New paintings and regular art updates.
Cat playing with toy mouse. He pounced on it when he came in from the garden. It’s good to see him happy, belly up. He snuck in past my other boy cat and grabbed it before the other one saw it. He’s throwing it around now.
I usually get the cats catnip toys a couple of times a year. I have a box full of old toys that they still sometimes play with. Cats are funny creatures, they make me laugh when they fling toys about. But I’d rather they play with toys than real animals. X
I found a toy eyeball ball, a very bouncy ball that I must have bought years ago. I jazzed it up with a few gold stripes on its iris. Then I put it on top of my sequined makeup bag… I tried various filters to bring out the details. That’s the second photo. Again it’s just me playing with images to make something slightly spooky this time.
Who remembers these? I loved mine and by twirling both buttons together I found I could draw curves! I used to draw mazes. I remember turning it over and the shake of the silver dust as it covered the trace of your sketch. Also the twanging of what might have been elastic bands moving a stylus? Against the screen. It was just a tiny dot. A bit like a computer cursor! I’d love to get one again!
We went to a coffee morning today and a new friend from the group had a smartly dressed bear with her. I had taken my sketchpad so I decided to draw it.
Took about fifteen minutes to draw. Black ink fine line pen. Tomorrow I might try and do some actual painting!
She still plays, she’s got a little fatter, I think it’s lockdown ‘spread’, I probably give the cats too many treats. When you are in a lot of the time and they ask for food, it’s easy to be lax about portion sizes. Plus the house is warm and so are the cats so they are not expending much energy. Still all three get on and seem happy. X
Outdoor cat is in again. In fact he’s been in three times today. Mainly to avoid the noise of fireworks 🎇 going off.
He will sit on the settee for an hour then mooch back off to the backdoor, to be let out. He’s also eating in the kitchen now. In the past he was eating in the shed, then by the back door. Eventually he started eating inside the back door with the door open… Now, inside. Next thing I want to do is get him a strong flea collar. He’s worn collars in the past so it should be OK.
Tonight there is more progress, he actually played with a cat toy for a few minutes, then came over to be petted by both of us and purred loudly. I’m glad he’s ‘playing nicely’ he’s twice the size of my other cats. I want no squabbles. So I’ll stay up till he wants out again, just to ensure my other two are OK.
It’s not often that you find a cycling scalextric set for sale for a tenner, and it works. From a local charity shop. After a bit of messing about with the pickups underneath the model cyclists, we were flying round the velodrome, racing round the backed curves and barging each other in the little built in narrow sections. I flew off into the crowd and hubby fell off sideways onto the blue track around the base of the racing surface. It was fun, I actually smiled! Plus the cat found it interesting, her head was going side to side as she watched the toy cyclists.
It bought back memories of Sir Chris Hoy at the London Olympics, and all the different sorts of races cyclists do, devil take the hind most, different numbers of laps, pursuit and other races, (OK I cant remember the names). They race fixed gear bikes with no brakes on banked track. I had a go once. I could not get onto the banking on my old steel bike. I was much happier watching the races!
Clackers.. Two balls on a string you waved up and down, with a little ring in the middle. They were meant to bounce off each other top and bottom. Many a broken finger….
Made of hard plastic, some luminous green, other colours too. I remember them being quite heavy. The cord holding them together was made of nylon. The string was tied round the ring at the halfway point. You moved your arm up and down fast, the balls would be sent flying and bounce at the top and bottom of their arc, making the characteristic ‘clacking’ noise. Hence the name.
As with other toys from the 70’s I doubt they would have been approved by health and safety now!
Mallaband-Brown