Saturday, 13 August 2016

The cat and the pansy...

The villian in my life,  or Harvey, he who rules.  Or at least I let him think he is in charge.    Wish I could say that it has been a quiet week, but it hasn't,  had a large chunk of stress on Thursday,  all caused by officialdom.   It should be sorted out this week, or so I've been promised. 

Until Thursday the week hadn't been too bad, aside from the weather, the usual summer stuff: rain, wind, dip in temperature.   Of course this didn't help Harvey's grumpy mood,  though I found out why he was grumpy, he had a tummy upset and was sick all over the carpet.   After that he was fine, though the grumpiness came back.  He's also been on wake up duty, or so he thinks,  just wish he'd remember that he has claws, that they are sharp and that there is no need to use them to wake me.    So what have I been up to, a bit of small housebuilding...


Nope, a bit of art.  I saw a step by step in Liesure Painter, so decided to have a go.  Plus it was for coloured pencils!   It is a Trompe l'oeil,  which is sort of a trick, or illusion.  In this case it is to make you think that there is a piece of paper lying on a piece of paper.  Hopefully it will look like that when it is finished. This was my first attempt.  The exercise used a technique I've never used,  you had to grate a pencil on a tea strainer, then use the 'bits' to shade the paper.  It took a bit of practice, first run wasn't so good, I'd got too much pencil dust, so had another go and it was much better.   This was going well until I made a hash of things with the eraser and left a dirty mark.  So it was a case of starting over!



This is take two,  it is hard to make out, but it is a pansy.  The pencil lines are deliberately faint.  I've also cleaned the eraser.  I'm happier with take two,  it is coming along nicely.  This is just the first layer of colour,   there will be a darker purple, then some cool grey, and some payne's grey.  It all takes time to blend in, and to get the lines in the right place to make it look like a flower.    But the Olympics are helping,  I can sit and colour while watching.   I've had to use the PC to watch most of the tennis and the golf. 

Today I did some gardening, or planted the new plant, then the neighbour came along and gave me a hand.  He helped fix one of the planters, then put some fresh compost in for me.  He's such a lovely chap, and his wife is nice,  both are really helpful.   I'd have not managed to do anything with the planter without his help.   He will also break up the old and rotten planter,  then we can cart it up to the tip, along with some stuff he needs to get rid of. 

So it is art for the next week or so, and also the Olympics,  we're doing very nicely for Gold medals!  Hope Andy can add another, although he is guaranteed a silver medal, but gold is a nice colour. 

Enjoy the week ahead.

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