art is everywhere....

it seems that wherever I go there are colours, lines, textures and shapes and forms which please my eye and give me arty thoughts...or just simply a pleasure in the observing,...carrying a little camera allows the images to be captured and re-lived at home, and shared here - I hope you find them as lovely as I do....finding your own inspiring pictures, images, things, details...whatever it is which pleases your eye and gives you a hum of pleasure can only be good...learning to look, learning to see the beauty all around, even in things which seem mundane and work-a-day, celebrating the small, the details of life....beauty in a line of washing...or a pleasingly hand-crafted earthenware cup, which feels as well as looks good...gives extra pleasure in the moment as you drink a simple cup of tea....not just the art of living but the art of living well and beautifully.....

l

all this art and you can get your oats too!! The Watermill at Little Salkeld in Cumbria is a delightful rambling place where chickens roam free and where whole English grain is stoneground into flour as it has been down the centuries...where you can buy a variety of tasty of organic flours and other organic foodstuffs...and have a delicious meal in the tearoom all freshly cooked breads and soups and yummy cakes...with lovely art and hand-dyed knitting to stimulate the eye...and we actually ate outside... because of course IT IS STILL SUMMER!!

Friday night and I'm loving....

that daughter made a fabulous tea tonight.... pan-fried chicken and pasta with home made pesto...yummy

that I could go down to the veggie patch and come back withrunner beans and broad beans and tiny wee french beans and peas to make a delicious addition to tea...and eating a few while I'm down there is such a lovely feeling...

that swimming in Crummock water made daughter very happy ...she now has to wear MY wetsuit....so maybe it's time I had a new one...

that yesterday was my last day in my old job...a buzzy mix of sadness at leaving a great place to work ....sad to be leaving lovely people with whom I have learnt and shared and laughed such a lot...and exitement at new opportunities

that it was a hot and sunny day today (in between the cloudy bits) and I wore shorts to prove it's still summer....

that I am finally moving back into my studio after many patient months and that my beloved sewing machine is out on my old bench and I have been making again...

that I can now have all the fun of re-discovering all my fabrics and treasures and arranging them artistically...

my husband for making it all possible and for painting it all a lovely clean white... I danced around in it today for sheer joy!

that friday night is bath night....

sea inspiration

journeying to the Isle of Lewis, across the land and across the sea, with shifting restless waves and colours changing as the light alters... with far off misty mysterious islands...seabirds swooping through the sky and diving expertly into the sea... the magic of dolphins sinuously swimming so close we could almost touch them as they came leaping fluidly through the waves...it is another world, another place...
I have returnd to my own landlocked home with a head full of notions and ideas and feelings about textile makingness, with a need to create art... my lovely knitting turned out not to want to be anything as lowly as a garment, more artwork as the beautiful yarn became a sea inspired delicate net of waves....

ok so last night a late blogging session just got later....somehow just had to start playing with our lovely blog...time for a change... time to make it more personal...and we can have bigger pics....it was great fun playing with layouts and text sizes...oooh must get a life and get out more! anyway hope you like the result.... and now for breakfast and some house loving and sorting...the studio awaits... boxes to carry... furniture to move...painting to do....not to mention those fluffy corners and extremely dusty everything.....but as we are expecting some VIP guests aka fantastic and wonderful parents-in-law to stay next week  we really need to find the lounge and the sofabed from under the teerering piles...might get some making done too....daughter and husband off to athletics so a treat of leetle time 'home alone'... I can do anything I want!! hope you have a lovely day too...

Friday night and I'm loving....

this feeling that my life is very much full of all rightness just now ...

being in the pink after a relaxing holiday in such a beautiful place, and the journey too was sooo inspiring...

that it is still holiday time and the world is our oyster....that the sun is shining...in between the cloudy bits which is pretty much ok by me as the rain and sun is making the veggie patch deliciously edible...

that my studio is beginning to recover thanks to fabbydoo builders putting in a lovely window and plastering over all the sadly-knocked-about bits from having the heating put in and thanks to husband mine for all his fantastic efforts in painting, varnishing, cleaning etc...he is a star!

(and that come winter it will be sooo warm and snug in there)

that I am all inspired after the time away to get creating again...which is very necessary as there is the small matter of an Open Studio Event approaching on that horse which gallops frequently into my life...

that daughter mine is so verrry happy as she spotted lots of lovely birds on the Isle of Lewis... and is now home and free to be and do whatever takes her fancy....

and I'm loving that it's now Saturday morning ...but that matters not 

and that breakfast in pyjamas outside is still a lovely thing to do (just about!)...

and the cat is snoozing in the kitchen on a chair and she's not going to let us go away again....

and reader, yes I got the job! starting 7th September a gallery assistant role for me in an exiting new gallery, part-time so I can do all the other lovely creating and making and planning workshops to share the creating joyfulness...how scrummy is that!

  
it really is the strawberry on the top of the smoothie of life...

to make a journey... to travel far...

 

to the utterly beautiful Outer Hebrides, through the romantic Isle of Skye and over the sea to Harris and to the Isle of Lewis, land of light and vast skies, wilderness, bog, heathland and heather, rocks and boulders, turquoise seas and black moody hills, ancient buildings filled with times long before, distant emptiness as far as the horizon, no crowds of jostling people but simply crofts and crofting, wild flowers, wild birds, wild weather...and then the rich colours and textures of stunning painted and stitched and woven art and crafts capturing the essence of this special place and its people, culture, history and language...it is impossible to describe in words, it has to be felt...an experience as rich in variety of colour and mood as the weave and texture of the famous Harris Tweed...it touches like the soft delicate whisper of grasses in the breeze...

 

 

 

 

 

and then to return to a beloved home...to the lush remembered greenness of Cumbria...with minds and hearts full of images and memories of people and places... tucked away as treasure for the days and years to come... in subtle ways to influence our thoughts and lives and very ways of being...

craftyness and exitements galore.....

so much to say and so much to do and so seemingly little time.... just remember this is all an illusion...but in the meantime there's craftyness required for The Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap signed up for in a moment of joyful connnectedness then realisation that I have now got to make it! Piles of washing moving from dirty crumpledness to clean, crisp and folded...but still in piles, house full of stuff (and fluff of gargantuan quantities) though studio floor now beautifully varnished thanking my fabbydo husband...still in shorts but with sore knees... trying to pack for the approaching on a galloping horse holiday...and the minor matter of a bit of job switching going on inspired by the wonderful Beth Nicholls and Do What You Love for Life...ok an interview 18 hours before we set off ain't the best of timing...and I haven't even told you of the wonderful family party for Niece 1 and Niece 2 celebrating being 21 and 18 respectively, nor of the meeting-up-and-sharing-some-laughs-with-old-friends much to the bemusement of our daughters...nor of the 2 delightful wee ducklings who have joined the family , clever duck either Flora or Mary but we're not sure which... being a wonderful mummy....

it started with a feasting and merrymaking to celebrate two beautiful girls being soo grown up...and lots of puddings made by my amazing sister and soux chef/chief washer up and general all round good egg...aka husband), it's always a pudding fest when we get together, chiefly in honour of my mum who loved nothing better than the pudding trolley and a taste of everything when out for a meal...

then the 3 headed to guide camp...hey ho, for summer days under canvas, fires to light and gadgets to make, songs to sing, and lots of fun with your friends... and before you know it home again and off to the local agricultural show to win prizes, despite Basil trying to get in on the act...

 

embroidered buttons are always lovely to make

and yes dear reader I not only finished my wee bag but thanks indeed to that fine publication Mollie Makes I actually made a delicious wee flowery corsage to be decorating the front...

don't be put off,  it was easy peasey once you read the instructions and got the idea of how the flower was made...tho' I had to make it in total fierce concentratedness and no interruptions or else....and then a quick designering and stitching away to create a BLOOM postcard for The Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap... really enjoyed making something which will go all the way across the seas to America! Can't wait to see what comes my way in return..

all packed and ready to fly across the Atlantic...

and still I live in hope of accomplishing enough so that when I sink into my car seat on Friday mrning at the crack of gnats (ie early ha ha!) I can relax and leave everything behind as we head for the journey of beauty up through scotland to the far north-east, via roads and ferries, to the sea washed isle of lewis...and i am thinking ooh, long journey, just how much yarn can i stash away with my trusty hook to while away said travelling hours with craftyness... after visiting a certain famous local wool shop I stumbled across some delicious yarn and am anticipating some delicious making and creating....

I am feeling all sea ish ness already...can you see it and feel it in the colours and textures even before taking crochet hook or knitting needles in hand....and am soo inspired by the delightful and talented julia crossland's sea pennies....and then there's all the makers and galleries and beautiful views to explore as we pass through wild parts of the isles of harris and lewis...think I feel a long lie-down coming on to prepare myself.....
see you all in a week or so, have a lovely summmerytime
xx