Having fun with cheap pens

Another fun scribble with some very cheap coloured pens I bought. Alisa Burke had done something similar on her blog and I wondered how I would go doing this. It is fun, bright and calming to play with.
I need a few bright colours at the moment, it has suddenly got quite cold and grey and overcast. Not a lot of rain for us unfortunately up north it has been flooding, down here we need more.
I am slowly doing a few household tasks (boring but necessary, dishes, washing, bed making, floor sweeping!) but in the middle of it my computer screen wouldnt work so I spent time fiddling with that and also the colour on the screen has gone very pale so I had to get John to try and fix that.
In the midst of this I cant find a book I want to work on and I have a sneaking suspicion that perhaps I have too much 'stuff'!.

Home from Halls Gap

Very tired but had a lovely time, we drove over on Friday, called into see a lovely basket exhibition at the Arrarat Gallery and then took the back road through to Halls Gap, arrived about 4 ish having left home at 7.30, our apartment was great, then off to the first night briefing and meal. We were home pretty early!
Very hot on Saturday, my class with Keith Lo Bue was really good, but pretty full on, we used steel wire to make our jewellery connections. It was fun and the girls in the class were great. Another night out for the sales and another quick meal.
P had a full day, wandering in my car and swimming in the pool.
Sunday was hot and humid and got worse as the day wore on and thunderstorms hit, again the class was very intensive but fun. We had to pack up and set up what we had done in the Hall which got hotter and more humid as the afternoon wore on, then just as I was leaving the heavens opened and it teemed with rain and thunder boomed.
The top painting was done on Sunday morning as I sat outside and had breakfast, I have never seen so many kangaroos as in that area, lots of lovely little birds as well.
Another opening that evening and I staggered home to a sandwich for dinner. We packed up early the next morning and went wandering, first through the fog over the Grampians to the other side and the Wakool valley, through to Horsham and then dived off again and went to look at Mt Arapiles, the best climbing area in the southern hemisphere I was told, through the little desert national park to Nhill and then on the main highway home, getting caught up in road works again.
A lovely few days but boy am I tired today, I have unpacked and washed and done a few things but not really all I should.
The bottom play was sitting in the chair fiddling with flower shapes and colour and adding black to make it pop a bit,.
Off to walk Max who was so pleased to see me it was almost embarrassing as John had done his best to look after him.
Photos etc on my other blog here.

HM Bark Endeavour

Today I sat and sketched bits of the Endeavour, a replica of Cook's ship that circumnavigated the world and put Australia on the map. I last saw her in Whitby when we were there a few years ago. Incredible, she is now almost around Australia. Her home port is Sydney.
It was a beautiful day and I just sat and looked and sketched odd bits that probably dont look much to any one else but were bits of rigging and cleats and the flag and the wheel that caught my eye and I could see though the crowds of school children and their teachers, actually I think the teachers were more enthralled than the children.
A bit more on this and photos on my other blog here.

two more cottages, blogger complaint.

Two more old cottages to add to my accordion book. I seem to have made the 2nd one rather crooked, blame my odd eyes and the arthritis.
I am slowly finding more fairly typical ones to add to it all, slowly is the operative word.
It is warm and steamy today and as J is fishing I am trying to get some housework done, but my toe is now sore so the vacuuming will have to wait until tomorrow.
Friends dropped some fruit in for me this morning so it was an excuse to bring out freshly baked biscuits and some tea and coffee. I felt terribly virtuous, and there is also enough of the fishy lasagna left from last nights dinner to just add a salad and dinner is organised.
We very rarely eat the fish that is caught today as it is better left for a day and any way I dont know if they have any.
tomorrow I will be stewing more fruit to freeze. It looks as if we may not have to buy much for breakfast for most of the year.
I am enjoying being a frugal house wife!
Oh and blogger in its stupid wisdom seems to have altered how you put up comments, two to get right and with my odd eysight I dont very often get them right and I cant hear the ones they speak, I have had a go at turning my comment words off so I will see if it works. Why do they have to keep changing things that in my opinion are so far not better. Probably alright for the bright young things but for the older bloggers if it worked well before why change it. Or am I getting a grumpy old woman!

Layering a background

It is several days since I sae the Anne Babgby video on how to do this and I have forgotten some of it but this was fun any way. I did manage to tear a bit of the tissue paper, but this really was to try and reenforce what I thought I had seen.
I found a heap of metal washers and glued them onto a piece of wood, then I inked up a piece of old lego flooring and in looking for that found half an old hand clapper which I also inked up.
Tried things on both sides of the paper and left some holes to see what it looked like.
Dearly wanted to try combing it but that was when i managed to put a hole in the paper.
This is another of my trial pieces, I have lots of those, but it was fun and I need to play some more.

Sketches for a new accordion book

I have decided to try and sketch what remains of some of the old buildings in the towns around me. So many are going and it is very sad.
These are very typical of older style buildings in Australian towns, well South Australian but you will find variations all over Australia.
Here we had very lttle timber so mostly they were built of stone, the Willunga one had a slate roof and probably a slate floor as there was a good slate mine at Willunga.
This project is slow, actually all my projects except the photos on my other blog are slow.
I seem to have slowed down a lot and it is annoying me. I know I am I supposed to be 'elderly' but dont want to admit it.
This morning I finally got to get my feet into the sea and walk the sands bare foot. The toe hasnt completely healed but this is part of the 'therapy'! It made me feel good, oh so good. I havent been able to do this since the end of last October.

Filling in time - and help

A few sketches made yeaterday while I was waiting for J to collect me in Adelaide. I had seen a painting in progress done by a friend and sat and thought about what she was doing, her painting is lovely but it was the components that had caught my feeble attempts at remembering it. Started with a seed that was orange and black and went from there.
The second one was of dandelions and grass seed heads, a lot of which are around at home at the moment, I love the shape of them but again I know I havent caught them at all well.
Now for the Help bit, I am trying to access some sticky back (adhesive on the back) fun or funky foam. I am having absolutely no luck in finding it here in Australia and the places that have it cheaply in either the US or UK dont seem to send it overseas. I wondered if some lovely person could get me some, or I could get it using your address and some how we do a swap to get the postage to me.
I have a friend in the USA at the moment but cant contact her!!
Just a thought but otherwise I will keep on trying to get some, some how. If any one in OZ knows of any where I can get it I would be forever grateful.
If all else fails I may have to work out what adhesive I can use to glue it.

A new stamp carved

I am never quite sure where to put these, in this blog or my other one.
I decided that today it will be here. I have been meaning to carve a few more stamps. this very Japanese style tree has been waiting for me to sketch it up and then carve it out. I also put it on some fabric.
A lovely day today, rain overnight and then some wind, two walks (on my other blog here) and a visit to see Millie.
It is warming up a bit, I have had to re do my clothing as tonights short walk with Max saw the sun come out and there is plenty of strength in that.
I have also rather belatedly joined Mary Ann Moss's on line class Remains of the Day, a fun book with all the remainders of ones life. I will take it slowly but am already gathering 'stuff'. She has a blog called Dispatch from LA and it is here (I hope!~).
I know I need another project like a hole in the head but... this looked like me.
Looks like a full week end, a granddaughters birthday tomorrow and a bbq, John is going fishing and oldest son had a birthday yesterday.
Hope you all have a fun filled week end.

My small accordion book

This as they say is a prototype!
Not terribly well done, but then it is not supposed to look professional, but I am very pleased with it in a silly sort of way.
I cut out some paper shapes, a fish skeleton, a weedy bit and a sort of shell. First they were laid on the watercolour paper and I used a brayer of black acrylic paint over the cut out, then prized the cut out off and turned it over and using the brayer again used that as another shape and finally prized the cut out off, not without it falling apart! and glued it to the page.
I found some stamps, a set I havent used before and discovered that the N is glued on incorrectly after I tried to use it! Oh well, it was a fun thing to do and maybe I will make some more. As you can see I should use a better place than the ironing board in the bedroom to take photos!
I am having a slow day today, after yesterdays excitement I needed to take things quietly so have been reading, enjoying re reading The Shell Seakers, with a few bits of house work in between.
Still cool and a bit damp, but I know it will heat up again soon.

After lunch

Just a few collaged photos of our lunch and where we were at the Flying fish Pt Elliot.
Great lunch and thank you to every one who sent good wishes.

Wedding anniversary

This is almost a reapeat from my other blog.
53 years! We look so young, and somehow against all odds we are still together and still enjoying each other.
Off to a nice lunch by the sea.

Celebrations

This was the center piece for the table we were at on Thursday night to celebrate the 100 years of the business one of our fishing friends is part of.
A lovely night, bit tiring but fun although we were of the older generation and most of the guests were of the younger by far.
Good food wonderful wine and good company.
Even the speeches were fun.
Last night we had rain, not a huge amount and again unfortunately there have been pretty strong winds, but at least some has gone into the rain water tanks and I always think that rain does so much more for the garden than dam water.
John has been out in it trying to make sure every drop goes into those tanks.
This is the first decent rain since December, and even then we only had one big rain and there has not been a lot since October where we are falling behind the averages again. John is an official rain recorder for the Bureau of Meteorology.
We had a lovely morning, went over to Goolwa and had a coffee at the beach ( see my other blog here) and then visited some exhibitions. Once more I poured over the lovely books I saw a week or so ago and I am now actually constructing some.
Just need to get all the other stuff I want to get done finished and then I will begin (I hope).
I hope every one in those cold areas of Europe and the Uk are surviving, it doesnt look much like fun in some areas.