Good morning, well I'm back - layouts galore to share with you, this one taken at Harry Potter world (you've been warned there are going to be a lot from this day - we took over 700 photos - I kid you not).
And the Gryffindor boys bedroom, complete with the tiny beds designed for 11 year old boys without much consideration that they would grow significantly between the first and last films!
Hoping to share some more layouts now I'm back off the starting blocks - have a fabulous day!dorm
Good morning tis Friday and that means only one thing in this house
First up is a trip with said 15 year old to Yorkshire Sculpture Park, he'd not had chance to see the Kaws exhibition and we all fancied a good walk, plus the bridge over the bottom end of the lake was re-opened which meant a circular walk - so we headed out.
Unfortunately the weather was being a little naughty - we got caught in a hail shower, had it been rain we would have got drenched!
The bluebells were out in the wooden area above the lake, a beautiful sight!
Although quite difficult to photograph up close in a hail shower apparently! I love seeing the bluebells out at this time of the year, with them being a protected they have had time to flourish and grow and whole areas are now covered in this tiny bell flower - although they look more purple than blue to me!
Then Mischief 1 and Mischief 2 checking out the circular sculpture, it has no entry and is quite difficult to see in as you can tell!
We walked past a field with highland cattle, they always look so cuddly - despite their size!
Up at the long gallery we managed a better photo of one of the Bendy sculptures, said 15 year old is planning an art textile piece based on the work of Travis Bedel - which is all cut anatomical images, so seeing brightly coloured internal organs has made him have a rethink about his design!
And just to show the varying sizes in these sculptures this is the two of them next to the bronze sculpture
I liked this shot of the back of the pink rabbit sculpture and the one that reminds me of a certain tyre advert!
Outside the hail clouds had disappeared to leave a beautiful blue sky and these amazing sculptures, this type of sculpture appears to be fairing better
than the black lacquered ones that seem to have been affected by the prolonged variations in our weather!
This one is simply magical, it looks from the back like a little wooden boy that tells lies, it's only when stood in front that the trademark Kaws design is more apparent!
But the reason why I love this one soooooooooooooooooo much is the size of it - simply breathtaking and can be seen from the long gallery up on the hillside - stunning!
Inside the visitors centre there was another exhibit for another artist, almost 50 years apart in the work of Kaws, but still influenced by similar cultures - bright colours, cartoon like elements, well known faces!
I managed to send off the photo of my Shakespeare piece for this month, only to discover we'd been given a month off and I was a month early - hey ho! This one is my favourite up to now and represents The Tempest.
I've still no idea what to do with them once completed, the original intention was a fabric book but I'm not so sure that is going to actually work at this moment in time. If you have any ideas let me know!
Sunday found us back at Chatsworth, this time for a wander around the house, as Chatsworth members we get to frequent the house whenever we fancy and unlike a lot of other country houses Chatsworth allows you to take photos inside the house itself.
We found the resin seat still inside the chapel!
And got a photo of the Damien Hirst piece - Saint Bartholomew - Exquisite Pain This particular version (apparently there are 3), is silver with a gold plate over the top and really does make you stop and think. It is currently housed inside the chapel
One of the more famous paintings at Chatsworth
We even found a new room open that isn't normally - you imagine the other rooms to be quite plain, so when they open up a room and you get to see this - you wonder what other amazing rooms there are around the house!
The room next to the library has this amazing picture on its ceiling!
Which I then managed to capture in the mirror!
The veiled lady - always so difficult to photograph if truth be known
Other positives this week, meeting up with my Mum, my niece and her friend last Friday for a wander around the local shopping centre, not very exciting but lovely to spend some quality time with them!
Monday found said 15 year old visiting a friends house, so we had a lovely afternoon just the two of us, popped to see my Mum and caught up with my sister at the same time which was great.
The rest of the week has been filled with early morning walks with views like this mornings one
and lots of work, although getting things sorted posted year end is always heavy going!
I hope you've had a good week and that it's been filled with sunshine and happy moments, if you fancy joining in, pop back and link up and we can come and visit.
And finally Friday mornings waves to James - hope you've had a good week!
Good Morning and welcome to another Rocking your World post to celebrate the positives, silver linings and general smiles that make you glad to be alive
I'll be honest before we start, this week has been mad crazy as my main two jobs have involved some significant work towards two financial year ends, so that has left little time for anything else, but let us see what I can drag out of the bag in the way of happy moments for this week.
First up - arting at the weekend, I got challenged to share some art for 7 days this week and decided that some new art might be nice, they are approximately 7"x5" and are all mixed media - as for what I'm going to do with them - the answer currently is no idea, but if you've got any ideas then let me know.
Next up managing our walk around Worsbrough Dam last weekend, in amongst the trees we spotted these little beauties and I managed a close up. I'm lucky because, on my drive into my first job of the week my route takes me alongside an ancient wood which is absolutely awash with a carpet of purple at the moment - I'm hoping to visit and see them up close before they disappear for this season.
Having a weekend catch up with my Mum, sister and niece was lovely, I haven't touched base with them for a few weeks, so it was nice to put the world to rights as it were.
Mid week saw the anniversary of my Dad passing away, not a happy moment by any stretch of the imagination but I do try to reminisce and remember the happier times. He was quite a formidable character and memory sharing makes the pain of the anniversary, that little bit more bearable. I shared this very old scrapbook page on facebook this week documenting two photos of him and thought it would be nice to share it here as well.
I also thought it would be nice to share some words from my lil bro, he is always so eloquent and this week, when we were all a little sombre his words reminded us of who he is - this message was for my Mum.
"Whenever the road seemed most bumpy, or the night seemed uncertain ahead, he always shared his footprints with you, and your hand was in his, as he led.
He weathered the storm for the both of you, though sometimes if felt like he'd gone, but he left three warriors, loyal to their queen, who promised to help you carry on.
Three versions of Paddy O'Reilly, why mammy that's more than you'll need, he walked on in front cleared the path for you and left 6 hands their to lead.
Now he's there in the sun that shines down on you, he's in every step that you take, he's the wind at your back at journey's start and will be their at the last journey you make.
Our bodies are vessels that are lent to us, but our heats can be given away, he gave you his heart as a young man and you carry two hearts to this day.
"Cities burn, people die, but real love lives forever."
Needless to say it made us all a little bit more teary but I love how beautiful the words are and hope you don't mind me sharing them here.
Onto other moments, I had a meeting in the middle of town this week and spotted this on my travels, a yarn-bombed tree. I loved it, the fact someone had to stand and finish it off - brilliant!
I've also got a new app on my phone called You, it combines a new approach to micro actions which allows you to make little changes in life, I'm a little sporadic in my usage, but one of the prompts this week was to try and have a healthy drink, so I got this little beast out of the cupboard and had a cup of herbal tea that we'd bought from the Hebden Tea Shop in York, a fabulous little shop on The Shambles which has an open window at the front with several pots of tea always on the go for you to try!
I tried a new green tea I bought when there - Japanese Sencha cherry - smells beautiful - tastes weird and afterwards hubby made up almond and orange tea which was much more preferable if I'm honest.
We got the warmer when we were in York last time, it kept the pot ticking along nicely if I'm honest.
Final positive for this week, this morning's walk at 6am - it was freezing out there with a heavy crisp frost covering everything, most strange for the very end of April! Mind you we've had snow showers this week - even weirder!
We get to enjoy some beautiful morning skies though, so despite the cold it made us both smile.
After a very very busy week and a mass clean up this evening, with hubby and said 15 year old my plans for tomorrow is to do nothing - well not work or cleaning orientated in any event. Although what I will actually do I don't know but then you can catch up with that next week.
I hope you've had a beautiful and blessed week and have lots of positive moments to look back on and smile about. If you fancy joining in, pop a post together, pop back and link up so we can come and visit.
time once more, time to take a step back and look at the silver linings and positives in the week.
I'm going to start off with the first one, which is that my Mum's scan shows an issue that needs resolving, but it isn't what we thought it might be. We have all been quite apprehensive this week whittling about it, but thankfully it is something that can be sorted. Thank you all for your kind words and prayers, they are very much appreciated!
So next on the happy list - Saturday doing some crafting, hubby was silk painting, said 15 year old was fabric painting with inktense pencils and I was acrylic painting. We had a film on in the background and were sat chatting, twas fab!
Here is a glimpse of what I was painting, I've done further work on them since this photo.
Sunday found us over the other side of Sheffield dropping said 15 year old off for a team building afternoon, so we decided to head to Chatsworth to blow the cobwebs off as it were. It was cool but a lovely day nonetheless! The gardens were full of gorgeous daffodils
And we were pleased to see this tile covered sculpture specifically designed for Chatsworth still in situ, it looked brilliant surrounded by all the daffodils.
We walked the trough path - backwards for a change and were delighted to see these bright yellow flowers, not that we know what they are!
We had a great view out of the grotto over the pond and managed to dodge the smallest of rain showers.
I really enjoyed the blue skies
And we got to admire the David Nash sculpture that has ended up at Chatsworth as part of the revitalisation of the trout stream, in effect they brought the Chatsworth entry to the Chelsea flower show, back to Chatsworth and have planted the trout pond area out with the items!
Look and sunshine - can you tell how pleased I was to be enjoying the weather!
Selfie with hubby
The amazing pink hyacinth's next to the maze smelt fantastic (I was going to say amazing - but I thought I could hear you groan).
And the small elephant sculpture looked great in the sunshine.
For once this sculpture was actually working, although said 15 year old growled when I told him as he has yet to see it working! It fills with water and the petals close and once full it pumps the bottom out of the base and once light enough the petals open and the sphere inside pops up!
And how sad does this lion look? We found him in the cottage garden.
I loved the moving obelisk in the cottage garden, particularly the part that reflected the sky!
Whilst we were there we headed into the shop to try and find an anniversary gift for one another, unfortunately Chatsworth is once again under a mass of scaffolding on the back of the building, which apparently will be there until the end of next year, included in this scaffold is the orangery shop, so there were limited supplies. So we headed up to the Stables shops which have been revamped and are looking lovely and found these. Apparently whilst there is no traditional gift for an 18th wedding anniversary, it has become the norm to associate porcelain with the anniversary - so we thought - why not!
We enjoyed our wedding anniversary despite both being at work. We had a bar meal out that evening (no photos unfortunately).
We've enjoyed our morning walk and managed a few lovely sunrises too, although the longer days mean that won't continue much longer.
We managed to get the grass cup (although we won't mention the broken mower)
I had a busy day on Wednesday at work (although we won't mention the broken car).
And I've even managed 3 layouts this week, which I know by my normal standards is tiny but to be honest my mojo has been on holiday for quite some time now. I'm hoping it is back for good - but we shall see.
I hope you've had an amazing week, if you fancy joining in pop a post together, pop back, link up and we shall come and visit.
