My favourite mountain the Matterhorn seen from St Luc in Switzerland.

Have done some Christmas shopping at Conakry Refugee School. Such a small amount of money can do so much. £5 buys exercise books, pens and pencils for 5 children for a year. £10 pays for 50 school lunches, the only hot meal many of the children have each day. The charity is run by a family we know back in Shropshire and their promise is that every £ given goes directly to the school.

light

After the success of Warb's exhibition at the tour we had planned to have a couple of 'open house' weekends at the end of November/beginning of December. The light here in Autumn/early Winter can be so beautiful. Then I got to thinking about the leaden, rainy days where the lights are on from the time we get up.... What if we were unlucky? Our lighting is fine for living with art but not for the scrutiny of a potential buyer. I chickened out but next year the new studios will be up and running with adequate lighting for the exhibiting as well as the making of art.

'Follow a Thread' exhibition at the Dovecot Studios in Edinburgh - includes work by Jo Barker and Sara Brennan. Until 31st December.

update

An almost edible display of pencils. I want them all!

The last few months in this house have included sciatica (ongoing), flu, an unspecific chest infection and specific bronchitis! Also a dead ibook and camera...

BUT the sciatica is improving, I've finally got antibiotics for the bronchitis, a gorgeous MacBook Pro was delivered yesterday ( all set up and ready to go thanks to Katy and Paul at PC Net Solutions), a Panasonic Lumix has been purchased (the nearest I'll ever get to a Leica!) and project henshed is back on (only nearly 3 years later....things happen slowly around here) as is project 'convert the small barn into a studio for Warb'.

If that weren't all exciting enough we had 6 cubic metres of firewood delivered this morning. Firewood really, really makes me happy!

ps. I've lost everyone's email address with the old Mac. Any friends/family reading this please email me so that I have them on the new one. Thanks!

One of Warb's self portraits on show at Galerie La Tour Montsalès. The show is going well - lots of appreciative visitors coming and good sales. It' s now going to run until the 13th of September instead of the 7th.
My apple laptop has died now ( in addition to the camera) - my fingers are well and truly crossed for the washing machine...! Fortunately the tour has a laptop and I can borrow it until I get a new computer sorted out.

BTW... we produced a small catalogue for the show. 20 pages, full colour with essays by Daniel Lefranc and Ian Warburton (in French). We've sold out for the moment but are going to reprint this week. If you are interested please email me. Cost is 5 euro plus postage.

Warb at La Tour

I wish I'd had a camera this morning. At 9.30 a neighbour came by to collect Warb's paintings and take them to the tour - thankfully only a couple of miles away. Said neighbour has a huge roof rack on his van so a dozen large paintings fitted on easily. Another car load of friends arrived and another neighbour on his motorbike. Once everything was loaded we set off to Montsalès - a convoy of 3 vehicles and 1 motorcycle outrider - we drove all the way there at about 30 mph with the hazards flashing! So funny!

The show is up and looks great. If I climbed the tour once today I must have done it 20 times - I'll pay for it tomorrow. The pv is at 6 pm. Venez nombreux!

and now for...

something quite different! I had a sudden desire to make this collage so despite the fact that this is probably the busiest week of the year with Warb's exhibition in the Tour starting on Monday, I did! It all worked out paler than I anticipated - ( the letters are covered with a layer of tissue paper but the circles aren't) - but it was good fun!

poplar

Just had a call from my Mum in Dublin to say that Poplar won 1st prize in the tapestry category at the RDS National Crafts Competition!