GRAPHICS FAIRY LABELS, A LARGE WINDOW ELEMENT, ANKLE WOES, AND THE TIME IS TICKING!

Bits of this and that today.

Graphics Fairy Labels

Some time ago, when I got my new colour laser printer, I printed out a lot of material from the Graphics Fairy Premium Membership site, including sheets of blank labels. It was only later that I realised that they also had the same labels with printing on them, and this would have been a lot better, because putting a blank label on a page looks a bit naff, and I’d have to do something about them!

I ordered a generic unbranded text/label set of clear stamps from Ebay. They were all too large for my labels but I was able to mask off part of them before inking them up and using a small acrylic block to stamp the labels, which I anchored in place on my DIY sticky grid mat which normally lives in my stamping platform. I stamped them with black archival ink.

On some of them I did over-stamp them a bit and there was some ink on the edge of the stamp, but I think this all adds to the grunginess of them so I’m not bothered.

I am also planning on adding some text digitally onto further labels before printing them. I can make them whatever size I want, which is great as well. I did this for the book plate on the front of my tiny “Curious Cabinets” album a few months ago.

The same applies to all the blank specimen labels that I printed out from the collection – I discovered they also had some with printing on, and I had printed out the blank collection. No matter – it’s fun to personalise them!

For these, I hand-wrote on them, and then took the only really tiny stamps I’ve got – some butterflies and a bee – to add to the square on the right-hand side of each label. I wrote some illegible script in the description section. I used a sanguine archival marker for the number, and a sepia one for the rest of the text. The insects were stamped with Ground Espresso archival ink, with the exception of one which was a solid butterfly shape which I stamped with Hickory Smoke. I then used my fine-liner markers to colour them.

I inked the edges of all these labels with Vintage Photo Distress Ink.

They are all now back in the box and ready for use, with the other printed labels.

Another window element

I ordered some fabric recently (see below) and the packing sheet which came with them had a large window filled with waxed paper covering the top half of the sheet, where presumably the label for the outside of the parcel had been printed. I pulled this waxed paper off, and stuck down another of my pieces of printed vellum with butterflies. I managed to wrinkle it a bit but once it’s covered it won’t matter, I am sure.

Once the background is covered, this will make a very nice page element in an album.

Ticking

Fabric ticking, not time ticking, although time certainly is ticking away at an alarming rate these days, wouldn’t you agree?

I have seen various people using ticking in their projects recently and thought how attractive this fabric was. I was familiar with it from my childhood when pillows were always made of it. It is a strong, closely woven fabric which was excellent for keeping all those feathers safely inside, and in those days it was deemed a utilitarian sort of fabric and not usually for display, at least here in the UK.

This cotton fabric seems to have enjoyed a bit of a revival today, with its attractive stripes and twill weave. There are other colours available now, for example red and grey, but I love the traditional blue – I chose an indigo shade, and ordered half a metre – it is really quite wide, so there is plenty to play with. I thought it would be gorgeous on an album cover, and I have seen people using scraps of frayed ticking to embellish the tops of tags. It goes so well with natural materials and earth tones.

The striped pattern is woven, not printed, and because of the twill weave, the blue on the reverse side is slightly lighter.

I am absolutely thrilled with the quality and handle of this fabric, and shall definitely be going back to that company in future.

Painful ankle

Over a week ago my left ankle began to be quite painful. To start with it felt as if the pain was joint-related, and then it felt more like an inflamed vein – I had experienced this in my calf once, shortly after having surgery. I had sat throughout a weekend conference without being able to elevate my legs, and having just had an operation I had been taken off my anticoagulant. The doctor told me the problem would resolve itself once I was back on that medication, which proved to be the case.

This current problem doesn’t feel like arthritis, which tends to be acute when you move the joint – it is constant, and worse when I’m on my feet for any length of time. The ankle is slightly swollen. It began immediately before the bank holiday weekend – isn’t that always the way? – so I wasn’t able to phone the surgery until the Tuesday. When I phoned, the receptionist suggested I went to the Minor Injuries department of A&E, despite my having told her from the beginning that I had not injured it.

I made an appointment to go in on the Thursday to see a clinical assistant to have it looked at, and when we arrived, we were informed that I should have gone to the other surgery. Since our local surgery joined up with that practice, it has really gone down hill and it’s all pretty chaotic. I had specifically asked to be seen locally because the surgery is more accessible for me, and it is also much nearer. Then she looked again and said they’d sent me a text cancelling the appointment altogether because of sickness among the staff! I looked at my phone and found the text, which I had not seen as I had not had my phone with me when we were out in the garden. I was pretty fed up. By this time there were half a dozen other people waiting, and one man was really annoyed, because he had walked all the way there for his appointment, only to be told he also should have gone to the other surgery, which is only just around the corner from where he lives.

The receptionist told us all to wait and she would see what she could do to arrange for us all to get seen somehow. I didn’t have to wait too long, and saw a doctor (which was better than the original arrangement). These days you never get to see the same doctor twice, and this one was new – there seems to be a pretty high turnover. She was very good, and very pleasant and friendly. I do find the younger ones are often better because they have not yet had time to become jaded and dissilusioned with the system!

She told me she thought it was highly unlikely that I had a thrombophlebitis because I was anticoagulated, and that the problem was much more likely to be musculoskeletal. She has referred me for an X-ray at the hospital to see what’s going on, and I am hoping this appointment will come through early this week, because it continues to be quite painful. In the meantime she told me to keep it elevated as much as possible, and I am trying to do this, but my daily activities tend to preclude this. It is definitely more comfortable with my feet up.

Always something, isn’t there… I suppose I have to expect this sort of thing to happen more frequently now I’m 70!

On that subject, while we were all waiting and feeling pretty annoyed about the chaos, a general camaraderie and conversation started between us all, and it came out that I’d just had my 70th birthday. The man who’d had to walk all the way said, “Really? I wouldn’t have put you older than 64!” So – perhaps I shall be 64 instead, and stay put there. Reminds me of that old Beatles’ song.

We were able to give one lady a lift home, which was nice. So it wasn’t all bad – good can come out of chaos sometimes!

Update – 20th June – my X-ray appointment eventually came through at the end of last week, for a date mid-July!!! My Dad was a hospital doctor and even back in the mid-80s when he retired, NHS waiting lists were legendary, and he always said you were either dead or better by the time your appointment arrived… I am happy to report that in this case, the latter has proved to be true. My ankle pain resoved itself on its own and it is now fine again, so I phoned both the X-ray department and the GP’s surgery to let them know and to cancel the appointment. What caused the pain remains a mystery, and the woman at the surgery said that if it recurs, to come back and they could reschedule the X-ray.