Beading Lovely time!

Well I managed my visit to Scotland without any major mishaps!

It was a flying visit, which seemed like a good idea at the time of booking but in reality just wasn't long enough.

Had a nice day at the safari park with me and Kirsty, my mum and dad and my brother's little girl Kaitlin who's 8!!

I was dissapointed that I didn't get to see my older sister and her kids Emma and Ewan, as they were on holiday, but best laid plans and all that......

Delighted to see my wee sis and her baby Paige, Kirsty loves seeing her because she is the closest in age to her! And I also was delighted to see my wee cousin Linda and her 11 week old son Kyle! He's gorgeous, reminds me so much of Kirsty when she was a baby! It's weird that we have all changed so much over the last 5 years, life has a way of settling itself.

I miss Scotland, I miss the "friendliness" of the Scottish nation, here in Ireland people are just NOT as friendly!

Anyway, I didn't get to do as much as I had hoped when I was in Scotland, I had planned to visit the bead shops in Glasgow, but never managed it, it's just not viable when you have 3 kids in tow! But I did manage to make it to a fabulous art shop in Glasgow, Millers art, they have brilliant range of Fimo.... I was dying to get my hands on some of the tools that they had on offer there, like the needle tool and the blending tools but just didn't want to take the chance on them being taken off of me on the plane but I did spend a few quid on some lovely clay.... sometimes I wish the airports were allowed to have "common sense" surely the security should be allowed to make judgement calls?!?!?! Talking of which I had a rough idea that security would have an issue with my hand luggage when I reached Prestwick Airport, I kept hold of my reciept for my clay, to prove where I had purchased it in an art shop. To say that the security woman was clueless is an understatement...... I had to spell clay for her!

She said: What is this?

I said: It's clay

She said: What?

I said: It's clay

She said: What?

I was getting frustrated now as Kirsty was inside the security part now, looking at the telly screens asking "mummy what's this?" and rolling her folded arms along the bit where they roll the trays through the xray machine!

I said: It's C.L.A.Y (spelling it out to her)

She said: What?

I said: Ok, here's what it is, it's an art material which can be moulded into many different things, the particular use that I use it for is to make beads, here let me show you in this magazine (I had purchased a recent copy of bead magazine which happened to have a polymer clay project in it)

She said: Oh I don't think that you can travel with that in your hand luggage?!?!

I said: Why?

She said: Let me check!

She then called an equally uninformed member of staff over who agreed that I couldn't travel with Fimo in my hand luggage...... I asked for them to explain to me why I could not travel with this in my hand luggage? Pointing out the restrictions on the poster behind them I reminded them that it was not a liquid, what was I going to do knock them out with one fell swoop of my Fimo?

After inspecting the label for several minutes, thankfully a knowledgable crafter happened to be passing security (just a member of the public) and advised them that this was indeed a craft material and that the WH Smith next stall was selling another magazine with a polymer clay project in it, so therefor they finally decided that my clay wasn't dangerous and that we could fly at last!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Stupid stuff, why did they take this ladies word and not mine? Do I look like a terrorist????? Maybe so!!