Here we are (again)

It’s Black Friday and we are here in Boston after a completely uneventful and trouble-free journey (the kind we like).

Our travelling companions have found a spot on the windowsill from where they can view the goings on down below.

Shopping.

Hard not to, really.  I had spotted a jacket which I thought interesting and worth trying on.  When I asked if there was any discount on it, I was told that it had already been discounted by 30%.  Thinking that was that, I began to do sums in my head and didn’t really register the rest of the assistant’s sentence…”and because it’s already discounted, there’s a further 40% off as well”.  Take another 5% off because I have a loyalty card for that particular store (hmm…yes…!) and I took home a jacket priced at $150 for around $50.

Chatting to the assistant as she packed it for me, she asked how long we’d been in town.  She laughed when we said “oh, about an hour”.

Christmas has arrived here and I know someone who will recognise those decorations from previous years but as she doesn’t read my blog, I’ll be taking the photographs along to show her later.  Bettine (m-i-l) has been with us on our last two visits and it seems strange not to have her along this time – she felt she’d “been there, done that” this year, though when we spoke on the phone on our arrival, she was rather rueful that we were eating in Legal Seafoods tonight!

We did a quick run into the drugstore opposite and though we haven’t stocked up on Christmas chocolates yet, it’s good to know they’re there when we want them!

And though we didn’t eat in this particular restaurant, I couldn’t resist taking a photograph of the menu.  Peekytoe crab?  Johnny Cakes?  Research needed!!

Tomorrow, we’ll hit the shops for real.  The weather is unseasonably warm – warmer than at home, even, and this evening we both went out wearing sweater but no coat.  The forecast predicts gradually decreasing temperatures but well above freezing and we’ll keep our fingers crossed that it stays dry.

But first, a good night’s sleep!!

Lily and Ernie

Working through Jessica Sprague and Heidi Swapp’s Mouse Paper Scissors Give course materials yesterday, I decided to swerve off the given path and, instead of using the digital files provided, I’d create something about my grandparents.

Though I wouldn’t say the finished project is really to my taste, I will certainly use the ideas and techniques involved over and again – the Photoshop processes alone are worth the cost of the class, so useful are they.

I’m lucky to have a bit of ephemera from my grandparents’ lives: their wedding certificate, Grandad’s war record and Nan’s school report from 1912 (“She is clean and tidy, polite and well-behaved and very clever with her needle.  She is a big, fine girl, capable of doing much hard work and very willing” – destined for “service”, most surely, though that was not to be).  I used scans of those documents in the collaged background and then build the film strip from photographs of them both.

I really loved making the flowers, risking life and limb as I played with fire!  Definitely something to do more of, though sadly, not at all the kind of thing to teach in a class.

It’s very nearly finished, then.  I just need to sort something out for the lower left hand corner as an alternative to the bird motif supplied.  I shall see what I can come up with.

and finally

I couldn’t resist sharing the book of the season in Stockholm, a book of knitted Christmas tree balls with the most eyecatching front cover ;-)

Arne and Carlos have quite a following…

(and I just ordered the English language version on Amazon UK, of course)

Seen in Stockholm

A flavour of the season last weekend, in the shop windows and around.

So many Scandinavian touches in the beautifully arranged displays.

The red, cream and grey is such an elegant alternative Christmas palette, isn’t it?  We spotted those felted beads immediately and went in search – only to find them rather beyond our price range, beautiful or no.

Inside, it was fascinating to see how the traditional Christmas theme predominates here with a strong red-white-grey-black palette.  It was also interesting to see how between Friday afternoon and Sunday morning, the Christmas department of Ahlens store was virtually stripped bare!

Tablewares, small household items all with a seasonal touch – all very tempting and so attractive.

 

The beautiful Littala tableware of which I’d have a complete set just for use at Christmas if I could.

 

Of course, there’s always cute, isn’t there?  Not particularly my taste but clearly someone loves them!

Oh, and the scarf in the department store window which was worthy of a return visit.  Would we find it inside?  Well, no – but the assistant knew where they were.

Sadly, only in black!  Somehow, I felt that the stark contrast between the black knitted section and the cream lace was just a little too much.  The young sales assistant looked puzzled and said she felt sure there were cream ones still available if only she could find them.

But no worries…she stepped into the shop window and took the one from the model for me.

Hooray!

(I’ve even got a red lipstick this season, too, though I might be a little more restrained than the dolly in the window)

What a fun weekend we had, but for sure, it’s good to be home.  Until Friday, at least ;-)

Are we nearly home?

Thankfully, no-one uttered those particular words though I’m sure they were in many minds as we flew back yesterday afternoon.  Having checked in and made ourselves comfortable whilst waiting for our 3pm flight home, we spotted a red flag on the departure board, alerting us to a 45 minute delay.  Ho hum.

Going to the gate around 3pm, noticing that the later flight had been cancelled altogether, we waited for news.  Sure enough, an announcement came to say that there was likely to be a longer wait on the plane because there was fog at Heathrow and fewer planes than usual were being granted permission to land.  Nevertheless, we boarded as instructed, settled ourselves in and summoned up all patience.

That’s when the Captain came on the loudspeaker to say that we were likely to be there waiting for another four hours.

ooo.

What does one do?  Play solitaire on the laptop, do a puzzle or two, read a magazine…for someone like me with the boredom threshold of a gnat, it’s no problem to find some kind of activity in my bag – but going nowhere makes settling to anything rather a challenge.

We were getting hungry too.  As a result of the cancelled flight ours was completely full and space was not exactly available to wander around, to stretch legs or anything else.  We simply sat and waited.

From time to time the Captain issued updates and one or two folks decided to get off the plane, so permission was sought, luggage offloaded and the rest of us settled back for a while longer.  Our inflight meal of a sandwich was served, a round of drinks brought and remarkably the baby in the row in front of us was happily entertained by his doting parents and didn’t make a sound.  A chap across the way asked if he may buy a giant Toblerone from the inflight shopping catalogue but was advised that since we were still on the ground, nothing could be sold.  A pity that…I can imagine BA could have made a killing on those chocolate bars! 

His request reminded me that I had a little secret stash of peanut M&Ms in my bag – we thought about rationing them out so they would last the full two hours remaining but actually scoffed the lot in one go!

Thankfully, with about an hour to go, the Captain reported that we had been given a slot and we were taking off as soon as everyone could get themselves seated and belted up – within five minutes we were all there, ready and waiting, the safety demonstration was done in superfast time and we were off.  An uneventful (and snackless!) two and a half hours later, we were back at Heathrow, where the fog had thankfully lifted but list of cancelled flights reminded us of how lucky we were to have arrived home tonight.