Sicily

Last week I was away in Sicily. Sadly we took the weather with us, however we had a great time. Here are some photos for you to enjoy.

Below are the wall paintings in the ballroom of the hotel and it also had a 20 foot gorgeous chandalier. Unfortunately all the lights were switched off. We just sneaked in to take some pictures hence the pictures are not bright enough.

 The churches are all beautifully decorated

 Inspite of the weather the scenary was stunning!

 A local food and veg market.

 The Greek temples were imposing and beautiful.

 Some of the mountains had still snow on them.

 Toarmina was a beautiful place and this is the Greek theatre. It was absolutely stunning. If you ever go there don't miss it.

 There were lots of cactuses and one of them was in full bloom.

 We had planned to go up Mt Etna. We drove half way up but were defeated by the weather.  As you can see there was a lot of snow on the mountain and the fog was coming down thick and fast so we decided to return back and not risk going up further. It was rather disappointing as I wanted to see the crater but I guess this time of the year was not the right time to visit it anyway.

 Packed snow on the roadside. Look at the bluish glow. That is the first time I have seen that .

 There were evidences of the lava flow everywhere. It looked like such a desolate place. Yet there are villages on the foot hills of the mountain and on the southern slopes as the ground is so fertile. I don't know how people live there with the constant threat of the mountain errupting. The most recent erruption was in 2009

 On our way back we saw some beautiful sunset.

 This was on the way up to Erice which is a small medivel town on top of a mountain. The view down below from half way up.

 We did not spend much  time here as it was foggy cold and started sleeting heavily. Walking down to our car was a nightmare as it became like an ice rink when it started sleeting and snowing. On a warm summer's day it must be a delightful place to walk around and explore the narrow streets.

 Someone's  delightful courtyard from outside. I could have taken a shot of the inner garden but did not want to intrude



Two steps forward one step back

I made some progress with this doll of mine. I think she will be ok once I paint her. I made her arms and legs as well but I think I will have to make them again as I feel they are rather short. I like long limbs for my dolls so I have got to do that and then look for a nice fabric for her body.

 I the meantime I cannot believe that I spent so much of time beading this skirt and the beading is not even nice. Although I like the fabric a lot, I decided enough is enough and off with the skirt lol! She looks a bit decent now. Shall finish her soon I hope. 

Head burnt

Yesterday I was trying to make a flower and some other bits and bobs out of polymer clay to embellish my brown cloth doll. While I was at it my fingers started sculpting a head as I thought of killing 2 birds with one stone as it were. But unfortunately I burnt the head as you can see. My oven obviously doesn't maintain the temperature that it is supposed to on the dial. I had to keep fiddling with the dial to keep it up to the right temperature and the result was I burnt it from the top. So the lesson learnt is cheap ovens are no good for this sort of thing. However since I don't do that much of polymer clay work I think I shall manage with the oven I have. Just have to find the right no. on the dial to get the right temp. Next time I shall try covering the sculpt with baking paper on top so that it doesn't get burnt. As for the flower that I sculpted it looks rather weird so I am not going to use it or show it. I have another idea in my head so shall see if that will work out.

I would like to thank all of you for all the colour combination suggestions you have given to me and I have gone with purple/magenta which picks out the colour from the green fabric.

I would also like to say this to you all that I am finding Google reader rather tiresome to use, and I found out that bloglines is still operating under a different name. I tried to transfer all my feeds to the new site but unfortunately it only transferred a handful so now I have to go and do it one by one. I shall get it all up to date so until then please bear with me for not commenting or visiting you blogs. I shall get there eventually.

Look what I won!

Just before Christmas Natalie Hamade had a free give away in her blog. When I wrote a comment I didn't even know she was doing a draw so I was blissfully unaware of it and that I had won a give away until Natalie wrote to me. It was such a wonderful surprise and that too to have won an art piece of Natalie was so awesome. I had to ask Natalie not to send it to me until I got back from my vacation. I was not prepared to lose it amongst the Christmas post. Today I got her little parcel and I was just so thrilled to have won this beautiful pin. I have always admired her art and to have won something of hers is just too awesome. Natalie thank you so much I love this pin and will treasure it always.

Dilemma!

I have been doing faces and trying to finish the brown doll which has been lying around since ages.

 The problem I have, is her costuming. I never usually have a problem with that but for some reason I just cannot decide on her colours and costuming. I started off with her skirt but now I am finding that the colour I chose is a bit dull and I want to brighten her up a bit. The brown top looks good in the picture but it actually dulls the colour in reality. The blue perhaps may be ok but I am not sure if really matches the present colours. I may have to add more blue to the skirt to be able to use the blue for the top. What do you think. Or I might try the purple or magenta, as the skirt is two toned with a hint of purple in the green.

Back now

I am back now and trying to catch up with all the blogs. I have not been able to post much during the last couple of months of last year mainly because I have been travelling as well as life has been happening. So let me tell you I away for a week in Brno in Czech Republic before Christmas. They say a lot of things about mad dogs and Englishmen but I am not mad or an Englishman but still I must have been rather mad to go out sightseeing in temperatures of -9 in Brno. But I did and to tell you the truth I just enjoyed it even though it was so very cold. The cold there was so different to the one we have here in England. I don't have many pictures to show because it was too cold to get my hands out to take a picture but here are some for you to see.

Patrov one of the Cathedrals.

 Walk in the woods on the way to the castle and it had a true winter wonderland look even though there was not much snow.

 In the castle grounds

 A dungeon in the fort

 The fort was used by Germans troops during the occupation and here is a piece of their transmitter, you can see the tiny swastica at the bottom.

 There was a delightful Christmas market in the town square

 and it seemed as if the whole town turned out here in the evening to drink warm wine and hear the children sing carols.

 After a week of staying in temperatures in the minus I was in plus 29 degrees in India the following week. Whew that was a huge jump.

Went for a day trip to Pondicherry

which was at one time a French colony.

 I bought some absolutely yummy handmade papers from here.

 Then I went for a few days to Goa. View from the hotel room

 Early morning walk on the beach

 and I loved these patterns on the sand formed by the tide.

 One of the many Churches of Goa and this one has a mummy of one the Saints St Francis Xavier I think. They bring him out every 3 years and it is a big event in Goa when that happens.  No wonder the condition of the mummy is deteriorating.

 It also has many beautiful painting which I am sad to say are almost ruined because they have not been preserved properly. These monuments are supposed to be taken care by the Heritage of India trust but it doesn't look as though they are doing much to preserve these beautiful treasures.

 View from a pier and I don't know how those kids got down there looks very risky to me.

 This is a fort in Goa. As you may know the Portugese landed here and made it their port. They mainly traded in spices, and came here as traders and left as traders. Vasco De Gama who first landed here actually had gone in search of America but he landed in India! I am sure he never regretted it.

 Some school children going on an excursion. I thought they looked so colourful.

 It was a glorious sunset.

 It gave me such a surprise when I saw this board in Goa lol!!

 The highlight of the trip for me was when I spotted a dolphin swiming along with the barges in the backwaters while having lunch in one of the hotels. I just couldn't catch him on camera. Can you see that little patch of ripple below the big ripple that is where he went down and he was having a great time swimming along with the boats and barges.

 This church looked so magical in the twilight with the wedding group coming out that I had to take a picture.