Travels near to home

 As you may have gathered if you visit my blog regularly I love to travel and see new things......while I do love to travel to places far and wide I also think we should appreciate what is on our own doorstep!
So today a friend and I headed to CHEDDLETON which is near LEEK in Staffordshire.......the reason for this visit? To go to St Edwards church....pic above!

 Inside this church is a most beautiful stained glass window by the pre-raphaelite artist EDWARD BURNE-JONES.
Three panels with angels with red wings!

 Edward Burne-Jones was a friend of William Morris and a partner in Morris's company.

Another friend of Morris was Thomas Wardle who was a silk importer, dyer and printer in nearby Leek and William Morris who believed in only using natural dyes, spent three years at the factory learning dyeing techniques before he started his own famous company........you may wonder why I'm rambling on about silk dying but there is a connection with the church! The chancel roof is painted with symbols significant to the local community......one of these is a plant called the Wild Madder which produced a dye used by Wardles company to dye silk fibers. This also leads to the next connection...........

 Wardles wife Elizabeth was given some of these dyed threads and asked to devise a method of embroidery to encourage the use of the silks. In 1879 Elizabeth founded THE LEEK EMBROIDERY SOCIETY .....it became well known for large church embroideries........and there was a beautiful example on display in the church.......I apologise for the poor pics but the embroidery was behind glass and the light from the windows behind did not help! I hope you can see how beautiful it is.

 I hope you don't mind me rambling away about all this stuff.......but I find it fascinating and I hope some of you do too!!

Mum was a dress maker

I grew up with

because

 she was also a

 and an

 I just bought this BIG dress form stamp......this page is A4 so you can see how big it is......and it prompted a lot of childhood memories.......my Mum used to make bridesmaids dresses.....I remember people coming to the house for fittings......once the dresses were made of red velvet and we had red dust for weeks! This dress is stamped on canvas!

 This page already had "stuff " on it.....been there WELL over 12 months, didn't like it much, couldn't decide what to do with it.......can you see the doily? looks almost like cogs......and the hole protectors? I worked over them, they added to the texture!

Yesterday.......

I went to London and met up with a friend. 
We had a full day planned that started in the British Library looking at an exhibition called OUT OF THIS WORLD Science Fiction but not as you know it.......it was really interesting, well worth a visit.........I have postcards so watch out for a journal page coming soon!
Next we went on to TEMPLE CHURCH....it's just off The Strand....this was our third attempt at visiting this church and it was finally open! This is the church featured in Dan Browns Da Vinci Code film, but that's not why we went! It is a medieval church built by the Knights Templar and has an unusual round nave......that's why we went!!

Next on the list was The London Review Bookshop in Bury Place right next door to Blade Rubber Stamps........now this sounds very worthy and while I do love a good book shop (which this was) the other reason to go there is that they have a coffee shop attached with THE MOST YUMMY cakes ever!!!!
Then just across the road to THE BRITISH MUSEUM to see their latest exhibition .....TREASURES OF HEAVEN......which was fantastic....lots of reliquaries.
By this time we were hungry again so we headed to COVENT GARDEN and an Italian restaurant called DA POLPO........yummy veggie (meat) balls and spaghetti!!
PHEW!! Time to head home..........I discovered my ticket home was FIRST CLASS......not planned, it was just the cheapest option......but very civilised......sandwiches, crisps, cake, tea/coffee and glass of wine......perfect end to FABULOUS day!!

To use red, yellow and orange......

is the challenge presented by KAZ on STAMPOTIQUE DESIGNERS this time.

 I took a slightly darker take on the theme than most of the other DT members......I was going to apologise for that but then decided it's just the way it is!!
 I used NETHER(6073) and WINTER(6053) both quite dark characters!! Also CIRCLE BORDER(9136)and BLA BLA BLA(6991)

I found the quote in a magazine and it just seemed to fit somehow!

 STAMPOTIQUE stamps are available in the UK from THE STAMP ATTIC

Do you know where you are?

 Do you ever get that feeling when you wake up that just for a few seconds you don't know where you are? Just lately I have had that feeling quite a lot! Not only do I not know which bed I'm in but I lie there wondering which house/apartment I'm in and then which country!!

 I'm hoping it will get better as time goes by and I settle back into home here in UK!

 This page shows how my head feels sometimes!! LOL The doily over the mouth is there for no ther reason than I drew around the mouth then didn't like it so needed to cover it over!!!

One of the things that is helping me settle back in at home is my garden........this plant is doing particularly well........

 

......so I cut some and took it into the house!!

A hoard

 This is my first proper blog post in 2 weeks!! On one hand I have missed blogging but I have to admit that the break (even though it was un-intended) has been good!!
I am now more or less settled back in at home here in UK and my husband is heading back to work next week so I am looking forward to getting back to more regular creating and therefore blogging.

While he was home one of the things we did was to go to Stafford to see THE STAFFORDSHIRE HOARD......a fabulous collection of Anglo Saxon gold and silver unearthed in a field near Lichfield.
This seahorse, which in real life is tiny, was one of my fav things.

 I used a leaflet from the exhibition as the background for my pages, cut some pics from a couple of postcards, adding some stencilling and stamped some words.

 Making these pages set me off on thinking about what makes a journal.....again!!! I mean does using leaflets and postcards from the exhibition make this more a scrapbook than a journal??? What do you think?? 
I don't really mind what it's called......art journal or just journal or scrapbook.....whatever it is, it's where I have fun, catalogue things that make me happy/smile/remind me of days out etc etc

 I've been asked a few times what I use for my large lettering.....I use these (and other sets) foam stamps that I've had for EVER!! I love them dipped in paint!

SORRY..........

for the lack of activity on here just now!!! What with moving back to UK, boxes arriving and unpacking them, decorating kitchens, fixing leaking showers and now a few days away in Suffolk things have been a bit hectic!!!

Normal service will resume as soon as possible! For now I'll leave you with this fun pic I took on Saturday!

Anyone 4 tea?

 Today is my day for my official piece of inspiration for ALTERED ALICE!

ALTERED ALICE!

 

 This month we are sponsored by ONECRABAPPLE Etsy shop.......she has some quirky collage sheets (and not just Alice!) and is offering 5 collage sheets to the winner.

 The challenge this month is to use a teacup or teapot in your piece.......I used both!!

ICON

 This is a piece I started while still in Kazakhstan but finished here in UK. It is made using an embroidered piece I bought in a haberdashery shop in Almaty........I have a liking for icon style images!

 I used a cut out of the cathedral to stencil the outline around the embroidered piece and then across the other page.

 I like this orthodox version of a cross.

Our packing boxes with our stuff from Almaty arrived yesterday, way sooner than we expected so my house now looks like a bomb hads gone off while we try and fit everything back in! 3 trips to the tip later.....the crap you keep is amazing!!

Tea things

I do try to vary what's on my blog but it just so happens that it's ALTERED ALICE challenge time again so there are two Alice related pieces one after the other....apologies for that!

 This is not my "official" piece of inspiration.....that will appear next weekend.......but I like to make a piece to announce the challenge.......and it gives me a reason to play with Alice...like I really need one!!

 This month we are sponsored by ONECRABAPPLE Etsy shop.......they have some unusal Alice related collage sheets.......the winner this month will have the choice of 5 of their collage sheets.

 Answers on a postcard please!!!!!

Chapter 1 and a new challenge blog

 Today sees the launch of a new challenge blog run by LILY from THE OCTOPODE FACTORY.......THE OCTOPODE FACTORY FRIDAY CHALLENGE.......... I was very pleased to be asked to be the first guest designer.

 The first challenge is ALICE!!!!!

Seeing as this is the FIRST challenge  I decided to use the FIRST chapter of  Alice in Wonderland as the inspiration for my journal pages.

 All images used are available from THE OCTOPODE FACTORY as digital download images. For the challenge you don't have to use The Octopode Factory images but if you do you will be enterted into a prize draw!