My mothers day

Before Sunday my husband was asking me what I wanted to do for mothers day, I think he was hoping I would want to go on a trip somewhere, visit something, DO something, but my wish for the day was simple.  I wanted some flowers, some chocolates and to be on my own for a bit.  

Does that sound terrible?  I love my baby so much, and my husband of course, but for the last year I could probably count on one hand the number of hours I have spent truly alone, and I missed it.  

Of course the chocolates and the flowers were an instant win, it is kind of a tradition in my family to give/receive daffodils on Mother's Day ever since as children we had to go up to the front in church and collect a little bunch of them to take back to our mothers, (I always loved how my mum had loads of flowers because she had four children.)

I enjoyed a tasty breakfast of pastries then lunch out I had about two wonderful hours to myself and I used it to do a painting, my first since Orren was born.  I didn't write finish it unfortunately, but I did get some nice textures, layers and shapes down.  It was great to sit for a while, to not have to talk and to let the paper, glue, brushes and paint do the talking.  Here are some details.

I hope at some point I will be able to finish it, it's still out, along with all my paints, waiting for some words and a symbolic image, I am not sure what they will be yet, I will have to see where it takes me. 

One the Monday following Mothers Day, I was in the bathroom and Orren was crawling around upstairs, I thought I had packed all my paints away, then Orren crawled through onto the landing and I noticed his hands and feet had white emulsion on them, NOT good. I went into the spare room where I had been working on the floor and there was a puddle of white emulsion on the carpet.  I spent the next 40 minutes scrubbing the carpet to get it up, my hands look like an old lady's now!! Not a great start to the week, but I can laugh about it now thankfully.

What did you do for mothers day, did you see your mum?  Did you have something special to celebrate being a mum?

Etsy Feature

I am feeling fired up about art this week and just itching to get my paints and collage stuff out and get making, time is tight at the moment now though with a new baby, a house and a husband to look after so in the mean time I will just have to drool over these gorgeous artworks on Etsy:

Love the colours, the glitter, the texture and the use of circles,

Love the sort colours and shapes, the collaged cups, the use of text,

Love the layering, the variety of shapes, the colour pallet,

Love the stencilled letters, the loose paintwork, the balanced composition,

Love the character, the black outlines, which highlights,

Love the broad  strokes contrasting with the delicate black lines, 

Love the angular shapes, the bright colours, the pattern,

Love the blocks of colour against the fields of colours, love the variety of sized of squares.

Click on each artwork to view each artists shop.

Things to do with doilies

There is something so beautiful about doilies, I love their lacyness, the creamy hue that comes with age, their delicateness and perhaps more importantly their versatility.  I love using doilies is art and c raft projects.

Here are some of the ways I have used doilies in art and crafts in the past:

                                          

In textile projects, this was an art piece I did a few years ago.

Using fabric hardener to stiffen the doily into 3D forms such as a bowl.

Paper doilies in collages.

This wall hanging covers a shelf unit containing lots of junk that we want to keep hidden.

On canvas paintings layered with acrylic paint.

Here are some other brilliant craft ideas using doilies from some of my favourite blogs:

Doily coasters

Doily blanket

Doily lamp shade

Doily table runner

Paper doily garland

Doily gift decorating.

Hope you are having a good week, spring continues to be in the air in this part of the world, time is passing very quickly.

Review of 2011

Last year I made some new years resolutions, so though I would now take the opportunity to see which ones I achieved, which ones I nearly achieved and which ones I didn't achieve (and why)  So these were my resolutions for 2011:

1. Read the Bible in a year - I have very nearly done this, I am about two months behind and am proud of that alone, I have never got this far through the Bible before.  I have found the process of reading it very useful, though I have to confess often I am just reading the words and I feel they are not really sinking in, however the odd verse jumps out at me and speaks to me on a really personal level.  My aim now is to read the rest before the baby arrives!

courtesy of weheartit

2. Buy nothing new for a year - Although I did of course buy new things this year, I think I was much more thoughtful when making purchases, I did consider if I could make things or get them second hand and have come to the conclusion that if there is something out there that I really really want (but can't afford), then I can get it one way or another, either I buy something similar second hand or make it myself.

Vintage map bunting for sale in the craft shop

3. Exercise at least 3 time a week - for a long time I was cycling to work every day, but since I fell pregnant I have been too frightened to cycle in case I fall off or hurt myself on the handle bars, so I have stuck with walking; walking to the shops when I can and going for long woodland walks at weekends.

Me on one of our many woodland walks,

4. Eat more healthily - I started the year eating very healthily but in the spring I started medication for Poly-cystic ovarian syndrome which made me feel very sick, then I fell pregnant and felt even more sick to the point where vegetables made me gag (I can't think why my body didn't want me to eat veg but I couldn't) however I did keep eating lots of fruit so don't feel too bad about not being super healthy.

Courtesy of weheartit.com

5. Finish my wedding scrapbook - hmmm still not finished, or even close!

Unfinished wedding scrapbook,

6. Grow more veg - I struggled with this because I had a very difficult start to my pregnancy and as a result wasn't able to work the allotment...AND I got an eviction letter :(  On the bright side I am now sharing the allotment with a friend so hopefully it will be more manageable in 2012, I can't wait to spend time there with my child, showing him or her the wonders of nature,

Courtesy of weheartit.com

7. Make £400 per month of crafts, photography etc - Didn't manage £400 per month, but I was pleased with what I achieved in 2011 in terms of independent money making.  I am going to carry on with my Etsy craft shop, although I have closed the art shop because it wasn't as successful as I had hoped.  I am on maternity leave from photography now, but will start again in late March/April.  Having said that I am definitely happier with the craft side of things than the photography, and am going to work on this more in 2012,

32 sales yippy!

8. Pay off overdraft -  I did this!!  Purely on saving and spending less, so very pleased with myself,

Courtesy of weheartit.com

9. Watch less TV - I did this and re-read "Remotely controlled" to motivate me further, I am going to continue watching less TV and hope that when our baby comes I will be far to busy!  Really don't want to look back on my life and have wasted 12 years watching TV (The average amount British people watch TV in their lifetime!)

Courtesy of weheartit.com

10.  Have 100 followers on the blog - I have 106 lovely lovely followers, I have love for you all, I love your comments, thankyou thankyou for following my blog.

My fabulous followers!

As for 2012, I am not making New Years resolutions but I do have many hopes for my life with my husband and our new baby which I am sure I will share with you as time goes by.  I am really looking forward to 2012.

(Photos are mine unless linked to weheartit.com)

Alex Duncan - Surge

The weekend before last I visited a lovely art gallery in Swansea called The Mission Gallery, the gallery alone is beautiful because it is an old church that has been converted into a small gallery space.  It has a really calm, peaceful feel inside, a really beautiful, small space.  The exhibition that we saw was called Surge by an artist called Alex Duncan, it consisted of a series of large format photographs which were reflections of urban environments in the surface of puddles, a series of small photographs of water - the ocean, rivers, lakes- which had been left in water till the image had begun to fall away from the paper creating a fascinating rippling effect on the surface of the photograph, and finally, an installation which, from afar, appeared to be hundreds of ocean tumbled stones but on closer examination was in fact different sized pieces of polystyrene which had been collected from beaches across the UK.  The installation was really beautiful and thought provoking and we spent a long time looking at it,  I would really recommend the exhibition if you are ever in Swansea.
I find it really encouraging and inspiring to visit contemporary fine art exhibitions like this one as it is such a contrast from the very traditional paintings that I spend a lot of time looking at online.  Unfortunately I couldn't take any photos inside but I did manage to find on online that someone must have sneaked;  I have also included some images from the publicity material:

Have you seen any inspiring contemporary art exhibitions recently?

Recent artwork

I am finally feeling like I can be creative again, the artistic juices are flowing and rather than giving up when things don't turn out perfect, or not even starting out to begin with, as I have done in the past, I am just having a go anyway, making art for myself and not even thinking about selling and not worrying that some of it is quite bad.
So here are some recent artworks that I have created just in my small journals, I drew ideas from how I was feeling at the time of paintings them.  They are certainly not the best things I have ever done, but they are "something"; paint to paper, creativity, and something of my spirit on paper.  I would love to know what you think.

Youth Group painting

I have recently been helping run my church youth group on Sunday evenings and I was given the responsibility of  organising a group painting.  We decided we would create an image similar to that of the church logo which is a tree with people underneath it, the kids at youth group all designed their own logo and we combined them to create a new logo.  I was worried about being too "teachery" in the evening, but the girls who I help run the group with said I was really good.  It gave me a real boost to have people tell me I did really well because positive praise and encouragement like that rarely/never happens at school.  Also all the kids really enjoyed the painting, they tried really hard and were really appreciative, (again another thing that rarely happens in school)  All in all it was a really rewarding experience and is definitely the sort of thing I would like to do more of.

Here are some pics:

And the finished painting: