Nellie Windmill

I really didn’t feel like blogging today but I’m so glad I did. It forced me to think about things that are beyond the here and now and I felt so much better afterwards. Thanks for the great prompts Gwen!

December 24 Learning Experience

What was a lesson you learned this year that changed you?

1. You must live it to learn it (bumper sticker much?). Life lessons are not something we can be given. They don’t make sense on that fundamental, your gut know’s it’s true kinda way until you’ve worked your own way there. Only then will you be open to it and see the wisdom of it.

2. The consequences for a functioning alcoholic who has a family that has an immense capacity for denial is exactly zero. All of the consequences fall on the family. The functioning alcoholic does not experience shame, or embarrassment for his behaviour because of his masterful use of denial. Denial that he has a problem. Denial that the problem is serious. Denial that there is anything he can do about it. Oh, and there’s that pesky black out side effect of drinking that means he doesn’t remember anything to be ashamed of. All of the shame and embarrassment falls on the family. Like antisocial personality disorder the negative effects of his behaviour are predominantly preserved for the blameless loved one’s.The thing is, he doesn’t know any of this if nobody tells him.

3. You cannot be authentically yourself and try to make everyone like you at the same time. The two are like oil and water. They are mutually exclusive states of being:

“To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.”

- ELBERT HUBBARD

December 25 Gift

What’s a gift your gave yourself this year that kept on giving?

I gave myself permission to dream big. To be impractical and ridiculously optimistic and do what excites me no matter how green I am. I gave myself permission to want more than a secure, comfortable, unchallenging subsistence.

December 26 Insight or aha! moment

What was your epiphany of the year?

First of all, can I just say that I find the phrase “aha! moment” extremely aggravating. It’s just so clunky and we already have a perfectly good, elegantly French sounding word for it. Can we all just agree to say “epiphany” and be done with it? Well, with that out of the way… My answer here is intrinsically linked with my one above. It’s funny how much overlap there has been with my answers. i guess the significant things in one’s life all share the same roots. First, some background. I’m very new to the art world. I left my social work job in Australia to travel around Europe in a campervan with my partner 6 months ago and have recently let myself dream of having a creative business. It’s obscenely early to be thinking of starting my own creative business but it’s the only thing that makes sense. I’ve read two self-helpy type books – one on creativity (“Taking Flight” by Kelly Rae Roberts) and one on lifestye design (“The 4 Hour Work Week” by Tim Ferriss). Amazingly, despite their vastly different scopes and styles the two books actually have many philosophies in common, which was something I didn’t recognise straight away. One of these philosophies is to dream big. So, this “dream big” message just popped into my head a few weeks ago and you know, I’m not sure I’ve ever really had a groundbreaking epiphany (or at least none that I can remember) but this probably came close. I realised that in terms of my career I haven’t been dreaming at all let alone dreaming big. I haven’t even let myself think about art in terms of a career because it’s way too much pressure, and absurdly unrealistic. But you know what, as soon as I let myself imagine doing art for my career it made sense. Saying it out loud to my partner for the first time was really hard! I felt embarrassed and vulnerable and was kind of hyper aware of his reaction. In light of this epiphany I started re-reading “The 4 Hour Work Week” and realised that that book has the same message! It was like reinforcement from the universe that I’m on the right track.

December 27 Social Web Moment

Did you meet someone you used to only know from her blog? Did you discover twitter?

I started my blog this year and I am in love with it. I get ridiculously excited when I get comments (hint, hint). I get excited when I read other people’s blogs and I feel like I could have written their article myself because it’s so in tune with what I’m experiencing, feeling, dreaming. I’m amazed at how much we all have in common. One blogger who I commented to about this replied “Ithink we all have really similar thoughts and feelings when we are being really honest” and I think she’s right. I’m continually impressed by the level of honesty and openness in the blogs I read and I aspire to that. I love how blogging has changed how I experience things in the “real world”. I pay attention more. I take my camera when I go on walks or just down the street. I reflect more. My blog is very new and I can’t say I’ve made any friends through it yet but I have hopes. Big, big hopes. I’m really excited to join twitter, something I haven’t done yet but it’s on the to do list. I’d like to join a few other creatively oriented online communities but the vastness is a bit overwhelming. Any suggestions? You could leave a comment (nudge, nudge)?

Oh good lord, I’m atrociously behind in my posts and I thought I was doing so well!

December 19 Car Ride

What did you see? How did it smell? Did you eat anything as you drove there? Who were you with?

Oh wow, the last 6 months have been one big car ride. Since we picked up our motorhome, “Nettle”, in the Cotswolds, England we’ve driven her through a bit of English countryside, across Wales, all around Ireland and Northern Ireland, back across the UK, from the top of France to the bottom, from the top of Italy to the bottom and then a little bit of Tunisia in Northern Africa. That’s a lot of driving. Of course, some legs have been better than others. I really can’t narrow it down to just one car ride so I’m gonna go ahead and say Ireland and Northern Ireland was one big awesome road trip. I could write a very lengthy blog article just on this one prompt! I’m going to be very restrained and just dot point a few highlights with 1 photo each. If you feel an uncontrollable desire to read about our journeys in elaborate detail check out my very diligent partner’s blog.

Highlights:

• Brightly coloured flowers growing wild along the sides of the roads and clinging to steep hill sides

• The in-between bits – they were just as beautiful as the destinations we were driving to

• A spontaneous detour that took us through the Wicklow Mountains and the first place that made me go “this is why I’ve been dying to travel all my life”

• The Giant’s Causeway Coastal Tour – A driving tour described in “The European Driver’s Handbook”

• Connemara national park – stark, breathtaking, rugged

• Dingle Peninsula -You could believe in faeries and magik and elves in this enchanting place.

• The Ring of Kerry (which was actually pretty disappointing to be honest, but the second half of the drive redeemed itself)

December 20 New Person

She came into your life and turned it upside down. He went out of his way to provide incredible customer service. Who is your unsung hero of 2009.

My partner Mike, and I were befriended by a local Sicilian whilst hiking in the Mt Etna national park one day. He was on his way to a celebration of Sicily’s patron saint with his Alpine club and invited us to come along. There was much eating and singing and dancing. Our new friend and a friend of his then invited us to go see a few of the local natural sights with them another day. Of course, we couldn’t believe our luck and were more than happy to accept the generous invitation. As they showed us the sights they would point out which plants were poisonous, which were good for haemorrhoids, and which ones can crack lava with their roots. They picked various exotic fruits and berries for us to eat along the way. We were then invited to a road rally and then another road rally, dinner at a very special seafood restaurant, a trip to a food expo at Italy’s largest shopping centre with our friend’s mother and partner, and a road trip to a wetland park where flamingos were pitch stopped on their way to Africa for the winter. We’ve been invited back in the spring and summer for some special annual events and have been offered a house to stay in rent-free.

I’ve never met someone so friendly and open and generous. He has almost 700 friends in facebook and I’m not surprised. I’m so unused to such genuine kindness from strangers I frequently found myself entertaining uncharitable thoughts about what could possibly be in it for him and how this could all be a scam, an intricate long-con. I have trust issues. He certainly did come into my life and turn it upside down, as did all the other Sicilians we met who went out of their way to help us. My entire perception of human kind will be forever altered for the better for having met these uncommonly kind Sicilians.

December 21 Project

What did you start this year that you’re proud of?

I have big [for me, not world domination big] plans. I’m so excited. I’m working on them everyday and I’m loving every day. I’ve plunged myself into creating an online creative business. I’m learning how to use photoshop so I can create collage papers to sell as pdf’s on etsy. I love them so much that I look at them every now and then throughout the day. I’m painting every other day and I hope to sell my paintings on Red Bubble. When I decided I’d like to sell prints of my art work on Red Bubble I thought maybe I’d have something good enough in a couple of months. Two days later I had something I was super proud of and am more than happy to put out there in the ether to be looked at and judged and maybe rejected. I’m also learning how to digitally alter photos and am hoping to sell these on Red Bubble also. Just a month ago I hadn’t even entertained the notion of selling my art and now I have an action plan, baby! I feel so energised and things feel so right. I feel like for the first time in my life I’m doing something that I can excel at if I just give it my time and hard work.

December 22 Start-up

What’s a business that you found this year that you love? Who thought it up? What makes it special?

This is very biased of me and it’s also something that I’ve already blogged about so I’m sort of cheating.

December 23 Web Tool

It came into your work flow this year and now you couldn’t live without it. It has simplified or improved your online experience.

Since starting out on this crazy new slow travel lifestyle of ours, Mike and I have been keeping tabs on our expenses so we know how much we need to earn to feasibly do this indefinitely. We’ve been religiously using an iphone app called “iExpenseIt” – terrible name, I know, but it’s a good app. Thanks to this nifty app we know that slow travelling in expensive Italy cost us on average $48 (AUD) a day and since we’ve been in Thrifty Tunisia we’ve been making do on $27 a day. That’s cheaper than living and paying rent in Melbourne, Australia. Add a 30% buffer to cover savings and unforeseen expenses and we need to earn $62 a day (based on expenses in Italy) to continue living our dream. It feels so liberating to know how much we need to be earning and aim for that instead of aimlessly earning as much as we can. If you’re interested in this kind of lifestyle and philosophy, check out The Four Hour Work Week.

Ooh I’ve left it too long and now they’ve all gone and backed up on me.

December 13

What’s the best change you made to the place you live?

Anyone who even vaguely knows myself or my partner knows the answer to this one but for those of you who are friends we have yet to meet, in July this year we bought a motorhome in the UK. Her name is Nettle. I wish she looked like this:

but alas, she’s the sturdier more beefy breed of German gal:

… although she does come with a chimney.

December 14 Rush

When did you get your best rush of the year?

I might just ramble a bit here and see if I’ve answered the question by the end of it. I’m a big wuss. Always have been. I don’t like scary rides at theme parks. They make me feel queasy. In primary school I dreaded the end of school break up when we would all go to our tiny town’s amusement park. When all the other kids were giddy with excitement I was dreading the water slide, especially the one that was an enclosed tube that all the big kids liked. I wasn’t too keen on the toboggan either. And then there were the geese that would chase after me. I don’t push myself to do the things that scare me I simply avoid them. It’s a character flaw, I know. I’m okay with that. So, needless to say I haven’t done anything too rush inducing this year. Whilst writing this I’ve sorted through the meagre, somewhat vivifying activities that have made the short list and this is all I’ve got. There’s really no way I can’t make this sound lame. A severe change in weather on a hike in the Central Sperrin’s Way in Ireland is what did it for me. I’m not sure I can describe it exactly but I’ll give it a go. There was nothing particularly hairy about the hike; no vertigo inducing precipices to be skirted or swaying rope bridges to be braved. Just a lovely, hilly, oftentimes boggy terrain to be leisurely trundled. It was a beautiful day and after walking steadily uphill for quite some time we were fairly hot and sweaty. When we finally crested the summit we found ourselves in the turbulent cloud layer. It was awesome. We were buffeted by a fiercely strong wind, pounded by icy cold rain and a dark layer of swiftly moving clouds surrounded us. I was elated. That’s all. The pure joy of being out in the elements and the intense surprise of the extreme weather exhilarated me. Quite a rush.   

December 15 Best Packaging

Did your headphones come in a sweet case? See a bottle of tea in another country that stood off the shelves?

Self righteous hippy outrage isn’t usually my style but I feel a rant coming on. You have been warned! Throughout our travels in Europe we’ve noticed a distressing trend towards over packaging. Things come in boxes which come in plastic then the things in the boxes are divided into smaller portions that are covered in more plastic. It’s out of control. I’m boycotting Twinnings after discovering that they’re tea bags are individually wrapped! How ridiculous, how pretentious, how irresponsible! Which brings me to the best packaging. We’ve been in Tunisia for a month now. We do grocery shopping here and of course there are many differences such as the deafeningly loud Islamic singing playing in one supermarket but by far the biggest difference I’ve noticed is in the packaging, or lack thereof. In the small grocery stores that dot the streets, everything from olives to beans to sugar can be found in vats or bins or buckets to be scooped into a bag. The focus is truly on providing the produce in the most economical way possible with none of the branding or marketing that has led to boutique individually wrapped products in more developed countries. Even olive oil can be bought in re-used water bottles. It’s not always pretty and I have no idea how hygienic it is but it’s refreshing.

December 16 Tea of the Year

I can taste my favourite tea right now. What’s yours?

Mike and I were befriended by a local Tunisian the other week. He took us out for coffee the day we met then that night we went out for dinner and tea afterwards. I’ve yet to see a woman in a cafe here. They definitely seem to be solely a masculine domain. Walking past one always gives me a vague feeling of unease. Maybe it’s because I grew up in machismo-drenched rural Australia but I find there’s something inherently menacing about a group of men. Is that just me, ladies? Am I in need of therapy? So, when our new friend took us to one of these establishments I kind of felt like a curiosity, an honorary male as a foreign woman, if you will. No matter how much it’s something I don’t want to do or wouldn’t usually want to do, if it involves going out with a local in a foreign country it’s always worthwhile. In this case I experienced the taste sensation that is mint tea. Of course, I’ve had mint tea before but never one that’s made me exclaim with delight. And I did exclaim boys and girls, oh yes. I’ve never been one for flavoured teas. I like the exotic romance of them (plus those little arabic tea glasses) but have never been able to actually summon up much of a taste for them. A whole new world of tea drinking possibilities has opened up before me.

December 17 Word or Phrase

A word that encapsulates your year. “2009 was ___.”

“The moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred”.

- JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

Truly the universe seemed to conspire in our favour to make this vagabonding life choice of ours a success. I discovered art just when I was to be granted the time to pursue it. Almost a year’s worth of housesitting opportunities presented themselves so that we could save money on rent and put it towards our new home, “Nettle”. Distant relatives who also happen to be full time motorhomers took us under their wing and found the perfect motorhome for us the first time we visited a dealer. Honestly, it was just all too easy. If we had of done this at any other time maybe none of these things would have transpired. As it is it’s all worked out beautifully, like jigsaw puzzle pieces snapping into place.

December 18 Shop

Online or offline, where did you spend most of your mad money this year?

I brought very few clothes with me on our move to Europe. I packed as much as I would if we were only coming over for a few weeks. This leaves me in the dubiously enviable position of being able to reinvent my wardrobe. Something that, given my pickiness and frugal ways is long overdue. I’ve determined I will only buy clothes that I am absolutely in love with and have been drawing much inspiration from Some Girls Wander to give some focus to my personal makeover. Since my last clothes shopping trip I’ve also added an addendum that that which I love must also be flattering or at the very least not unflattering – a stipulation you would think should go without saying but one look at some of the items that have found their way into my wardrobe disproves that theory rather conclusively. I found a little hand made clothes boutique in Positano, Italy by the name of “Nadir”. I could have purchased about 80% of the clothes in that store and stayed true to my “must love it” commandment. I spent hours in there whilst my friends were at the beach. It was a very emotional experience given that the skirts were going for €200 – €250 and therefore completely out of reach of my frugal little fingers. I wish I had of taken photos of the skirts because they were the real show stoppers but a few shots of the more affordable bits and pieces I did buy and a screen shot of their website that hasn’t been updated since 2007 will have to suffice.

I came away with a passionate desire to buy a sewing machine and learn how to make skirts. It’s definitely still on the to do list.

Do you like a sexy website? Then check out A Tasty Pixel. I unabashedly and oh so biasedly testify that A Tasty Pixel is the super swankiest software website you’ll come across this side of eleven cyber rivers.   It’s amazing to think that just a year and a half ago the most creative thing I’d done since high school was a few doodles whilst conducting market research over the phone. Now with a bit of digital rendering magiks by my partner my doodles adorn a real life business website and I’m so proud of the little guys. A Tasty Pixel is the new face of my partner’s not so new software development business. He makes nifty apps for the iphone amongst other things and he’s super passionate about it. It’s his bag. We’re both really happy with the concept we came up with. It’s very playful and whimsical and injects the business with a good dose of personality. Click through the different pages to see a different illustration on each – my favourite is on the contact page and my other favourite is on the Talkie page. Please let us know what you think!

It’s that time again. A bit of Best of 2009 batching coming up…

December 9 Challenge

Something that really made you grow this year. That made you go to your edge and then some. What made it the best challenge of the year for you?

See “New Food” entry below.

December 10 Album of the year.

What’s rocking your world?

I discovered “The Flight of the Concords” this year and I can’t get enough of their albums. They make me laugh out loud every time. A spin off from this is that I also discovered David Bowie, which I wrote about here.  

The old school Bowie songs that are rocking my world (for all those closet Bowie groupies out there) are “Boys Keep Swinging” , “Alabama Song”, and “Ashes to Ashes”.

I’m really going to geek out now and list the often cheeky sometimes torrid lyrics that make his music so deliciously freaky:

“Life’s a pop of the cherry when you’re a boy”… “When you’re a boy you can wear a uniform, when you’re a boy other boys check you out, when you’re a boy you can learn to drive and everything”.

~ Boys Keep Swinging

“We must find our way to the next whiskey bar or I tell you we must die”… “Oh show us the way to the next little girl. Oh don’t ask why, no don’t ask why. We must find the next little girl for if we don’t find the next little girl I tell you we must die”. [creepy, no?]

~ Alabama Song

“Ashes to ashes, funk to funky, we know Major Tom’s a junky”.

~ Ashes to Ashes

December 11 The best place.

A coffee shop? A pub? A retreat center? A cubicle? A nook?

It’s a tie:

Ireland

VS

Sicily

They’re so different they’re the proverbial apples and oranges so I can’t decide between the two. The photo of Ireland is of the Dingle Peninsula. It’s a place that could make you believe in faeries and magik. The photo of Sicily was taken on a hike in the Mt Etna national park. I remarked to my partner Mike on our hike that just when I think I’ve seen a place so beautiful nothing could ever compare we travel somewhere new and see something even more beautiful. However, Sicily stole my heart not for it’s beautiful scenery but for it’s beautiful people. I honestly never knew that people could be so kind and open and genuinely friendly. We were treated like family by complete strangers. We were invited to stay at people’s homes, join their celebrations and were taken on personal guided tours that lasted all day and all night and then invited to do it all again.

December 12 New food.

You’re now in love with Lebanese food and you didn’t even know what it was in January of this year.

I well and truly conquered my seafood phobia this year, which I wrote about here. I’m still not a seafood lover but I do salivate over a nice fresh piece of pesce spada (a Sicilian favourite – sword fish) and I know I can eat texture challenging jiblets like oysters and tentacles if I must.

I’m batching my responses to “Best of 2009″ so here are the three latest.

December 6 Workshop or conference. Was there a conference or workshop you attended that was especially beneficial? Where was it? What did you learn?

I bravely went to my very first mixed media workshop this year, about 6 months after taking up painting. Unfortunately, by the time I heard about the retreat most of the classes were booked out and I missed out on some kick-ass stuff. But I still did manage to squeeze into a workshop on “collage with found treasures” by DJ Pettitt, whose work I am continually inspired by. I was very excited to learn recently that she’s in the process of creating an online class on digitally altering photos. I just can’t wait! What’s even more exciting is that she may be creating another online class of the very workshop that I was gutted to miss out on earlier in the year – book making. I’ve wanted to learn bookbinding techniques since I took up mixed media art a year ago and DJ’s books are so beautiful. I swear I did a little happy dance when I learnt about these online classes. Bring ‘em on DJ!

December 7 Blog find of the year. That gem of a blog you can’t believe you didn’t know about until this year.

My latest blog crush is on Andrea’s ABC Creativity: Create your own happily ever after. Every time I visit this blog I read something that I can relate to so completely it’s eerie, like she’s writing my thoughts only more eloquently and insightfully. Andrea description of her blog is that it “is filled with tips, encouragement, support and tools for your creative journey”.

December 8 Moment of peace. An hour or a day or a week of solitude. What was the quality of your breath? The state of your mind? How did you get there?

Hmmm, I don’t remember the last time I had an hour of solitude, let alone a day or week! But I do remember a moment of peace. The type you get when you know you’ve made a massive life changing decision and it was absolutely the right thing to do and that every thing’s going to be okay and so much better than okay. I wrote this in my journal on the 12th July, 2 weeks after arriving in the UK to embark on our long-term slow travel throughout Europe – “This is probably the most amazing thing we’ll do in our lives and this is the beginning. It is all ahead of us”. We’d just purchased our motorhome “Nettle” (as yet unnamed) and were waiting for the money transfer to go through so we could pick her up. So often in life we feel that where we are (the city we live in, the friends we have, our job) is a culmination of seemingly random events or decisions made too young, too flippantly or without direction. That we’ve been swept along by a current stronger than our own will, that we didn’t choose to be where we are, we just ended up there. In that moment I experienced the peace of mind that comes with knowing that I had made a conscious decision about how I wanted to live my life and had made it happen. I wonder how many people in life are lucky enough to have such an opportunity. Is there a greater blessing than that?

This year has been a year worthy of reflection so I was excited to discover the best of 2009 blog challenge. Thirty-one “best ___” prompts for each day of the month of December. Here are the first five:

Best Trip

I just love that photo. To me, it makes me think “journey”. We took this photo at the very beginning of our adventure. We’d been in the UK a few weeks, had bought our motorhome and named her “Nettle” and driven her through the English country side very tentatively. We travelled through Ireland and Northern Ireland for a month, drove to Paris to catch up with friends then down to Italy and ended up spending three months there and finding our home away from home in Sicily and then onto Tunisia in North Africa where we are now. Yeah, it’s been pretty good. My partner has blogged about our trip so far in impressive detail on his blog.

Best Restaurant Moment

I’m going to take some creative license here and interpret “best” as “most memorable” – I’m not sure best can really be used to refer to a meal where tentacles are involved. Whilst in the Mt Etna region of Sicily a local by the name of Nucchio took us under his wing and spent seemingly every spare moment he had showing us the sights, taking us to car rallies and making us eat scary things. Neither Mike or I are big on seafood. I’ve only very recently been able to eat fish that’s not battered, deep fried, and served wrapped up in paper with chips.

Once at the restaurant we sat down and didn’t order a thing. Unlike every other restaurant in the world they bring you whatever was caught that day and you eat what you’re given. First course was approximately nine different dishes, including things I swear I never thought I would eat, namely tentacles, oysters, other gooey things in shells and unshelled prawns that smelt funky. It was all surprisingly palatable, except for the funky smelling prawns. Second course was another 9 dishes or so with pasta and risotto thrown in. Nucchio warned us to expect an obscene amount of food and we had fasted in preparation but the pasta pushed me over the edge. Third course was aborted due to the very real threat of exploding and making a mess. I later cursed my non-Sicilian sized stomach when I learned pesce spada was to be had – my new favourite seafood, sword fish. Our relief at not having to put anything else in our mouths was short lived when biscuits and nuts with a small glass of the best lemon slushy I’ve ever tasted was brought out. Seven different bottles of alcohol were placed on our table and I cracked Nucchio up with my baffled expression. Apparently we were in for a serious night of hard drinking. Each one was to be drunk in a particular order. There was pistachio liqueur, grappa (good for digestion and stripping paint), chocolate liqueur, limoncello, lemon cream (my favourite) and some yucky brown bitter tasting stuff made by monks. Seems like a very un-monkish thing to do to me. Naughty monks.

We finished off the night by walking around the lovely mediaeval town and being followed by a cat that sounded like a frog.

Fun Fact to know and tell: the restaurant was in the town where scenes from The Godfather were shot, including the church were he gets married.

Best Article

Gave me chills and brought tears to my eyes…

Here are my highlights for the time poor:

The intro:

“When I was invited to give this speech, I was asked if I could give a simple short talk that was “direct, naked, taut, honest, passionate, lean, shivering, startling, and graceful.” No pressure there… Important rules like don’t poison the water, soil, or air, don’t let the earth get overcrowded, and don’t touch the thermostat have been broken…”

Lines that make my heart go thump:

“And here’s the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don’t be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done… Conservative spokesmen ridiculed the abolitionists as liberals, progressives, do-gooders, meddlers, and activists. They were told they would ruin the economy and drive England into poverty. But for the first time in history a group of people organized themselves to help people they would never know, from whom they would never receive direct or indirect benefit… We have an economy that tells us that it is cheaper to destroy earth in real time rather than renew, restore, and sustain it. You can print money to bail out a bank but you can’t print life to bail out a planet. At present we are stealing the future, selling it in the present, and calling it gross domestic product.”

The Clincher:

Each of us is as complex and beautiful as all the stars in the universe. We have done great things and we have gone way off course in terms of honoring creation. You are graduating to the most amazing, stupefying challenge ever bequested to any generation. The generations before you failed… Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn’t ask for a better boss.”

- PAUL HAWKEN

Best Book

“Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell” by Susanna Clarke

My favourite whimsies (no spoilers, just tasters):

“Upon other evenings the gilt lettering upon the drawers proclaimed the contents to be such things as: Mace (Blades), Mustard (Unhusked), Nutmeg, Ground Fennel, Bay Leaves, Pepper of Jamaica, Essence of Ginger, Caraway, Peppercorns and Vinegar and all the other stock of a fashionable and prosperous grocery business. But now the words appeared to read: Mercy (Deserved), Mercy (Undeserved), Nightmare, Good Fortune, Bad Fortune, Persecution by Families, Ingratitude of Children, Confusion, Perspicacity and Veracity. It was as well that none of them noticed this odd change. Mrs Brandy would have been most distressed by it had she known. She would not have had the least notion what to charge for these new commodities…”

“Oak trees can be befriended and will aid you against your enemies if they think your cause is just. Birch woods are well known for providing doors into Faerie. Ash trees will never cease to mourn until the Raven King comes”.

And I love her characterisation of faeries:

“In men reason is strong and magic is weak. With fairies it is the other way round: magic comes very naturally to them, but by human standards they are barely sane.”

Best Night Out

Taking in the sights of London at night with my man and my best girl pal who I hadn’t seen in over a year. Westminster bridge, Jubilee walkway, floodlit Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, #10 Downing Street for a spot of tea with Gordon, Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, Piccadilly, Soho and Oxford Circus. We all wanted to amputate our feet by the end of the night. Good times…

I’m not sure if I like this piece. I think it falls into the category of “It’s nice but I wouldn’t want it on the living room wall”. It’s my first abstract landscape painting and I’m looking forward to doing lots more. It was born after I read an article in Cloth Paper Scissors by Serena Barton. I just love her abstract landscapes and she was the catalyst for my new favourite fine art technique: tea bag stains.

What I do like about this piece are the details. I can see a few paintings within the painting that appeal to me much more than the whole: