Gas Street Moorings, Birmingham

Yesterday afternoon David heard that familiar "pop, pop, pop" and looked out to see this working boat heading towards the lock.













It was one of the BW working boat volunteer boats collecting money for BBC's Children in Need










They moored up by the Gormet Burger Bar.

The weather has been really lovely during the day, blue skies and sunshine; but frosty in the morning. Tom has sprinkled the first lot of sand and grit on the moorings to stop us all slipping.






As Christmas is coming you get two Christmas cards. (I have got that many in the folder I'll never get to show them all.)

This one is a large white square one. I wrapped some red ribbon around the bottom of the card and then added a large music cleft with shiny green holly leaves and red berries. I think it started off as a cracker ornament or for a Christmas Tree. I printed out the sentiment and name using a music font and matted them both before adding them to the card with sticky fixers.













This one is made using a light green card blank. I wrapped some sparkly tartan ribbon around the top half and then added a table decoration using glue dots. I had to make a box for this one.

Gas Street Moorings, Birmingham

Lots of yellow leaves in the cut. Shame about the rubbish. Just a few days ago Graham discovered a body floating around here.

Went swimming in the Hyatt yesterday (as I do every day) and shared the pool with Dwight Yorke and an actor from the REP and I saw the Manchester United team arriving for their match against Villa. Exciting or what?

Today Caroline came to sort out our tax returns. It only took her 3 hours (she charges £350 per hour when she is at work proper). Still, it's gone and hopefully won't come back again like the Companies House one.







A couple of New Year cards.

For this one I used my Nestability circles, squares and scallops. I printed out the date and sentiment on the computer using a font with stars inside and covered the letters and numbers with glossy accents.

They were then stuck onto the step card with silver stars wrapped with silver cord and blue star gems.




This one was made up in the same way but I made an easel card and added some yellow ribbon and some big stars.

Last Friday I attended the Hobbycrafts Exhibition at the NEC and bought some new Nestabilities. Must find some time to use them.

Gas Street, Birmingham

This picture was actually taken some time ago. It is another boat which was used during the filming. No Photographs Allowed. So I took it for devilment.

The clocks have gone back. It seems to be permanently dark and gloomy now. It just about sums up our moods at the moment.

Though last night we went to see Nigel Kennedy and the New Age Orchestra in the Symphony Call. He, and they, were terrific.



I have finally finished this year's set of cards for Amber Moon. The brief (as usual) was use the picture of the Buckby from the roof. This year I cut the pictures out with a round Nestability and edged it with a gold pen. I then cut out a scalloped circle in gold card to mat behind the photo. I made a hole in the top and threaded some gold ribbon through, tying it with a length of gold thread.

I cut out a green panel and wrapped some more gold ribbon around the bottom. The white panel is Cuttlebug embossed and the whole panel was then stuck down onto a white card blank.

Gas Street, Birmingham

There has been a lot of fuss around here recently, a Bollywood film is being filmed down by the Mailbox and the NIA. The towpath has been closed and people are jumping off the bridge into the canal and jumping over garden walls. What the ski jets are used for I dread to think. They didn't like any photographs being taken, but David managed to sneak this one.

I made this card for Baldish who is the Office Manager at our Doctor's surgery. The last time we visited she was looking very harassed so I thought a worry doll might help her.

I bought the doll when I was in Melbourne, Australia, though she comes from South America. She is supposed to take away all your worries.

To make the card I took a white, square card. I Cuttlebugged some white card and stuck it to the centre of the card. Then I put two strips of double sided tape along the vertical edges and sprinkled over glitter to make the strip.

I used my oval Nestabilities to make a white oval, which I embossed), a pink oval and a green scalloped oval which I matted up. I used the string which was attached to the doll to stick on the back of the ovals and stuck it down onto the card. The doll can then be removed and hung up.

Hope it helps.

Gas Street Moorings, Birmingham

Anyone know who lives here?










Here is a clue.

Yes, it is BW Headquarters. They are going to have to move now though, we have found out where they live.

We went to London for the day and stopped off in Watford as David wanted to visit the BW offices for an article he is going to write.

It must be the only place with a Customer Relations Department where the customers cannot access it without much difficulty. Almost as good as our Customer Relations office in Birmingham which is only open between 1200 - 1400 hours during the week!

Sorry about the awful photographs of this card. I finished it very late at night as we were catching an early train the following morning and had to photograph it without a flash (the flash just bounced the light back).

David's younger sister Lil, and Joe her husband were renewing their wedding vows on their 40th wedding anniversary.

The colour of the card was actually a rich ruby red (matching the rose). I cut a diagonal piece of the top of the front of the card and then emphasised the diagonal by adding a strip of silver peel-off, then some black ribbon with black ribbon flowers and black beads in the centres. Finally and strip of white organdie ribbon with little hearts embroidered on it. I tied a heart pendant onto a bow made with the white organdie ribbon and stuck it down with a glue dot.

The bottom decoration was cut out with a Martha Stewart punch using the black music paper and to finish it off a "40" topper.

I covered most of the back of the inside of the card with black and silver music paper. A rich ruby red rose, covered in glitter is stuck down on the top right hand corner with another glue dot and the sentiment is a peel-off stuck onto more ruby card and matted onto silver mirror card with 4 ruby gems in each corner..

Gas Street Moorings, Birmingham

There was ice on the moorings this morning!!!!! Even in the bright sunshine it was cold today. Must get the winter coats from under the bed.

David took this photo of boats at Sherborne Wharf this morning.






Had some sad news a few days ago. My eldest cousin died at the very young age of 66. Blimey, that's my generation dropping off already.

This card was for his mother, my auntie and I made it using a couple of rub-on seedheads on a white, square card. I coloured the sentiment (which was silver) with a black Sharpie and added it to the card.

Nice and simple.

Gas Street Moorings, Birmingham

Another picture detail of Swallow. Almost beautiful in its shabbiness.

We have been missing something at the moorings and it has taken a while to realise what it is. Woody our North American Wood Duck has disappeared.

He used to molt in the summer and looked just like a normal duck before growing his colourful feathers for the winter, so we didn't really notice that he wasn't around. But he hasn't been seen for a couple of months now.

And, something else we've not seen for days and days now. A policeman!

These are some of the Christmas cards I made for Michael of his boat St Christopher. They began with a white card blank. I cut out the large aperture using a Nestability and the Cuttlebug and then embossed it with snowflakes using the Cuttlebug again. I cut a smaller aperture in coloured paper and stuck it behind the white one leaving a small edge all around it. I then fixed the photograph behind this using sticky fixers so that the frame stood out. To finish off I stamped out three silver snowflakes, tow. in the top left hand corner and one in the bottom right. The centres of the snowflakes are made with clear glass gems.