My new work space

Here it is the elephant-sized coffeetable in my studio. I look very productive don't I? Perhaps this time I'll start being it too.

 

The pleasures of decluttering.

Over the last few days I had to deal with the prospect of some major changes to my personal life. They are good changes, but scary as I really dont know what to expect no matter how much I try to prepare for them. That's the reason why I have not been blogging of late.
But I have had lots of lovely ideas brewing inside me and over the weekend I did a serious case of decluttering in my studio. It felt so good to get all the junk out! We used to have this huge coffee table in the living room. Mr Ts favourite piece of furniture. With a highly planned schedule of pleading throughout the weekend, I managed to persuade him to have it in my studio. Now my living room is free of an elephant-sized coffeetable.Now I can see my carpet! And in the far end of my studio, lies a beautiful coffee-turned-worktable with all my drawing goodies. Lovely.
I'll post some photos once I get round to kicking my current habit of lying on my bed with the laptop on my legs to keep them warm. I sometimes have to will myself to get out of this position. Today is one of those days.

Whats wrong with me?

The tree girl

These things are currently making me very zen-like

1. Keeping a journal
2. Listening to Kings of Convenience in the car
3. Creating my own herb garden indoors
4. Lemon tea
5. Having long chats on the phone with my best friend Yasmin
6. Colouring in drawings that were previously meant to be black and white.

I have recently been thinking about joining my poetry and drawings together to create a little book. I feel really excited about this idea.

New piece

New piece which I started over the weekend. Quite pleased with how it's going so far. This was originally meant to be a simple pencil drawing but the roses looked like they needed colour, as they should, so I changed my mind. I think I made the right decision.

I've gone back to reading again! It's called "Journal of Solitude" by May Sarton. The title doesn't exactly rock ones boat, but I've noticed that it has been highly recommended around the blog circuit and it made me curious.
So yesterday I got my bent copy in the post from Amazon(don't you just love it when the postman is considerate enough to push whatever sized package into your letterbox?) and got straight on to reading it. I recommend it to anyone who loves beautiful descriptions of nature, domesticity and thoughts on the creative processes of the mind. It's the kind of book that makes you want to curl up by the fire (or the radiator) and make you want to take up gardening (or at least buy some flowers from your local supermarket..)All in all, a gentle book for gentle folk.

When I draw or paint, I usually like to listen to soft mellow music; a little bit of lounge here, chillout there. But over at Youtube I came across an EXCELLENT series of inspiring talks held by an organisation called TED. They have so far had the likes of Bill Clinton, Dave Eggars, Steve Pinker and the great Al Gore give 20 minute talks on a wide variety of issues. I have been absolutely hooked.
Heres one that blew me away. I strongly encourage anyone whos reading this to watch it. It's a passionate, yet humourous talk on the subject of schools and their effect on childrens creativity.

Do schools kill creativity?

2008..What would I have done without you....

After 7 years of wondering, we finally did it, we got hitched!


A year where I finally let go of my fear of doing nothing with warm weekends in a little house overlooking the sea.


A year where we took up gardening from scratch, and enjoyed every minute of it, aphids and dirty fingernails included.


A year where I rolled up my sleeves, blew the dust off my brushes, and started drawing and painting to my hearts content.


A year where I finally figured out how to be me and be proud...


..of everything I do.