I broke the oven?

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When I got in from choir last night my hubby was standing in the kitchen looking perplexed. He had some bread dough in a tin because he’d decided to make a loaf. He had attempted to light the oven but it would not light. It’s a double oven with a small oven/grill at the top and a main oven. He was convinced we would have to contact the shop we got it from or get hold of a repair service. I said let me have a look…

What I saw was an egg timer symbol and another one of a casserole dish. I tried pressing the ignition. Nothing happened. I looked again at the clock display. It was several hours out? Something was clearly wrong. I asked him if he had pushed any buttons? Yes to set the timer. I looked again and realised there must be a delayed start on the main oven as it showed a casserole dish shape with a little clock face on it. I dialled that down to zero, and the egg timer down to zero. Then I tried the ignition again… It lit! I checked why the top oven was blowing out hot air… He had the grill on with the door closed and he had thought the heat had been from the main oven, so he didn’t understand why the bread hadn’t started to cook. Finally he put the dough back in the oven. The resulting loaf (which is nice and tasty) is in the photo…

THUD! Patter, patter, patter……

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On my kitchen roof

Bouncing around,

Pesky magpies and pigeons.

I like them,

Don’t get me wrong,

But just as I’m about to

Pour a coffee

THUD patter patter,

Or get the bread out of the oven…

THUD patter patter

Delicately lining up some icing

THUD! Patter…. Patter!

Do you have to?

You make me jump…

THUD!

Words

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Do you find yourself thinking of a word that just pops into your mind? I thought of a few today. Gestalt, Normality and Defunct all jumped into my head today.

Another day it could be crumble, grunge or fanciful, which is probably what this is.

I think I need sleep when I can dream of words chasing each other through the sky and over hills. Trundling into the sunset where they burst into brilliant petals.

Words are fun, they need using or abusing, but they definitely can make life interesting, exuberant and startling!

Papier-mache pot

In the play we are doing this weekend my partner has to pretend to throw a pot on a wheel. We don’t want anything big, heavy or breakable, so I’m Papier-macheing a black plastic flowerpot. I had to buy some pva glue but only wanted just enough, not a great big tub or a tiny bottle. So instead of the adult craft section I found a bottle of clear pva in the children’s section at a craft shop.

Got home and started ripping up newspaper. This is many layers later, I’ve added a few layers about two thirds up to give it a slight bulge. When it’s dry I will paint it white as a base coat then a pale brown “clay” colour with shading to make it look hand thrown. I’m hoping it will look reasonably realistic.

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When I was forty

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I did this self portrait. I don’t do many and haven’t done one recently. Maybe I should. At this time I had the front bedroom as a studio, until we got too much stuff and I moved my painting stuff out. My tee shirt was a recycling one but I haven’t seen it for years. I’m not sure what I think about this, but it’s another Facebook memory. It’s a bit blurred. I still have the original upstairs, will have to find it out.. Almost twenty years later.

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Mystery Music

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Where would the mystery play be without the music. This year as always provided by the brilliant Boatband and Clay Chorus choir.

I don’t want to give away the music or plot too much. But the singing covers dramatic action in the play. I know Clay have been learning the songs for a couple of months now and there are some poignant pieces to illustrate the conditions in the first half of the nineteenth century. We don’t realise just how much things have improved for both adults and children.

I think the audience are in for a treat this year if we all keep our cool and get it right.

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Last year’s scenery

FB_IMG_1562490907053this is the scenery I painted last year. Two eight by four boards attached together to make an eight foot square panel.

In some ways painting on calico is more difficult because of the way the paint sits on it. However at least I’m not struggling to line up the two sections. I do love doing this. It makes my year.

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Kaleidoscopic

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I like this word, kaleidoscopic, I can’t always spell it but it’s something I remember as a child’s toy. A tube you rotate and glass or plastic pieces fall in an enclosed end of the tube so that when you look through the eyepiece they change patterns. The inside of the rest of the tube has mirrors along the length of it so the image is split into sections like a sliced up pie.

It’s difficult to try and explain exactly how it works without taking one apart but you get beautiful patterns similar to the image above (this is just some patterned cloth).