WOYWW #686: A mish-mash of this and that

Hello again, I'm back with my monthly WOYWW check-in. Lots been going on so this will be a bit of a mish-mash post. My husband and son have been away for the past 12 days on a trip to New York, along with my brother-in-law and his son (a boys trip!). They are now on their way back from Heathrow as I write this. I stayed at home to look after Oreo (and water the garden!) and had a good time indulging myself in all sorts of selfish endeavours, like art-making and experimental cooking that no one else would eat. Cabbage soup, anyone?  Of course, I missed them, but we spoke every day so it didn't feel like they were that far away at all and the time went so fast. 

So what have I been up to art-wise? Quite a lot as there are back-to-back challenges on Instagram, starting with #makecreateexpress22 -  I completed a couple of florals for this event:

Then there was Laly Mille's annual #artistsoulretreat - I think this was my third year taking part in this challenge where we made four mini abstracts followed by a canvas project:  

Currently, I'm doing Francisca Nunes' #flowersmagicchallenge where we first made a journal and then ecoprinted it. I'd tried ecodyeing/ecoprinting before, but I always worked with individual pieces of paper - this was a different experience and again so addictive! Below is a photo of my journal before and after ecodyeing it, followed by photos of some of the pages while they were still wet. At the end there's a video flip-through of my journal once dry - just listen to those pages turning! We'll be doing some more work in this journal during the challenge, which runs until August 10th. 

I've also been splashing out on some of the new TH dies - these are the vintage labels below - although I've already got plenty of label dies, I just had to try the embossing technique using these with archival inks, the way Tim demoed it in his Chapter 3 Live. (I really have to stop watching these videos LOL!) Then I tried the same technique with embossing ink too and it worked (in a shabby sort of way)! 

I'll also show you some photos of New York that my son sent me (just a few of many):

I sent him some photos of Oreo in return! They've missed each other so much! Oreo's been a bit more needy than usual, constantly looking for attention and purring all the time.  

Also, if you're still with me, today of all days is our 20th wedding anniversary! I've found the perfect card for hubs - ok, it's actually a birthday card, but that doesn't make the sentiment any less perfect! 

Here we are on our wedding day 20 years ago today! I wish we had known back then just how good looking we were, and that's true for everyone! We took photos of each other, that's why we're not in the same photo together, though we have  a couple of those too, courtesy of my brother-in-law, but I think I already shared those in previous years. 

I've missed my bloggiversary this year. Oh well, been too busy to remember - eight years on July 2nd! I'll try not to forget it next year. 

Hope all's well with you - I will be visiting blogs throughout the week, should I not make it to everyone today. Keep on blogging! xx