Wednesday 29 August 2007

Longer time no blog!

It is ages since I wrote anything on here!

Since my last entry, Lizzie and I have booked tickets to see the first night of Hairspray in London, and we have also got tickets for the three of us (Frank, Lizzie and me) to see a play at the Derngate and Royal in Northampton in about 10 days time. It apparently takes place in the whole theatre. I believe the audience moves around - the Derngate, the Royal and the bar! Should be interesting!

Katie has finally got her computer and is now able to update her blog on Life in Purdue, so if anyone reading this wants to read what she is up to, the follow the link on the right!

We (F, L and me) are off to Paris tomorrow and will spend some of Friday, Saturday and Sunday in Disneyland and then we will return home on Monday. Hopefully there will be an update on that when we get home!

Friday 17 August 2007

Long time no blog!

I cannot believe it is almost two weeks since I wrote on here! Where does the time go?

A lot has happened since my last entry. Katie, Lizzie and I went to see Hairspray, which was a very funny film. We want to go and see the stage version which has Ben from the Joseph show on BBC playing the lead role and Michael Ball playing the mother!

Katie flew out to Purdue on Monday 13th August and arrived safely at the university on Tuesday. We are having great problems buying her the laptop she needs as there is a problem with the Apple website not accepting UK credit cards, but this is a long story which I will not go into!

Lizzie got her A level results today and she is thrilled with them. She had been told she would fail her Geography but she got a D and that included a B in one of the papers! Her other A levels were both grade C - one was Drama and the other was Philosophy and Ethics. Her AS Music was a grade D too (another long story as the Music teacher was new to A level teaching and didn't prepare them properly for the written paper!). She is really pleased with all her results as she now has 3 A levels grades C, C and D and 3 AS levels, also grades C, C and D. She will now start applying to universities for next September to study Performing Arts. She is especially pleased with her performance grade in her Drama exam as she was given 83 marks out of a possible 90.

Tonight I went to a scrapbooking crop for the second time. Last time I managed to stick 3 photos on a sheet of paper in 3 hours and that was all. At least tonight I managed to complete one page which was an achievement!


I have also completed the second page of my journal (I know - I am VERY slow) - Things I love. Now to decide which prompt to follow next!

Sunday 5 August 2007

Name page

I finished my name page in the sketchbook today! I decided I didn't want to do much too it as the lettering took up quite a lot of the page.



Now to think about the next page!

Anniversary

Yesterday was our 23rd Wedding Anniversary. Frank bought me some wonderful earring and I bought him some binoculars. Katie and Lizzie have something coming by mail but it has been held up with the strikes - so we get a second day of pressies so that will be good!

We went to London in the afternoon as we had tickets to see Lord of the Rings and before the show we ate in Carluccio's restaurant at Canary Wharf. Really lovely Italian food!

If anyone gets the chance to see Lord of the Rings on stage in London, it is brilliant. It has had mixed reviews but we thought it was excellent. Get there early because there is pre-show entertainment by all the hobbits and at several points in the show the cast intermingle with the audience. Naturally most of this happens in the stalls, but a couple of the cast did go up into the circle.

The way the stage moves is very clever with different levels rising and falling and rotating. The guy who plays Golum is also really good. A really good evening's entertainment.

Friday 3 August 2007

Name Page

I only had 4 letters to find adjectives for! I thought it would be easy! In the end I decided on Broadminded, Right!, Encouraging and Nosy.

So far all I have done is add the words to the page. I now need to think of something else to add to the rather plain page!



Tomorrow is our 23rd Anniversary and all four of us are going to London to see the stage show 'Lord of the Rings'. I have heard mixed reviews but I am expecting it to be good. I will get back to the sketchbook Monday evening, hopefully, as I have to go back into work on Monday!

Stuff

Last night I went to my first ever Scrapbook crop. It was a fun evening and in 3 hours I managed to stick 3 photographs to a sheet of paper. That was it! Nothing fancy, not even matted because I thought they looked better straight onto the paper. I looked around the craft warehouse where the crop was held (20% off everything while you are there) but couldn't find any letters that would go well on the page and nothing else that took my fancy either. Back to the computer I guess for a title and then try to find some suitable embellishments to decorate what is a very plain page. My excuse is that I had an awful headache and when I did get home I went straight to bed. These crops are held every two weeks and I will definitely go again but I know to go better prepared with exactly what I want to do, rather than just some odd photos and a few bits of paper. I have also signed up for an all day crop at the same place on 15th September, which will be just before the new term starts at college. I know I have to have lots of stuff prepared to do that day!

This morning I got a couple of magazines that had been sent me by the Gay Switchboard in Colchester. I had contacted them to see how an old friend of mine was - I had lost touch with him a couple of years ago and sadly I discovered he had died in December. The magazines contained photos of him and an obituary written by one of his many friends. Such a shame!

Wednesday 1 August 2007

Sketchbook Journal

Trish has suggested a sketchbook challenge!

After buying a sketchbook we were to colour one side of the first five pages in different colours. I decided to use different techniques for the colours.

The first is Twinkling H2Os in two shades of light blue.
The second is DTP using Pearlescent Crimson Brilliance inkpad.




The third is brayered using a rainbow Big and Juicy pad in Waterfall colour (blues and greens).
The fourth is simply two shades of brown acrylic paint.




The fifth is DTP using Tangerine Chalk inkpad.

Now we wait to find out what we need to do next!