Claire's blog

As well as the beading, I’ve been doing some chain maille. I recently got a shipment of rubber rings, so I’ve been playing with the possibilities with those, first by weaving some foxtail. Then by playing at making stretchy bracelets using a Japanese 12-2 weave I’ve just learnt from a new book. These look great […]

Seeing as I normally mention the films I’ve been watching, I thought it would make a change to mention the books I bought recently – especially as I came back to Ireland with seven new books to go on my already straining bookshelves. Culinaria Hungaria – I love, love, love this book. Mum’s had a […]

So I was back in the UK this weekend, as I had a meeting in London on Saturday. In order to make my flight on Friday I had to leave Galway at 9.30 a.m., and as I had some things to sort out at work before I left I was intending to get up at […]

My grandparents arrived on Friday without any problems, and we’ve had a good time this weekend. I’m still feeling a bit off from my cold, so on Saturday we took it pretty easy, going for a mooch around Galway. We strolled down to the harbour to visit the swans… …before walking back up into the […]

I was due to fly back into Galway on Monday, but due to a horrible, horrible cold I ended up staying home until yesterday to give me a chance to recover. The journey back went fine, right up until I was a few miles outside Galway when one of my front tyres gave up the […]

Spent some time today in the sun putting out stakes and posters to tie balloons too for the Festival tomorrow, along with tidying up the studio and admiring the marquees. It seems a bit strange that it all starts tomorrow! The chicks are still growing well though, and now all have feathery wings with distinct […]

The plan was to take today off, spend some time at home, and go shopping, but with the Festival looming ever closer we popped into Patchings for half an hour to tidy up a bit. I know things don’t kick off until Thursday, but Mum will be driving down to Heathrow tomorrow to pick Dad […]

Spent the day in Patchings preparing for the Festival. The marquees are going up now, and everyone is getting very excited. The chicks are still getting larger (and still eating non-stop), we can now hear them cheeping quite clearly. The nest box is in a laburnum tree just outside the studio at Patchings, so we […]

Why I ever coughed up the money for a Rough Guide to Ireland, or spent time searching for internet sites about the place before I moved here I don’t know. I’d completely forgotten the existence of H2G2, which has a fairly accurate and amusing entry on Galway that’s got me giggling at work this morning. […]

So last night I went to pick up a friend from Shannon airport. Her plane got in at 10.20pm, so we went straight to bed when we got back to my flat last night, but today we headed into Galway for a bit of a mooch. I drove us in and we parked up by […]

It’s another gorgeous, gorgeous day, which again means that work is half empty! I can’t comment though, as I arrived a bit late myself 😀 In honour of the sunshine, I’ve put up a more cheerful layout. I head back to the UK tomorrow, so that I can borrow Mum’s car and drive all the […]

It’s a beautiful sunny day over here in Galway, and as far as I can tell there are about 3 other people here at work with me! Not that I blame them – the sun is shining, there’s a gentle breeze, it’s Friday afternoon…. I think I might be heading off soon as well 🙂

So I was messing around with Google maps and discovered that they’ve got quite a high-res image of Galway! You can even see my flat on it (although I can’t find my car anywhere)

Spring has sprung, so I really need to knuckle down and give both the website and this blog a more cheerful theme – hopefully fairly soon. This could be the time when I finally knuckle down and learn enough html to write my own theme for the website – but don’t hold your breath! I’ve […]

I got a parcel from home in the post today with two DVDs, a bracelet I’ve been asked to extend, my mail, and a surprise scarf! Good job too, as we’ve had snow flurries on and off to day, and it’s rather nippy. I shall be nice and warm while I walk over to my […]

I was going to be having friends visiting this weekend but they chickened out on me at the last minute 😥 So I found myself browsing the shelves at the DVD rental place AGAIN. This time it was Serenity and Nanny McPhee. Rob recently lent me the series ‘Firefly’ on DVD, so I was quite […]

Except this time I wasn’t renting, I handed over good money for them. Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were Rabbit has come out, and let’s face it, there was no way I wasn’t going to buy that. So today I popped into HMV while I was in town to see how much they were […]

Managed to find a branch of the DVD rental place with the Corpse Bride, so I went for a bit of a Tim Burton fest and rented both that and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (which I did manage to see in the cinema). The Corpse Bride was great, I liked the story and I […]

Wanted to rent the Corpse Bride this weekend as I’ve been wanting to see it ever since it first arrived in the cinema, but the video shop didn’t have any copies in stock. Instead I got Pride and Prejudice (already seen in the cinema) and Madagascar, which I’ve been wanting to see for a while. […]

At BinI I was chatting with Marie and we found that neither of us had yet seen Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, although we both wanted to. We didn’t think it would still be on at the cinema, but today we made it to a matinee showing at the Eye cinema – us […]