Swallows and Stars

I've just finished another card commission! My brief was to make a wedding card to go with the theme of 'Stars and Swallows'. It took me a while and lots of searching for images before I found the perfect picture ... on a tattoo site! Yes, somebody somewhere is sporting the central image of my card as a tattoo - I hope they don't mind me pinching it!

I thought the image was sort of victorian so searched for ideas for victorian weddings cards. A lot of the results came up with lacey border effects, so I found some paper doily craft strips on ebay which have made the perfect backdrop to the image. I found a lovely heart border punch at the weekend, so started off the card by punching the design down the front right hand edge.

I thought I would bring  the card up to date by adding some bling so set about attaching some flowers the same colour as the background, but with different coloured sparkly centres. Some pearls and a few more sparkles dotted here and there, and a 'wedding' banner finish it off nicely.

Fall back

Musee d'Orsay - Paris

One of my favourite days of the year.  The clocks go back an hour and I get to spend a little bit more time in my bed having delicious dreams ;-)

Horses for Courses

It's been a very quiet week.  I was back to work on Wednesday, and had my 'rolling programme' course on Thursday.  This consists of 3 sessions:   Health and Hygeine, Inanimate Loads, and Fire Procedures.  We're required to do them once a year and they used to be presented at different times, but thankfully someone came up with the idea of putting them all together in a morning's session, which is much better.

I've also signed up to do level 2 AMSPAR training, which is an 8 day course to improve my knowledge of medical terminology - I get study leave for this, although most of the modules fall on Wednesdays which means I will be using half a day of my own time - but it should be worth it.  Starts in February and finishes in June.  It should be good for my brain!

I need to check the registration date for the next OU course that I want to do as well, I think it's November sometime - I really don't want to miss the deadline.  This will also start in February - so there should be plenty to keep me occupied in the new year.

Bakewell

There was me thinking I'd finished all of my galavanting this holiday, when Becky reminded me that I had promised to go out with her for the day today as it's half term. 

So we had a drive out to Bakewell and lunch at the Famous Bakewell Pudding Shop - one of our favourite eateries in Bakewell.  They've recently extended downstairs and  had a collection of Christmas decorations and pressies, and a whole section of  alcohol, jams and preserves - all made locally.  So I bought a couple of christmas pressies for folks and a bakewell pudding to bring home for Simon. 


There's a new Apothecary shop opened where the sweet shop used to be so we had a wander in and I got a delicious honey bathbomb and a small china heart shaped dish for the bathroom.

The town was heaving with folks, it being half term, market day AND the sun was cracking the flags - so it was a bit of a squash getting into some of the smaller shops.  We looked at drum books in the music shop and I spotted a gorgeous Mandelin hanging on the wall.  Hmmmmm!!!  No I can't play.  I can barely remember a few guitar chords despite having a full blown acoustic Fender sitting in my living room.  I really should dig it out sometime soon.  But the mandelin can't be THAT much different to the guitar.  Can it??

Busking in Bakewell

Anyway, I should really put such things from my mind, I have a million and one craft projects to be getting on with and can't be going off at a musical tangent on a mere whim.

Colourful Cafe Advertising

A cornocopia of books

Apart from a food shop tomorrow and a wedding card commission - I'm hoping that I get a chance to relax over the next day and a half before I'm back in work again.  For some reason once October hits, things seem to be manic and non-stop until Christmas - it happens every year and I have no idea why, there doesn't seem to be any rhyme nor reason to it.   And it always catches me unawares!

You have to smile though!

Rochdale

It's been far too long since I had a decent night out or drank half of my weight in alcohol (ok, so I exaggerated the latter).  Knew last night was going to be a good one though, it always is when we meet up with the Stockport lot.  The Stockport lot (not to be confused with the Stockpot Lot which are more to do with hearty winter stews) are Paul & Sheila, Andy & Sally and Steve & Julie.  The fellas all worked with Simon quite a few years back now at Stockport Council and although all have gone their different ways now career-wise - we've always kept in touch.  We tend to have 2 get togethers a year, one camping expedition including kids (that are of an age to still appreciate camping and don't yet find hairdryer and straighteners essential - which now that I think about it, is only the lads) and another autumnal trip to a cheap hotel deal weekend in various parts of the North West of England.  

This year we get an extra trip as Paul and Sheila  were celebrating their 50th and 40th birthday's respectively, and also their son Lewis has recently turned 21.  So we all made the trek to Littleborough (near Rochdale) for the celebrations.

We booked in at the The Rake Inn for the night before wandering up to the Conservative Club (yes, I know) where the do was being held.  Hotel was lovely - it's a tapas restaurant that does accommmodation at the back.   It's a 16th Century building and is purported to have a ghost of a 'laughing cavalier'.  I did see him having a sly smoke in the garden outside our room, but that turned out to be a stone statue and the effects of a couple of pre-party glasses of wine.

Great night had by all though - I took some photos of the room (see below) - because it was so nicely renovated and would have been cheap at twice the price.  I gave up on photos after that point though as alcohol only aids the wobbly picture syndrome where I'm concerned so I cut my losses early.

It never ceases to amaze me that no matter how many years go between hearings, but there are some old disco songs that are indelibly imprinted into my psyche enough for me to remember most of the words to.  Low point of the night however, was when a highly recognisable song intro started and I exclaimed, 'oh I love this' only to realise it was Reach for the Stars by S Club 7.  Oh the shame.

Some pics of the accommodation:

Our accommodation for the night

Hobbit sized doorway

Most comfortable bed.  Ever.

Making ourselves at home

There may be some very dubious photos of me appearing on Facebook in the coming days or weeks, but these should just be disregarded as an imposter who looks a bit like me.

Occupy LSX

I've been following the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations quite closely since they started and decided to take a trip down to London today in order to see how things were at Occupy London Stock Exchange.    Out of convenience the media are calling this movement 'anti-capatalist' and whilst there are some demonstrators who would certainly like to see an end to capitalism, I think it's a misleading to say that this is what the demonstration is about.

There are many factors at work here but I think bottom line is that some people are fed up with the unequal distribution of wealth, worldwide really.  That whenever there is a recession, it is always those at the bottom of the pile who end up paying dearly for it - through cut-backs which lead to job losses and a fall in the general standard of care all round.   At a time when the normal person in the street is forced to tighten their belt, the rich appear to be immune to the effects of recession.   This cannot be fair. We see that government officials have fingers in corporation pies, and conclude that they are just rubbing each other's backs while the general populace is left to go to hell in a handcart.

So you have those who are demonstrating for a fairer society.

We have students demonstrating who are facing an even deeper debt-laden future as university fees are poised to go up dramatically.  We see politicians becoming part of a coalition and doing dramatic u-turn's on their own party's policies (Lib-Dems were against increasing university fees).  These students are our future, and we want to weigh them down with impossible financial burdens before they are even in the workplace.  That isn't right.

We have a government wishing to make sweeping reforms in the NHS - we have whole departments in local hospitals reduced from 60 odd staff down to 6, and once again valuable nursing staff having the humility of having to apply for their own jobs.  If they don't get a place on their current level their options are to apply for lower banded jobs, or leave.   What sort of society have we built that we allow footballers, musicians and actors to reap huge financial rewards for the right to entertain us, whilst the essential roles of nurses, fire fighters, ambulance staff etc., are blatantly disregarded and amongst the first to suffer from our government's 'tightening of the belt' policy.

That isn't anti-capitalism -that's just plain unfair and it really is time something was done about it.

So because of these and other issues I found myself on a long bus journey to London this morning.  As the media are only reporting the controversial issues of the demonstration, all had been quiet for the past few days so I didn't know whether or not there were still any demonstrators there to go and register my support with, or whether they had all gone home.  I took the gamble knowing there is always plenty of things to do and see in our capital so it wouldn't be a wasted journey whatever the outcome.

It was a cracking day weather-wise as I walked along the embankment with the dome of St Paul's drawing me closer.   I was pleased to see around 200 tents erected outside the cathedral and a bit of a pow-wow was in full flow on the plaza at the bottom of the cathedral steps.  It was hard to tell how many of the folks gathered there were tourists, visitors or genuine demonstrators, but there was a healthy throng.

The camp itself was well organised with refuse and fire facilities and an info tent and working parties set up to deal with all aspects of the demonstration.   The site itself was a little cramped and it was difficult to take part in a discussion going on outside the Star.Books (a pun on the Starbucks shop which was in the background) tent without tripping over other tents and one of my impressions was that they really needed to either relocate to a bigger site, or set up camp at a second site if they wanted more people to join them.  Even just psychologically the lack of space outside St Paul's would put off more people being added to their number.  I have since read that they are to set up a second camp at Finsbury Square, which can accommodation up to 400 tents.

While it is more a forum for discussion about how to move things forward, than a series of demands, I did feel that they should be engaging passers by with either a hand out of their manifesto (which was displayed in various parts of the camp) or in conversation - a bit of a wasted opportunity, but maybe one that they can address in the coming days or weeks.

At the end of the day, real change will come when enough normal folks like you and me decide that it's about time we took a stand for what is right.

Here's a  few photos that I took from the camp - the rest are in my pix.ie account which you can find here

Snickelling in York

I've taken a few days holiday to tag onto my week off and decided to get myself out and about for a couple of days whilst Simon is working and Becky at school.

I decided that I would get the train up to York today and did a bit of a google search on 'ancient York' as I wanted to find some parts of the city that I'd not seen before.

York Station

The search came up with a book called 'Snickelways of York' by Mark W Jones. Snickelways is an amalgan of the words snicket, ginnel and alleyway and is used to describe the various passageways and alleys throught the city of York. The book has been written in true Wainwright style, by hand, and is a great map of howd to get around the cente of York using mainly Snickelways.

Having decided this was just the ticket for my day in York, I got myself a copy and then set off to discover York as I'd never seen it before. I really enjoyed myself traversing the various passageways with such wondrous names as Mad Alice Lane and Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma-Gate. Some of the passageways held wonderful discoveries and hidden gems such as the 15th Century Holy Trinity Church on Goodramgate and the Roman Bath pub whose cellar houses the Roman Bath Museum where you can see excavations of an actual roman bath. And have a spot of lunch!!

The whole experience took me 4 hours although this included a half hour break for lunch and frequent stops to read the book for directions and information about each little place it took me to.

Whether you've never been to York before or think you know it like the back of your hand, I'd definitely recommend the book and also a chance go Snickelling. You can do the whole lot in one fell swoop as I did, or little bits of it at a time. I will admit that I didn't have a lot of energy left for shopping afterwards, but a half hour rest and liquid refreshment at The Hole in the Wall soon remedied that!



More photos here

Saundersfoot

Simon and Jack

Prince

All Is Grace

I really didn't mean to read it all in one sitting, honest, that wasn't my intention, but I just couldn't put it down.

It's definitely one to go on the savoury list though.

I'm a big fan of grace.  But I don't always accept it for myself.  Or practice it on others.  But I know it's important.  I know it has the potential to be big and  life transforming and I really should spend some time thinking about this a bit more.

SERIOUSLY

IN NEED OF

SOME

LIGHT

RELIEF 

or

chocolate 

A Night to Remember - Naomi Smith

Becky and her friends organised a gig night at the O2 in Sheffield.  The event was to raise money for P.A.C.T. (Parent's Association of Children with Tumours and Leukaemia).  They did an absolutely brilliant job of organising the evening and raised over £900 for the charity, on top of paying for the venue (which they got at a reduced price, thank you O2!!).

There were 4 solo acoustic artists and 3 bands, who were all really, really good, and over 150 came through the door on the night. 

Huge success and I'm extremely proud of Becky for pulling this off.

And relax!!!!

Keeper - Andrea Gillies

I've just finished reading this.  It's a true story, taken from Andrea's diaries, of caring for her mother-in-law, Nancy who has the mid-stages of Alzheimer's Disease.  It's heart wrenching and you feel for both Nancy and Andrea as they struggle to manage the illness from their own perspectives.

From Amazon:   Can our personalities be taken away from us? Are we more than just the sum of our memories? What exactly is the soul?

Three years ago, Andrea Gillies, a writer and mother of three, took on the care of her mother-in-law Nancy, who was in the middle stages of Alzheimer's disease. This newly extended family moved to a big Victorian house on a headland in the far, far north of Scotland, where the author failed to write a novel and Nancy, her disease accelerated by change, began to move out of the rational world and into dementia's alternative reality.


This book is a journal of life in this wild location, in which Gillies tracks Nancy's unravelling grasp on everything that we think of as ordinary, and interweaves her own brilliantly cogent investigations into the way Alzheimer's works. For the family at the centre of this drama, the learning curve was steeper and more interesting than anyone could have imagined.