Sewing

First stages of a skirt from this book.  Considering stitching the entire thing by hand (resting, meditating, creating in the quiet).
The pattern is wonderful, and seems to drape so nicely around the body.  I am deeply in love……
Reading 

I bought this book for my conventional son - who is thrilled by extremes, but won’t go there [...]

Detail of a wall in Carlton (Melbourne).
I do believe in messages from the universe, and I’ve had the same one twice this week from slightly different angles, and combined, makes a fantastically useful tool when looking for inspiration, so I thought I’d share what I have distilled out of it, and pass it on……

italian totmatoes [...]

Down the rabbit hole - oil on canvas
Which is how my life is feeling a bit at the moment.  Furtively looking for inspiration, painting my head off - dizzy with fumes.  Computer on a seemingly endless loop of children’s websites to occupy Z in the same room. Worrying about the fumes.
Worrying about the show.
Worrying about [...]

Thinking of her - oil on linen

Thinking of him - oil on linen
Two new works for Life Lines.
When I havn’t been painting, I’ve been knitting.  So I guess it was inevitable that knitted garments would start appearing in the paintings.  Knitting something that is getting longer - and yet is not long enough.  It’s sea-green.  [...]

work in progress - or not - oil on linen
Just over a week to go until the show opens.
Invitations have been distributed, papers have been contacted and a photographer has just left my house.
In anticipation of said photographer I cleaned the kitchen, made beds, tidied the lounge, and in the end, the photo was taken [...]

Alison Willoughby makes an art form of the skirt form.  She’s been on my list of favourites for evah.
When a good mate of mine sent me an email to say look at this book, I hyperventilated.  There was gasping, there was speeding of pulse, there was an immediate order.
Immediate.

It arrived yesterday.
If I had tiny little [...]

 Small work for Life Lines - oil on canvas panel 
It seems that when the house is quiet and full I am able to work my best.  All quiet, all sleeping, me madly working - until the clock nags me to retire or suffer the consequences the next day.
After a decent painting session on something larger, [...]

Inside an oyster shell found on Brighton Beach.
Husband said - Look at this huge Oyster shell.
Son said - Hasn’t it got lots of layers!
Daughter said - Can I throw it?
I said - Crikey - look at the tree on a hill.  I’m taking that home.
And I did.  Painting in progress…..

As kids do, my boy asked me the other day what my favourite colour was.  The answer immediately came - red.
But it’s not actually true.
The colour that feeds me the most - that I can never quite find - except from it’s true source - the colour that I would wear from top to toe [...]

The answer came in a dream (oil on linen).
It’s slow and steady.  Steady and slow.
And sloooow.  But steady.
Trying to keep my head in the 2 weeks remaining.   Handing cards to friends and relatives, and finding good places to just leave them, hoping they will find their way into the right hands.   Getting a bit excited, [...]