Travelling in West Ireland and more...

Last week we took the ferry from Pembroke Dock to Rosslare.   We chose this route so that we could see Pembrokeshire in all its glory from the sea.  Sadly it was shrouded in mist so I didn't get the photos I really wanted.


We arrived at our B&B in Wexford to find a castle wall in the back garden.

During the 4 days I am going to share with you in this post I took 296 photos.  You will be pleased to know that I whittled them down to 26 for this post!   We love to travel about along country lanes and look at the passing countryside, occasionally stopping off to have a bit of a walkabout.  I took this photo of Lismore Castle through the car windscreen.

We went into the church at Lismore.

Shame about the lights hanging in the way!


We meandered on until we got to Cashel.  We walked around the cathedral on top of the rock.  There was a plethora of Celtic crosses.


We travelled on that day to Limerick.  And next day we walked around the old town of Limerick.  There were a couple of large churches and a castle.   I loved these chimneys.

And these derelict cottages painted to look as though people lived there.

We continued our meandering around Loop Head, stopping to walk around the headland and obviously to take yet more photos.



We passed many of these square towers which we eventually found out were built by people to keep themselves safe.

We eventually arrived at Spanish Point where we were staying the night.

This dog decided to accompany us on our walk.






Our fourth day had disappointing weather in the morning.  So after stopping in Miltown Malbay to see the waterfall that is right in the middle of town, we went to The Burren Visitor Centre, in Kilfenora.


When we came out of the Visitor Centre it had stopped raining and the sun had come out.  It was still very windy.  We made our way to the Cliffs of Moher - along with about 10,000 other people.  May be an exaggeration but there were a lot of cars, coaches and people!



The Burren is famous for its limestone pavements which I found quite difficult to photograph.

The Burren is an amazing area with miles and miles of the limestone pavements and amazing inland cliffs.   We included a visit to a Megolithic tomb.  I particularly liked this bit of pavement that looked like an animal.



We travelled on to Galway City where we found a B&B in Salthill.

More to come about our travels along the Wild Atlantic Coast in my next post.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice

In our Living Your Word of the Year group we are using a fortnightly (bi-weekly) A-Z challenge throughout the year to help us focus on our word and live it out.

Because of the way I have made my journal it's a case of going with the flow of what background the pages have when I turn to them. This page had a little booklet sewn into the signature and the picture and words.

I was looking for something simple for this page.  I have to admit I was in a hurry and needed to do the page in a short amount of time.  The 'live, love & take pictures' made me think about skills which led me on to strengths and spiritual gifts.  I have done spiritual gifts tests and the top one is always Administration.

I've also done the Strengthsfinder survey which came out with these 5.

I put a variety of pictures in the little booklet - views, my work etc.



I printed out the words and pictures and stuck them into my journal.   The thing about pages like this is that I can always come back and add more design.


Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice



Join Mary Brack, Valerie Sjodin and I in our Facebook group where we are giving participants the opportunity to live out an A-Z of their own word throughout 2019.  Mary explains what we are doing in her blog post.  We don't like a lot of rules, so we will have suggestions and options to spark creativity, and to help in recording and exploring our word’s meaning in visual and fun ways. We will each blog about our experiences and our art.

Hashtags on Instagram:  #livingyourword2019

Check out the other blogs:
Mary: www.foundonbrighton.com
Valerie: www.valeriesjodin.com/blog

To ensure you get updates from Valerie, Mary & I why not subscribe to our blogs.

I have finished my final piece for the Master Practitioner Module 2.  Sadly it's not a great photo.  The piece is based on a walk along the canal.  You can find out about the sketchbook work and samples here.

Now to start Module 3.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice

I had such a lovely day celebrating my birthday last Saturday.  I took a group of my friends to Littleheath Barn Studio where Liske showed them how to print on fabric with wooden blocks and Thermofax screens.







Each person brought a plate of food and we had a lovely lunch together.

Ange made another birthday cake - chocolate this time.

And some mini sponge cakes.  I think we should put her forward for the Great British Bake Off.

Then Liske showed us how to use our printed fabric to make little lanterns.




 We had such a fabulous time.

Thanks Liske for a great day.  And thanks to my friends for celebrating with me.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice

Last Saturday I spent the day at The West Country Quilt & Textile Show with Traverse who had an exhibition there.  I had a wander around the show and these are the quilts that jumped out at me.  Most of these were in exhibition galleries rather than competition quilts.

Shenge Fish Market by Isabel Hollis

On To Glory by Judy Fairless

Red Sails in the Sunset by Penny Cole

The Sentinels: Silent Witness by Anne Beare

All That Remains by Gillian Cooper

Yellow Starflowers by Elinor Sigler

Birchington Breakwaters by Margaret Ramsey

Haven Brow at Sunset by Amelia Leigh

Processional Way by Judith Barker

And finally part of a beautiful mixed media zigzag book by Hilary Beattie.

I'm almost tempted to make a quilt myself and enter it into next year's show:  August 20th-22nd.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice