It’s my office wall. One I’ve recently let myself loose with washi tape on, so it’s expanding. Organically. A bit like everything else in this house.

Those two framed pics at the top are by one of my absolutely favourite artists, Gennine. And the Hydrangea is by the incredibly talented Allison Langton – you will have seen her work in Home Beautiful and she does stacks of other wonderful things.

The postcards on the left are from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. They remind me to be free. As do the Lainie’s Ladies hanging in the middle there.

I really really love these little snippets of children’s artwork being nice and close to this letter that my Grandmother wrote me in January 1998. She was a generous letter writer and this is some special paper that I had given her and that I know she would have loved to write on and send back to me. It reminds me to write more letters. They’re important.

There are lots of other interesting walls being revealed this week at Vic’s. Pop on by and have  a squiz for yourself!

I have stocked Golden Paints for years now, but somehow (yeah, right) a couple of babies happened and my lovely Golden has stayed in my studio, being used by me and sporadically by others, but not often being paraded in front of the world.

Well, that’s all going to change. Can you believe that pic above is all the colours you can make with just 3 bottles of Golden Fluid Acrylics? Gorgeous, huh?

Nancy demonstrated lots of the things I had ideas that you could do with Golden, but hadn’t actually seen in the flesh. These Digital Grounds make printing onto all sorts of substrates possible. I’ll let you know when I have them in stock. My mind is exploding with the possibilities, and with ways to incorporate these techniques and methods into future Paint Alongs.

These are some ‘skins’ I’m making that will be incorporated into future projects… I’m stepping outside of my comfort zone and you saw it here first!

These are the sensational Golden Fluids that I have in stock right now

… and these are some Golden products that I will also be stocking very soon – if you’re a visual artist of any sort (painting, fabric, printing, sculpture) these products can help you lift your work from good to great. I saw it happen yesterday. And I’m going to do it myself today.

Thank you Nancy for all your advice and inspiration. And now, dear readers, watch this space because there’s stacks of great stuff to learn – and I’m inviting you along. If there’s anything in particular about acrylic paints that you’d like to find out about, just let me know.

It’s going to be great!

I get a bit stressed when my nice art and craft things get wrecked. And it seems to happen every day at the moment. At least they couldn’t totally destroy these stamps, and I have to admit that they actually look pretty groovy in this pic…. but before today’s session, they were cared for and pristine.

We ended up with a light garland (you don’t see shots like this in Home Beautiful – and I cleaned the glass to take this pic)…

… and a door garland (I also de-cobwebbed the door)…

… and a bunch of cards…

..which were carefully constructed…

…although two members of the family won’t have a chocolate heart on theirs tomorrow morning, thanks to a certain 2 year old…

I hope you have a LOVELY day!

I now know for sure that with 4 people in the class we can definitely get to the varnish step by the 2.5 hour mark, and that with more people, we’d be looking at 3 hours at least.

So thank you to my very enthusiastic painters so far – I’ve had a ball and it’s been lovely to watch those hearts fly out the door.

In a nutshell, this is what we do at a Paint Along-

Just quite a bit slower and with more interesting conversation and maybe a drink or two.

There are two more sessions on this subject still to go, and in the meantime I’m designing next month’s butterfly painting. And that’s the fun for today. Tomorrow better be good too (it’s my birthday!).

The lovely Curlypops and I have unveiled our latest collaboration – iPad sleeves – my art, her superior sewing skills. They fit your iPad 2 in style, even if it’s already got one of those folding cover thingys. Available now, right here.

Loving my new TO DO app – TeuxDeux – on the computer and my iPhone. It carries over all the things from yesterday that didn’t get crossed off, and there’s also a “Someday” section for those miscellaneous things. Plus it LOOKS beautiful and is clear and easy to use. But I am finding I have to add things like “Clean bathroom” and “Bake quiche for school lunches” so I have things to cross off at the end of the day. Honestly, their FAQ page is worth the read alone!

I’ve been clapping from the sidelines as my son’s little business, The Blackboard Boy, has taken off! He’s learning so much about the manual art of actually making the speechbubble blackboards he’s selling, as well as all the business, marketing, facebook, and costing lessons that go along with running a business, and it’s fantastic. He’s got about 280 likers now on his facebook fan page, and we’ve been down to the post office to send parcels off three times this week. It’s really exciting!

Also loving Words with Friends (another iPhone app) although am a little concerned about the addictiveness of this activity. While I have been SOUNDLY BEATEN by those who have been previously keeping their scrabble-ability close to their chests, I am RIDICULOUSLY PROUD of a recent 99 pointer  - JUDO – on triple letter (J) and triple word score. Just had to photograph the evidence in case my cousin, Jack, doesn’t tell enough people. It’s a bit hard to see (which I will admit) but it’s right up the top there (crossing ‘DATED’)… I know you weren’t distracted by the huge pile of mending above my shoulder. This little piece of brilliance is slightly offset my the fact that I’m constantly trying words like ‘QUEP’ and ‘STRILL’ and ‘TOLEY’ (all of which I realise are not actual words) just in case they’re in the (slightly dodgy) Words with Friends dictionary.

I’ve decided that I am far too much of a perfectionist to be any good at housework. There are not enough hours in the day to do things around here the way I know they should be done, and that makes it very hard to start. This mindset seems to be closely related to the ‘there are already so many skinny people in the world already’ concept … can you tell I did actually clean the bathroom today and had far too much time to think?

My sewing area, which was in the office, is now moving up to the ‘fish tank room’ because the eldest needs to share our office and I still have lots of Kindy Shorts to make… LOTS of organising and rearranging to do here. It is nice to have the grog cupboard so handy though.

My husband asked me to do some calligraphy during the week – writing titles in a school year book. I used to do calligraphy all the time, pre-kids, but as you need uninterrupted sessions to complete large callligraphy pieces, it has gone by the wayside, well and truly. But it ended up feeling pretty wonderful, getting out the japanese ink sticks and the grinding stone, loading up the nibs and doing a bit of practice… and I feel like I’ve still ‘got it’! So I wrote these favourite words of mine to share with you. If you click on it you’ll go to the printable pdf file (A5 size) if it’s something you’d like to put up somewhere… just a little something, seeing as I’ve been neglecting you!

Serendipitously, the French Essence blog also posted about calligraphy this week. (That reminds me, I must write “go to Paris” in my “Sometime” section of the TeuxDeux list.)

And my first Paint Along is tomorrow night! Off to the studio now to rearrange things. Can. Not. Wait. Here is the invitation again if you’re a local yokel.

Will have pics to show when it’s done. Have a great week! If you are missing me (yeah, I know), you’ll probably find me on facebook… who would have guessed?

As you know, I’m the very happy owner of two Curlypops handbags. The first was is that she blogged about and I fell in love with, and the second is one that she made especially for me from my “Finches in the Flowers” teatowel fabric panel.

I rotate between the two bags, depending on what I’m wearing (if I have the time!). They’re SO well made and a perfect size to use as an everyday bag. They sit so happily over my shoulder and the inside pocket is a generous size so it’s easy to keep my keys and phone in easy reach.

So when the opportunity arose to have a few more bags made exclusively for me by Cam (Ms Curlypops herself), I jumped at it.

And now there are four. And they are simply lovely.

And they’re unique.

And they’re beautifully made, with colourful innards, a divided inside pocket, a magnetic snap, and interfacing in all the right places.

They’re $95 each (including the smaller one as it has a second panel of artwork on the back), and they’re available from noon tomorrow (Sunday) in the online store. Just remember there are only four, and we’re not sure if/when there will be more. Either way, there will never be any more exactly the same as these. Which is the way Art Bags should be, I think.

Thanks Curlypops – you’ve done a wonderful job and Dear Reader, I’m so happy to be introducing them to you!

He sent me some terrific, front on photos, we discussed sizes, and then he left it with me.

The portrait percolated in my head for the next two months (I can’t tell you how beneficial that percolation time is), while lots of other things were happening. And in early December I finally got a chance to put paint to canvas and get stuck into it.

It took a few sessions to knock it over, with the final tweaking being done the night before our ‘rendezvous’ for delivery. Honestly, it was 9:30, on a dark night, on the street of a Brisbane suburb… he went to superior lengths to keep this a surprise!

And because it was a surprise, I couldn’t blog about it, of course. But as it’s been over a month since Christmas, it’s high time I do now.

I think my favourite bit was when Bridget’s face first emerged from the canvas. Sometimes when this happens I’m so tempted just to stop there. I guess I’ll have to be the client for that to happen.

And I forgot to photograph a few steps just before the end, but here’s the animation of the painting’s development for your viewing pleasure. I haven’t done an animation on this blog since last October, so I’m glad I still remember how. (OK, I had to look just one or two things up.) The photos were taken at all times of the day, and I didn’t go photoshop mad, so the colour in the last image is probably closest to the real thing (even though all monitors are different, of course).

The good thing about posting this now, is that it’s a lovely segue to mention that I’m starting “Paint Along” sessions in my studio.

There will be four dates in February and we’ll all be painting this (logical for February) painting on canvas.

I’m just finalising the dates and costs, and you’ll be the first to know.

But thank you Paul. I loved painting your children, and I’m delighted your lovely wife loved the end result. You’ll be in the good books for years with this one!

It was a marketing job that, when I read through the criteria, didn’t scare me at all. I knew I could do it well if given the opportunity.

But it was full time.

Now, I know I could also have applied, requesting a part time position, in the hope that someone equally qualified is out there also looking for a part time job.

But I still didn’t, choosing instead to spend the time that I could have been doing up a resume, energetically painting a canvas instead.

And you know, it felt right. I’ve even decided to have some ‘Paint Alongs’ in my studio in February. (Interested? Make sure you’re on the mailing list.)

So, Universe, I’m asking you to back me up.

“Not applying will have been one of the best decisions I’ve made.” You read it right here.

(PS. Universe, thanks for the lovely weather on Australia Day.)

“A good plan violently executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week.”

I think it was originally said by General Patton.

Now, I’m not saying that I’m getting ‘violent’ with these shorts, but I’m just getting them out there ‘right now’, instead of fluffing around making the perfect website that won’t be ready ’til the elusive ‘next week’.

So, this is how they came about.

About 18 months ago my eldest daughter started a couple of days of daycare, which we call ‘kindy’. Even though I can sew, I decided to save some time and head into Target to find some basic, easy, elastic waisted shorts for her to wear. While I seem to have some sort of physical reaction to shopping centres these days (is it an age thing?) I was also amazed that all the shorts available seemed to be ultra short and have lots of buttons and zips and pockets… nothing like what I was looking for.

So, long story short, I ended up making her a few pairs and they’ve been terrific. And I have a stash of fabric that I’ve been collecting, or has been given to me over the years, and it’s getting so high that it’s almost blocking out the sun. The result is ‘Kindy Shorts’.

I have about 18 pairs in two ‘kindy kid’ sizes available at the moment, and will be making more over the coming weeks. But they’re pretty much one-offs (there’s a lot of fabrics there, but sometimes only enough for one pair of shorts!), so if you like one, be sure to grab it now. If you have a fussy dresser, might be best for them to choose their own. And if you get them and they just don’t fit right (or your kid refuses to wear them!) just send them back for a full refund of your purchase price.

Either way, the fabric pile is getting lower and my husband is a little happier.

You’ll find more info on Kindy Shorts on facebook here.

Or you can go straight to that section of the store here.

Would love to know what you think (and if you notice anything I’ve forgotten to add – violent execution and all that).

Onward!

…sending little gifts to friends…

…baby girls becoming little girls…

…bigger little girls who are totally unafraid of crawly things (she doesn’t get it from me!)…

…sunny skies and simple pleasures…

…big men going to A LOT of effort to delivery a much loved cubby to a new generation of little girls (and an upcoming reno project for me!)…

…to making Anzac Slice for the first time because I found out it’s ok to freeze…

…sending them off to school for the new year…

One down, three to go. And I’m sure he was happier than he looked!

It’s hard to get motivated, but there are lots of big plans percolating in my head as usual. Might be time to get some off the page and into action… tomorrow… see you then blog friends!