Holidays, Esther Chilton prompt.

Posted on April 10, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Cinema, Clitheroe, cycling holiday, Esther Chilton prompt, holidays, Memories, minus centigrade, posh, SnowLeave a comment

Holidays, more memories of adventures long gone by. Camping in a tent at Easter thirty years ago.

We’d cycled up to Clitheroe in Lancashire and used our cycle trailer to carry our camping gear.

The holiday started out sunny, but the wind picked up and by the time we had the tent up the snow was blowing sideways at it. I even wrote C 4 R on the snow on the side of the tent.

We went off for a cycle into town and stopped off at a tiny cinema. It was very posh, there were photos of the Queen in the ladies loo! I remember we got a bit of warmth while watching the cat from outer space.

We had dinner at the local pub and cycled back to the tent afterwards. Luckily it was downhill but we were slipping around on the falling snow. We ended up putting on extra clothes, three jumpers and an extra pair of trousers each. We found out in the morning it had been minus 11°C.

The rest of the week was almost as cold and we cycled back in deep snow!

Possible painting?

Posted on April 7, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Age, Buddlea, Cold, Erosion, History, Life, Memories, Ruins, spode works, Thinking, Time, WindowLeave a comment

There’s something fascinating about the old windows at Spode Works. I took this photo this week in my friend Amy’s studio. It looks out over the back of the ceramic halls that front onto Kingsway in Stoke. The dirt and grime is from the clay dust that still covers much of the site. The buildings are freezing in winter and stay cool in the summer, I think because of the thermal mass of the solid factory.

Time is gradually eroding and changing the structure of the buildings. Buddlea bushes have colonised one of the older parts of the factory and I wonder if they will make it crumble. It will feel strange not to go there anymore.

For Esther Chiltons’ prompt “Lost”

Posted on April 4, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Blank verse, Esther Chilton blog, Lost, Memories, Poem, Poetry, Prompt, Thought, Writing challenge4 Comments

I lost him in December.

Since then my heart has been empty.

Now I’m alone, the universe seems cold.

Like Pandoras box, but with hope gone?

I have to carry on,

But it won’t be the same,

I’ve lost him, lost his name.

Lost my heart and soul.

Gone.

April fools day

Posted on April 1, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Fun, Funny, Humbolt Penguins, Leek, Memories, Peak Wildlife Park, Penguins, programmes, Staffordshire, TV, Winkhill3 Comments

The Peak Wildlife Park posted a prank on Facebook today. It reported that some of their Humbolt Penguins had taken flight today and if anyone saw one or found them in their garden they should report it to the park (to check their migratory habits?).

Of course Penguins don’t fly, (and they don’t migrate either as far as I know, but I added that bit), so it was obviously an April Fools joke, but it’s nice and gentle, not rude or unkind. I remember an old one on TV when they reported that the spaghetti trees were being harvested and another one on a children’s TV programme about dehydrated water!

I haven’t seen many jokes today but I liked one about flat pack Easter eggs from IKEA, (chocolate bars), may your April Fools day be fun!

Peak Wildlife Park is at Winkhill, Leek ST13 7QR, UK. Details can be found on Google.

Fears

Posted on March 29, 2024March 29, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Anxiety, Fears, Insomnia, Life, Memories, OK, Sadness, slack, Thinking, Time, Tired, Upset, WorldLeave a comment

Today is a hiding day. Lots of thoughts and fears roaming around the inside of my head. I need to get things done but I don’t feel like doing them. I’m going to give myself some slack, just a few hours to feel safe.

Yesterday I was more optimistic, I got some things done I’d been putting off. I’ve even started my gratitude book again. And later I will go out as the cats won’t have anything to eat if I don’t. But yesterday afternoon something happened that put everything into another perspective. And I just froze. I’m only hinting, I’m not going to say, and I think I will be OK, it was something mental not physical. I’m OK. I will be OK.

Cadmium colours

Posted on March 28, 2024March 28, 2024 Posted in Fine Art, Memories, UncategorizedTagged analytical chemistry, Art, Cadmium, coffee jars, Fine Art, Memories, Paint, Pigments4 Comments

Back in the eighties hubby brought a whole load of cadmium colours back from the company where he was doing chemical analysis. I had about eight coffee jars full of cadmium ranging from pale yellow to red to deep maroon. But I didn’t know how to mix them, it was before Google and I had them on a shelf for a year. I also knew Cadmium is a heavy metal although these colours were pigments so hopefully they were safe.

Then a fellow art student asked about them. I agreed to give them to her. I know she used them in many paintings! I often wonder if she used them all, I haven’t seen her for forty years.

An artist!

Posted on March 28, 2024 Posted in Memories, Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, Artist, Childhood, Colouring, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1891, Drawing, Etch-a-sketch, Figures, Life, Memories, PaintingLeave a comment

When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Give me crayons, give me colouring books. Books with paper covered in dots that you wet with a paintbrush and colours emerge.. Dot to dot books, pages with squares on that I could turn into patterns. I might have been a bit older than five for some of these, but I always wanted art things for my birthday or Christmas. I must have heard of artists because I always wanted to be one. I got an etch-a-sketch machine to draw with, I loved that.

My sister wanted to be a musician, she eventually borrowed a violin from school. I got jealous because my parents said I was doing art and they couldn’t let me have a musical instrument, so I overtightened the strings on the violin and they snapped ( bad/very guilty memory!)…

Now? I’ve been an artist all my life. I started drawing when I was a child such as historical people in tudor dress, Asterix the Gaul, horses, clouds, all sorts of things. I still do that, anything is interesting to me.

Gratitude book

Posted on March 15, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1878, gratitude, Life, Memories, Poem, Poetry, Sadness, Thoughts4 Comments

What strategies do you use to cope with negative feelings?

My gratitude book it is blank

I feel like I’ve nothing to thank

Thinking all things are bad

When there is some good

But I keep on getting so sad…

I may try and fill in the blank

Pages with three thoughts a day

But it’s been so hard

To find the right way

I really don’t know what to say.

Words and drawings

For over a year

I collected my

Thoughts so dear

But then in December

Bad things I remember

Made me give up

On any small cheer.

I’ll start again one day

If my troubles do go away

My mind is in rubble

With no happy bubble

I hope that’s not how I will stay.

I don’t have one

Posted on February 29, 2024 Posted in Fine Art, Memories, UncategorizedTagged Art, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1863, Hubby, job, Life, Memories, Painting, Sadness, Studio, Time2 Comments

Do you enjoy your job?

I gave up work to look after my hubby and try and set up as an artist. Sadly circumstances mean that he is no longer here and I don’t have the possibility of keeping my artists studio.

I won’t stop painting though, creativity is my reason for living. Despite health issues I cannot give it up. So I suppose really I do have a job, but it’s very much part time. I will still accept commissions and do my best to produce quality art work. I hope I continue long into the future, drawing on these recent events to produce new art.

Singing cheers me up

Posted on February 27, 2024 Posted in Memories, UncategorizedTagged Choir, Languages, Learning, Memories, Mental health, Music, sheet music, Singing, socialising, TimeLeave a comment

I was at choir practice yesterday and today. It cheered me up. I have to say I feel much better when I do go. I believe it helps to release endorphins in your brain? I know that when I’m feeling really down it helps so much. I would suggest if you can join a choir do it! A lot of choirs don’t have auditions, and are taught be repetition of the musical phrases rather than using sheet music. That’s how we are taught, the choir master sings a line and we repeat it. Gradually building up the song. We sometimes have the words printed off phonetically. We’ve learnt French, Zulu, Maori, Spanish, Bulgarian and many other languages learning that way.

I know this is a bit random, but I think its a great way af helping your mental health and also a good way of socialising.

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Memories