Urban sketchers

I went to the January meet-up of the urban sketchers on Sunday - big turn-out of nearly 30 people, which is a lot for us. There's a short pedestrian street in the middle of town that has just been refurbished so we went there to see what we could see.

Definitely more onlookers and bystanders around than we usually have. All fairly interested and asking questions, which is kind of nice. I cannot imagine a situation where I would be comfortable sitting on my own drawing on a busy street but once you're in a group? No problems at all. 

As usual there were all sorts of different takes on the scene and levels of talent. I wanted to include people because my people are AWFUL so I need the practice ... they look like humans but I clearly need to work on it more. Mostly I wanted to capture how very green the street was, which I did! The two hours just flew by, I didn't go for lunch afterwards this time as I had boxes to pack, but it was a lovely morning. 

Meandering through January

Not going to lie, working two days a week is awesome. The non-working days are busy with all the things we have to do and it is a real treat wearing disreputable shorts and no shoes ... We have been out to the house a couple more times to take the carpet to the tip (with the help of friends with a trailer! very handy) and get quotes from a variety of tradespeople. We are already finding out that older houses suck up money ... although our 1970s house is keeping its end up on the money-suck front. So many things to fix. Luckily we have a cat to assist us in clearing out cupboards.

We cleared out the filing cabinet too, so many useless bits of paper. Who has hard copies of anything any more? Why would we need the receipt for our wedding cake? 

That is a great price, even at the time, for a three tiered beautifully decorated cake. We couldn't agree on the cake flavour so had the top and bottom tiers chocolate mud and the middle one fruit. 

And I threw out all the job offer letters (but took photos first, for posterity). I was absolutely delighted to be earning that, back in 2005 ... when you think about it the $10.20 per hour library job was only ten years earlier! I worked there until the start of 1994. So that salary seemed like heaps, although it was the sole household income for a while when my husband took two and half years off to mind the infants and keep the house ... which he did wonderfully. Stay at home spouses are the BEST.

And a passport photo of infant number two, from about that time. Sooooo cute.

So much to do

We had our little break and now it is full on with the cleaning and packing and decluttering and getting stuff done. All of which we should have done ages ago of course ... I forget just how much we have accomplished over the past year when there is still so much to do. I am at the point where I would like to throw out all our belongings and start over, but I realise I might regret that decision in a couple of months. So I will show some of the very brainless painting I am doing - it is basically just doodles to quiet my brain for a bit.

Diane Antone's blobby birds have been popular.

A monochromatic something.

Always flowers if I'm stuck.

An A3 sheet of mini landscapes, this was quite fun and also made me a bit pleased with myself, that I can paint a few different types of scenes. 

I am just working two days a week through January to give me time to do house things and also not bust a foofer valve. January is always very quiet here so I can keep on top of work without too much trouble. The doctor put me on blood pressure pills which should help ... I am blaming work but I should probably blame fatness. Luckily I can do something about both, although work might be easier to discard than the blubber. 

Happy New Year

Welcome to 2025 - the retirement year :) it hardly seems possible, but here we are, and I am ready for it. We managed to get a couple of good beach days in after Christmas, both swimming and doing some sewing. The cat assisted me. 

But that will be the last of the relaxing for a few weeks ... I have to go back to work and it will be full steam ahead getting the Canberra house ready for sale and doing things to the Braidwood house before we move in.

We hauled up a couple of camping mattresses and chairs and some plastic plates to spend New Year's Eve at the new house - start 2025 as we mean to go on. We had takeaway pizza for dinner and a bottle of the good champagne before sleeping in the front room, and getting used to all the noises and creaks of an unfamiliar house. 

So many parrots! And insects, and a tiny skink. We will get it emphatically sprayed before we move in. We put paint samples on the walls (antique white? whisper white? natural white? polar white?), pulled up the tacking strips, despaired at the (lack of) kitchen cupboards, resisted the urge to get stuck into the garden beds and failed to kill any rabbits by running over them in the car. Poison is apparently a lot more effective.

Merry christmas

We had a great christmas - traditional for us, doing absolutely nothing. Number two won at 2010s Trivial Pursuit for the third year in a row (it is NOT a game for the over 50s), presents were exchanged, food was eaten and three of us went for an evening walk. 

Number one stayed over for christmas eve and christmas night and it was very lovely to have all four of us in the house again. Boxing Day number two left on an early flight back to Melbourne and the rest of us went out to the Braidwood house to rip the carpet up from the bedrooms before the painters arrive ... it was stinking hot but we got it off the floor OK. Haven't removed the tacking strips yet but that can be a job for another day. Number one thought the house was pretty cool, if a bit peculiar in layout! And picked a room, being the first child to see the place (the two rooms are largely identical, but you know, always nice to get first pick).

The gardens are very shaggy and the house is very echoey and empty, although the tenants left it absolutely spotless. We thought there might be floorboards or something exciting under the carpet ... and there might be but it was a school house for many years so there are very ugly green lino squares emphatically glued to whatever is underneath.

 

We are not that interested in renovating so will happily carpet over it all again. I like carpet in bedrooms anyway, warmer and quieter.

We had a picnic lunch and headed back into Canberra for drinks with friends. Lots of traffic going the other way, down to the beach. Hopefully we'll get some beach days but there's so much to do....

More lino printing

 The face is still improving and I'm taking the opportunity to do house things and a little bit of art on the side. It's amazing what a couple of weeks rest will do - I feel so much better all over, even though I didn't think I was particularly overworked! One of the many reasons why I never made it to be a big boss, I don't think I could physically handle it. And who would want to? 

Lino printing is messy as all get out. I moved from water-based to oil-based inks which resulted in a much better print, but the clean up is brutal, even though I'm using an ink that can be washed up in water (if you're quick! don't let it dry...). 

So I've had a mad fiesta of cutting and printing, and now I've packed it all away until we move house. I will be doing dainty watercolours and perhaps some pencil sketching until we sell this place. 

Some of the prints work much better than others. I  bought some lovely thin rice paper with bits of flowers and leaves in it. It takes a print wonderfully, and you have pink bits.

The better ones are where there is actually some use of the qualities of lino printing - that is, taking what is essentially two options (ink or no ink) and making it mean different things in different spaces.

Sometimes the blank space is darkness, and sometimes it is light.

The ones where it is just a drawing in light (or dark) are less good. 

These are all copies of other people's work with some minor alterations (usually simplifying! The new Pfeil tools are lovely but I am not yet able to get the level of detail that some people achieve). Except for this one, this is all my own idea :)

The movement on the penguins is completely unintentional - just bits where I haven't cut away properly - but I like it! Looks like they're dancing. I am foolishly in a lino printing Facebook group which is international and has the most extraordinarily accomplished works ... as well as absolute beginners which make me feel better. 

I hang them on a little clothesline to dry - takes about two weeks to dry completely - one of the many reasons why it's not suitable for people trying to sell a house.

Definitely better

They were right - about two weeks is the charm and I have been steadily getting some movement back over the last few days. Thank heavens. I have taken leave from work to rest and recover, which was a very good idea, and generally eating slowly and going for short walks. The cat (and husband) have been delighted to have me at home, which is nice.

We did a short quiet trip to Melbourne to see number two graduate from univesity! Can you believe it, three years has passed so quickly from our perspective, although life changing for the student. University of Melbourne has it as a well oiled machine, this was just the ceremony for the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music, so the entertainment interludes were of higher quality and the students were a little bit quirkier. 

This is the traditional photo of what you actually see when your child graduates from uni. Not much. Then back to the flat for Thai takeaway, I wasn't up for the big celebration dinner ... number two drove back with us and is staying for Christmas which is really really nice. Before back to Melbourne and on to the next adventure, whatever that may be! A career in the theatre is apparently totally a thing, it just seems strange to my public servant brain.