The Royal Wedding

Congratulations to HRH Prince William Duke of Cambridge and his beautiful bride Catherine Duchess of Cambridge. I was glued to the TV yesterday and and since my husband wasn't all that interested in the wedding, he took the littlie into the garden and kept him amused (mostly trampoline bouncing I believe). 
I have to say though I cant chastise him too much for his lack of interest in our future monarch, because not only did he afford me the time to watch the wedding, have a diet blowing lunch of little sandwiches and dainty cakes, but he also bought me a new ring, since I don't have an engagement ring (I did have one, but its a long story). Some of you may recognize the ring it is modeled after.
Have a lovely bank holiday everyone.

The Seaside

Did I mention the nursery we viewed was at the seaside? My husband and myself went to school in this small place and spent many summer holidays on the beach there. It makes it all very seductive. The nursery was quite small, the building and the number of children (18 to be precise), which I think will work better for the littlie. He is not used to large volumes of people around him, so a big nursery would possibly be very overwhelming.
The first place opens up in July so we have put our name down for it. I can foresee the littlie asking to be taken to the beach park instead though because he had a wonderful time there, just the two of us, this afternoon.

Choices

Lately I have had to make some tough choices, some good, some bad and some undecidedly neither as yet. Today, my husband the littlie and I are off to look over a nursery. It is in a lovely area and in the middle price range of the private nursery sector, but of course that doesn't mean it is necessarily any better than any other nursery. It doesn't mean I want to 'leave' my son in the hands of strangers 1 or 2 days a week. It also doesn't mean my son will want to stay there. What I do know right now, is that I will benefit from 2 days a week to work on my creative endeavors and he will benefit from the company of other children. Both of these things are dependent on both of us being willing to let go of each other, just a little bit. What a choice to make.

A Lovely Weekend

Well first of all, the trampoline was a huge success. I don't have any photos just now because they are still on my husbands iphone. He is going to put them on to a 'dropbox' account or something, I have no idea what it is but as soon as I have some photo's I will post them up.
I hope everyone had a lovely Easter weekend. We had a very relaxing time and even though it rained for a while, it coincided with our egg decorating and the littlies afternoon nap so it wasn't too bad. My husband had Monday off work too so I even managed to fit in some painting. Its a 3 day week for him this week because he is off again for the Royal Wedding on Friday (and May Day on the following Monday), so its probably going to be next weekend before we know it.

Here is the littlie in his Easter Crown, the winner of the egg decorating contest won the crown and a little prize. Funny how the crown fitted the 'winner' like a glove ;)

I Love The Sun On Our Backs

Our back garden is a reasonable size, big enough for the wee guy to play in, but unfortunately its fairly shaded for most of the day. This tends to make it quite cold for most of the day, until we hit late July early August, then it is warm enough in general to play in the shade. By comparison, the front garden (we live in a 1950s terraced house), is quite small, and very overlooked, in fact its on a main bus route and every Tom, Dick and Harry peers in to the garden and the lounge window (to my 'great' annoyance). The front garden however, is very very warm, a veritable sun-trap in fact. So, despite being a bit shy and a bit paranoid, I take the littlie out into the front garden to play, because out there, he is able to do this.

We have had such excellent fun the last few days, I only hope the weather stays good, because my husband was in the back garden until 11.20pm last night building a 6ft trampoline. As I am typing this in the lounge, the littlie is running between the lounge and the dining room (terrorizing the cats), and as yet he hasn't looked out of the sliding doors in the dining room. When he does, he will see a hulking great trampoline taking up most of the garden. Its amusing me no end that he hasn't noticed it yet. I will let you know how it goes tomorrow. In the mean time, here is a round up of the last few days.

Wednesdays Most Wanted

Well, it should be fashion, but like I said before, I get bored very easily. If truth be told, I have been busy looking at artists blogs and websites and not had time to fit in fashion as well. So, here are some of my 'most wanted' artists, in the style of Pop Surrealism.

Aunia Kahn - HERE

Esao Andrews - HERE

Ania Tomicka - HERE

Brandi Milne - HERE

James Jean - HERE

Joshua Petker - HERE

Fantasy

I am still painting and researching for my new project 'Pop Surrealism'. I have an ideas for a whole series of paintings. Its funny, once I started sketching, all of these ideas came tumbling out, and it has been difficult deciding what to leave out as opposed to what to put in. Can you tell it has engaged me? The old problems are ever present, no time to fit it in. The littlie didnt go to sleep until 9pm last night, and by then I was fairly pooped myself. In my fantasy world, I would have all the time in the world to play with my son all day long, and as the sun sets I would sip a glass of wine while listening to some light jazz on the radio and be painting away in my fabulous studio. Yeah! fantasy.
And talking of fantasy, I found a wonderful artist on my internet research travels. I think her work is a bit of a fusion of fantasy art and pop surrealism, which to me at least, are 2 different categorys. Please take a look at her work it is wonderful. ANIA TOMICKA

Art Therapy

Its fair to say my last post was pretty depressive, putting it down on the blog has actually helped me retain the memory of how bad I felt that day. While I was typing that out on Friday morning I had a headache, by lunchtime it was a migraine. Its Sunday and its still lingering. It is apparently quite common for migraine's to be preceded by a depressive episode, I didn't know that until yesterday. I was taking medication 3 times a day for migraines up until I became pregnant last year. When I lost the baby I started taking them again, but obviously now we are trying for a baby again I have had to stop. I guess I need to look into alternative treatment.
To distract myself from the migraine and the doldrums I have started a new painting, and I am very excited about it. I have been looking at a lot of POP SURREALIST art recently and it has inspired me into painting something in a pop surrealist style of my own. I used to paint this way as a teenager, my Higher Grade art exam had a section in it where you had to design a book cover (anyone my age who took Higher Art will probably remember this element of the exam). My design was definitely Pop Surrealist, I cant tell you how much I wish I still had my school artwork.
I looked at a few different artists for inspiration, here are some links to the ones I really like

ANA BAGAYAN
AUNIA KAHN
AUDREY KAWASAKI
STELLA IM HULTBURG
ZOE LACCHEI
XUE WANG

You may notice they are all women? I like the male artists work, but I also like to see what my peers are doing, and for me that means women. There are many excellent works by male Pop Surrealist artists available on the web for anyone interested in this art movement.
I hope to have a painting of my own to show you soon.

*Painting in this post is by Zoe Lacchei, see link above.

Boredom Kills

If you think the post title is a little over dramatic? I would have to disagree, boredom and loneliness do kill. They kill the spirit as seriously as any physical death kills. I wouldn't say I was dead yet but I am certainly a pale comparison of some of my former selves. I say that, because I have been here before. When my daughter (now 19), was 2, I was desperately lonely. I remember wailing and throwing myself around the place in front of my unsympathetic (1st) husband. He was so far from understanding that I had to run away. I was in my nightgown at the time and lived in a block of flats, so only got as far as the hall landing. I did remedy the situation then though, that's when I took up a drawing class 2 afternoons a week. The next year I took a full time drawing course, the year after that I did an HNC course, the year after that I went to art school and the year after that I left my unsympathetic husband.
My littlie is 2 now, I guess its my cut off point, where I cannot take the loneliness and isolation of being at home alone EVERY day. I don't visit any friends, they don't visit me. There is no-one to watch the littlie for a few hours to let me do something for 'me'. The mother and toddler group didn't suit us, I don't swim, or go to the gym or yoga, or dance or pottery or................. I think you get the picture.
On the plus side, my husband is a wonderful man. Unfortunately its bad timing for me to be asking for more time/attention. Like many companies his employer has cut back on staff due to the recession and this means longer working hours for the staff lucky enough to still have jobs (much longer). He has received a pay increase by way of compensation (chopping lots of staff salaries has afforded a chosen few a couple of thousand extra wages per year). But even though I do like financial security, I have never been all about the money. I would rather have more time than more money. We cant change that situation for now.
I dont know how to change my daily monotony. Dont get me wrong, I am not looking for someone to take the littlie for me, I LOVE being with him, but pretty soon, he isnt going to love being with his tearful moody mother.

I read this story last night about it.
There was a woman who had an Aunt. This Aunt used to break the boredom of her life by every once in a while, putting on her finest clothes and walking around the 'poshest' shops in the city where she lived. Due to financial instability, her husband was sent to work in a new area out in the sticks. There were no posh shops and the Aunt began to shrivel up in her perfect little home with her darling little children. One day, she cleaned her kitchen floor, put on her finest clothes, took her husbands shotgun and blew her head off. Every woman alive knows why she washed the floor first.

I don't want to blow my head off, but I think I need to blow the lid off these feelings. I just don't know if I am quite desperate enough to give myself the push yet.

Hello Wind & Rain

As we expected, the lovely weather didn't last very long here at all. It has rained every day since Monday. There have been sunny periods but it has mostly been windy too, and being in Scotland its a cold north wind that blows. My littlie has had his cute little nose pressed against the window most of the time, looking longingly at his newly filled sandpit. He also knows the 10 pack of bubbles from the pound shop are for the garden. So, with that in mind, when we got a break in the clouds I dressed him appropriately and opened the doors. Its amazing how wee ones dont feel the cold when they are skipping around transporting sludgy sand from one place to another. Mummy on the other hand, was freezing her butt off. It was so worth it to see that smile though.

Wednesdays Most Wanted

Vintage Chic

I love vintage clothes, well vintage anything actually, you may have picked up on that already, but being the size I am seriously hampers vintage clothes buying. The problem is, even if you find clothes in the right size, you can look very frumpy in them if you are overweight. At 41 I know I cant get away with the same things a 20 year old can, but even so, the last thing I want to do is look older than I am.
I am on a weight loss program though, so I decided to take a peek at what the internet has to offer. Obviously car-boot sales and local charity shops are a cheaper alternative, but if you live in an area where second hand style is on the light side, here is what I found.

Top Left - Multicoloured Velvet Jacket - £40 - HERE
Top Middle - Glittering Lurex 1960's Bag - £26 - HERE
Top Right - Vintage 1960s Snakeskin Bag - £32.50 HERE
Bottom Left - Sorry SOLD
Bottom Middle - Spider Brooch 1920s-30s - £18  HERE
Bottom Right - 1960s Hot Pink Dress - £65 - HERE

As I said, some of them are quite expensive but most websites have a 'clearance' area worth a look.
And while we are on the subject of Vintage, please take a look at the handmade jewelery of 
Ruby Dixie found HERE, the designer and maker is Jakki  from the Hastings area. I love the unique style she has created, I will be pointing my husband in that direction for my next birthday.

Memory Lane

Recently some old baby/childhood pictures were unearthed by my Aunt, and seeing them took me right back to childhood again. In the spring of 1976 when I was 6 years old, my Mum went to hospital and because Dad had to work I was sent to live with my Gran. My Mum didn't come back for over 4 months. I expect it seemed like an eternity to me at the time, and as the school holidays rolled around anyone around at that time may remember, so did the great heatwave of 1976. I probably didn't understand a lot of what was going on, and I cant even recall visiting Mum, although I know I did. I do recall my Uncle taking me home to visit my pet rabbits and becoming really upset because he didn't have a key to let me in to my own house (Dad was working), and also I was stung on the ankle by a bee ( a traumatic day indeed).
Mum was not ill though, she was in fact in hospital desperately trying to hang on to her twin pregnancy. Medicine was not nearly as advanced then and premature babies had a lot less of a chance than they do now. Anyway, Mum and the twins were amongst the lucky ones and she held on to them until 36 weeks. They were born on 9th July 1976 and both weighed under 4lbs each. They were both quite ill and with one baby in particular it was touch and go. My parents were advised to have them baptized if they were that way inclined.
I cant remember the exact date, I am sure Mum does, but I do remember the day the car pulled up outside and in the back Mum was holding one healthy baby and Gran was holding another (yeah, no car seats at that time).
Now I was properly a big sister to my twin sister and brother. They were still tiny and a bit odd looking, but I fell in love with them. I remember that new baby smell filling the house and I am sure to this day that's when I decided I wanted to be a Mum. I think I really got a sense of how precious they were.
They will be 35 this year and both big and healthy with children of their own but to me they will always be my little twins.

Me with Tiny Tears, Christmas 1976

EDIT

In the interest of full disclosure here are two more photos, the first is my sister when she got home from hospital, September 1976. The second is a rare photo of the twins on their birthday. My sister lives in Auckland NZ, so it is rare for them to spend birthdays together, this was 2006.

Ebay Is My Downfall

So, I have told myself not to shop for the house just now because hopefully we will be moving soon, but then I see something on Ebay (yes I know, I shouldn't be looking), and I cant help myself, especially if its a bargain.

3 vintage Ladybird Books - £2.99 inc p&p

Hooray

Another beautiful day came our way.

It Has Been A Long Winter

After spending a long winter 'trying' to think up activities to keep the littlie amused (and often failing), its amazing how quickly I forget that not all play needs thought up in advance. All we needed was one sunny day to remind us.

Aah dirt, isn't it wonderful.

Women Who Run With Wolves

"What is the basic nutrition for the soul? Well, it differs from creature to creature, but here are some combinations. ... For some women air, night, sunlight, and trees are necessities. For others, words, paper, and books are the only things that satiate. For others, color, form, shadow, and clay at the absolutes. Some women must leap, bow, and run, for their souls crave dance. Yet others crave only a tree-leaning peace."

 Maybe this book  Women Who Run With Wolves is something a lot of people have read, and its an 'oh yes, I read that years ago / as a teenager / in college etc, book, but I stumbled apon it by accident when going through the 'what other people bought' function on Amazon. Now, its one of those books which say, every woman should read this, this is more than just a book its life-changing bla-bla-bla, and in the past I have read other books with these labels attached, and been quite disappointed. However, this books seems to be living up to its reputation. I am only a small way in and it has uplifted my spirit already. 

The majority of the book consists of folk/fairy tales and legends, put together in a way to best represent the origins of the story. The author has studied the same stores told over and over again and found the common 'bones' of them. The stories are about women, and in particular 'the wild woman'. I couldn't begin to explain it, but to me, in essence, its the free woman buried under all the crap of living, and as the book says, she may be silent, but if she spies a loophole big enough she is sure to slip out. (Gosh, I really am a big hippie after all).

Anyway, I would highly recommend this book to anyone feeling a need for change or lifting out of themselves. I will be sure to let you know how it pans out.

'So what comprises the Wild Woman?... she is the female soul, yet she is more. She is the source of the feminine. She is all that is of instinct, of the worlds both seen and hidden-she is the basis. We each receive from her a glowing cell which contains all the instincts and knowings needed for our lives.

....She is the Life/Death/Life force, she is the incubator. She is intuition, she is far-seer, she is deep listener, she is loyal heart. She encourages humans to remain multi-lingual; fluent in the languages of dreams, passion and poetry. She whispers from night dreams, she leaves behind on the terrain of a woman's soul a coarse hair and muddy footprints. These fill women with longing to find her, free her and love her'

Wednesdays Most Wanted

Animal Magnetism
I am never very sure about animal print, it seems to go nicely with the over-tanned loop earrings style. Like Mrs Moon here

But surely so many designers cant be wrong? Decide for yourself, earrings and bump optional.

 

Top Left - Sleeveless Dress - £209 -  HERE

Top Right - D&G Print Cardigan - £240 - HERE

Bottom Left - Moschino Print Coat - £695 - HERE

Bottom Right - Jimmy Choo Lockett Shoes - £445 - HERE

Top Left - Asda Dippy Print Dress - £10 - HERE

Top Right - M&S Animal Mac - £69 - HERE

Bottom Left - New Look Printed Shrug - £19.99 - HERE

Bottom Right - Dune Animal Print Court Shoe - £53 - HERE

Looking Back

My favorite moment on Mothers Day this year was this.

I may be talking about another baby, but I don't half love the one I have got.