Hydrangea and camellia

The last of the hydrangea leaves has now fallen and these were the most stunning colour, so I had to get a photo. This is Hydrangea Merveille Sanguine.

Down at the bottom of the garden, Camellia Yoimachi is quietly flowering away.

I do like these delicate white flowers, with just a hint of pale pink on the petals. They appear on my blog with regularity as I so enjoy seeing them at this time of year.

Really pretty and brightening up many a dull grey day.

Cards and cake

My nephew has just bought a house and was saying he needed some art for the walls, so my sister suggested some of  my slow drawings.  He looked through the many patterns that I have drawn (since joining the slow drawing group in 2023) and decided on nine.  I got them done for him and have since sent them to him.  Here they are above, in one formation, but it will be interesting to see how he chooses to put them together.

This was a card for my sister-in-law, using the Sizzix stencil, which I first mentioned here.

I sent this card to my nephew, with the nine drawings.

This was for a colleague's birthday.  She has several cats, so I often make her a cat based card!

This is the inside...

...and the back.

Here is a card for my husband's big birthday.  I put the numbers on balloons on the inside, just in case he didn't want to be reminded of his age! He loves 'Snarky Cats' stamps by Tim Holtz and Stampers Anonymous, so these usually make an appearance on his cards.

Here's the back.  Yes, I did mention cake, didn't I?

This is the 'Russian Roulette Revels Cake' which I make as a birthday cake, as it is a great recipe that is moist and keeps well (if you can stop yourself eating it!).  This is the very indulgent version with chocolate fudge icing, but the butter cream icing version is just as good.  

Revels are a chocolate covered sweet, with various fillings, such as toffee, Malteser, orange, chocolate, raisin and the dreaded coffee (I really don't like that one and often seem to get one on a slice!) There was an advert about Revels from 2001, when there was also a peanut one, but these were then removed due to allergies - the advert sums up my dislike of the coffee one!

I have made myself feel hungry now, so am off to have something to eat!

Colour swatching

I have said it before and no doubt will say it again, but colour swatching makes me happy!  I was watching Alison Bomber from Words and Pictures on Youtube this week, as you do, and she was doing some swatching with paints she had had for a while.  This reminded me that I have had the same brand (Kuretake Gansai Tambi) in a different colour palette that I hadn't swatched yet.  They are a creamy watercolour which does have some opacity, but will water down to give more transparency.  I have been guilty of keeping them 'for best' but actually, that is a silly idea as I bought them to use!

So I added more pages to my swatch book and had a very happy time testing the colours and adding water to them.  Above you can see the results.  

I have made a swatch book  and all the paints/pencils, watersoluble media etc. are gradually being added to it so that I can see what colours I have and how they look.  Hopefully then I will use them all a bit more!

Here they are again - a bit of colour on a very grey day!

Flowers and Fireworks

I have had a flower-filled few weeks recently and have been really enjoying the additional colour they bring.  Above was a 'Just Because' bunch of flowers from my lovely husband, "I thought they were your colours" - they were!

Then there was a bunch of dahlias to add to the display from a fellow allotmenteer.  

Then there was a bunch of chrysanthemums from a different fellow allotmenteer.

Finally, a colleague at work gave me these roses and lilies as a 'thank you'. I have been so lucky!  

Having discovered that my camera does have some settings for various things such as Fireworks, Portraits and Low light (see here for the post about it), I decided to have a go with the Firework setting.  After a slight problem of not remembering how to access the settings, I downloaded the manual and then found the setting.  The photos were better than previously, but as these were taken from a distance, they aren't all that great.

I obviously managed to move the camera when I was taking this one, but I rather like it. (I don't think professional photographers need to be worried though!)

More Autumn colour to enjoy

The garden is definitely changing and autumn colour is more in evidence.  I was stopped in my tracks by the fiery combinations of leaf colour from the blueberry Goldtraube and hydrangea Pinky Winky on the patio.  I had to rush in for my camera. 

Smaller things are also bringing joy with this little cyclamen. The others finished flowering a while ago, but this one is having a late flush.  I do like its crinkly-edged leaves too. 

The salvias are still flowering as well.  Above is Cerro Potosi with its bright fuchsia flowers. This one is in a pot and I really should get it planted in the border.

This is another salvia Cerro Potosi which is planted in the border and which has decided to grow up through the magnolia. 

Here it is again, with the last few cosmos and helianthus flowers.  I have been planting some bulbs and gathering leaves for leaf mould.  I expect I will be able to gather up a few more this week too.

More cards

As you know, being able to make cards for people is something I really enjoy.  This card was tailored for a friend who has a big birthday this year and includes lots of things she likes, such as travelling, gardens, flowers, cups of tea/coffee, reading, embroidery, painting and cats. I also found a page from a class register in a digital kit which I used for the background, as we worked together as teaching assistants, and a couple of dictionary definitions for children and grandchildren.   

The back of the card symbolises the travels she has been on as her husband is a keen birdwatcher!

This was the other card I made for her, as she liked a page like this that I had done in a journal, so I reproduced it for her.

Men's cards are always a little trickier, so I do keep an eye out for stamps or stencils that would work well.  Geometric shapes are usually a good choice.  This is one of the Sizzix stencils I bought in August - you can see them here. 

This was for my nephew.  

This was for my sister who has seen some of the slow drawings I do and so I thought I should use them for her card.  I have a box full of these little drawings/paintings, so it is good to be able to use them.

I have some cards to make for November birthdays, so will need to get on with them next.

Wanderlust 2025 - part three

Here are my favourite pieces from the last twelve weeks of the art journaling course, Wanderlust 2025.  The broad theme was 'Storytelling' and within that, we had 'Journaling', 'Capturing Moments' and 'Taking Inspiration'.  Above was all about gratitude and using different ways to capture things we were grateful for.  I used a die I bought earlier this year to make the mini clipboard and a die for the paperclip. 

More journaling opportunities with this page. I used a napkin for the flowers.  Simple, but enjoyable. 

I think this was a 'capturing moments' lesson.  We used a photo and then drew the image on tracing paper.  The flower is one of my cosmos flowers. 

I used magazine transfer for this page.  The magazine images didn't really like the textured watercolour card page, but it gives a faded and worn look , which I like.  The images are of the Eden project in Cornwall and views of Florence and Rome, all places I have visited. The birds stamp is one I have cut from lino and it is one of my favourites to use.  The word is also a transfer, using magazine letters onto sticky tape, which was a new technique to me.

Memories of a holiday to Egypt turned into the next page, with tickets, money, and photos.

We looked at Expressionist artists as the inspiration for this piece.  We were asked to just go with our intuition and not worry what the image was going to be.  You can see the Van Gogh influence in the lines here, I think.  I am still not sure what the three hill shapes mean, but I enjoyed the process of this one. I think the face is somewhat enigmatic too.  

We chose a favourite poem or song lyric as the inspiration for this page.  Mine is 'The Way through the Woods' by Rudyard Kipling.  Again, I thoroughly enjoyed the process on this one too and am pleased with the end result. 

Finally, this interesting page.  This is very much in Dyan Reaveley's style (she was the teacher for this one) and she does have a recognisable style in her work.  She told us about something she does every six months or so, which is to go through magazines and pull out pictures which appeal. It should be an intuitive process. My pictures include cake, gardening equipment, flowers, a woman reading, a pen, a vase, a mug, some blue glass, a cat face, a silk scarf and some jewellery.  It depends what magazines you have used for the images you might find.  I loved creating the collage, although it took a bit of time to get it right and I had to take a photo of it  before I started glueing things down. 

On to the last twelve weeks of this year's course - the broad theme is 'Leaps and Bounds'.

Autumn is here

Autumn is definitely flexing its muscles and the garden is reacting.  While there is still lots of colour, leaves are changing, like those of the blueberry above. 

This is Symphyotrichum (Aster) Little Carlow which is covered in powdery mildew thanks to being too dry at its roots, but the flowers are looking pretty. 

Hydrangea Bobo also got too dry and has taken all summer to actually flower.  Now its leaves are beautiful shades or orange and red...

...fiery and gorgeous!

However, the flowers are still quite a pristine white, with touches of pink on the edges.  It makes quite a combination with the leaves.

Other hydrangeas - these are Magical Revolution ones - are turning their red tones.

Here you can see various shades on the different flowers.

Rose Dannahue is bringing a lot of joy with its pretty apricot flowers.

How's this for an eye catching duo?  Symphyotrichum (Aster) Mrs S T Wright and September Ruby. These are seedlings from the original plants and have planted themselves here, but they look good together, so I have left them.

Resilience in the garden (part two)

Following on from my previous post, here are a few more plants which have done well during this hot and dry summer.  Above is Clematis heracleifolia Wyevvale, which is a perennial non-clingy herbaceous plant.  This one is in a pot, so it has been watered this summer, but I divided it in the Spring and put the division into the border and that has not had any extra water.  It has pretty blue/purple flowers and a scent which reminds me of soap.  Not unpleasant, just soapy.

This is Clemaris heracleifolia New Love which is in the border and had no extra water. It has flowered for a long time and is still going strong. 

I forgot to put this photo in my previous post - this is the back of a flower of Japanese Anemone Ruffled Swan - so pretty.

The ever reliable Asters or Symphyotrichum as they have been re-named (they will remain asters to me as it's much easier to say and spell!).  Above is Aster/Symphyotrichum novae-angliae September Ruby.  I love the helpful way their flower centres change colour once the pollen is gone.

Here is  Aster/Symphyotrichum novae-angliae Mrs S T Wright.  These two are great and don't get the powdery mildew that others may succumb to (yes, Aster/Symphyotrichum Little Carlow, I'm looking at you! To be fair, that plant is probably planted in the wrong place with not enough moisture at the roots...)

Liriope Muscari is the unsung hero in my north facing border. It is reliable, comes back every year, (needs dividing, but I am a bit worried about doing that in case it upsets it) and gives me the green strappy leaves to enjoy as well as these purple flower spires at this time of year.  

The flowers are really interesting too. 

Hydrangea Arborescens Annabelle, my favourite hydrangea, who usually appears on this blog at least once a year, will not be making an appearance. The heat and lack of water did her no favours and she is a shadow of her former self.  I may have to address that for next year...