Jessie Lilac Blog

I thought I'd missed last friday's life drawing session having been caught up in the flight cancellation fiasco but I found out today that this was the first one of the term today, so I've not missed anything! It's been an age since I've done any drawing from observation and many weeks since the last life drawing session. I enjoyed using the watercolour pencils, I did do another painting with them but I didn't scan it and show it here because I'd nearly made a whole through the paper getting it too wet so it was a little bit of a mess. I really ought to take some decent paper along with me next time instead of lazily using my (cheapish) sketchbook! Have a happy bank holiday weekend, hope it's not too wet!

Hello watercolour paints, do you remember me? I used to play with you every day. I expect you thought I'd forgotten all about you. I could give you a long list of excuses why I haven't splashed around in my sketchbook for weeks, (or is it months??) But I won't. Here's a page of watercolouryness. It's just a start but you've got to start somewhere haven't you? I hope to do more very soon.

Our adventure started in Rome, an amazing place with lovely people, even the air smelt beautiful! So many stunning churches, paintings, sculptures, fountains, shops. We even saw the Pope without knowing he'd be there at the Vatican, sat on his chair doing a talk (like you do!) Everywhere were things to please the eye. My eye anyway. and to feed the soul. Once we'd planned our route back home to the UK, (amidst the stress!) we enjoyed an unexpected day in Paris. The grave of the artist Edward Degas A quick visit to Montmartre to see the artists at work. I do love Paris.

I'm so glad to be back with my family after the terrible ordeal of flight cancellations and long train journeys. One particular day I was upset about the possibility of missing was my youngest daughter's birthday. I could hardly bear to think about it while I was away. If it hadn't been for the travel disaster, I would have had a whole week to organise, shop, cook, wrap and prepare but as it turned out, there was only one day to get it all done! But done it was and it was bliss to be back home and to have the rest of the family here too. The birthday girl made her own cake (She's actually better at it than me!) and I decorated it so it would be at least a bit of a surprise and here she is with her friends tucking in! Sorry I forgot to photograph the cake, it's been a mad rush here as you can imagine. While I'm here I want to thank Amalia for honouring me with this wonderful Blog award! It says 'Hope, Courage and Faith' Thankyou Amalia so much! Very ti...

You might wonder why I haven't been blogging for a while. It was supposed to be a couple of days away in Rome but ended up with us spending the last 7 days trying to find a way to get back to the UK. We arrived back last night after ten journeys to get here and I'm feeling quite traumatised by the whole thing because we went without the children and my biggest fear was not seeing them for such a long time. Many people, probably most, are still stranded on holiday so we're the lucky ones. We saw lots of beautiful things in Rome and had an expected stop in Paris (see pic above) so we were lucky enough to have moments of pure bliss mixed in with the terrible stress of not knowing if we were going to make it back. I've got lots of things to sort out at home first but when I can, I'll be back here visiting you all and I look forward to getting back to normal. It's good to be home, you have no idea!

At last I've finished the mermaid painting ! We took the hardboard side panel off of the bath so that I could paint her on there. It was an odd size to paint on and would hardly fit on my easel. I did some of the painting with it across a table because the hardboard was quite thin and bendy and some of the smaller details were impossible to do with it bending to and fro! I sprinkled some very fine glitter on the scaly parts, like the mermaid's tail and the fish and finished off with several coats of matte varnish over the whole thing. She's not fixed back on the bath just yet, but you can get an idea of how it'll look if I turn this photo around this way up. Thankyou to Violette for the inspiration of using glitter in the bathroom!

Sorry if I'm a bit late with the draw to see who wins the giveaway, it's just that it was such a sunny day today, that we popped into the countryside for a little while. I hope you'll forgive me? :) I've written all your names on to pieces of paper and picked one at random. And the winner is......... Diana Congratulations Diana! Send me your address so I can mail the cards to you as soon as possible! Sorry to those who didn't get picked and thankyou so much for taking part. I always wish at this point that I was sending them out to all of you. xx

I'm having a giveaway of 3 of my postcard prints. Choose any 3! Leave a comment on the post that has all the details by clicking HERE . The draw will be tomorrow so get those last minute comments in while there's time! We've been away for a few days and the lovely thing about coming home is to see the changes in the garden. My forsythia is out in force! Good luck with the draw, I'll post about the winner very soon. :o)

We're feeling quite chocolated out but it's been a perfect Easter Day! We've had an Easter egg hunt around the house and the garden, A sunny walk surrounded by beautiful trees and the bluest of blue seas! Happy Easter! Hope yours was a good one too :o)