Another beautiful day ...

... weatherwise.  It can't last much longer - or can it?  I'd planned to do some of the dreaded 'h' word today while Paul was at his pre-op assessment but he sat out front of house waiting for the transport to arrive and I went out to keep him company for a while.  The 'while' ended up being a weeding and tidy up session in the garden but instead of me commenting on how it 'needs doing' every time I go out there, it's now done!

Trimmed the lilac and brought some indoors.  Hard to believe that this bush was cut back to the ground just 4 to 5 years ago.  Seems to have done it the power of good.

Transport arrived, I finished the tidy up and then decided to bake some chocolate chip cookies.  Cheated though :0)  Last shopping order had a couple of packet mixes in and one was .... chocolate chip cookies. Haven't used a packet mix in years (mind you, until very recently I've not baked in years *grin*).  Probably not much quicker than doing them from scratch and certainly no cheaper but I was curious.  They made a lovely dessert with some vanilla ice cream this evening .....

Suitcases are out of the top of the wardrobe but dimensions for hand luggage are smaller than last year (different airline) and mine's too big :0(  I put it right with the purchase of another, smaller, overnight/weekend case with dimensions that Ryanair accepts so reckon every other airline out there will have no problems - *lol*  Now I need to sort out what I'm taking to Bali and start my packing.  I want it done by Tuesday evening, all bar the last minute bits :0)

Now ..... I'm gonna show you what we did in Jane's FPC class last Friday.  Was it Friday?  Time passes so quickly nowadays and it goes quicker the older I get.  I do have some very morbid thoughts sometimes.  Can't help it but they creep in.  I've become very aware of my own mortality.  It started when I reached 50 but has got worse as I've gone more years past that.  Mostly I don't think about it but just sometimes those thoughts creep in, especially recently and I can only put that down to losing our friend Barbara so suddenly and at such a comparatively young age.  Anyway, morbid thoughts to one side and back on track with post!

Friday, yep, checked calendar and it was Friday, spent the day at the Glitterpot in the company of some lovely ladies and Jane Gill making poppies and a form of clematis (I thought Montana variety but what do I know?)  The poppy came from Leone Em's latest book.  I swear that lady likes to find theeee most difficult way of doing things - *lol*! Anyway, I love the flower but there's something not quite right about it as a poppy to my mind.  I think that the 2 back petals should be much larger and practically meet one another and the 2 slightly smaller ones lay on top.  I kept trying to pull the petals together more but they wouldn't go and, since having it home I've Googled poppies and the pics I've found seem to bear that out.  If I ever make the flower again I may well play with the 'design'.  Whatever, I still like what we did and the finished card ....

Clematis

All the flowers started as white 80gsm copy paper and then coloured.  The poppies were coloured with diluted acrylic paint and the clematis? Well, would you believe it, I can't remember! Yet another senior moment. I remember an ink pad and a toning pen for the stamens but can't remember how we coloured the petals but guess the ink pad was involved somewhere along the line else why have it? Poppies took all morning to make and half the afternoon to put card together. Clematis took no time hence didn't quite gel in the memory but you get the idea.  If you don't like to colour you could always use a coloured paper ... for both the flowers - *lol*!

Update:  I've remembered!  We used a dauber and dabbed the colour on. Sheesh!  P'raps I'm not so daft after all *LOL*

Thanks for dropping by .....