Christmas at The Queens

Last week we enjoyed a Christmas meal with our fellow Love My Beach volunteers at The Queens Hotel in Lytham. This page was inspired by good company and our Christmas celebration.

I chose to create a blue background to match the “Love My Beach” colours. Firstly I masked off the top and bottom of my page with masking tape and then painted diluted Salty Ocean Distress Ink to the top and bottom sections. I had diluted the Distress Ink by applying the ink to an acrylic block and adding water with a paint brush. I then added festive trees to the bottom panel and holly to the top using stamps and Danube Blue Memento Ink. For the middle section I painted Peacock Feathers Distress Ink using the same technique and stamped a selection of festive images and the saying “Peace on Earth” using Bahama Blue Memento Ink, repeating the pattern across the page. To finish the background I added the red Christmas tape and metallic grey glittery washi tape horizontally across the page. Next I cut out star shapes from the festive menu leaflet, which I picked up during our visit. I also cut the menu and venue from the same leaflet and a “Love My Beach” logo using pinking cut scissors as I thought the spiky edges would compliment the stars nicely.  I stuck them all to the page using a UHU Stic and double-sided foam tape.  To finish I added some lovely wooden red star embellishments that I found in my craft stash that matched the theme.

The food was so yummy! I was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture of my Salmon Waldorf starter (made for me without the nuts) so you’ll have to take my word for it that it was very good. Here’s our traditional roast turkey main course and our drinks are ice water with lemon and Theakstons Christmas Ale. A vegetarian option of Cheese and Onion Pie can be seen in the background, which looked really good too! Wishing all of the T Gang over at T Stands for Tuesday a very Happy T Day and a Merry Christmas!

My hubby had dessert which is a Chocolate & Cherry Swiss Roll – delicious!

It was such a lovely evening and as a special treat to wish my friends a Merry Christmas I made Chocolate Bark for everyone!

It was fun to make, the hardest part was tempering the chocolate, which makes it keep its glossy appearance and allows the finished chocolate to ‘snap’ when broken. Once the chocolate is tempered I just spread it onto a baking tray then added the toppings. For my milk chocolate option I added mini marshmallows, fudge pieces, broken Amaretti biscuits and rice crispies, then drizzled the whole thing with tempered white chocolate. For the dark chocolate option I added tempered white chocolate and used a cocktail stick to swirl it together, then I sprinkled dried golden sultanas, dried cranberries and dried raisins over the top. Yum!

Thanks for joining me today! If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you.

Here is a list of all the materials used to create this art journal page:

• Tim Holtz Distress Ink (Salty Ocean, Peacock Feathers)
• Memento Ink (Danube Blue, Bahama Blue)
• Sharpie Fine Point Permanent Marker (Black)
• Clear Impressions clear stamp set (Woodland Christmas)
• Papermania Urban Stamps Easy Cling stamp set (12 Days of Christmas – Icons PMA 907909)
• Leaflets
• Westcott  Pinking Cut Scissor
• The Works (Heart & Star Shapes)
• Wilko (Glitter Tape)
• The Range (Merry Xmas Gift Tape)
• UHU Stic
• The Range double-sided foam tape