Creative chaos

Greetings from a windfree...for a change...Fish Hoek! We are finishing my favourite part of our summer (January and February) where the weather is gorgeous with very little wind! And then to top it all, yesterday, we had rain all day!

The younget gannet had a fun and busy week, starting off with her Grade 5 camp from Monday to Wednesday. She had a ball - night hikes in the sanddunes, bird and snake talks, picnic lunches and walks to the Slangkop Lighthouse, and a potjiekos competition! The best part is that the camp is 20 mins from home! They all came home very tired, but very happy.

Michaela and Abbi when we arrived on Monday morning

My view of Hout Bay on the way home (with Chapmans Peak on the right)

 I watched a movie I've wanted to watch for ages and ages on Sunday last week: Inkheart....a man with a "Silver tongue" who, when he reads aloud, the characters come out the book! At the end of the movie, I see the movie is based on the book, so I start looking for the Kindle version, which turned out to be a bit expensive :(   Lo and behold, at our weekly visit to the public library on Friday afternoon, I see Inkheart and the sequel  -Inkspell on the returns shelf! So much excitement from my side, I even made myself a new bookmark!

The book with bookmark...

 

A close-up of the book mark I made.

Technologically speaking.....my hubby got his new iPhone 5 this week. The iPad I've been using has to go back to the office, so I've now appropriated his iPhone 4 and the stylus to use as a miniature iPad / iPod touch! Unfortunately I battle to use the phone because I have nails...long ones...and am therefore always pressing the wrong buttons when typing! So, I'm going to play with  my new toy instead :-D

Creatively, I'm playing with crochet cotton instead of wool (as it's a bit too hot to crochet with wool in the summer) and have been making these really cool bags! The green and yellow one is a slightly different style complete with a flap. It's a bit smaller too. Personally, I prefer the other ones. 

Finally, my entry into The Diva's weekly challenge. I got the idea from Ledenzer to use Dansk as the string! It was quite good fun creating this one, especially with the red accent!

Challenge #105: Dansk, Fife and Blossom

 I'm reeeeaaally enjoying using my new markers and pens and have a couple of coloured ZIA's/doodle combinations that I'm busy with. I always seem to have two or three designs on the go at the same time! Some of my favourite blog artists are featured on my side panel, look them up if you haven't already!

Til next week

Pennyb

Oops...Challenge # 104

Hi everyone!

A short posting tody as it's been a very busy week! 

The eldest gannet swam in her first High School gala on Thursday and swam a really good time for her 50m backstroke, and then played her first water polo match for the U16s on Friday (she's only U14!!) which they won 16-0.

The youngest gannet goes on her first school camp tomorrow until Wednesday and is soooo excited - the clothes have been packed out since Monday last week!

My OOPS for this week, was in misreading the Diva's Challenge and doing string #37 instead of string #003. I tried some new patterns/tangles too and really enjoyed them!

I did a double tangle-one with a different colour....using my new micron 01 colours!

A close up of Tangles: cadent and puffle

A close up of Tangles: blossom and fang

Phew!

See you next week

PennyB

Doodle fever

OMG...what a week! You know the feeling you get when everything starts to go wrong and then it gets progressively worse...mine happened on Tuesday! A small bit of salvation was tangling this weeks Challenge and creating a Zendala using Suzanne McNeill's method from her Zentangle 7 book. You can see it here on this Youtube clip .

Tangles used: coral and teardrops from Creative Doodling with Judy West

Zendala without shading

My hubby finally came home on Monday after travelling for 48 hours! He flew from Austin, Texas to New York, spent 12 hours there...then to London, spent 12 hours there..and then home to Cape Town. The worst part of his trip was not knowing if he would be flying or not as Europe, Uk and USA were blanketed in snow and expecting more each day! The gannets and I were in London the week before and it was 2 degrees C - whic for us is COLD - his temp was -4!!

Green Park in London with Buckingham Palace at the other end...

...the same park a week later when Hubby was there!

Had to take this pic!

Evening light at 4pm in the afternoon!!

The gannets in the London underground

The gannets with Madiba

Big Ben in his tower silhoutted in the London Eye

The gannets and The Globe

I'm busy with a ZIA of sorts in the style of Lex WIlson otherwise known as Major Lazor...his stuff is reallygood, his penmanship is amazing!
Otherwise the weekend is going to be a chilled one!

Happy creating

2013

And so it begins...

A new year and all the excitement and changes that it brings! 

We had THE MOST amazing holiday over New Year....we were in Orlando for 2 weeks courtesy of lots of hard work on my hubby's behalf in the last quarter at work!! We hired a house for the 2 weeks-which was way cheaper than the hotel route (especially with the R at R8.50 to the $!) We did what every tourist does when visiting Orlando and visited all the parks...Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Seaworld, Universal and Islands of Adventure, Wet n Wild...it was such fun seeing everyting that I've only ever seen on TV and movies etc. The gannets and hubby rollercoasted themselves into oblivion (I was the bag-lady and photographer...I don't do loops etc!)

We also shopped....Orlando Premium Outlets, Krispy Kreemes... I bought a leather jacket for $33 on sale, which is one-fifth of what it would cost me at home! It was a "rollercoaster" 2 weeks and my body is still halfway across the Atlantic, unfortunately, so sleep is a luxury at the moment.

"Our house, in the middle of our street"

I couldn't resist!

My all time favourite Disney character from when I was little

Donald was sooooo funny when the eldest gannet went for her hug and photo. HE held her hands and kissed her cheek while waggling his little tail frantically the whole time! Her then did the heart throb gesture when she left!

Oh wow is all I can say! I've dreamt of standing in front of this castle since forever.

Always the photographer...never let a good photo opportunity go to waste!

The cherry on the top was the Art shopping! There are so many markers etc available in the States that I drool over but just can't get, so I had a field day in the art shops!
 I bought a set of coloured Micron 0.1 pens. lePlume double ended markers(brush and fibre tip), a set of 24 Sharpie ultrafine and 2 books!

So to commemorate my new aquasitions, this weeks Challenge, and my first of the year was done using my Sharpie markers. The DIva had us doing a duo tangle - not my favourite - she always seems to find tangles that I don't like doing or can't seem to draw! Bunzo "grew" on me, however, as I drew it sort of developed a life of its own!

Challenge #102: Auraknot and bunzo

 Hope everyone has an Amazing 2013!

Holidays!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

I know it's been a reeeeaaalllyy long time since I've written, and I apologise most profusely! I couldn't load any pictures for nearly two weeks and then we had our Surfski Festival the last 2 weeks!

Soooo....news from Cape Town:
My eldest gannet - Caitlin- did us so proud at her Grade 7 Prizegiving at the end of the school term. She received 5 certificates ranging from Excellence in English, to commitment and dedication in Netball, Cross country, Athletics and Drama. She then also received 2 trophies: Swimming Victrix Ludorum and the Best Girl All-Rounder in Sport! An awesome way to end her Primary school career!

At a friendly athletics meeting held in the last week of school, the youngest gannet - Michaela-came first in the U10 Long Jump, 2nd in the 100m sprint, 2nd in the 1200m and her relay team came first. Caitlin came first in the U13 high jump with a height of 1.40m!

Long jump star with a distance of  3.50m

Finishing straight in the 1200m

My high jump star!

The last 2 weeks have been HECTIC too! We had the inaugural Fish Hoek Surfski Festival! It started on 9 December with the Peter Creese Lighthouse race(Peter was a Springbok lifesaver and member of the lifesaving club and died in an accident quite young). Then on 16 and 17 December, we had the World Series and SA Champs singles and doubles races organised and ending at Fish Hoek Lifesaving Club. Paddlers from around the world came down to our town and the weather man didn't disappoint! The crowning race was the Cape POint Challenge - a 50km paddle around Cape Point! It's the longest and richest surfski race in the world! I had the most amazing treat this year too...I was offered a trip on one of the boats following the paddlers! We were at the slipway at 4:30am and waited for an hour until all the commercial fishermen had launched before we could go! We met up with the paddlers on the Atlantic side of the point and then followed them home to Fish Hoek. THe slowest paddlers start first (group H) and the top paddlers start last (group B). The top 7 guys paddled together the whole way and they ended up having a sprint to the finish line...after 50km!! (the reason why this is so amazing this year is that there was a NW wind blowing, which means the paddlers were going with the wind for the first 20km and then into the wind for the last 30km! The SE usually howls which the paddlers all love!)

Sunrise in the morning

The middle group of paddlers approaching Cape Point

The lighthouse at the very front of Cape POint catching the early mornign light

If you look carefully, you can see the two sets of paddlers

Fish Hoek Lifesaving Club and the finish of the Cape POint Challenge

The final 3 in the sprint to the finish!

 
 Apologies to the Diva and all my zentangle friends for not having a tangle ready, but Congratulations to the DIva for her 100th Challenge and having a tangle named after her...it's very well deserved!

My best news I'm leaving for last........we"re going on a 2 week family holiday to Kissemee, Orlando, USA leaving on Friday 28th!! I'm sooooo excited! I'm saving space in my suitcase for a few art supplies that I'm desperate to buy there because they're made in the US! 
Shopping list includes: Dual tip markers with a brush on one side and fibre tip on the other and maybe soem more zentangle supplies from a CZT in the area! Can I buy Suzanne McNeills Zentangle 1-7 somewhere? 

4 days and counting!
Merry Christmas everyone!

PennyB

Exam week!

Ok, so I missed the Mickey Mouse challenge, sadly, but I 've been studying!! Both girls are writing exams this week, and I've been studying with the youngest gannet who is writing her first exams, so time has been at a minimum. 

I did, however, get inspired and start an A4 ZIA using hollibaugh as the base. I tried using lots of tangles I've never used before and found some really interesting ones. (My tangle collection consists of a flipfile with tangles pasted alphabetically onto the pages. I did read somewhere - and I can't rememeber where - about different storage ideas for all your patterns.) Anyway, this is my entry into The DIva's Challenge this week....I had two small spaces left and so added zinger into the space! I've got a similar pattern to Zinger which I've used in my pattern stacks. Can you believe that I've managed to submit a tile to the challenge on the Monday it comes out?!!!

Challenge 96: bales, camelia, cadent, cubine, cruffle, cockles adn mussels, girdy, huggins, flukes, jetties, keeko, knyt, lanie, nzeppel, pavonia, printemps, paradox, planateen, sanibelle, socc, sez, tripoli, tink, ix, zinger and my own flower daizees!

Happy creating, see you all later this week

Pennyb