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Climbing Ladders, Brush in Hand, Nose in Books.

Estuary Moon by Adele Cosgrove-Bray; watercolour; 2018. I've been busy decorating my art studio, stripping off old wallpaper, mending dents and holes with Polyfiller, (one and a half tubes' worth!), and then climbing up and down an ancient step-ladder in order to paint the walls with three layers of plain, pristine white. The job is not quite finished; one small wall needs a final coat of paint and its skirting board doing with white gloss, and the door frame needs white gloss too, but the end is in sight. Photos to follow once it's completely done! I've also been pulling out armfuls of forget-me-nots from our garden. There are supposed to be 74 official species of forget-me-nots, some of which are very pretty. Unfortunately, we're lumbered with horrible hairy things which self-seed prolifically and swamp all the other flowers and, once they've bloomed, flop over, turn brown and go brittle. Pull them out then and the spiny hairs cause a nasty rash.

Daftness, Dogs and Drawing.

Life drawing; pencil on A4 paper; 2018. First take a look at this interesting and diverse series of photos which depict womens' jobs from around the world , then have a good chuckle over the absurd descriptions of women by some male writers. The contrast between the two is quite telling. I am reminded of a conversation, which took place years ago, between an ex-boyfriend and myself.  He remarked that it must be marvellous to be a woman as we have breasts. I looked at him in bewilderment, and then pointed out that we also have knees and elbows but don't pay them much attention most of the time. "Oh," he said, crestfallen. "You disappoint me." "Really? You're the one with the delusions about female anatomy." It is no co-incidence that he became an ex. Life drawing class, March 2018. Photo credit: Marie Mairs. Here's a photo of my hands holding a pencil. The A4 sketchpad I'm using here is nearly full, mostly of life dr

Trees, Snow and Confused Dogs.

Richard was undeterred by the weather. So far this week we've had snow (twice), icy winds, torrential rain and a fleeting glimpse of spring sunshine. This figures, as I'm on annual leave for a few days. On Monday we decided to take the dogs to the beach, seeing as the first batch of snow had melted. Would it be New Brighton or West Kirby? We chose to board whichever bus came first, and a short while later we disembarked at Hoylake. We meandered round the shops along Market Street then took the public footpath which runs between the railway line and the golf course, coming out on Greenbank Road in West Kirby. Emily got  a bit confused and wanted to turn left, the route we used to take to head for home - or rather, to what used to be home three years ago. The familiar sight of the beach cheered her up, even though the tide had only just turned and much of the sand remained underwater. Poppi gave a chunk of seaweed a good barking at because it was there. Richard is curr

Stingy Chips and Sidestreet Surprises

Gentle Waves and Tranquil Days; watercolour,2018. Eagle-eyed regulars have already noticed that I've changed the name of my online merchandise store from Spooky Cute Designs to something more direct.  There was nothing wrong with the old name, as such, but had become rather misleading.  The store's earliest designs tended to be teddy bears wearing a witch's hat, or the ever-popular Beelzebear designs or similar, and while many of these items are still available, (printed onto T-shirts, bags, household furnishings, posters and more), the majority of the store's merchandise now derives from my art and photography, plus the range of items for writers which remains popular.  Therefore the old store name was misleading to new clients.  I only changed its name recently but sales are already improving. One of my nieces recently posted on Facebook that she was thinking of combining her two YouTube channels into one.  As I said to her, a hazard of having any kind of websit

Goals for 2018

 Since 2012, I've created a list of annual goals which I aim to achieve during the next twelve months.  This is one way to keep track of the progress of various projects, and it's a bit of self-entertainment.   These were my goals for 2017:- Write a minimum of one short story per month;  Write a minimum of one poem per month;  Write the 1st draft of Morgan , the 5th of the Artisan-Sorcerer series;  Paint, draw & photograph;  Take up swimming again. Well, the first two goals weren't met at all!   I wrote only three short stories and four poems, which is a spectacularly lousy output.  However, the reason for this is my focus on #3, ( and #4), and progress with Morgan is doing very well.  Will it be finished in 2018?  Here's hoping, as I've been playing around with an idea for another novel for some time already, which explores the subject of reincarnation, karma and soul growth.  It will be a stand-alone novel; in fact Morgan will probably be the l

Video - Birkenhead Park Sketches 2017

Video - Paintings and Drawings from 2017

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Paintings, Paintings Everywhere...!

Sunrise Wave; A4-size, mixed media, 2017. My week's annual leave seemingly passed in the blink of an eye and I enjoyed my time off, and took the dogs on several extra long walks.  I managed to get some of the garden pruned back too - most of the roses and the St John's wort.  The bin's full now so I will have to wait until that has been emptied before finishing the job. I went to the Tate Gallery in Liverpool to see the "Constellations" exhibition, which thematically links select works by well-known artists of the past century to look at different contemporary approaches to similar subjects.  The diverse exhibition brings together works by Lowry, Rothko, Braque, Duchamp and Warhol, and many more, and is well worth viewing. I also saw their small Roy Lichtenstein exhibition plus a third exhibition, this one by two lesser-known artists, Mary Reid Kelley and Patrick Kelley. After a much-needed pit-stop at Cafe Nero, I visited the ever-fabulous Walker Art Ga

Readin', Writin' and Rovin' (with a sketch book).

The exhibition at Seagrass Studios and Gallery, in West Kirby, Wirral, closes this weekend so if you wish to view my watercolour painting on show there - plus lots of other truly lovely art - then be sure to call in.  The gallery can be found on Acacia Grove, which is directly opposite the train station. Birkenhead Park sketch, and my painting (centre by lamp) in Seagrass Gallery These last few weeks, I've been busy writing Morgan .  Explained simply, there are three ways to write a novel.  One way is to plan everything in advance, making detailed notes which are then followed rigidly.  The opposite method is to plan nothing at all, to have a loose idea and start exploring this through writing and slowly discover where it might lead.  The middle way offers a compromise between these two extremes; the writer has a few notes which log important plot twists and outcomes, but which also leaves plenty of room for flexibility and improvisation. Each writer needs to experiment and