Norfolk Island

We have been on holiday for a week, to Norfolk Island of all places. This is a strange little Australian external territory in the Pacific about two hours flight from Sydney and home to just over 2000 people and many (mostly elderly) tourists. 

It is absolutely beautiful and a wonderful place to chill for a week. My parents-in-law have gone there twice a year for at least half a dozen years; they rent a big house sometimes and family come and share part of their holiday! We went over last Sunday for a week to eat good food, walk about, see historical things and generally have a lovely time.

Norfolk is very peculiar . It had a brief period of Polynesian settlement but they all left about 1400 AD ... then the British set up a convict colony in 1788 but that failed and in 1814 they burnt all the buildings and left ... tried again with another harsh convict settlement from 1824-1855 but moved them all back to Tasmania ... then in 1856 they decided to re-settle the Pitcairn Islanders (i.e. children of the Bounty mutineers and the Tahitians they had kidnapped) there because Pitcairn is tiny, pointless and overcrowded. Norfolk has never had a proper jetty or harbour and only got an airfield in WWII. 

So, of all the things you would expect a tiny isolated island - that is literally populated by descendants of people who tipped Bligh into a longboat - to become, would you pick a favourite haunt of senior citizens in small tour groups? There are four flights a week from Australia, and it is one of the easiest, most chill places I have ever travelled to. When we flew out we left the hire car unlocked in the airport carpark with the key under the floor mat. I will post again because we really did have a wonderful time but it was not at all what I expected. 

Painting from life

I'm trying to do more painting from real life scenes and not copying other people's art on the internet. This is quite difficult for a number of reasons - not only is my local environment fairly dull, but I do all my painting after about 8 pm so it would have to be photos, and most of all it's REALLY HARD to make decisions about what to include and how to go about it. Much easier when somebody has already done that work and all you have to do is trot along behind. But, because I am committed to continuous personal growth (I'm really not) I am giving it a go.

I did a sketch of folk festival scenes. Coffee and ice-cream! The inflatable ice cream on the van did totally look like testicles in real life, it's not just my drawing.

My people are genuinely awful. The ones in the back are meant to be dancing.

A house on a street from my walk a couple of weeks ago. It is quite a nice house and I have not done it justice. I can't see myself being one of those artists that post little sketches through the letter box as a nice surprise for the owner (yes, it happens, google it). 

Beach and sewing

I spent the weekend at the beach - swimming both days and also doing a bit of sewing. There are many lengths of fabric in the drawers that are really only going to be good for workwear ... so given I only have perhaps a year of working left, I thought I should try and use up whatever I can and get some wear out of it.

This is a very unsatisfying photo of black pants, but trust me they worked out quite well. They are perhaps slightly too wide at the bottom but the fit around the waist and bum is excellent - there is minimal shaping, just two darts at the front, two darts at the back and a zip up the side. I am a bit nervous of limited fit options given the blubber rolls but it was great, the fit at the back in particular is excellent. I will definitely make this again - it was Vogue 9336. I made the skirt as well, in a grey drill, but I haven't worn it yet.

I also turned some very light striped georgette into a top - I bought this material ages ago and haven't found a use for it - too light for pants or even a dress but the stripes make it hard to do a shirt. So I used a very very old Burda pattern for what is manifestly a fat-lady tunic ... nice and long to go over your hips with a bit of a tie to give some shape definition and the rest just hanging like a sack. Perfect.

It was super comfortable to wear. My overlocker is behaving beautifully after I had it serviced (and took some lessons!) so both of these are nice and neat on the inside.

And the beach was lovely too.

Francisco from Portugal

There is a Portugese artist and illustrator - Francisco Fonseca - who does the most wonderful buildings ... and lots of other fabulous things as well but I really like the buildings. I did a Domestika course of his and also on Patreon for a while but he's not very active ... and to be honest probably a better artist than teacher. But just watching him do stuff is very educational - with the buildings he uses pen and wash quite differently, using the inking for shadowing and then colour for effect. 

I have done many poor copies, as is my way. 

And he just 'looks around my ordinary town, there is always something to draw' .... well maybe there is in your ancient Portugese village Francisco but try wandering around a town built entirely in the ugliest phases of the twentieth century and see what you can do .... nothing picturesque round here my friend.

I am using my new Clairefontaine sketchbook which also has lovely heavy cotton watercolour paper - so far the paper is performing better than the Winsor&Newton one but it is smaller, and the spiral binding isn't big enough to let you lay it properly flat. There's always something.

Filled up the sketchbook with Gary

I did a whole sketchbook of Gary paintings, and now I'm taking a break for a little while. I still do love them though, the houses and the colours and the strange people. I was a bit nervous about doing people (given how much I suck at people when I'm doing my urban sketching) but Gary's people have a certain non-realistic charm. I enjoyed destitute Santa. 

And naked guy sitting on rocks.

Then back to the houses - I like the orange trees. 

Rainy weekend

After the heat and sunshine of Easter last weekend was rainy and cold. Hard to believe a week can take us from air-conditioning and iced drinks through to thinking about putting the fire on. Not actually putting the fire on - just thinking about it. We made do with putting on socks. The rain was good for the garden - the leaves are just starting to turn. Grapevine and golden ash are first as usual.

Unusually both me and my husband were in Canberra and not gardening or doing anything so we turned out the kitchen! It's been four years since the new kitchen was put in and we'd done the pantry a couple of times and the cutlery drawer ... but the rest of it hadn't been emptied and cleaned so we did every cupboard and every drawer. Except the one over the fridge which we forgot about it.

We managed to throw some things out, which is excellent, and then did the outside of the all the doors and surfaces. Mostly we thought about how amazing the new kitchen is, and how much we love it, and how shitty the kitchen at the retirement house is. You certainly enjoy things more when you know you'll be losing them soon ... even though kitchens are very replaceable. We have spent every day since randomly opening drawers and admiring the sparkle.

Sydney

First thing Tuesday morning I went up to Sydney for work ... with the rousing sounds of folk music still rattling in my brain. It was an interesting couple of days visiting various government sites - some of which are on the beautiful Sydney harbour. Whenever I go to Sydney and it's crowded and busy I think how could anyone live there ... but there are such beautiful nooks and bays all around the harbour. Stone cliffs down to the water (unlike the mud flats I grew up on).

We went to the maritime museum - this submarine is one of the exhibits. The others toured it, I did not. Confined spaces under the water? No.

This is looking back to the city, featuring my new hat that I bought at the folk festival. It's a proper expensive wool felt hat and I love it, even though it looks a bit farming. Super comfortable and cool... cool in the temperature sense. I am under no illusion that it is cool in the fashionable sense.

We also visited Australia's only nuclear reactor (in the suburbs of Sydney, why not) and an office building in the middle of town. Fun times but I was exhausted by the end of it, after four days of music festival then two days of travel. I got my flu shot on Thursday and ended up taking the day off on Friday! Felt very unwell for about half a day, then slept and felt better.

Folk Festival!

Easter snuck up on me this year - too early - but I had bought my early bird season ticket to the folk festival way back in August, so all I had to do was rock up and enjoy four days of wonderful music. My crowd-tolerance has reduced since covid, so I was a bit worried it might be too much, but absolutely not ... lots of old people sitting around quietly as usual. And the music was GREAT, I saw some amazing acts. The photos are not of the amazing acts because dark stages are always terrible photos. Here are 100 Australians doing the nutbush in the hot sun.

After my day job it was nice to be in such an unashamedly left-wing space - much palestine-supporting, billionaire-beheading (just suggestions, no actual billionaires were harmed) and queer-allying going on. As usual some of my favourite shows were unexpected re-arrangements of artists where they dragged up some of the street performers, or young people, onto a bigger stage. The ones below were not on a bigger stage - a random group - I took a photo because they were doing an excellent version of Friday I'm in Love by the Cure on ukeleles by the rubbish bins. 

I caught up with a few friends that I see there every year - saw one of them in the choir below - and tried to stay cool. It was hotter than usual but the weather was glorious. They said crowds were a bit down (cost of living and all) and I could see the lack of queues at the vendors ... except the beer and ice-cream sellers. They did very well.