some thumbnails of my illustrations

some thumbnails of my illustrations
Please click on the links below to view my portfolio ........ Images copyright of Carrie Osborne

Monday 28 June 2010

Spindle Cottage...


The weekend of the 20th June, I took a couple of hours off to take the children to see a wonderful, magical garden belonging to good friends of my Mum and Dad. (To see why it's taken me this long to post about it, see what we've been up to on the business blog! Work, work, work!)

Spindle Cottage in Binegar on the Mendip Hills, is truly a creation of love, magical imagination and superbly skilled craftsmanship. Every nook and cranny hides quirky secrets and wonders to discover! The gardens are just beautiful...


For each of their Grandchildren, Alban has built play houses, but not just any playhouses....
Here is Tom's Lodge, needless to say my children LOVED these houses...






And here is Charlotte's Post Office...






And Ruth's Cottage...


There's even a little house for the bins and recycling...

And other houses in unexpected places...

To the left in this picture is the Garderobe, complete with flag and crenellations, so even calls of nature become interesting!

Ponds and wishing wells...
And Elswyth's favourite - one of the Mouse Houses, how I would have loved this as a child...




And of course here are the creators of this little haven, Angela and Alban... Thankyou both for a really enjoyable afternoon! And especially from the children!

If you are interested in finding out more about Spindle Cottage or to book a break there, please go to www.spindlecottage.co.uk !

Back soon,
Carrie... :)

Monday 21 June 2010

A lovely new toy!


I've been playing with my fantastic new camera - a gift from Tony, my lovely, lovely other half, who managed to scrape the money together from what was left over after trading in 3 guitars to finally get his beloved Les Paul...! ( A long awaited love!)
I've been so frustrated for so long by my pathetic little 3px camera, and missing my tempremental old 35mm that I loved years ago...









These were just taken on auto with the macro setting just to try and get the hang of the camera - I need to read the hugely complex advanced guide so I can work out how to use the manual settings, but I'm so impressed just as it is! I think I'm going to have a lot of fun!

Tuesday 15 June 2010

A bit more life drawing!


Well things have been so busy lately and only getting busier, I haven't had chance to even think about picking up a pencil in what seems like a long, long time! I am really missing my life drawing these past couple of weeks, it has been the one thing keeping my hand in while the illustration has been on indefinate hold...
So, to make me feel better about having no artwork to post up, here are the last set of life drawings from the last time I went 2 weeks ago. I didn't get around to posting them at the time...
She was a lovely model with the most beautiful profile - the kind of face I'd easily imagine Gabriel Rossetti drawing. In fact next time I have chance to draw her I intend to do a proper portrait study of her profile... I always end up focussing so much on getting down the poses that the faces are usually neglected, so I must try to draw her face!
5 minute pose
5 minutes again
15 minutes
Her lovely profile
30 minutes and floating up in the air unfortunately! Ran out of time to ground her!

And another 30 minute pose ( but with a terrible facial likeness!)

If the shop move goes to plan this weekend I should get a chance to attend the next session the following week hopefully! Really can't wait...

Sunday 13 June 2010

An Owl has come winging its way...

Thankyou so much Valerie of Acornmoon for my beautiful 'Owl in the ivy' lino cut which arrived just in time for my birthday as it happens! In fact although I had been checking the post, my husband managed to intercept it and sneakily framed it up to surprise me this morning! He looks great doesn't he!

Well, better get off to work now... but I might just come home early while the suns shining!

Tuesday 8 June 2010

Castell Henllys and a journey into the Iron Age...

I would love to share with you a place I love so much, and try to visit whenever I'm in Wales... It is a place where you can really feel the weave of past and present as a continuous thread, and where the people of the past seem only a veil of shadow away. It is so easy here to imagine their voices, dim laughter through the woodsmoke, the daily rhythms of shared toil and community...


Castell Henllys near Cardigan in Wales is an Iron Age Hillfort, where some of the roundhouses have been rebuilt on their original foundations and ongoing living archaeological work brings back the past. They keep native sheep and boar and have built a medicinal herb garden... The people who tend this place for visitors always seem such gentle folk with a genuine love for the place, dressed in iron-age garb and showing the crafts and skills that were used in daily life here...
Every time I am here I wish I could stay!

I will show you some things along the wooded paths that wind around the hillfort. Don't be alarmed if my children change size in some of the pictures! I have taken the best pictures from the last three visits!
The first thing you see as you arrive is this magnificent totem pole...


Some hidden carvings emerge from the green...

This year someone had begun making a coracle by the riverside...


And last year a Wicker Man awaited fire on the hilltop...


And if you know the hidden path, you will find a Shrine where a natural spring emerges from the hillside beneath the fort. There are all sorts of offerings and trophys of war... It feels very real!


Here is the Blacksmith's house...

The utterly impressive Chieftain's house with its high roof where swallows nest and flit in and out of the low doorway... If the Chieftain's house was designed to impress and convey status, then it certainly held me in awe when I first saw it!





The Granary on its curious legs...



A smaller homely roundhouse where the children ground corn into flour and made flat breads to cook on the griddles ( and of course like little Goldilocks twins they tried every bed in every house!)


Elswyth making bread

It is so nice for the children to experience all this... next time they shall have to try their hand at wattle and daub - they were too shy this time to have their faces and arms decorated with blue woad, but after all they are a bit small yet for war!



And lastly my favourite place of all. I could sit and dream all day in the big communal roundhouse. I feel so at home watching the sun slant throught the woodsmoke that blackens the thatch overhead, imagining the evenings they would have had here sharing songs and stories out of the wind and weather. The walls are painted with beasts and spirals, the benches well worn. It is dark yet your eyes soon grow accustomed. It is a warm, peaceful place and I am never ready to leave.
My pictures really don't do it justice and just can't convey the atmosphere I feel here. It is a place you need to feel with all your senses, to hear the embers in the fire, smell the soot in the timbers of the houses, touch the wood, grind the flour, immerse yourself in the past...
I love it (can you tell?)
If you are near or passing by, do visit and discover for yourselves!
www.castellhenllys.com

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