New paintings and regular art updates.
On the pavement outside our garden this little beauty I’d flowering. I think its out of a packet of wild flower seeds that my husband scattered a few months ago. It’s a surprise as the majority of poppy’s we have in the garden are yellow “Welsh” poppies. I love the crinkly way the petals expand. I’m hoping we get a few more soon.
Plants grow towards the light
That’s phototropism!
Etiolation means
Growing long and leggy
Not enough light
Makes them stretch
Darkened room
Not enough light
Plants are clever
They use light to photosynthesise
This poem?
An excuse to use long words!
How do you waste the most time every day?
I curse myself sometimes, because I can spend far too much time blogging and posting to social media.
I do have a purpose, as a part time artist and illustrator I like to keep people informed of what I’ve been doing during the day. So I posted pictures of the life drawing session I went to earlier on today.
I also post little poems, I don’t pretend to be a poet though, if it rhymes that’s a bonus.
Truly though, I ought to give it a break, but is it dopamine hits you get from picking up your phone and seeing you’ve got a like? If social media removed the buttons perhaps they would get less traffic. And that’s what it’s about isn’t it? Keeping people occupied and interested in the next new thing, be it politics or advertising. So then you get the “I’ll just watch one more video” feeling, and by the time you realise its 3.30am in the morning….
So yes, blogging is probably time wasting, it’s also shouting into an echo chamber, you hear yourself, but does anyone else care. As the saying goes “why don’t you just go and do something less boring instead?”….
Hang on, just got a notification, must check my phone…
If you see the face you might be experiencing Pareidolia. It’s one of my favourite things, I love finding faces or animals in or on other objects.
That’s what people did with the stars in the skies… They could see people or creatures and called them constellations. Some constellations are the basis of the signs of the Zodiac. Different civilisations had different myths and legends, so the combinations of stars creating them will be different depending on what part of the world you live in. Even the moon is seen as a boat when it is viewed from the equator and is waxing or waning, because it looks horizontal, not vertical. And what about the man in the moon? A face seen in the moons surface made up of the different craters and seas on it.
I think Pareidolia is really interesting. I read that it helped early people notice animals that might have been camouflaged without that skill. It’s more redundant now. But still there. So if you see faces in wallpaper or bunches of flowers Pareidolia is happening!
On a windowsill in Spode. The plant fits in with the background of a metal window frame and frosted glass. The buildings outside are hidden from view. The old teapot adds to the ancient feel of the image. It just needs a spiders web to make it really spooky.
Life drawing, 30 minute sketch with the Orme Art Group. Felt pen and water colour pencil sketch. Dark blue acrylic paint curtain courtesy Steph from the group. Back to work again in a min!
Trees, that’s our garden, and leaves in the summer. We planted most of this about thirty years ago. There is an Irish yew tree, an old goat willow, holly trees, a sycamore, a walnut tree that must be 60 foot high, cherry trees, apple trees, ash trees, mountain ash, an elderberry tree, eucalyptus tree, two oaks, and a huge laurel bush at one end that is now tree sized.
Why? We were regularly pruning the trees and we plant perennials beneath them like poppies and geraniums and roses, plus a fig tree and wisteria and ivy everywhere. But for several years we didn’t actually own the garden, we rented it. Then the owner wanted to build on it, but we objected because we would have looked out onto a new house and the garden had become a natural place, with a pond and frogs, hedgehogs and the occasional fox. We have bluetits nesting every year and it’s home to house sparrows and other birds too.
Then we were in dispute and the owner would not let us tend the garden for about three years, so it grew wild and wooly. Eventually though, we bought the land, but by then the growth had got a bit out of hand. The land is where two houses used to stand. But we made it green. This is our way of lessening our carbon footprint…. I’m proud of what we grew!
Which food, when you eat it, instantly transports you to childhood?
Christmas and Easter, we always had trifle.
It was a concoction of jelly (strawberry or raspberry) in the base with trifle sponges, hard fingers of dry sugary sponge that swelled up and absorbed the jelly. This made it firm when it set for the next layer. This was always blancmange, not custard. A raspberry, strawberry or chocolate layer made with blancmange powder, sugar and boiled in with a pint of milk. Then the top was double cream whipped to stiff peaks.
Mom used to decorate the top with silver coloured balls and hundreds and thousands (coloured sprinkles), or maybe some tinned peach slices or glacé cherries? When I was young we didn’t have strawberries or raspberries or blackberries in the winter or spring. Fruit was more seasonal than it is now. It was usually grown here, so it just wasn’t available.
Memories like this are great. Whenever I think of comfort food it has to be trifle. Mom’s secret ingredient as we got a bit older was sherry added to the jelly. Nowadays I prefer a small amount of port. I don’t use sponge fingers as they are full of sugar. I use sugar free jelly and sweetner in the blancmange (which is getting hard to source). It’s still full fat cream though. I usually put blueberries in the jelly, unheard of in my childhood days.
Maybe I could try pomegranate seeds in one? I like blackberries, maybe blackcurrants? And I’ve even considered making my own jelly with sheets of gelatine. However I make it, it still brings back good childhood memories.
Cheap, cheerful and quick! Found some pictures of pansies online and rememberd how much I loved them as a kid. So yet another felt pen (cheap and cheerful) sketch. Another #bandofsketchers prompt completed.
It’s hot, and the cats have come into the living room to enjoy the breeze from our oscillating fan. They won’t sit right in front of it but are off to one side so they can feel a bit cooler. I’ve got the back door open for once after dosing myself up with hay-fever spray. Usually the windows and doors stay firmly shut but it’s hot AND humid tonight. It’s rained for a bit so that’s cooled the atmosphere slightly. Meanwhile the cats just decided to mooch off somewhere else xxx
Mallaband-Brown