Greenwich in January

I wrote most of this post and then managed to loose the whole lot...I joke not. I  came to edit it yesterday and managed to erase it...despite me closing it double quick it has saved as empty! I have attempted to re write it but probably the original was better...grrrr. Luckily the photos are saved in my Picasso album so I was able to restore them.

Here are the promised photos I took during our recent visit to Greenwich on my Hb's birthday. It was a glorious sunny day, one of only a few this year. I have decided to divide my photos into 2 posts and show The Old Royal Naval College (ORNC) today and then another time the Royal Observatory and Meridian Dockyard. It was such an interesting day. If you ever have the chance to visit London, Greenwich should be on your must see list.

We took our local train to Blackfriars and then changed to the tube. Blackfriars has been shrouded in scaffolding for many months but has finally reopened and the views of the River Thames from there are marvellous.

 We took the tube to Tower Hill station and emerged to see The Tower of London glinting in the sunshine.

 From Tower Hill we walked across to catch the Dockland Light Railway (DLR) which we took to Cutty Sark. I love travelling on the DLR, it goes through some really cool London sights including Canary Wharf.

 My Hb and I have not visited Greenwich since we were children and we were really impressed how the area has been developed, it used to be quite a dive 40 years ago.

 The Cutty Sark has been fully restored following the fire and now rests in an amazing glass dry dock.

 We walked via the High Street to the the ORNC which stands on the original site of Greenwich Palace, one of Henry V111's favourite palaces. It was built in the 1660s and was designed by Sir Christopher Wren of St' Paul's fame. The buildings are so iconic. The parts of the college which have been opened to the public are also free entry.  The College was open in my lifetime and was originally a hospital for old or injured sailors. It closed as a college in 1998 and is now a top visitor attraction. This was the entrance to the chapel

 The amazing ceiling inside

 We then walked over to the Painted Hall.

 and were blown away by  what lay behind these doors

 How incredible is this for a dining hall. It has been called the finest dining hall in Europe and I certainly agree. The body of Nelson also lay in state here after his death at the Battle of Trafalgar.

Just stunning.

So my card challenge entry today needs to have a vintage theme and is a gift tag and paper set I made for my Hb's friend's 50th birthday. I used my one of my  LOTV fabulous statements stamp which I embossed with green embossing powder. I made an inky background with torn pages of a book and lots of frantage for some sparkle. The tag sentiments are also LOTV from their tags le jardin sentiments. I added some twine and ribbon to finish it off.

I simply stamped onto brown paper with green ink.

and here is the finished paper and tag. The recipient really loved it.

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

Lili of the Valley anything goes
Fashionable Stamping tag along
Pan Pastel UK anything goes
Ribbon Girl anything goes
Dream Valley No designer paper
Artistic Inspiration anything goes
Crafting from the heart anything goes/fancy folds
The Squirrel and Fox use embellishments
Make it Monday linky challenge #176
Party Time Tuesdays anything goes
Stampin for the weekend anything but a card
Rhedd and Rosie anything goes
Simon says stamp anything goes with twine or string
Oldie but a Goodie Recycle I have recycled some pages of a book (it's the Tale of Two Cities!) and my old are all my LOTV stamps which I won last June (I still pinch myself I won!)

So here we are at the very last day of January and as I type yes it's still raining. It is now officially the wettest January since records began and it shows no sign of drying up yet. The forecast for this weekend is high winds and yet more rain. The only good side of this is that I need no excuse to craft.....I hope everyone else is keeping dry and can carrying on crafting too. We also need to finish off painting our kitchen. Our gardens are going to have to wait. I have another Guest Design post on Monday so do pop back to see what I made for Lexi's Creations new Challenge.

Thanks for visiting and I would also like to give a very warm welcome to my newest followers, it's fun having you here. Please feel at home. Thanks everyone for the lovely comments you so kindly leave, I really love reading them.

Back on Monday,

Bye for now,

Jane x

PS I am sure my regular bloggers want to see how my darling granddaughter Daisy Jane is coming along. She will be 12 weeks old on Monday.......she is just a total delight and is even managing some 8 hours stretches of sleep at night...woop woop for my daughter and SIL!  These are some photos I was sent this week and she's coming up to stay again with her Mummy next week as her Daddy has to work in Dubai for a week...woop woop for Nana ;0)

 Hello from Daisy

xx