A New Year's toast... Slainte!

A New Year's toast! To health, hope and happiness!

There's nothing better than a dram of the finest Single Malt out of a beautiful bottle, firelight wickering through whisky, warmest amber gleaming in glass, rich copper honey, sap resin pure... Reminds me of bronze-age embers, copper smelting, gold and bronze, Ore-Masters, Myth-makers and Sun-shapers...

... Slainte! And a Happy New Year to you all...

Belated Seasonal Greetings and painting with salt...

Hello folks and a belated Seasons Greetings to you all!
I hope you've all had a happy, restful and creative time with your families...
My lack of posts of late is mainly due to the fact we've been working so hard and running on empty for so long, that once we were able to stop and close shop for the Christmas break, the exhaustion just came crashing down, crushing any hope of finding any motivation whatsoever! There was just nothing left...
But hopefully now I can start to climb back up, shake off the dragging depression and re-ignite my creativity, though it may take a bit of coaxing!
So today I started by reclaiming my work space, and Ta Da! - here is my little cubby hole, three large bags of children's paintings and drawings later, several random scatterings of toys removed and a great deal of tidying!



I wanted to do some experimenting with salt over wet on wet washes of watercolour and had tremendous fun! I love the way it changes moment by moment, though sometimes I wish I could stop it at just that right point, but the paint inexorably keeps moving... I became quite fascinated by it...

I'm not sure any of these experiments will be quite right for the images in pen and ink over the top I had in mind, but I do think I will do a lot more of them and something interesting may very well come... This was the best of this batch I think...


I haven't had permission yet to show you the Unicorn commission, but it did turn out very well so hopefully I'll get to show it. The other portrait commission however had a bit of an 'uncertain' reaction so I was too intimidated to ask permission to show that one... but I may show some close up 'details' later on...
Hopefully much more art to come, time and head space allowing! I feel I've been away from my brushes far too long!
Take care all...

I Shiver - Robert Cray

I can't get enough of Robert Cray right now! He's got to be among the best of the best blues singers with guitar playing to match... His voice is just wonderful!
It's been in my head all day so I thought I'd share it, also its quite fitting for me today because I've got a rotten cold!
Take it away Robert Cray...

Ghosts of trees, ghosts of birds...

It was an unearthly world we awoke to this morning, petrified trees ghosting from a pale freezing fog, crystal rimed and ice-stricken. A spectral land of mists, silent with no birds flying but one, a lone crow-shadow like a shrouded spirit across my path.
There were so many beautiful ghostly pictures I wanted to take as I drove to work through the wooded lanes, but there always seemed to be someone behind me so I couldn't stop, and we live more or less in the middle of nowhere!
Here's a few shots of the incredibly thick hoar frost...





And it didn't thaw all day, this is the first one again this evening! It has an unearthly beauty but it does nake for treacherous driving, especially out in the lanes... so if you're out driving about, do take care! And keep warm!

Aladdin's cave - a tale of ritual humilation! And one commission down, three to go!

This belongs on the business blog really but while I'm waiting for the press photo for that post I thought I'd show you here as well what we got roped into last friday night by the Chambers of Commerce folk!
Twas a bit of fun, though I still can't quite believe how, painfully self concious as I am, we ended up taking part in a very public parade down the High Street lined with hundreds of people for the Christmas Lantern Fayre!
Basically a fair few of the traders, ourselves included were taking part in a competition where the public had to visit all our shops and guess which pantomime we were representing buy our costumes and window displays. Considering how bitterly cold it was that week I think we got the short straw by being given Aladdin! I think my husband turned blue just from the parade down the high Street!
I thought I'd show you a few shots of our Aladdin's cave window which I was quite proud of actually!


Other news is that I've finally finished the first of my christmas commissions and I'm actually quite pleased with it... I'm meeting the clients on wednesday to show them and I always find that really nerve wracking! I do hope they like it! Fingers crossed!
Hopefully I'll be able to show you soon if they agree to me posting it, though because its a christmas prezzie it might have to wait till after the day...!
Commission number two begins tomorrow!