Is it a bird, is it a plane...?

No but watch this space.
I'm working on putting together an little tutorial on how to make a plaster mould.

Celebrating love and passion.

The work of Kim Saunders: Dorothy's shoes from the Wizard of Oz
(Thanks Kim for letting me use them.)

What could be more perfect an image than this delightful pair of shoes by one of our students.

I have been gone too long

I have been gone too long. I don't know if I am the only one experiencing blogger problems but I have had a hard time of it of late. So I have been out of the loop for a while.

Here's a quick catch-up on a long process. Christmas 2007 ( I have to start the story here) I gave each of my kids a plain bowl that I had made. The idea being that they would paint on their own design and I would get it fired.
Now move forward a year December 2008: They finally get to put brush to bowl. I did a quick pencil guide sketch and let them loose. Then added some black outline afterward to help things along.
Finally Tuesday morning February 2009 my baby bears woke up to this surprise!

Birdy Num Num

Flipper

My mom always said "good things come to those who wait" in my children's case... and wait, and wait. But my little ones are completely delighted and breakfast is a lot more fun.

Gardens are for colour

And spending quality time in them on the weekend puts things in perspective.

My neighbours...

...mine.

She sees Seashells by the Sea

I'm back at ceramics. I started a little vessel inspired by this shell. I really love the textures and the colours. Bone whites, sun bleached pinks and mauve's with strong dark chocolate contrasts.


I'm not entirely happy with my hand carved textures but I'm adopting a wait and see approach. Once the underglazes etc. get fired I'm hoping it will look less contrived.

The bisque fired bowl.

Lizards, Snails and Puppydog Tails

Gardens are definitely for ... boys

FoodFacts

Gardens are for...educating Heloise

The Humble Carrot has quite a history:
The Greeks called the carrot Philon or Philtron from their word philo that means loving, although the current word we use has it's roots in French.
We can thank the Dutch for our sweet orange carrots ~ developed in the honour of 'The House of Orange'

Some other weird facts:
- Carrots were originally red or purple
- During the reign of James 1 fashionable ladies often wore carrot foliage as decoration on their hats (very weird)
- Carrot stew precedes Viaggra as an aphrodisiac (TeeHee)
- Someone out there is trying to create a 'rainbow' carrot
- and if it were used as a biofuel it would take approximately 6000 carrots to drive one mile

And that's only scratching the surface.
All this and more from the invaluable Carrot Museum

Go on dig up some dirt this weekend you never know what you might find.