Another Journey Begins

My sleepy winter self is stirring now the days are getting lighter.  I hope you dear readers had a wonderful Christmas time and I wish you all a rather belated Happy New Year!
I will begin by sharing with you a painting that I did in the last quiet days of December.
                                                    'Another Journey begins'

It's a beginning and an ending. As 2017 drew to a close I thought about what the year had brought and wanted to do a little picture to honour my dear feathered friend who I lost that year. 

I've been quietly recharging on these January days. Wandering beneath the apple trees looking for the wind fallen oak moss and collecting kindling to lay the fire at night. Sitting beneath the golden tails of hazel catkins with a mug of hot spiced berry juice and delighting in the snowdrops return. This has been my 2018 so far.

 My sleepy hibernating self is reflected in this recent work.

'The Quiet Sleep Of Stars'

Although quiet I've been quite busy spending some time designing new cards. I re-designed the bee card that I previously used to sell as a hand made card edged with glitter. Now it comes all printed, including the glitter effect.    

The next card, was using the small image Moth Spell that I created last summer.

'Stay wild and enchanted'

And lastly my heart images have also been added to cards in the shop ready for Valentines day.

I finished a little donation piece for the 2018 Twitter art exhibition which this year takes place in Australia. This year all money raised will go to a riding for the disabled charity. in Canberra.

'Origin' 

With the beginnings of a brand new year, my little white hare decided it was time for him to dust off his magical wooden staff and prepare himself for an adventure. The mountains are calling and he longs to see the silver lakes again and to head for the wild wood once more.

"Then something Tookish woke up inside of him and he wished to go and see the great mountains and hear the pine trees and the waterfalls and explore the caves and wear a sword instead of a walking stick."~ JRR Tolkien

Well this hare doesn't need sword, as his walking stick is rather special ;-)
The picture evolved from playing with ink. Once dry I could see a landscape. Forests and distant mountains, silvery lakes in the soft swirls and watery marks. And so the map was born and the continued travels in a Tolkien inspired landscape.

Where he is heading? Well that my dear readers we shall have to wait to find to out?

 'No half heartedness and no worldly fear must turn us aside from following the light unflinchingly'~JRRTolkien

Karen 
x

January you disappeared so soon

So January has gone for another year...
We've said goodbye to early morning tiny frosted fingers on stems and branches. Not that we had many this year at all, with it being so mild.  The month whizzed by and for me (after my wonderful adventure) has been filled with restocking my shop with prints and cards. Re-ordering bits and pieces, doing my tax return, having a sort out, tidying up, with quite a few trips to the charity shop to drop unwanted items off and hibernating  somewhat.

The garden is green and snowdrops are blooming. Even the bluebell leaves are quite advanced and some primroses are in flower. This is good news for any bees that are awake of course. I did see a bee on a snowdrop the other day...

On Sunday I participated in the 'Big Garden Bird Watch' You've probably heard of it. Each year it is run by the RSPB over a weekend and people sit for an hour and record the bird sightings then add them to the database. It's a great help to the RSPB for finding out how our bird numbers are doing and of course is a pleasurable hour spent just sitting quietly watching these beautiful creatures.

My recordings were as follows:

x 2 Robin x 3 Blackbird x 2 Collared Dove x 2 Dunnock x 3 Blue tit x 2 Coal tit x2 Jackdaw x 2 Wood pigeon x 3 Great tit x 1 Long tailed tit x 2 Chaffinch x 1 Magpie x 1 Songthrush.

This picture below was taken on another day. It seems I have a new friend that has figured out that Robin was getting special treatment on the tree stump. I decided to give the mistletoe berries to Mr or Mrs Song thrush  in the hope that Mistletoe berry + Song thrush = bird poo + berry seed = Mistletoe  

Not sure it will work, but all the berries were eaten...

Robin still comes to my hand occasionally but prefers the tree stump most often these days.

Like last year, he has begun to stay further away as he has paired up ready for Spring. Here they are together. 

Mr Blackbird is never far away. 

The kitchen is scented with hyacinth and is a great reminder that Spring is on the way. I'm always so glad that I took the time to plant these back in Autumn, when they finally come into flower.

Some of the new postcards, now in my Etsy shop...

I also managed to finally finish this painting that I began before Christmas, after my visit to Wistmans wood. I have named it  'Journey through Wistmans'  

It will be available as a print, as soon as I get a good scan of it, the next time I go into town. 

I hope your January was a good one?

Karen
 x 

The Slow Path

January is flying by but I wasn't fast enough to jump onto her wing and hitch a ride. I feel I have been left behind and  am taking the scenic path. I have been working very slowly. I'm not sure why this is? I think I'm gathering my thoughts and still recharging my creative battery?  It's strange as when the new year arrives you want to throw yourself into the fresh new beginning. But the mind is not willing and is telling me it's a journey not a race. So I've been looking.

I've met Jack Frost a couple of times, but this year he has more business elsewhere, not Wiltshire.
Sky watching. I've done a lot of that. In fact I always do. There is more magic in light than in anything I feel.

January has gifted me with  lavender sweets, celandines in bloom,  a tear shed or two over War horse, falling into heather and the highlands by candlelight via the pages of my book, answering a song thrush that definitely spoke to me! Beautiful new music, browsing in bookshops, sweet incense and warm spicy soup, a meteorite so ancient my mind boggled and of course  the prettiest thing of January, snowdrops.
Thus have been my days. Simple days.
In between I've been painting. This one, a sketch from last year has been on the list for a long time. And  with the muse deciding it's rest time, it's taking longer than anticipated. But, we'll get there. ;)

There's still quite a lot to do on this painting, but hopefully it should be finished next week?

I'll leave you with a clip of War Horse. Do go and see, a beautiful book  an amazing theatre production (which I've yet to see but so want to) and  now magical movie and part of it filmed here in Wiltshire just a few miles away at Castle Combe.