Utility Boxes

 A couple more utility boxes - one from Cork, when we were down a few weekends ago before we were, once again, limited to travel within Dublin. No expedition to the Galway/Clare border to look for sloes this year: when the park where we have gathered them before proved fruitless, I bought some raspberries and we will try raspberry gin instead. This utility box is one of a series, but by the time I passed some more, I was fully laden and less inclined to stop.

The other one is on the main road outside the Botanic Gardens, and I've always wanted to take a picture of it. Last weekend C went back to the car, and I went out the front gate and walked back along the road.

And just a couple more photos from the Botanic Gardens, since I'm revisiting it...

July snaps

July started out raining...

and it feels as it has pretty much continued that way, although fortunately not on Saturday afternoon when I visited my sister. I had taken a couple of photos of this utility box last summer, but that was the time my memory card got corrupted, and I wasn't able to download any of the photos from that day. The last couple of times I was there were over the winter on dull grey days, but as Saturday was bright, I was able to snap it again. Just with my phone - knitting, chocolate mousse and assorted other things meant that I didn't actually pack my camera that day.

And never, in all the times I have visited the English Market, has it been so empty. However, I didn't wish to stand about in the way in the entrance blocking other people, so I only took one quick shot of the lovely Art Deco heron fountain; usually it's so crowded that it's not possible to get a full view of it.

I shared a couple of closer shots last summer. In case you missed them, here they are again:

Around Town

I walked into town after work last Friday to leave my flute in a for a service - and since the shop is closed for lunch, it was a slow walk. Luckily it was a lovely day, and I got to see the more cultural end of Temple Bar, which isn't normally somewhere I pass through...

The first one isn't actually part of that walk at all, it's the Christmas window display in the local bakery near work.

Then we have some utility box art celebrating Handel's Messiah, just outside Christchurch. Love the hat the fiddle player is wearing!

The back entrance to Dollard & Co , this is the staircase...

Window boxes in the Clarence Hotel

I've often walked past Christchurch and have never gone into the grounds to see what this is - it's a memorial to the Armenian Genocide.

And this last one, I couldn't find any information about. It's beside the back entrance to the Smock Alley Theatre, and is obviously an interpretation of the stars and constellations, but I'm not sure what the boat represents.

Floral Utility

A couple of weeks back I walked home through the park to take a couple of photos for a Flat Stanley project for someone. By the time I got to the park gates (well past the point of no return in terms of getting the bus), it started to rain. So I stopped for a few minutes to shelter till the worst of the shower was over. This utility box is just between the courthouse and the park gates. There were several more showers, but luckily not when I got to the point where I had planned to take photos.

I got my Tyvek out again and made this - I have another piece painted and sitting on the desk waiting to heat and then see what it will become. 

Seen Around Town

I spotted this utility box art a couple of weeks back, when I was walking to get the coach down to Cork. It used to be much more of an abstract pop-art design. This new one is much more appropriate, as it's outside Smock Alley Theatre,  converted from a 19th-century church building, incorporating structural material from an 18th-century theatre building, and built on the site of the 17th century Theatre Royal, Dublin.

This is the mural that used to be on the side wall of a building I often pass on the way to work,

there are a few photos of it as a work in progress in THIS post from last year. 

Since the new Roe & Co microdistillery opened in the old Guinness power plant building, it's been replaced with this bird's eye view of Dublin.

You can see the Pigeon Chimneys on the left - the photo below shows them from the ferry as we left Dublin this summer. The building under them is the new distillery. I assume the river is the Liffey running through. The tall building is St. Patrick's Tower, as shown in THIS post. 

Recipe time - and a mixed medley

February has been a testing month here - but I thought I ought to get one quick post in before it's time to pick out and share my favourite cards later in the week.

With snow on the way this week, I'm starting with a snowman on our green beside the bus stop. We had a brief evening on snow one Monday night, C was coming home from Swords and said it was beautiful out that way. There was still enough here for someone to either stay up very late or get up very early and create a life-size snowman.

We have also had  a few lovely sunsets. I suspect these actually date back to January. Come next February I'm going to have trouble finding a suitable photo from this month to use for my blog header.

We were in town this afternoon and I spotted this lovely utility box. We were on the other side of the road and the sunshine was quite strong - but we'll be in the area again and hopefully then I can make time to get the bunny and the fox on the two ends of it.

And a recipe: as we needed to be in town by 1.30, we just had a good breakfast. In January I had been making Posy's Russian Black Bread from The Bread Book, A Baker's Almanac (a lovely rye, but time-consuming as it requires making polenta and mashed potatoes before even starting on the rest of it) and C was looking through the book. He made a list of several recipes he wanted to try, and the following is one of them.  We also thought the French Bread with Beer sounded interesting. I was asking a work colleague if he thought that the beer would simply give a sourdough taste with the lightness of a regular bread. At first he said he thought it would also add some extra leavening...and then he asked how old the book was. Well, I knew I'd had it for at least twenty years, so he reckoned that any widely available beer in America back then would have had no leavening effect and be purely for the flavour. We'll try that one another day. This morning we had these, and they're on the "make again" list.

Maple Buttermilk Muffins

1 3/4 cup white flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs
1/3 cup buttermilk or sour milk
1/4 cup melted butter or light oil
1/2 cup maple syrup
3/4 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

Preheat oven to 400 F, about 180 C.
Sift all the dry ingredients together.
In a large bowl, beat the eggs till light and slightly thick.
Add the buttermilk, maple syrup and melted butter, whisk to mix.
Add the sifted dry ingredients: blend with a spatula or wooden spoon, stopping before the flour is fully absorbed. The mixture will be rough and lumpy.
Spoon into buttered muffin tins (I just used paper cases), filling about two-thirds full.
Bake for 15 - 20 minutes.
Yield: 12-14 medium muffins.

A Miscellany

The Art Neko blog and website are still down for a revamp, so instead of posting on the blog, I thought I'd add another card here this week, although I can't provide any links.  The metallic tissue background was created for this week's TLC challenge on Splitcoast.  I used two different stamps from Art Neko, the still life with grapes and wine, and I stamped and cut a couple more leaves from the grapes and leaves with tendrils stamp.

A long-empty site near the bus stop has been opened up for work, and in the process has acquired a new hoarding.

And another utility box - very suitable for our climate, this one.

Utility Box Art

This barrister dog appeared outside the Law Society some day last week, unless I have been very unobservant.

The Viking invasion has taken place at the corner of Ellis Quay, but it's not an easy place to take photos with all the traffic.

And a couple of matchbox projects which I didn't include with my favourite cards last week. The Sizzix matchbox die creates a box about 3 1/2" by 2 1/2" by 3/4".  I'd like to try making a suitcase again with a couple of modifications to this prototype, but it was fun to make.

A miscellany

I spotted this utility box art a couple of weeks ago, and have been waiting ever since for a day when there was enough time between an earlier bus on a different route and my own bus for me to get off and take a photo, then get onto my own bus. Yesterday was the day. This one is called Deer Dance.

The next two photos were both taken around work. I'm assuming the black and white one is done using some sort of stencil or mask - to great effect.

And the other few photos were taken the last time I went to visit my dad, walking down the Liffey from Docklands station to get the coach. The Jeannie Johnston is now temporarily closed for refurbishment, but I'd certainly like to visit it when it opens again...the lion and the unicorn are on the Customs House. I did take a couple more photos of the Jeannie Johnston but they're not sharp enough to be worth uploading. There'll be more opportunities.

I'm not sure what those fittings are called that the boats used to tie up to. Seeing them and the bollards brought back memories of when we used to visit and walk along the quays as children when there was still a fair amount of shipping moored along there, including the Guinness boats.

So Many Books

and not enough time, so very true!

I received the Bookmarks and Sentiments set of stamps from Art Neko, and this is one of them.

I started out with a dictionary page - but by the time I had sprayed it with this and that it was almost totally invisible, so I used another piece of the page on the finished card.

Anyway, for starters I stuck the dictionary page to some card and gessoed it, then added some die-cut cogs. After that I used a mixture of homemade misters and some Brusho acrylic shimmer mists, with metallic rub-ons for the cogs-  Inka and some from Craft-T. I then used some chunky metallic embossing powder, and finally some dots of white acrylic paint. The panel is edged with black paint and Stickles, and I added two strands of Mizuhiki cord with knots.
The bookmark image was stamped on white card and coloured with pencils. I don't think the flowers are meant to be poppies, but they remind me of the multicoloured Iceland poppies so I chose those colours. I layered it onto another piece of the dictionary page, added some clock hands, and then decided it needed a couple of little butterflies in the bright flower colours.

Books - Poirot and Me by David Suchet is sitting on the shelf and I need to read it soon before I have to return it to the library!

Here's another utility box - I took the photo a couple of weeks ago and didn't get round to uploading it from my phone. The colours go well with the card. This mermaid hangs out along the River Liffey, down near the Samuel Beckett bridge.