Sunday 29 June 2014

29/06: YELLOW LAB COMMISSION

I'm not getting much computer time just now - so much to organise before work begins on replacing our ceiling and removing/replacing spoiled floor and furniture ... 

This portrait was a secret commission - first wedding anniversary present for 'hubby' and he is very pleased with it I'm told.

Max - a gorgeous yellow lab who looks much younger than his 14 years!

Completed in pastels on Fisher 400 sanded paper


Thursday 19 June 2014

19/06: UKCPS REGIONAL EXHIBITION, ILMINSTER

If you're in the West Country, why not take a look at the coloured pencil work on display at the UK Coloured Pencil Society's first Regional Exhibition. 

Venue:  Ilminster Arts Centre, The Meeting House, East Street, Ilminster, Somerset.  

The exhibition runs from 16 - 28 June and will hopefully become an annual event being staged at different venues round the country.

One of my pictures was sold yesterday and taken out of the exhibition as the buyer needed to take it immediately.  That means the picture is not available for judging at the weekend but ... in this day and age and economic climate, buyers can't be turned away LOL

This is the picture which I called 'Reflectivity' and its coloured pencil on pastelmat paper.    Great fun to do and rather different from my usual animal portraits.    It was originally done for the UKCPS Int'l Exhibition in Nuneaton (Autumn 2012) so this was its second 'outing'




Tuesday 17 June 2014

17/06: CHRISTINE STRIKES AGAIN

Sorry for the very long gap between posts.   I've had pictures on exhibition in Birmingham, Patchings Art Festival website and now in Ilminster (many thanks to Pauline/Bev Lewis for storing/delivering the 4 pictures to Ilminster)

We've also been on holiday but had to cut our trip short as we had a problem at home.   The toilet cistern in the master bedroom ensuite developed a crack and water leaked through the ceiling into our lounge.   A friend was watching the house for us and phoned us to break the bad news.   She turned the water and electricity off and we got an early flight home.

We have oak flooring throughout 90% of the downstairs and the water has slowly caused the boards to rise/buckle which makes for an interesting experience to walk on - like a bouncy castle in places.

Insurers have agreed to cover replacement of all the wooden floor areas, lounger/diner, hallway and 2 downstairs bedrooms (his & her workrooms/studios) but we're still waiting for a visit from the 'contents' assessor to find out what will happen about our damaged furniture.    So the last few days we've been packing up the contents of all the wooden display units/sideboards/dressers etc to make furniture moving easier.     I'm not sure yet whether we have to clear everything out of the ground floor rooms or if the flooring guys will work room by room - I hope its the latter as we don't have much storage space to put all the furniture.

Regular followers of my Blog may recall that we have a travel computer which gets taken everywhere when we're away from home.     She is bright red and we call her Christine after the 'killer car' in Stephen King's book (also a film).    Our Christine hates me ... she once threw herself off a table when I walked past and the screen was totally scrambled.     Next day she'd regenerated herself (just like the car) and was more evil than ever.     This last trip, we left her at home and took a newer, more powerful computer with us - we thought we'd got away with it and never mentioned our trip in her presence..... but she obviously knew and this was her revenge .... will we ever be free of her?   LOL

Hole in ceiling - dangling wires where we had to remove the ceiling fan/light


Cracked cistern



The floor's like this in several places now



We're sitting on garden loungers to watch TV at the moment - Happy Days!


On the bright side .... I'll be despatching the portrait of a gorgeous yellow lab on Thursday in time for a 1st wedding anniversary gift (Saturday).    Can't show any pictures till then ... just in case.  


ps: apologies if you're seeing some garbled words above the final picture ... I can't seem to get rid of them - Christine at work again maybe   :-{