Isle of Wight in September

I took a Barnes Coach tour to the I o W with a friend and we had a fantastic week. The weather could not have been better, especially when you consider the summer we have had.

Our room overlooked the sea and we saw the sun rise on the horizon each morning. The first morning I looked out at about 6.30 to a rather misty effect and thought we were in for a rather dull day, I turned round to make a cup of tea and suddenly my friend was shouting my name and telling me to come and look. Well I have never seen the sun rise like this before, it was balanced on the horizon and was as red as could be, a good time to get the camera out, I only wished I had caught the moment when it was half way there, but I needn't have worried every morning it was the same and we never tired of it.

We had trips out in the coach Tues, Thurs & Friday which was very pleasant we didn't have to think where to go or which way or worry about traffic. Tuesday was market day in Newport so that was our first port of call, I managed to get a hat that fitted me, that's a rare occurrence so I had to buy it. We ate ice cream and generally enjoyed the day.

On the Wednesday my brother and sister in law, who were also on holiday on the island took us both to Ryde, then the I 0 W lavender place and finally to Butterfly World. I found that so fascinating and have wanted to go to such a place for a long while as it is a brilliant photo opportunity

Thursday saw us at Alum Bay, our driver had told us that there was a chairlift down the cliff face to the beach and that it was scary and he wouldn't go on it again. Well that was a challenge I was not going to ignore and it was a thrilling and exhilarating experience. No one else would come with me so I took my own photo of myself and then turned the camera at the scenery.

Friday we went to Godshill and Sandown, not so impressed with either of these two places, Godshill is too commercialised and Sandown didn't seem as nice as Shanklin where we were staying.

All in all we felt privileged to have had such wonderful weather and such a gorgeous view from our bedroom window

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Scrapaholics

We had a super scrapping day yesterday it was our 1st birthday and we decided to have an all day crop. You can see from this photo just how many of us made it to this special day's event.
We were amply supplied with lovely papers and cardstock and embelishments by Scrapajacks who brought so much of the stock with them we were spoilt for choice and I spent quite a bit of money too.

I managed to do three layouts there which is pretty good for me. The first one of my two cats Rudi & Tabatha. For this one I use a Pencil Line sketch 48


This next one is of my husband as a toddler in his mother's arms. I couldn't think of a title for this and Jools came up with this one Safe in my mother's arms. I would love to have used the whole of that but it was a bit too big so I used the shortened version.


The last one I used the sketch drawn by Sandie Sorry that I don't seemed to have done this excelent sketch justice but I will try again to do a better one. If you want to see Sandie's original layout here it is



thanks also to Sandie for the patterned paper, by this time the shop was closed and the paper I had brought with me just was not working right

Finding a Hat for Ethel

Hi thought I would just muse around here for a while. I have done a layout for the midweek Mojo challenge using only what they put in their recipe

1) 2 different ribbons

2) Doodles

3) 4 flowers

4) white cardstock

5) Black cardstock

6) Bling (shiny stuff)

7) 2 photos of me

8) Scalloped edge on something

So this is what I have come up with I chose to do a digital layout cos that is what I am happiest with

these hats came into the Jeremiah Sale today and I couldn't resist trying them on and of course taking a photo of me in them. At the end of the morning needless to say they had not sold but I was talking to a customer with the beige one in my hand and she said this which really tickled me.
"That hat has character it would be just right for my scarecrow, she is a lady scarecrow and her name is Ethel."
I'm not making this up that is truely what she said.
Well say no more that had to be scrapped didn't it. lol

Sunday Lunch

I love going out to Sunday Lunch, that is one day of the week that I really don't like eating on my own.

When my John was a live and the children were at home that was always a family time, we ate around the dining table on Sundays, sometimes much to the children's annoyance if they wanted to watch something on television, but I loved it. A time to catch up on what everyone was doing, to share and to really enjoy a meal.

Usually one or twice a month several of us ladies who are all widows get together to have a meal, and today was one of those occasions. We went to the carvery at the Devere hotel in Swindon, we have been there several times and always have a superb meal. Plenty of chatting and sharing as well as eating. Thank you ladies for making Sunday Lunch time an enjoyable experience again.

Well what have I been doing since I came home? scrapping of course. I have now done two pages for my Swindon Album, the first I did yesterday is just the front page, today's contribution is about the greenery in the town centre.

One of the challenges I do every month is the book of me challenge and this month we had to ask a family member to describe us and make a layout using that description. I asked both my son & daughter to do that in just a few words, and was near to tears when I received the lists, especially the one from my son.

Here is the resulting page