A Garden for Danella

Posted on June 1, 2020 by thecontentedcrafter

My apologies to the early birds who popped into Version 1 of this post. I could see the photos, everything looked good at my end, but it appears nobody else could. I tried to fix it, failed and had to take it down as I couldn’t work out why WP wouldn’t let you see my photos – so I started again. In doing that I lost the comments attached to the first version – but thank you for letting me know all was not as it should be. Fingers crossed it works this time!

Any hoo – here we go again………

June 1st 2020: A month has passed. Maybe even more. Time telescopes, bends, flies, crawls, disappears, comes and goes. Essentially it means very little to me these days. Maybe it was so even before the days of the Great Pause arrived upon us all. I confess, I’m no longer sure.

I pass my days doing essentially the same things I have adopted as my life’s activities since I retired and became a lady of leisure. I create, I make, I talk, I visit, in reality again, or still virtually; I am quiet. I read, I walk, I think – maybe too much and not always kindly. I am cross with myself about that – I’d rather be kind than not. Yet I fail in my aspiration constantly. But still, I am grateful and a little in awe of how a life unfolds and reflects back to what was and opens up to what could be. There’s a kind of magic in this space we have been given.

I am privileged and I recognise this every moment of every day. And I am immensely grateful for where and how I am able to live. And so, I make. Using Pinata Alcohol Inks, Blending Fluid and an air blower I played with colour and form so that my daughter could have a new arty layout on the wall above her sofa. A Garden to inspire her during this darkest time of the year.

And when all the pieces were chosen and the chosen pieces were framed up we spent quite some more time arranging and rearranging the hanging layout – until finally, it was declared done

Image may contain: indoor — The Garden in place May 2020

And while photographs and copies can never hold the depth and richness of the original pieces, if you like anything, please feel free to download a copy for your own use.

And finally, here is Siddy waiting patiently for the light to return. Just three more weeks til the Winter Solstice here in the Riviera of Antarctica

Oh, and here – finally – really – just moments before he was at last able to visit his friends at MudPuppy and get a proper haircut. Oh how happy we all were!

I hope all the photos have been allowed to show for everyone this time. Please do let me know if you can’t view anything.

Thanks so much for coming by today, I’m so happy that you did.

October Went By In a Blur ……

Posted on October 25, 2018 by thecontentedcrafter

Time is shooting past isn’t it. Danella, aka The Official Photographer, went back into hospital and finally, almost eleven months after the initial accident had all the screws, broken and entire, removed from her leg. The steel plates however are left in.

Due to the extraordinarily long wait period, Danella was booked into a private hospital. We reported to Mercy Hospital at 9 am on the 21st and she was checked in and ready to go off with her handsome American surgeon within the hour.

I received a call from said handsome American surgeon an hour and a half later, immediately following the surgery and given full details of what had been done. We had a prolonged and congenial discussion about whether he was a surgeon or a car mechanic after he described having difficulty getting one of the screws out from behind the metal plate and having to use his screwdriver to ‘ping it up’.

It was an almost shocking juxtaposition from the event a year earlier when the Dunedin Hospital had lost my daughter for two hours and no-one could tell me where she was or what was happening to her, followed by the lack of communication over what had been done to her in surgery.

I was incredibly impressed with the quality of care and attention given by the nursing staff at Mercy and by the calm, serene ambience of the reception and the ward. She was well tended to by her nurse throughout the day and I was encouraged to be there, and be fully informed throughout the process. By 4 pm that day I was driving Danella back home and tucking her in. Within two days she was up and about and caring totally for herself and was back at work a week later, having been at my place the day before cleaning my hard to reach windows. 🙂 It was, all in all, a really great experience. I do love it when life serves us up the very best possible outcome and puts bells on it too.

We’ve been enjoying some lovely weather. Siddy and I took it into out heads to take an extra walk in the evenings as dusk was falling and the streets were a bit quieter so he could practise his off leash walking. Orlando took it into his head to come with us, each night coming a little further. So there we were last night, all three of us, heading off for a stroll round the block.

I say ‘stroll’, but the thing that got me was that the puppy became quite serious when he saw that the cat stayed with him. He didn’t stop to pick up or leave messages as usual, but trotted along, not deviating from the path as is his usual style, as if he needed to get his kitty back home safely as soon as possible. The kitty trotted along just behind Siddy, tail held high and clearly not bothered. I was quite puffed as we completed the block in record time. I’m kind of hoping it doesn’t become a regular occurrence and I kind of wished The Official Photographer could have accompanied us, it must have been quite a sight.

I’m still managing to create at least one card every day and a series gets completed in about three days. Here’s a few of them. I do love my owlsThese are fun and will appeal to certain people in my circle of friends and family dav This one isn’t a card, I made it for me to put on the fridge just to remind me I don’t need to buy any more crafting supplies – I gave myself an intervention 🙂 I’m not sure if it’s worked….. dav I designed a Christmas card and blinged them up with an increasing amount of diamantes and glitter, which you can’t see here, but believe me they sparkle and shine – these are just the first two, there’s several more…. dav Then, with the next series, the pets got in on the actSomewhere along the line I found some unused inky splatter backgrounds and added these gnomes to them – this made me happy! They are so useless and cute and I must make more dav dav dav dav And to finish a design still in process dav That’s it, that’s October almost done and dusted. Is it seven weeks til Christmas?

Here’s Siddy getting his aunty Jo’s bed ready for her Christmas visit. If you look closely you might catch a glimpse of his ‘Superdog’ harness. He’s looking a little porky on account of too many treats, so not really capable of flying ……… dav Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did.

I Decided to Make Some Cards

Posted on October 2, 2018 by thecontentedcrafter

On a grey day there is time to do a quick catch up of the latest makings from the craft room – I just thought you might have missed the playing about with inks and stamps and doodles ……… I do hope I’m not being presumptuous, but you know it’s all been about Kakapo’s and free books in recent weeks……. I haven’t been at all idle. In between the doing up of the conservatory to make me a forest like feel in the middle of the city and much yarn work, there are at least 60 – yes SIXTY – new hand made greeting cards packed away. Christmas is all but taken care of 😀

First up is a pile of new inkies, neatly packed up into assorted colour packs of six cards, no envelopes. There’s about 40 of these, ready for anything that comes my way – this is a small selection of colours. For some reason I did not photograph any of the mauve, yellow or green combos of colours …….. but you get the idea and, anyway, you’ve seen these before

When I got tired of those I went on to playing with Distress Inks and die-cut silhouettes, also all neatly and individually packed up, complete with envelopes – this is a small selection

dav dav

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Then I discovered some old serviettes that required something doing with, so they got made into cards too – complete with their own hand made envelopes because the finished size of the cards was inconsiderate of mass produced envelopes

dav

dav and my personal favourite

dav Next, I went here. Here is playing with pens and pencils and inks and stamps and doodles and seeing what comes out in the end – again a very small selection dav And just in case you missed him here is Siddy in his new bandanna, looking rather coy ….

dav

Finally, I’ve been watching Jacinda via YouTube make her way through the UN and American talk shows. It’s so nice to feel proud of the person who represents our little country. I don’t believe I’ve ever felt that before from preceding Prime Ministers – not even the two women who previously held the position. Her maiden address to the UN ended with this:

“Perhaps then it is time to step back from the chaos and ask what we want. It is in that space that we’ll find simplicity. The simplicity of peace, of prosperity, of fairness. If I could distil it down into one concept that we are pursuing in New Zealand it is simple and it is this. Kindness. In the face of isolationism, protectionism, racism – the simple concept of looking outwardly and beyond ourselves, of kindness and collectivism, might just be as good a starting point as any. So let’s start here with the institutions that have served us well in times of need, and will do so again……….. “

Pretty cool intro to the world huh!

Thanks for coming by today, I’m so happy that you did!

Autumnal April Art

Posted on May 11, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

It’s been almost a month since I last posted – did you notice? I’ve been enjoying some lovely Autumnal weather, kicking my way through carpets of brown and gold spread across damp green fields in my pink ‘bovver boot’ gumboots with my happy puppy gamboling alongside. It’s turning cooler now and the days are noticeably shorter. Serendipitously, I decided to change ISP providers and got ‘LightBox’ free as part of the deal so it’s time for me to catch up on some TV programmes.

My tiny courtyard has been half demolished as a new fence had to be built. My lovely neighbour went to hang a piece of garden art on his side of the old brick wall and it wobbled alarmingly. So it was decided it needed to come down before major damage ensued. As the replacement is a lovely white painted solid wood fence the garden that was built up against the brick wall (and which was probably the only thing holding the wall up for the past twenty years) also went. I get a tiny bit of extra space and now want even more…. It’s a work in progress.

‘We Are All Made of Stardust’ stands on my dining table, leaning against the wall – I’ve grown quite fond of it.

With the big painting finished, and when time allows, I’ve been playing quietly in my art room. Nothing big and bold – just playing with paints and inks and shapes and colours.

I’ve learnt a lot. I turned most of my experiments into cards and have photographed none of them. Oooops!

I finally scanned the painting I made in the dying days of 2016 which bears my mantra for this year: ‘Create Beauty; Cultivate Kindness; Expect Miracles’ I’m practising living it, I fail every day but it’s an excellent challenge.

2017 Mantra

Most recently I laid out four sheets of yupo paper and played with alcohol inks and metallic mixatives

Set 2 Brown cropped

Set 2 Green cropped

Set 2 Blue cropped

and my personal favourite:

Set 2 Pink cropped

I may or may not doodle on these, but I do have some interesting plans afoot for them which involves a largish art board and scissors and glue ……

This month I also finished a collage and mixed media painting for a special friend which I’ll show you when she has received it.

Just a heads up – Siddy is apparently considering moving to Canada

16 4 17 Canadian bandana

It was a gift from the delightful Ms Boomdee. He’s a boy who likes a bandana!

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Inky Doodle Note Cards

Posted on February 15, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Do you remember a couple of posts back I mentioned a give-away? And where I showed you the beginning processes in the creation of my new line of Note Cards. Yupo paper, alcohol inks and hours of doodling went into completing four A4 sheets. Each sheet was then cut into four pieces and, when the note cards were all made up there is a grand total of 16 different designs.

I already showed you the first four completed cards. When Susanne made a comment on that previous post about them reminding her of ‘Swinging London’ in the 60’s their name was born. Here they are again, sporting their new look. Meet ‘Note-Cards ‘Carnaby Street’

Here is the second sheet of Inky Yupo paper

And here the doodling work is completed

Here are the four cards that utilise that design ‘Note Cards Summer Garden’

Here is the third ink dropped sheet

Doodles completed

And here are the four cards ‘Cosmic Time’. I think this is my favourite one

Here is the fourth sheet, remember I had started the doodling work

This one took the longest to complete, there is more than 15 doodle hours here:

And here are the four note cards ‘Evening Garden’

You can use any card upright or top hinged, it is purely personal preference.

Every A5 note card comes with a writing paper insert, allowing you to write fully on three leaves. After much experimentation and contemplation I decided to stay with white card and ordinary printing paper for the inserts. It was simply easier and more affordable.

Every note card is hand made by me. I cut the card, slice the original design into four and trim it to fit the card. I ink the edges of each little printed design. I alone score, crease and fold the card into shape, wrestle with my double sided tape gun (which is being extremely temperamental at the moment) and adhere the card and printed paper together. I then cut the paper insert to size, trim and finally adhere that inside the card. Slight variations and imperfections are inevitable.

Now to the give away. Which isn’t really a free thing at all, I’m asking for your advice and in return your name goes in the draw for a set of note cards, design of your choice. So, to enter you must humour me and help me solve a terrible conundrum. Please do read on if you want to play…….

Will you pretend with me that you want to purchase a set of four note cards. You are ready and champing at the bit to get into letter writing again, these doodly cards are the perfect size for a chatty and cheerful note to get the ball rolling. You feel that the cost of $NZ17 is affordable, you know, that’s just $4 per card and 25c per envelope, cheaper than most mass produced cards.

And then you check out shipping costs. (We’ve been here before recently, yes? Well, here we go again!)

You discover that four note cards with envelopes costs $17 + $15 shipping for International customers and $5 shipping for domestic customers. Suddenly the cards from the corner store are looking way more appealing!

The thing that pushes the cost up is the size of the envelopes, they take the packet from letter rate to small packet rate, which is the same rate I send small light catchers around the world for. And there’s a big difference in size and weight between 4 note cards and a triple strand light catcher!

So what if you just bought your own envelopes from the local store?

Four note cards with no envelopes costs $16 + $3 shipping – anywhere in the world.

Which scenario would you prefer?

Hit your option choice in the poll box

*$NZ16 = $US11.50 / $Ca15.11 / $Au15.05 / UKP9.20

Double your amount for total cost inc shipping of option 1

But talk to me too – I love you to talk to me 🙂

Do you have a favourite design or colour way?

All regular chatterers will go in the draw, your choice of note card pack:

*Carnaby Street

*Summer Garden

*Cosmic Time

*Evening Garden

*Mixed Notes {one of each collection)

And finally, Siddy says “Helllloooooo!” to his fans

March 16 3

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Yupo Fun and ‘Believe’

Posted on January 27, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Wow, lookit me go! It’s still January and here’s another post! I hope it won’t be too much of a shock for you.

I’ve been pottering, and the silver lining to the no-show summer is (Ta-da!!) the tiny house has now been entirely decluttered. I mean ENTIRELY! There is nothing in this house now that is not useful or beautiful and probably both. The laundry was the last space holding onto ‘someday’ things. The last drawer has been sorted and tidied and there is nothing left to do now but keep it all ticking over nicely. Can you see my halo, isn’t it bright and sparkly ……..

I rocked up to my local stationers a couple of days ago and had them scan all twenty of the pieces in the art journal I worked on for the last three months of 2016. Plus print out copies of all the yupo paper/alcohol ink pages I had made. I’d decided to copy the ink spreads and then doodle so that I have lots of options to play.

Did those last two sentences sound like a foreign language to you? Read on my friend, read on.

Yupo paper isn’t paper, it’s a synthetic, a plastic pretending to be paper. It is therefore classed as a non-porous surface and things can be done to this stuff that can’t be done on paper, no matter how many gsm’s it is.

It’s also, at this end of the world, horribly expensive and something I intend to try only once in this life. Hence the photocopying before doodling remark. I treated myself to fifteen sheets and waved a fond farewell to $25.00.

One of the really fun things we can play with is alcohol inks, dripping drops of different colours onto the page and watching what happens. The ink spreads out and ‘blooms’, changing colour somewhat at the edges, more with some colours than others. Mixing different colours together results in different spreadings, different blooms, and sometimes even no blooms. It’s like taking part in some mysterious class in alchemy and is totally fascinating to observe.

When the dripping and watching and wondering is done and the inks are dry (which doesn’t take long at all provided you don’t over drop in the first place) you doodle. Doodling is also fun! It can be done in front of the TV if you are so inclined, or can just be a quiet, meditative activity that steals hours from your life 🙂

Here’s some examples of the ink drops

Here’s one I have started to doodle on

And here is the only spread that is finished so far.

And here is that last spread cut into four pieces and note cards made using different coloured card and with writing paper inserts. The following two photos taken at the desk, under lamp light, in the middle of a dreary, wet day:

Notecards 1

Notecards 2

I’m not complaining though, we had three lovely sunny, warm days on the trot. It was quite exciting!

I have to say I really like these notecards, and in the interests of encouraging the renewed interest in letter writing, I’m going to package some up and put them in my shop. And do a giveaway. Stay tuned for that.

‘Believe’ is finished.

This is a texture rich piece and there’s also a ton of gold metallic paint in there so it looks entirely different in different lights. This is a slightly skewed scan, which is entirely unexciting as far as mood lighting goes. You must therefore use your imagination to see all the gold glimmery bits. Sorry about that.

I’m quite pleased with this one.

I hope you like it too.

So what do you think, are you tempted to play with yupo paper and alcohol inks? Have you done so already? How did it go for you? And what do you think of those notecards?

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!