The COOLBOXUK Site

Go To...

2010-12-17T19:18:00.000Z

Please got to
http://coolboxuk.accweb.org.uk/
to see my new posts.

The New CoolBoxUk Blog and Website

2010-01-09T22:09:00.001Z

And this, my friends, is the end of this blog... If you want to read my 2010 musings you will have to look somewhere else, as I now have a new website to combine all my blogs and photo albums: here's the link --
http://coolboxuk.accweb.org.uk/

Roundup Month November

2009-12-03T17:46:00.006Z

November 2009

What books and/or magazines did I read this month?
I’m sadly nearing the end of my Cadfael whodunit series which I’m thoroughly enjoying, and will definitely keep for a re-read in some years’ time. The episodes I’ve read this month are “The Heretic’s Apprentice”, “The Confession of Brother Haluin”, “The Potter’s Field”, “The Summer of the Danes” (one of my favourites!) and “The Holy Thief”.
I also had the quarterly issue of the “Permaculture Magazine” in and read most articles – some interesting thoughts on possible energy shortage in the future and inspiring allotment stories.

What movies, television shows, plays, etc. did I watch this month?
We still have the “Merlin” series once a week on iBBC, turning more and more into a comedy and giving us some good laughs. There is also a series of short behind-the-scenes videos available on the Merlin Website which we’ve been watching over dinner, too.
More special were two theatre plays I’ve been seeing together with my SIL Fiona, one right at the beginning of the month and one right at the end: First, we saw “Origins + Lemons”, a play by the Christian playgroup Riding Lights – just five actors and minimum props but an amazing performance with food for thought as well as a good laugh. The play, staged at Egham church, reviewed many well-known Bible stories in the light of the ongoing religion-science conflict. You can see a little rehearsal video of it here.
The other play was a more famous piece: “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller, based on the real happenings around the witch trials in the puritan community of Salem/USA in the late 1600s. This is a very emotional tragedy and was incredibly well played by the local amateur playgroup The Runnymede Drama Group, with my BIL Graham in one of the leading roles (atypically as a pastor!) and our niece Eleanor as one of the “afflicted” children. There is a lot of information on the original happenings, including biographies of all the main characters in the play, on this website, and also a link to The Crucible broadway play and movie.

What fun things did I do with my family and/or friends?
This month was full of activities and events! On the 5th of November of course was Bonfire Night, the annual British celebration of an historical event when one Guy Fawkes intended to blow up Parliament and the King, incidentally also in the late 1600. He didn’t succeed but provided the future generations of the country with a great excuse to have parties, bonfires and fireworks!
So, every year on the closest Saturday we have the “Bonfire and Fireworks Extravaganza” at the Vicarage here in Chertsey. This year there were nearly 400 people in attendance – soup kitchen, BBQ and cakes, a huge bonfire and great fireworks, and a welcome opportunity to meet lots of people I hadn’t seen for a while. The rain held off until all was finished and we only got a little damper on the way home. There are lots of photos on my Facebook, but I think you need to have your own account there (free) and be “Friends” with me to be able to see them. If you haven’t got a Facebook account let me know and I’ll send you an invite…
Next we had a late birthday dinner (yes, for MY birthday!) at Eve’s – lovely roast (and all Petra-diet friendly) and good company, and then a farewell party for David and Margaret, moving into their retirement home at the coast. David used to be one of the Chertsey bellringers for many years and the party, a bring-and-share at the house of our Tower Captain, was after his last practise with us.

What seasonal activities did I do?
Time seems to be flying by – I noticed out of the blue how late in the year it was when somebody asked after the homemade Christmas cards I usually sell on behalf of SfP, the charity crafts group I run. That was at the beginning of the month, and I immediately spent an “emergency session” – all afternoon long – to put together the Christmas card packs and label them to take to church for the first Coffee Morning of the month. It is amazing how much time that takes up…
We have started handbell practice with a view of playing in the Christmas service and maybe at a carol afternoon in one of the old people’s homes in Chertsey. It’s the first time I’m doing this, as it is the first time since we joined St Peter’s that Malcolm, our Tower Captain, has offered this activity, prompted by our new bellringing member Rachel from the US (it was what she did over there, rather than church bell ringing). I find it great fun – we are doing an assortment of Christmas songs and carols – and hope we’ll keep it going…
The 29th of the month was already First Advent Sunday – I can’t believe we are that close to Christmas! I spent the afternoon at practice and evening singing evensong with the choir at Lyne church because I like the traditional Lessons and Carols style of their advent services.

What special or unusual purchases did I make?
Freecycle (now called Freegle here but I can’t get used to that) has afforded us a second freezer, now sitting in the shed for trial. It’s quite an old version and missing a couple of drawers, so we don’t know how well it will work, or how energy efficient (or not) it will be, but we could certainly use the extra freezing space!
Plus, Sean got a colour laser printer also from Freegle which needed repairs but now works absolutely fine and has replaced my very old black+white laser printer which had started to play up too often.
And I got some more National Geographics magazines; 4-ring binders; and a pair of outdoor mittens via Freegle; and bought a pair of brandnew “walking socks” from the FARA shop. They are wonderfully warm (although I can’t get used to walking sock-footed, so still wear my sandals over them)…

What illnesses or health concerns did I have?
The diet is still going on and beginning to really grate on me now with all the Christmas parties coming up…
A health concern developed in the bathroom: some mildew and even a real mushroom! It is not so very damp in there but on the other hand, there’s no airing – still, this is the first time I’ve seen these here. I’ve been using vinegar to discourage them, and Sean has brought in his heatgun to give them a good singeing – let’s see if it works…

What was going on in garden and allotment?
The garden has died down completely – just a few carrots and cooking radishes left, and the chard is still producing some leaves. I spent some of the nicer days – it was quite mild earlier in the month! - with stints cleaning up the veggie beds for digging in some manure, and some light pruning.
We had some very high winds and the large window we had leaning against the wall (for use in a cold frame to be built for spring) fell over and the glass went into smithereens. Shame…so much for that project.
The allotments look poorly now – there’s still some kale/cavolo nero, as well as parsnips and Jerusalem artichokes going in ours, but other than that everything is ready for clearing and manuring, just as the garden. Haven’t seen Emily since the Bonfire Party!

What new recipes did I try out?
Typical autumnal fare to use up the kale and the squashes!
This one is our firm favourite: Bacon Chestnut Squash Roast
Roast Salmon on Crispy Kale
Cavolo Bero, Pine Nut and Basil Risotto

What were my accomplishments this month?
I’m keeping up-to-date with the Faithbook project and managed a few random digi scrapbook pages, plus I’ve started to put together a new website for myself, called The Coolboxuk Site, on Joomla which is a CMS rather than standard website. This will replace my old website and the various blogs I’m currently running, all in one place. It’s quite different and has lots of possibilities (some limitations, too, I’ve noticed) and should be much easier to maintain for me, and easier to look at all my different things for those of you who like to do that. But – this is only a pre-announcement. It will take a long time to upload all the scrapbook albums and tag them!
Also, I finally got proof of my acceptance into the Church Bellringers' Guild in the form of a certificate - it was signed in March but only given out during the AGM and received in my stead by our Tower Captain Malcolm. It's

What were my disappointments this month?
It was more Sean’s disappointment than mine but I do feel for him, and of course I find thing like this mega annoying on principle: one night somebody vandalized his van, right here in the driveway! One mirror was broken off altogether leaving nothing but holes in the side of the van, on the other the actual mirror was prised out of its frame. He has now replaced both provisionally with mirrors from his old van, which is still living officially off-road at Woodlands.

Anything else noteworthy to include?
Some strange things happened this month, vaguely related to us. The first one was caused by the rough weather and flooding: a canoeist died on the river Dart, on a section that Sean has paddled often, and I’ve paddled it, too (although not in spate conditions!). It was somebody I knew vaguely, and a Facebook friend of Sean’s – so it came us quite a shock as well as a reminder that things do go wrong in canoeing, even for the most experienced!
A few days later I had an appointment at my chiropractor’s to find the carpark full of police cars including a Forensic Team van, and the receptionist in a fluff. Apparently, there had been an armed robbery that morning at the jeweller’s next doors! In quiet Ascot…

Roundup Month October

2009-11-12T16:08:00.010Z

October 2009

What books and/or magazines did I read this month?
I managed to read three more of the Cadfael Chronicles mysteries – books 12 to 14 (The Raven in the Foregate; The Rose Rent; and The Hermit of Eyton Forest). I really enjoy these medieval whodunits with the herbalist monk turned sleuth! They give a vivid insight into the world of the Dark Ages which is one of my special interests, as well as having an affinity for my faith and for herbs which I’m also interested in…the perfect book match for me! (You can find some of my reviews of Cadfael books here but I haven't done these last ones yet!)
I am also still doing my daily Bible-in-a-Year section and have managed, seen over a week at a time, to keep my Faithbook pages of the daily devotional verse up-to-date. You can follow them on my Faithbook Blog here.

What movies, television shows, plays, etc. did I watch this month?
We enjoyed watching the last episodes of part 3 of the “The Tudors” which we liked except for the fact that Henry has just gone through wife #4 and still looks like “the handsomest prince in Europe”… I reckon while following the historical events and personages by and large, the series is rather taking creative liberties with the details. It does, however, show the king’s spiritual dilemma of being a Catholic at heart despite all his reformative actions, which I was able to confirm from other sources. I wonder how many of his dubious decisions were really caused by the council of those close to him…
As this series closed, BBC fell back on the next part of “Merlin” which is suffering from the same problem – following the characters and main outline of the Arthur epic but playing at random with the stories. Well, after all, this one is a comedy... We find it rather enjoyable but I admit that it is only due to the flexible time of watching on iBBC on a laptop that we have got into watching these things at all – usually while having dinner…

What fun things did I do with my family and/or friends?
The main event of the month was the annual District Bellringers’ Outing. We visited eight churches and many of them were really special for their interior or their harvest flowers; foremost the” Westminster of the South” (Lingfield) and a tiny little church in Chaldon featuring a set of chiming bells, a replica of the oldest bell in England and one of the best preserved doom paintings. We also visited Outwood Windmill, the oldest working post mill in England, and were given a tour inside which was really interesting. They even swivelled the mill around while Sean and I happened to be on the top level and that was a really eerie sensation! Here is an article with photos I wrote for the Runnymede Deanery Website as part of my job!
I also spent an afternoon with my friend Eve during the half-term holiday, making two draught excluders for which I’m now knitting covers from leftover bits of wool – they’ll be really funky!

What gifts did I give and/or receive?
I received some belated birthday presents: a lovely little hand-turned vase from Emily which she had bought during a recent holiday in Devon, so it’s a really special thing (picture here); and a beginner’s lace making kit from Eve which she had found by lucky coincidence in a local charity shop (picture here)!
And I finally managed to meet up with Emily at the beginning of the month to present her with her (by now very belated) wedding present: the keepsake album I’d made for her. She was absolutely thrilled with it which of course made every minute I spent on it worthwhile! You can see some photos of this album a bit further down on this page - entry of September 09!

What special or unusual purchases did I make?
Found via Freecycle (now Freegle here in Surrey): a pair of brand new wellies; and a thick door curtain which should help keep us a bit warmer this winter.

What illnesses or health concerns did I have?
Right early on in the month I picked up a nasty flu – it first seemed to be only a really bad cold (the type that makes your nose drip so bad you have to actually block it up with tissue!) but then turned into a gastro flu type problem which persisted on and off for most of the month. Rather annoying.
I also had a call from the local clinic to come in following my recent blood tests and was told by my doctor that I was low on vitamin D, so now I’m on a daily two big chewable tablets of D+calcium.

What was going on in garden and allotment?
The last of the harvest was brought in – now the freezers are both full of beans and courgettes, blackberries, grapes and plum compote; and corn is hanging up to try for popcorn.
Autumn is well advanced and everything turned to glorious colours at the end of the month – I was out photo hunting!
Things are starting to die down now and we dug over the first beds at the allotment to receive their winter cover of manure. We are still having the last beets, radishes, carrots, chard and some lettuce in the garden.

What new recipes did I try out?
We really liked a recipe called “Iranian Tortilla” which was recommended in a real life TV series called “Economy Gastronomy” which we watched in September.
And as Emily and I dug up the first parsnip (okay, without waiting for them to get the first frost…) she recommended “Curried Parsnip Soup” which has also made its way into our favourites list.
(The two recipe names are linked to my own Joomla favourite recipes website which is a collection of recipes I want to try, or have tried and liked - collected online so I can use them on my kitchen mini laptop.)

What were my accomplishments this month?
This month my profile and artwork were featured in the Spot Light section of Club Scrap's Digi Scraprap.
I was very pleased with the sunflowers I’d planted for some colour in the garden – they were the late types and flowered from end August until now in wonderful shades of amber to brown.
I’m still keeping up with the photo a month even if I’m way behind in making the scrapbook pages for them – I have started publishing the photos themselves with short information on my 365-blog. People are getting used to my having the camera round for everything and are volunteering photo ideas, and even Sean sometimes picks up the camera for a snapshot of me in my daily or special activities…
I’m still keeping up with the no yeast/no sugar diet, appreciating the fact that now after half a year I am allowed wet cheeses (i.e. cream cheese, feta, mozzarella etc) and some fruit which was what I missed the most!
I completed part two of the Book of Me Challenge with the Club Scrap Forum – I do a page for each part for Sean and one for me to match, and each part consists of three different questions – i.e. six pages a month. You can see the October pages here - or if you want to see more go to my Crafts website.
Also managed to complete a few pages with photos from the Bellringing Outing.

What were my disappointments this month?
The external mega hard drive we have with ALL our data has started to keep crashing. So far nothing has been lost but it is very annoying as every time it happens I cannot do any work, or any scrapbooking, as all my files are on that drive and I don’t dare touch it so I have to wait for Sean to come home and fix it. Also, it worries me in case it would corrupt some data! So now Sean has bought a couple of terabyte disks for backing up and saved all the photos, and I’m going through all my digiscrap files to resort everything before a big backup that can then be synchronised on a regular basis. This is one of the most boring large projects I’ve ever undertaken! But I’m sure I’ll feel better for it once it’s done…

Anything else noteworthy to include?
Uncle John and Jenny moved to the New Forest – shame, no more beehives at Woodlands…it’s like the end of an era!

District Bellringers' Outing

2009-10-25T20:58:00.004Z

The happening of the month (for us) was the District Bellringers' Outing on 10th October. You can see the first LOs with photos and story of the day on my Digi blog:
http://petrapages.blogspot.com/

My Faithbook and Photo-a-Day blogs have also been updated to today!
http://petrafaithbook.blogspot.com/
http://petra365.blogspot.com/

New blog: my Faithbook + Lots of Photos

2009-10-08T23:32:00.003+01:00

I have started reading my Bible-in-a-Year and apart from a mixed reading section for each day with consecutive passages from the Old Testament, New Testament, Psalms and Proverbs, it also has a highlighted verse and passage as a basis for daily devotions. To extend and deepen my meditation, and involve my faith in my hobby, I have started a digital scrapbooking Faithbook: a page every day with the chosen verse/passage of my Bible. I'm showing these in a separate blog and hopefully they will be updated fairly regularly (which means about once a week I suppose) and if you would like to share in my daily devotions, here is the link:
http://petrafaithbook.blogspot.com/

I've been uploading lots of recent photos with short explanations to my other blog - if you are following this one, you might also want to follow the other one as it gets updated much more often. It's just glimpses of my life rather than long stories but you might enjoy the photos...
http://petra365.blogspot.com/

Monthly Roundup September

2009-10-08T23:29:00.016+01:00

Here's a new idea I picked up from a friend's blog and thought I might try and do this on a monthly basis, too. This might get me out of my dilemma of the irregular blog entries and keep you all informed about my doings: it's called a "monthly roundup", just answering a set of questions at the beginning of the new month about the previous one. I hope you'll be enjoying it!

September 2009

What books and/or magazines did I read this month?
I have finally managed to get the Cadfael Chronicles complete and am now reading them all consecutively, which is more fun than piecemeal. They are separate stories, but the author has a habit of referring casually to things or characters from previous episodes. I’ve had a fair bit of time for reading and so I’ve got through books one to eleven! You can find an introduction review on my Book Reviews Blog but I haven't completed later pages.
The other thing I started this month is reading my Bible-in-a-Year, finally - I bought this three years ago at Spring Harvest and have been meaning every year to start it at the beginning of the year as it is numbered so. But of course, then I always forgot. Now I just thought it doesn't really matter when to start, and between my dodgy health and our upside-down lifestyle of going to bed late and getting up late I haven't been to church much this year and miss some spirituality. So doing this long daily reading and the meditation verse each day seemed a good idea. I'm also using the meditation verse to make a page for my Faithbook each day (well, FOR each day but not necessarily daily, just as I find time...). It is very rewarding.

What movies, television shows, plays, etc. did I watch this month?
The third part of “The Tudors” is on iBBC and we’ve been watching King Henry with his third wife (three episodes) and his grief after her loss (fourth episode). Shame Queen Jane died in childbed – he might have been content with her…
We also watched another weekly on iBBC called “Economy Gastronomy”, a rather fun real life TV series where two chefs teach a family each week how to save money and make the most of their ingredients while still have satisfying meals. They had a good variety – large families, a gay family, a single mother and child, and even a student cohab. I learnt some tips and tricks, too, and copied various recipes from their website. Some useful entertainment for a change…
Finally, we watched a variety of Open University documentations: on dinosaurs; the chemistry of snow; the history of mathematics; the mysterious decline of the honeybee; and the oldest map of Britain. It’s our “dinner theatre, thanks to the flexibility of iBBC…

What fun things did I do with my family and/or friends?
Sean and I spent an afternoon at Saltex, the local show for estate managment, clubs and amenities. It’s a strange mix of agri- and horticulture; playground stuff; and sports resources. We got free tickets through Sean’s uncle, and Sean wanted to have a look at wood processing machinery. There wasn’t much on show, and what was there was so expensive as to put a stop to any further musings about getting into the wood recycling business. We ended up buying some work clothes and shoes for Sean, and a sturdy pair of secateurs and thick gardening gloves for me.

What gifts did I give and/or receive?
Well, of course September is my birthday month but we usually ignore the fact more or less. I got a lovely home-knitted scarf from a friend (the type that is knitted in the round and you can double-sling it over your head, pull it up as a hood, or pull it down over your shoulders to keep you warm there. Plus a nice little picture from MIL.
Not so much a gift as a prize: Sean was away for a weekend at the Cardington Interclub Slalom Finals, coming third in his division which got him a special 25-year anniversary trophy from the event (photo here). Not that he’s proudly collecting this kind of thing – but it’s an ashtray shaped little bowl and will probably come in useful for something…

What special or unusual purchases did I make?
We have pretty much gone off spending a lot of money on buying things – not that either of us was ever a big spender – and have instead started thinking about resources we have. For the first time since I’ve met Sean we have been getting lots of fruit from Woodlands (there are tons of different sorts of plums and apples, and also Asian pears, grapes and figs), and Sean has ingeniously converted an old filing trays box and some computer fans into a dehydrator (photo here), so we have been cooking plum compote for the freezer and drying apples, prunes and pears to tide us over the fruitless season. Let’s see how long it will last us!
Received via Freecycle: book ends; 4-ring binders; grapevine cuttings; waterproof mittens; two planting tables and a load of big terracotta planting pots

What illnesses or health concerns did I have?
My annual blood test was due (compulsory for anybody on Thyroxine) and my doctor ordered some extra tests as well to try and look into my continuing problems of low energy and immune system. One of the tests required was for fasting blood sugar which meant for 12 hours before the appointment I couldn’t eat or drink anything other than a little water, and the tests have to be sent in early so I had to go for the early morning session! The whole setup did NOT suit our normal lifestyle and was a right nuisance.
Later in the month I developed a really bad leg after a mossie got to me one night, biting me 6 times across my calf. Either I’ve suddenly gone allergic to mossies or this one was infected with something because each of these bites went swollen, pussy ad sore, and they took over two weeks to heal. (photo taken after about a week!)

What was going on in garden and allotment?
The courgettes and beans are in full production – there are far more than we can eat so Sean did some research on freezing containers and found a type that is the ideal size for our freezer drawers. He drove over to Maidenhead to buy them in bulk – only a few pence per box and we have 200 boxes, so that should cover the whole of our harvest.
The little cucurbits called “melothrie” are also a success, making an easy and unusual addition to salads. Sean has got quite used to a little side salad with most meals and doesn’t deride it as “rabbit food” anymore – in fact, if there isn’t one he asks what’s missing!
Sean’s taken the chilli plant in the growhouse under his wings, tending to it rather lovingly, and it’s responding with tons of flowers and little chillies in various states of ripeness. He takes a few off almost every day now – sometimes as many as 20! Again, the surplus goes into the freezer, and I’ve started using chilli in cooking a lot more than I used to.
The allotment still looks in good shape after our mega effort in July – unfortunately, “something” (rabbits? mice?) ate nearly all the beetroot, the carrot fly tunnelled all the carrots, the fennels don’t seem to want to form proper bulbs, and the corn is far behind, but there’s more beans and courgettes, spinach, parsley, the last potatoes, onions and garlic ready. And it all looks very pretty thanks to Emily’s wedding flowers – sunflowers, cornflowers, nigella, marigolds and cosmos.
Oh, and of course there’s the hedgerow bounty as well – I’ve spent a couple of afternoons out foraging for blackberries!

What new recipes did I try out?
I have been searching for bean and courgette recipes, of course, and these are our favourites:
Crunchy Pecan Beans (in photo mixed with sprouting broccoli)
Courgettes in Blankets
Salmon Stir Fry
Salad Nicoise
I also found an interesting recipe to deal with those green tomatoes we had to rescue from the blight last month: Tex Mex Rice with Green Tomatoes (no photo)
(Recipe links go to my new online cookbook - see next paragraph.)

What were my accomplishments this month?
I finished the first section of the Book of Me Challenge at the Club Scrap Forum (six pages – one each for the three themes for Sean and for me). It was interesting to talk to Sean about some of the questions and I certainly learnt a bit more about how he sees things (he’s not very forthcoming in such talk unprompted!). You can see them here.
I also completed Emily’s wedding keepsake album – 40 pages!!! Format is 6x6”, but still, it was a lot of work and I hope that she’ll like it. I think it turned out really well (and was a good way of using up some of the lovey-dovey embellishments for which I don’t have much use in my ordinary scrapbooking…). See photos in post below.
On another note, I started a new project: an online cookbook with my favourite recipes, especially recipes adapted or found for this anti-candida diet I’m on. As I’m getting used to Joomla from my work with the Deanery website, I had Sean convince me that it is the ideal medium for this idea, and it turned out that, as usual, he’s right. It works really well – and Sean did up one of the mini IBM laptops for me which now sits in the kitchen so that I can use my online cookbook without having to print the recipes – safe the trees!
Finally, job-wise we had the first network meeting, for School Governors in the Deanery, and with a speaker from the Diocesan Education Centre. It all went really well and was appreciated by those who took part, so hopefully it will be the start to some successful networking projects in the future. As this is a main objective in my job description I feel quite passionately about it!

What were my disappointments this month?
Something really annoying happened: after my blood test I went to Coffee Break at church just to say hello and sort out the SfP cards for sale as I hadn’t looked after them in a long time. Everybody wanted to talk to me, and the Traidcraft stall was up as well, so it all took longer than expected, and what with a long wait at the post office afterwards and queue in the supermarket I was a few minutes late at the carpark – and Mr Job’s Worth Traffic Warden must have been waiting right there to put the ticket on my car. Or maybe it’s because my little car stands out from all the others and is easy to remember that he thought it had been there for a long time and checked back…? Anyway, it cost me £30 which I thought hilarious, especially since the carpark is usually half empty now that the maximum parking time is only two hours…

Anything else noteworthy to include?
Our old church choir was called back in for an afternoon on special request to sing at the memorial service for one of its former members. Although a sad occasion it was a happy get-together and the singing went really well, and felt really good. We all still feel ready to get back into our Sunday duties if only they could find us a new music director… (photo here)

Have a look at my latest pages

2009-09-09T20:27:00.006+01:00

I know, I know - two months no entries again... That's because I've been busy. I'll write something up with a few photos soon. But meanwhile have a look at my other blogs and see my latest pages on the 365 photo challenge (updated to June 10th) and my childhood Deck of Arts - some interesting tidbits I'd say.
But I've been busy with more: I've made a whole keepsake book for my friend Emily's wedding - here is what it looks like but you can see all the pages in my scrapbook website. On the homepage, find "Emily & Giles' Wedding".

The whole album can be stood up - it's 6x6" format.Front cover (it's covered with a plastic-type sheet).One of the pages - there are over 40 all together...

I've also started another album in my old favourite format of 12x12" - going back years to my holiday in Bali. So many lovely photos, and I'm using the travelogue I wrote at the time as base for the journals. Here's the dedication page - I've already done some more pages which again you can all find on my scrapbook website (find the link "Bali Holiday").

On the website, all the pages are big enough to read the text as well!

Links to all my new scrapbook crafts blogs

2009-07-14T19:20:00.003+01:00

If you are interested in learning more about me and my life, now and earlier on, there are lots of random spotlights on these blogs - why not go and check them out!

A Photo Every Day 2009 http://petra365.blogspot.com/
Memories of my Childhood http://petradoa.blogspot.com/
My Digital Pages (various events of the last four years but mostly recent) http://petrapages.blogspot.com/
Book Reviews - my favourites and recent reading http://petrabooks.blogspot.com/
Art Inspiration - random layouts inspired by real paintings http://petraartlayouts.blogspot.com/

Many things happened - but nothing that moved our world

2009-07-14T18:49:00.011+01:00

We've got a new fence - new from old - in the garden with extended beds so that we can now grow veggies without Chiefie digging them up or adding her special taste to the salad... The tomatoes are growing nicely in the photo and we've already had lettuces, radishes, chard, komatsuma, sorrel, some beans and a courgette from our own production! Sean has successfully started his little "Three Sisters" plantation - he found out on the Internet that sweetcorn, beans and squashes planted together like this will benefit from each other, and was determined to try it out. So far so good - we'll have to see what cornucopia of food will grow from it, or not... We've had the most amazing "heat wave" for a couple of weeks - it was so hot Sean took to doing outside work at night when it was cooler... It doesn't really get dark outside here because of the massive street lights over the roundabout outside the house. That's him planting the Three Sisters! We've had our very own bonfire in the garden one night to get rid of all those ivy cuttings (see previous post) and lots of other woody bits... We've attended dances, weddings and fairs... Just this weekend past we had the Black Cherry Fair in Chertsey (as you can see, weather is back to cool and rainy - these are two friends from church). The nieces (Eleanor and Zoe) at their dance school show, also last Saturday: And the weather vane, newly gilded, in front of the church at a fundraising opening of the tower to gather money for a new flagpole (the old one had to be taken down as it had rusted through). Sean spent most of the afternoon there to man the tower at various levels in a rota. And of course it was Sean's birthday (now he's as old as I am again for the next 3 months...!).
The "T" stands for his middle name, Trouble, and two rows of four candles each makes 44 (there wasn't enough room for 44....).

If you want to see more of the things that are happening in our lives, please have a look at the scrapbook layouts on my 365-photos blog (link in the sidebar). There's a page for every day of the year - currently updated to sometime in May, with all the special and lots of the ordinary things in our life here in Chertsey.

Garden Update

2009-05-20T16:27:00.016+01:00

Boy, what a long time of not posting again. Time just goes so fast, and there hasn't really been very much special going on since Easter. I suppose here are a few update photos from our gardening projects:

General tidying up - I asked Sean to give the ivy hedge a trim...personally, I thought he went a bit overboard as there was nothing left to see but woody bits! (It's recovering now and starting to look quite nice with lots of fresh light green - update photo to follow.)

Very little of our bulbs and gorms have been producing last year and this year again - we had a few tulips, one hyacinth and a couple of tete-a-tetes but nothing else. So when we prepared the bed for our vegetable project this year we dug down to have a look at the bulbs/gorms and most of them were gone or so eaten to bits that you can just see why they wouldn't go on living.

As a result, we decided to take a definite step to decimate the slug population in our garden which over the last years has been enormous. As we don't like chemicals, we resorted to nematodes which are tiny organisms that invade the slugs in the earth and parasitically cause them die. The creatures need to be watered into the moist soil with preferably several rainy days after, so we have only been able to do that recently as our April and early May was unusually dry and hot!

(No, I'm not watering the lawn on a rainy day! It's the nematodes in the water!!!)

At least some other things in the garden have been doing well and giving us pleasure:

Pulsatilla (alpine plant)

Corkscrew Hazel

Bleeding Heart

And on the veggie growing front there is some progress, too. I convinced Sean to a trip to a nearby gardening centre to buy soil and other bits for potting, some tomato and chilli plants, and also a "grownhouse" - a plastic covered shelf that acts like a mini greenhouse; and then I spent a weekend potting and Sean harvested some of our bamboo which is now drying in the shed to be used for staking and for holding up netting to keep the birds off the veg.

My new blog: Childhood Deck of Art

2009-04-29T19:15:00.001+01:00

I have just started a new blog to cover the latest challenge I'm taking part in with one of the Internet crafters forums. It's a Deck of Art childhood mini scrapbook - and if you wish to find out what that is, click on the link here or in the links section on the right... To bookmark this new blog click on the "be a follower" link on the left side of the new blog.

Spring Harvest in Minehead

2009-04-15T15:41:00.016+01:00

We've been back for nearly a week and Easter has come and gone as well, and I haven't written anything up here! The reason is perhaps that I've been ill again, coming home from Spring Harvest with a sore throat and cough that have been really nasty. A lot of our group picked up bugs - not a very healthy environment! Mine isn't really shifting but I'm trying to avoid the doctor as he'll only prescribe some antibiotics which are really not what I need at the moment, cocking up my diet. After all I have been very good, even at Spring Harvest, and mainly stayed with all the dos and don'ts of it even though it meant cooking in the chalet most evenings, being tempted constantly by the smell of other people's coffees and watching them eat lovely treats, and a lot of snacks that are scrap food really but somehow so appealing when you've just come out of a lecture...

Sean and his favourite treat:
hot chocolate with a BIG blob of cream on top

The Chocolate Fountain in the skyline -
had to walk past it so many times a day...

On the up-side, we had some decent weather for a change - only one rainy day! The drive down was okay and we managed to make our way earlier than in the last years, arriving about 5pm which meant we could go to the first night's event! Here are some piccies taken on the way:

Passing by Stonehenge -

a little holdup just there came in handy for photos...

Pig farm just after Stonehenge - happy pigs!

Just a hedgerow and clouds - but I like this photo.

Butlins hasn't changed much, except for getting a little dingier every year. The tent ceiling of the skyline is getting rather yellow and Sean reckons it will fall apart soon... As for our chalet, which we were sharing with a couple from our church and their little son Jacob, was okay except for creaking doors and a very stiff entrance door that was impossible to open or close quietly. Our flat mates went for early morning beach walks every day, getting up at 6am - needless to say not much sleep for Sean and me! Not quite our idea of a holiday - but otherwise the Stokers were nice to live with, friendly, chatty and flexible to get cooking schedules sorted out etc.

Our chalets were all in Block H, Ocean View -
as you can see, the view was really of the chalet across!

The ever present seagulls were also still in evidence and getting bolder every year. One stole an icecream right out of Zoe's hand, leaving her rather shocked and with a scratch on her finger and nose! And yes, that's Sean's niece Zoe - she was there with her Mum and sister Eleanor and two friends from church. We didn't see much of the kids all week - they have their own programmes at Spring Harvest and prefer to spend the time in between in the swimming pools (the younger ones) or with the other teenagers (the older ones).

Seagulls' Galore

The programme and events did not exactly hit a note with Sean and me this year. Much of a muchness I would say - the topic was "Apprentice - Learning to be Disciples of Jesus". There wasn't exactly much new in it, although some of the talks were quite catching. In the afternoons, we visited a seminar on Islam and its interaction with Christianity which was very interesting and held lots of new information for us, but the speaker was rather less than inspiring which made it also a bit of a torture. They had also made certain changes to the schedule of Spring Harvest that were a lot less flexible than in previous years and as a result, and with the lack of good sleep, Sean and I ended up watching a lot of the morning sessions on telly in our chalet instead of attending, as this meant being able to stay in bed a bit longer and have a leisurely breakfast while watching. And finally, we didn't like the music this year - it was very teenage style, and all the songs were very samey in lyrics, rythm, key and even tunes. A lot of people made similar comments, so it's not just us getting old or somthing...!

The "Big Top" - the main events' tent

Speaker at one of the evening events

We did take the chance with the nice weather and had a good long walk one afternoon, into Minehead and up the hill for a view. I hadn't realised what a cute quaint old town centre Minehead has. Here are some photos from the walk - there are many more on my Facebook (see link to the right).

Thought this tree in blossom was stunning
against the blue sky...

"Church Steps" in the middle of the old town centre

Loved the colour contrast...

View from the top -
you can see the Skyline and the Big Top at Butlins.

Coming back into Butlins from the Seaside Promenade -
through their little fairground.

We came back home on Thursday with a trouble free but not very fast ride - first stop at the level crossing right outside Butlins, to see the local steam train come through!

Churches, Crypts and Clerics - A Walk with the London Goth Meetup Group

2009-03-24T19:21:00.009Z

My best friend Eve has always been a Goth, and she has always been telling me, very fondly, of all the lovely people in the "London Goth Meetup Group". So finally, here was the ideal chance for me to go and get to know them a bit: James, the Curate in Weybridge, whom I know through work and who is a friend of Eve's through the group, was organising the March Walk, under the name of "Churches, Crypts and Clerics". I met Eve and another friend, Martin, around midday in Staines and we took the trains to London/Temple and walked from there to Blackfriars because the station at Blackfriars was closed. Most people were late because of that, so we sat at the pub with the few that had got there on time. The Blackfriars is a lovely pub, very beautifully decorated inside, no TV!!!, friendly staff, good food (so I was told - I couldn't eat anything but a salad without the dressing because of this diet...), and it was a lovely sunny and warm day, too.

The Blackfriars Pub

We finally got off for the walk at 3pm and it took us a good 3 hours, to Fenchurch and back to Monument in a big circle, taking in several of the oldest churches in London, or at least visiting the sites where they used to stand. James had a fascinating lot of poetry, contemporary prose and just little "useless bits of knowledge" to go with the places.

Me (right in the middle) with Eve,
Martin and some other Goths

We heard about the church porch that was officially used as a ladies' lavatory; the biggest dog turd ever seen; undercutting prices for wedding ceremonies; the vicar who didn't like being around the poor; and the poor vicar of Bethel Green who had such a large parish and no help that he had to conduct 800 baptism, 300 weddings and 600 funerals in a single year!

Having a rest (right to left): me, Eve, Martin, Lena

We had a refreshing stop in the rest garden inside the ruin of a chuch (St Dunstan's of the East) but didn't go inside St Paul's cathedral because it is so expensive (£12 a head!).

St Paul's Cathedral

A real treat for anybody who likes the macabre - which by default includes all Goths! - was the entrance to St Olave's Hart Street with its spiked skulls carved over the gate. It's otherwise known as "St Ghastly Grim" and Samuel Pepys described it so: “The gate is ornamented with skulls and crossbones…wrought in stone; but it likewise came into the mind of St Ghastly Grim that to stick iron spikes a-top of the stone skulls, as though they were impaled, would be a pleasant device. Therefore the skulls grin aloft horribly, thrust through and through with iron spears.” Charles Dickens felt eerily drawn to them one dark stormy night: “…and found the skulls most effective, having the air of a public execution and seeming, as the lightning flashed, to wink and grin with the pain of the spikes.” (from “Uncommon Traveller”)

The entrance to St Olave's Hart Street

But in the end we were all glad when we reached St Mary's Woolnoth, because James had the key to that one and we could actually go inside and sit on nice plush cushioned pews to listen to the last part of the "sermon" on the old London churches! A really entertaining and educating day out in London...

James "preaching" in St Mary's Woolnoth

"365 Photos Challenge" Blog

2009-03-20T13:40:00.001Z

Just a quick note to say that I've opened another blog where I will be showing small scrapbook layouts for a daily photo challenge. This might be quite interesting/amusing for you to follow regularly with all kinds of odd things turning up!
The challenge started Jan 1st, so I'm a bit behind, but luckily I had taken lots of photos of all kinds of things and events this year anyway, so at least I've got the material... The first two layouts are up, so do have a look and click on the "follow" button at the top left to bookmark the site for you.
Here's the link - but for the future it will also be in the links section on the right under "Links to my other websites".
http://petra365.blogspot.com/

Pancake Day at Treffelin

2009-03-16T22:43:00.007Z

I know - we are about three weeks late but since I missed the "real" Pancake Day this year (I was convinced it would be the week after!) we simply had it today. However, what made it remarkable was not the date but the fact that with the new diet I can't have shop-bought pancakes anymore - I had to make them myself. BUT - I'd never before made English-style pancakes (the type that you flip over in the pan...) before, so I required a lesson off Sean! After some initial problems with the oil beading in the non-stick pan and the heaviness of the buckwheat batter (I can't have white flour, either), he got things going, while really showing off doing flips and double flips half-way up to the ceiling. Then it was my turn - the first ones were decidedly frilly at the edges and folded over or landed on the edge of the pan, breaking apart. But all in all, only one ended up in the dog (off the floor!) and we had sufficient not only to eat but to freeze a batch, too - apparently, I'd been a bit optimistic with the amount of batter (or pessimistic, depending on how you look at it...). Plus: I had a thoroughly good time cooking tonight!

The Master Chef at work...

My first try...

Getting better...

Buckwheat batter in the pan.

The final dish out of the oven: buckwheat pancakes
filled with a thick salmon & asparagus sauce.

Back into crafting

2009-03-10T19:40:00.007Z

I can't believe that I haven't done any crafting for almost a year, apart from a few cards for SfP. It felt REALLY strange when I finally picked up scissors, cutters and rulers again and set to work on a scrapbook page. It took me much longer than it should, and not only because the printer went temperamental when I tried to do the journalling... Anyway, I tried to pick up where I left off - on the theme of a scraplift challenge, recreating every single layout shown in a chosen magazine with your own twist, without buying any extra goodies. Only - I couldn't find the magazine I'd used! In the end, I chose a different one which is all about holidays and the first chapter is all seaside layouts. I don't have many seaside photos but decided I could tweak them to suit other themes. Also, the magazine is a rather old one, going back to the times when most layouts were done on plain papers or rather lary patterned stuff and with none of the sophisticated embellishments we have nowadays. So I set myself a new challenge - not only to scraplift all the layouts but to convert them into modern style, using the papers and embellishments more common today. Here's my first offering with which I'm quite pleased:

For those who are interested: all the papers used including the white netty stuff are from Club Scrap's "Weather" kit and the alpha stickers are from their "Salsa" kit. I used a Quickutz alphabet called HONEY and Quickutz elements for the mattes of the alphas. The photo is Sean paddling in the salmon steps in the Barle river - this was quite some years ago, maybe 2001 or 2002, and he was literally fishing for some missing gear a boy had lost while capsizing on one of the steps (quite a dangerous thing to do but he got away with it...). And here is the original LO from the magazine:

The Diet

2009-03-09T13:21:00.004Z

It's been a while again since my last post and I felt that I should be putting something on here but to be honest, there has been very little happening that would be worth telling. I did not go on my holiday to Scotland because I still didn't feel right, hadn't been dancing much for weeks and simply didn't feel I would have the energy for travelling, early mornings and late nights, and all the exercise of a week's worth of classes and dances... More's the shame but well...
Instead I went to see a Nutritionist in Addlestone, a nice Russian lady called Olga, to see if I could get some advice on my diet in general and on the anti-candidiasis diet I'm intending to do this year in particular. We spent an hour talking things over and I thought she had some most peculiar ideas which were very contrary to anything I'd heard and read so far - really rather heavy on protein and speaking quite loudly against grains (not only wheat but all grains) on the basis that our "stomachs are not adapted to so many grains because in our original hunter-gatherer lifestyle there would have been no grains because agriculture was unknown...??? I think I was too baffled to reply much to her theories - but I mean, does she think agriculture invented the grain?
So well, now I'm rather confused as to what I should eat - I admit my normal diet was rather based on grains, veggies and pulses supplemented with nuts and dairies. For a long time I did not eat any meat or fish at all, and only recently had I started to use some meat again in home-cooking, buying from a butcher in Laleham who provides meat from traditionally raised animals. I will probably have some more of that, but I cannot see that my diet will ever amount to Olga's suggestions... Hmmm.
Having said all that, I am since Ash Wednesday on this Anti-candidiasis Diet to which Olga prescribed some supplements (probiotics) and gave some further explanations. It all sounds okay at first hearing but it's really rather difficult: no yeast, no sugar, no refined carbohydrates and no stimulants. That obviously cuts out bread and Marmite, and all sweets, tea and coffee. BUT - there are sugars also in dairy products, fruit and many other things; everything fermented contains yeast and it's also in almost everything readymade like condiments, sauces and dressings; chocolate is a stimulant - and so the list goes on. It basically means cooking everything from scratch and learning to substitute in recipes, but planning a week's worth of meals is a nightmare, and I kind of have to relearn cooking as well. With Sean rarely coming home before 7pm or later it makes going out difficult - no more "ready pizza in the oven at 11pm" option; and eating out, even at friends, is almost impossible unless I want to hassle them up front with instructions. Whatever I'm going to do to survive Spring Harvest this year I haven't figured out yet? That will be the week before Easter, coming back on Maundy Thursday...
Well, so far the news - it remains to see how I'm going to do on this regime since I'm not known for the amount of discipline I can put up for anything I don't much like...

Under the weather...

2009-02-23T21:11:00.011Z

A long silence again - simply because there was not much to say or share. I have been feeling under the weather still, and have cancelled my dancing holiday in Pitlochry - more's the pity, but I do not have the energy at the moment... Equally, I have not been doing much of anything else other than work, websites and trying to sell some crafts stuff on Ebay (my seller addy is "phcrafts" if anybody wants to have a look - or click here which will take you straight to my listings page).

But -- everything else has been under the weather, too. We have had some massive rainfalls here and the Bourne and the Abbey River (a sidearm of the river Thames) in Chertsey both flooded and caused substantial trouble, as did some other small streams in the area although not the Thames itself. None of those will ever trouble us here in this part of town as we are well away from all the rivers, however, the problem here (and in some other areas, too) is drains not coping with the amount of water. There were puddles in the main road just outside our house in both ways of driving, so deep that several times I did not dare drive through them (which is the only official way to get anywhere from our house!) and at some point deep enough for this section of the road to be closed for a few hours. The picture shows the puddle at the bottom of the bridge, which was the smaller of the two but this one I could take from our house! It got worse later but it was too dark then and the photos didn't turn out. There is now a roadworks not 500 yards down the road where they are trying to clear (or repair?) the drains, so hopefully we will not have those problems again.

Flood sign at the other side of the bridge.

Our side of the bridge - photo taken from our front garden.

That was a couple of weeks back - in the meantime, the waters have receded and we had some really nice sunny and warm days, and Emily and I spent some time together at the allotment. I think I mentioned before that as of this year I'm sharing her allotment which is at the end of a little road just a few hundred yards from here. Last Thursday I visited the council offices to get my "coworker's key", so it's official now! We've been doing a lot of clearing and ordering work - the soil is quite heavy with all the rain and the digging was hard work but it was good to be out and about in the first almost spring-like days, and nice to see the few things growing that were planted last year. Time to plan and order seeds - that should be fun!

The allotment - our plot goes from the shed to
where you can see Emily standing.

Emily standing by our patch of purple sprouting broccoli.

Check out my new crafts website

2009-02-12T17:58:00.002Z

The weather has been rather ugly of late - the snow was beautiful for a couple of days but then turned into slush and soon disappeared. We have since had another day of snow but rather sleety and didn't stay, and after that, the usual: lots of rain. There is a lot of flooding about in the whole area and also in Chertsey, and most worryingly, quite a lot in the road just outside our house on both sides of the roundabout. At some point it was so deep that the police closed the road for a few hours one morning.

As a consequence, I haven't been out and about much and instead have finally managed to complete and upload the scrapbook section of my crafts website. In all honesty, this has been a project I started and dumped several times over the last few years but finally found a way to make it work (well, Sean finally showed me a way...). So there you are: you can now look at all my scrapbooks online - every single page I've ever made! Here's the link, and I will also put it up in the links section on the right if you want to come back later: http://petra.hostit.us/scrapbook/

I think the website is easy to use: the home page is a list of the album links - just click on what you find interesting and it will take you to a thumbnail album where you can click on either the pictures or their captions to see them enlarged. The large versions, I think, are worth looking at as they are big enough so that often you can even read the journalling, and certainly see some detail. There are also some descriptions by the side or below, for those who don't want to read the whole journals, and for the crafters amongst you I've also listed the materials used as far as I could remember.

For the time being, this is complete, but will get updated from time to time whenever I get around to making some new pages (which does not happen often these days!). Apart from that, I want to extend the website to also show some of my needlecrafts projects of which I have taken photos; some cards I made in the past, and also some other crafts projects - that, however, may take a while again!

English favourite: the weather!!!

2009-02-02T20:35:00.009Z

Oh yes, the weather! It is always the number one topic in England, but I have never heard it talked about as much as in the last two days. We had snow! Okay, for most of the world that is probably not news to bring the day to a standstill, but here it is! Seriously... Of course, you are talking about a country that normally does not get snow, more than a sprinkling anyway, here in the South. There are no snowplows and other gadgets to get rid of the stuff, and hardly anybody has such things as winter tyres or snow chains. Ergo -- thousands of schools were closed, public transport was disrupted, flights grounded, appointments cancelled. I should have been seeing my chiropractor and also I should have had minor surgery today, just a little cyst cut away, but both of those were cancelled... Nicole is marooned on the island because her flight was cancelled, too; Sean's colleague didn't turn up because he couldn't get the car out of their cul-de-sac, and one of my friends burned up the motor of her windscreen wipers trying to use them to clear the approximately 10" of snow off the windscreen instead of using a brush! People here seriously don't know how to handle snow - I thought it rather funny (although I admit I was quite pleased not having to go out myself...). It is definitely beautiful, though - I've never seen that much snow here, and it is amazing how quiet it can be here, with the snow muffling the sounds of the few cars on the A-road, and the motorway just outside town down to a more or less permanent crawl. I hope we'll have some more days like this!

Pavement in front of our house and view to the station -
last night when it was all pristine

The road coming down the railway bridge in front of our house -
if they miss that bend they go straight into our driveway
(hitting whatever is parked there - bit worrying!)

Our house front and the cars - my "Smartie" and Sean's "new" van
which we brought down from Nottingham in early January:
it's an ex-post-service van and it's huuuuuge!

Today in the garden...

View out our back door...

Wall planter - just to give an idea of the amount of snow...

A Memorable Saturday

2009-02-02T20:03:00.010Z

Sometimes, life is like this - nothing much happens for ages and then you get several events on the same day. Last Saturday was a day like this!

It started with a late morning Punch Party at Rosemary's, our former Choir Leader at St Peter's Church. Rosemary retired last summer because she began "feeling her age", and for the choir that was a very sad occasion because our new "Musical Director" only does modern music and guitar strumming - she does not play the organ or even the piano, does not read music, and cannot deal with the multiple parts of a traditional choir. So ever since August, we have been without a choir leader. That aside, we had bought a small collection of presents for Rosemary, to be given at the official retiring party at church - only for one reason and another, that party never happened, and finally, we asked Rosemary to meet up with her as just the choir and she kindly invited us round her house for a yummy punch, tea or coffee and nibbles. It was a wonderful morning of chatting and catching up with each other's news, and Rosemary was absolutely chuffed with all the presents. She donned the African costume (the contribution from our Ghanaean member) straight away and kept it on for the rest of the party!

The choir (most of us anyway) at Rosemary's
who is in the middle in her African gown

The afternoon I spent in Englefield Green with Nicole, my German friend, who comes three times a year to work bank shifts at the local hospital to keep her British midwifery licence going. She used to work for some years at St Peter's Hospital which is just down the road from us, and came to our church which is how we met, and as we became very good friends, she now usually stays with us when she's doing her bank shifts. This time it was all nights and so we only got a few hours each day between her waking up and having to go back to work, and on Saturday we decided to join the Coffee Break at the church in Englefield Green because I wanted to buy their 150 years anniversary calendar (after all, I lived in Englefield Green for several years, and there are really nice photos of the village in that calendar). Anyway, at the church we ran into their current vicar (who is the curate of a neighbouring town's church and standing in for the vicar who is on a year with the forces in Iraq) and got chatting to him - turns out we have a common friend: Eve. Eve, however, has nothing at all to do with church or faith - she and James know each other from the London Goth Meet! So that was quite a coincidence...

Finally, in the evening it was time for this year's Burns' Night Supper at the Addlestone & District Scottish Society - which always is a seriously posh affair anyway, but as it is the Society's 75 years anniversary season, it was extra posh this year! There were all the usual ceremonies like the Piping in of the Haggis, the Toasts, the Address to the Haggis, the Immortal Address (a eulogy to Robert Burns) and the Toast to the Lads and the Lassies; plus of course a traditional Haggis Dinner, Scottish songs sung by the ADSS Choir and Scottish Country Dancing. It was lovely seeing everybody again - I had not been dancing for several weeks due to still not feeling very well...

The ceremonies - the Toasts after the Address of the Haggis

Our table - me in the corner between two of my favourite dancers;
the other lady is my friend Trisha with her husband

The ADSS Choir - I'm at the very left behind Trisha

And so begins the new year...

2009-01-31T13:01:00.013Z

I know I should have written this particular bit ages ago but alas - I caught another flu (or maybe a recurrence of the same one?) and it truly put me out of action again, and out of energy and enthusiasm for anything... So here we go with a very overdue report of Christmas and the New Year!

Not that there is so much to say about Christmas, as Sean and I do not really celebrate the occasion. We did go to the Midnight Mass, ringing the bells and joining in for the service, but apart from the Museum Carol Service (followed by yummy mulled wine and mince pies at the Museum) that was the only Christmas service we observed. Christmas Day passed as a non-event - although it was nice taking some time out with Sean to discuss what we are intending to do with the garden this year - and Boxing Day was the usual evening family-get-together at Woodlands. Everybody was there, enjoying the bring-and-share buffet, the obligatory rounds of Scattergories and the world's strangest jigsaw puzzle, and of course the exchanging of presents. We have finally given up giving presents from everybody to everybody - only for the kids and our closest relations. I received a pair of funny thick bed socks (everybody knows I'm always cold...), a set of scented candles, a basket full of lavender-scented toiletries and a pocket notebook with pen.

The week "between the years" was quiet, too - I spent most time sorting out my crafts stash and deciding what to sell and what to keep as I'll definitely need to make room on those shelves this year, and studying Joomla to put together the website for the Deanery. I'm still very much enjoying my new job but admit that I had a break over Christmas for nearly two weeks, except for the studying. New Year's Eve again was quiet until we went to church around 11:30pm for the traditional ringing out of the old and ringing in of the new year. Almost the whole band was there, which is more people than the eight bells in the ring, so I was in the group ringing out the old year and watching later while the new year was being rung in. And after that we got the usual glass of sparklies and nibbles while exchanging hugs and kisses and new year's wishes - even Tim the Vicar came round to the church (not everybody gets a new year's hug from her boss...!).

The bellringing band at New Year - Sean and I smack in the middle,
next to my father-in-law

I'm not a great one for New Year's Resolutions normally, but decided on some this year:
1. to see myself through a year of the anti-candidiasis diet, beginning after my return from the Pitlochry holiday in early March (and that will be a real bind, I know!)
2. to be stricter about continuous exercise of the type that's good for my back (i.e. Yoga, Pilates...)
3. to finally make a real effort to clear out my crafts stash except for the things I might really conceivably use up
4. to sort out my various involvements in church, clubs etc to bring them down to a manageable schedule and a number of things that I actually enjoy doing
5. to get deeper into the permaculture lifestyle by growing our own veg in the garden and the shared allotment with Emily (which means actually learning something about gardening first!)

So considering resolution #1, Eve and I decided that it was time to put into action our long-hedged plan to have a totally posh High Tea at the famous Ritz Hotel now before I will be on a diet excluding anything with the remotest amount of sugar or yeast in it, and as a result we were booked for London on Monday 5th of January. I was supposed to drive over to Eve's from where we would go into town by train, all nicely dressed and done up - and couldn't believe it when I woke up, on that day of all days, to see snow outside! This is only the 2nd time ever since I came to England twelve years ago that there has been any decent amount of snow in this area - and I really did not enjoy it! Luckily, in London it was marginally warmer and no snow, but we still decided to only have our tea and go back home. The tea was somthing to behold - the Ritz Palm Court is beautiful, amazing! All gilt and mirrors and period, with stunning fresh flower arrangements, lovely piano music in the background, and waiters in full livery, really friendly too. The food was excellent - 5 types of sandwiches, plus scones with clotted cream and jam, chocolate cake, and a selection of the most extraordinary petit fours - all that at 11:30am - and the etagère was being refilled as soon as you cleared a layer! We never truly got round to eating the cake or the petit fours even though I felt I wouldn't want another bite in a lifetime!

The place was actually packed but they book in "sessions" of an hour and a half,
and the photo was taken just before we left, which is why it looks empty.

Eve looking at me "through the food" - the middle layer was still waiting
for the scones which were served fresh and warm
once you decided that you'd had enough of the sandwiches

After this lovely start-of-the-year event, unfortunately, things went rapidly downhill: it went so cold that I had serious problems feeling warm at any time outside my bed, and unsurprisingly, got the flu soon after which put me into bed fairly solid for a week and a half. Which meant I missed most of the frosted beauty outside - it would have been lovely to go for a proper walk somewhere like Chobham Common perhaps. As I said, I've never seen it so cold here: for nearly two weeks it was frozen all through the nights and days. The water in the garden water butt had about 1" worth of ice crust several times (Sean had to break it daily as Chiefie drinks from it...).

Frosted spiderwebs in the eaves

Holly in the garden

Hedge overhanging the wall

Branch in the garden with the most peculiar frost spikes

Christmas Stories

2008-12-17T15:23:00.019Z

I can hardly believe that it is only a week till Christmas! It’s always such a hectic season that time seems to fly by even quicker than usual! As every year, I’m missing the quiet contemplative spirit of advent in Germany – although I admit I had a lovely quiet and contemplative start to the season this year, singing evensong in Lyne for First Advent Sunday: a long afternoon practise, followed by tea and biscuits, and then a “lessons & carols” style service. We had 20 in the choir which was quite joyful, but unfortunately a rather small congregation…

People here in England seem to find more pleasure in making advent into a major rat race – and there’s no escape from it! Everywhere, people are cramming and jostling in the streets, loaded with bags, and in the aisles, stocking up on food and presents like there was no tomorrow. Usually, “Rocking around the Christmas tree” or “Santa is coming to town” are warbling from the loudspeakers in the supermarkets and stores. We even did the “Jingle Bells Jig” at the last Scottish Dance class! I admit I enjoyed that one – more of a party dance but it was a laugh, especially considering the number of people who cannot tell their right hand from their left!

And of course, the world in England now explodes into colour every night once it gets dark – and it does that fairly early after all, around 4pm… Larger-than-life Santas and snowmen are nodding their big heads in the breeze and reindeer sleighs, Christmas trees and angels flicker in and out of existence on many house fronts in a rather garish manner. On the whole, Chertsey isn’t too bad – at least, our official lights are quite tasteful: white or light blue spirals on all the lamp posts, and angels under the roof of our church. Addlestone and Staines are much worse with those modern dark blue lights everywhere. It’s in, but to my taste it’s missing the point: “Light”, as the word implies, should be something light, not dark, and the idea of Christmas lights was to light the dark nights of this season as Christ lights the world. Are we dimming the lights along with the message in an age where it is no longer politically correct to wish a “Merry Christmas”? Well, it’s rather refreshing to have a big (sort of half live sized) nativity scene in one of Chertsey’s shop windows!

St Peters, Chertsey - Christmas Angels

Apart from the lights, the shopping, the decorations and the happy-music everywhere, there are of course also the parties and Christmas dinners. So far Sean and I went to one biggish dinner party with “all the trimmings” at a pub and a quieter private one, both of which were rather enjoyable. A couple of weeks ago the Old Windsor Bellringing Band met at The Oxford Blue which is traditionally a pub but has been turned more into an Italian restaurant. Surprisingly, the food was rather disappointing in every aspect: originality, taste and size. I had a vegetable soup for starters, which was nice all few spoonfuls; then a posh-sounding French Onion Tart which was mainly tart and not much filling, accompanied by nearly black roasted potatoes and very little veggies; and then a brandy-snap basket which had all of 3 bits of fruit in it and a strawberry on top… Well, they made up for it with an ample supply of decorations and toys, and particularly the boys (young and old!) had much fun competing for the longest balloon, or who can blow the most trumpets at once. All in all, a rather noisy evening (we cleared the other Christmas party out of the dining room fairly quickly…) – not very Christmassy but certainly a laugh.

Sean enjoying the balloons

...but Paul's is longer!Sean and his dad "playing" the glasses - the neighbouring table wasn't impressed!Sean's contribution to the "who can play more than one trumpet" competitionDani won: three - two by mouth and one through the nose!

Then last Saturday, our old housegroup met at Charles’ new place for a much more quiet dinner. It was great being able to catch up (and reminisce!) with everybody as we hadn’t been together for the better part of a year. (Remember, our housegroup ceased just before Christmas last year due to moves, new jobs and new babies…) We do of course occasionally meet around church but never all of us together, and rarely with much time to talk. It was quite late by the time we got there – first we had an odyssey through flooded roads in a right deluge, then trying to find “Flat 2, Heatherly”, which we expected to be an apartment block, but when we got to the road we found it had mostly detached houses with their names not readable from the road in the dark... Well, one of them had been converted into two flats, and even their neighbour two doors away didn’t know where it was! Sean finally located it traipsing around through the pouring rain, walking up to the houses to read the name plates! But the company and lovely food made up for it soon and in no time it was midnight and time for parting…

Other seasonal happenings were a Christmas play and a Christmas market. The play was “Oliver Twist”, performed at Woking Theatre by one of our local playgroups: The Ottershaw Players. I usually go to see their shows mainly because my sister-in-law's family are all members of that playgroup. This time both Fiona and Graham had various supporting roles like “a gentleman”, “the bookseller”, “the maid”…, and Zoe was one of Fagin’s band. One of the main roles, namely Oliver Twist, was played by Charles’ son (our dinner host mentioned above). A few of my dancing friends came along as well and we really enjoyed the evening out, even though the play was at times a little difficult to follow. But the stage set and costumes were amazing, and I suppose I was long overdue seeing the classic “Oliver Twist”!

Fiona and Graham in their maid and butler outfits

The “Christmas Market” was in Haslemere and I went there with Monica. It was a nice afternoon out on a sunny day but the market itself was not what I had expected. I suppose, being German, I’m spoiled where Christmas markets are concerned. Apparently, this one was typical by English standards! They had an interesting “live” nativity scene: a straw strewn shelter with two people dressed up as Mary and Joseph in the corner and a variety of livestock pattering around; and a Santa who would have his photo taken with the kids – but other than that nothing to do with Christmas. There was an assortment of food and gift stalls, the only seasonal ones being roast chestnuts (slightly undercooked – probably due to over-demand) and candle & evergreen arrangements. In Germany, Christmas markets have a certain smell to them: mingled mulled wine with gingerbread with grilled sausage with roast chestnuts with the pine trees that are up for sale. No pine trees in sight in Haslemere… Also, all the stalls have to be Christmassy, crafts or charity. Usually, there are stalls from the churches, schools and clubs selling handmade goodies and home cooked biscuits for fundraising; big stalls with lebkuchen and gingerbread houses; all sorts of Christmas decorations; Christmas cards and wrappers; carol CDs; and some more professional crafts stalls. Well, we did end up having a look at everything anyway – I bought some chocolate for Sean and one of the padded chequered shirts he likes to wear for a coat (they are not so easy to find – not very fashionable…); some unusual liquorice as part of FIL’s Christmas present; and a lovely beaded choker from a lacemaker (for myself, hehe).

Monday then kicked off the round of Christmas events at our church: the annual traditional carol service in conjunction with the local museum. Sean and I both joined in the bellringing (I made an embarrassing hash of it!), then stayed for the service which apart from the carol singing always has some interesting vintage Christmas poems and local Christmas anecdotes read out; and afterwards everybody repaired to the museum just down the road for mulled wine and mince pies. I found that two glasses of the very nice mulled wine were detrimental to my cooking mood, so we picked up some fish & chips on the way home! Not very Christmassy again but well…

We never do much in terms of Christmas decorations in our house because Sean doesn't really like the "upheaval" but I did manage to put up some evergreen arrangements from cuttings picked up via Freecycle (a very useful system, that: I can only recommend everybody to join their local group which you can find here: http://www.uk.freecycle.org/ - click on the “UK Groups” link in the black bar at the top to find your local group and sign up there, totally free); the Christmas cards we’ve got so far; and a lovely knitted advent wreath from one of the ladies in my charity crafts group (yes, you’ve read that right: knitted advent wreath – it’s a decoration hanging at the door of our dining room cabinet and hopefully, instructions for making these will soon be available on the SfP blog!).

The knitted Christmas Wreath

Enough about Christmas now – two more parties to go to this week, both Scottish dancing groups. I will be cutting and stuffing dates for the rest of the week!

Punk Goth and Hobo

2008-12-02T16:38:00.015Z

Last Saturday, Sean and I were invited to a friend's birthday party: Adele's 50th - barn dance with fancy dress theme - a character most unlikely to come to a barn dance!

Sean as usual couldn't be asked to make much fuss about it and decided to go as a hobo - easy enough: there was plenty of usable "holy" clothes around the house, although his favourite ragged top had gone canoeing in the afternoon and needed a quick dry on the radiator (seeing that he only made that decision about an hour before leaving time...).

As for me, I had spent the afternoon at my friend Eve's where we both got dressed and made up for an evening out. Eve went to her favourite Goth Club and I ended up as a punk goth girl - and I admit I loved the outfit, down to the blood red fingernails!

The party itself was great as well. We saw lots of old friends there, most of whom we hadn't seen in a long time - and all together we had not seen them since our wedding nearly 10 years ago! It was fantastic being able to catch up with everybody, as well as having fun with all the different costumes and the dancing which I admit was a bit rough and tumble (as it has always been with that crowd!). I'm still nursing several bruises, mostly from a pile-up with Jezz...

Here are some photos:

with Sean, Moe, Colin and Adele

Mike Sue + AdeleSean, Adele, me + JezzSeanDancing a Star with Colin + Moe with Fera

There are a lot more photos (about 60) on my Facebook in an album called "Adele's Birthday Party". To see them, you need to be a facebook member as well as my "friend" on facebook. If you are a member but not my friend (because I haven't found you there for some reason) please add me to your friends list. If you are not a member you can sign up here: http://www.facebook.com

It's totally free, easy and save (just don't give out too many details about your identity...). When you have signed up, find my profile (under my full name) and add me to your friends list - then you can go ahead and see all my photo albums there!

Bonfire Night 2008

2008-11-20T17:22:00.002Z

The most recent event was Guy Faulke's night (for info on this British tradition check out the 4th post under my Archives/November 2006!). As usual, there was a big open party at the Vicarage, with food and fireworks and a huge bonfire behind the garage. (If you page down a little further on that 2006 archive page you'll find some more scrapbook pages of that year's Vicarage Party with the bonfire and the BBQ - it was all very much like that again. And on the middle picture bottom right corner you see a photo with the inscription "Chris Soup" and a woman looking out of a window: that was my position this year!) Yes, I was on the catering team, responsible for dishing out foam cups of soup to the incoming visitors - "Tomato or Veg???"... There were nearly 250 people there this year - which sounds a lot but was down from the last years, owing to the muggy cold weather and threatening rain. They ended up putting on the fireworks before the appointed time, and just as well as no sooner had they finished as it started to rain for good and everybody hurried home, grabbing a piece of cake from the trays on the way out. Real shame - so far all the years we've been in Chertsey they have always been lucky with the Bonfire Night weekends...

Norfolk: A Visit and Funeral

2008-11-20T16:37:00.014Z

In October, we had the rather sad news that Sean's nan was diagnosed with secondary cancer and failing fast, so we made a short notice decision to visit her the weekend after. It was really sad to see her so diminished as she used to be quite a sturdy lady. Despite it all she seemed in good spirits and was quite talkative for a while between catching her breaths. She was ever so happy to see us all, as we managed to coincide our visit with that of Sean's mum Paula and his sister Fiona. At some point, Paula mentioned that there were now four Scottish dancers in the room, because both she and her mum used to dance in younger years, I have been dancing for about two years now and Fiona started before the summer break. So more or less our last conversation with Elsie was sharing which ones were our favourite Scottish country dances! Eventually she grew too tired and so Paula and Fiona went back home while Sean and I had a look around town.

Elsie used to live in Sheringham on the Norfolk coast - quite pleasant to live perhaps but not much to see or do out of season. We had a look at the famous station which is done up Victorian style because the local steam tourist train stops there (of course not in October...) - quite cute, down to a stack of old luggage.
Then we went on to the seaside (buying a brollie on the way!) but the weather was really too sharp and the grey-brown sea was in, so there was no beach to walk on anyway.
So instead we found a cute little teahouse right overlooking the sea. It was called "Whelk Coppers", a reference to its history: it used to be three fishermen's cottages and the site around them was used to boil "Whelks" in big "Coppers" (copper cauldrons) to prepare them for the market in London. Whelk fishing was a major industry in Sheringham up to WW2.
The conversion of the cottages made what was reputedly one of the finest houses in town, and indeed the inside it beautiful: panelled floor to ceiling with carved Indian Teak, reputedly taken from an 1830's naval frigate. It was a stylish and cosy place to have a good old high tea with Darjeeling and tea cakes.
But that was about all that could be done in Sheringham and so we decided to drive in the general direction of home and see if there was anything to visit on the way. We stopped at Castle Acre, a ruined castle only a few hundred yards off the road we followed. Although just a provincial castle and a ruin it was still imposing, and also refreshingly open to visitors without gates, fees or restrictions so it was nice to just climb around the earthworks.
Plaques told us the history and showed drawings and sketches of what the complete buildings would have looked like, and also pointed out some of the rare chalkland wildflowers growing on the site. This one is a Small Scabious.
We spent a good hour rambling and climbing around and reading all the plaques - unfortunately, it was too late to visit the nearby abbey ruin by then. However, the journey home was adventurous, too, as Sean chose to take a shortcut out of the village to another road further South - but near the brook at the bottom of valley the road appeared to be completely flooded. We only had the little Smart car and the "puddle" seemed rather like a river to be forded which seemed a dubious manoevre. But as the photo is taken out the rear window you can see that we made it through...
And later on the motorway we were treated to a fantastic sunset (difficult to believe that we had started out the journey in the morning with torrential rains!).
Our second visit to Norfolk - precisely to Norwich on the 3rd of November - was in a more sombre mood as we were going to Elsie's funeral, held at the local crematorium. It was a drafty morning and cold in their chapel, and of course the occasion was sad, but nonetheless everybody seemed in reasonably good spirits and there were not too many tears. The service was short, with Paula reading the eulogy - a lot about Scotland, dancing and music, and I felt that I would have been more appropriately dressed in my highland costume... That would have been a nice touch, picking up on my last conversation with Elsie. We sang "Love Divine" but nobody seemed to know the music they used and it felt like I was the only person singing. Then all the close family had been invited to read a verse or poem (see below for mine). Afterwards, we all went to a country inn down the road for the wake with ample coffee and tea and a nice little finger buffet. It was lovely to see Sean's maternal relatives whom we don't meet very often (they all seem to live in Dorset and Somerset and I hadn't seen them since our wedding nearly 10 years ago!), and to share some old photos...

She is Gone
(Read out at the Queen Mother's Funeral)

You can shed tears that she is gone
or you can smile because she has lived.

You can close your eyes and pray that she'll come back
or you can open your eyes and see all she's left.

Your heart can be empty because you can't see her
or you can be full of the love you shared.

You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday
or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.

You can remember her and only that she's gone
or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.

You can cry and close your mind, be empty and turn your back
or you can do what she'd want: smile, open your eyes, love and go on.

Bellringer's Outing 2008

2008-11-20T15:58:00.013Z

Let me show you some more photos: these are from the latest bellringer's outing, some time in October. We went with the Old Windsor band this year and unfortunately, the date clashed with the outing of the Guildford Diocesan Guild of Bellringers which we normally join. I would have loved to go with them, too, as they went to Cambridge this year! We went to Kent instead, ringing in four different churches - and very different they were. From the charming old style village church in Lympne which sits right next to the castle on an escarpment overlooking marsh and sea
to some more Victorian churches in New Church and Lydd, to a tiny village church in Brookland which has a wooden belltower separate from the church! Here is what the guidebook has to say about this curiosity: "St Augustine church is well known on account of the fact that it has a detached wooden bell tower. The tower is octagonal, and has a conical roof of three diminishing 'flounces'. Until 1936 it was covered in black tarred weatherboarding. It is believed the tower was built around 1260, and so is contemporary with the church itself."

Ringing inside Lympne and Brookland:
The startling red polo shirts are the team wear of the Old Windsor band and we were all supposed to wear them but it was rather a cold day so Sean and I had thick sweaters on top, and his father (middle of top photo) had clean forgotten...

The day's schedule was meeting at some horribly early time in Old Windsor from where Danny, the Tower Captain, conveyed us to Kent by minibus. It was a long slogging motorway journey through the foggy morning, only broken by a Little Chef coffee stop, and then a bit more interesting down tiny country lanes near the coast (some of them so small the minibus hardly fitted through!). We rang at two churches in the morning and then stopped for lunch in Dungeness. Dungeness is unlike any village or town I've ever been to in the UK: strewn out across a headland, most of which is a designated wildlife area, people seem to have built houses how and where they wanted - from clapboard to brick, all sizes and colours, some with neatly fenced off gardens staked out or an old boat by the side, some just thrown in amongst the dunes. A mini railway takes tourists around the nature reserve and of course where there are tourists there are hawkers - some of the houses had little stalls attached selling the usual array of cheap plastic beach ware. And somewhere amongst the lot sits the Britannia, a sort of old-style pub cum restaurant from the outside but done up like a ship inside. Everything was ship-like down to the menues and waitresses' shirts - obviously aimed at the kids.

This is where we had lunch - I took of course the vegetarian choice which was a lasagne and wasn't half bad. Everybody else had fish - the main item on the menu. Locally caught it said (and I couldn't quite see the wisdom in that as at the tip of the headland sits the big ominous bulk of a nuclear power station).
Right next to it is also the old lighthouse which is now a museum and for £3 a head we were allowed to climb the endless staircase to the top for a good view - of not a lot. The most interesting part was perhaps a series of caleidoscope mirrors fitted to the round inside walls:
The view from the top shows another Dungeness curiosity: it has two lighthouses. The old one (from which this photo is taken and which is now the tourist attraction) and the new one in the photo which is an automated working one.

The view also gives a bit of an idea of the strewn out houses although they get even sparser the further you go away from the "centre" of the village.
Then two more churches to ring at in the afternoon and another long drive back with a stop at the same service station... It was well dark by the time we got home!

Caterpillars, Hawks and Meadows

2008-11-20T15:28:00.011Z

Okay, my latest interest/project is getting into gardening. My husband usually calls me "brown fingers" because I have absolutely no idea of how to grow things and consequently it has never worked very well when I tried. I've also never tried very hard...
However, with the way the world is going it all of a sudden seems a good idea to grow some vegetables in your own garden, preferably permaculture style, and so I have started reading up on it and have become quite hooked on the idea. Alas, next year I shall try...
On a more immediate note, it so happened that a friend of mine (Emily) became interested in learning a bit of ballet, and she offered me produce from her allotment as "payment". I asked if she could teach me about gardening instead - you know the old saying: give a poor man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach him angling and you feed him for a lifetime... In the end we struck a bargain of sharing the allotment (she has recently started studying for a masters degree and finds that she doesn't have enough time to do it all by herself) and teaching each other. At the moment of course there's not much to harvest: lots of kale, some turnips and the odd squash but it's so exciting to cook with things that you've just brought in from the garden...

Anyway, the whole garden theme has prompted me to share some photos with you from our own garden. These are not exactly new - and neither are the other stories I'm intending to tell you today - but cover the last few months. I don't think I'll ever get around to keeping this blog patch up to date, but better late than never I suppose...

First of all, I found some of these charming critters the last time I weeded the beds - probably in October or maybe late September. Isn't he beautiful? I have no idea what he would have turned into later on - we did have a lot of Painted Lady and Red Admiral butterflies on the ivy at some point, but of course that doesn't mean they grew up in our garden! He might well have become a moth instead... So if anybody knows what sort of caterpillar this is please share with me!!!

This one is Sean mowing the lawn - but with a difference. If you have a closer look you'll see that it's lawn on the left (where he has been with the mower) and meadow on the right! Yes, we left our lawn to grow wild this summer and had the most beautiful meadow full of lovely wildflowers, most of them yellow, sort-of-daisy-looking ones. They attracted whole charms of finches to come and feed in the meadow and it was really lovely to watch. Unfortunately Chiefie kept treading the grass seeds into her paws (some of the wild grass seeds can be quite sharp), so we won't be able to repeat this wonderful exercise next year and will have to keep it as boring lawn...

And the final garden story is about a hawk killing a pidgeon at the bottom end of our garden. Unfortunately, the pictures taken through the window of my upstairs study didn't turn out too well but it was definitely a sparrowhawk. I saw the movement out of the corner of my eye while working on the computer and as he was presenting his dark side my brain just registered him as something black - crow or similar - and I didn't pay much attention. Eventually the colour white penetrated as he was turning around and also plucking feathers from his prey and I realised that it was a bird of prey, so I started watching and taking photos. He was there for quite a long time, peacefully feeding on his pidgeon - I later took a photo of the "leftovers" which seemed rather "wasteful" :). He came back about an hour later and fed some more but in the end he disappeared and we were left to dispose of the carcass.

And just some more recent garden photos: pretties down the bottom...

Addlestone Scottish Dance Society Website

2008-09-29T15:12:00.002+01:00

And something else I wanted to mention:
The website I spoke of in my July post is now online and again, there's a link to the right in the section of "things that I'm involved in". There are a few pictures on the home page which for those of you who have no Scottish or dancing connections will give you an idea of what we do. You can also see me in some of the photos, although mostly only as a tiny speck: in "Demo Dancing" I'm on the far right in a dark brown dress; in Strawberry Cream Tea I'm in the middle with an orange top and patterned skirt; and in Choir at Burns' Night I'm on the far left in a dark red evening dress. I really enjoyed the singing, too, and hope we'll do that again next year!

Environmental Church Projects

2008-09-29T15:00:00.003+01:00

This time I actually have a really good excuse for having had such a long break in posting: I was busy preparing for the "Greener St Peter's" project and a presentation I have to give about it at the PCC (church council) meeting. It is very interesting but very time consuming to work through all the information and additional website links the Eco-Congregation programme supplies (see link in the section to the right called "Links to things I'm involved in"). I have come across some really interesting sites and blogs that way - some of my favourites I've linked into the section further down to the right under "Links to Environmental and Health Website I use or read". Do have a look at them - you may well find some interesting things. I can definitely recommend the use of the FreshPod - it does keep your veggies nice for a lot longer (I used to hate the floppy carrots and parsnips at the end of the week...not to mention more delicate things that had to be eaten straight away or ended up in the bin...). And have a look at the site with leftover recipes - full of good ideas. The others are interesting, too. Fairtrade will be part of our greening the church project, and privately of course I use their products where possible. It's good that we can get some in the supermarkets now - makes life a lot easier! I'm still finding new interesting websites all the time, so watch that space in the links and there may be more appearing!

Party Week

2008-09-29T14:49:00.003+01:00

I can't believe it's been two months again since I last wrote. I meant for this to be a more regular activity but I don't think I'll manage. Life has been busy... But - here is a story of Party Week which was the week ending July/starting August and it's been sitting as a draft on my Blogger dashboard ever since because I'd forgotten to post it!

Party Week was amazing for us, on a social scale: we had three unusual parties to go to. What I remember most of them is FOOD, FOOD and more FOOD. I think the English are a nation of Foodies! But of course we had lots of fun as well, and it was great seeing some old friends, making some new ones and getting to know some a bit better. Let me tell you more about it.

Fist we had our International Day party at church. Sadly, it was quite a small meeting - maybe a lot of people were already away on their holidays... We were all supposed to dress up with at least one item of foreign dress we might have bought on a holiday if not the real thing, and bring some foreign food for a bring and share buffet. Sean wore his Hawaii shirt and because I had been asked for an interview on Germany, I chose to wear my Dirndl (German folk custome) and bring some German potato salad and frankfurters. Most of the international members of our congregation were there (probably because they had been asked for interviews as well) and so we heard some stories from Norway, Germany, Ghana, South Africa, the Gambia, Zimbabwe and China. The buffet was an ecclectic mix but yummy as always, and we had great fun together.

Next we went to the wedding of some old friends we know from the canoeing club. It had been a real surprise when they told us they were getting married as they had already been together for some 20 years... We went to the reception which took place in an infant school, beautifully decorated with an enormous amount of fairy lights. Everybody had to line up to welcome and parade the bride and groom who came in a huge landrover with canoes and paddles on the roof and ribbons for decoration. Wendy wore a beautiful turquoise silk dress and Andy had cleaned up nicely, too. There was an all vegetarian buffet, nibbles buffet and dessert buffet with 12 different elaborate gateaux, and later a barn dance on a decking stage outside. Shame that there didn't seem to be anybody with much experience of barn dancing or anything similar, and the band while making nice music in the breaks was neither very good at teaching nor inspiring in getting people up -- not to mention lots of small kids trying to dance. It was rather chaotic, so most of the time we didn't even bother and kept talking to some more old canoeing friends whom we hadn't seen for ages - and of course all the while, going back for some more nibbles or another piece of gateaux. By the time we left, I would have sworn I'd never eat another thing!

But of course the day after we were invited for a BBQ with the Old Windsor bellringers... The weather had turned and it was raining more or less all day so this turned into a truly English event by which everybody huddled under the two gazebos and the BBQ under some big umbrellas. It didn't stop us having fun, though, or lots to eat: Daniel, the tower captain, made it his aim to ensure that there would be nothing left in the fridge and kept putting food on the BBQ long after we were all full and declining, and of course food shouldn't be thrown away, so he kept simply putting it on everybody's plate. I hadn't eaten that much in a long time! Most of us kept sitting long after the BBQ had gone out, until it finally got too chilly to sit outside. It was a really nice opportunity to get to know the Old Windsor ringing band a bit better.

I'm Back

2008-07-31T17:43:00.004+01:00

Okay, it's been a looooong time and so much has happened and changed since then. I have become so busy with various things that I hardly have any time left to do crafts, so I have decided to use this blog in a more conventional way: for updates on my life and things I do, sometimes photos, rather than only showing my scrapbooking work. Let me give you a brief summary and point you to some new links that will show you more about some of the things I'm involved with (the links show up as green words in the text).

First of all, I've started a part-time job in June. It's only very small, about 8 hours a week as Administrator of the Runnymede Deanery. I'm enjoying it very much - a lot of it is correspondence and admin stuff from home but there are also some meetings to attend and networks to set up which is a bit of a challenge. I'm still doing bits of translating and proofreading from home but it is nice to be involved in something more definite which has a goal to work towards rather than just completing individual little jobs...

Then I have also become involved in the committees of the two Scottish Dancing Clubs to which I belong, being the Minutes Secretary for one and the Webmaster for the other. The website is only in its infancy and in fact it will only go online this week, so I will have to add that link later.

I am still very involved with our church - they have a website now (not written by me), so if you are interested look here. I am back on the church council, now as a Deanery Synod Representative which is also in connection with my job. I'm still part of the team running Coffee Break on Friday mornings and Songs of Praise on the 2nd Wednesday of the month; still singing in the choir and also presently organising a Church Barn Dance for early September. After the holidays I will be starting the "Green St Peter's Project" which consists of implementing Eco-Congregation and also doing a series of monthly education snippets in the church services and notices about how our members individually can become more environmentally friendly. This is something I've wanted to introduce into our church for years, because environmental issues are really close to my heart, and finally got the green light. By the way, Eco-Congregation is a project developed by A Rocha, a Christian environmental charity.

Still on the spiritual side but nothing to do with our parish church or my job, I have also become interested in contemplative Christian practises, and during a Christian Music Conference at Worth Abbey a few weeks ago I met Phillip Roderick of Contemplative Fire whom and which I find really inspiring and hope to get more closely involved with.

Another thing that now takes up a lot of my time is studying with the Open University. My subject is Geoscience and Environmental Studies (at the moment the courses are overlapping but eventually I will have to choose into which direction to go). I'm only studying on level one so far and it's not really challenging at all, other than having to find the discipline to do it regularly - reading, activities and TMAs (Tutor Marked Assignments). The courses I do at the moment are "Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis" and "Introduction to the Environment" both of which will finish in September. So far my TMAs came back with positive remarks so I expect to pass the ECA (End of Course Assessment) without too much trouble.

Of course, something had to give to make room for all these new ventures, and mainly that was my crafts hobby. I have almost stopped scrapbooking all together, and I had already more or less stopped needlecrafts and card making a while ago. At the moment, I'm more interested in doing things together with other people rather than all things that keep me home alone. The scrapbooking I miss a bit but not as much as I would have thought - maybe one day I'll come back to more of it... And of course I'm still running SfP (Stitches for Presents), the charity crafts group, which is going from stregth to strength.

On the hobby front, I still love my Scottish Dancing and in the winter half of the year go to two club sessions in Guildford and Addlestone, a fortnightly dance meeting here in Chertsey (which is mainly older ladies, many of whom I know from church) and assorted open dances and balls on Saturday nights. It's a shame that Sean isn't interested in dancing... During the summer, there's not much dancing available other than the Summer School in St Andrews/Scotland and I've decided to attend there for a week this year as my holiday. I'll be going together with Richard, a friend from the Guildford Club, from 9th to 16th August.

I'm also becoming more and more involved with the bellringing which is a bit of a family hobby. It was my FIL Bob who used to do it in his younger years and picked it up again when he saw and met the ringers in our church at Eleanor's baptism. Then he talked Sean into starting and at the beginning of last year I started, too. It was hard going first but this year I started going to another church with Bob where the bells are easier to ring and found a new enjoyment in it, so I'm making progress now... I'm regularly ringing for practise at both St Peter's (our church) and Old Windsor towers as well as for services and weddings at St Peter's, and have been to several outings to ring at other churches in the South of England including the Cathedral in Guildford.

The canoeing is a bit on the back burner, mainly due to my health problems. It's always given me back aches, and over the last couple of years this has just got worse and worse. Earlier this year it was so bad that I started really intensive treatment first with a chiropactor and then with a doctor for sports injuries. He found out that the problem was not only the damage to my spine from the old horse riding accident many years ago but also muscle weakness, i.e. the muscles not holding the joints in place and also getting tired very quickly, therefore causing extra pain. He diagnosed this as a result of a metal allergy caused mainly by the metal fillings and crowns in my teeth - so all of these have to be exchanged. I'll be talking about that more when I'm going to see the special cosmetic dentist next week who can do porcellain crowns and fillings but hopefully it will make a big difference and I should then be able to follow a regime of physiotherapy and chiropractic treatments to get me back in "working order".

What's even better is that I have also finally found something that helps with the symptoms of my ME - particularly the irritable bowel and the low energy levels. (If anybody wants to know more about ME there are some interesting things on this website.) It's a product called Aloe Vera Gel and it's really quite amazing - it's like a jellyish drink (best mixed with a bit of fruit juice) that you simply have once or twice a day. It's totally natural, organically grown and ethically produced and distributed via a network marketing system rather than shops. It was a recommendation and I am so glad that I found it. I'm trying to find out more about their other products and about their network marketing system opportunities because I'm so enthusiastic about it that I would like to join and help other people with this stuff as well... So, my life will probably get even busier!

I think this is all for today - I'll definitely try and write more regularly in the future, so do come back and have another look soon!

On Pompeii's Houses and Gardens

2007-11-28T13:56:00.000Z

Another late entry - this is talking about Monday morning... We had another charity event on in our church hall, profits towards The Children's Society, and I was responsible for the card stall (also gift wrap and advent calendars...), while the main event was a talk about The Houses and Gardens of Pompeii, followed by a light lunch of soup and cheese board. The talk was quite interesting - at least for me because I've always been interested in things Roman and Pompeii/Herculaneum is one place I've never been but would love to see... Italy as a whole is big on my list of "wannados"! Shame that the person who did the talk was a bit to scholarly about it and at times it was rather lame and filled with probably too much detail, but still a good topic and a good turnout of about 50 people, which of course made a good donation to the charity...

Today's LO then is something Roman, and since I haven't been to Pompeii, here is a contribution from Aquae Sulis (Roman Bath in good old England where I visited with my mother a couple of years ago).

This is the introduction page: it's done on Club Scrap "Wings" paper with HOTP alphas and a 7Gs index tab (the "P" is for "pull" because there is a sheet about the history of the baths hidden behind the photo board). The bit on the right is the official brochure of the Roman Baths which are an absolutely fascinating place to explore!

The double page is about the museum adjacent to the Baths. The hot spring feeding the baths, as well as the overflow outlet, can be seen within the museum, which I thought was rather unique. There are also models and drawings of Aquae Sulis and all kinds of things found during the excavations... This is Club Scrap "Wings" paper again together with a Design Classic of the "Music and Fine Arts" kit which had the perfect Roman pillars...

Eleanor's Confirmation

2007-11-23T13:44:00.000Z

A couple of days ago we had another special event in the family: Eleanor, the older one of our nieces, was being confirmed. I thought it was a strange idea to do that in the evening in the middle of the week (our confirmation was at the Cathedral on a Sunday afternoon) but apparently, that's how they do it now: having confirmations more often so people don't have to wait for them so long, and choosing another local church each time. So this one was in New Haw (a very cute old tiny little church). Sean came along as he is Eleanor's Godfather, and I sang in the choir which was mixed from the churches who sent Confirmation Candidates. The service was very moving and joyful, and afterwards we all met in the Hall where the New Haw church people had put up a splendid buffet. Everybody was joining in there (the Hall is twice as big as the church!), chatting and enjoying the food, even our Bishop! Hopefully it will stay a memorable event for Eleanor.

This is a LO I made a couple of years ago of our own comfirmation - both Sean and I, as well as his sister Fiona (Eleanor's mother) and a cousin, Kim, were confirmed then. The papers used are all from the Club Scrap kit "Extra Extra" which was a news headline type kit and seemed to suit the event well as it was a big confirmation with over 80 candidates.

Journal reads:"Guildford Cathedral Confirmation; Sunday,16 May 2004 at 3pm
We believe! 80+ Confirmed at Guildford Cathedral, 13 from St Peters Shared Church, Chertsey
Sunday, the 16^th of May 2004, was a busy day at Guildford Cathedral as 80+ candidates lined up to receive their confirmation from the Bishop of Dorking. Although slightly unwell, the Bishop performed this service at Guildford in place of the local recently retired patriarch. Spirits were high on Cathedral Hill as the instigator of the occasion had blessed the day with beautiful unseasonably hot weather. Sunlight flooded the tall arches of the cathedral which, holding some 2000, was full almost to the last seat. The event was spiritually charged, despite the impressive array of clergymen in formal attire, holding a personal note for each participant before the candidates processed out behind their parish clergy to assemble on the Cathedral lawns for photos and gift exchange…"

Another LO I made of this occasion (2-page LO; top page is left): this one is done with a Scrapgoods kit and the left page holds all the names of the Chertsey candidates (i.e. from our church) while on the right is a pocket with all the memorabilia of the day.

Home Comforts

2007-11-17T12:40:00.000Z

Oh, some really good news for a change. After months of nagging my DH we finally went out for some "mattress testing" a few weeks ago, and even managed to agree on one and order it (we had to order bespoke because our bed is the one I brought all the way from Germany and the size is different from UK specs!). Anyway, the mattress is one of these new memory foam jobs (that's why I had to take hubby for "testing" in case he wouldn't like it...). And it's simply blissful!!! It came during the week, so we've already spent a few nights on it and tried it out every which way, and I must say I haven't slept that well in a long time! If you need a new mattress, go for memory foam - I can really recommend it!!!

That leaves the question of which LO to show - I haven't got anything to do with beds or sleeping of course, so maybe this LO of my first house here in England will do. It seems ages ago that I lived there - in fact, 10 years it is!!! Seems a much more respectable neighbourhood than where I've lived since...oops...

Sweet 70s

2007-11-09T15:18:00.000Z

Do you love dress up parties? Well I do - but I don't often get the chance... Today I had the time of my life visiting the Fairy Godmother shop here in Chertsey to choose a dress for Winnie's birthday party. Now, Winnie is one of the old ladies at church who, due to family circumstances, has had a rather sad life until she finally became "independent" at the age of 82. Since then she's been indulging herself a bit in nice dresses, hairdressing, fake nails etc and being very prominent at all the parties in church. She's been thriving on it and it's great to see. Now she decided to have a great party for her 85th birthday this December and she's invited lots of people, including Sean and myself. She also asked me to wear the dress I had for our Blessing of Marriage last year - only I don't have that anymore, nor would I really think it proper for the occasion. But she was sooo disappointed when I told her that I decided to go and get something a bit similar but less wedding-orientated from the hire shop - I settled for an 18th century gown in dark blue with flower bouquets. It comes with hoops and a pretty choker, so that should hopefully please Winnie and give her something to look at and have her photo taken with me. And it should make for some nice photos for my scrapbooking, too, hehe... I've always liked fancy dress parties - but the last one we went to was years ago:

This was the Christmas party at the canoe club in 2000 - the theme was 70s and there were a lot of afro wigs, flared trousers and pointed lapels, and of course some hippies... Sean and I are top left; his cousin Kevin and Tracy (who got married this year - remember?) at the bottom, and some friends...

Fireworks - Wow!

2007-11-03T19:57:00.000Z

Wow, I say!!! It is Bonfire Night weekend again in the UK, and for the first time since we moved to Chertsey we did not go out for a party. Well, I had no idea what splendid fireworks they do this end of town. Although I should have guessed: just over the road and up the hill is one of the more fashionable and expensive areas - all half-a-million-Pound houses... And guess what, just as we were sitting over dinner just the right one of our "neighbours" was putting on his fireworks display - it showed beautifully in our dining room window - we didn't even have to move! And not only that: it went on and on and on - and it was for sure the most fantastic private fireworks I've ever seen. Each display seemed to fill the whole sky, and all of our window, and they were just beautiful. And all that, sitting nicely: warm and with triple glazing to keep out the horrid noise and smell... What better way to enjoy bonfire night??? Okay, no photos of it this year, but below is a photo of our own bonfire party at Woodlands some years ago, and if you go to the archives of November 2006 (down the links on the right side of this page) you'll see photos of 2005 and an explanation of Bonfire Night and its history for those who are interested in such things (see Nov 20th) and further down several pages of last year's Bonfire Party at the Vicarage (see Nov 6th).

Journal reads: "The observation of Guy Fawke’s Night on the 5^th of November was compulsory in all England for a long period in history, to commemorate the fortunate outcome of the Houses of Parliament NOT being blown up by his treasonous attack. Nowadays, of course, it is just another occasion to get the firecrackers out, or even light a big bonfire like the one we had in the field at Woodlands this year. For me, despite seven years in England, this was my first Bonfire Night celebration! Sean added to the atmosphere with some way overdue fireworks that caused us to keep good distance (Eleanor and Jean didn’t show up at all outside!) but only the Catherine Wheel was really memorable…"
That was in 2003.

The Giant Fungus

2007-10-30T16:12:00.000Z

We've been having a few more fine autumn days over here and I've been enjoying the views outside. The ivy in our garden is in flower again, but I must admit I'm rather disappointed that there are no butterflies this year. I remember last year in October we had so many I spent a whole day in the garden with my camera - it was so beautiful. You can see several LOs of butterfly shots if you click on the November link in archives (down the right side of this page) - they start on the second post of the November page.
The only special thing in the garden this year - which I didn't see last year - is a whole host of fungi, covering spaces between the herbs and underneath the rosemary. I think they may be of the same type as the giant fungus Helen and I found in Windsor Park some years ago, although of course they are nowhere near as big: that one was worth a LO of its own!

Journal reads: "We found this mega mushroom (toadstool?) in Windsor Park during our first walk with Helen’s new Spaniel dog. Unfortunately, our two “proportion props” were still so excited with each other that they wouldn’t sit still… 30th September 2003"

London Adventure

2007-10-25T15:26:00.000+01:00

You won't believe what's happened to me... On Tuesday, I finally went into London with Eve - I needed to renew my passport and she'd offered to accompany me, so we could make it a nice day out, but of course she can only go during term breaks as she is a teacher. I'd been trying to phone the Embassy twice, to find out how much it would cost, possible waiting times etc, but both times I was cut off after over 5 minutes of holding! I wrote them a letter to which I never got a reply. Their website only says "passports and visas Mon - Fri 9am to 12nn".
BUT -- when we got their, they simply told me that presently they cannot renew passports or accept applications for new ones, as the passports are due to change to a new style, with finger prints, but they are not yet in place. Meanwhile, they simply turn people away!!! Not a word on their website, or on the spiel that you listen to while holding the phone line for ages!!!! They really are the most inconsiderate b... on the planet - I think the notion that an Embassy is there to SUPPORT its people is completely lost on them. So - for the time being I'm stuck in England, for better or worse (and I can only hope that nothing is going to happen to my Mother that would require me to travel to Germany!)...

In any case, once I'd got over the shock and anger of this, we did have a nice day out, strolling around - there is some fascinating architecture in London, even just some of the older residential blocks... We came across a beautiful, massive catholic church called The Brompton Oratory and decided to have a look inside - it was very Italianate and absolutely marvellous and we spent quite some time looking at it all; then just down the road we found the V&A museum and spent some time there seeing the textiles and silverware exhibits and also had a sumptous lunch in the "refreshments room" with beautiful stained glass windows and chandeliers - the prices were sumptous, too, though: nearly £18 for two salad plates with rolls and butter! Then around the corner into the Natural History Museum but that wasn't a good idea as it was far too crowded with families and children, being half-term, so we left quickly and went back home for some tea...

I thought it would be appropriate to add the cover page of my London album here today - it will soon get some additional pages as I took quite a few photos (it was a beautiful crisp and bright autumn day on Tuesday!).

Autumn has come

2007-10-19T17:12:00.000+01:00

Autumn is definitely here - the leaves are turning and starting to fall. It's such a beautiful season on a day like today (the sun is actually shining!!!). So I thought it was a nice idea to dig out this LO I made some years ago of a walk I took on another lovely day like this, with my SIL and the kids at a beautiful place about an hour's drive from here, called the Devil's Punch Bowl.

Journal reads: "Our 'Test Walk' at the Devil’s Punch Bowl was much luckier than the 'real thing' – we had gorgeous sunshine and brilliant views across the gorge and from the ridge across the surrounding lands.
Fiona had chosen the location particularly as an “Autumn Colours Walk”, and indeed, the trees were beautiful, but the main attraction was an abundance of many types of fungi everywhere along the way. The place seemed aptly named, not only as a Devil’s punch dent in the range, but because one could imagine it to be a favourite spot for all his witches to descend and collect some ingredients for their cauldrons…! It also prompted Eleanor to suggest another challenge for the walk: the 'Mushroom Trail' – the person who could find the most different varieties of fungi would win the trophy (it went to Granddad Bob in the end!)."

My first ever scrapbook page

2007-10-16T17:01:00.000+01:00

Just had the idea of showing you this one: it's my first ever scrapbook page. Of course nowadays you can buy cow patch paper, but in those days there was only plain paper, so I made it myself. I copied the journal in below the photo so that the whole thing will make sense to you: the LO was inspired by the photo, taken at a friend's wedding, as well as Sean's "Sean the Sheep" birthday card - when he gave it to me he was also carrying a single small rosebud stem in his mouth - it was soooo cute!

Journal reads:
"This lovely photo was taken at my cow-loving friend Maggie’s wedding party in November 1998. The handcrafted special picture frame was her definite favourite wedding gift. Sean’s pose was inspired by his very first birthday card he had given me the year before, and had everybody in absolute fits!"

Bellringer's Outing

2007-10-14T14:32:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, we were away most of the day for the Bellringer's Outing, visiting 5 different churches in Hampshire with a mixed group of ringers of the Guildford Diocese. There were 9 people there from Chertsey, including Sean, his Dad and myself (with Jean along, mainly having little village walks with the dogs while the rest of us were ringing). It was the first time I took actively part in this event and got to ring at least one session of plain rounds in each of the towers. It was amazing how different the bells were - all of them lighter (some by a long margin!) and easier to ring than ours in Chertsey, and I really enjoyed it. It was also interesting to see the different churches and some really lovely typically English villages...
I took a few photos but haven't had time to make pages yet, so here's a bellringing LO which I made for Sophie after her visit here last year.

This is a digital LO made with the "Retro" kit from Club Scrap and a template from Jen Caputo. I think the journalling is big enough to read on the LO itself, so no need to repeat it...

Sean the Sheep

2007-10-10T15:29:00.000+01:00

Thought I show this LO today - there's a new exhibition at the Lightbox Gallery in Woking, about Wallace, Grommit and Sean the Sheep which I would like to see and hope to go with my friend Monica some time later this year. We both have one of the Sean the Sheep backpacks you can see in this LO, and both use them for our Scottish dancing stuff when we go to the reel clubs - much to everybody's amusement! But I do love my little Sean the Sheep rucksack, and the LO explains why (journal below).

Journal: "I wasn’t really very much aware of the cartoon character of SEAN THE SHEEP, until I met my husband – SEAN. Needless to say, people have a habit of giving him SEAN THE SHEEP goodies as presents, and at various times he’s had t-shirts, underwear, socks, fridge magnets, pencils, mugs and of course, videos… Over the years, the little critter grew on me quite a bit, so when I found this cute little backpack in a charity shop I had to have it. That summer, SEAN THE SHEEP followed me round everywhere, reminding me of SEAN all the time. I’ve still got him around, although he spends more time in the cupboard nowadays – maybe next year I should pull him out again for the summer…"

Well, he's out of the cupboard again, as I said - on duty at least twice a week for dancing... Below is just a little close-up of the photo, so you can see him better!

LO Threads of Love

2007-10-08T12:55:00.000+01:00

Here's another rather old LO I made which I think is interesting. It really is about charity stitching and the beginnings of Stitches for Presents, the group I run (see link in sidebar). It does have pictures of some projects I'd made at the time, as well as a few mini samples of different stitching techniques that I like: cross stitch; Hardanger; Blackwork; and Canvaswork; as well as other needlecraft related embellishments I made myself. I also stitched the green divider lines onto the paper, and the vellum is sewn own with beads...

The text reads: "Despite many years of stitching and countless projects for my own house and for friends, including many birth and wedding samplers, I had to come to England to discover stitching for charity! This pair of cats was a sponsored picture as part of a Noah’s Ark wallhanging. It was my first ever charity piece through Ladyshield Stitchcraft and brought in £148 on its own. The finished project and the total of nearly £2500 went to St Oswald’s Jigsaw Appeal for Children with Life-Limiting Conditions, at Christmas 1999. The idea, though, took hold and in the wake I started to form Stitches for Presents, a postal club for people who want to continually stitch for good causes, and to date (August 2002) the group has had 53 members!"

To date (October 2007) we have had nearly a hundred members over the years, with 40 currently active. For an update on Stitches for Presents (SfP) please follow the links in the sidebar to our website (general info) or to our blog (latest updates).

School Cones - Part 2

2007-10-06T13:52:00.000+01:00

Just thought this LO was a nice addition to yesterday's story - it shows you that it is really not a new thing (another LO I made many years ago...):

Left is my Mum in 1935 - right is me in 1970...

I'm back

2007-10-05T17:49:00.000+01:00

Well, I admit I lost touch with my blog - wasn't in the mood for posting and had to rethink what to do with it. My life doesn't seem to be that exciting although I'm always busy... Here's an update:
1. The shop was a flop - full stop. (Haha, at least it rhymes...) A few friends bought a few bits and that was that - I can't seem to find a way to link into google properly for OTHER people to find it, and Sean is too busy to look into these things. Maybe one day... Meanwhile, please remember my little shop when you need some crafts stuff, and maybe spread the news amongst your crafting friends. The prices are certainly good! (Link is in the sidebar!)
2. The dancing season has started again and I've already been to the Opening Dance, a Dance Scottish Open Day afternoon and several of the Addlestone and Guildford club nights. Great fun, I just love it...
3. Everything else is going it's usual way so nothing to tell really.

Now for this blog, since I don't seem to be doing too good on any of the scrapping projects I started (like the Year-a-Day Challenge and the ALS) I shall try instead to show some older LOs I made over the years, just in a random format - once a day or every other day. This should add interest for my non-scrapping friends who would like to learn more about me, as well as for the scrappers who can see what different kinds of artwork I've produced over the years, and will hopefully help me to not leave such huge posting gaps between things of interest... So here's the first LO:

A LO I made many years ago, quite at the beginning of my scrapbooking career when my stash consisted of plain papers and basic letter stickers and a few cardmaking goodies such a Mulberry paper. I had a phase of doing these kind of shape LOs - this one is photos interspersed with sweet packages. The meaning of this and the shape becomes clear from the journal:

"There’s one German tradition that has survived the purge in the aftermath of WW2 – and that is the “First Day of School Cone”. In Germany, simply known as “Schultüte” (School Carrier).

Generally, at age 6, German kids start their 4-year primary school careers, the first stage of compulsory education in the country. And on that day, every child – boys and girls alike – is given a fanciful paper cone filled with sweets and goodies as a present. It’s good-bye to the playful days of childhood and welcome to the “real world”, because although we all coveted the goodies inside, those cones are incredibly heavy and have to be carried around for a good many hours.

Here, my Mum and Nan were exceptionally kind to me: the better part of the sweets stayed at home and my cone was stuffed with crumpled newspaper more than halfway up and only topped with goodies, just in case that I was asked to share some with friends… Thanks Mum and Nan!"

Finally: My "Shop" is going...

2007-08-14T11:54:00.001+01:00

Good news today. After a lot of work and long struggling with the technical side of things, I've finally got my little "shop" on line. No, I'm not going into business - this is just a larger version of the few albums of sales stuff I used to feature on my Picturetrail, and it features only things I'm selling off out of my stash - mainly craft materials and some other bits and bobs like my collection of cross pendants, some other collector's items, a few books etc., and also some Needlecrafts materials and handcrafted items selling on behalf of SfP for charity.

I have to admit that I'm using a free webshop programme and it's not fantastic - for example it doesn't have a tare weight feature, which means you need to add the packaging material yourself - and please don't forget it because orders without packaging will have wrong shipping added! So, there is a welcome and introduction on the homepage - please read it, which asks you to read the Terms&Conditions - so please read them, too, before shopping. Then you can go shopping like in any other webshop: put stuff in your basket, sign in/register, pay and wait for your goodies... (You can pay via Paypal, personal cheque or UK Postal Order; overseas via Paypal only).

I hope this will be a great improvement for me to sell the lots of goodies I have accummulated and don't really use, and as well as for your "shopping experience" with me. Everything has a photo and a description, so you'll know better what you are getting.

I'm still in the process of adding more things, and will probably from time to time go through my stash to clear out things that haven't been used, so do come again once in a while.

And here, after all my babble, is the link: phcrafts.plus.com (just click on it or enter into your addy line without www. at the front!). I'll also add this link to the link bar at the right of this blog in case you wish to find the site again in the future...

I hope to see some of you as my "customers" in the shop soon...

Boohoo...

2007-08-05T13:21:00.000+01:00

Not a Happy Bunny today! I'm so disappointed. I had been looking forward to my holiday in St Andrew's/Scotland for the Scottish Dancing Summer School for so long (I'd booked it in February!) and today is the day I should have gone! But...I have a bad ankle that doesn't lend itself to dancing or hill-walking! And so I'm still in good old Chertsey and will be singing at the afternoon service at a local residence for the elderly instead... Nice enough, but of course no comparison to being on holiday and practising my favourite hobby!
However, I've promised myself to still get some "holiday" out of this week by doing at least lots of stuff that I like, such as lots of scrapbooking and reading and being out in the sunshine. (Yes, the big yellow thing is finally in the sky - I'd almost given up hope, but the last week was nice off and on, and since yesterday it has been positively hot.) And I've already started finishing some of the ALS pages off (the blank pages I showed a few posts down) - so here they are:

The title is the first line of one of my favourite songs (from "The Man La Mancha") - the photos
are from my early days in England when I really loved the feeling of freedom and being
able to do all those outdoorsy adventurous things, with and without Sean...

Photos taken at a pub dinner stop during our canalboat holiday
last summer - with our friends Kate and Nicole.

This LO was inspired by the worded cutouts that came with the kit - they reminded me of all
the worries I used to go through before the slalom competitions, thinking I'd never get anywhere:
this was the Promotion to Div 3.

A LO on my dear friend Eve - both photos taken during day trips the summer before last.
The title panel is made from a Valentine's card I received from Tinny, a friend in the US.

Credits: all materials from Club Scrap SR kit "Fizz" except for some aubergine and white background pages from Bazzill; black round alpha stickers from Club Scrap "Salsa" and little black peel-off letters from Crafts Creations.

River Photos

2007-07-30T18:40:00.000+01:00

Here are the promised photos of the river Thames on Friday. Not so bad here after all...

Okay so far...

2007-07-27T15:42:00.000+01:00

Just a quick update on the flood warnings and then I'll grab my camera and wander down to the river to have a look. According to the reports, the Thames peaked here at Chertsey last night. I haven't had any disaster news from anybody I know yet, so I assume it wasn't as bad as expected. Certainly around here we are dry so far. That doesn't mean the worries are over, though, because the river will carry high water for at least a couple of days, so heavy rain would still be a problem. Luckily it's been more or less dry for the last days, although there's clouds going over now which do look like more rain. I'll see if I can get a few good shots of the Thames now...

Meanwhile, some more completed LOs of the Fizz kit - thos of you who've known me for long enough might remember those trips...

The 2 pages above are a LO about my first holiday here in England: the summer after I arrived
I did an Outdoor Bound and Expedition First Aid Course in the Lake District and these
photos were taken during the final 2-day trek test. Everything used is from the Club Scrap "Fizz" kit.

These ones are even older - both pages are a LO about the New Year festivities we had in
Senegal during a holiday in 1988-89. Materials are mostly from the "Fizz" kit again,
plus some peel-off letters from Crafts Creations and aubergine background paper.

Getting worried

2007-07-24T13:17:00.000+01:00

I'm starting to get worried with all this flooding here in England - it doesn't seem to want to stop! I do hope it won't hit around here, but the Thames will not doubt bring down a lot of water in the next days from those flooded areas in Oxfordshire and Berkshire, and although all the flood relief schemes are open, if it rains more on top of that (and there's another bad one forcast for Thursday) I'm sure it'll flood Chertsey, at least partly. The area where we live has not been flooded before according to the records, but I'm sure neither have a lot of the places who are under water at the moment! This year really is exceptionally bad - it must all have to do with those dreaded climate changes. I'm not quite sure what to do - should we take some stuff upstairs, just in case???

Anyway, I just realised that I never showed all the finished LOs I made with that FIZZ kit I ALSed a few posts back. Well, here are some more.

Both pages above are one LO: a shopping village in Bali. Everything used from Club Scrap "Fizz" kit.

Both pages above are one LO: a Barn Dance I organised for church last year. Again, everything used is from Fizz kit.

Finally some rest...

2007-07-20T11:25:00.000+01:00

Boy, it has been a hectic month since my last entry. First I had Mum over from Germany for 2 weeks - she is a full-time job, since she doesn't speak any English and always assumes she must be the centre of my attention 24/7! The lack of sunshine and suitable weather made things worse as we were confined to indoors sightseeing most of the time (she insists that we have to "see things" every single day of her stay - I honestly think she comes to see England more than me...). She came on the 16th of June and stayed to the 1st of July, and the 2 weeks after that, starting right from the 2nd of July, I took part in the Cathedral Summer School in Guildford, which was workshops etc all day most days and evening programme some days. I must say that some of it was very interesting and should be useful within our own church here in Chertsey, too, but I have to yet do a writeup to present to our vicar... Then, we also went to Kevin+Tracy's wedding over in Dartmoor (Kevin is Sean's cousin, and both of them are canoeists, so we know them quite well). Whyever they decided to get married so far away I'm not sure - it was a horrendous drive and we got there just in time for the ceremony which took place in a special room at their chosen hotel. Again, the weather wasn't brilliant but at least it didn't rain and we got to take some photos outside (see below). There was a lovely meal and in the evening a Ceilidh (Scottish Party Dancing) which I thoroughly enjoyed! We stayed the night and had a nice little walk the next day before driving home.

Kevin + Tracy with baby Harry and the bridesmaids in the Wedding Room

Photo Session by the river: bride + groom with their canoeing friends (Sean and I are on the very right of the picture)

Ali + I (she's a friends from canoeing)

"Holding the baby"...thought this was a funny photo; and no, it's not ours!!!

Continuation on the ALS Project

2007-06-14T17:52:00.000+01:00

Nothing worth telling has been happening in my life recently, so I'll just show you some more scrapbooking I did.
It's taken me a week to complete the 20 pages I made with the ALS method and I'm rather happy with the outcome - to my own surprise, I must admit! I'd never really bought into this idea of making blank pages, then finding photos and finishing them. There are drawbacks, of course - well, mainly one, and that is the problem with doing printed journals on something that's already stuck together. I tried a handwritten journal - which would be the obvious thing to do with this kind of LO - but really didn't like it (it's not very well visible in the picture but it's readable on the original - I just don't like my writing!!!). So most of the other LOs, where I wanted more extensive journals, I used scrap bits of paper to print them on. This looks all right, but it's more awkward and will not suit every LO. Have to think about it...
Anyway, the two LOs below are both for a pet challenge at the Club Scrap Yahoo group. They are both 2-page LOs but I'm showing them separately for better visibility (because of the width limit of this blog). They are both of Sandie, one of my first cats many years ago in Germany.

Credits: everything used is from Club Scrap SR kit "Fizz"

The text above tells about Sandy having been with me for only a short time (5 years) because I got her from a rescue home rather than as a kitten. During that time we moved house 4 times and she was always brilliant, always happy - she even loved travelling in the car!

Credits: again everything from the "Fizz" kit except for the aubergine-coloured background papers
which are from another Club Scrap kit but I can't remember which.

The text refers to the quote below it: "Happiness is a direction, not a place." It says that for Sandie, happiness definitely had something to do with places - I found her in the most unusual ones!!! (like my filing trays, child car seat, the washing machine, drinking out of the loo...and in the car she liked to sit on the hat board behind the back seats - people must have taken her for a plush toy!) It also says that of all the cats I've ever had, Sandie was my absolute favourite. She was by far the most interesting!

My first ever ALS production

2007-06-05T18:13:00.000+01:00

So, finally I've finished the kit I was talking about below. I managed to get, lo and behold, 20 LOs from it, by only adding 9 plain pages, 4 brads, a piece of artwork from a Valentine's card a friend sent me, and some bits from a wedding card we received (because that page will be for my wedding album...). I'm really chuffed with that effort and it was quite good fun (although I admit I will only be converted once I've finished the LOs off with photos, titles, journalling etc and STILL like them!). But anyway, for the time being, here are all the empty LOs I made (first bunch is made using the ALS instructions for the kit; second bunch is using the instructions for another kit; last bunch is just my own ideas with the leftovers/extras).

all above from kit ALS instructions

from JR kit instructions

my own ideas with leftovers

This is still left of the kit (plus 2 sheets of 8 1/2 x 11" paper).

Right - I'm back

2007-06-02T15:26:00.000+01:00

Grrr, it's been ages since I last posted. Had problems getting into my Blogger account, which is apparently now a Google account--??? Wished they'd stop changing things...

Times have been busy anyway, working away on a few projects for church as well as privately, and not getting much scrapbooking in either. I did, however, give the ALS idea a try (this is "Assembly Line Scrapbooking" a la Club Scrap - it means you try and finish off a whole kit in one go, just making empty LOs and finding photos for them later). I'd always thought it odd, but I knew that one day I had to try it, and since I didn't have any ideas whatsoever on what to use this "Fizz" kit, I thought it's a good time to try. I'm still not convinced it's the thing for me - but at least I've got some LOs done (still no idea as for photos and not yet finished all the kit - when I get there I'll show you all the LOs and you'll see what I mean...).

This is the Club Scrap SR kit "Fizz"

The Scotttish Dancing season is finished until September; the canoeing season is in full swing I suppose; and I've started a new (old) hobby - yes, I know you'll think I'm crazy since I haven't even got enough time to do the things I'm already involved in, but a friend invited me to a TaiChi class. It was rather peculiar to start with as I hadn't done it for about 9 or 10 years...! but I liked it, so I think I'll keep going. It's on Saturday mornings, so I suppose it doesn't interfere with too many other things...

So much for an update - here at least a couple more LOs I made of our Easter holidays: both were for challenges at TSG (top for a summer lyrics challenge and bottom for the Year-at-a-Day challenge).

Credits: quickpage by Stacey Carlson; font: SF INTOXICATED BLUES; lyrics: Cliff Richards ("Summer Holiday")

Credits: kit "Blue-tiful Sea Breeze" by Maryse Vincent; netting element by Tracy Blankenship;

Rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Busy time...

2007-04-25T11:53:00.000+01:00

Wow, I can't believe how long I haven't done anything on my blog. Life has been so hectic - I admit there were a lot of nice things, like lots of extra Scottish dancing evenings and a whole day on Saturday; but also a lot of extra duties, like preparing our family walk for this month which will take place next Sunday; taking my car through MOT (it failed - as usual - so now Sean needs to do the repairs and he's just soooo busy, too, at the moment!); St George's Day; meetings for housegroup and church; etc. So for today I'll just show you a few more LOs I made with photos from our holidays, and hope that next time I'll have something more interesting to tell... This set of photos is about how and with whom we spent most of our breaks at Spring Harvest - and how we had lots of fun together.

Credits: template by Jennifer Schmitt; "Red April" kit by Joan Thompson; wordart by Tina Williams; font: MARIAH

Credits: template by Conny B; "Red April" kit by Joan Thompson; font: PORKY'S

Credits: template by Dumpty; kit "Red April" by Joan Thompson; Font: SF INTOXICATED BLUES

New Year-A-Day Challenge Layouts

2007-04-12T13:47:00.000+01:00

Not much news but a few new challenge LOs I made:

Credits: kit "Noble Castellana" by Nina; brads by DSS
Credits for all 4 layouts: Rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Credits: kit "My Husband's Flannel Shirt" by Janidee; stones by Barb Dercksen

Credits: kit "Spring Doodles" by Lynn Reloza

Credits: kit "Musica" by Fatima Dannemann

We are back...

2007-04-10T18:04:00.000+01:00

We've survived our holidays and Easter - actually, some of it was quite relaxing! I spent most of yesterday just catching up with emails and some scrapbooking as well - couldn't resist all those new photos!!! I've finished the LOs of one set: a little walk in Minehead from the resort where we stayed to the pierhead at the other end of town... Minehead, by the way, is a little seaside town on the Exmoor coast (in UK West Country). It's quite lovely countryside there. More photos to come soon of course...

Credits: template by Joanne Berry; "Seashore" kit by Saxon Holt; fonts: KRISTEN and CK CRACKED

Credits: template by Joanne Berry; "Denim" kit by Miss Vivi; fonts: MARIAH and INKYBEAR

Credits: based on quickpage by Leah Riordan; fonts: EMERALD ISLE and FREESTYLE SCRIPT

Credits: based on quickpage by Michelle Swadling; alphas by Jan Crowley; font: CORNERSTONE

Happy Easter

2007-03-31T13:00:00.000+01:00

Just a quick post to wish you all a Happy Easter. We are on holiday in the West Country - mainly for Spring Harvest, a Christian Conference at Butlins/Minehead on the coast of beautiful Exmoor. Programme will start tonight and will be pretty full-on as usual, so I don't think I'll find time to do another post before Easter - therefore, have a wonderful Easter holiday everybody!!!

Highland Ball - and new layouts

2007-03-25T16:17:00.000+01:00

Here are some more layouts I quickly produced for the challenge I mentioned yesterday. Two of them are worked restrospectively for February and March, but the third is brandnew - as new as last night actually, and I've only just finished it. I went to my first Highland Ball last night - Scottish Dancing event with lots of dancing, a little buffet dinner, everybody nicely dressed up, and none of the dances walked through or even recapped, so you had to know what you were doing. It was quite a challenge but I managed most of the dances, so it was real good fun.

Credits: kit "New Year" by Rhonna Farrer; bow by Shelle Pukas; balloons by Hummie;
tag by Faith True; Rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Credits: kit "Delicate Kitchen" by CIA dos Scraps; Rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Credits: tartan paper by Sann; flower spray by Chickypow Designs; Rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

New Challenge: Year at a Day

2007-03-23T21:41:00.000Z

Oh, I can't believe it - I have talked myself into starting on yet another long-time scrapbooking challenge! This one is with one of the digital forums and it's called "A year in my life - A month at a time". You are supposed to scrap at least 3 days in your week, preferably more, to cover anything special (personally or general), i.e. birthdays and special events, bank holidays and celebrations, vacation etc... The challenge started at the beginning of the year - so I'll have to try and work my way backwards but at the same time trying to keep up with at least 3 layouts a week of current stuff. So I sat down and made my first 3 today, for this week, and I thought I share them with you...

Credits: kit "Stay for Tea" by Amy Kropp; rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Credits: kit "Spring Flowers" by Sara Amarie; rolodex template by Cheryl McCain; Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

Credits: kit "Faith Hope Love" by Beth Nixon; brads by Kim Hill; rolodex template by Cheryl McCain;
Fonts: VAGABOND and SNELL

More Spring Stuff

2007-03-22T21:32:00.000Z

Despite the fact, that the weather isn't very spring-like at the moment (it turned to cold, frost and hailstorms since Sunday!), I feel like showing the rest of my spring flower layouts...

Credits for both above: everything from Club Scrap "Refresh" digikit;
except title which is modified from wordart from Becky at 1hour-scraps; fonts: ROCKSTONE + PORKY'S

Credits: based on quickpage by Tania Ramalho; font: STONEHENGE

Credits: template by Andrea Gold; verse by Rina Kroes; papers by Monica Larsen;
fonts: LUCINDA CALLIGRAPHY and ROCKSTONE

Change of Topic: SPRING

2007-03-17T18:45:00.000Z

Spring has been pushing in here so strongly at the moment, that I couldn't resist taking some photos of the views and the garden, and of course I want to share them with you. I love this time of year, especially if - like this week - it comes with lots of sunshine: it just makes my heart jump with joy! Here's what I see if I look out the window in my study:

Credits: based on quickpage by Bannerrwoman; note paper by Gina Huff

Credits: based on quickpage by Welli Designs

Credits: based in template by Andrea Gold; with kit "Spring Blossom" by Kris Myers

Beautiful Poinsettia

2007-03-13T14:05:00.000Z

Of course, there's no Christmas party without presents, and so it was at Woodlands, too. It took a good long time to distribute the huge heap that had accommulated underneath the "Camouflage Tree". My FIL, Bob, as the host, had the honours of picking and reading out the names, and all the kids helped him, full of excitement, by bringing them to the person they were destined for. Of course, in reality they were only waiting for their own presents, and as soon as one turned up, Bob lost another helper for a while...
I got some really nice presents this year including a lovely fluffy dressing gown and a Victorian photobook to use for some photos of our Blessing of Marriage last year, and a gorgeous specimen of Poinsettia. I'm usually useless with plants and these aren't too easy to keep, so all the ones I've had before died a pretty quick death. However, this one is still going strong 2 1/2 months later - I reckon it is stronger because it was already so big - it's about 1/2 metre high!

Credits: based on quickpage by Tracy Collins

Credits for the 2 pages above which are left+right of one LO:

based on quickpages by Valinda J; alphas by Roseli Padoveze

Credits: based on template by Kathleen Giuliano; alphas by Roseli Padoveze; kit by Stacie Harper

Boxing Day at Woodlands

2007-03-07T15:25:00.000Z

Back to our Christmas adventures of this winter - now I have some LOs with photos taken at the annual family get-together at Woodlands. Woodlands is my FIL's house and it's big enough to hold the 30-odd members of the Hudson family... Our Boxing Day parties there are always great fun - very informal with bring+share buffet, lots of games, dogs and kids running about... You can see it in the LOs today and some more to come.

Credits: based on quickpage by Monique Gascon

Credits: based on quickpage by Karla (Lifesong Creations)

Credits: template by Kim Johnson; papers + woof bones by Monti; alphas by isabelle.scrap

Winter Ade

2007-03-05T18:01:00.000Z

This is a layout with a picture I took a short time ago, in February - the first blossoms of our Japanese Quince bush (which is now in full bloom) with some rather soft snow on it. The snow lasted hardly any time at all...and now I think spring is well on its way. Welcome!!!

Credits: based on quickpage by Conny B; alphas by FDS; buttons by Caroline Bender; ribbon by Amanda Sok

Cars and things

2007-02-27T15:04:00.000Z

I suppose next in that story you would expect photos of the Christmas meal. Well, the truth is that I was feeling absolutely horrid on Christmas Day and by the time it was evening and I should have cooked the meal I couldn't face it - not even the smell of it. As a result, we just had some quick sausages, mash and peas (very traditional English meal - just not for Christmas!) and the big roast was postponed to Thursday after... I wasn't in the mood for anything much later on either, so we settled down to watch a film. We don't have a television - on purpose! - but we do occasionally get DVDs or downloads to watch on the computer, and so we did then: Disney's latest - Cars! Great fun! After that, I had an early night while Sophie and Sean settled down for their favourite computer game: Star Wars...

Credits: based on template by Jenny with kit "Cars" by digiscrap.ch

Christmas Presents

2007-02-21T16:43:00.000Z

And a bit more Christmas... After the stockings came the presents under the tree. Sophie had the honours of distributing them, and I was chuffed with the amount of well-thought out presents I received. Most unusual for me, seeing that we don't normally celebrate that way... I think the text is just about readable in the LO, and you can see the presents in the bottom picture (no, the thing in the front is not a discman - it's a sandwich toaster! - I also got an electric knife and a German type cake tin for baking; plus woolly socks and lovely German pralines).

Credits: based on quickpage by Janette Padley with goodies from Club Scrap "Ivory Elegance" kit

The Stocking Story

2007-02-19T18:24:00.000Z

I'm finally going through some more of those Christmas photos - I think I'll be scrapping and showing our Christmas until the middle of summer: there is just so many, because it was so unusual for us to do all these things. At least you can rest assured: it won't be the same again next year!
These are all photos/pages of our unpacking the stockings - they were the main attraction, particularly for Sophie and myself, because we don't have stockings in Germany - we only get the one lot of presents: the ones under the Christmas tree...

Credits: based on quickpage in Club Scrap "Ivory Elegance" kit; brad by Valery Foster; stocking by Michelle Coleman

Credits for 2-page spread: based on sketch by Alexis; paper from charity kit by Sara Carling; ribbon+tag by Amy Watson

Credits: edge by Tina Chambers; tag by Jessica Gorny; brad by Helena Monteiro; stocking by Michelle Colemanl alphas by Holly Ann

PT Notification - Heritage LOs

2007-02-16T20:09:00.000Z

Just a quick note to let you know that I've uploaded another album into my picturetrail: these are all "Heritage" pages, about my parents and their families - some are really sweet I think.
I've also added more pages into the Pets album, towards the bottom in the horseriding section.

Deck the Halls

2007-02-13T16:53:00.000Z

A bit more Christmas stuff: just another LO of our decorations - I know they were not really so special but I was quite excited about them because as I said, I haven't had ANY for so long...

Credits: based on quickpage by Roseli Padoveze; furry alphas by Toni Berman; ribbon by Jen White; font: CRATE.

Latest Project

2007-02-11T16:47:00.000Z

I'm quite excited about the latest project I've finished. Most of my scrapbooks are kind of open-ended, so to get one complete is something special. This one was a present for a friend who got married last autumn. We were invited but unfortunately, weren't able to make the trip at that weekend - still, I'd started a medium size scrapbook (8x8") for her already and really thought it would be a nice present, so I asked her for photos (which of course originally I'd expected to take myself but well...) and now, the album is complete and on its way to Germany. Below is the cover page (album front) and if you want to see the pages you can visit my picturetrail . This was my first ever small scrapbooking project - I normally always do 12x12" albums/pages - so it was special and quite an experience in that sense as well. It worked out cute I think, although for my own personal scrapbooking that size mostly wouldn't offer enough room... So I think it'll be the odd exception for gift books.

Credits: papers and album kit from Club Scrap ("Key to my Heart" and "Retro")

Finally: Winter

2007-02-08T18:38:00.000Z

Yes, at long last, winter has arrived here! It's been stiff cold for a few days now - and of course I'm complaining, that I'm always cold, but I do realise that we need the cold to get rid of some vermin... Also, I have to admit that the frozen world outside is rather beautiful, and couldn't resist taking the camera to it... Here are some results:

Credits: based on quickpage by Selena with "On a cold winter's day" kit; lace snowflake by Robin Ackler;
thermometre by Rebecca Ferraioli; ice alphas by Lauren Bavin

Credits: template by Jen Maceyunas; kit "Snowy" by Renee Peters

The Holly and the Ivy

2007-02-06T16:34:00.000Z

At long last, the next instalment of the 2006 Christmas story... Once the tree was set up, we went about the mantlepiece decoration. It was my first time ever to do such a thing, because as mentioned before Sean doesn't really like celebrating Christmas at home, and before I came to England I was not familiar with the tradition of swags and arrangements around fireplaces, and mostly didn't have a fireplace anyway!
It is very convenient that we have loads of ivy very prolific on the fences, the female type that makes flowers, and also a berry-bearing holly tree in the neighbour's garden that vastly overhangs the fence. So I only had to buy some oasis to hold the arrangement in the basket, add a candle and tie some ribbon into a big bow, and voila - the mantlepiece in style (well, it wasn't quite so easy, but I was happy with the final effect and it lasted for a good 2 weeks...).

Credits: based on quickpage by Club Scrap ("Ivory Elegance" digi kit); with swag by Tricia Oliver;
corner swag by Vickie Fernandez; and bows and holly by Jen White

PT Notification - Pets LOs

2007-02-01T20:25:00.000Z

Just a quick note to say that I've uploaded another album onto my picturetrail (link on the right). I've chosen my pet LOs because I thought you might find them interesting - it's not conclusive as there are many photos to be scrapped yet, but it gives you an idea of what four-legged or winged companions I've had: cats, dogs, horses and birds! I'll be adding to this album whenever I'll make another pet LO.

Victorian Dolls

2007-01-29T16:11:00.000Z

This is a recent little project I did for a friend at church: she had a fire in her house some years ago and these lovely Victorian dolls' dresses got soiled by the soot. So a while ago she asked me if there was any chance that I could redress them - she herself is incapable of such work nowadays because she's suffering from Parkinson's Disease (it makes you shake violently). It took me quite a while but I think they came out nicely, and Pat was so happy when I brought them back to her...

Such dolls are actually collectors' items over here: they have porcelain heads and limbs which are often made by one of the famous porcelain manufacturies like Royal Doulton or Wedgewood. These are attached to stuffed fabric bodies, onto which clothing can be sewn. The Victorian dolls in this picture have complete outfits including shifts, petticoats and stockings under their dresses. Most of them are the originals which I could rescue by washing and pressing, but some bits had to be replaced.

Credits: everything from Club Scrap "Ivory Elegance" and "Design" digi kits

PT Notification

2007-01-26T18:10:00.000Z

Just a quick hello to say that I've been working on my picturetrail, updating some of the albums and adding two albums with scrapbook pages: the complete albums of Sophie's summer holiday and of Dorothee's wedding. Do have a look there if you are interested...

Christmas Tree Add-on

2007-01-25T19:52:00.000Z

Another little page I made of the 23rd of December - an unexpected surprise upon our return from shopping... - speaks for itself...

Credits: based on quickpage by Mrs Miles + Valinda J

Christmas Revisited

2007-01-22T17:48:00.000Z

As promised, I'm going to show you a bit about our Christmas this year (well, last year but this winter). It was quite unusual in that normally Sean and I don't do anything Christmassy at home except maybe put up some of the cards we receive. But no other decorations, no special dinners, no celebrations in our house...
So, with Sophie's visit this year things were a bit different: we decided to have a Christmas tree for the first time since I came to England, and some other decorations, too, but I left them all to be done together with Sophie which I thought she might enjoy - and she did! We spent the better part of her first day, the 23rd of December rearranging things, dressing the tree and "decking the halls"...

Credits: based on quickpage by Valinda J; star frame by Xyreena

Credits: based on quickpage by Christina Oliveira; ornament alphas by Amy Watson

A London Peasouper

2007-01-16T16:02:00.000Z

Yes, we are talking weather again! I thought I had to keep it up since this year has been quite so unusual. The latest oddity coincided with the beginning of the story of Sophie's Christmas visit and it was what we call a "peasouper" over here. I actually thought those were a thing of the past and that modern technology and emission control had got the better of this feature, which means a very dense thick fog hanging heavily over the London area for days. Well, it had a comeback this year (the first time I've experienced it) just in the week before Christmas and it was really something to behold (that's NOT saying that it was pleasant): you could not see as far as across the road, and I mean really nothing, not even the shadow of a shape for the first two days. By the time Sophie was due to arrive, it had thinned a little but Heathrow Airport was still running at half capacity. Apparently, the problem was not the in liftoff or landing, nor even the air traffic, but the taxying around the runaways, where pilots could not even see their planes' wing tips!

So we spent a very sad/excited Friday the 22nd when we first found out early in the morning that Sophie's flight had been cancelled. I phoned her and it didn't look at that time as if she would be able to come before Christmas at all - so everybody involved was rather disappointed and sad. But some hours later her Mum called to say that she had managed to get a seat on a later plane and that they'd just taken her to the airport. So we started watching the Internet flight announcements again, half excited and half despondend as we read about more and more flights being cancelled again. There was still more delay but finally Sophie's plane was announced departed and we made our way to the airport. There was surprisingly little traffic apart from loads of coaches bringing people in to catch their overseas flights as all national air traffic was at a standstill... It was odd driving through the thick fog, hardly able to see anything or read signs, and I was mighty glad that Sean had stayed home to do the pickup with me. There was still more waiting at the airport as it took Sophie a long time to get her luggage (apparently there were lots of problems with missing and wrongly delivered baggage but luckily hers had arrived in the same plane!) but finally we were reunited at the gate and ... so they all lived happily ever after... (or at least we had a very nice Christmas and New Year together about which you'll hear soon...).

Credits: template and "A Brand New Day" kit by Ruby Q Hammer; wordart by Tina Williams; Burlap alphas by Lauren Bavin

Introducing Sophie

2007-01-14T16:29:00.000Z

Now you are probably curious to hear who this Sophie is whom I've been talking about in my previous post - so I thought I tell you a bit about how we came to know her. Sophie visited us for the first time during the summer holidays last year, in order to improve her English with a view of upcoming Abitur/A-Level examinations. She was the friend of a friend, who asked us whether we'd be happy to have her along for a couple of weeks - and in fact we got on so well that we were really sad to see her go, and invited her to come again in winter to sample the English Christmas traditions...
Sophie comes from a town near Madgeburg in Germany and she's 16 years old - nearly 17 now, actually. The layout below gives a few ideas of the things she does and likes and how she came across to us in summer (the photos were taken in August and the page is part of a virtual scrapbook I made as a Christmas present for her).

Credits: all parts from the Club Scrap Digi Kit "Retro"

Belated New Year Greetings

2007-01-14T16:14:00.000Z

It looks like being late is the story of my life these days - I do apologise for the lack of posts on my blog since before Christmas. Things got rather a bit on top of me suddenly with the preparations for Sophie's visit, alongside other things I had to do. Come Christmas I caught my annual winter bug - actually was too sick to cook the Christmas meal on Christmas Day (but you'll hear more about this once I get round to scrapbooking the photos!) - and then tried to spend as much time as possible with Sophie for the two weeks of her stay. We had a wonderful time again (I hope she would tell you the same!) and made a good start into the new year, too. Unfortunately, once Sophie had gone home I discovered a problem with my computer and was unable to do much with it until the end of this week - certainly handling photos and layouts was quite out of the question, and my emails and Internet connection were infrequent at best... So, well - that's my excuse! But I hope I'll do better for the rest of the year and am looking forward to telling you all about the things we've been doing through Christmas and New Year...

Credits: based on quickpage from Maddy Fernandez

The Ice Palace

2006-12-20T23:54:00.000Z

And more Christmas shopping photos - I was actually quite fascinated by all the decorations and variations and efforts made by the shop to draw people in and make shopping irresistible... One of my favourite features was the Ice Palace - an amazing glittering grotto of blue and white set up between the more traditional displays. The sparkle was difficult to ignore and we spent quite some time browsing around the fake snowy trees and the stacks of snowman soft toys...

Credits: based on qp by Dumpty (from Selena's "Silent Night" kit); snow flakes by Free Digital Scrapbooking; Ice Alphas by Lauren Bavin

Credits: based on qp by Silke (from Selena's "Silent Night" kit); Ice Alphas by Lauren Bavin

Credits: based on qp by Linda (from Selena's "Silent Night" kit); Ice Alphas by Lauren Bavin;
fibre by Jennifer Riggins; bauble template by Jess Bolton

Santa is coming to town...

2006-12-17T01:09:00.000Z

Here are some more photos from our Christmas shopping excursion to Notcutts. The Santas were all part of the traditional display as well as the main feature of the Scandinavian section whereas the Father Christmas with Rudolph could be found inside a forest of fake Christmas trees at the centre of the whole Christmas display. Goes to show how huge this whole section was (or is)!

Credits: based on quickpage from Tina Williams, with a Santa's hat from Robin Gough.

Credits: based on quickpage from Val J.

Christmas Shopping

2006-12-13T13:39:00.000Z

I finally had to admit that I could ignore Christmas approaching no longer (this was some time in November!). I had been moaning about the early Christmas displays in shops (no kidding, the first one I saw was at the end of August!) for weeks, or even months, but with the general hectic and being ill in November I then completely "forgot" to develop any sort of Christmas mood at all. I still haven't! It also wasn't until my friend dragged me out for some Christmas shopping at about the mid of November that I realised that it had indeed become time to think about presents and cards. I made a sluggish start on the latter and have to admit that any overseas ones will probably be late this year, but thanks to Eve at least I'm in good time on the presents front.
Just like every year, I was amazed by the extent of the Christmas displays and selections in some of the big shops over here, and thought that over the next days I could share some of the things I saw... Let's start with Notcutts, a big garden centre, where Eve and I did our first bit of shopping. They conveniently had put on a "Thursday Night Shopping" event at exactly the day we wanted to go. We enjoyed some delicious and enormous baked potatoes in their restaurant first (the food was great although the one-man-band they'd put on for that night was a bit of a nuisance) and then wandered through their various sections of Christmas decorations, delicacies and general gifts. This was more a feast for the eye as the prices were offputting... Here's the first instalment of piccies, taken in the traditional decorations section.

Credits: based on qp by Valinda J; tag by Alice Naylor

Credits: based on template by Amy Watson; kit by Sara Carling (this was a charity kit - do have a look on the site)

Oops, the roof is gone...

2006-12-10T13:52:00.000Z

And here's another result of the recent weather - the high winds took off part of the roof of our garden shed! Lucky that Sean is so good at fixing things - it was a nuisance, but not a major problem... (And by the way, you can see the window of my crafts-room-cum-study in the top photo - it's the left one above the shed!)

Credits: digikit "Interior Design" by Club Scrap

The Mega Puddle

2006-12-06T17:48:00.000Z

Back to the weather topic... After the wonderful autumn we had this year, the English winter weather finally struck with loads of high winds and rains of every variety. We had gales howling around our house for several nights, flood warnings and giant puddles in the road where we live. My husband, however, is happy: the paddling is good in the weirs now - Shepperton was on ten gates last week!

Credits: template by Sonia Harvy; digi kit Grafik by Patricia Eschenbrenner

November BOM Challenge on Club Srap

2006-11-30T15:38:00.000Z

Just a short entry today with not much text but some layouts I thought you might like - they are quite funny because they were for a "10 things that..." challenge that was on the Club Scrap Group this month. However, you will find that I've modified the theme slightly into "9 things" because that went with the paper, which has numbers (I highlighted them with circles) printed in the design: 1 - 9. The third layout I modified to just one thing because I don't like "brag pages" in general...
For those of you who are not into scrapbooking: "BOM" means "Book of Me", and it's all pages that somehow centre on yourself - your ideas, memories, likes and dislikes, role models, attitudes or whatever the person devising the challenge asks for (BOM pages are mostly done in challenges...). It's great fun to compare what everybody makes of it!

Challenge: 10 Things you love

Challenge: 10 Things that make you smile

Challenge: 10 Things you like about yourself

Credits: paper layouts done with Club Scrap kits "Let me count the ways" and "Autumn Splendour"; some stickers and deco brad from Making Memories; peel-offs from Crafts Creations

The Day of the Butterflies

2006-11-28T12:01:00.000Z

Okay, this is going back a few weeks and I admit that, looking out the window right now, it is hard to believe that these pictures were taken only in October. But I'm so pleased with them that I really want to share them with you, even if it is a little late.
There was one particular day when I looked out the kitchen window while doing the dishes - the view gives straight onto our herb beds and the ivy hedge which was in full bloom, and: full of butterflies. It was just incredible, there must have been 30 or 40 or maybe more of them. I dropped everything I was doing and went out with my camera for quite a while. It was amazing - the golden autumn sunshine, the warmth, and the beauty of it. The butterflies seemed almost tame: they let me come close enough for some really great photos. There were three different types: Red Admirals, Painted Ladies, and Peacocks, although of the latter I didn't get any photos, they just never got into the right positions (it's quite a tall hedge climbing the big fence to our neighbours!). They stayed there all day until the sun went down, but strangely the next day, although it was sunny, too, there were only a few of them.

Credits: based on quickpage by Robin Ackler

Credits for 3 pages: Club Scrap "Farmers Market" digi Kit

Four Weddings and a Funeral

2006-11-25T16:31:00.000Z

Or nearly so… Three of my friends had got married or had their marriages blessed within the last two months, and yesterday was the funeral of John Dunster, one of the elderly chaps in our church whom I had come to know and like at the Friday Morning Coffee Break where I frequently help. The funeral was a great big affair in our church, with four clergy attending, including the retired previous vicar who had been in service at John’s confirmation. I sang in the choir – a lot of hymns with strong descants, which John really used to like and always commented on, though I found it really hard because my throat was still sore from that cold. But it seemed fitting to sing for John’s funeral because I’d been genuinely fond of him – we’d had some very good chats and he’d always had an encouraging word or a suggestion when I did my year as Social Events Coordinator at St Peter’s, a duty that I had found truly burdensome. So yes, it feels like I’ve lost a friend…

Credits: quickpage and elements from Robin Ackler

Credits: kit "Lacy Memories" from Manuela Zimmermann; Wordart from scrapNfonts; tab from Mandie Stewart

Fireworks revisited

2006-11-20T14:44:00.000Z

Some people asked me for a bit more background on all the fireworks celebrations here on the 5th of November, and so I did some research and used it to make another couple of layouts. The photos in these are from last year's fireworks - I hadn't looked at them for a long time and was surprised by how different they are from this year's! (Compare to pages in post further down...) Anyway - the text in the layouts is too small for reading here but I've copied it all below the photos - the rhyme as well as the tradition, so I hope you'll find this little excursion interesting!

Credits: scans of paper LOs made with Club Scrap "Time & Space" kit

Remember remember
the 5th of November:
gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason
why gunpowder treason
should ever be forgot.

A Tradition Begins...

The words of the famous rhyme have their origins in 17th century English history. On 5th November 1605, Guy Fawkes was caught in the cellars of the Houses of Parliament with several dozen barrels of gunpowder. He and his co-conspirators were subsequently tried as traitors with for plotting against the government. Fawkes was sentenced to death by a form of execution most horrendous; hung, drawn and quartered, which reflected the serious nature of the crime of treason.
Beginning the following year, in 1606, it became an annual custom for the King and Parliament to commission a sermon to commemorate the event. This practice, together with the nursery rhyme, ensured that this crime would never be forgotten! The poem is sometimes also referred to as 'Please to remember the fifth of November'. It serves as a warning to each new generation that treason will never be forgotten. In England, the 5th of November is still commemorated each year with fireworks and bonfires.

Raindrops on a Spider's Web

2006-11-17T15:46:00.000Z

This will be a rather short entry as I've really got a bad cold and don't feel very creative or chatty but wanted to share a beautiful/thoughtful photo/layout with you today:

Credits: template and papers from Amy Watson

I took this photo only a couple of days ago in our front garden which is full of spiderwebs in the St John's Wort and the berry bush beside the entrance. I happened to walk out between two showers (of which we have plenty these days!) and was startled by how beautiful these webs all looked, as if they had pearls or jewels strung onto them! Had to go and get the camera out...

Going Organic

2006-11-14T12:51:00.000Z

Monday is delivery day! It’s always rather exciting waiting for my box… And what am I talking about??? Well, this:

Credits: everything from Club Scrap's "Farmer's Market" digi kit

I’ve been getting these organic fruit and veg boxes since early summer this year when I signed up following a junk mail flyer that came through my door! NOW – I’m really not the kind of person that normally reads junk mail, let alone reacts on it. In fact, they normally go straight into the bin. But there was something appealing about this particular flyer – a funny size paper with cartoon veg on it… I liked what I read on the flyer, so I visited the company’s website, and I liked even better what I read there. Their idea about weekly boxes (with a database for your likes and dislikes and a substitute system in place for things that you don’t want in your boxes…) and their ethical contract schemes and environmentally friendly principles impressed me. Things have not always gone smoothly but the service is good – every complain has been looked after promptly with money credited for unsatisfactory produce, so no problem really…

The company I’m talking about, in case anybody is interested, is called Abel & Cole – as far as I know they deliver in most of England. You can visit their website here: http://www.abel-cole.co.uk/ - even if you aren’t intent on buying, it is interesting to read about their concepts with contracts for farmers, non-airmail imports and “in transition produce”.

I must say that these boxes have also stretched my cooking ideas a bit further, since I now regularly get veggies that I would not normally buy in a shop, which then leaves me having to sort out recipes that I haven’t cooked before – and that’s interesting, too. Even Sean seems to enjoy the experiments (well, mostly…). And needless to say that the swap to organic produce and the increased amount of fruit and veg we now consume has got to be good for our health! I’m really quite enthusiastic about this (not that you wouldn’t have noticed…)…

Bookcrossers' Meeting

2006-11-09T13:34:00.000Z

Last night I went to the monthly meeting of the local Bookcrossers in the Crown Pub here in Chertsey. We have been meeting every second Wednesday of the month for about a year and half now (phew – time really is running!!!) and it’s always great fun to catch up with everybody's news, particularly of course on what we’ve been reading, what other bookcrossing meetings people have been to, and what books we have wild released or found where…and of course, to swap our latest reads as well!

For those who don’t know bookcrossing: the word was added to the Concise Oxford English Dictionary in August 2004 and described as “n. the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise”. I think the idea is great and I’ve been a member for just over two years now. If you would like to learn more about it I’ve put their worldwide website in the link section to the right: do have a look; it explains it quite well in more detail, and if you are interested you can sign up there and then (it’s free and very easy to handle). You can also find my virtual bookshelf – of course under coolboxuk – and see what I’ve been reading over the last years and what I’ve got piled up and waiting!

And here is a photo of one of our meetings – actually one of the first, in summer 2005. The group has grown since then although not everybody comes every time, so most meetings are still quite intimate in size (yesterday was very much so - we were only four!). The sitting area we are using here is behind the reception (The Crown is also a hotel) rather than in the pub – it’s quieter there and not as crowded, since our meetings often collide with “football TV evenings”…

Credits: this is a photo of a non-digi layout: everything used is from Club Scrap except the little letter peel-offs from Crafts Creations

Bonfires and Fireworks

2006-11-06T15:44:00.000Z

Yesterday was Bonfire Night here in the UK – Motto: “remember, remember the 5^th of November”… As usual, the whole weekend closest to the date is dominated by the noise and smell of bonfire and fireworks - but it is doubtlessly good fun!

Our church had an open-for-all party going on Saturday night in the wonderfully large garden of the Vicarage, with a three-course outdoors meal (soup served through the kitchen window, sausages and burgers from the BBQ and a table loaded with cakes for pudding), a roaring bonfire behind the shed and an amazing 45-minute fireworks display! As per the latest count, there were 340 people there, including a group from the local assisted-living home, and everybody seemed to really enjoy themselves! The food crew even had to pop over to Sainsbury’s to get some extra burgers and sausages…

On the way home, we were “treated” to more fireworks displays over Chertsey in all directions – people seem to have more and longer parties and displays every year! It was beautiful – that is not to say that it’s all so well: the town seemed swathed in the dense and acrid smoke and smell of the fireworks (we won’t ask what that does to the issue of Global Warming…) and the noise, when they were still going in some places at nearer 1am, was rather detrimental to the idea of sleep…

But here are some photos of the fun part: party time at the vicarage and bits of the fireworks we managed to ban onto camera…

Credits: Papers by Club Scrap (Wheels & Sprockets kit) + overlays by Suzanne C Walker

Credits for both above: papers, ribbons, blue tags by Ann-Marie Borg; other elements by Club Scrap (Farmer's Market extras)

Credits: background paper by Hummie; other by Club Scrap (Wheels + Sprockets kit); template by Jen Caputo

I probably won't have time to upload anything for the next couple of days, so watch this space again towards the end of the week - and as always: please leave your comments!!! Thanks!

Glorious Autumn

2006-11-05T13:40:00.000Z

So after my introduction, in typical English manner, I think I should talk a bit about the weather!

This year, I was really stunned with it, because it broke all the patterns. To start with, that wasn’t very nice because we missed out on those first sunny days in March that I love so much – it just kept on, raining and cold, until the beginning of June, with only a few decent spots in the first half of the year. Then it broke very drastically and I can remember the exact day! Why??? Because it happened to be the day of our Blessing of Marriage celebration, 3rd of June. I had been so worried in the days before that I would be freezing in my lovely gown and that the rain would spoil the silk. But on the morning of the day I looked out of the window and I simply couldn’t believe it! All blue skies and sunshine – it turned out to be a really hot day, the first one of the year! And it was followed by many more as the weather stayed generally nice until the end of July – even very uncharacteristically through those dodgy weather days of the Wimbledon Tournament. Just as the school holidays began it turned for the worse– poor kids, they got nothing but rain and grey! Then it brightened up again right with the beginning of the new term and we had wonderful weather all throughout September and October, the kind I was used to around my birthday time from my childhood days… There’s nothing like the colours of a glorious Indian summer, and it even stayed warm with it, right until a few days ago. The first of November brought the first frost with all the summer plants in the garden dying a very sudden death, and ever since winter’s approach could be felt: it’s coats and gloves now and you can see your breath once the sun comes down, but we still have blue skies and sunshine during the day!
Now I bet you are wondering why I’m giving you all this weather report? Well, it is SO English, isn’t it – and apart from that it made a nice introduction to today’s set of layouts… These are all photos taken only a couple of weeks ago during a trip to our local farm shop, and I really love them. They represent the glorious autumn we’ve had this year so very well…

Credits for all layouts: kit used - "Farmer's Market" by Club Scrap

Welcome to my blog

2006-11-04T11:53:00.000Z

Credits: LO made with a kit from Julia Fialho

Welcome to THE COOLBOXUK SITE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here’s my first entry into my brandnew blog – and like with all new things, this is really exciting, but also awkward… What shall I talk about???

Maybe I should tell you the story first of how this blog came to be named. Most of you probably think that COOLBOXUK is rather an odd name, but actually it has been one of my “labels” for quite a long time, and started for a reason. That was several years ago when I first got into crafts on the Internet and wanted to join my very first yahoo group, one to do with card making. I jokingly asked Sean to help me find a user ID for me and he suggested “coolbox”, because I complain about feeling cold all the time unless it’s really boiling hot! To my surprise, somebody else already had that ID and she turned out to be a lady from the US, so I added the “uk” and off it went… I have since used that same screen ID for all kinds of groups and forums, so if you ever want to look for my stuff (for example in some of the links given on this blog) just look for “coolboxuk”!!!
I think I’ll leave it at this for today. I’m aiming to write something here at least once a week, if not more often, because my idea behind having a blog was getting in touch with my friends again on a more regular basis. I do hope you’ll enjoy hearing from me this way – especially because there is the added advantage of seeing things as well because I intend to upload photos and scrapbook layouts along with my ramblings (like the one above which I made specially for he occasion).

It would be great if you could leave comments whenever you pop round, either via the blog or the usual email and I'll get back to you!!!