When You Least Expect It...

You sell a painting....

I finished this back in March and it has hung on my wall ever since patiently waiting to steal someone's heart.  On Christmas day my Mum brought her neighbour along to our celebrations so she wouldn't be alone for the day.  This lovely lady, who is a fun 93 years old, fell in love with the painting and purchased it.  I went around today and hung it on her wall for her and she is absolutely delighted which is lovely. It's so much fun to have a part in making people happy!

The Days Around Christmas 2014

We've been dressing up.  The two pirates were shy and were not to be photographed as that would show people where the treasure was. If you look carefully you can see one pirate in the background of the bottom photo.

Jigsaw puzzles and the building of Bilbo Baggins Bag End in lego.  The children flitted in and out of these activities. Running, chasing, swimming, hide and seek with Aunty Sandy were more to their taste on the day.

Poppy and the boys.

Some quiet time amid the chaos and fun.  Uncle Poh (from Kung Fu Panda) is hiding in the back of his ute in the front yard to scratch his scratchies.  Peace....

The kids made their own orange juice slushies with gifts from my sister.  Pretty awesome little inventions. You freeze the cups then add juice, softdrink, flavoured milk - whatever takes your fancy.  Then squeeze the cup repeatedly and a slushy appears in the middle.  Voila!

Chalk love letters to family.  So very sweet.

Glow sticks in the pool for Mr J and Miss S on their Boxing day sleepover.  SO... MUCH....FUN...

Camping out in in the playroom and watching a movie on the big screen.  Kids thrilled and the old peoples home they put Jeff and I in has just improved in quality!!  ha ha.

To cap it all off a HUGE branch came down on the neighbours driveway and over the road.  The top photo is after extensive chainsawing, pushing and pulling to get the bottom half of the branch off the driveway. Yes this is only half of the branch.  The whole thing was probably 20m long perhaps more and came off the tree you see on the right edge of the driveway in the bottom photograph.  It's the second big branch to drop from this tree in 3 weeks. The bloke in the red ute who narrowly missed having the branch fall on him as he drove past got his Christmas miracle.

I hope you are all having a safe and happy holiday period and that work is being kind to you if you are back on the job.

Tree Day

For the past 8 or so years since I first became an aunty I have hosted Tree Day here at my house.  Being married to the Grinch I wanted to share the joy of decorating for Christmas with my niece and nephews while giving them a tradition to share with their cousins.  Each year I give them a new decoration to hang on the tree and it's always fun to choose the decorations each year.  As I was so involved in the day - supervising tinsel, dogs, children etc I didn't take photos. My sister Susan stepped into the gap though and even wrote a lovely blog post about it (I feel very teary).  Head on over and read about our Tree Day at Daydream in Colour.  Hope you enjoy it.

Apologies

I'm sorry I'm missing in action at present.  We continue to find ourselves in a difficult and stressful family situation which is taking all of my time and attention.  I haven't been painting or doing anything at all really.  I'm not sure when I'll be be back into blogging and painting with any regularity but will be back when I have more space and less stress so keep popping in to check and see if I've returned!

On a final note I just want to mention that men can be victims of domestic violence too.  It's horrible and life changing and if you are in Australia you can reach out for support at Mensline Australia for the cost of a local call.  Calls are confidential and they provide a truly wonderful service and advice. If you or someone you know needs help please SEEK it.  There is help out there and you don't need to live like this.

Another wonderful service in Australia is Beyond Blue and organisation that provides support for those dealing with depression and or anxiety.  Your family GP is also a wonderful source of support.

If you are concerned about someone with a mental health issue you can call Adult Mental Health in your area (Australia) and receive advice and support.

If you are a support person look after yourself and seek help if YOU end up needing it too.

Enough said.

Hope I have time to bring you some finished artworks or even some new happy fun pieces before Christmas but I won't make any promises.  Thinking of you all and I'm popping in on your blogs when I am online (which is not often at present).

Stay well and happy! :)

On my camera.

I've been very busy of late. Very, very busy and this week I've spent much of my time in bed having long afternoon naps.  I had not been able to upload images to blogger for awhile so have a backlog.  It's a bit of a hodgepodge and I'll go into more detail in later posts.  Are you ready for a peak?  Some of the things that have been filling up my days and nights of late......

Monopoly

 An unexpected visitor on the back door. 

The best waterslide EVER.  Happy birthday to Lily and Kayden!

 Happy birthday Miss R. We love you!

Helping the neighbour harvest her jaboticaba fruit.

 Starting to study portraiture.

 Participating in my first 'professional' art exhibition. 

Second portraiture lesson.

I'll elaborate more on all of the art including our art exhibition in subsequent posts.  Mma Tembo is still in progress as are three more canvases of intuitive paintings for my Flora Bowley e-course.  Now that I seem to be back in business with blog access I'll be able to fill you all in.  

Hope you are all well and happy!

love Sandy xx

Slow progress

With playing pirates, Monopoly, Pictureka, hide and seek and supervising pool splashing, bumped heads and sick kids I've not made much progress at all with Mma Tembo.  My nephews have been here and when they're not I've found myself frightfully busy with a family issue that is taking lots of time also.  Oh and I started an online five week class with Flora Bowley on Monday because my life is obviously NOT overwhelming enough at present.  I'll talk about the online course at a later date.

Now......Mma Tembo.  I've done a wee bit on the left side of her face, just small adjustments and then as it was easiest while attending to very busy or sick children I grabbed charcoal and used that to add some detail.  These will be painted over at a later date of course. 

Here's a close up

 

Would really like to get this done by the weekend but am not sure if I have the kids or not.  No use pushing the river, it will get done in it's own time. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished result.

I'm off to bed early tonight being totally flogged at board games by a 5 and 9 year old  has worn me out!

 

Mma Tembo update

We've had Open Studios again this weekend with seven lovely visitors today.  I spent some time further developing the gray scale underpainting of Mma Tembo. I concentrated on the left hand side today.  Once I adjust the tones on the forehead, add the details of creases in the trunk etc I'll be ready to add colour in the form of glazes.  I may get to this tomorrow as I am close to finishing the gray scale.