and thought this was the ideal page for her.  I love the colours on this page.

Dream Song Lyrics

We had to choose and illustrate some lyrics from any "dream" song we liked.  I chose these words from "Dream a Little Dream" by the Mamas 'n Papas as they kept going round and round in my head - seems this has been a popular choice for several others too.  I painted the background with acrylic paints and I've tried to keep it very basic to echo the Sixties style.  I'm much happier with my writing this time, even though my spacing was a little out here and there.

For April, we're going to be working on seven pages to illustrate each of the Chakra energies of the body, so that'll be a bit of a challenge!

Mia loves being in the spare room with me when I'm crafting or on the computer (actually, she follows me virtually everywhere around the house - no use me trying to hide from anyone, they've only got to spot Mia to know I'm not far away).  When she's not curled up on a cushion on the floor or rooting behind the computer after a ball of paper she's pushed underneath it, she's sat like this on the windowsill staring out and chunnering at the seagulls sitting on the lamp-posts and rooftops.  It's so funny to watch her.