ROCKING YOUR WORLD FRIDAY - 44TH OF 2020

 Good morning lovely people tis Friday time for 

So as you will know from last week's post we were away last week, so this week you get the enjoyment of seeing what we got up to (as this week has been wall to wall work and trying to get back into the grove) 

So first up a trip to Brinkburn Priory, it surprised us as the church was intact despite Henry VIII dissolution of the monasteries, reading up afterwards it appears it was repaired in the Victorian era as it wasn't completely ruinous unlike some of the abbeys and monasteries around the country

The inside was beautiful and the stained glass absolutely gorgeous

The rear of the church and you can see the church on the left and the manor house built with some of the outbuildings on the left, although they used the original monastery footprint for the cellars.  The house is in ruins inside as they had a significant dry rot problem and I'll be honest, the church building and the half remaining cloisters were far prettier. 

then we toddled off to Newbiggin by the sea, to see their sea sculpture

The maquette to the statue is on the sea front, so we found that too

And managed to get a photo of the maquette and the statue in the shot, the artist is Sean Henry who did the man on the hill at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

The following day we went to Belsay Hall Castle and gardens, it was a lovely day, very peaceful walking through the quarry garden and we loved the smell of the candyfloss tree that is grown quite prolifically here and smells at this time of year of burnt sugar

The hall and castle are always a beautiful sight I love the warmth of the stone.  We couldn't climb the tower due to the times we live in, but we did enjoy the solace, the fresh air and time with each other. 

Tuesday saw us visiting Alnwick Castle, always a favourite as it was used for filming Harry Potter in the first two films.  This particular wall is the one the Ford Anglia flies over in the second film for anyone interested. 

We also went in search of Professor McGonagall's room as we wandered, not sure which one it is.  

Alnwick has also been used in the last transformers film as well as a key filming location for Downton Abbey and it is still lived in by the family that own it. 

Wednesday and we headed to Bamburgh Castle, despite the fact that it is one of the most iconic castles in the country we didn't actually get a photo of the exterior.  Again still lived in by its current owner, I must admit to admiring this amazing ceiling inside. 

We also were due to visit Dunstanburgh castle but as you can see the rain was pouring, we got half way along the path to it (as that's the only way to get there) and had to admit defeat and turn back, so this is as close as we got! 

Thursday was our penultimate trip out and we'd opted for the beautiful National Trust house of Cragside with its surrounding gardens, built during the Victorian era by an Industrialist, it is always such a delight, originally this was moorland which he planted out its hard to believe that it hasn't always been woods. 

Final day back to Alnwick but this time the gardens, designed and built in the year 2000 they really are amazing, we spotted this lego sculpture of the gardens on our way in

And here is the grand cascade in all its glory

Absolutely beautiful day just missing some blue skies but we managed to dodge the raindrops

So as you can see we had a lovely holiday away, thankfully it was last week and not this week, because had it been this week we'd have had to cancel as our local area is now in a local tier 3 lockdown, which means no moving in and out of the area amongst other things. 

We arrived home bright and early on Saturday, said 20 year old had been home alone all week working on his university stuff, so he was grateful for some company and it was fabulous to catch up. 

The rest of the week has been washing, drying, work etc but I'm definitely grateful for the break last week, it was very much needed! 

I hope you've had a good week too, if you fancy joining in, pop a post together, come back and link up and we can come and visit. 

HI YA

This layout still makes me smile.  We were on our way up to the entrance to Alnwick Castle and hubby stood on the Hagrid hill (see earlier post for reference to this), we were having a strange conversation when we realised hubby was trying to take a photo - only me and my sister noticed and as you can see - her surprised expression was as a result of her saying "Hi ya" - hence the title! 

STORIES

Alnwick Gardens have these fabulous fairy tale sculptures dotted around the garden and you all know how much I love a good sculpture.  We managed to get most of them photograph, but I particularly loved the Frog overlooking the water and the glass slipper on the pumpkin!

TREE HOUSE

Morning all, well this time last year we were enjoying the beautiful coastline in Northumberland, one of these trips was to Alnwick and they have the most amazing tree house to explore (its also a restaurant) - it is such a magical place to visit and explore!  

Hope you are having a great Sunday! 

BEING HAGRID

Morning all, this layout documents the raised embankment by the walkway up to Alnwick Castle, this is where they placed Robbie Coltrane when filming Harry Potter to give the giant perspective of Hagrid.  When we visited last year I explained this to my sister, who insisted that we are stand and try 'being Hagrid' 

A fun family day out in a great location! 

Hope you have a splendiferous day! 

WATER

This layout was based on a brilliant sketch 

found over on the Scrapthology blog click the link below for the post in question. 

Sketch Link

I honestly didn't think I'd get the sketch to work - so many photos required in such a tiny space, but I must admit it was brilliant at using photos that were less than perfect.  You know the ones you've had printed and aren't quite sure how you are going to use them as there are objects and unknown people in the way! 

I usually have my photos printed almost 5" x 7" so you can imagine how much 'cropping' has been done to get these to work, but it was also a great summary of the day and what we'd seen! 

The layout documents our day at Alnwick Gardens last summer - such fun and so beautiful! 

NATURE

Sometimes it is good to stop and smell the roses.  Picture taken last summer at Alnwick Gardens, the rose garden was breathtaking beautiful and filled with the most exquisite perfumes.

This particular rose was my favourite as the colour was so rich and vibrant! 

This was one of those layouts that I wasn't sure would work.  The paper was from a cheap range at the local discount book store and whilst it was beautiful in its own right, it didn't quite do it for me.  Hence adding the less than perfect (but that's OK) hand stamped border and then 'colouring in' with a sharpie pen to make it a little more detailed. 

I added the little rose embellishments, hand stamped the title and noted where we were.  A simple layout to document a great day! 

THURSDAY - FUN, EXPLORING AND LIFE

Good morning all, well this morning's three layouts (two using yesterday's colour scheme), this first one based on squares lots and lots of squares.  Photo taken on said niece's 16th birthday where we had a fun family day trip to Mablethorpe and yes they did swap seats midway round! 

Next up exploring the tree house at Alnwick Gardens, it is such an amazing building but totally random, particularly when you end up walking through someone's office to get to the top section! 

And finally an evening walk on the sea front at Seahouses, made us stop and absorb the view!

Have a great Thursday people! 

ROCKING YOUR WORLD FRIDAY - 33RD OF 2015

Morning lovely people, tis Friday which means only one thing - it's time to reflect, take stock and look at the happy moments from the last 7 days, this week you get a double helping as it's more a reflection of the last two weeks.

First up these two - utterly amazing people, having great fun playing pool whilst we were away - hysterically funny because we have a full sized pool table at home that no one ever uses, which I've threatened to get rid of for quite some time!!

We had a fabulous afternoon at Barter Books a second hand bookstore in Alnwick with 350,000 titles to choose from.  I loved this central piece of sculpture in the book store, inspired by the fact that the building was once a train station.

Two very happy people when we were there my little sis and my niece and 350,000 books to choose from!

We set ourselves up on a table to check out the books we had found, we also found the coffee pot with its honesty box for 30p so we were all a little whizzy from the coffee if I'm honest!  My Mum was very pleased with herself finding a book on Audrey - my niece was a little less pleased as she secretly wanted it, although you can't tell from this photo

Although this one makes it look a little more apparent

We had quizz nights

And a day out at Alnwick Gardens, which I absolutely adore!

My niece looking uber pretty as always

We found the magical door (doing the quest backwards as usual).

We saw some great light phenomenon in the sky and look a pigeon!

The highlight of the holiday was that we could literally walk to the beach which was only about a mile away and if you've never been to Northumberland it is first and foremost one of the prettiest unspoilt coastlines that I know!

We ended up walking from Seahouses to try and get a closer shot of Bamburgh Castle one evening, we came across this Castle and we walked for above 4 hours in total managing over 28000 steps on our phone counters

And this was as close as we got!

We managed a visit to Bamburgh Castle by car, it's a strange little place if I'm honest but it had a nice tea room!

One of my favourite places to visit is Alnwick Castle as it was the castle used in the first two Harry Potter films it got us very giddy!  We did the movie tour where they point out all the areas of the castle used in the filming.  We also discovered that it was used for Robin Hood Prince of Thieves and the Hollow Crown Series amongst other things and apparently the first series of Blackadder

This lamp appears on the Harry Potter film and it's weird when you see it because you sort of recognise it but don't understand why, so we did lots of film spotting when we were there and then spent the next couple of evenings with the first two films on trying to spot the places we'd seen.  We also discovered that a lot of the interior and some of the exterior has been used for Downton Abbey so it will become probably just as famous for that as it is for Harry Potter, they still do the broom stick flying lessons where Madam Hooch did hers in the film (I kid you not) and you now have to get there early to partake!

Our only 'wet' day was our trip over to Holy Island, but we still got to walk around the priory and enjoyed a drink outside!

This is the causeway from Holy Island back onto main land!

And some more shots of Alnwick Castle, I love the water garden, being the height of summer there were lots of children there enjoying the serpent's water garden too.

Evening walks

Finding a comfortable bench to enjoy the view

Spending time with loved ones

Enjoying amazing sunsets

Time with my hubby

Finding sculptures

 Fun taking photos

Exploring the tree house

Making Viking Furniture at Bamburgh

More sunsets

Beautiful little harbour

And finally getting 'that' shot of Bamburgh Castle

It was quite honestly an amazing week, which we all enjoyed, the house we stayed in was clean and comfortable and allowed for extra space to spread out in the loft area.  Overall a fabulous week was had.

This week has been just as quick if I'm honest.  I'm grateful for the dry weather when we got home as by the end of Sunday all the washing was done and dried and ready to be put away.

I enjoyed a relaxing PJ day on Sunday scrapbooking and watching TV, including watching The Woman In Black, a fabulous film that scared me immensely, said 14 year old was not enamoured either and it is only a 12 certificate, he is like me in that we don't like 'jumpy' films - you know the ones, he didn't like the ending either but it falls in line with a typical Victorian Gothic style film.

We've enjoyed exploring Amazon Prime recently, I 'bought' it for the free speedy delivery but now we are enjoying the TV side of it and the music, we've found 'The Following' and 'The IT Crowd' a good watch, saves us watching repeats anyway!

Travelling to work on Wednesday, I could smell freshly cut grass and it was lovely, we also had a night out but I'm going to save that one for next week's grateful moments which are not likely to be as extensive!

Eating some great home cooked food too!

And that my lovelies is the epic two weeks that was!

If you fancy joining in pop a post together, pop back link up, it doesn't have to be war and peace like mine (but it can be if you like), it's lovely to see other peoples positives so come on join in, it's good for your sense of wellbeing and keeps a positive perspective on life!