Friday, March 07, 2008

Spell Checker

To help with such things ...this made me laugh!

Eye halve a spelling chequer,

It came with my pea sea;
It plainly marques for my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.

Eye strike a quay and type a ward
And weight four it two say
Weather aye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee four two long,
And eye can put the error rite
It's rare lea ever wrong.

Eye have run this poem threw it
Aye am shore your pleased to no;
Eats let her perfect awl the weigh
My checker tolled me sew.

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Todays Craft Fair




The weather was very kind to us today on the craft market.We got down there at 7.40am to get set up.
Bill had been busy for a few hours the day before making new bubble wrap bags for some of the paintings.
We soon got into the swing of things and the paintings were hung in no time.
The morning was pretty quiet, which was good as it gave us the chance to catch up on all the gossip from the regular stall holders.
It would seem we made the right decision not to do the craft fairs during the winter months-it has been cold and wet and windy up there, and haven't missed anything!
As soon as lunchtime came it got busy and we had a great time.One of the stall holders bought a gift voucher for her father as a surprise 60th birthday pressie.
His birthday is just after my Bills in May, so we will see him sometime after that.
One customer was really happy to see us-she had been going up to the craft market looking for us every month since Oct.!!! She had picked up a leaflet from me previously and had mislaid it-couldn't remember the name and wasn't on the Internet.
She has gone away with a business card and a leaflet this time, we will be hearing from her soon.
We went for a great meal tonight -well recommend it.The Traveller's Rest near Craven Arms.They do a special deal of 3 courses for just £10 each Mon --Thursday.
We couldn't fault it at all.Great choice of starters-we both had prawn cocktail followed by roast beef for bill and Roast pork for me.I had some of the best stuffing Ive ever tasted with mine-it really was tasty.
There was about 10 veg's to choose from and homemade Yorkshire puddings too.
We really did struggle to eat it all.
But when the waitress bought the dessert menu we just had to try to fit a pudding in!
Bread and butter pudding with cream ws lovely-I couldn't finish mine-but I tryed really hard to-Bill just about managed his.
Back on the diets tomorrow--I think being out in the fresh air all day gave us an appetite today.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

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.

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Todays Class







Today Dorothy and Norlene returned to paint this seascape.Its been quite a while since I have seen them. Norlene had a gift voucher to use that her daughter had bought her.
They decided to paint a different coloured vesion of Summer Day as that would fit in with their decor at home better than the usual!
It proved to be a good choice.The red's and orange's were quite subtle after it was blended onto the white undercoat.
They really enjoyed bashing the paint onto the canvas and tickling it afterwards to get the brush marks out!!
The paintings developed quite quickly, and the finishing touches of the marigolds and grasses in the forground really set off the paintings a treat!

Sunday, March 02, 2008

Childrens Class









As you can see from the pictures above,children acheive very high standards of work in my classes.I am going to set a couple of dates shortly for JUST children. These will be held during the school holidays and will be held during the week rather than the weekends. As soon as I have sorted out the dates I will post them on here and on my website.

Keith Norris's Painting's



I was explaining to my students about the different ways that the new acrylic paint can be used and was trying to descibe the paintings that the artist Keith Norris did in his demos.I promised that I would put them on here for them all to see--so here they are guys!

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!!!!

Frosty Reflections Class



We had an interesting class yesterday.The subject was quite a simple painting, of frosty trees reflected into the water. I gave the students a choice of 2 colour ways to do this painting.
Shades of orange, yellow's and reds or shades of purple.
Bill and Dennis both chose to do the orange version and Brian, Mandy, Sheila and Jan all chose the purple version.
When it came to do the shimmering water at the end I had a wide variety of special acrylic colours that adds that special effect. I showed everyone how each of them looked on my own painting. The gold shimmering paint looked great on the orange version.Jan and Mandy both used the violet shimmer and Sheila used the opalescence one.
The results were great and everyone enjoyed themselves.
The new students all agreed that it was far more laid back in the classes than expected, and everyone felt at ease very quickly!
Bill bought along his mother in law Sheila who knew nothing about coming until late the night before, so she had a great surprise. Dennis and Brian had travelled from Stoke On Trent, their wives went off into Ludlow shopping whie the guys painted.
Dennis's wife was enquiring about childrens classes for their little 5 year old grandaughter. I will be setting some dates for july again for childrens classes.

Friday, February 29, 2008

Tomorrow's Class


Im really looking forward to tomorows class.
I love working with acrylic paint and the subject in this class is completed entirely with acrylic paint.
There are several differnt sorts of acrylic paint used for this subject and its going to be great fun watching this painting develop tomorrow.
Ive got people coming from a long way away off tomorrow, Ive spoken to all of them and told them not to worry about being late for class--We understand that when travelling a distance its not always possible to get here exactly on time.
My classes are always easy on and laid back as well as being very imformative.
I dont want anyone getting speeding tickets!As long as I know you are coming the class will wait for your arrival!

Switzerland and beyond




Well ''Cornfield Poppies'' is on its way to Switzerland now and should be with its new owner in around 4 days.
''Desire'' is going to have a lovely home with Nigel and ''Midnight Daisies'' is possibly heading for Malta.
Things have been very busy of late with paintings going all over the world.!!

Keith Norris-Atelier Acrylic Seminar



Well Keith Norris who came over from Australia with his delightful wife and daughter to spread the word about this fantastic new acrylic paint certainly won over the audience.He has helped to develop this new paint-he has a chemist background and also an artist one, so knows what we as artists all need from a paint.
He had us all in stitches with his antedotes about art and the people in the art world, at the same time as explaining how this brilliant new paint works.

The Atelier Interactive Acrylic paint is a new concept in the art world.
There had been nothing new in the art world for donkeys years until this breakthrough,

You can re activate this paint simply by spraying with water-something that wasnt possible before.
It has the same properties as oil paint, it remains workable for a long time enabling the artist to work wet on wet.
There are several mediums available to use with this brilliant new paint, something to help every kind of artist.
I will be able to supply the paint and mediums very shortly at a very good price.
I am waiting for the price list and colour charts from the company.
If you want to know more about the paint please take a look at www.CHROMAONLINE.COM
I have bought lots of new canvas and I cant wait to get started with this new paint.

Seminar at The Shillingford Hotel,Wallingford.




The whole point in our trip away was to attend the new acrylic paint seminar which was held at the Shillinford Hotel, near Wallinsford. We had decided to make it a 3 day trip as it is our wedding anniversary next month and things are so busy next month we wont have chance to get away.
So we decided to combine the 2 things and make it a romantic break along with the seminar!
As you can see,The Shillingford Hotel is set in the most beautiful setting.I have taken lots of photographs to remind us of our time there.

A Busy Week!



We had a lovely drive down to Wallinsford in Oxfordshire On Tuesday morning.We stayed at the 16th century Fleur de Lys Inn in nearby Dorchester On Thames.We had a great time there--the food was second to none -as you can see the lamb shank and the duck breast are to die for!
Ive been and bought some duck breasts for tomorrow nights dinner-just got to try and re-create it again. It had black pudding and bubble and squeak, all with a beautiful plum sauce.Will let you know how that goes!
It was lovely to relax on the day before the seminar, which was the reason of being there in the first place.
Our room (the Abbots Room)had a beautiful bathroom, with a great big bath and power shower, all very tastfully decorated and with all soft white towels.The king size bed was very comfortable and the white bed linen set it off a treat.

Monday, February 25, 2008

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!

Bird Table




Here are some of our regular visitors to our bird table.
The bull finch and his wife arent showing up very well in this pic,we counted 16 siskins on the table and feeder at one time, but wasnt quick enough with the camera to catch them all.
We love watching them from the house, the bull finches are quick to chase off anything else that comes near until they have had their fill!!

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Sunset





As I was helping Bill dish out the roast lamb dinner at around 5pm this evening, I glanced through the kitchen window and saw this beautiful sunset. I couldnt resist grabbing the camera and taking some shots-its amazing how quickly it changes colour, some more inspiration for some paintings when I get time to paint them!
We are popping over to Stafford tomorrow to pick up my friend who is pet/house sitting while we are away this week.
We are off to Oxfordshire to attend a new acrylic paint seminar.
As it is our wedding anniversary shortly we have decided to combine the two things and we are booked into a lovely 16th century Inn for 2 nights. Must say Im really looking forward to spending some quality time with my long suffering hubby Bill!!!
The place we are staying has had some fantastic reviews on both the accomadation and the food-so a real treat in store for us!
Sparky and Paddy are both looking forward to being spoiled rotten while we are away--I swear they both put on weight whenever we go away and leave them!!!

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Oliver's Birthday Party




We had a lovely time today at Olivers birthday party.
We met Oliver a while ago at one of the craft fairs here in Ludlow. He came along to the first oil painting class of the year and is booked in to do the "African Dream" one on March 8th.
All six of the children had great fun using the encaustic irons,wax, and special tools. Their imagination ran riot with all sorts of wonderful things being spotted in the finished pictures.We had polar bears, foxes,dogs, people, fishes--you name it we had it!!
Everyone really enjoyed themselves, and apart from Oliver who had one go at it previously at the craft fair-no one had come accross this unusual way of creating art before!
Oliver was very pleased with his birthday present of a frame big enough to put his big picture into that he created today!