Here comes the sun do do do da

What a nice week its been.

Sunday I was at a monthly crop over at Whittle Le Woods, got a few bits done, ate loads of cake and some chatting :o) Good day was had.

Tuesday I took a days holiday and went up to see Dyan at Art from the Heart in Harrogate for one of her excellent classes. The new studio is great, so light and airy and it was a hot sunny day so we didn't miss a thing.

The class was learning about backgrounds, so we started with mixing some of Claudine Helmuth's paints to create backgrounds for some tags. Swapped them round the table and then used old book pages and Stampotique stamps to create some masterpieces. Mine weren't so much but I had a great time.

The afternoon we used some other techniques to decorate a sheet of watercolour paper. This was great fun and so messy :o) We used gesso and tissue paper to add some bits of texture, diluted paint dabbers for the splodges on the first layer, paint dabbers to paint around heart templates, colour wash to spray stencils and add more texture, more gesso, pens and oil pastels to highlight bits. Did I say it was great and messy? This was my finished piece and definitely something I'll have another go at (probably this weekend if I can get MP to go out on the bike).

Cool or what?

Today I have been on a study day supposedly Patient Safety and Research. It really wasn't what it said on the tin and the sessions I attended on engaging clinicians weren't really, in fact there wasn't any and certainly no tips on how to, so a bit of a waste of time really BUT I stayed until the end because .................. James Reason was the last speaker.

Now this probably doesn't mean much to you but to me and those of us who are really really into patient safety, James Reason is a God or Guru. The man who invented the swiss cheese model, brought human factors into healthcare and a leader in patient safety in the UK, also based at Manchester University. His swiss cheese model is now used as a major consideration in incident investigations not just in healthcare as this shows. I've heard him speak before and he is excellent so I go to hear him any chance I can. Today he did not disappoint.

I've also managed a few layouts since my last post:

This is a lift of Taniwah's interpretation of one of the UKS cybercrop classes

One of MP's previous bikes

This was a class from a Scrap a Go Go day I did last year and only just had the right photos to finish it off

a cup of coffee and a cigarette

Jenna, Me, Marc (only a few days old) and Lauren

Well nearly time for the last episode of Ashes to Ashes so thats all for now. Thanks for looking and see you soon.