Monet Colours and a Craft Roulette Surprise

Friday, Suna and I were chatting about the Craft Roulette show, and it reminded me just how much I enjoy playing along. I haven’t joined in for quite a while, mostly because of the timing—the live show airs on a Saturday morning, which usually clashes with my grocery run. This weekend, though, I managed to catch the replay on Saturday afternoon, and as soon as I saw the four parameters, I was inspired to create.

The prompt for Monet colours instantly took me back to our visit to Claude Monet’s cottage in Giverny many years ago. The lily pond there is absolutely stunning, and his Water Lilies paintings really inspired me. Those soft blues, greens, yellows, and touches of pink felt like the perfect palette to bring that memory into this project.

My card began as an A2 design, but after making my Crinkle Inkle background with a smooshing tool, I realised I had trimmed the panels to 4.25 inches long instead of 5.5 inches. Rather than starting over, I switched gears and turned it into a 4.25-inch square gatefold card—an “Ardyth” square size, which felt especially fitting since Ardyth was the guest designer on Craft Roulette this week. At first, my natural element was going to be a daisy, but then I saw that Ardyth had used one too, so I changed direction again and chose a butterfly instead. As luck would have it, a new butterfly die had arrived that very morning, so it all came together perfectly. In the end, this card involved a couple of happy surprises and last-minute changes, which made it even more fun to create.

Entering this into Darnell's NBUS challenge as this was my first time using the butterfly die. 

Holiday instalment # 5 - Paris part 2

Paris.... what a city.

We walked from Palais de Chailot to the Eiffel Tower - via the Carousel to join the queue for the elevator to Level 2 ( not too long a wait - only about 20 mins) what a marvel this tower is. Once on Level 2 I decided that right to the top was for me..... so a bit more queuing and up we went..... TOTALLY AMAZING views from up there.  It is 324 metres (1,063 ft) tall...

 So worth the wait to get up there!!!!!! and the long wait to get back down.

Our next day in Paris was Sunday and we were up at 6.00am as we were taking a bus tour to Giverny to visit Claude Monet's gardens and then back to Versailles in the afternoon.  It was a beautiful still morning and I captured this amazing shot of the Seine River.

 

The Monet gardens were amazing.  I took so many photos of the flowers as they were so pretty and the pond.... it is exactly like you see in the Monet paintings.  Here are just a few of the photos

 I have already used a couple to make thank you cards ( see here and here )
After lunch at an amazing old mill we headed to Versailles.  The Mill has a wheel that still turns.

Versailles was the one of the highlights of the trip for Peter.  He was totally amazed at the opulence of the Palace.  The Hall of Mirrors was something special and all the amazing painting, the painted ceilings.... so much to see and then the gardens and fountains.

As you can see, we were very lucky with the weather.  The whole time we were in Paris we had sunshine... only one day a bit cooler and cloudy on and off and that was the day we visited the Louvre.....

Next instalment for that one....
Hope you are enjoying my trip.  I am so loving choosing the photos to show and reliving again each day.  So thanks for stopping by.