Summer time

Sitting with the fan on. Eating strawberries

While my dog keeps me company.

The garden bursts into a kaliedascope of colours.

Weekend in Spain

I was away in Spain for the weekend and I had a lovely time. The weather was hot infact I found it a bit too hot. I seemed to have lost the ability to tolerate heat after living in England for so long. Anyway I have some photos to share. This is birds eye view of cloud formation from the aircraft. I am always struck by the beauty of cloud formations from up above. They are so dramatic.

Birds eye view of land below.

We stayed in a small and very quiet village in Alicante. This is the street at night. Notice there is no traffic at all. It was a Sunday but there was a fiesta taking place on the next street where families were have a nice time but still no traffic. People just walked to the fiesta as I imagine they all lived close by. It was lovely to see that even this day and age there is a community spirit where people get together and there were kids of all ages playing and the parents sitting and just chatting and having a meal together.

This was the only historical building in the village. It is supposed to be some sort of palace but unfortunately I didn't get the opportunity to go inside.

I saw these succulents and the shoe flower while walking in another town aren't they lovely.

We had to take a trip to the beach even though it was extremely hot. I always wonder how people can actually lie down face up towards the sun when it is so very very hot. Even I who is from a hot country and I am dark, cannot tolerate such intense sun light, my skin simply burns inspite of putting sun blocks. Surely it must be worse for people with light skin and they must be putting themselves in danger of skin cancer just for a little bit of tan. Well that is what I think anyway.

There were lots of sand castles on the beach which were made I guess by this man and who was looking after them constantly spraying them with water. They were all lovely.

Foot steps in the sand. Isn't the sky and the sea a beautiful colour. I love that blue.

These pictures of the sunset were taken while travelling to the airport. The pictures actually are no where near as beautiful as it actually was. I took several of them but none of them seem very satisfactory to me. I shall show you just these 2 which I think were the best of the lot.

Progress on Pandora

This is how far I have got to with my Pandora. I have a feeling I will have to reglue the arms again with a different glue as I feel that super glue is not good enough to hold it properly. I have to also repair one of her fingers which I managed to break. But for present just a few embellishments and she is done. I didn't do the Monday challenge as I didn't have anything interesting to show. I know you must have got fed up with the flowers but these bloomed after a heavey shower last night and I thought they look lovely so I wanted to share.

All done

I have finished this painting. Couldn't get it uploaded yesterday as too many things were going wrong. Firstly my camera was not working properly then the computer got invaded with viruses ,thankfully a friend who looks after our computer was able to sort it out last night. Anyway here it is. I tried to follow the book as much as possible but I did not have any of the distress inks or the paints that the author has used but I used other stuff instead. I used a lot of metallic rubs where ever she has used ink pads. The paint colours are slightly different as well but I think that is what art is about. To use what you have to create art and this turned out ok I think. I also did not use the method of making the heart as in the book as I thought it was easier and quicker to use paperclay to make the heart or I guess any other airdrying clay would do even though I did have the plaster. Then I had to add those dry flowers to cover up some mistakes which looks ok but in the picture it doesn't seem that nice.

What I am doing

This is what I have been doing. I had bought a book by Kelly Rae Roberts and was trying out a project from that. I am making this for my niece whose birthday is coming soon. Hope she will like it. There are one or two spots I need to cover up which I will do with something. In the project she says to use alcohol inks with paint. For me it didn't work very well and then I got those blobs where the ink sort of didn't spread. It does disappear rather quickly so one has to be very quick in mixing and applying. Also I think I went over the paint too much so it has become a be too blended which was not the idea. Oh well this is all new to me as I never do this sort of artwork so I guess I am learning. One thing I do like about this sort of art is you can finish it quickly.

Dottees arrive!

Our Dollstreet doll club did a swap on Dottee dolls. I am so thrilled to receive these Dottee dolls. They are lovely and I am a proud owner of dolls each made by Julie R.Gausvik, Dot Lewallen and Kat Tyni. Thank you so much and thank you to Judi for arranging this swap.