Poor Spaky Cat

Poor Sparky is in the wars again-he came in the other night with an ear split from fighting with the other younger cats that have moved into the area.
We have been keeping an eye on him in case of infection and would you believe it-he strolled in tonight with his one eye closed and an abcess forming on his face.
Bill will have to take him down to he vets in the morning for a long acting antibiotic injection, while I get on with the class.

He will have to learn to keep out of the way of the younger cats or he will be in trouble more often! Good job hes insured!
We are off on holiday on Sunday for 8 nights-but the pet sitter will keep a close eye on him and take him back down the vets if need be, though the long acting jab he has usually does the trick, dosent usually need more than one!

Tomorrows Class-Winters Walk

Im really looking forward to tomorrow class-there will be some of students I havent seen for ages in-apart from seeing them at the market when they call by to have a chat!
I have 3 newbies in as well.
The painting is a mix of acrylic under painting and oils-great fun to do.

Twilight Tree

Painted in acrylic on a deep edge box canvas measuring 12in x 24in--''Twilight Tree''
An atmospheric painting that will look great in a contemporary rom or a more traditional one.
£130
The price includes P+P in UK
For more details please take look at my website
www.paintingmyway.co.uk

EVENING LIGHT

Painted in acrylic on a staple free box canvas measuring 16in x 20in
'Evening Light' has had 3 coats of varnish to protect it.
Price is £140 including P+P in Uk for more details please check out the website www.paintingmyway.co.uk

Good Luck Andrew

We want to wish my brother Andrew good luck this weekend -he is co-driving Icelandic rally champion Daniel Sigourdarson in the Cambrian Rally In Llandudno-they will be in a Mitsubishi EVO10.
Its the start of a busy week for the pair of them as they are also competing a the Uk round of the World Championship, Wales Rally GB 5 days later.

Market Oct 14th

It was like a summers days yesterday up on the market square-had a sleeveless dress on and was as warm as toast!
There were quite a few visitors in the town enjoying the hustle and bustle of the market and surrounding shops.
I had 2 more bookings for Poppy Field next March,and Celia called by for advice about getting set up at home to start oil painting.
I stock all the brushes needed to start up--and Celia took away all she needed for just £19.50 which included a large tickling brush,a bashing brush, filberts,round brushes, flats and lovely liner brush!
Then I marked all the other bits and pieces in the latest SAA catalogue that she would need-including the oil paint which is on offer at the moment bogof.
So Celia has gone away to join the SAA and buy her bits and bobs she needs.Ive told her to ring me if she is unsure about anything when it comes and she makes a start! She has one of my fact sheets which goes through the whole process of painting step by step-so fingers crossed I will be receiving an email from her with a painting attached shortly!

Beautiful Evening

There was a beautiful sunset again this evening- must get the brushes out soon and give it a go!

Bigger Classes

As classes are getting more and more popular I have had to come to a decision about how many students I can take in classes.
Some classes are more intensive than others such as the ''Summer Day'' one where students have to master the palette knife-that can take some time and it wouldn't be fair to everyone if I didn't have time to spend with individual students -so in that class I will only have 9 while in something like the ''Yesterday'' which is coming up in Dec I can take 14 as its more straight forward-although it is big painting! I already have 13 booked in for Yesterday so Ive had to order 3 new easels to make sure Ive enough, while I was at it another 40 canvas were ordered from another supplier--both ordered yesterday afternoon and both orders were here first thing this morning!
Now we just have to find a space for all the canvas's!
I'm trying to track down a special size one at the moment or a commission Ive got--its proving a little difficult-got another couple of websites to try-will have a look while I'm on the market tomorrow.

Lin and Dave want an acrylic and melted wax poppy in quite neutral shades of beige's,creams , yellow and gold to go over their fireplace-cant wait to get started on it --when I can find a canvas to match their requirements!

Lazy Summer Days

Lazy Summer Days has been sold, and is going to live in Bishops Castle- so its gone hone in a way-as I realised today that I painted that picture while I was at Bishops Castle Michaelmas Fair recently.
The lady who bought it on Sunday from me at the Book and Craft market is quite a collector of my work-having commissioned 2 paintings and also bought 4 others.
Karen and her hubby have become great friends of ours as a result!

Strange!!

I had a phone call tonight from one of my students Noreen.
She said--" Ive just come back off holiday to find a message for YOU on MY answering machine!-- "Mrs Mills wants you to do a demo for her WI in March 2010"'
when I asked her how come?-she said her phone number was just one digit out to mine-and of course she recognised my name which was mentioned in the message--
but how weird is that-if it had been anyone else other than my student Noreen , I may not have got the message!
Mrs Mills said she thought I was on holiday when she heard nothing back and would have tryed again to book me, so as long as she dialed the right number I would have been booked !

Book and Craft Fair

We are on the book and craft fair tomorrow on Castle Square-the weather is supposed to be good so we should have a good day!
Time is ticking down to out holiday- a week tomorrow we are away for 8 nights-exploring the south coast with a couple of stops in different places then up to Weston Super Mare for the last 3 nights.
Cant wait!
I will have wi fi where we stay so will keep you updated with things as we go !

TODAYS CLASS-PERFECT EVENING

After a couple of last minute cancellations due to illness we were down to just 3 students today! Bill and Tony had been before , and today Tony had bought along his 10 year old grandson George.
The class went very well-George was very attentive and asked all the right questions about the method! The hairdryer came in handy to dry each stage of the painting before going on.
As expected we finished before time although we had several tea breaks,sit downs and chats during the class!
Bill and Tony will be receiving their artists badges next time they come (long service awards my Bill calls them!)
The painting were bright and vibrant in reds, oranges and yellow.The meatallic paint we used on the water works so well, as the light changes so does the painting.
We added a couple more trees to the right hand side of the painting today which worked really well.

Autumn Indulgence Evening

I have been invited to be part of the ''Autumn Indulgence Evening'' at St Josephs RC School Leavale Road, Stourbridge on Wednesday 11th November
7pm -9.30pm the price is £3.50p which includes mulled wine and nibbles.
There will be lots going on including
SeeSaw childrens clothes,
Tizzy's accessories,
Vintage jewellery,
Virgin Vie,
Dove Spa of Hagley,
Mandy Bell Jewellery.
Claire Louise Glass designes,
Cuppycake Childrens gifts,
Wine tasting,
The Holistic Farmer
Luxery Hand Made soaps,
Olivias Celebration cakes,
Phoenix cards,
Casa Homewares,
Styles By Mel,
Indian Head massage
and lots more as well!
I will be demonstrating and will have a display of paintings .
I will take along plenty of gift vouchers as they are very popular at this time of year---
Its the same day as the usual Wednesday market-and the first day of the new stalls that the council have had done for us traders--cost in the region of £60,000 ---the layout is supposed to be staying the same-but we will be having an apex roof on our stall and also the stalls will be easier to adapt to each trader-- for example ---we put the bars up to create a walk in stall-which at the moment takes a lot of hamering from Bill with his rubber mallet-not good on a Sunday Morning for the very local residents!

Varnishing

The paintings hanging on my kitchen wall at the moment are not mine--they have been dropped off by one of the students of the last Birch tree class--Jan lives not far away from us- and she dropped hers and Carolines paintings in to be varnished- thats Bills domain-I dont have anything to do with that at all-just leave it up to him and he gets on with it! I can never get the brush strokes out of the varnish when I do it so leave it to the expert!

Great Evening

Lin and Dave came over to bring the latest cards for me that Lin has created from my paintings.
They sell like hot cakes thanks to Lins artistic eye-she takes part of my paintings and makes them in to cards for me.Im sure I will be ordering some more shortly after we have been on the market this Sunday!
It seems like we have know Lin and Dave forever-we just get on so well-we all have the same sense of humour and think along the same lines-funny to think we only met a few months ago at Shobdon Food and Drink Festival!
We all went up for a meal at The Squirrel tonight and we had a lovely time-lots of laughs and the time---- it just flew by !

Blitz!

I intended having a dusting session yesterday after we got back from the market but I was so cold all day all I wanted to do when I got home was sleep!
Bill had popped over the Andrew Francis butchers ( winner of the experts choice in the Ludlow Food and Drink Festival) and got some rare breeds sausage, a beautiful big cabbage from Farmers fruit and veg stall just down the way from us and by the time I had made the onion gravy and ate tea all I was fit for was bed!
It was the earliest night for absolutely ages and I slept like a log.
Today I was determined to have a long overdue blitz on the housework!
You wouldn't believe just how much dust comes off 2 parrots!
I even took all my cats off the sideboard in the hall and gave it all a good clean! I worked solidly all day-got all the ground floor cleaned -was so pleased with the kitchen--all my chrome stuff looked like new after I had finished-
I didn't get chance to do the painting I intended-but so glad I stuck at it-everything was spick and span and it felt great when I finished!

New Bag!

A while ago I bought some material off Ebay-just because it had cats who were also artists on there!
I didn't know what I was going to do with it when I bought it-just knew I liked it!

Anyway I mentioned it passing to a dear friend of mine who is 98 years old--Wyn said bring it down and I will make you a bag with it-went to see her on Monday and she had done it bless her!
Its ideal for taking to the market-I can put my purse, phone and other bits and pieces in there so its really handy!
She is marvellous-she cooks every day- she makes jams, cakes etc--I never come from there empty handed-there is always an apple pie or jar of jam to bring home whenever I see her.
I took her some blackberries last week and this week they were turned into jam and apple and blackberry pies!
She is a star -not long ago she made a cake for her daughters 50th wedding anniversary- she had also made her wedding cake--there are not many who could say the same thing is there?

Garden

Bill has potted up some of the new plants we bought the other day from the market, dont know what they are called-we had some last year but they didn't come again this year :-( they small devine in the evening -almost like a lily.
They should be safer this year in the pots-they can rot in the ground-so fingers crossed they will survive this winter in the pots!

New Sunflowers

Having tryed the new Sunflowers class painting on both a black and white canvas using oil paint I wasn't completely happy that it was do-able by first timers so got stuck in with the acrylic paint yesterday.
I still like the painting on the deep edge box canvas but it needed tweaking a bit.
I am going to paint over the sunflowers tomorrow with oils to add the definition they need-and the results will be on here,as soon as Im finished.
I'm sure the finished results will be the one I'm after.

Cold Day On The Market!

The sun was shining as we set off to the weekly market yesterday-but looks were deceiving-it was bitter cold and after a couple of hours Bill came home to fetch the kettle , mugs and some oxo's to warm us up!
Trade was steady and the gift vouchers were proving to be popular for Christmas pressies!

Happy Birthday Jake

Our Jake is 3 today !
To think 3 years ago he was hatching out of an egg and to hear what he can say now--its amazing!
We must write down how many words he can say--he really is a little star--he has the knack of putting different words together and making a sentence-and of course when that happens we laugh and he says it all the more--the best one yet though is
"Bill, Bill, Bill--get off her - stop it--you naughty boy!"
That cracks us up without fail--but all of it is what he hears regularly--Im always shouting through to Bill, so he hears "Bill" all the time-"stop it" and "naughty boy" he hears quite a lot too as you can imagine-but the "get off her" we think should be get off THERE not her, but hes done his own thing with it!
Its also funny to hear him coughing and coughing and then he says "Oh dear-Its a bugger init!"
And if our other bird starts making a noise Jake says "shut up you noisy bugger! "
There is never a dull moment with him!

Celias Poppies

I had a lovely email (below) today from Celia who came to the class on Saturday.She has now got the confidence to have a go at home-she has done this picture using waxes instead of paint and she has made a lovely job of it!I can see its opened up a whole new world for her!

Dear Diane,

This is my latest effort, you have really got me fired up, I have always wanted to try painting but never had the courage, now I can't understand why I even needed courage.

Thanks so much. We will come and see you at Ludlow one Wednesday soon.

Best wishes

Celia

New Sunflowers

Ive started work on the new sunflower painting that will be the subject for Saturday April 3rd 2010 I have had 4 bookings for this already!
Jan and her daughter Vicki who attended the birch trees classes a few weeks ago and Sue and Celia who came for the first time on Saturday.

I like it on this long deep edge canvas-it suits the subject perfectly--Ive got some more to do on the lighter one, the petals need fattening up a bit!

Ive tryed it on a black canvas and a white one in oils--tomorrow I will have a go with the acrylics and see how that turns out.

new class subject for April 2010

Susan and Celia just loved my sunflower painting yesterday and have requested that it is made a class subject!
Im going to have a little play and tweak here and there to make sure it is do-able by first timers but Im sure it will be a popular subject--I know someone for sure who will want to come along and join the class (karen!)
I may try it on one of the chunky 12in x 24in canvas that I have--I think it will suit the subject beautifuly. Will post the picture on here as soon as its done!

Feedback!!!

I had just finished cleaning around 70 brushes after todays class-my feet were aching and my back was getting stiff from standing all day teaching--I switched on my computer to check up on my emails etc and I found an email from two of todays students-- The following just made my day---

Hi Diane

We've just completed your Saturday class and are still so amazed at the result, thank you so much. Celia and I would like to book into your Summer's Day class on 30th Jaunary 2010 and the Silver Birches on 6th February 2010. Do hope this will be possible. Just off to gaze in wonder at my painting!

Many thanks

Susan H. and Celia D.

Poppy Field Class Oct 3rd

We had a lovely laid back class today--all ten of the students were ladies!
We had a first today-- a very heavily pregnant student! Nichola is just 5 weeks off giving birth to her 2nd baby- It sounds like Poppy will be one of the options for a name if the baby is a little girl--we will all be waiting to hear the news!
We had 3 ladies back for the second time-Jess age 14 who came to the Birch Tree class a few weeks ago and Jenny and Margret who had attended the Stormy Skies class a while ago.
I think there were a few nerves to begin with and the usual '' I wont be able to paint anything that looks any good'' from most of them--but surprise surprise-as soon as their bashing brushes hit the canvas they all settled down---getting them to put the first brush mark on the canvas was hard though!
Susan and Celia we had met a few months ago when we did a WI demo at Luston WI-both were completly convinced they wouldnt be able to paint- but within minutes they were standing back and admiring their beautiful skies and grasses waving in the breeze.
Yvonne and daughter Natalie had travelled from Wolverhampton to join us, they settled down quickly too--Suzanne came over from Telford and I cant for the life of me remember where Cynthia travelled from!
Anyway-the time flew by-when it came to painting the poppies,daisies and cornflowers in among the grasses-everyone got stuck in and in no time at all they had all finished.
The wind was blowing quite hard so we decided against going outside for the photos as there would have been bits stuck to the paint!
We are looking forward to seeing everyone again soon.

Jess is coming back to 3 more classes this year,Suzanne is back for the Summer Day next year,Susan and Celia are coming to Summer Day and the Birches next year and Cynthia is booked in to the Yesterday class in Dec.

Path in The Birches/ The Pool

The latest in my series of birches are
" Path Through The Birches" which has been painted in acrylic on to 36in x 14 in canvas in soft shades of sage green and creams.
A pathway leads through the trees to a tranquil place deep in the woods.
All the sides are painted and it has been varnished with 3 coats to protect it.
The price including P+P in UK is £200

" The Pool in the Birches" has been painted onto a 20in x 16in canvas-all the sides are painted.
This painting is the first of its sort in my gallery--its been painted by both myself and my husband Bill!
Bill has been known to pick up the brushes and have a go before now but this is the first time one of the paintings has been offered for sale!
Bill painted most of the birch trees in this painting while I did the rest of it!

The pond has been painted with a special metallic paint--I have used 2 colours on the water-gold and green and it really works well!
The price including P+P in Uk is £100

Painting Arrived Safely

I was pleased to hear from Farhara yesterday that the painting she purchased ''Birch Tree Pool'' had arrived safely and that she was very pleased with it! She also told me she was now saving up to purchase another of my Birch Tree series!
I have been busy painting some more to add to this series-I love the greens in this painting so I have tryed to recreate the colour I mixed to do another in the series!