Painting

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In which I haven’t fallen into a black hole

IMG_4043No black holes, only that I got a job (a miraculous occurrence if you know anything about me and interviews) in October and haven’t been heard of since.

IMG_4044Time is precious, the last three months have wooshed by and there is little enough time to make things now, without stopping to write it down and take pictures.

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I just about managed to finish the Christmas knitting. There were Vikings, Lego man gloves, Red Riding Hood/wolf costumes and I got them done in time, the people with birthdays in December and January were probably breathing a sigh of relief that they didn’t have to work out how to be polite about being given knitting again.

IMG_4047Now it is half term and I have almost found the bottom of the washing basket.

IMG_4048Christmas didn’t really count as a break because it had Christmas in it and was still busy although we managed not to have flu this year which is always nice.

IMG_4049We are decorating Small’s room at the moment, he wanted it red and orange.

IMG_4050We compromised, I said he could have one wall red and one wall orange if the rest were a very light colour.

IMG_4051At the last minute he decided to have red and blue instead and we found some blackboard paint which gave us an idea to make the blue wall more interesting.IMG_4053I think I’ve earned a cup of tea now.

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A swift report from the abyss

Sorry. I have been atrociously bad at writing any posts recently. I realised as well that I showed you lots of started things and didn’t write anything when they were finished. It has been a busy couple of months.

The treasure chest got finished, complete with added sea creatures by Small and Tiny inside.

Tiny Clanger got finished in time for the birthday and finally got to meet Small Clanger.

The Man in the Shed tidied his shed.

The aquilegias and all the colour in the garden came and went and I forgot to take a picture, now it is a green jungle again.

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I unraveled a cardigan which I knitted for my mum when I was less good at knitting and re-knitted it into a vest which I made up as I went along, was much better and I completely failed to take a photo of.

The Man in the Shed finished the bathroom so I can have a bath again. Hurrah!

I painted a backdrop of a cottage for a thing where it has to sometimes belong to the seven dwarves and sometimes to the three bears – spot the difference (and the mouse, don’t look Grandma!).

I rescued a swift with a damaged wing which has been passed on to the vets who might have a better idea what to do with it than me.

I started making a Sophie’s Universe blanket which I haven’t got a picture of yet. It’s a gorgeous free pattern which is available online and is really easy to follow as it has loads of photos. I’ve been printing the version without pictures but I did wonder whether it wouldn’t save some paper to follow it off a screen. That said it is not the thing I have printed recently that has used the most paper. But that’s another story, never mind, anyway, I paused in making Sophie’s Universe when I realised that the nursery teacher is about to pop and last time she was pregnant I made her a baby blanket and there are only a few of weeks left of term to make something. So I got on with it.

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It is blocking, it is pinned to the bed (which was the only sensible (debatable) place big enough to put it) with nearly six hundred pins to open up the lace edges which now means that a) I know I have well over six hundred pins (I thought I would run out when I started and there are more than half left) b) I have to keep the cats off it until it is dry (it is white and they are black) c) I have to get it dry before bedtime or explain to the Man in the Shed why the bed is slightly damp and d) I have to get nearly six hundred pins out of the bed before bedtime or explain to the Man in the Shed why the bed is slightly prickly…

 

UPDATE: 1303, 24 Jun 2015.

Slightly red faced update – despite having a maths degree I forgot to divide by two – * chain 3, cast off two, repeat from * gives half as many loops as stitches so there are nearly three hundred pins rather than nearly six hundred. But why let accuracy get in the way of a good story? Which is the principle employed, or so I am led to believe, by several of my forebears, well three of them anyway. Who’s been sleeping in my porridge…

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In which a wall is (almost) finished

Well, here you go, it’s even got a free kitty in it if you know where to look:IMG_1385

That’s as much as I’m going to get done for a while judging by the weather forecast and it is more or less finished. I was looking at this bit though and it gave me an idea for a couple of details which I might add later on.

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I need to find some photos to copy first or have a practice at drawing them because I’m a lot better at colouring in than I am at painting things that actually look like things. I’ll show you later on if I do decide to add them and you’ll just have to guess what they might be until then but I’ll give you a clue – the one that I thought of first might have too many legs and I might do some others with some wings or even more legs.

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Here’s an updated gallery thing with the last photo added if you like that sort of thing:

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Greenest Leaves

Right, that’s as green as it is going to get.

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I find it fascinating watching how things change and develop and I have already forgotten what the wall used to be like so here is (hopefully) a gallery thing showing how it has changed so far.

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Now I am going to sleep for three days before I start the purple and to wash off all the green paint I keep finding in strange places.

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Greener leaves

I’m not sure what is going on with the weather – it is doing what it is supposed to for the time of year which is very good for painting (if a little confusing) but I mustn’t say it too loud otherwise it will hear me and start raining again. The last couple of days have been really productive, by my reckoning that is slightly more than two thirds of the green done.

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I’ve mostly been doing about a jam jar’s worth of paint a day because a) that is how much I can mix in one go in my jam jar, b) that is how long Tiny will entertain herself for and c) that is about the length of time it takes me to go a tad crazy and start wondering why I am filling in so many green rhombuses. Yesterday was perfect painting weather; most days so far I have done one jar in the morning and then by the time it gets to lunchtime the sun has come round and there is only about a two foot strip of shade left at the bottom of the wall (fine if you want to paint the bottom but if you climb up the ladder to do the top then your head is back in the sun and you’re in danger of looking like a baked beetroot in about five minutes, well I am anyway) but yesterday there was just enough cloud that it was nice and warm whilst being shady enough to carry on in the afternoon without me or the paint baking before I had finished fiddling with it and I managed to get two jars done.
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The green is creeping across enough now that I can breathe a sigh of relief. There is always a point when I’m doing stuff like this (somewhere quite a while after the bit where I merrily launch into it with only a vague idea of what I am doing) when whatever it is starts to look roughly like I imagined and I can think that it might be worth carrying on with.

The weather is looking about right for carrying on now but I think I’ve had all the green paint I can take for today. And I have a sleeve to finish…

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Green Leaves

This is just a quick update on the wall. I haven’t done much else this week apart from a little bit of secret knitting that I can’t show you yet. It doesn’t look that much different but the green is starting to creep across – I think I’ve done nearly a third of it – most of the original blue and green ones are covered up anyway.

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By the way, the hay fever inducing sweet peas are there because they have been banished by one of the inmates, I am not in the habit of picking flowers to put on the outside table. I’m not sure if you will be able to make it out in the picture but there is also a couple of very small cups and saucers on the table so it looks as though someone has been visiting for a tiny tea party, perhaps they enjoyed the flowers…

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In which there is a friendly beetle

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This is Ruby, she is a cardinal beetle and has been keeping me and Tiny company in the garden today. Tiny has been busy in the sand pit (I took pity on her and replenished the sand even though it was her own fault that all the previous sand vanished down the cracks in the patio), Ruby has been busy avoiding being painted (she approves of the green) or squashed and trying to climb up my leg at every opportunity (even though I keep moving her out of the way) and I have been busy with the paints, I think I need to get the next lot a bit lighter though. I have done all the marking out and started filling in some of the shapes again.SL274241

If you live near me and it starts raining now then you know that it is a sub-optimal microclimate in the vicinity of my wall brought on by the application of Murphy’s Law and me wanting to get it finished. I apologise.

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In which there is a lot of polygons of one sort or another

It’s been a busy week – the Man in the Shed is away with work and I’ve been outside as much as possible so sorry I haven’t posted much. I keep meaning to write something and then not doing it. I have finished the Happypotomus, need to think of a secret name now so people can guess it at the fair. I think I’ve got one but obviously I can’t tell you. I’m not too sure about its gender either, there has been some debate!

I have mostly been painting this week, weather permitting (the forecast last week said it was going to piddle down all week but every time I look it up again it seems to be better and I’ve got more done than I expected to). Our garden is about nine foot up in the air and is currently held up by this wall:

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The reason being that I couldn’t bear having that much plain rendering and spent quite a long time five years ago painting it pretty colours and shapes. The only trouble is that it is going rusty from underneath – there is an edging strip on the corner of the ledge under the render which should be galvanised and clearly isn’t. I scrub all the lichen and grub off every year but the rusty drips stay and get a bit worse each year however hard I scrub and now it is getting to me. Also it is covered in small holes (at a height of about eighteen inches and below) which I suspect have something to do with Small’s bike and they look like this:

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So what with the rust and the holes I decided it was time to do something about it. I’ve been scraping off loose paint and rust and trying to seal it all again and I managed to get some real paint on it today. Now part of it looks like this:

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The Man in the Shed asked Small to describe it to him because he hasn’t seen it yet and was told, “Green and purple.” Which sounds boring but I suppose it is at least accurate. In my defence I haven’t finished yet…