Christmas craft fair

Better late than never, a quick hello to let you know I'll be at the craft fair at the waterfront tomorrow morning, sharing a stall with my good friend Ingrid. I think there'll be over 80 stalls all local arts and crafts, I can't wait to see what everybody has been making. It's going to be hot so it'll be an earlier start and finish than usual 9 til 1 (instead of 10 til 2).

Here are some of the happiness flags I've been working on.

A friend of a friend has a gorgeous blog of daily photos of the sky! She recently did her 2000th post and had a celebration on facebook where she invited everyone to post a photo of the sky where they were, here's my shot.

Enjoy your weekend :)

Hello May!

Better late than never, here is the 2nd painting I did for the Don Whyte 'Offcuts"show - which I blogged about last time.

So April flew past and May is going the same way. I'm working towards a group show that opens on the 5th June, I'll keep the finished work under wraps for now, but here are some of my drawings working out ideas.

As always I've been finding it hard to knuckle down and get things finished, so I'm hoping a few things will come together at the last minute!!

The dry season is here with beautiful cool nights - I planted some tomato seedlings about a month ago and they're on the verge of flowering...

My oldest son is in year 12 at school, I feel him flexing his wings, about to launch into adulthood, imagining possibilities beyond 'boring Darwin'. (Wherever you grew up seems boring I suppose!) During poetry month I got a Sharon Olds poem "High School Senior" in my inbox, which expresses beautifully some of what I'm feeling.

I've been reading, reading, reading. Favorite reads of the year so far are -
A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler
Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O'Farrell - (just finished last night and loved it)
Also recommended -
We are all completely beside ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton
I'd love to hear what you've been reading.

This Sunday I'll be at the waterfront craft fair, do drop by and say hello.

Crazy weekend

I've survived a crazy weekend, lots of choir rehearsals last week and a lovely performance on Saturday night (Darwin Chorale at the CDU theatre) followed by a craft fair at the waterfront yesterday. That was the really crazy bit, it's the build up here, temperatures up around 35 degrees centigrade, humid but no sign of rain - the craft fair became something of an endurance test. I'm amazed and grateful that so many people risked heatstroke to come out and buy their Christmas presents!! It's lovely to have the ambiance of an outdoor event by the sea, but sometimes I think an airconditioned venue would make more sense. I was so hot and grumpy I didn't even go for a stroll around the other stalls...

The last couple of months have been busy, not only with choir and craft fair preparations but with a commission - a lady who bought some of my prints many years ago and then moved away from Darwin, tracked me down online and requested some ginger cat paintings. Luckily this is a subject I was happy to tackle as I have a ginger cat who turns up in my paintings now and again! Here are the three paintings which I sent down south a couple of weeks ago.

Today I've got the day off work to catch up on exciting things like cleaning the bathroom!! and baking cookies and apple crumble for my neglected family!

Hope you had a great weekend, and hope we get some rain soon :)

Saying it with every colour!

Here are the finished birds that I started back in July, they'll be on my stall at the craft fair this Sunday at the Darwin waterfront.

Also on my table is this doll in progress (the 3rd one for an exhib coming up in Oct), in some way it feels like drawing, cutting out the fabric is just drawing a line, and the same with the embroidery, a row of stitches is another way of drawing. They also remind me of paper dolls that can be decorated a hundred ways...

Last week was my birthday and I just had to share this creation made by my daughter...

I know the boys love me too, but it's so lovely to have one who expresses it in every colour and texture she can lay her hands on!

I hope your week is going well, come and say hello if you can on Sunday.