Japanese Gardens...

 At the beginning of the summer we visited Beale Park, which is near Reading.  We went because it has a very nice small zoo and we spent a lovely day wandering around the animals.  On our return to the car, we found a beautiful spot with Japanese gardens, full of flowers, a large lake with water lilies, and some glorious views.  I took several photos and have painted this from my favourite one.  It took a few weeks to complete - firstly because of the detail involved, and secondly because this summer has been difficult to say the least and it has been hard to concentrate on anything much.

 This is much larger than my usual work, it filled the whole of my drawing board, but it was necessary in order to fit the picture in as I wanted.  It is painted in watercolour and it was a joy to be holding a paintbrush again!

This has just been listed in my Etsy shop. 

At the beginning of September we took a much needed short break in Lyme Regis, home of the fossil! We had a great time, even though the weather was a bit iffy at times, and did all we had planned to do.  In one of the shops were knitted cushions shaped like ammonites for a princely sum of money.  You know me, I thought 'I can do that!' so came home and gave it a go.  turns out it was an easy make but a bit tedious as I knitted it on dpns and as it got longer and longer, it became more difficult to wrangle!

I am pleased with the end result though and would like to make more of these in different yarns.

Next up - I think it's time I painted a bear or two...maybe three!
 

 

Getting Back To Normal...

Well, after the hottest summer I've ever experienced in this country, temperatures have finally dropped to normal levels for this time of year and I can get back to doing some arts and crafts without dripping in sweat or the paint drying on my brush.  It has been a struggle keeping the garden alive, carting watering cans up and down due to the hosepipe ban, and I have lost a few plants - no cucumbers this year, although the tomatoes have been OK and the runner beans are just about starting now, with help from copious bowls of washing up water!

I saw a funny crocheted coaster on the net last week and decided to have a go at creating my own version.  It works by using the yarn double and making a dome using the amigurumi method of increases.  The coaster sits with the body concave and when you put your mug on it...

 

...tadah!  The head and legs spring up to clasp the mug!  Well, it made me laugh...

 I've also been painting another wooden box - no photos just yet, I still have to put a lining in it. That was a chore as well - hard to paint when the paint dries on your brush before you even get it on the work!

I am also working on a large watercolour - good to be painting again after a difficult summer where my enthusiasm was at an all time low.

It's Too Hot Out There...

 I am definitely not enjoying this summer.  For one thing, it is far too hot for me - I lived in Greece for 13 years and coped OK with the summer heat, but here in the UK it is something else. The humidity makes it stifling, our houses are built to keep heat in and that's definitely what mine is doing!  There is no prospect of any decent rain coming and we now have a hosepipe ban, so a lot of time is spent hauling watering cans around the garden in an attempt to keep everything I have worked so hard to grow alive.  I know in the winter I'll probably be bemoaning the constant rain and grey skies, but hey, I'm British, I have to complain about the weather, it's the law!

So that, combined with a difficult time at home, means I have not really felt  in the mood to paint.  Painting is my escape from the world, so I miss it.  I did attempt this painting of some nasturtiums in my garden - the blue is supposed to represent the pot they are in.  I enjoyed the process but hate the result - not my best work!

 Last week I bought myself a cyanotype kit - I'd seen an article in a magazine about using it on stones and shells so I wanted to give it a go.  The stone was my first experiment - it's OK, but the stone itself is grey so the design did not come out as clear as I would have wanted.  The paper prints were very much experimental - I did not have  sheet of glass with which to hold the leaves down which resulted in them being a bit fuzzy - the plastic I did use also caused considerable condensation which might have affected the print too.  Now I have seen what went wrong, I am keep to give this another go - perhaps even try it on fabric.

Last week I took my daughter and granddaughter to a local place to have a go at painting on pottery. We had a lot of fun but we won't see the results for a few weeks as our works of art have to be glazed and fired and they do it in big batches, plus they were rather busy due to the school summer holidays.  I can't wait to see how they turn out, especially my daughter's mug as she spent most of the 2 hours painting the inside of it rather than the outside...

Peter Rabbit...

 A couple of weeks ago we had a heatwave - unusual for Britain in June, and felt far hotter than anything I've experienced in this country before.  So it was a matter of getting everything done early in the morning while there was a vestige of cool air, then spending the rest of the day flopping around being sweaty!

I couldn't paint - the paint dried on the brush before hitting paper - so  I decided to knit this Peter Rabbit for my granddaughter.  She had said that she wanted one so that he could play with her other knitted rabbit.

 I used the book 'Knitting Peter Rabbit' by Clare Garland, which contains knitting patterns for most of the Beatrix Potter characters.  This pattern was supposed to use multiple strands of alpaca wool in order to get the texture and colour shades, but as this was the first time I had tried the pattern, I just used plain DK.

 I think because of the different yarn he might have turned out a bit bigger than he was supposed to be - his jacket (made from felt) was a bit snug!  It didn't bother my granddaughter though, she was very happy with him!

I'm working on some little creatures for the animator, and I have a painting still on the go - a watercolour that should have been completed in a few days but due to the heat is dragging on far too long.  After that, I have another painted wooden box to get on with. 

Treasure Chest...

 Despite all the goings on at home, I did find the time to finally paint this little wooden treasure chest.  I've had the idea for the design on it for months but was puzzling as to how to achieve it.  In the end I just went for it, using three snapshots taken on the Explore.org bear cam website.  I don't know which bears they are, I was just aiming for a pleasing picture.

Funnily enough, the whole thing just flowed - I must have planned it out so many times in my head that when it came to the actual painting my brain knew what to do!

The main body of the box was painted using Hookers Green, and the edging was varnished with an oak wood stain.  Mr.B had to carefully remove all paint splodges from it for me -no matter how careful I was I still managed to get a few dabs of the green on to the edging.

Finally, I lined it with green felt in the same shade as the outer box.  This involved a fair bit of measuring and mathematics!  I had decided that lining the box with my usual fishy fabric would make the whole thing far too 'busy' - looks like that was the right decision.

I found a buyer for this before the varnish was even dry - it will be going to another bear cam enthusiast, for which I am very happy.  I would love to paint some more of this type of box, let's hope I can find them in the store where I bought this.  I'm open for orders!
 

Blankies...

I've been crocheting these lap blankets lately to keep my hands busy, using Patatya yarn cakes as they have lovely colourways and require very little thinking!

I like this one best, although the photo does not show the true vibrancy of the colours.

I've also knitted this shawl in a cotton varigated yarn.  

I'm hoping to get some better photos of these items after which they will be in my Etsy shop. 

Melancholy...

Sadly there have been things going on in my life that have been occupying my mind constantly and making it very difficult to even think of being creative, so nothing much to show here.  I did buy myself a little Lego-type kit to keep myself occupied.  I thought it was bears initially, but they turned out to be capybaras but still very cute!  This thing drove me crazy for a week or so - the bricks are so very tiny and my hands are so very arthritic.  I ended up with a bag of spare pieces and so I went through the instructions over and over, checked the photo, and it would appear I have not made any mistakes, they just put a load of extra bricks in the kit.  It was 'fun' to make but I'm not doing one of those again!

At Christmas I was given a couple of amaryllis bulbs, both of which did not grow well and seemed to be a breeding ground for small flies which drove us crazy in the living room.  So I chucked the pots out into the greenhouse as I didn't want to throw them away.  Come the beginning of Spring, they started to sprout again - one of them didn't get far before dying, the other one turned into this magnificent specimen!  It seems to love being out in the garden, all three blooms are now open and the flowers are lasting much longer than they would indoors.  Perhaps next time I get given one of these, I will put it in the greenhouse straight away and see what happens.

I've been stress-crocheting a lot - on to my second blanket now.  It keeps my hands busy and gives me a finished product so that I am not just sitting mindlessly watching tv in the evenings.  I've also returned to a wooden box I started painting some months ago - again, something that doesn't require too much thinking but does mean I am painting once more.