Creative Update

Another night when I am not sure what to say. I am not sure I have much in me right now. The last few weeks have been draining and the things on my mind are things I have already written about. I am tired. Work next week is going to be horrendous. Work, eat and sleep will be the name of the game next week.... Assuming all works out that is.

I have not done anything much creative. Luckily the grand Xmas making was well in progress. The nasty necklace I was stuck on for the future m-i-l is a non-starter, with her preferred length and it being a slow grower and all but I have decided to just make her the one necklace this year. This just leaves one for my Aunt and one for my Mum.

My Aunt's is in progress. It is a series of beaded beads that will be strung onto a piece of satin cord. While ill I have made about 6 beads and I shall stop when I get bored or run out of time.

My Mum's remaining necklace doesn't need to be finished until the end of January and will be a silver loom lariat to match her bracelet.

My Great Aunt and my Gran are getting silk scarves this year. One is done but the other is in progress. I have done the base colour and now I need to trace the design on using clear gesso before finishing to add colour. Nothing to complicated really....

I was going to do other things for Xmas but money is now going to be somewhat tighter than anticipated and I still have the men to buy for. I also now have a lot less time and energy for all the crafting. I have more silk scarves I was planning on painting but I think I need to go gently now.

The rest of this year is going to be about taking it slowly, gently and very, very easily. Then in the new year I am going to hopefully be fitter to attack life again a bit. My house certainly needs attacking...

I still have blog candy and pass it forwards to finish. I am determined to finish these but I am not going to take on anything else like this for some time. It occurs to me that most of my crafting is for others and my house could really use some craftiness. Very, very badly. And some decluttering. A lot of that really....

I still want to learn to crochet and felting looks like great fun and then there are rag rugs, curtain making and other bits of sewing... I could use some matching curtains, table runner and mats for the dining room for instance. I want a beautiful home....

Drain

I have come to realise why I stopped making jewellery. I have come to realise why I have been known to have a hobby that one day I suddenly turn round and never, ever do again.

I like taking a little extra time over The Artist's Way. I like giving my subconscious time to get messages through. I like having time to allow synchronicity to provide a few answers and ideas.

I am not sure where this bit came from, I am sure I read about it in there somewhere. Sometimes we create in such a way as to drain ourselves. We force ourselves to keep going. We drain our souls. We have to give ourselves time to replenish our creativity and we have to respect ourselves and be true to our muse...

I don't enjoy creating jewellery for certain people. The sorts of things they would wear and enjoy don't inspire me. They are neither challenging or interesting to make and I don't find the finished product inspiring in any way really. Some people are easy to make fun things for, they love colour and they have a funky sense of style.

Last year I had a few weeks off after crashing out of my teacher training. I also had a few weeks off just before Christmas between jobs. I made beaded artwork after beaded artwork. I had so many things I sent a handful off to be sold (two did sell!). And then before I completed all my presents, I crashed. I couldn't face another bead.

I have been making a few things again for this years pressies and suddenly I have hit the second piece for a certain person... It is in translucent and pale peach beads so there is hardly any colour to it. It is a simple spiral so there is nothing challenging or exciting about it. I am finding it difficult to make. It is draining. It is work, not fun.

But having started, I am going to continue.

I like making gothy chokers for my niece. I like putting together funky shapes and colours for my Mum and my Aunt. But I seldom enjoy pieces I make for some others...

Morning

I find myself slowing again and feeling grumpy and I wonder if maybe my lack of morning pages is beginning to show. I think their benefit is clear... I shall start again I will. I think though they set challenges in that they uncover things and bring them out into the open....

I am tired and sleeping oddly with many and varied dreams. One saw a huge Lime tree that grows in my parents garden, supporting many sunflowers in it's upper brances - an odd sight to be sure! No idea what that means! Or where it came from...

I must get on with them for they definitely have their rewards. My head is quieter. I am more even tempered. I am more creative as long as I get them done. Strange how such a simple thing can do so much. Strange how something so simple can be so hard.

Angels and Demons

This post is a bit of a work in progress but I figure if I start writing more will come out as well. It is for my The Artist's Way book (TAW) which I am doing with a group called On The Wing. The book asks you to think back to discover who some of your monsters and heroes were. Those who encouraged your artistic endeavours and those who didn't, who damaged instead.

***

Miss W was the first teacher I had when I changed school at seven. She was in charge of a tiny class which I was part of and the year above which was larger. We were all in the same room together and I spent two years there. When I joined the school, I was the youngest in the whole school. I loved to write. It was agreed I had a fantastic imagination but somehow that didn't feel like an entirely positive thing, or at least not positive enough to outweigh the problems with my writing.

***

When TAW talks about the censer I see an old woman with grey hair in a bun and glasses in a 70s styley with slight wings to the side and a glasses chain round her neck. She is looking over the top of them a little. She looks bored and boring, self righteous, fuddy duddy.... She is sat at a desk stacked high with papers and she has a pen, and old fashioned one and a jar of ink. She is scrutinising each and every paper and destroying it slowly under the weight of her own marks...

You see my brain had the story and my pen struggled to keep up. My handwriting was awful. There was no grammar or punctuation. My sentences went on and on and there was just no stopping them. And as for my spelling....

They looked at my work and tested me for dyslexia. I wasn't dyslexic. They put me in the 'special' classes at lunch times to make sure I caught up. Everything I did wasn't good enough because I was behind. At the school I had come from I had spent the year with a lovely teacher. It was all play based but I remember more lessons from that classroom than I do the ones before or immediately after. Somehow all that play and fun became bad because now I was behind and that just wouldn't do.

It took me years to figure out but I eventually did... In my old school which was state run, I had been one of the oldest children. My birthday fell very close to the cut off point for that year and I just missed out on being in the year above. My new school didn't worry about dates and cut off points for the year. I got put up a year by accident and no one realised. Maybe my spelling and grammar and punctuation and sentence structure were not as bad as all that.... Maybe they didn't have to destroy my stories to make my writing perfect, but they did....

***

After I spent my two years in that class, I moved to a new one with a new teacher Miss E. Miss E was a spinster nearing retirement but she had an energy to her. There was no lack of discipline in her class and sometimes she was hard and strict but she was always consistent and fair. Both my sister and I liked being in her class. I don't so much remember her lessons as things that happened and some of the rules. If you were stuck you couldn't queue at her desk if there were more than three there. If you were there you had to listen to what she was saying to others in case it helped you.

She was very Christian and one girl had a copy of the Demon Headmaster. It was taken away. One time I picked up an out of date factual book and she saw it and took it from me and ripped it up because it was out of date. I remember wanting to take it out of the bin and make it better...

I remember that she always said I would write a book one day. She said it more than once and she said it to my Mum as well, who repeated it to me. I remember that belief in me. I remember that rules and discipline are not counter to care and love. You can be strict and loving at the same time, if you do it right....

***

Later on when we had different teachers for different subjects there was Mrs D. She mis-prounounced my name for years but I never told her, it wasn't important. She was an English teacher and she taught us to dissect questions for reading comprehension. She had us take different parts in Shakespeare and read aloud, which helped us all understand it, Shakespeare has to be spoken....

She knew I had book club money even though it was mostly younger ones that used it lots. There was always something there choosen for me, something she thought I might like. She encouraged.

Mrs D is both a hero and a monster. She is a monster because she had to mark and to her red pen, my writing was never perfect, no matter how much soul I put in it. I don't think marking is always a good thing. If a clever and able child who can write well can't get full marks then who can? What good does that do anyone?

She is a hero because she gave us interesting things to write about and encouraged us to love books and writing. Because when I found myself writing a pagan creation myth that came from nowhere she didn't treat it as anything other than a good piece of writing. In such a Christian school she could very easily have made a lot of trouble with that piece of writing. Instead it was entered as a piece of coursework for my GCSE. This was however a mixed blessing as none of us ever got any of our coursework back....

***

And now for an art teacher or two... Both I think monsters.

We had a task to create a picture using white, black and newspaper. I created a fish jumping out of a river. It was a simple enough picture and din't take too long but the fish was exactly as I wanted it. The river was exactly as I wanted it. The clouds were exactly as I wanted them. I had managed to reproduce the picture in my head perfectly. I liked it. He didn't. It didn't tick some nice little box that he had I guess.

I remember one time we had to pick two letters and find a font and use those two letters to mask out areas across a page and colour the gaps inbetween. I liked what I produced. So did the art teacher. I remember him staring at it intently and then saying that he thought I would make a good little artist, probably even better than my sister.

Now I have issues with my sister, she has long time been built up and me knocked down in order to try and make us more equal. What started as a compliment turned into trouble as soon as he said I might be better than her. I wasn't allowed to be better than her. Not really....

In the art room there was a long row of cupboards down one side and on top was a huge number of fantastic items for people to draw. Things that had been collected over years and years from all over the world. They drew us like moths to a flame but we couldn't touch and God forbid we try and draw them. They were too hard and they were for the real artists who did A-level or maybe towards the end of GCSE. I never, ever got anywhere near them. I am sure I could have had a damn good go if someone had given me some nice pastels to play with....

***

My last hero is an unlikely one, a gay chemistry teacher. He had a class full of girls who were not necessarily overly interested in the finer intricacies of chemistry. He did all the fun stuff, maybe not teaching exactly what he should but making sure we had some fun in there too... He made purple smoke one day in the fume cupboard. He showed us interesting reactions and had us play with fun substances. He blew things up and burned them. We didn't like the proper chemistry and all those titrations but we liked the other bits.

He leant me a book one day. Out of the blue I think. The Enigma Score by Sheri S. Tepper. I havn't read it in years but Sheri S. Tepper is one of my favourite authors to this day and one day I shall re-read that old book just to see if it is in much the same style as her later books. You see her current stuff is high fantasy with a woman's rights and environmental twist. She doesn't preach but she makes you cry in sympathy at the injustice and that raises you up as she takes it all somewhere ehere beauty wins out... He did me a good favour that day. I often wonder why me and why that book. Did he see something in my soul that he was trying to help fly free? He planted a seed... One I chose to grow.

Wasson!

I am sure I had some great idea of what to write about while at work today... Maybe not... Anyway it has vanished now...

This month's herb / spice is to be tamarind paste and as yet I have no idea what to do with it. Asfotedia wasn't my most favourite and is alright used in small quantities with other flavourings. I love Black onion seed and it often finds it way into dishes. Fenugreek is fine, if you want things to taste like curry powder. So any ideas about tamarind would be gratefully received...

I failed to do anything for charity last month so I have a month to make up. Pirate FM, a Cornish radio station, is currently supporting the Precious Lives Appeal. In Cornwall we often suffer in terms of facilities. Specialist things often tend to be placed in Devon and this can mean a very long journey. One example of this is children's hospices and the Precious Lives Appeal is raising money for a hospice in Cornwall, especially for those children who can't travel so far.

The radio station has selected three contestants who are having a mad fund raising time in order to try and win a holiday and do the best they can for the charity. One person is having an appeal for pants (knickers or whatever you might call them) which will be hung on a giant washing line across the Tamar Bridge (big bridge between Cornwall and Devon). I might buy a cheap pair and decorate them and send them with my donation - maybe £10 because I know I am never, ever going to do the fruit thing on my list...

I might also do another parcel for a service person, maybe in Iraq this time. I enjoyed doing this last time and it will help me catch up!

Yesterday in my wanderings I missed out on a visit to a holy well (St Levan) and a hillfort (Maen Castle). Maybe I should take my map with me so that I can tell where things are when I end up in places.

I started drawing spirals yesterday. I did a single and a double spiral and they are both pretty simple once you know how. I need to start having a go at constructing more complicated spirals now in order to develop them into beautiful full on celtic lovelinesses.

I also discovered that using silk painting techniques on cotton isn't so good. I used gutta on one side but it doesn't soak through the fabric enough to make a barrier. I am going to try putting gutta on both sides of the cotton to see if that works.

I have also accepted that some of my ideas for blog candy are just not practical. I can draw abstract and geometrical things but trying to draw a tree spirit with willow leaves for hair is beyond my current skills. I can see what I want in my head but i can't get it onto paper.... So I am going to stick with what I can do, for now....

I have already started thinking of things for my next list of 101 things. I have a little word file and as I think of things they go on the list. So hopefully next time there will be no dramatic scrabbling for ideas... I like this whole list thing but I did give myself a lot of big projects and things to learn....

F has returned from his work weekend away, yay! So nice to have him back, it just doesn't seem natural not seeing him. I don't much like being on my own really. Just as well I have Little Dog for company....

I guess my only problem with my 101 things list, is my own ambitiousness. I am not getting to tick many things off. Lots of things won't be ticked off until near the end.... This is frustrating....

Detritus

Today has been a quiet day of bits and bobs. F has pretty much worked all weekend, except Friday evening, Saturday evening and Saturday night. I shall get to see him tomorrow as I go to bed...

Part of me knows I should take Little Dog for a walk but I am a bit wary right now. On Friday S and I took her for a run and we threw that ball a fair bit. It seems though that she doesn't know when to stop as she got way too overheated. When we got back she seemed fine at first but began to get a bit wobbly. I had to put her in the shower and hose her down and she quickly recovered. In the future I will have a really good reason to be stern with S about running her too much....

It has been a warm sort of a day although not as hot as last week and I obviously can't take her out midday or in the afternoon.... Do I want to take her out now? Can I get myself out of the house? Not sure. Will update tomorrow *laugh*

So I caught up on my postcrossing. I had a load of cards to scan that I had received and a load of cards to send out and scan. Then I wrote those letters to my Aunt, Sister and Mother to go with their jewellery and packaged them all up. I also spoke to my Mum and Dad and sorted my Great Aunt's birthday card. Then there were the orange swap cards to package up... Most of this stuff won't be sent till next weekend because it needs weighing.

I also have so many things that I am waiting to get where they are supposed to go... A present for a friend, the card to Belarus which hasn't arrived after 38 days (I am sending a second hoping this one makes it), my ATC swap cards from the True North Mandala swap (I so want to see them!), The Chalres de Lint books which were despatched Friday and the two Keri Smith books (missus WTJ) that were despatched today and then of course WTJ itself...

I ordered WTJ from Amazon initially but had several other long order books in the same order. The despatch date was 18th June. When I realised this I split the order down but it was too late - they had sold out and needed to reorder. I waited and waited and hoped they would give me a nice update on my despatch date, but no. I hunted for it in Truro yesterday and Waterstones informed me thatthey had had it on order since April and it was not in stock at their wholesalers either.... Hearing this I realised Amazon wasn't going to come up with the goods and went for an Amazon marketplace copy which should be here for next weekend - and cost less - and is still a pristine new copy (I hope). Getting this book has so far been a saga and it isn't over yet...

I have so many projects to start and get stuck into but it is so easy to forget how long even the simplest bits take - like packaging and writing notes to go with things. Sometimes I try to pack too much in and other times I mess about, wasting time, doing what I could do in half an hour in two.... I also have a huge pile of books to get read and this latest lot of ordering isn't going to help with that!

Truth to tell I am stuck on my current book - Paulo Coelho's Winner Stands Alone. I am not liking any of the characters and I am not feeling the plot. It is darker than previous books I think and by going darker, I am finding him less inspiring and uplifting. I read the book and I feel tired and that is so unlike me. I will get to the end because I trust this author to have a point to all of it....

It is a nice evening, I think it would do me and the Little one good to get out before bed. I know she is missing F as well...

Return of the Sun

Today the gloomy morning matched my mood heading to work. The day however did brighten and so did everything else to. I can't say work is a happy place for me right now, although everyone is trying painfully hard. It all feels a bit shiny and brittle. It wasn't too bad though once we got into it and it all settled down....

This morning I made use of my new paycheck to do some hunting on Amazon. I was after Wreck this Journal and a new Charles de Lint book. However both books were available with offers for two others by the same author... So I have a little bevy of arty books and an enchanted fairy circle on their way to me. Joy! *grin*

Wreck the Journal is the book being followed by The Next Chapter book group starting in a week's time. There are a lot of people taking part and I can't wait to get my books in the post.... Go take a look at what we get up to sometime. I will post more about my progress with this on my creative blog.

Somehow while I was at work today my kitchen changed from magnolia to yellow. Although I miss F on the evenings and nights and weekends when he has to work, there are some benefits. I have decided that this still counts towards my 101 things, it is just an example of delegation *grin*.

Little Dog found herself being wiped out the door as soon as I got home. We went down by the river. The path faces towards the sun and it was baking hot despite the strong winds that made the trees rustle so much the leaves sounded like an ocean.

Butterflies basked on the path. The stagnant pool with millions of tadpoles had changed since last time, there was still tadpoles but they were fewer and fatter. I even saw one where little legs had just started to grow. The hedgerows are full of the white flowers of the Umbellifer family, probably cow parsley, and ferns were unfurling.

I had hoped to let Little Dog swim in the pool we discovered under the trees but it had dried up too much. It was an expanse of mud with a stagnant puddle or two. I think Little Dog was disappointed....

She didn't mind too much though. She trotted around happily sniffing things. She reminds me of a horse, quite a classy horse, or maybe a pony. She has quite a collected little trot and it is so precise and upright.

And now it is the weekend and the sun is set to shine all through it....

Pay it Forward

My Soulsister Mel has this lovely idea going on, on her blog....

I will make a handmade gift for the first 3 interested people who comment on this post. I have 365 days to do it in…What it will be and when it will arrive is a total surprise! The catch is that you must participate as well: you must have a blog and before you leave your comment here, write up a pay it forward post on your blog to keep the fun going. (just cut and paste this one if you like!, which I did)

I thought I would offer this on this blog because I have a similar thing going on on my other one....

Twilight

Tonight i made a Hello Kitty postcard. This is so not my normal sort of thing. I don't generally do cute but I have loads of cute things. I have picked up bits here and there but once I found a draw unit filled with end of line things at a shop called Trago Mills which specialises in cheap, cheap, cheap. I couldn't see what was in it before I bought it but it had some great things, lots of transfers, blank cards, paper, embossing powder.... all sorts. And much of it was cutesy.

I really enjoyed doing this card and I found having a focal image as a start made putting together papers and other elements much, much easier. It creates a very different effect to multi-media work.

I so hope it's new owner likes it. The only thing they listed as liking was Hello Kitty. I have to say I have enjoyed the more tricky postcrosses the most fun so far. This one and the one who wanted an altered card were the best.

And after I finished we went out.

We took Little Dog and went and bought chips. We sat and ate them in the car on the headland, overlooking a lovely big bay. Little Dog watched the sea intently and din't pester us, although she did enjoy a few chips at the end... We then went for a walk.

Although there were plenty of people around, they were mosly surfers in the bay. The walkers had stayed at home, put off by the weather or they had been and gone. So we had it mostly to ourselves on the headland and there were no dogs in sight so the lead came off and Little Dog played her favourite game. This consists of me and F being some distance apart and taking it in turns to run (or saunter in my case, at a slightly faster speed than normal). She chases us, loops round and then sets off after the other person.

It was not a warm evening and a mist had settled over the bay so the town on the far side was indistict. It was grey. There were different shades though. The sea was grey and light jade. The sky was grey and light blue with a soft hint of peach in places. The waves were crested in white. All was soft and beautiful and peaceful.

Help!

I really need three nice people to give me a little hand...

Over on my arty (well attempting to be, at least!) blog I have put up a special offer... I am beginning to realise that trying to find five people with time is a bit of a challenge for a small little pair of blogs like mine. Anyone over here fancy having a go?

You could even sign up to mine and Mel's and then you would only need to find three other willing participants...

*pulls sad eyes like the cat, Puss in Boots, played by Antonio Banderas, in Shrek*

Treasures in My Cupboards (Part 2)

So to many this might seem a treasure trove and indeed these craft resources are but as I cleared them away and reorganised them I found a box hidden behind. It was covered in dust and had not been moved r opened for a long, long time.

My Great-grandfather, my Grandfather and my Dad were all printers. My Dad was the last in this line and when he retired all the tools of his life went with him. This box represented the small portion of these I had kept, my mementoes from my families livelihood of generations.

First I came across an envelope. It was full of cards that my Dad had printed. This prompted me to look up Andrew online and I came across his fascinating obituary. I remember him clearly and his paintings. Looking at them now I realise they are from a different era. The London he painted has changed and moved on. You can see one of his pictures here but his work, sadly, seems to be largely forgotten as it is the only one I could find online. He was a lovely man whose personality shows through clearly. Looking at his pictures took me back in time...

Then underneath I came across other things my Dad used. My Dad was an old-fashioned printer. No computers or high-tech. His machines had whirring arms and little suction cups along them to pick up paper. The machines had a rhythm that made you want to dance. Something like this. He set type by hand. I could have taken type away by the ton, different fonts, different sizes - it was all there.

Of course I didn't. I had no idea it would later be of interest to me. I took some large wooden blocks of letters and punctuation marks, a small set of metal type in one font, some blocks of varying sorts and some decorative elements.

The blocks were pieces commissioned for regular use or were pictorial. Companies would have a block made of their logo for instance and it would stay with the printer for use whenever they had something printed. I have some company logos, crests, pictures, that sort of thing.

The decorative elements are things like border pieces. I have a lovely wooden case with little blocks you can use to build up borders. I also discovered a small bag with decorative type, most smaller than a cm squared. These will be used for adding printed elements to my art and will remind me of where I come from every time I use them.

I also have heavy metal frames type was set in and all sorts of spacers and things with which the type was set within the frame. Some of the pieces could be expanded to hold the type in place.

Of course looking at this wonderful treasure trove, I wish I had kept more. How much should we ever hold on though? If I had more would I appreciate it as much? I kept a representative sample....

Treasures in My Cupboards (Part 1)

Today I decided to sort out my craft materials and the area I use. Accumulating papers and paints had altered the balance of my stacking draw units. Some draws overflowed and others were not well used. Stuff was overflowing off my table. I needed some room!

I guess it might seem odd that I have so much craft material. I mean I am after all a science geek only recently come to their creativity who works in a warehouse. Have I bought all this since starting soul journaling a few weeks back? Or did I already have it all there, sitting, waiting the day it might be used...

I have decided to share a painful piece of my recent past.

A while back, i decided to train as a Primary school Teacher. I desperately wanted to show little children all the fun and wonderful things in the world. I wanted to make them love learning. I wanted them to see the fun in science, the wonder in the world, the elegance of math.

I knew it would be a hard course and I was prepared. I worked and I worked and I worked. but I didn't make it. It wasn't my work, it was my personality. I loved the kids and they loved me. I had great ideas and sometimes I could teach them well. The problem was I am too laid back to stay on top of classroom discipline. I am not charismatic enough to lead a class of children. I can manage well enough but leading is another thing entirely and I just don't have it.

This didn't become clear until relatively near the end. It just wasn't going to happen. To do it, I would have to completely alter who i was and I couldn't do that, I mostly like who I am.

We had college classes on each subject area. This included art where we drew objects with oil pastels, experimented with pencil lines and made papier mache masks. In design and technology we looked at mechanisms in paper such as hinges, sliders and levers as well as textiles. In english we used animation to tell stories and looked at childrens books and poetry.

Trainee teachers can use the resources of the schools they are in for their lessons but in practice they end up buying a lot of things themselves in most schools. Or at least I did. By the end of the year I had bought (invested) in quite a lot of stuff. Things I thought I would make use of in my professional career.

I guess the course opened something in me. I understand children much, much better and would love to be a Mother. It also bought me back to subjects I left behind long ago such as Art and English. It also left me with all sorts of things I wouldn't have normally bought... sequins and fluffy balls, films and glitter, pipe cleaners and scoobies, chalks and pens, acrylics and brushes... I could go on.... It's amazing how much you can pick up cheaply when you have a bursary and are looking in the right places....

Demands and Ultimatums

It has been an odd day but not a bad day... I got to leave work earlier than normal which gave me time to do a few creative bits.

The reason I got to leave work earlier though was a little odd. It all has to do with Neanderthal. At the end of his three weeks with us, I have found him even more abhorrent than I expected on the first day I met him. He had a strange attitude to work and honesty.

Our boss is one who allows people certain privileges in return for working hard to help team spirit, such as leaving early. These are not things we expect or take advantage of and we certainly don't just disappear a little early because we have no work and it is five to. Neanderthal had different ideas.... He blatantly abused this easy going atmosphere. He was always going on little walks and making phone calls and took eery opportunity to avoid doing any work he could.

If I had to ask him to do something he very much resented it. At first he was only rude when others were absent but eventually there wasn't so much care. At first if I wanted to sow him something i would ask if he fancied.... His answer was generally no thank you. So I began to say do this rather than being more polite. He didn't like that either and took it that my getting him to do things was driven my desire to remain in my office behind my computer. He asked me directly and insultingly if I was agoraphobic. After which things were never quite so relaxed between us.... He stopped taking pains to hide his dislike of me and I am not sure how good I was at covering up my dislike of him.

He was obviously clever but just as obviously lazy. He made no effort to remember things he was shown and even when asked to look out for something, checking a couple of hours later it would be evident that he hadn't bothered. He felt the work was easy and beneath him and he didn't have enough pride to still do it well.

He was also odd, one day he would say to someone he lived in one town, the next he would tell someone he lived in a different one. One day he was single, the next he had a long-term girlfriend and a child. He was very interested in ladies and his behaviour and attitude towards some could have been considered harassment.

So as he was a temp, why did he last three weeks? Because my boss is nice and felt awkward getting rid of someone. Talking to the agency it became obvious that although he had been the best choice at the time, more amiable staff were now available. It was all agreed. He would go. Celebrations all round. He won't be that sorry either as he made it clear the only thing he would miss would be the money.

So how did he go? At 3.00 I was allowed to go and so was he. Shortly after he left he would have received a phone call from the agency. Although I am relieved he is going, i am not sure that all of how he has been removed sit well with me. As a long term temp, I have worked for employers who found it hard to talk about leaving and have had the agency have to do the telling. It hurts and leaves a whole range of awkward emotions.

In his case there were so many reasons for him to go but...

This was the theme of the day though. I finally had to start work on the necklace my future m-i-l has insisted I make, even though I am off making jewellery in a big way and am overdue several piece for my family that were due weeks ago. she also chose a very fiddly, intricate and time consuming design.... *sigh* There is no getting away from it however and also no telling her no. I don't think she would be able to take it in without my being very rude as it wouldn't fit with what she wants.

I have also been listening to the relationship difficulties of a friend where there is a lack of communication and too many demands. An ultimatum seems inevitable...

So how do I feel? Tired but fine. Neanderthal is gone. I still like all my other workmates and my job has very much grown on me. I have done several inches of the necklace and I know that it won't take me ALL weekend and I will still have some time for other fun things. My relationship is great, we communicate and sometimes we bicker and sometimes we have fun but mostly we have fun bickering.

Part of me does wonder how Neanderthal feels. Thinking all is fine. Being let out of work nice and early on a Friday. Feeling good ecause it is the weekend and getting some bonus time. Then receiving that call and instantly being one of the many unemployed.... I do feel sorry for him.



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I am in two minds whether to leave this post up here or not. It was late and it had been a long and tiring week. I never wanted to whine to much on this blog or be nasty about people but at the same time I need to own my less positive emotions. So here it is. Take it with a pinch of salt...

Today Part Two

I watched Seabiscuit (which always makes me cry) while completing Caspiana's scavenger hunt for pages 4 and 5 of my soul journal. The magazines and flyers from yesterday really helped. I then went and put a lamb joint in to boil with the duck stock from Xmas and some bay leaves and a handful or Ras el Hanout spices.

I then pretty much failed to do anything else much at all... Except I discovered another bloggy creative challenge. Project Spectrum is this year to spend two months looking at each of the directions / elements with associated colours and materials. This really appeals as I started looking at the elements earlier on this year. It feels like a good extension and will fit nicely with my Creative Every Day challenge as well.

Apart from that, I now have a stonking headache. *sigh*

Toxicity and Creativity

I am about as toxic as I get right now. Something has gone wrong the last few days and my body is struggling. I am so glad my next lymphatic massage is this week. Since Wednesday i have been hungry and salads have not been cutting it... My legs have swollen and been sore, my feet are sore. My skin is awful. I have felt cold. Nodes in my throat came up. I probably had a bit of the nasty throat bug my colleagues have had. They are a lot fitter and healthier than me but I didn't come down with it fully. All the same, I havn't felt this toxic in a loooong time.

This means I have felt pretty tired today. I have had a day of housework and creativity with a little food and bathing thrown in for good measure. Either that or creativity is really quite tiring.

I have been thinking about my creativity today as well. I come from three generations of printers and it has taken me a long time to understand that some of my gifts are the things that made them good at what they did. I have realised that I know how to lay things out on a page and that this would have been vital to them as they set type. Balancing things on a page might not seem much of an art but when I produce a document, I just feel how to make it balance and sometimes doing it a different way feels wrong.

I have quite a mathematical brain, I am a scientist who started by studying Physics. I found this a little detached from the real world and switched to Environmental Science. I love geometry. I even worked as a CAD operator at one point. Form and shape appeal to me. As a teen I was fascinated by celtic knotwork which is a real geometrical treat. I never quite got on to constructing some of the really intricate spirals but I love all this. The simplicity of the forms gives such a complicated and intricate result.

I nearly became a mechanical engineer at one point. I like structure as well. As part of a course I was on, we had to construct a papier mache mask. Using a cardboard base you build up the underlying structure using anything you have on hand and lots and lots of masking tape to hold it all together before covering it with glue and paper. I really enjoyed the task but it was obvious that my mask was a little different from the others. The others were much more arty while mine was much more structural. They had felt their masks while I had built mine.

The art I create that is the best, in my mind, is that which draws on my talents of form and structure and geometry but I desire that arty creative force as well. Even my jewellery making can be seen as a logical exercise in combining stitches to make forms. I think I approach creativity as a scientist in many ways. I trained so long as one. In many ways I don't want to undo that training, I want to make my mind even more flexible.

While at college there was a particular display in the college's museum and gallery that reinforced this for me a little. It was a display of work my various members of staff. I remember the work of one very eminent scientist in particular. He has produced technically fantastic line drawings of local places. They were so precise and perfect. They could have been photographs digitally convereted into line drawings. Were they creative or technical drawings?

I guess the root of these thoughts is what exactly is creativity and how does it relate to artyness and technical skill? Is pure application of technical skill artistic? Is it creative? If a computer creates random images of circles overlapping each other of different colours, is this creative?

I guess, for now, I am just practicing and the whole question is academic. I create and therefore I am creative. Are debates such as this toxic? Do they imply that some creativity is better than others? Do they discourage people from creating for the pure enjoyment of it? Are there many more repressed scientists out their, bottling up their creativity until poisons them from within?

Red Breast and Yellow Chest

When at the Imbolc celebration last weekend, I had an encounter on the way back from the well. I met a Robin. He stood and watched me from a branch. Curious, bright, intelligent and cheerful. He ignored those who walked on but when a lady stopped, he was off. I am not sure anyone else even noticed him. The lady who stopped was looking at the buds on the tree the Robin was sat in.

On my way up the hill on Imbolc to scatter my wish seeds, I was tempted to turn back as the snow started to come down. On this little track, covered in snow and very open to the elements, I came across not one but two Robins! They should have been tucked away somewhere warm and out of the way....

Today as I drove out of the supermarket feeling sad I had to go to work, I met a Robin flying in. It flew over my car, flashing it's chest at me as it did so. A smudge of red, moving up and over.

I began to feel that there was maybe something being said to me that my normal magpies couldn't quite convey... I have long read magpies and watched for them as I feel I have developed some link with them, but Robins? Hmmm.

Robins are lovely birds. Independent but friendly. One used to sit on my Dad's spade and fly down to pick over the soil as he dug it. Obviously it is not the same Robin now but he seems to have developed a relationship with the Robins that live on his land. My family does this with birds, each post has to be put in a metal tin instead of the post box because a family of blue tits nest in it. They let us look at the nest and don't mind the gate opening and closing or people walking by... My folks even have green and lesser spotted woodpeckers regularly visit their bird feeders...

So I had a little look at what Robins might mean to me and it seems they represent growth and renewal. This post on Blogickal has some interesting information. Acticvation of creative spirit.... A stimulus for growth.... A sign I should let go of the past and be free to nurture myself and others.... I can feel happy with this sign to me for I am indeed trying to grow creatively.

Robins are also symbols of Spring, having overturned the Wren at Yule. (or something like that) So they are another symbol spring is coming. And what do I want this Spring to mean for me? Warmth! and I want to be able to give up work and concentrate on all the wonderful creative and nature based things I want to do and experience... *sigh* I can't let go without feeling some sort of financial stability though, maybe the Robin is a sign that this will magically appear from somewhere *sigh*

Warmth... this is where yellow chest comes in. His name is Oswald and he has been a steady companion for around about twenty years. When I am most in need of warmth, he is there. He likes to be held and F doesn't mind him coming to bed with us AND sleeping under the covers. In fact sometimes he tries to steal Oswald... *sigh* as if he ever could!

I feel in love with him as soon as I saw him, sat on the shelf. My sister chose a cheaper one for Christmas as a pressie and was all virtuous over it. I am sure I was asked if a cheaper one would do. But no, I wanted Ossie. And Ossie I have, looking almost as good as new and worth every penny! He is a lovely plush crocodile with a yellow tummy and chest. Inside he has a hot water bottle.

Right now I am not sure if I am coming down with something or not... but I feel cold and Ossie is the one to help...

New Blog!

I have been thinking today, as I completed my first postcards, that a daily posting of pictures would take this blog away from it's original purpose. So I have created a new one! This will have photos and scanned images of things as well as descriptions of the methods used to create them.

The Hidden

Last night F and I went for a walk. Only a little one to get some milk but we went the long way. We walked places we don't normally walk. I guess I had known it was there. One day as I walked along the wall, the door had been open and I had had the merest glimpse inside. I guess I also knew that there had to be a public gate on the other side, tucked up an alleyway. We found that gate last night and the yew trees glistened with snow and beckoned me. By this time however, F was cold and hungry and wanted to go home. He also had no desire to visit a cemetery at night.

I guess I can understand that. Doesn't hold for me though. I like graveyards. I always have. My parents are bell ringers and I found myself left to my own devices in many a church as I was growing up. Churches themselves and churchyards are pretty awesome places. Full of history. The churchyards are little nature reserves in their own right and have many interesting nooks and crannies to explore. Of course I am not talking about bleak modern cemeteries, they are something else again. I had no idea at that age that although I would turn somewhat from Christianity, that I would revere some of these places in a different way as I remember their pagan roots.

One of the events that stayed with me was as follows. I was a fairly disgusting sort of a child. I liked to get mucky. So when I was poking around in a corner of a church and found some vases with mould in the bottom, I of course picked up the mould. The mould gently shook itself in my hand and a head appeared. We watched each other for the longest time. I stood still in awe, not wanting to scare this little beast I held. Eventually he gathered himself and flew off into the growing dusk to catch an early insect. Not surprisingly, I have always loved bats and never felt even slightly scared of them. In Summer while at my folks I love to lie on my back on the grass and watch them fly overhead.

This morning I received the happy news that work was closed for the day and I had no need to brave the icy roads. I knew straight away that I would head for this churchyard. The Cornish of old can broadly be divided into three categories, miners, farmers and fishermen. There is no shortage of granite to carve and because of the mining links, there was no shortage of skill. It is no surprise then that the stones in this graveyard are so very intricate. There is a plethora of crosses and carvings of flowers. The Cornish gravestones are so very much more intricate than those where I grew up.

I have no idea how many times I have walked and driven past the graveyards far wall. Only one or two of the nearby houses have a view into the cemetery. Only the supermarket that has caused this little oasis to become a backwater has a good view from their office windows. I was the first there, fresh snow all around. I could see the last snow shower being carried off and the sky was shining blue.

As I was walking around I was thinking about my latest e-life venture. I have joined a group called creativity every day. To be more creative was one of the wishes I made for new Year which I encased in a seed and flung to the wind last night. It was one wish I made as I planted a sunflower seed at the Imbolc ceremony I went to.

Creativity for me is something I lost and have had to regain. As a child I wrote huge long imaginative stories, often with chunks missing as my hand struggled to keep up with my head. The need for spelling and punctuation and shorter sentences intruded and I slowly lost much of the raw passion I had felt for writing. I liked art but this too eventually died in me when I became ill. Art was a superfluous subject and as my load had to be lightened it went. Somehow there never seemed time for art after that and although it lingered in my life, by the time I reached University, this to had left me. I also wrote poetry as a teenager and I guess you can figure out what happened to that to.

I studied science and this has trained my brain to be logical and rational and reasonable. There was no time for art while studying hard to achieve a first in Environmental Science. There was no time for much else at all (except partying). Creativity died in my life. It slowly became apparent to me that I had lost something I valued and wanted back. I took a jewellery class and slowly gained skill with beads. I have been expanding my craft repotoire of late and have experimented with papier mache, modelling and silk painting. I want more! I don't want to just be crafty creative, I want to be arty creative as well.

I feel like my creativity is a little like the graveyard. It is there in the midst of the community but forgotten and lost. There is a gate but it is forgotten and little used. Craft has been a gate but I hope to make holes in the wall with art and bring my graveyard back into the community. Unfortunately the little graveyard will continue to nestle behind walls, mostly forgotten...

CED seems like the perfect opportunity. It has links to a huge variety of crafty, arty, creative people and their work is inspiring. I consider this blog to be creative and as the starter of CED says creativity can be found in even more mundane things such as cooking. This sort of ethos fits in very well with that of my hearth craft course as well, where the mundane can be magical. So some days my blog may be it, particularly after work but on other days I will try and cook creatively or something...

One plan I have is to use a couple of pack of blank postcards. Being small and white they are perfect for experimenting with colour and form in a small non-threatening way. If I can complete a card a day, I may find that my skill and creativity grows. I would love to gain skill at drawing and painting et al. I intend to scan these in and post them, probably mostly without comment. I also intend to post once a week on my creative activities as a summary. Word Wednesday will be my creative activity for Wednesday!