WOYWW#160 AND TAG TUESDAY - TALES OF THE RIVER BANK

Here's my desk for this week's WOYWW - if you want to know more pop over to Julia's Stamping Ground and visit a huge number of other peoples work spaces - it's great fun!

I have just started this week's Summer of Colour challenge - to create art based on the colours pink and lemon for Strawberry Lemonade Punch ice cream.  I have found a few bits and pieces for inspiration and my sketchbook page is in the middle of drying.  On the left are some packets of decorative pins that I recently purchased and haven't found space for yet, and I haven't got round to putting away the hot plate and wax yet - how lazy!

I came across this lovely stamp while desperately searching for some glimmer of inspiration for this weeks Tag Tuesday theme Tales of the River Bank.  As soon as I found it I knew it had to be used!

I carefully picked out the colours in the stamp and made some colour bars as a background, using embroidery silks wound around strips of card.  I painted and splashed a tag to give a watery feel and attached the colour bars.  I then attached the stamp onto the bars with Sticky Fixers and added a fishing fly that I hooked through the stamp.

SUMMER OF COLOUR - WEEK 3

This week the challenge over at Kristin's Summer of Color is to make art based on the colours of Baseball Nut flavoured ice cream - deep red and cream for black raspberry and vanilla - yummy!

Thinking about these colours reminded me of a neighbour's garden when I was a child back in the 60's - they had tall Chrysanthemums and Dahlias in a large plot of garden, all staked out with little paths running between the rows.  

 The flowers were grown purely for cutting and they towered above me - playing with their children the plot became our jungle, hiding place, prison - or anything we wanted really!  

Thank you to the very nice gardener at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight last week, who allowed me to climb over a barrier into the non-public area, and photograph the red Peonies up close!

Still on the red and cream theme I thought this Poppy, photographed at my local garden centre, fitted the challenge perfectly - it looks like it's dripping in raspberry sauce!

And still feeling obsessed with the colour scheme this week I picked these up beautiful Alstroemeria flowers at my supermarket.

I am linking the colour palette to Color Me Weekly and the photo mosaic to Little Red House

TAG TUESDAY AND A GREEN THEME

Not only did Summer of Colour challenge me to work with the colour green this week (mint choc chip ice cream colours), but Tag Tuesday also had a green theme this week - double struggles going on!

However, I finally produced two tags - not because I was working away happily in the colour green but because I wanted to improve on the first tag! 

They are made up of cut and torn images, phrases and words from an old book on trees I found in a charity shop.  I also used inks, pastels and acrylic paint. 

SUMMER OF COLOUR - WEEK 2 - MINT CHOC CHIP ICE CREAM

This week has been a real challenge!  Summer of Colour, hosted by the lovely Kristin over at Twinkle Twinkle challenged us to make a piece of art based on the colours of mint choc chip ice cream - green and brown in other words!

Now, I love green - in the great outdoors - but I don't really work with it, wear it much or live with it in my home. 

Anyway, after a week of struggling I have managed to put together a sketchbook page loosely based on my on-going theme of pollen.

I also made a photo mosaic of the very few minty green things around my home - including a specially made cupcake, some marzipan eggs, and two pretty green moths from my collection - and I am linking this to the

Little Red House

And finally I've put together a colour palette that I am linking to 

Colour Me Weekly over at Rosie's LeavesnBloom.

WOYWW #158

It's that time of the week again, for Whats On Your Workdesk Wednesday - when loads of people link up over at Julia's Stamping Ground and share views of their work desks. And here's my desk - 

My sketch book shows a start on next week's ice-cream challenge over at Twinkle Twinkle - the colour combination we are working on is minty green and dark brown, for Mint Choc Chip - I still have quite a lot of work to do on it though.

Surrounding my sketch book is a bag of lace bits, a box of 'cool colour' matchpot paints (I have too many for one box so have divided them into cool and warm colours!), a hot plate, some foil pudding dishes (useful for EVERYTHING including melting wax), sticks of beeswax, Golden Gel, and a new roll of red and white bakers twine from Papermash that I have no idea what I am going to do with but really had to buy!!!  And that's about it folks!

CAMPING AND TAG TUESDAY

This week's theme for Tag Tuesday is camping, and it has brought back lots of many happy childhood memories.  Every year my parents took us camping and to be honest I don't know how they did it!  We had all our stuff piled high on the roof rack of our old Morris Oxford car and my sister and I sitting in the back on the pillows and sleeping bags (no child booster seats back then!).  We were often huddled into the tent while it was lashing with rain and our poor mum would be trying to stop us bickering and getting bored.  

I have never wanted to go camping as an adult, but I still look back through rose-tinted specs at our childhood holidays!!!

Here is this weeks camping-inspired tag and below is an old photo from the '60's of one of our camping trips.

Aah, happy memories!

SUMMER OF COLOUR - WEEK 1

I'm taking part in this years Summer of Colour challenge - each week for six weeks we shall be making art based on an ice cream colour combination - how yummy!  This weeks prompt was rainbow sherbert, with oranges, pinks, yellows and a bit of white.

As some of you may already know I have rather an obsession with pollen and seeds, and I decided to continue working along this theme.  

To the Navaho the Pollen Path is sacred.  It represents the source of life and the path to the centre of existence.

The words on the second piece of work are from a Navaho night chant:

In the house of life I wander,

On the pollen path,

With a god of cloud I wander,

To a holy place,

With a god ahead I wander,

And a god behind.

In the house of life I wander, 

On the pollen path.

 I have a small south facing flower bed in a corner of my garden that has become a vivid pink and orange colour scheme - it's wonderful and the colours really buzz in the hot sunshine. I must admit it doesn't look so good on dull days, that's when the pastels come into their own, but it more than makes up for it on sunny days!

So, still being very 'into' this colour scheme, I decided to put together a photo mosaic of pink and orange flowers to link up with Mosaic Monday over at the Little Red House.  

Finally I made a colour palette, still in the same theme of pink and orange but not as vibrant as the rainbow sherbert ice cream colours.  I love how the flowers change from a delicate mauve/pink to the peachy colour as they go up the stem.  I am linking this to Color Me Weekly.

TAG TUESDAY AND DIAMOND JUBILEE

Not surprisingly this weeks Tag Tuesday theme is Diamond Jubilee!

I found this wonderful stamp in my stash and decided it had to be used when I saw the words Jubilee Jamboree on it.

I really love the colour red, especially when it is used in small amounts as an accent colour - I think it has such an impact - so I decided to keep the tones of the tag fairly neutral in order to emphasize the stamp.  In order to stop it becoming too bland I also added one piece of bright red bunting.

After a Jubilee weekend full of fetes, picnics, fly-pasts, fireworks, a hog-roast, live music, aching feet and much, much more I am now off to watch the rest of the celebrations live on TV!

THE DIAMOND JUBILEE

 I hope everyone is enjoying the Diamond Jubilee weekend (weather permitting!).

I just wanted to share this photo I took over the weekend of one of the pubs in our village high street - all decorated and ready to celebrate!