Cissie in Budapest & PPF

Another Friday, another Paint Party Friday, and another week of Darcy's postcard challenge, where our participants are off to Budapest.

The happy family has had a busy week. Queenie has opened her shop in Lewisham, and has called it ‘All our yesterdays’, where she is selling vintage clothes from the 40’s to the 90’s, bric-a-brac and accessories, like hats, handbags, gloves etc. The ladies think it is wonderful, and spend time reminiscing about how they loved this and that. Shannon tries everything on, and has a whale of a time. Jason watches, with his usual charm, and says, ‘Bloody ‘ell, ‘oo would want to wear old shmattes (Yiddish=rags) like that?’ ‘Yes, you always look so smart!’ hisses Queenie. Cissie and Thelma tell him that the only time he was decently clothed was at his wedding. Shannon says, ‘Leave him alone! He can’t help it. And I like him as he is!’

This week Cissie is off on her own. Thelma’s knees are hurting, Queenie is busy, and Jason and Shannon are still at it every day. I mean, of course, busy getting their new shop ready to open. Cissie has a very distant cousin at least 5 times removed who lives in Budapest, and she flies over to visit him. She hasn’t seen him since he was a knock-kneed teenie, so is rather surprised when I a skinny, bearded old man collects her at the airport and kisses her excitedly on both cheeks, making all her chins wobble.

Bálint lives with his wife Dora in a large flat in a beautiful, old Art Nouveau house in Buda. His wife is as round as he is thin, and she and Cissie have one thing in common straightaway – their love of food. The table is laden with Hungarian and other culinary specialities morning, noon and night. In between the ladies go shopping, and enjoy cakes and snacks in some of the many cafés and bakeries in the town. They take a coach tour to see the sights. The word ‘coach’ comes from the Hungarian word ‘Cocsi’ = wagon from Kocs, the place where coaches were first made.
They see theDanube River, the famous lion guarding the Chain Bridge, Heroes' Square, the Parliament Building, Fisherman's Bastion, St. Stephen's Basilica, and from Gellért Hill with Buda Castle on the left.

The Chain Bridge

The Museum of Applied Arts

Keleti Station

Buda by night

(Photos courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)

Dora shows Cissie the enormous Station, and the Doháni Street Synagoge, the largest in Europe. ‘And our Metro is the second oldest in the world’, says Dora proudly. ‘Yes’, says Cissie, 'only our Tube in London is older – we had the very first one!’ ‘Right!’ says Dora, ‘But our food is the best in the world!’ ‘Oh yes’, sighs Cissie happily. She hasn’t even missed her fish and chips while enjoying goulash, chicken paprikash, game stew with dumplings, dobos cake, strudels, pancakes and much, much more.

Cissie is sad to leave her cousins, but has enjoyed every minute of her stay in Budapest, and invites them to come to London to visit her and Thelma soon.
But as always, she is happy to be going home again. ‘The food was wonderful!’ she tells he family. ‘But the tea was awful!’ This is the postcard she sends them:

Cissie's Hungarian Delight

For PPF I just have a work in progress to show; had a nasty time at the doc's yesterday and did not feel up to much when I came home. I am still playing with my marbles. The beads have also been marbled, I am still not sure what background to use. Time will tell!

Have a great day you all, have fun and take care! Thanks for coming by!

STOP PRESS STOP PRESS STOP PRESS

The cactus mystery has been solved. A neighbour bought it for me as a little thank you for taking in his parcels!

More This and That

Yesterday when I came home from a little walk I found this in front of my door. I don't know who is it from. I wonder what someone was trying to say to me?

I spent a lot of time doing some dreaded H*******K, too. I even cleaned the kitchen windows, and put up new curtains! To get at the window I had to move the bench in front of the window, and stand on it, as my little step ladder has disappeared. (Probably those fairies again!) I hate climbing onto anything, as I often get dizzy, but this time I managed not to fall down, and the curtains look nice and fresh And while I was at it, I cleaned the floor, changed the bed and did the washing. I think I have earned myself lots of bonus craft-time after all that!

Yesterday I just managed one card, a masculine one, which I kept simple, using lots of layers and muted colours.

I will be back tomorrow with the newest adventures of Cissie and Co. Have a good day, take care, and thanks for visiting!

This and That

Yesterday we had a strange day weather-wise - a bit of everything. But in the evening, the wind died down, and there was a really pleasant sky, full of changing pastel colours. I took the photo from my balcony. My camera isn't able to catch the colours well, I use the camera on an ancient mobile phone, but I think it looks like the sky has been distressed with various TH blue inks!

I made this card for a birthday, using a card Donna sent me a couple of years back as inspiration. The recipient of the card is a psychologist, so I used a page from Webster's dictionary with different psychological definitions. I cut the bottom of the paper with a Martha Stewart punch, and layered some old ledger paper under it. The die-cut bird, ribbon and ledger paper were also from Donna, so thanks for the inspiration! And as Donna is a poor, sick little chicken right now, with a bad bout of bronchitis, get well soon!

That's all for today, have a good day, take care, and thanks for visiting!

Happy Mail and Tag Tuesday

I am happy to say I won the July Postcard Prize over at *Darcy's Postcard Challenge* for my card of Jason and Shannon in Kaiserswerth, and yesterday morning, my prize arrived, and in addition, this beautiful, hand painted card from Darcy. It cheered me up no end when I held this bright and cheerful bunny in my hands.  Thanks a lot Darcy, it will be treasured.

And that was not everything. In the afternoon I got a mail from Gecko Galz, to say that my dear friend Diane had ordered some wonderful sheets of images for me, with 2 sheets each of steampunk, Autumn,  Monet and card-toppers - wow! What a wealth of images all at once, and a wonderful surprise, thanks again Diane.

At Tag Tuesday this week the theme is 'Funfair'. I have once again made a dimensional tag. I found  a nice image on 'Free vintage Digital Stamps', which I printed out 3x. I fussy cut two of the images, leaving a strip of paper on the side to take the adhesive, and put them together to form a merry-go round. I coloured the sky with blue before cutting it out. I mounted it onto an empty ribbon spool, and covered the white plastic rim with green flocking powder for grass. From the third image, I cut out 2 of the individual images, and decoupaged them, to give it more depth. Then I just added the streamers. It will be given to a friend together with a book about the circus,

It was, as always, fun to make; I will go to almost any lengths to make a mess and avoid H*******K!

Have a good day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!

Grungy postcards & Happy Mail ready to post.

Hi everybody, here's wishing you a good week. Hope you have all enjoyed your weekend. I have spent my time doing lots of crafting to get my mind off other things. I made three French themed postcards, using ephemera, vintage images, tissue tape, Inka gold, stamping and crackle varnishing, and lots of sticky fingers!

The three 'backsides' are all more or less the same

 

And here are some envelopes, large and small, waiting to be sent out into the world!. Hope they get to my *winners* soon.

.

And as it's Monday, a joke from Narda to send us laughing into the week:

My trip to the store

There was a bit of confusion at the store this morning. When I was

Ready to pay for my groceries, the cashier said, "Strip down facing me."

Making a mental note to complain to my congressman about Homeland

Security running amok, I did just as she had instructed.

When the hysterical shrieking and alarms finally subsided, I found

Out that she was referring to my credit card.

I have been asked to shop elsewhere in the future.

They need to make their instructions to us seniors a little clearer!

Okay, that was it for today. Have a good day, take care and thanks for visiting.

Marie distressed

Hi everybody. I have at last managed to alter my mouse-trap for the challenge at Out of a Hat Creations. It's a very strange thing to alter, and I did not really like playing with this little murder machine. Perhaps that's what me think of Marie Antoinette... I printed off some Marie images, and then went to work. I removed the dangerous bits from the trap, cut the image to size, and glued it down. Then I painted it with clear varnish, before using a 2-component crackle varnish on it. I used the indents on the trap to elevate her head, and put the nasty metal part behind it, after winding some silver ribbon onto it. I used some turquoise roses, some of which I sprayed with silver, and a matching butterfly for decoration. To finish it I used some silver seed-beads to frame the head.

The second trap has been turned into a note pad for the kitchen. I distressed and stamped a tag, which I glued on to make the background. The tag is a bit longer than the trap, so I can use the eyelet at the top to hang it up. I embellished it with a vintage image, a TH branch-tree, painted silver, and some butterflies. The posy of the girl has been glammed up with blue beads. I cut some scrap card to size, and snapped them under the trap part, and I can remove them one at a time as I need them. Now  I just need to hang a little pencil onto it

I used the rest of the Marie images glued to  some biscuit box card to make the book-mark tags. The images have all been distressed to within an inch of their lives, using my crackle varnish again. Now they look almost old enough to hang in the Louvre.

I am also linking to the 'Alter it' Challenge at the Stamp Man Challenge Blog

That was all for today.  Thanks for visiting, take care, and have a great weekend.

Japan and PPF

Today is Friday, so it's time once again for Paint Party Friday, hosted by Eva and Kristin,  and Darcy's Postcard Challenge, which is all about Japan this week.

This last week the family has been enjoying being together again, having the usual discussions, and of course, eating – especially their daily fish-and-chips. Shannon and Jason tell about their all the wonderful sights they saw in Malta.
‘You mean you actually left your room now and then?’ Queenie asks. ‘Of course they did!’ says Thelma, ‘They had to buy us our presents!’ Each of the ladies got a glass vase from Malta, and Queenie got a beautiful glass mobile with birds to hang in her new shop. Next week she will be opening it. Jason and Shannon have started getting their new shop organised, too. Jason is selling vintage comics, magazines, newspapers and toys. He has given up on finding a real Picasso! Shannon keeps sorting out things that she considers as junk, and Jason sneaks to the dustbins every time to salvage them when she is not looking. ‘Bloody ‘ell!’ he says, ‘Typical woman! Throwing away things that will bring good money!’ Shannon laughs. ‘You would have to pay good money to get people to take  them!’
‘You ain’t got no idea about antiques’, he says. ‘Just leave it to me! You’ll soon be occupied with other things!’
Cissie and Thelma are off for a day out with their friends to tell them all about South Africa, and Queenie, Jason and Shannon decide to visit the Japanese Garden in Holland Park. The weather is lovely. They have a quick breakfast at home – tea, cereals, rolls, toast, eggs and bacon, and then set off to the Tube Station. They don’t want to eat too much as they are planning to have a Japanese breakfast at a restaurant near the park before they go exploring. Queenie sits between them on the tube, as she does not like them snogging non-stop in public. But they at least manage to hold hands behind her back.
The breakfast is quite different to what they had expected. They are served grilled mackerel, dashimaki eggs, and tofu in kaminabe ( a paper pot), and of course rice, and Japanese tea.

Shannon says she prefers their usual breakfast at home, but loves the tea. Jason does not like the tea, he compares it to ‘horses’ p*ddle’, which makes both ladies make furious grimaces and tell him to shut up….
Thus fortified, they stroll through the beautiful park till they come to the ‘Kyoto Garden’. It is quiet and green, and very beautiful. They sit at different places to admire the views, the lakes, the waterfall, and of course, the fish pond. Jason is impressed that the  fish are so large. ‘Bet they wouldn’t taste bad fried!’ he says, and is once again told to shut up by the ladies. ‘What have I got myself into?’ he thinks. ‘Four women to boss me about, I need an evening out with my mates!’ But he doesn’t dare to mention it.

In the evening they go to an elegant restaurant, where they enjoy a selection of sushi, tempura - battered and deep fried seafood and vegetables, and yakitori – grilled chicken. The ladies drink tea again, and Jason enjoys sake. They set out for home feeling very full up, tired, and happy.

(Photos courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)

This is the postcard they send to Cissie and Thelma:

(The postcard shows a card I made for a challenge 'staged' on my balcony)

 For Paint Party Friday I have lost my marbles!  I spent an afternoon this week trying heads in marble technique. This one fell back into the paint after it was finished, and got a second layer through the middle. I didn't like it at first, but now my 'accident' has grown on me. The marbles have been cut from marbled scraps.

Here I was just cleaning my paint-roller. I think I was working off some frustrations with it, this has not been a good week.  I added the stamped tulips to soften it a bit.

Have a good day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!

And the Winner is.....

Hi you all!
I am pleased to announce that I successfully managed to write down the names of all who entered my little giveaway, found my battered summer hat in the shoe cupboard (?), and pulled a name. And the first out of the hat was..............................................
Jan of Jan's Arty Junk, who has won the Paris themed matchbox.
Congratulations, please send me your snail mail addy - my mail addy is on my profile.

And as it was fun, I decided to pull another name. This time it was Karen -  Missy K, and she will be getting the second matchbox which I showed yesterday. Congratulations.

And I decided to award three little consolation prizes. The next three names out of the hat will each get a postcard and a bookmark,  and they are: Suze, Lululiz and SusieJ. Please send me your post addies if I don't already have them!

Thanks to all who took part, sorry not everyone could win! I will get the prizes out to the winners next week.

Have a great day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!

Another grungy box

Hi everybody! I was able to do a bit of crafting this evening, and finished off the second *antique* matchbox. Made it more or less the same as before, ( see here) but used tissue tape for the inside edges instead of ribbon. I re-used an old greetings card for the front and back images.

The sides have been made again with tissue tape, treated with Inka Gold and then varnished. You can still see the brown strip for striking the match, and a picture of the match shining through the tissue tape, an effect I liked very much.

The inside image is once again from Gecko Galz.

I am linking again to recycle, re-purpose and re-invent.

It kept me occupied this evening, and that was a good, as I have quite a few problems on my mind just now.

Have a good day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!