Etsy Treasury, Summer Living

Impressionism, Light and Summer sunshine.

I write the daily blog for Craft Pimp and today I decided to write about the light, its the summer sunshine it does that to me, that and I have brought out my pencils due to the heat as I can't turn my torch on unless I want to be a puddle on the floor!

Thought I would share what I wrote with 'my' blog readers.

Enjoy and have a great weekend.


Lx



Impressionism.  Its all about the light.

With this fabulous few weeks of hot summer, bright sunshine and long days, its been wonderful to enjoy wearing less clothes, eating outdoors, BBQ's and being a bit lazy if I am totally honest, but the best thing about these days, for me, is the light.

I love painting and wish I could paint like the Impressionists, all that light and colour.  Renoir used light and colour for movement in his paintings, Monet used colour and broken lines to capture the essence of the subject, allowing the eye of the viewer to mix the colours.  English Impressionist painters like J W Turner known as the 'painter of light' and John Constable his paintings full of feeling, used the impressionist style to give art a modern view of life, the here and now.  The style is evocative, energetic, lively and full of light.

Summer sunshine always reminds me of these things, life, light, spontaneity, energy and the ability to do anything we want if we just let ourselves go!

Our very own Jill Egan of Kiln Fired Art her brush strokes bring still life to life with her use of the light!

 

Jill from Kiln Fired Art Craft Pimp Team

 

I found this painter Robert Hagan whilst looking at Impressionist Painters on the web, his work is romantic and light.

Robert Hagan Australian Impressionist Painter

Zhaoming Wu is one of my most favourite modern day impressionist painters, his brushstrokes are just like pure magic on a canvas.

 

Zhaoming Wu

I could list so many other Impressionist Painters that I love, in so many mediums but this is just one blog, maybe next time.

Enjoy your weekend, don't forget the sun cream and watch out for bitey bugs!!

Laney x

Hubby brought me a new lens for my camera

Sometimes I could swing for the man, other times he comes up trumps!! 

 

My husband has been a misery with this weather, he doesn't do heat, but today my new zoom lens arrived for my camera, and its brilliant so I have completely forgiven him all the grumping he has been doing!! 

 

As you do I went around the garden snapping away, my only problem with it so far is that its quite heavy so a lot of the shots are not quite in focus, but its brilliant from far away I can get the most amazing shots, here are a few of the hundreds I took this afternoon.

 

The Hollyhock

 



 

My daughter and I had a few giggles.....

 

Pretending to sell her brothers car, its not going well....

 

 

The sun was in her eyes in this one with the infamous gap that has caused some issues with her and the dentist over the years, the outcome?  She kept it!

 

Seed heads from the Azaylia with what looks like dog hair!

 

The nose of my gorgeous Izabel

 

 

The very happy and pink tongue of my biggest baby, Defi

 

 

Flowers, no idea what they are they were cuttings from the MIL years ago and are dotted all around the garden, long green spikes with tall stems of yellow flowers

 

Red Hot Poker Flower, nearly there!!

 

 

This one is out of focus, but I love it, Defi turning circles and I am sure he is laughing, he was playing with my daughter

 Pink Roses

 

 

My beautiful Izabel, I have wanted photo's like this for years but my camera never focused that far away and she would move before I got to her



 

Close up of the Hollyhock

My little veggie plot

When I am not in the studio, which is quite rare I love to potter in the garden.  A few years ago my hubby and son built me three raised planters at the back of the garden next to the studio, I merrily planted my veggies and had a few disasters along the way, then last year I just didn't bother at all the weather was so horrid and wet but I missed my pottering, so this year I decided to do it again.

 

I don't spend a lot of money, I am a real cheap skate, I brought all my seeds from Aldi's this year for a total of £2, I got lettuce, broccoli, leek, onion, cabbage, carrot, chilli's and tomatoes, oh and cucumbers but I never do well with those.

 

My first veggie bed has my strawberries and rhubarb in.  The strawberries have got huge this year.  Around the garden I have those little wild strawberries, they are really nice to nibble on when I come back from the daily dog walk.  Defi and I wander around the garden tasting them, which nearly cost me my huge strawberries and in fact the first biggest one of the year as Defi watched me check it for readiness which it was only a day away from, and snaffled it!  I turned to see my lovely strawberry disappear from the plant and the juice dribble down his chin, the golden swine!

 

 

 

Inbetween the strawberries and the rhubarb - which is brilliant for wine making, but don't use on its own it has to be mixed with other fruits to blend it - I have garlic.  I have no idea how they got to this bed I sowed them in the other bed the other year, they moved!  But, they grow happily amongst the strawberries and so far no taste has been tainted, but the slugs and snails have kept away from the berries so maybe the garlic wards them off?

 



You can see the garlic now ready for lifting, tomorrows job, on the right.

 

 

My other two beds have the other veggies.  I am not a tidy gardener, I used to be, but I developed OCD years ago and battled against it, now I love the fact I don't need to put everything in its place and am rewarded by bees and birds, ladybugs and beetles, they might not be the most productive in the garden but I like them and they inspire my beads.



 

You can see my old chair in the corner, it's next to my little shed for my gardening tools and potting table, which is under a big tree just in front of my compost heap, I like to sit here and watch my garden grow!



 

 

These lettuces are Little Gem and are sweet and delicious, they are in a pot as they are the ones I separated earlier this year to grow larger.  I hate thinning my crops it feels so wasteful but I did today so hopefully more big Little Gems will be soon.

 

 

I have to plant my toms and cucumbers from the pots they are in at the moment, we are probably 3-4 weeks behind the South of the UK in gardening, but we usually have those weeks back at the end of the season.

 

 

Laney x

 

Sheep on a morning hillside.

 

Sheep on a morning hillside.  A new fused glass bowl from me now available in my Etsy shop.  Brighten up that picnic table.

 

 

 

Sheep on a morning hillside

Laney x

Glass bowls and hanging things...

 

I have been continuing with my experiments in fused glass and have a couple more bowls to show you.  First up is the Blue Water bowl, all those lovely blues.

 

Next is the Puddle bowl, it just reminds me of a puddle with all its reflections.

Then the 'hanging thingy'   A fused glass piece to hang somewhere special, the pocket on the front holds a little bit of water to put those flowers from a treasured little one. 

 



This is a fused drop vase that I made a while ago, I think it has potential for more experimenting.

 



Laney x

Giraffes Gallery

I do love Giraffes.  Here are some of my favourites

From Pinterest, a wonderful place for inspiration

Giraffe on Pinterest.com

 

 

This fabulous sock monkey is made by a very old friend of mine, she helped to deliver my son nearly 20 yrs ago!! 

Nikki's Giraffe


This Giraffe is one of mine, he is now sold and living in America where he is making his new owner smile!

Izzybeads

 

 

Keep smiling :)

 

Lx

Old Mog Claude

Claude

My old man Claudey, when he curls up like this in front of the hearth in the kitchen, I can forgive him for all the poops that don't make it to the tray.  I do moan and groan at his furry little self when I am cleaning up yet another round of poop, but, at 22 years he is still the most handsome mog, a bit bony, half blind, deaf geriatric, but he is our Claude, the one and only.

 

Lx