Stoke Sings choir festival.

Posted on January 25, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Cheshire, Choir, Choirs, Fun, Life, Music, Singing, Songs, Staffordshire, Stoke sings, Stoke-on trentLeave a comment

Sixteen Choirs, including the Deaf links Choir and the Intertheatre choir got together in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent today at the Victoria Hall. The reason? It was a splendid Choir festival for choirs around Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire and Cheshire.

Workshops on sea shanties, music from the shows. Gospel singing and African music were some of the wonderful things we learnt. The teachers were so enthusiastic and so we’re we as pupils. Then later we learnt a new song to sing at the Finale.

There was a concert in the evening when all the choirs performed. An eclectic mix of Bond themes, a song from sister act, old songs by Robbie Burns because it is Burns night tonight. Lots of beautiful melodies and friendly people. Finally we sang auld land syne and said farewells to new friends. A grand day out.

Sea and Sky

Posted on January 23, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Coast, Duplicated, Fun, groynes, Life, Mirrored, Photo, Sea, Sky, Water2 Comments

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Surreal image of sea and sky. I choose things that will make a good picture when they are duplicated and put together in a pattern. The waves were breaking in the distance and the sand was thinly covered with a film of water. The groynes are wearing out but still stop the sand drifting. I like the triangles on poles at either end of them (only one in the original photo) I think this makes a plesant composition…

I’m not saying…

Posted on January 22, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Bad rhyme, Fun, Green and pink?, Humour, Layout app, Photo, Playing with words, Poem, Poetry, Silly poem, Strange imageLeave a comment

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I’m not saying what you are,

A great green mop of fur.

Reflected vegetation?

I’m not sure what you are.

Troublesome alien,

Grass or reeds?

Still not sure what you are.

Pink and green,

Flower and leaf?

You are what you are..

A duster..

Who knows?

My old cat

Posted on January 22, 2020 Posted in Cat, UncategorizedTagged Art, Cat, Fun, Garden Wall, Gate, Jump, Leaping, Oil on canvas, Old friend, Photo6 Comments

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Sorry for the bad photo of this, but this was my old cat. She was on the big painting I posted a few days ago. She was very clever and if I tapped the wall on the other side of the gate she would jump the gap. I decided to take a photo on an old 35mm Olympus trip camera (this was before digital). She jumped on cue and I snapped the photo. When I saw it I decided to paint it. I won a small prize in a local art exhibition.

Shades of green

Posted on January 22, 2020January 22, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged 64 million artists challenge, Art, Colour, Design, Fun, Green, Layout app, Montage, photo montage, Photos, PlantsLeave a comment

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Today’s challenge on the 64 million artists January challenge on Facebook was to take a journey through your home or garden or to take a walk and collect images of a colour. Because I’ve got a lot of plants and other objects that are green I decided to choose that colour. Including crocheted blanket from my sis, a book on trains, a box for a toy train, a multicolour duster (green section). A late I designed based on clarice cliffs’ pottery, a little sketchbook, Christmas cactus, some plants I’m growing on for spring, ferns and a green bottle, my cat and the garden outside, the border round some photos, finally the ariel roots of my orchid…..

Remembering Georges

Posted on January 21, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Devon, Dolphin, Fun, Life, Memory, SwimmingLeave a comment

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I met a wild dolphin when I was on holiday in Devon once. It swam into the bay and lots of people were watching it in the shallows and about fifty yards out ( they were wearing wetsuits) I got in fully clothed except for my shoes and glasses and swam about midway between the two groups. I wasn’t going to miss the opportunity. Soon the dolphin was swimming around me. I noticed he was male (later found out he was called Georges, an adolescent male). Goodness knows what he thought I was! The next day there was a notice put up saying not to swim near him as you can catch diseases when they breathe out droplets of water, luckily I was fine. I remember he was badly scored along his sides. Apparently he was too interested in motor boats. I still think of him and hope he was OK. I did a painting of him but can’t find it.

More trees

Posted on January 20, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Design, Digital drawings, Experiment, Fun, Playing, SketchLeave a comment

IMG_20200120_193348_455 IMG_20200120_193440_105 IMG_20200120_193418_085 I’m sitting here working with my digital drawings because my hip is still playing up so I’m missing choir practice. My hubby is just making a loaf and I’m going to bake some potatoes later so the house warms up.

Once you have done a drawing you don’t have to stick with that image, you can alter the hue, change positive to negative and find the edges of the image. Experiment is good. X

Read through this cat!

Posted on January 19, 2020 Posted in Cat, UncategorizedTagged Art, Blogging, Cat, Cats sleeping, Curled up, Fun, Newspaper, Paper, Sleep, Tired6 Comments

Is your cat asleep on your Sunday paper? Snuggled up and warm? How can I possibly move him…. Two hours… Four hours.. Finally he went off for some food an I got the chance to read the paper.

I think cats can sleep up to 16 hours a day? well I might be wrong. Mine usually find the warmest spot and snooze. Sometimes when they are dreaming they twitch. That’s interesting to watch, whiskers and paws moving rapidly. Tail flicking. Ears moving. What interesting dreams they must have….

Cats are beautiful to paint, they are sleek and lithe. They make interesting shapes and are graceful. As you can tell I’m a fan.

Listening to the Radio.

Posted on January 13, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged BBC sounds app, Blogging, Comedy, Fun, Humour, Life, Listening, Radio, Radio 4, The unbelievable truthLeave a comment

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I don’t do this often enough, but it is good to listen while I’m painting, ( not doing it at the moment). I’m just listening to ‘ the unbelievable truth’ a comedy programme on BBC radio four. It is about people telling a story full of lies about a subject while trying to sneak four truths past the other members of the panel. The winner is the one who spots the most truths.

It’s very very funny. You might be able to find it on the BBC Sounds app….

Can you see the face?

Posted on January 12, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Clown, Face, Food, Fun, Humour, Life, Pasty, sauce, TeaLeave a comment

I am doing it again, I can see a crying clown!? On my tea which I’d a cornish pasty. (a pastry case filled with minced lamb, sliced potato and swede or turnip) the proper ones have much thicker pastry and are crimped along the top so they look like a bag with a curved, arching top. They are originally from Cornwall although Devon, the next door county also claims to have made them originally.

We had them for tea with a cup of coffee. The sauce is HP brown sauce. Slightly spicy, and the pasties have quite a bit of pepper too.

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Fun