Dolly's Dreamings

Magical Prompt 4 pages and general ramblings

Well - we tookt he plunge this morning - our new kitchen is ordered, the deposit is paid and we are good to go.

I think it will look lovely - I so hope it will after all of this. It will be so much lighter and brighter. The units will be Canadian Maple and the example of them is here. We have chosen black worktops but deliberately not shiny surfaces - just not practical for either the cats or someone like me with OCD cleanliness and polishing issues. I think I'd drive myself potty.

We also looked at toasters, kettles and microwaves and found the most perfect chair for the kitchen. That was the problem - the chair. They only had one, can't get others and we loved it - it was like nothing else but we have to pass up on that and move on.

These are the pages I made yesterday for the Magical memories prompt 4 about travel.

The first page is our car. We love doing road trips and the Wild West one involved 3000 miles and 9 states and a lot of time int he car. We had asked for a luxury car and were given this Chrysler 300. It had only just been released and Nigel was smitten (so much so that he bought his own here 18 months ago) He got stopped a lot of times to ask what he thought of it and was always a little rueful when he had to say it was a hire car. Anyway, our car was our base for 2 weeks and we loved it. It was stocked with all sorts of road trip goodies like a huge permanent ise bag filled with coke and water and snacks. Nigel drove and I navigated.

The second page show the other form of transport we used - our feet for hiking to places. The picture of Nigel is a poingnant one. It was taken in Arches National Park and there was a hike we wanted to do and tried to do. However, the temperatures were in the mid 90's and it was too hot for me to manage the whole hike. But I wanted the pictures of the arch at the end. Cue husband who is so devoted he did the rest of the hike alone whilst I found a rock to give some shade whilst he took pictures.  He genuinely did go the extra mile for me.

Now I want to leave you with a link that Sara sent me which is just beautiful. It is a You Tube link and when you have watched it search further because there is the full 10 part story ont here with Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna and it is wonderful.

This is the link Sara sent

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adYbFQFXG0U

This is the full story Part One (It's not good to begin with but stick with it - seriously - byt he time it gets to Part 2 and 3 you'll be as hooked as I was.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzxms9-qQZ4&feature=related

Thank you sara for introducing me to this.

Magical Memories Freebie

So sorry

Image and link removed

This is not allowed due to copyright restrictions. I didn't realise it was wrong

I am so sorry for the wasted visit

Magical Memories Prompt 4

I can't believe the time is passing so quickly and this is already into week 4.

I hope you are enjoying the prompts - would be fab to have some feedback .... there's an awful echo in here on my own!

Time to get moving with prompt 4 - can't wait to see what you come up with.

Download magical_moments_week_4.pdf

Magical Memories prompt 3 wild west pages

When I sat down to do my pages for prompt number 3 I have to confess I was a little horrified to realise quite how many pictures of various restuarants and food I had from the trip. I am pleased I had them but was surprised I had taken pictures. I am more organised than I thought I guess.

The first page of the double is really special to us. It is the most memorable evening we have ever spent and it was one of those purely by chance evenings. We had been driving and touring around Capitol Reef National Park - one of the least visited and where there is still real wilderness - and had pre-booked a night at Torrey. When we arrived at the hotel - a Best Western as we always use them - we were uninspired and phoned to see if we could make reservations at the next Best Western just a three hour drive away! We couldn't, there was no-where else and so we were stuck. On arrival our room wasn't ready - they said they could give us a room without a view but if we wanted a view it would be an hour or so and why didn't we go into town for a bit! Well, to be frank we couldn't see a view. I mean where were they going to put us where there was a view at all. But we stood for it and went into town. Now I am quite prepared to acknowledge that we may have missed it, but we couldn't find 'town' and my experience of lots of Utah is that there often isn't more than a general store and a gas station - and indeed that was all we found. It is quite hard to whle away more than 15 minutes in a  small town general store but we gave it our best shot and then went and sat in the car.

On returning to the hotel we were told our room was ready and were given a key and pointed over to a very uninspiring block at the far side of the grounds. This was the view from our balcony - which we agreed was worth waiting for (and later that night we sat and watched an amazing sunset from there are the sky and the rocks changed into so many colours)

Anyway, the hotel had a restuarant that looked awful and dull and so we headed just down and across the road to another we had seen called the Rim Rock Restuarant. And OMG - it was amazing. the restaurant was very rustic but beautiful and was literally perched on the edge of the canyon with windows along the entire one side. The views were amazing; the colours changed constantlyw itht he light, there were eagles swooping by (we were very high up) and hummingbirds feeding at the various feeders. The food was delicious, and then we saw soemthing fab. The native Americans called the area The Land of the Sleeping Rainbow because of the many colours in the rocks. There was rain over in the distance and suddenly a perfect rainbow appeared. It was the icing ont he cake - a night we may never have had and was one of the most special not only of the trip but ever. A real stand out magical memory.

The second page was much simpler and was all about the journalling. I picked 8 of the places we ate ont he trip - from a small Denny's and a real dive looking place that was billed as serving the best pizza in Utah and it did  to the Cheesecake Factory and a really nice restaurant in Cheyenne.

The blog prompt for My Freedom today is about books and reading. I am a real book addict. We have a library at home - it was a room I had always wanted to have and it is filled with books. I love it.

I read A LOT. I usually read three or four books a week, slightly more when I am on holiday and slightly less when I am at school, and I read anything and everything. I am not a huge fan of biographies and non fiction, preferring fiction really, but I read whatever I have. I like a nice classic such as Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, really rubbish chick lit such as Sophie Kinsella and even Jackie Collins and everything in between. Some of my favourite books are about early civilizations such as the jean Auel books and a series I have discivered recently by William Sarande about first Americans. I absolutely love Bill Brysona nd can read his books over and over. Just perfect observation, fact and humour all mixed together. I am currently loving Peter James and Jodi Picoult. The most recent book I finished yesterday was recommended by a  blog reader - The Five People You Meet In Heaven - and I loved it so much. Thank you for recommending it. I had 5 books for my birthday last week - that was one of them. I also had a Peter James, a Jackie Collins, the new Jeffrey Archer and Katie Price's autobiography. A real mix there then.

You might like to look at this list I shared a while ago and see how many of this top 100 you have read.

Have fun

So Summer's here then

Nij has been off for the last 5 days and we have had 5 days of glorious weather. Wonder if he will take it away when he goes back to work? I hope not.

I am a pleasant brown colour now (hate pasty white) and have had to admit defeat and come in fromt he garden and have a shower as it is way way way too hot. Nij is brilliant - he's sat on the new patio under the new parasol - but you don't get brown doing that now do you!

The new patio set is now out and looks awesome and when I have dried off I will take pictures and add them later. But I have to admit we are chuffed to bits with it all.

I am adding my Disney pages for prompt three of Magical Memories and will add my non Disney pages tomorrow.

I really enjoyed doing this one as I honestly think I wouldn't have added pages about food and places to eat unless I was encouraged to.

Eating is an important part of any holiday as it means not cooking (and those of you who know me know I hate to cook!)

The first page is one of our fave places to eat - The Sci Fi Diner in MGM. Just love the whole atmosphere, love watchingt he old sci fi movies - and the adverts -and love the food. I always have soemthing which is not on the menu. It used to be - a speciality veggie burger - but they took it off years ago - but if you ask for it they still do it. No idea why it is not on the menu.

The second page has pictures from the Concourse Steakhouse at the Contemporary which we also always visit during our stay.

The journalling - and the page is about the journalling really, details a few of the other places, botht hose we have loved and those we have not liked so much for various reasons.

I love that I have the details in my album now.

At the top of this post was the page for the month in my life from 25th - yes you see it correctly - it really is a picture of Tesco. What an exciting life we lead eh! And here is the page for 26th July - a picture of our nice new patio.

I have yet to make todays as the day is only half way through but I feel it may well have a picture of the new patio furniture LOL. Off to sit in it now.

Magical Memories Prompt 3

Well, I hope you have been having fun with the prompts so far. I have some great ideas lined up for the future but for this week here is something close to my heart.

Oh yes - it's food based LOL

I am hoping that the prompts are getting you to think of some different ways of approaching your album - maybe recording things you haven't done before and maybe doing some journalling too.

Please do post to let me know you are playing / planning to play one day /  enjoying it / not enjoying it (gosh I hope there are not too many of those)

Here is prompt 3

Download magical_memories_week_3.pdf

Nature's own show

I am sharing the double page I have made as part of the Magical Memories class but these two are for my non Disney album - my Wild West album.

It all seems to fit together nicely as Shimelle's blog prompt was about inspiration and nature is one of the things that inspire me most. My prompt for week 2 of Magical memories was about putting on a  show and so this has all combined to give me pages on one of the greatest natural shows in the world - Yellowstone National Park.

It really is like no-where else I have ever seen. It is such a mix of verdant grasslands, sulphur pots, lunar landscapes, hot springs and geysers. The wildlife we saw there was amazing. One of the most incredible sights I have ever seen was when we happened upon the resident herd of buffalo. They surrounded us (yes it was a bit scary as you are not meant to stop close to them as they are dangerous but when they are blocking the road you really don't have a lot of choice in the matter!)

We watched them running in the distance, kicking up dust clouds, grazing right next to us, rolling over and taking dust baths. It was wonderful - like being a real part of something like Dances with Wolves. It was a very special time.

We also saw the most famous geyser of all - Old Faithful (I couldn't resist the picture of Nij by the sign - he took it in good spirit - and Explorer Mickey who is our school traveller is also with him)

We saw hot springs, so many elk it wasn't true and the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. The first page has a stitched flap that lifts up to reveal extensive journalling and the flap is made from one of our favourite pictures of Excelsior Geyser printed onto canvas card so it was all faded and subtle. The negative strip acts as the lift up for the flap.

I have had a superb day today going to lunch at one of my favourite restuarants with the head teachers of two other school. The restaurant is right on the beach and it was just so nice to be relaxed and on holiday.

I need to think more about the My Freedom blog prompt as I am not sure I have fully understood it yet - so may be back later

My Prompt 2 pages and reflections on achievements

I have had fun myself working on the pages fro prompt number two. If you remember, the whole reason why I wanted to create this on line album class was to have people to play with whilst I tackled my own album.

I am making 2 albums - one Disney and one not - and these are the pages for the Disney album.

I always say I am not that fussed about the whole character thing at Disney. mmmmmm - who am I trying to kid. One appearance of Mickey and I am smitten. I am there, flinging small children out of the way in order to get a picture of the most famous rodent in the world. Its that cute face, that smart black and red suit, those ears! Love him.

So my show pages are a tribute to the mouse who started it all - hence the title.

I have used pictures from two different parades on 3 occassions. Two separate views of the Snow Globes parade at the Magic Kingdom in 2002  and the stars and cars parade from MGM in 2005. The snow globes parade was really special.

For one visit we were on the island in front of the castle with seats - yes seats I kid you not - and a perfect view as the floats arrived. However, we paid the price for that view. We sat there over an hour before parade started and both got hideously burnt. Ah well - the pictures were worth it.

The second time we saw the parade was even more remarkable. We had done the Behind the Scenes tour (if you haven't done it it is so worth it - a full day tour to see behind the scenes at Disney and I mean behind the scenes; going in the utilidors, seeing the floats up close to touch, seeing the wood shops, the costume dept, underneath the American Adventure, inside Body wars ... and so much more)

  Anyway we came up out of the utilidors into a VIP area at the end of Main Street with the best view of the parade ever and - being Disney - it was timed to perfection as we only had to wait 5 minutes for the first float. Fabulous. After the parade, back down into the utilidors and continue with the tour.

The Mickey journalling block is printed on acetate and I will upload these journalling blocks as freebies tomorrow so you can use them if you wish.

The My Freedom prompt today was to do a timeline of your achievements to date. It was actually quite hard to do and it became clear quickly that my memory of achievements isn't good. I had far more to say about the last few years but I did do it for my whole life .... it's just a bit sketchy in places LOL. I also included significant events along the way such as the years I lost my Mom and Dad, the year I met Nigel for the first time (I was just 15) and so on.

Some of my standouts are when I got my degree and later my MA (achieving that whilst working full time as a headteacher as well was blooming hard work!) swimming with dolphins, cuddling a  real life tiger and visiting Israel for a tour of the holy land. I have scrapping achievemnets too like the first time I was published in the UK, the first time I was published in the US, the first time I was invited to be on a DT and winning a national scrapping competition.

My biggest achievement - being happily married for 22 years. It's what I am most proud of and happiest about above everything else.

Magical Memories Prompt 2

Well, it's Wednesday again and that means the second Magical Memories prompt coming up.

I so hope people are enjoying these andfinding that it is making them want to scrap. To me it is always harder to scrap in summer as the sunny weather calls me outside. No problems this year then as it has been cold, wet or overcast for so much of Summer already.

Once again this second prompt had ideas for both people doing a Disney album and for people doing a non Disney album. I think you are going to love this prompt as it opens up lots of ideas.

I would love to hear feedback on the prompt if you download it and would love those of you using the prompts, either now or later, to sign in my guest book ( acouple of posts below) and if possible post your work in the Flickr gallery or post a link to your work in other places here so we could all go look.

Have fun with the prompts and there should be a little freebie to go with this on Thursday or Friday.

 

Download magical_memories_week_2.pdf

Magical Memories Non Disney pages 1

I decided that, in the spirit of those who are playing along in a non Disney way, I would do a non Disney album for my class too.

I never did like the Wild West album I made. It was too bitty and busy so I am going to make a Wild West album of what has to be our best ever holiday..... our wild west tour.

These are the two opening pages about the travel and the plans.

The first page has a picturw which just seems to shout Wild west. It was of a rusty old cart wheel and an old barn at Fruita, the town in Capitol Reef National Park which had such an interesting history. The letters are American Crafts Thickers and the tag pulls out to detail just how much planning and research went into the trip. We drove 3000 miles so I had to plan each leg carefully. It was so worth it as it worked out beautifully.

The second page has a pocket full of things. I printed off the route we took. I had used Microsoft Street finder and route planner for all the planning so it was appropriate to have a print out from that program. It looks so small, but it is a huge scale.

The pocket is full of receipts from the hotels alongt he way and two tages. One tag has a photo of the travel journal we kept. I will be relying on that heavily for this album as the trip was 4 years ago. I am so glad we wrote in it every day about thoughts and feelings and what we did. The second tag bears the itinerary.

Our route was Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Jackson Hole and Grand Teton National Park, Yellowstone National Park, Gilette, Devils Tower, Deadwood, Mount Rushmore, Cheyenne, Rocky Mountain National Park, Vail, Moab, Arches National Park, Capitol Reef National Park, Bryce Canyon, Las Vegas.  Quite some sights to see I can tell you.

I am really looking forward to working on the album.

Today we have been to the British Pedal Car grand Prix at Ringwood, which was great fun and taken very seriously by all the people who compete. It had a lovely atmosphere and I was thrilled that two sisters I used to teach, along with 2 friends, were one of the teams. The won the ladies class in 2006 and 2007 and I think they won this year as well.
My two favourite DJ's on Wave 105 - one who I listen to on the way to work and one on the way back, were also competing. (Not well I have to say) They were Steve Power and Andy Jackson.

I tell you something, you have to be fit to do that circuit over and over again. The race lasts for 2 hours and the winner is the team who complete the most laps in the two hours. If I managed one lap I'd be dead chuffed.

The cars were very diverse and some really beautiful, others clearly built for speed and the chase!

We were lucky to be opposite the pits which made for more interest too.