WOYWW travelling in a campervan

Happy Wednesday!

We are travelling in Spain on our way to England. Today we are in the north spanish port of Santander. I'm in a cafe in the docks that has wifi.

Obviously I have no desk to share with you although a real crafter never travels without some supplies. In true form I have aLiscaa box of 'stuff'. Here is a photo of the table/desk in the camper.

we have spent the last 4 days just outside Santander in a beautiful area called Cantabria. The highlight of our stay was the visit to the elephant enclosure where we saw numerous elephants, a baby too. There were impala and buffalo. A real treat to see them.

The ferry won't leave until tonight so we plan to go for a walk along the boulevard and lovely beaches. Shame the weather is not so good.

I'll leave it at that. I will try to visit some of you when we are on board tonight. There is bound to be wifi on board.

Have a good week all of you

Lisca

WOYWW 307 a red lorry, paella and (not with) sheep poo

Warning: photo heavy! (sorry Mrs Dunnit)

Hi folks! It’s Wednesday yet again.That means WOYWW. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, click on the WOYWW logo on the side bar and all will be explained.

Here is my desk as it looked last night. I’ve made little concertina booklets for the grandies and I’ve chosen the photos and the Bible verses. You can see the alphabet stamps ready to be used. Now all I have to do is put them together.

There is a little photo album of my mum’s with photos from 1932. (with my To-Do list on top of it) I’m in the process of scanning the photos into my computer.

The layout I was working on last week is now finished. This is the finished page. I've called it 'Cuel Valencia'. The journaling is on yesterday’s blog. (sorry, I don’t know how to do a link. Can anyone teach me?)

Now to our life in Spain: Last weekend was ‘Literary Weekend’ in our village. A stage was erected in the little park near our house and a lovely red classic lorry (1940) with a brass band on foot, paraded round the village advertising the theatre company from Granada who would be performing. 

I just love that lorry and followed the band all along the high street like a little kid!

A group of girls were preparing the bar and were very keen to be photographed for my blog. Here they are (I know most of them from the gym). 

At two o’clock the paella was ready.  And my hubby and I (and some friends) went for the food and the drink. 

I didn’t think our  Spanish language skills would be sufficient to appreciate the theatre production, so we didn't go. But my friends said it was very well attended and it was very good. (It was free apart from the food and drink which was subsidised by the council and very cheap indeed).

Finally the sheep poo. It’s a postcard. (sorry it's not straight)

It reads: In the magical, mystical mountains of Wales, sheep droppings are sterilised and washed.... then turned into card. No trees were harmed in the making of this postcard. A sheep only digests 50% of everything it eats. The rest is usable fibre. We made this special postcard for you from.... sheep poo!

I don’t know if this sheep poo story is true or if it is just a joke, (The card doesn’t smell or anything) but I thought it was funny.

We’re off travelling again this Friday. We’re taking the campervan to England (via the Santander ferry) to visit children and grandies, then to Holland to visit my mum, and through Belgium and France back to Spain. 

We will be away for 6 weeks. I’m not very good at blogging from my (android) tablet but I’ll try, depending also on finding wifi.

Anyway, that’s it for this week,

I wish everyone a great week and hopefully we’ll ‘meet’ again next Wednesday.

Lisca 

'Cuel' Valencia scrapbook page

I've just finished a scrapbook page I did following the CSI (Color, Stories and Inspiration) http://csicolorstoriesinspiration.ning.com/ 

Their palette and 'case file' was beautiful, as was their monthly sketch.

It was great to have a sketch as a guide and I have followed it more or less.

I loved the palette and the colours have all been used.

There is plenty of evidence in the form of a map print (our actual map of Valencia when we were there), flower and metal (metal flowers). There is a resin ‘button’ in the top corner of the photo. I’ve done chevrons with modelling paste.

The testimony is the journaling about our trip to Valencia. The journaling is hand written on a card and stuck behind the photo.

It reads: "Valencia: We are keen to visit places in our new homeland. In December 2014 we visited Valencia. We found a campervan park juts outside the city within walking distance of the Metro. Brill!

We met up with Maria Chiare, my D-I-L Marianna’s cousin, who is studying there at the university. She showed us around and we went for a paella meal (of course).

But the highlight of our visit was the modern Science Museum. Amazing architecture! We visited the L’Oceanografic, a large aquarium, which we both enjoyed very much. To express it in student terms: “CUEL”!"

Thanks for visiting,

I'll be doing a longer blog tomorrow for Whats On Your Workdesk Wednesday. See you then!

Lisca

WOYWW 306 plus Flamenco, jigsaw puzzles and Dutch bikes

Feliz miercoles! (means: happy Wednesday!) 

I’m happy because I get to peep at the desks of all my friends in blogland. If you have no idea what I am talking about, visit Julie at her blog. She is desk hopper supreme at http://www.stamping-ground.blogspot.com.es/

I'm a bit  late today as this morning I had to go to the hospital for a mammogram, ultrasound and various Xrays. I had cancer a few years ago and this is part of my regular check up. I pray that all is well.

Here is my desk. 

I have made an effort to write words in the picture. I have PSE (Adobi Photoshoop Elements, an older version) and I never use it because it is quite a learning curve. I am determined to learn how to use it. I have promised myself that if I do, I will allow myself to buy the latest version.

So on my desk is a scrapbook page in the making. I’m doing CSI challenge 160 (http://csicolorstoriesinspiration.ning.com/) and the colour palette is perfect for those photos  I have of our trip to Valencia in December. There is the washi tape I bought at Lidls not long ago, and a strip of chevrons that I made from a die and used as a template, which I used with acrylic paste to give the page some texture. The doodle is an attempt to draw an owl (not very successfully...)

I have a confession to make: I love doing jigsaw puzzles! Yes, I know, very sad indeed. But I have always liked doing them and in my working life there was never time. I was looking forward to retirement because I would have time to do puzzles. I have quite a collection and I have got them out of the cupboard and doing them again. This one (from the Buried Blueprints collection) I finished this week and alas: there are three pieces missing! How frustrating!

I have gotten in the habit of showing a postcard. Last week I didn’t and I have got asked where the postcard was, so OK, today there is a postcard. I thought I’d show you one of the cards I send rather than one I received. This is a gypsy girl dancing flamenco. I love black and white photos and this girl is so expressive in her pose. Flamenco is the dance typical of this region. Whenever there is a celebration, local ladies will dress up in those typical flamenco dresses and dance impromptu.

To finish this page I am showing you a photo of my mum when she was young. (she is now in her nineties and living independently) Here she is on the left in 1939 on one of those famous Dutch ‘sit-up-and-beg’ bikes. Isn’t that a brilliant photo! I love it!

That’s it for this week. Thanks everybody for your kind comments last week. I will try and visit as many of you as I can in the course of the week.

God bless all of you,

Lisca

WOYWW 305, scrapbook workshop and herbal tea

Hello desk hoppers! 

I hope everyone has had a lovely Easter holiday. Here in Spain Easter Monday is a normal working day so everything has gone back to normal after a hectic Holy Week. I managed to make time to make ‘pasta mandorle’, a typical Easter treat from Abruzzo in Italy (where I used to live). It has almonds, eggs and bitter chocolate in it. Yumm!

It’s Wednesday again and today I’m showing you the desk (i.e. table) with all the action. This is at my friend Antonia’s house (the lady on the right). My friends wanted to start scrapbooking and I had promised to do a session with them. We did A4 format as that format is easiest to buy things for in the local shops. I took a crate full of stash over to Antonia’s and here we are having scrapping fun. On the left is Patricia from Mexico and in the middle is Patricia from Peru. Antonia is Spanish and I am Dutch. Quite the united nations!

While we waited for the other girls to arrive Antonia showed me her cheese making equipment as she had made a lovely goat’s cheese the week before. The freshly made cheese gets put in the baskety round thing that then gets tightened. A weight is put on top so that the liquid is being squeezed out and runs along the little ‘channels’ into a bucket. Clever he?

Where in England people drink tea and in US girls drink coffee when they get together, here in Andalucia we drink ‘infusion’ or herbal drinks. Sometimes we use ‘tea’ bags we buy in the shops but more often than not they are dried herbs that have been picked locally. Some herbs are quite bitter so I usually add a leaf of Stevia ( the dried leaves in the plastic bag). 

They are real sweet. I want to watch my weight but don’t like to take artificial sweeteners. This is a really good solution.  Many of my friends are from South America, and they are in the habit of drinking a caffeinated herbal drink called ‘mate’ (pronounced: ma-tay).

 It is drunk from a special beaker and a straw. Drinking through the straw prevents you getting ‘bits’ in your mouth. 

The beaker gets passed around and everyone gets a turn. The same beaker gets filled up with hot water after each person has had a drink. These photos I got from Wikipedia as I forgot to photograph my friends’ beaker (which is a shame because hers is much nicer).

I’m sorry if I haven’t visited so many desks last week. It has been a hectic week. Will try to do better this week.

And if you are wondering what this desk hopping is all about, visit Julia’s blog at http://www.stamping-ground.blogspot.com.es/ where it all will become clear.

Have a good week everyone,

Greetings from sunny Spain,

Lisca

WOYWW 304 Semana santa, sunshine and a messy desk

WOYWW- 304 

Semana Santa, sunshine and a messy desk....

My desk is a work in progress. I've not been at my desk a lot as it has been such lovely hot weather....

Some of my friends want to come round on Thursday to do some crafting. They all want to do scrapbooking as this is something new here. (they don’t send cards so card making is not popular). In the photos you can see I’m getting some materials ready. This is another way of using up old stash...

 None of my friends have jobs so I have to keep it simple as nobody can afford any materials. I provide the materials and I’ll do A4 pages, as albums and transparent sleeves are easy to get by in A4. I’m looking forward to it and I hope they like it. I’ve done some sample pages in A4 as I usually do 12x12. I will be taking photos and show one next week.

Here in Spain it's Holy Week (Semana Santa) and it's the biggest religious celebration of the year here, which means public holidays, a good deal of eating and drinking and lots of processions. Easter is a time for Spaniards to take to the streets and watch elaborate reenactments of the Passion, as well as enjoy some time off work in the company of their families and friends. 

Elaborate processions take place throughout Holy Week. Associations known as cofradías or ‘brotherhoods’ (whose members take part in the processions) are a strong tradition in Spain, with many dating back to the Middle Ages.

Semana Santa processions are also known as ‘penance processions’ and involve members of the brotherhood (nazarenos) parading from their church to the city’s cathedral. People taking part in Semana Santa processions dress in traditional capirote; the tall conical hat which also covers their faces, as well as in belted robes. (a bit like the Ku Klux Klan) Capirotes used to be reserved for people doing penance - as a sign of atoning their sins, they would walk through the town wearing the hat, their faces covered so they could not be recognized as sinners. 

Women often wear the mantilla, a black lace veil worn high on the back of the head. 

In most Easter processions, participants carry large floats, or pasos, that are adorned with religious sculptures depicting Jesus or Mary, some by renowned Spanish artists. The floats are festooned with flowers and candles and are the focal point of the procession. Many brotherhoods have owned and preserved their pasos for hundreds of years. In our nearest town Granada there will be 32 processions this week!

(The photos I found on the Granada website, and some of the info is from there too)

I have received several nice postcards this week. This one is from Poland and has hand painted eggs on it.

With this image I wish every one a happy Easter, good weather and hopefully a few days off with loved ones,

Happy Easter!

Lisca

PS If you want to know what this desk hopping is all about, visit Julie’s blog at http://www.stamping-ground.blogspot.com.es/