September Photo a day ~Week 3

This week's photo a day. Not always very descriptive of what I've been up to, but just odds and ends I wanted to take photos of x3 Because i was away Tuesday last week, I've decided to just put up what would've been last week's post :] This weeks will either come later in the week or next week, not quite decided yet!


16.09.15 I'm learning to crochet, and as my first attempt I made a little skull XD


17.09.15 I had to go get my biometrics enrolled for my citizenship application, using this machine was really weird, but I got a sneaky shot ;p


18.09.15 On the 18th we received the keys to our new house! Even though it was only 15 minutes before I was supposed to be in work! Face & I skipped out for a little while to check out our new space x3


19.09.15 The day after we got the keys we went away to Devon on holiday! Aha, it was typical timing, but I felt so in need of a holiday I didn't mind too much. This was the cottage we stayed in with the rest of Face's family. It was huge!


20.09.15 A trip to Hartland Quay, our nearest ocean view :]


21.09.15 Visiting more seaside locations (as you have to do on holiday) x3 This is Bude, Cornwall.


22.09.15 Our daytrip last Tuesday was going to see Barnstable market :] I didn't get much but it was a lovely place to look around!
So that was last week, so much happened! I'll see if I can update you all in more detail soon :]



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Project Wednesday ~Mallorca Travel Journal

Well, a couple of weeks ago I said I'd give you a peak into my Mallorca travel journal, so here we are x] I'm so bad at keeping up with travel journals as I either get back into the room exhausted or find the TV being on too distracting. I also don't want to be antisocial to write about what a great time I'm having hanging out with everyone...

I got this travel journal from my sister who sent it to me from NZ. How cute? x3 It was really well organised too, already containing a pocket for extras and sections for things to pack, stuff to do before we leave and at the back, mini review spots for bars, shopping areas and cafes. Oh a few pages to keep addresses too so I know who to send postcards to x3

I decided to use this book for both my week long Spanish-island trips I took last year, so the first half was for my Mallorca holiday with Face's family. Every page had really nice but muted backgrounds to keep things interesting, and the first couple of pages sets I only wrote on. I'd taken my instax mini with me too though, so those pictures got included in the journal more often than not, like this one of the view from our hotel room.

  I'm always on the lookout for things to include to add something different to the pages and although I usually will keep anything, this time I was aiming for a slimmer journal so I stuck to things that weren't so bulky. The monster/mallorca sticker I got from a souvenir shop but I also have a thing for keeping receipts, particularly if they are in another language or have the shop (or in this case, restaurant) name at the top. On this one I even wrote who had what!

This is something I really enjoying doing for travel journals but almost never find the time- little sketches! This page had a prompt for sketching so I had the excuse to sit and do it while Face watched TV one afternoon/evening. I sat on the balcony of our hotel and just doodled the view. I've never been good at realism so true to my style, it looks a little cartoony. As you can see, I also didn't get a chance to finish my sketch, but I think I got the more interesting part in, of the harbour :]

I also cut up a few leaflets from places we had visited to include more pictures for interest and context. On this page I also stuck in Face & I's mini tren tickets after a ride we took which toured us all around Porto Cristo and some other nearby beaches.
I did quite a few more pages than this, but I think these were the most interesting ones. Quite a few of the others were just text, but even just now I got caught up reading as I tried to type this, so I guess that works for me!
I did most of this while I was in Mallorca, not bad for me! I admit though I had to complete it when I got back :x On the other hand, I still have my Japanese travel journal sitting on my desk waiting to be completed...I always need more time for craft! So I didn't do a bad job to get this one all done before I went off on my next trip.
Do you like to keep travel journals?



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This Time Last Year ~September 2014 Mallorca Holiday

Last year was a year of trips away, which was pretty good as my passport was so close to expiry and I still haven't got too far in replacing it :/ So I can look back on this holiday at least.

I went away with Face's family to Porto Cristo, Mallorca. I understood they were the kind of family who enjoyed sitting around the complex pool and just soaking up the sun, but we actually did quite a bit, something I'm much more used to! After all, if you don't come back off a holiday needing another holiday, you're doing something wrong! Okay, well it didn't quite come to that but I was happy with getting lots of photos of our corner of the island :]

We explored the town a few times, some of the streets were very much a Spanish holiday town, which of course I enjoyed getting shots of x3 This street led up to a small church, and also has a couple of really cute corner shops x3

As you may expect from the name, Porto Cristo has a pretty large port, another great place for pics for me x3 Not living anywhere near the sea in the UK either, it's always really fun to wander ports and the like and it really boosts the feeling of holiday to hear the water lapping on the shore & boat sides.

A couple of days rather than using our legs we caught the 'mini tren', a small land train that tootled you around the town and to a bunch of nearby beaches. It was a great little mooch to see a little out of the town and get some views, like of this beautiful blue sea and the cliffs!

Literally 5 minutes walk from our hotel was a large cave system, so of course we had to go check it out too! They were pretty extensive and it took us about an hour to wander around, even with guides pushing us along (I dawdled at the back getting photos...). At the end there was a massive cave with a lake and they put on a show with a few small lit up boats with orchestral-style music. It was really pretty.

On our last day we caught the market in the town, it was a good end to our holiday :]
I can't wait till I can get away again, although I think even a UK holiday would be fine for me right now! Have you been to Mallorca? Where did you stay? I would've loved to see the capital, but I'm happy with what we did get to see ^^



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Project Wednesday ~La De Dah Finale

Project Wednesday again, huh? This week I thought I'd go through my final pages of my La De Dah Smashbook, can you believe it? I'm sort of surprised it took this long actually, I'd really not realised how many pages I'd had to do to complete this book XD
Let's jump straight back in then with this two-page spread:

These were about my spanish holidays I took around September/October. (Last year was a really good year for holidays...) both Face's family and my Dad wanted us to go with them, so we went twice! First we went to Mallorca, on the left. It was a good holiday we spent not doing too much, just checking out the town we were in really. I still managed to collect a bit of stuff for this page though. The right hand page was the Ibiza/Eivissa page, where we did practically the opposite with a lot of touring around the island in a hire car. I even went swimming in the sea! On the right hand page is a bracelet I bought to wear for a while, but it quickly wore down to copper and turned my wrist green...so now it lives in here XD

This page was done towards the end of the year about all the places we'd been on daytrips that I didn't really have enough stuff for to make a whole page X3 I used my instax camera quite a bit on these trips and so I lined them up overlapping slightly, but they lift so you can see the pic under it too x3 The trip to Gloucester was really cool actually, I did have quite a bit from that trip so it was a bit of challenge to get it all on the one side XD

This page was completely an odds and ends page. Right at the end, as I was so close to finishing the smashbook I had so many random bits of paper hanging out in the pages waiting to find a home. I didn't really know what to put on this last page anyway so I did a 'true' smashbook on it and just smashed it all in! It has everything from pictures I drew, cut out or took to a DVLA notice that I don't own my old car anymore XD

The finale is a little boring- the very last page and back cover I didn't do anything to, though in retrospect I'm not sure why not. The pocket is full of other pictures I couldn't find a proper home for, to maps and stuff that were just too big to fit in.

And so that was my 2014 La De Dah Smashbook. I hope you enjoyed taking a more detailed look at the pages as much as I enjoyed creating them. I guess I'm going to have to look into a more detailed view of another book now. Which would you like to see more of? My Thai holiday smashbook, This is Not a Book by Keri Smith, or something else? Let me know x3



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New Zealand Gifts

So, on Tuesday my Dad returned from his long family-visiting holiday. I was up so early to go pick him up from the airport, which made us both pretty tired for the rest of the day, myself from 3 hours sleep and him from the same, plus a loooong plane journey! We still found ourselves awake enough to chat and find out things that had been going on in each others lives that hadn't made it over email x3
I showed him round the house and gardens when we got home, and he sorted his gathered mail while I went on the PC a while. In the afternoon he sorted his suitcase and found out loads of things he'd brought back for both me and Face x3

This is my share! -A mix of both 'christmas' presents from my Sister, Jen and my Mum and souvenirs from all of them. Thats a lot of cute stuff, shall we look in more detail? x3

From my Mum and Sister were these things- all wrapped in sweet Christmas paper! I really did feel like it was Christmas all over again as I unwrapped them x3 It was super weird though as as my birthday is next to Christmas, I never get to open presents this time of year, what a treat!
I got some super thick socks with kiwis and sheep on them- you don't get a lot more New Zealand than that! I think I'm gonna have to save these for winter they are so cozy, that'll give me something to look forward to wearing x3 Next to those is an NZ calendar, not sure where this is going yet, but probably next to my desk to give me super wanderlust when I look at the beautiful scenery. Just thinking about it makes me feel like I should get my passport problems sorted right now! On top of the calendar is a cute NZ/UK flag pin, I also got another pin, an ANZAC day poppy which I'd already taken away to put onto my work uniform. I'm not sure I could get away with the flag pin else I would wear that on my lapel too!

I was given these two bracelets as I'm pretty well known to my family to be a string bracelet fanatic, I'd say I don't know why they appeal so much to me, but just look how awesome this pair are! They speak for themselves X3 I actually had to take the green bracelet off to take the first couple of pics!
I was also given this keyring which has each of the NZ notes on, when I spoke to my sister on the phone she says these are for taking apart and putting into one of my craft books, so I'm sure you'll see these again in a layout somewhere xp
You can also see some animal cards collected from a supermarket that'll be used for crafting and a parisian themed sticker pack. At the top are two sticker strips- some maori whare and some 'I <3 NZ' (I do!). I'll have plenty to smash once I am done with my Thai smashbook! I also have a 'Grow you own Pink Poodle' to play with x3

This half of the haul was the souvenir half from all the family and a couple just from Dad. I have three shirts with different designs, all good to show off my heritage! I particularly like the brown one, I've not had a brown shirt before and this one looks super comfortable.
At the top is actually a present to us all, a super whisk! I can't wait to give this thing a try when I either get some skimmed milk or want to try a really fluffy omelette. I may make a mess when Dad is out tomorrow ;p
Below those are a couple of magnets, both souvenirs in their own way of things my Sister and Dad did together- the treetop walk and a visit to Weta studios, of course the famous studio that made the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films! I would've loved to go to check out the studios too, even as more of a fan of the books. Apparently Weta studios was pretty pricy, but I'm sure it was worth it just for the experience (and to send me a memento!).
The large NZ flag is a sticker that I think will go on my car. When I am a little more sure that it won't come off easily should I put it on, even my car will show my New Zealand pride!
Now, the diary milk chocolate is one of my major favourite sweets. In the UK I generally avoid dairy milk, I just don't like the flavour compared to other chocolate if I'm going to bother at all, but this is the exception- Black Forest has little red jellies and mini chocolate biscuit bits in that just come together to be awesome! I ate so much of this stuff when I lived over there it's a wonder I never got ill off it :x

Dad bought me these coke themed lip balms as a last minute present on the plane home, as he was given a voucher for being inconvenienced on the flight. They all smell so good and at the moment I've only tried the coke one, but it both smells spot on for coke and actually seems to work really well as balm, something these collaboration things rarely seem to manage!
The necklace was shown to me along with a couple of others via a snapchat sent by Jen while they were travelling, and I liked this one best x3 I really like really chunky, round koru for some reason. The fan was a gift from Singapore from Dad, to go on my wall of fans from other countries that is behind my computer desk x3
And I think that's a snippet of everything! Yeah, I am so spoilt x3 I love everything and I can't wait to start using it all! And I hope you enjoyed looking through my haul as much as I did receiving it, and a massive thank you to my family for thinking of me when I wasn't there with them (like I would've loved to have been ;0;)
Catch you soon,



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Sunday Catch Up ~Wales and Home

So, this week! It was a good one (mostly cause I wasn't at work for much of it ;p) and you know about most of it from my post the other day, so this is mostly just a few more pics of my time away!

We went to the seaside and I got a little caught up in taking pics of the beach shops laden with cute colourful buckets & spades!

The weather was bad, but as we were sat in a glass fronted cafe eating ice cream, it cleared enough to show off this lovely rainbow over the choppy sea x3

The Haven complex we were staying in had loads of cool little wood carvings about the place, I really liked this set, very Welsh!

Back at home I got straight out into the garden and got 'building' with all the flowers I bought a week or so ago. This basket needs somewhere better to hang than the greenhouse but I haven't found the place for it yet! Maybe Dad will help when he gets back by drilling some holes in a wall somewhere so I can place a bracket XD

I was also pleased to find stuff had been doing well without me about and I've got some pea shoots showing and the dirt is moving on some of the runner beans too. I'm hopefully going to have a ton of peas this year x3
Today I plan to go find a cloche or polytunnel so I can plant my squash and courgette outside, so I'm going to get going now, hope you have a great Sunday!



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Time away ~Little Welsh Holiday

So this last week I've been away (that's why I missed this weeks Project Wednesday- sorry about that!) with a couple of friends from work and their little lad. We went up near Pwllheli to a Haven resort called Hafen Y Mor, paid for mostly by sun holidays! I've never been on a Sun holiday before, but I really couldn't fault it, for only £80 Face and I stayed in this 6-sleeper apartment and we even got to be next door to our friends, so we hung out at each others places a lot.

The weather was pretty terrible for 3 out of the 4 days, but that can't be helped. Actually on our first day we spent most of it getting there, so we only got a little look around the site, which was huge, much bigger than I remember Haven sites being from when I used to go when I was little. We played on some 2p machines and looked at a show that was being put on, it wasn't really our thing though!

The next couple of days we did what we could while avoiding the weather. Tuesday was windy as, but only rained every hour or so and was mostly sunny inbetween, so we got a little time to look around, checking out Porthmadog, the beach and nearby Criccieth. We didn't make it up to the castle sadly as the wind would've blown us off the hill it's on top of! So we settled for some awesome fish and chips and then over the road to what became a bit of a theme of the holiday: the ice cream shop Cadwaladers, so good. This Cadwaladers had a conservatory area which was perfect to look out onto the blustery sea while staying nice and warm even while eating ice cream!

The next day topped even that though by raining constantly. We weren't sure what to do at first and hung out in the apartment for a while, but then we decided to go have a look in the complex, at a part we'd not been into before. It had a large arcade and we easily wasted a couple of hours in there. Face is so addicted to 2p machines! After we had worn ourselves out on flashy colours and losing money, Jenni, Ciaran & I went swimming while the lads went home to doss some more. The pool was huge and had some cool features like a slide, flumes, rapids and a wave pool!

On our last day the weather calmed right down so we put a little effort into getting out to see some things, first going to a local animal farm so Ciaran could see lots of cute animal (it didn't hurt that I got to see them too ;p) and then onto Pwllheli to see what was there. At first we missed the beach and had a wander around not finding much of interest but a Cadwaladers! After a little driving around though we found the seafront and spent some time playing in the sand, I got pretty good at building castles! Later on the other went for a rest in the apartment but I wanted to check out the beach at the haven park we were in, so I left them and went for a walk on the beach for an hour or so by myself, it was good to be by myself for a little while, I can't help myself, I'm just so antisocial sometimes!

Overall we had a good time, even if I'm not big on kids and stuff, Ciaran was mostly well behaved. I couldn't help but think it would've been even better had we gone a couple of weeks back when the weather was so much better, but it can't be helped! Overall was just nice to be away from work, back to it now I suppose xp



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