Meet Aunty Elsie

Actually she was my Great Aunty Elsie, my Grandma's elder sister.

Hopes and Dreams (17cm x 24 cm)

Sadly I never knew my Grandma as she died before I was born so Aunty Elsie was a sort of surrogate Grandma.  She was born in 1899 - I'm not sure when or why this photo was taken, but she looks a lot younger here than in her wedding photos of 1928, so I'm guessing it was taken around 1920, maybe her 21st birthday?

Her and her husband lived in Cottenham (near Cambridge) and were fruit and flower growers.  There are pictures of them from the 1930s with strawberries and tulips they'd grown for market.

She sometimes looked after us as children and although they’d sold most of their smallholding by then, I remember feeding a donkey in the orchard behind her house.  When I was in my early 20s I worked nearby and used to call and see her every week.  She gave me tea and tinned salmon sandwiches, taught me how to harvest asparagus, and told me off for suggesting that at 86 she shouldn’t be up a ladder picking plums!  She talked lots about people and relatives that I didn’t really know but had probably met every year on Feast Sunday without knowing who they were!  

 

She was a lovely lady and I hope she would like what I’ve done with her photo.  After some editing in photoshop I printed it onto calico.  Then I added vintage lace, velvet, recycled sari ribbon and some vintage buttons. 

I used to think of her a lot when I had my allotment – especially when harvesting my asparagus as when she died I was lucky enough to be given this:

 her asparagus knife.

A Whiter Shade of Pale

It's been a glorious day in Suffolk today, blue skies and sunshine - lovely!  Here are some of the white/almost white flowers that are blooming in my garden today, I think they provide a rather calm and cooling atmosphere:

Top row:  Cosmos Purity, Penstemon, Passion Flower (can't remember which variety!)

Middle row:  Rose 'Madame Alfred Carrier', Leucanthemum, Dahlia 'Cafe Au Lait'

Bottom row:  Mint flower, Anenome, Rose (unknown variety)

The penstemon was supposed to be red when I bought it, but I couldn't be bothered to take it back, and the passion flower was only planted this year and is already over 6ft high!  It's supposed to be a fully hardy one so should be ok in the winter as the garden is quite sheltered.

Wherever you are I hope the weather is kind to you this weekend - I plan to be in the garden as much as I can.

Then Came The Jolly Summer

Last week, while I was waiting and generally getting side tracked, I noticed a rather nice pattern had appeared on a piece of fabric I'd placed under some garden fleece I was painting (don't ask!) to catch the excess paint.  The fleece experiment wasn't a success but I fiddled around with that bit of fabric as it seemed to have flowers on.  I cut and stitched, and added some organza.  I painted some handmade paper and stitched the fabric on.  I used my new lumiere paints that I got from my recent visit to Art Van Go. 

Jolly Summer - 17cm x 21cm

  
The text is from The Fairie Queene (Edmund Spenser) because it seemed quite a jolly piece, especially when the sky was grey over the weekend.  I'm not actually sure how much I like it, but my neighbour does so I thought I'd share it anyway! (And is it a textile piece, or is it really mixed media, or doesn't it really matter? It all gets very complicated at times!)

The sun is back now - let's hope it stays awhile this time!

Waiting

While I'm waiting for summer to come back I've been inside fiddling with paints and fabric.  This also involves lots of waiting - waiting for crackle glaze to crackle, waiting for rusting powder to go rusty, waiting for paints to dry etc etc.  The trouble is that while I'm waiting for one thing I start something else and totally forget about the first thing, hence I currently have many half finished projects and a lot of mess!  Guess that's my random brain again!

I've also been waiting to have some time to join in with Gina's sketchbook project, and I've managed to start!  The challenge was to use one main colour and things close to home.  I chose purple, and flowers - obviously!

 

After preparing the background, (I used brusho, rather than watercolour, and clingfilm) I cut out a template of a fuchsia and rubbed round it with white oil pastel and then painted inside.  I then tried using markal paint sticks as well as adding pencil details.  I like the shapes that come from cutting away the page to reveal some of the next.
I also really like the shading that's left on the template!

I didn't do so well with the next bit - using a potato to print with.  I changed my shape to an aquilegia seed head (as the fuchsia was too big for my potato!) and think I got too fiddly.  I quite like them when there's hardly any paint on them though.  This is the area I've picked to enlarge (the next task):

I will show you more, but you'll have to wait as I got side tracked - again!

Sunsets, Froglets and a Blackberry.

I was told today that I had a "random brain".  Personally I don't think it is random, it's just that other people can't keep up with my train of thought (which is totally logical to me).  However this post is slightly random so maybe they have a point!

I thought I'd share a beautiful sunset that we had here the other night.  The change from orange to pink was quite stunning.

A few evenings later this little fellow appeared outside my patio doors.  He looks big in the photo but was actually only about 1.5cm long (the leaf he's on is a tiny wild violet).  He must have jumped all the way from the pond (about 150 feet away) and didn't appear to mind my neighbour and I watching him for ages.  We were fascinated with his tiny, perfect feet!  

But I haven't just been watching the sky and baby frogs, I have been a little bit constructive too.  Courtesy of my day job I'm now the proud (?) owner of a blackberry - not the edible kind, but the phone kind!  As we've all got identical ones I needed a case to identify mine and rather than buy one I thought I'd make one.  Following a little research on the internet I decided on a design and after a lot of trial and even more error produced this one:

Even if my brain is "random" at least it livens up meetings, and if it doesn't then my blackberry case does instead!

In Love

I think I'm in love - with hydrangeas!  I love how their exquisite little green flower buds

Hyrandgea Preziosa

gradually turn white

Hyrandgea Preziosa

and then pale pink

Hyrandgea Preziosa

I love that these unassuming buds

Hydrangea Paniculata 'Vanilla Fraise'

turn into these beautiful flowers

Hydrangea Paniculata 'Vanilla Fraise'

And I love that they can have flowers as big as these less than a year after planting!

Hydrangea Arborescens 'Annabelle'

I thought you might also like to see the "help" that I've had today whilst I was working from home...

it's of the less than helpful kind!  She did eventually get fed up with me trying to type over her and reluctantly relocated to my lap. I'll show you what her brother was up to another day!

Little Gems

Some of you will know that when I moved here three years ago the garden was rather neglected as it had been rented for two years to non-gardeners.  In fact ivy ruled!  But the owner was a passionate plants' woman and some of her special plants somehow managed to survive the neglect (and the ivy).  This is one of those special surviving plants - a real little gem:

Rosocea

Roscoea

It was one of the first "gems" to flower that first year, and has multiplied since so I have about four in flower now.  I think I've identified it correctly, but if you know exactly which variety it is then please let me know...

Also in flower this weekend is my dierama which I planted the first summer I was here and it has stubbornly refused to flower since - until now that is, and it was worth the wait:

Dierama

(Apologies for the not brilliant picture, you'll have to trust me that it looks lovely, but it's on the far side of the pond and is slightly difficult to photograph, even with the zoom, without risking falling in!)