Friday, January 20, 2012

Rocking Your World Friday - week 3

Gosh.  That week went fast! 

So here we are again, and it's time to round up this week's happy moments...

Last weekend there were smiles all round, as it was lovely and sunny.  I love Winter sunshine.  We went out for a fab (if rather cold!) walk and found a few geocaches, and along the way we discovered a little 13th century church, completely deserted, but open so we could have a good look round.


On the same walk we also found the remains of a medieval village called Richardston - not much left of it now but lumps and bumps in a large field, but it was fascinating to walk through where the village used to be, and imagine all the hustle and bustle (and the smells :) ) of the middle ages all around us.


As for the geocaches themselves, we only found two, but they were good ones - quality over quantity is our motto.



Sunday was Roller Derby day - woooohoooo!!!  I had been looking forward to this for ages.

This was the Swindon Rail Road Rebels' first ever game....not a full official bout just yet but a friendly scrimmage vs Oxford.  It wasn't open to the general public as they want to get a couple of friendlies under their belt before worrying about an audience, but I was lucky enough to be allowed in to take some photos.

And by "some", I mean around 700! Sadly 99% of them were blurry rubbish, though.  Close quarters, fast moving action is pretty hard to capture in a dimly lit indoor sports hall with no flash....  but by the end of the scrimmage I had got my camera settings pretty much optimised, and I'm hopeful of getting a better result next time.

These were a few of my favourite shots:

if looks could kill ;)


The game itself was incredibly exciting and fun to watch, I kept getting so caught up in the action that I forgot I was there to take photos - probably just as well as I would have ended up with 7,000 shots to sift through rather than 700 if I hadn't got distracted :)

Oh - and the final score?

Go Rebels Go!!!! :D :D :D

All the girls were really friendly, and I had a great time.  Can't wait for the next bout!


Redundancy woes continue at work, but at least all went smoothly for the young lady from my team who has elected to take voluntary - she wasn't required to work her notice and she seemed chuffed with that.  All was handled sympathetically, so that's good.  Or at least, less bad than it could have been.

On Monday evening I was watching this You Tube tutorial on space painting for beginners, and I thought I'd give it a go.

I was chuffed to bits with the results, not bad for a first attempt, eh?  (not that I can really take much credit, I just followed the steps in the video, and it just worked!)


The best part, though, was Darby's reaction when I showed it to him - apparently these "look like rocky terrestrial planets, though they seem to orbiting quite close to one another but thats not unheard of - though I would just have to say there shouldn't be quite as much debris between/close to the planets as per the IAU definition of planet they should have cleared the neighbourhood of their orbits of any small bodies" ....  ahhhh, the joys of having an undergraduate astrophysicist for a son :D

I'm still making progress with my Sketchbook Project book - in fact that's where the space painting ended up:

I only have one more double page spread left to do now, and the covers.  Phew!  Hopefully by next week's RYWF post I'll be able to say it's fiiiiinally finished :)

Also this week, for the first time in yonks and yonks, I had a little spend up on crafting supplies, with the last of my ebay proceeds.  I bought some bookbinding thread, charms, stencils and a few other bits and bobs from A Sprinkle Of Imagination....

It arrived beautifully packaged, both the white tissue paper and purple ribbon have been filed away for later use, and there were sweeties inside too :)  

Sweet retail therapy, how I have missed you!

(I need to sell more stuff on ebay so I can do it again lol)

And a couple more things that made me smile this week:

I found this book, that has been on my Amazon wish list for ages, in a charity shop for a quid, result.

And, very timely as I have been reading up a lot on printmaking techniques recently (I can smell a new obsession on the horizon, I'm SO faddy when it comes to arts and crafts, I wish I could settle on one thing and get good at it instead of all the flitting!) - there is a new print exhibition at the gallery near my work :


This was one of my favourites - a lino cut print with a little touch of gold leaf:

But there were tons of examples of all sorts of different techniques.

Loved it, definitely brightened up my lunchtime.

That's it for this week - see you again next time






12 comments:

CRAFTY WOMBLE said...

Excellent week and some lovely photo's throughput your post :) I especially like the first one and your first hockey shot! I am glad your team member didn't have to work their notice. The first time I was made redundant we knew in February and it was the end of May before they let us go (it was half the local workforce to). I was fine as I had somewhere to go from the September, but no one gave us work (we were researchers) as we were leaving, it was a very strange time. I to am a crafter of indeterminate purpose - I like to think of it as gathering as many different life skills as possible rather than not settling on one thing ;)

Sue said...

LOVE your space painting even if the planets are too close together:)

BadPenny said...

Your photos are superb what a lovely walk & wonderful finds.
The roller girls look scary ! How exciting to be involved.
I love your painting & great to use it in your journal.
Having a crafting loss of creation at the mo but lovely to see what others are making.
Lovely Friday post.

K said...

Great action shots!

Wow, super brainy Darby!! I would have just shrugged & answered "artistic licence **sticks tongue out**" lol
It truely looks very space like, & love the Tardis on it :-)

SusieJ said...

What a great week!
The roller derby looks fun but scary...love the photos you've shown us!!
My son is in his final year of a History degree (at UWE in Bristol) so he would just have said.."cool"..to the painting!! lol I love it by the way.
You've reminded me..I need to sort out DVDs and books to sell on Amazon so I can buy more crafty goodies! Your parcel looks interesting!!
Have a great weekend.
Hugs xx
p.s. my post is up on my new blog:http://susiej-thisismyworld.blogspot.com/2012/01/whats-rocking-my-world-friday_20.html
The Twilight Zone is now for crafts only..:)

Virginia said...

Oooh I'll try again - I commented earlier but blogger went awol - bless. You sound like you had a great week, loving the sun photo and the discoveries on your walk. The space picture is amazing and I don't care if the planets are too far together LOL! The crafy goodness also looks great. I'm glad you've nearly managed your sketchbook challenge, I really must put thinking cap on when it comes to my CJ - in fact might do that next - well think about it anyway.

I hope you have a beautiful and blessed weekend and week ahead.

Hugs

Shelley Malone said...

Oooohhhhhh, I could easily get sucked into printmaking too. Look at those patterns!! I suppose the bright side is that all the skills you learn along the way are transferable and make learning the next technique that much easier. At least that's what I tell myself... : )

Also I'm a little jealous of your little shopping spree. That looks like some fun stuff! You'll have to let us all know what you end up doing with it.

xoxo
Shelley

Joanna said...

Lovely Rocking post! Great photos and I LOVE those planets - I watched that youtube clip too - he made it all look so easy, didn't he?!

Bargain book, lovely crafting 'stuff' and the printmaking looks fab!

Have a great weekend,

x

Luna Art said...

Hi sarah,
First let me say thankyou for your lovely comment on my blog last week. My son is already starting to look at uni courses and the offer of input was great and something I will probably take you up on!
Your rocking post is fab, loads of cool stuff, where do I start... Great photos of the old church, always wondered about geo caching something I will have to find out about! The photos of the roller derby are amazing, you have captured some real action shots, love the dirty look one!
The planet painting is fab and your sons comments made me laugh, that is so like something Caleb would say! Your sketchbook is looking good, I took part last year but missed the deadline this time.
I also had an order arrive from a sprinkle of imagination this week, and it looks like we ordered the same stuff, book binding cord, charms, stencils!!!!!! Have fun creating with your new goodies. The printmaking exhibition also looks good.
Hope you have a great week x

Sabrina said...

Wow, what a full week you've had. I have to ask, 'chuffed' is a good thing? The sound of the word itself sounds negative, but by context it seems a good thing.

Your walks sound wonderful and adventurous. We just don't have those type of relics over here on the west coast.

I've not done geocaching before, but the kids and I sometimes go letterboxing. It's such a cool adventure. Of course it's a bummer if the kids don't actually find the box!

Hope you next week is as good and productive as this last one!

Carmen said...

Excellent week. Those ruins sound like my sort of find, they'd have made my day!

Fabulous book find too, I'll be interested what you think of that one, it's one I've had my eye on too and have read some conflicting reviews.

The space painting is amazing - love your sons reaction.

You are not alone with the craft hopping. I can never settle on one either. I don't think it's just craft related, Craig is the same with his birdies. Since I've known him he's had green finches, zebs, racing pigeons, canaries, quail, bengalese finches, budgies... he's busily rejigging his bird area to welcome some canries back as I type. Think this is all to do with his Dad though as he was fond of canaries.

Also, have been flogging on eBay too so I can have a little spend. I try not to buy supplies unless I've sold some old stash or something else that isn't nailed down or one of my crafty pieces. Was lovely to click 'buy' on some Gesso today :P

Have a great week Sarah x

Dayna Collins said...

What a great post! Looks like you had a full week - loved your explorations, the Derby photos, the goodies you received in the mail AND I can't wait to see your Sketchbook Project!