Claire and Evie come to stay

I haven't posted for a couple of weeks, but that doesn't mean to say I haven't been busy.  I am still making good progress with my portfolio and I am now thinking about the layout for each page and also tackling the dreaded paperwork, including health and safety and bibliography, which never fills me with inspiration!  But all an essential part of the course so it has to be done. 

The more exciting news is that I had some visitors this weekend; my lovely friend Claire, and her daughter Evie, who is the same age as Freya. They have been here for 5 days, and here are a few of our holiday snaps, out and about around the Island...

A quick trip to the local swings

Before heading to the beach

And admiring the stunning scenery

And when it's bedtime for the girls

It's dinner out for us

Before heading to the Lion Park the next day...among other things!

And Claire and Evie's stay was not without creative pursuit. When the girls were tucked up in bed, we decided to start making preparations for Christmas, and what could be more fun than making some salt dough tree decorations!  After initially thinking, yes we have everything we need in the cupboard (plain flour, salt) we were halted in our tracks when we discovered that we had rock salt, not table salt. So it was not until 24 hours later that we were able to commence, and what fun we had! First we made the dough, cut out different shapes and put them in the oven for 4 hours. And the following evening came the fun bit - the painting! We used a combination of acrylic, metallic and glitter paint, and decorated with buttons and ribbon. Here is our work in progress...

And we were pleased with the results considering it was our first ever attempt...

Claire's Masterpieces

And Mine

So this week, after recovering from having two 2 year olds in the house, (it was a pleasure really -  honestly!) I am going to carry on making Christmas preparations and work on my never-ending colour portfolio.  I can't wait to post some photos of some of the finished pages soon.