Excuses/ Part Three

Ok, here´s the last one of all my excuses for not being creative in the last few weeks: 

I´v been to....

 LONDON for the first time of my life!! And it was truly an experience! 

Just the fact that nearly 8.000.000 people are living there - almost the same amount of habitants as in my little country Austria!
We found a very nice room (private)  http://www.9flats.com/de/places/9755-wohnung-london-camdentown?origin=search  and had a really good time there - although it was quite exhausting to whip through this huge city in 2,5 days! The weather was cold and wet, but our very friendly host assured us, that this is the "real London experience" :-)
We managed to see Big Ben, Picadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Notting Hill, Portobello Road, Camden Market, The Tower and Tower Bridge and the new/old Shakespeare Theater...

I enjoyed strolling through Camden Market and Portobello Road Market very much... we bought quite a few "keepsakes"  :-)  ... and sometimes only just having a look was very delightful, too...

As I already said, it was very cold and wet and sometimes we just had to indulge ourselves with some yummy treats...

 ...aren´t they absolutely gorgeous?

Stunning cake-decorations, don´t you agree!

Ok, I guess you´re pretty tired now of all my excuses - in my next post I´ll show you something handcrafted again!

Until then - have a nice new week! Thanks for stopping by!

Excuses / Part Two

Staying in Venice is quite expensive - so we prefer staying in Padua (ital.: Padova)... a city with a really nice old city center. It´s quite medieval - when strolling through the streets of the ancient city center I sometimes expect Romeo and Juliet coming around the corner... ok, Padua is not Verona, but the feeling is the same :-)

Unfortunately we always "forget" to make some pictures there... don´t know, why.

Here´s one of the beautiful old houses - my aunt in the front...

It´s taken with a small "point&shoot digi cam", so please neglect the poor quality.

A main reason for coming to Italy is to enjoy life - La dolce vita, as the Italians say... and we try our best:

... an indoor pic from our favourite enoteca in the city... to avoid misunderstandings: these were not all for me :-) only the glass rightmost!!

And they have very delicious food there:

Thanks for visiting!

PS: I tried to make some cameos with my Mold Muse molds lately - I even tried to do them bicolored - and I think they came out quite well with Fimo/Sculpey ... I love these molds - they´re first class quality!

Excuses / Part One

Sorry for being so quiet lately... but I´ve some really good excuses!

 

Here´s the 1st one: our annual shopping trip to Padua (ital.:Padova) and Venice.... we had 4 fabulous days in Italy!

 

Want to travel a little?
Come with me on a short sightseeing tour through Venice ... we preferred to avoid the crowds of tourists this time and went through a more quiet area to the famous Rialto Bridge:

There are very popular stores called "Coin" in Italy - this one in Venice is in an old Palazzo - and look how gorgeous the decoration is! When you come in and look up to the ceiling - this is what you see:

Until next time!

Thanks for stopping by!

Just a quick post to be in time for the Papertrey Ink Challenge Day 9:


BEAUTIFUL BUTTERFLIES AND LOVELY LEAVES

(Sentiment =PTI)

This card reminded me a little bit of our favourite café located in the ancient inner city of Zadar in Croatia: hubby and I love to sit outside in the sun and read an exciting book or a magazine … it´s very pretty inside, too (LOVE the red chandelier!), but the icing on the cake is the very old inner part of the house…

Thanks for visiting – have a nice day!

Piran

Anybody ever heard of Piran?
Maybe not - it´s a small town/seaport in Slovenia, first mentioned in the 7th century.

Here´s a view from the ancient city walls:

One of the most famous houses of the town is the Venetian House - built in the middle of the 15th century - it was a present from a Venetian merchant to his beautiful mistress in Piran:

As you can imagine, this was a big scandal then and common talk of everybody! So the merchant installed an inscription on the wall, that says:" Let them talk."

In my imagination I can see this beautiful woman standing on her balcony ...

It was really nice strolling through this "steeped in history"-town.... but it wasn´t too warm, so hubby and I decided to warm up in a nice little tavern... we LOVE fish, so - being at the sea - we got fresh, unbelievably delicious fish dishes to eat ... just look at this fish soup:

... and can you imagine, that this was grilled seafood for ONE person?!

"Beam me up to Piran again, Scotty!!!" :-)

On the ground floor of the Venetian House we found a shop, that was selling sea salt for all purposes and table salt in several qualities. I bought some salt as souvenir and small present...

As we crafters never give away a gift unembellished and without a card, I used some leftover scraps to make a small card... the black patterned paper behind the Maya Road cardboard cameo is a leftover and also the grey strip at the bottom - there was a piece missing on one corner, but I hid this by adhering a rose...

Just in case you´re wondering why on earth I´m telling you this: there´s a challenge at the Cuttlebug spot :  Left Overs - use them!

... the stamps are from Waltzingmouse Stamps.

Thanks a lot for traveling with me today :-)

Venezia/Venice/Venedig

My familiy and I usually go to Italy once a year (at least) - we love that country!

One day is always reserved for Venice (established in 5th century) - I´m impressed by the beauty of this city every year anew!

Please come with me on a short trip to Venice! You won´t regret it!

Isn´t the architecture just great?! Have you ever seen such gorgeous chimneys?!

We had lunch in this picturesque Trattoria...

The gondolas are so pompous!

This is the famous "Rialto" bridge over the "Canal Grande"...

We love to sit at the edge of the Canal Grande at the bottom of the bridge and enjoy the sun... people who know me will spot me on the picture...

 

Now, inspired by the opulence and pompous beauty of this city, I want to share with you a wedding card - a very "blingy" one... to do this city justice!

If the famous Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) would have ever decided to marry, I would have sent him this one ;-)

Thanks for travelling with me!!

http://onestopcraftchallenge.blogspot.com/2011/03/week-123-diamonds-are.html
http://simplycreatechallenges.blogspot.com/2011/03/39-just-little-monochromatic.html

http://stampchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/03/something-sweet-challenge.html
http://cupcakecraftchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/03/cupcake-134-monochromatic-and-dt-call.html
http://houseofgilli.blogspot.com/
http://michelle-pinkpaperparadise.blogspot.com/
http://pollycraftchallengeblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/challenge-85-swirls-and-pearls-lynsey.html

Back home again

I´ve a terrible head-ache today, so I just want to let you know that I´m back home again from my beautiful weekend in…. can you guess it?


Here´s a hint for you:

 

 
… yes, you´re right… I´ve been to Italy the last few days to enjoy sweet life (“La dolce vita”).


I love to see pictures from other countries, so I assume that some of you might be interested in pictures from the cities I visited: Venice, Padua, Caorle. These are very picturesque cities!

I´ll show you some in the next few days….

Until then!

Sunshine-Trip

... for all those who feel cold because of  all that talk of snow in Blogland  ;-)

Come with me on a short trip to Mexico...

 

Can you feel the sun on your skin???

Thanks for stopping by today!