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 !

Ludlows Latest Gallery

We had a lovely afternoon today -we were invited to Ludlows latest contemporary gallery for afternoon tea with the owners/artists Pauline and Chris.
After a guided tour of the beautiful landscaped gardens we were shown through the great hall where the display of paintings began-there were some stunning works of art by the two artists.
As we moved on through the house the paintings lined the walls on the stairways and walls.We stopped on the second level in beautiful ,comfortable surroundings for some beautiful coffee and cakes and a chat with Pauline and Chris-very interesting too-we covered lots of subjects-from art to boot sales!
Afterwards we were shown the rest of the gallery on the 3 rd level-again some stunning pieces of art on display,the owners have made a lovely job of hanging the artwork. The time just flew by and in no time it was time to come home and do some more of the tedious stuff on the computer!
We had a lovely time with them-and cant wait til saturday when Pauline and Chris will be coming to class again to complete another painting to add to their extensive collection!
We saw lots of works that they have done at home on their own-one that stood out was the owl painting that Chris has done-though it didnt sound as if it was a relaxing one to do!

Thank You Everyone

Well Ive had a lovely birthday today, after opening loads of cards and pressies while getting ready for today's class ,it carried on with some of my friends/students bringing me some beautiful presents to class. We had a great class, I took along my birthday cake my daughter Becki had bought for me and we all had some with a cup of tea .
My phone was buzzing all morning with messages for me....After arriving home it was a constant stream of visitors bringing beautiful pressies and cards.
As well as my birthday its also our 8th wedding anniversary-- so the house if full of cards everywhere there is a space to put them!
We were going out for a meal tonight but we were too tired to get ready, so we had a lovely meal in and we are being taken out by Carl and Marcel tomorrow night.
All in all Ive been thoroughly spoiled rotten-will have some extra hoola hoops to do on the Wii fit after all the chocs are gone but hey who cares!!!
MANY THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO MADE THIS BIRTHDAY ONE TO REMEMBER LOVE DI XXX

Britsh Heart Foundation Charity Auction

I have donated 2 paintings for the following appeal.

Sian the area cordinator got in touch as I have helped this charity several times before in different ways.

Its a charity very close to my heart as my hubsband Bill had a heart attack 5 years ago and my dear Dad passed away suddenly 3 years ago with heart failure.

These arent the actual paintings--I havent time to search for the images at the moment-got a thousand and one things to be doing at moment, but they are along the same lines! A "Summer Day" one and a "Birch Tree" one.

. The auction is on Monday 3rd November at 7.30pm, at the Barley Mow Public House in Droitwich, Worcestershire. It is in aid of the Worcester Balloon Appeal, to raise £38,000 for a lifesaving Intra-Aortic Balloon Pump (IABP) for the Worcestershire Royal Hospital. This will help more patients to be treated locally, whilst also supporting acutely ill patients on the ITU.

If you are able to get along to the auction please do-its for a very good cause.

Tropical Sunset Class Aug 30th

We had a lovely class today, 4 students-- Oliver, Jack , Pauline and Chris had been to me before but Beverly and Doreen were first timers.

Doreen and Beverly had been going to watercolour classes and fancied a change of medium!

The class went very well with some really vibrant skies emerging from the brushes.

Olivers in particular was very bright to start with, but after some careful tickling with the tickling brush it mellowed down nicely.

The palm trees caused a few laugh among us all--we had all sorts-helicopter rotors and wind turbines to name a few, but as I told the students , real palm trees do come in all sorts of shapes and sizes.

I must cut out some pictures of some to take to class to show them!

Everyone was really happy with the end results--Beverly and Doreen have booked for another 2 classes -The Birch Trees and the Poppy Fields and Pauline and Chris have booked for the Poppy Fields so they will be meeting up again soon.

Thats what I love about the classes, everyone makes firm friendships with the other students and its a social event as much as a painting class.

For once we finished early in class and its lovely to relax with a glass of Tia Maria and Baily's on ice while doing some updating!

Back to the grindstone tomorrow -after the bootsale.

It will be my first Sunday off for what seems like ages-but have got to get cracking on the commissions in the afternoon!

A Drink For Jake!

My two nephews came around tonight with their Dad

to borrow our laminater---Jake was quick off the mark when he realised that they had a glass of J20 juice drink each ! He loves it!

He quickly flew down from his cage to have a sip or two-

along with the odd ice cube from their glass!

Date for Poppy Fields--Oct 4th

Poppy Fields has had some fantastic results whenever we have done this in a workshop.

Its a beautiful ,bright,vibrant painting that is suitable for all abilities -even first timers.

You will learn how to use a range of brushes in this class,and you will be amazed at just how different everyones paintings turn out!

If you would like to join this class please get in touch with me via my website www.paintingmyway.co.uk

This class tends to get booked up quite quickly, but will be held again next year.

Carole--Im so Proud!

Carole first came across me and my classes last year when I held my solo exhibition in Leominster Library-March 2007

She went in to have a look and liked what she saw and
A phone call later and she was booked into her first class in April.

She was an eager student who listened and watched what she was shown, and was producing first class paintings from the word go.

She excels at flowers and trees-anything with lots of detail in them. That seems to stem from her love of flower arranging-she makes the most beautiful dried flower arrangements-and has a natural eye for things

She has been to many of my classes, along with her daughter Hayley (who was really disappointed not to have been able to make it today due to having a hair rehearsal for being a bridesmaid)

Today Carole bought along some of the work she has done at home, I was gobsmacked and so chuffed at her work-she has worked very hard. I'm afraid my photos don't do her lovely work justice!

My favorite out of all she bought along was the simple poppy painting and she has given me permission to use the idea for a painting--

She was thrilled to tell me she had sold a version of the bluebell wood painting!

Her friend John has started up his own business doing framing as a direct result of her coming to my classes-so Painting My Way has changed a lot of lives over the past year alone!

John makes mounts and frames to suit any type of painting--I haven't got his details off Carole yet --too much going on today but as soon as I get the details I will post on here.

Its very exciting hearing how my classes have changed my students lives--Jan has paintings in Germany as well as this country and at the moment has an exhibition of her work on display at The Nelson Inn, Rocks Green, Ludlow.

Sharleen Toller has her own website on www.affordablebritishart.co.uk and Jack has had friends ''steal" his paintings when he showed them at work!

Kay has sold 4 out of 5 of her paintings she did in class--all for over £100 -the most memorable being her "Summer Day" painting that she entered into the art society exhibition --priced at £180 because she didnt want to sell it -but someone loved it enough to buy it for £180!

There have been many friendships forged in my classes--between students themselves and between us and the students--its a real pleasure to know all of these lovely people and to hear just how painting has changed their lives!

See you all soon!

Lovely Surprise

When we got back from Hereford there was a message on the phone from a lady who attended one of my classes over 3 years ago.

She had come with her daughter for a private class for their birthdays.

Its their joint birthdays soon and she was wondering if I still did classes!.

We all take it for granted that everyone is on the Internet these days, but of course they are not, and as she is not local had no idea if the classes were still running! We had a lovely chat when I rang her back, she said they had a lot of fun when they came the last time.

They are booked into the SaturdayJuly 12th class next week so that means there is only 2 places left for that class now.

If you want to join us for that class--which turned out very interesting last time we did it in class--get in touch via www.paintingmyway.co.uk

Wellsbourne Art Society

I have been invited back to Wellsbourne Arts Society to give another demonstration in June.
We were there in November, and obviously everyone enjoyed themselves as Ive been invited back!
Ive booked us into a lovely hotel for a couple of nights-we have to grab a few days break while we can now the -----weekends are being taken up with the classes.

The craft fairs have started up again,first one is tomorrow on Ludlow's Castle Square.Im looking forward to it, the weather is supposed to be quite reasonable, so fingers crossed for a busy day!

People are going to be able to see what goes on in classes on our new 10 in Digital photo frame, that will be on our stall.There will also be a slide show of the paintings that I cant take to the fair.
It will prove to be an invalueable tool I think.

Tenbry Ladies Guild

We had a lovely evening on Monday. I went to Tenbry to give a demonstration to Tenbry Ladies Guild.
As usual there were a lot of surprised faces when I explained that I was going to paint 2 full sized oil paintings from start to finish in under an hour!
There were lots of questions from the audience about how it was done.
Carol is pictured with the painting "Summer Day" that she chose after winning the raffle. I have as usual donated the other painting "The Falls" to the group to use for raising money for their chosen charity.

A lovely Day

After breakfast we went to the first boot sale of the season at leominster, picked up some more bargains, including some crayons for use on fabric-will have some fun personalising the aprons used in class with them!
Then back to clean out the stick insects-boy have they grown.I gave Paddy the parrot a good shower with the spray botle while I had it out spraying the sticks, then after calling round at mums to drop off her mothers day pressies, back to cook a beautiful roast beef dinner.
The roses I had for valentines day were about finished so I gently pulled all the petals off and put into some pretty glass dishes.They will continue to dry out in the sunny kitchen windowsill.Then when complety dry I will put some rose scented pot pourri oil on them.A real lasting memento of a great day!

Im now doing all the updating of my sites and catching up on emails!
Also got to send off the applications for some craft fairs coming up this summer.We seem to need more space every year with doing both encaustic demos and oil and acrylic demos too!!!!

Inspiration!!!

I am always out and about with my camera looking for something interesting to paint, the bottom 3 images I took earlier this week from Whitcliffe common, overlooking Ludlow.
Its pretty sensational.The big majestic Ludlow Castle dominates the view , but then turn slightly to your right and St Laurences Church comes into the picture with Clee Hill behind.
Now all I need is the time to paint all this beautiful scenes!

class of April 26th --Encaustic class

'
I am holding an encaustic wax class on Saturday April 26th.
You will be able to 'paint' using a special electric iron and special waxes- 2o postcard sized pics and 2 A4 size paintings with full instruction.
Its a fasinating way of producing art-its quite unpredictable to a certain extent--loading the special iron with wax and using it as you would a paint brush can produce some surprising results. The wax dries instantly amd its then polishe dwith some tissue.
Its going to be the most fun you will ever have ironing and polishing you will ever have!
You will see faces and animal's appear as if by magic in the melted wax, if you dont like what you see, its simple -just apply the iron to it and it changes in a flash!

Please get in touch via the website if you would like to join the class.
www.paintingmyway.co.uk
Check out my 'snaps' pages on my site to see all my happy students with their paintings---you will see that many of my students come back time after time--my classes get booked up very quickly and I have a waiting list for some subjects.

The classes are very friendly,laid back and informative at the same time- great fun and beautiful painting's to take home as well!
Take a look at the guest book to see what some of the students have said about the classes as well!
I also supply everything needed for this wonderful ,addictive way of creative art.

St Valentines Day

Well we have had a lovely day-- Bill had some fun trying out the new camera and printer--an amazing bargain off hot deals!! Just £55 for the 2!!! Its over £300 on Amazon.
Just the job to print off pics of the students on the day of the class if they want one!!
I had some beautiful red roses and a romantic CD for St Valentines Day. We went out for a lovely romantic 3 course meal tonight at the Bull Ring Tavern. Couldnt fault it--we have been there every week for their steak night special-so knew it would be good!!!
I bought my cheese home in a doggy bag as I couldnt manage to eat it all--very generous portions--it comes very highly recommended by us!
Back on the diet tomorrow!!!!!!

Reiki

Well I had a wonderful day today having my Reiki session with Jan.
It was the most relaxing and engergising experience at the same time!
Reiki is a ancient Japanese therapy-the word Reiki means universal life force energy.
The therapy involves the channeling of the energy that surrounds all of us into our bodies.

The session takes around an hour and invloves lying on the very comfortable reiki couch, fully clothed -but with watches , belts etc taken off as they can interfere with the energy.
There is lovely soothing music and candles in the room, and also incense burning,it was very easy to relax fairly soon in the calm atmosphere.
Jan began on my head, just gently holding it to start, I soon felt the heat of the energy coming through her hands.
She slowly carried on working down my body-there were times when the hands felt really cold as well as when they felt hot.
I could also feel a lot of heat when she wasnt actualy touching me-just holding her hands above me.

People can feel different things, some people dont feel very much but that dosent mean nothings happening, the healing will still be transfered through the practioner to the client.

She can feel where parts of the body need more healing than others and concentrates on those places.
I could feel a tingling sensation sometimes especialy when she was working on my back, after I had turned over onto my front around half way through.
I am sure I had just drifted off to sleep to be honest when Jan spoke to me and I came back to reality!!

It took me a few minutes to come round properly and sit up--I could have slept for days if she had left me there Im sure!!
I have never felt so relaxed and peaceful.
After having a drink of water-something I have to do regulary for a couple of days to help get rid of the toxins out of the body,I realised that I felt really full of energy as well.
Its very hard to describe to be honest!!
I would recommend it to anyone who feels under the weather for whatever reason-Im definatly going to have another session before too long.
Jan charges just £30 for this session of Reiki and belive me it is worth every penny.!!!
She can be contacted on 07837939797 if you want to book a session with Jan or just find out more about it, please give her a ring.

Cancer Research Donation

I have had an enjoyable few days-apart from having a streaming cold---painting some variations on Caroles picture that she painted at the weekend at the Advanced class.

I have painted this picture in order to raise money for Cancer Research.
Cancer has touched many peoples lives in one way or another, and I hope that this painting will raise at least £180 for the cause.
This oil painting called "Foxglove Dream"is done onto a high quality Loxley Gold deep edge canvas measuring 10in wide x 24in long.
The painting continues on all 4 sides of the canvas so it does not require framing.
The photographs do not do this picture justice, it is much brighter in real life.
The foxgloves are quite detailed, and lighter than they appear in the pics.
I will take some more close up pictures tomorrow when the light is better!!

It will (or should be) dry enough to post in around 3 weeks, it can be delivered in time for St Valentines Day-I only use special delivery for paintings.
It is next day delivery,insured and trackable.
Please note that this work is copyrighted and logged with www.protectmywork.com