Birds of a Feather

Birds of a feather flock together..........................................

Another Colour Sequence

These beautiful heart shaped leaves are from the tree commonly known as Tree Pansy (Cercis canadensis). The leaves throughout most of the year are a deep red violet...in Autumn they shift to green, to yellow, orange then to red. The top leaf in the photo has already started to shift into its green phase.

Colour Sequences

Autumn is a great time to develop an appreciation of the concept of colour sequences.

 An easy exercise to 'get your eye in' is to turn back the clock and be a child again and collect some autumn leaves. Collect the leaves from one species of tree and starting from green, track the changing colours. In colder districts you will tend to get a better 'autumn display' as my Grandmother called the beautiful colours found around Stanley, near Bright, where she was brought up.

In my front yard the tree (Liquidambar) is shifting from green to yellow green to yellow then golden yellow with flushes of red. Arrange your collection of leaves in the sequence of changing colours. The challenge then is to select your palette and paint one leaf that 'calls you'. A correctly chosen lean palette, one particular red, yellow and blue will enable you to capture the subtle shifts in the colour sequences. Paint a series of 'patches' first before doing the leaf study.

Get Your Pencils Out!

Wonderful grey day in downtown Queenscliff along the shore of Swan Bay. Foggy conditions allow you to see the tones in the landscape easier. Colour is downplayed in the overcast conditions and so you can observe the essence of the subject matter....look for the mid tone...the main light and the main dark. If you cannot be on site then try a quick thumbnail from the photo to get your 'eye in'.

Look beyond the blue of 'Sally', the dinghy and again do a tonal study of this pic...see if you can ignore the colour that is calling.........( and trying to distract you! )......... concentrate on the tonal values.

Pumpkin Seed Drying

Saving Pumpkin Seed

Scooped out the seed from half of this pumpkin and spread onto a piece of paper napkin. This enables the seeds to dry out before saving them in an envelope for planting next spring. The pumpkin flesh was cubed and baked with a dash of black pepper and a 'slurp' of olive oil. It then became one of the ingredients in a couscous dish for dinner !

Easter Monday bike riding around Queenscliff

Another bit of sillyness.........Easter chicks enjoying the sea air and sunshine.................................

My sort of Anzac Day football match

Easter Sunday Lunch Frivolities

The Rabbit made a Visit

The nest yesterday......                                                              The nest today....

Sweet Chilli Sauce

Picked from the garden today....hot chilli and limes

So here is the recipe that I put together to use these ingredients.

Sweet Chilli Sauce

10 Birds Eye Chillis with seeds removed (Capsicum frutecens cultivar)...use less for milder brew or more if you like it very hot!
2 Red  Sweet Capsicum/Bell Pepper  (Capsicum annuum)
1 lime, zest and juice
3 sticks of lemongrass
10 cloves of garlic
3/4 cup diced fresh ginger
5 cups white vinegar
2 kg sugar
1 teaspoon salt

1. Dice then puree in blender, peppers (both hot and sweet), ginger, garlic, lemongrass and lime with one cup of vinegar

2. Put pureed ingredients in pot with rest of vinegar, sugar and salt.

3.Bring to boil stirring till sugar is dissolved, then slow boil until syrupy consistency and bottle. Cooking process takes thirty to forty minutes.

Tip  Use gloves to prepare hot chillis......otherwise be prepared for that burning sensation when rubbing eyes or touching any sensitive area!

Japanese Inspired

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Documentation of sleepover.......lthe floor and door sill.................and the new pyjamas

Blueprint..The Leaves are Falling

This is a strata of blueprinted fabrics where I have used Japanese Maple leaves as the mask for the print. Now I will get to and place these prints onto a fragment if fine cream linen and layer it with a thin cotton wadding and get on with some stitchery and texture the surface.......

Blueprinting

Over the last weeks I have been teaching a workshop about blueprinting on fabric. As autumn sets in I have been inspired to do a series of works with Japanese maple leaves as the motif. Over the years I have prepared the cloth myself with the light sensitive chemicals but this time have tapped into www.blueprintsonfabric.com and purchased pre treated fabric. What a treat, all fun and no fuss, just get on with the creating without the time consuming preparation of the base material..

The leaves are falling...

Leaves are great.