A trip down memory lane to Horniman's Museum

On my husband's actual birthday last Monday we decided to visit a museum that neither of us had set foot in for nearly 50 years! As a child I lived in Peckham, South East London and 2 of my cousins lived at Forest Hill right next to Horniman's Park and museum. My brother and I spend countless days playing in the park with our 2 cousins. Those were the days when you went out to play and only went home when it got dark.

We were so lucky with the weather, it was cold but gloriously sunny. I looked up at the old part of the museum and the memories flooded back.

 This original part of the museum opened in 1901. If you are interest this is a link to the museum web site 

However with lottery funding there are now 2 fabulous extensions. 

 The gardens are gorgeous and the old band stand has been restored. When I was a child in the summer on a Sunday seating was put out and a band played to the gathered audience.

 The view from the summit of the gardens looks right out across London. When I was a child there was no Shard to be seen! Now the city is clearly visible in the distance.

Inside the old part of the museum still looked just as it did to me as a child but things have had a lick of paint and a tidy up. Even the old stuffed walrus is still there!

There are treasures from all around the world.

We had a delicious lunch in the Victorian conservatory

and visited the aquarium which although it has been completely modernised has an original "aquarium" from the Victorian era.

How delightful is this?

It was full of sweet anemones. 

There were other fantastic tanks too.

and yes some of my favourite sea creature, sea horses.

We had such a wonderful day and before we drove home we took a further trip down memory lane driving past my old family home and childhood haunts.

My card is one inspired by this gorgeous museum and Victorian era in which it opened. I used one of my treasured Tim Holtz paper doll and used a gellprint background from my stash. Extra stamping including the sentiment are from my Visible Image stash.. The world die is also by Tim Holtz..one of my favourite ever dies.

I could imagine this being a young Frederick Horniman, thinking about his future grand tours around the world where he would be able to buy artifacts to share in his amazing museum.

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges;

Pixie's snippets challenge #370
Through the craft room door 1/3 anything goes
Creative fingers 1/3 anything goes

Thanks so much for stopping by and for taking the time to leave your kind comments. Have a lovely week ahead. I am off to meet my dear blogging friend Brenda at Wisley today and enjoy the latest splendours Mother Nature will share with us here..and yes my camera is packed.

Back soon,

Bue for now,

Jane x

January celebrations

We had a lovely time celebrating my Hb's birthday last Saturday. Our big and small babies all came over and the sun shone all day.

We managed to go to see and feed my Dino ducks late in the afternoon. Daisy and Jack are delighted that some will take food from your hand. 

Here are some of the sunny photos from Beddington Ponds. 

 This sweetie I have named Ringo and Daisy thought she only had 1 leg until I showed her that she was just resting!

 In the evening we had a party tea and cake of course. Jack helped his Dan Dan blow out the candles!

For my Hb's actual birthday on Monday we visited an old haunt which I will share with your very soon.

As I showed you my Hb's card on Monday my card today is a general birthday one, for sale at Dotty'sTeahouse, SM5 2AE. I have used some of my fab STAMPlorations stamps and a CUTplorations die.  They are clear embossed in my distress ink background. I made the  candle myself and added some stars and glitter to finish.

I would like to enter it into the following challenges;

A bit more time to craft 3/3 anything goes
More mixed media 3/3 anything goes
As you like it 3/3 anything goes
Craft stamper take it make it 2/3 January
The house that stamps built 1/3 anything goes
Through the craft room door 1/3 anything goes

Have a lovely weekend ahead and thanks as always for stopping by and for the kind comments you take the time to leave me.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

A jazzy birthday

Good morning it is my darling Hb's birthday today so we will be off out to lunch to celebrate. We held our family party tea on Saturday which was lovely. It is always so good to get together. I made him a cake, no elaborate decoration this time, I save those for the grandbabies and "special" birthdays only now.

 Everyone likes a slice of my Victoria sandwich which has to have raspberry not strawberry jam as our family tradition.

Sending everyone a virtual slice 😍🍰😄

It is also time for my fortnightly design team make for Visible Image.

I decided to make my Hbs birthday card using some of their fab music stamps as he is learning to play the piano and is really sounding pretty cool! In the end I made 3 cards as I had a fiddle around with designs.
The products I used were;
Jazz it up

 Sing

 the clutch of stars from Rock out

and the birthday sentiment from Go to words set

Also these stencils; Distorted chess

and Strobes

This is what I got up to using these distress oxide inks. 

I made an inky, drippy background on mixed media card.

I then added vintage photo oxide through the distorted chess stencil

and also the strobes stencil. 

Then I stamped some of the stars using chipped sapphire.

After I was happy with my backgrounds I stamped the music stave using tulip red Versafine Claire and then red glitter embossed the singer.

On the other 2 backgrounds I red glitter embossed the jazz players.

I also stamped out the keyboard a few times, the birthday sentiment and then cut everything out. 

I then put my designs together. The one below is the card I gave my Hb.

Here are all 3 of them.

and one last shot.

The music stamps really do make great cards for men or women. 

I would like to enter my cards into the following challenges;

Craft stamper take it make it 1/3 January

Uniko 1/3 anything goes/cool winter colours

As you like it 2/3 anything goes
Allsorts 2/3 more than a single word sentiment
Addicted to stamps and more 2/3 make your mark
A bit more time to craft 2/3 anything goes
More mixed media 2/3 anything goes

All the Visible Image links are listed below

Visible Image group page on Facebook. Our friendly Group is here ...it would be lovely to see you there. You will see lots of gorgeous makes by the DT and customers to inspire your own creativity.

The main Visible Image Facebook page is here; there are regular giveaways...open world wide.

Their Instagram page can be found here

  Pinterest  here

And the shop web site is here; where all their gorgeous stamps and stencils can be purchased.

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

And a little heads up...shhh don't tell anyone but there is an awesome new Visible Image release coming your way very soon, stay tuned 😉

More love for Country View challenges

Good morning it is time for my 2nd design team piece for Country View challenges to hopefully inspire you to join our current "love" challenge.  So we would like to see all your love themed creations and one lucky randomly selected entry will receive a £20 gift code to spent on the website. 

All the details can be found here. 
I decided to use the same Tim Holtz dies as I did for my 1st Janurary piece which you can see here if you missed it. My first piece was a very layered piece, this time I decided to go for a very clean and simple card.
The stamps I used are from Have I told you set from Visible Image which also has some lovely heart stamps with the super sentiment.

I die cut the clock and the hearts using black inky mop up and red card.

I stamped my favourite sentiment from this set in black and the large heart I red glitter embossed/

I kept the card very clean and simple and just blended on a little distress ink.

I then added the stamped the same heart stamp in blue ink

Finally I added the clock face and the red die cuts. Here is my finished card;

with a close up;

 I hope I may have inspired you to join in with our challenge. You can use any stamps/products, the choice is yours.

I would like to enter it into the following challenges;

Dragonfly dreams 3/3 anything goes

As you like it 1/3 anything goes
Allsorts 1/3 more than a single word sentiment
Addicted to stamps and more 1/3 make your mark
A bit more time to craft 1/3 anything goes
More mixed media 1/3 anything goes

You can enter our challenge as many times as you like and combine with other challenges. There is also a £20 crafting voucher up for grabs to the lucky randomly selected winner to spend over on the Country View Crafts on line store. Remember that UK postage and packing is absolutely FREE! Once again all the details for the January challenge can be found here. 

Bye for now,

Jane x