More Horaces! Yay!!!

Sal has finished her gorgeous 'Special Needs Horace'. Let me allow her to introduce him in her own words...

He had a traumatic birth, being attacked by crazed burglars shortly before delivery, which may be why young Heinz Harold Horace is such a sad and saggy bear. His arm deformity is also being attributed to this attack (rather than maternal neglect during pregnancy...)
Being rather self-conscious about his deformed arm he tends to wear a glove...



And Jane has knitted a third Horace (WOW Jane!) Here he is sitting next to her second Horace. One of these will be going to Tami... you lucky lass.. which one will you choose?

So I've updated the Bears United web-site accordingly and am now waiting for more Horaces to come along.

Men in Lycra!

All the snow has disappeared and magically Spring seems to have sprung. I drove down the road to the Coed Y Brenin (King's Forest) which is just five or six miles away from home and met mum for coffee this morning. The Coed is one of the best biking trails in the country and to prove the point there was a plethora of men in lycra fiddling with their bikes and chattering to one another about gears and tyre pressures like a load of pensioners at a knitting club. Exceedingly difficult to avert ones eyes from the manly bulges that were everywhere you looked. I kept my eyes to the sky and tried to think mundane thoughts.
The Coed is a glorious place and has a well deserved reputation. Even at this time of year before the trees get their full crown of green, it is still heart-stoppingly beautiful. Here is a photo of The Bike in the Tree which is just visible from the cafe.

March UK ACEO Theme Week

Just finished my entry for this month's ACEO theme week which starts tomorrow. The theme is Mother and Child.
This is called On The Beach
Only realized as I started painting that Rotring ink is not waterproof which is really irritating. I had assumed it would be but didn't check. Managed to avoid smudges this time but in future I'll have to ink after paint.. ah well.. the Rotring pen is a joy to use though. Love it to bits.

What a view!

And because it is such a beautiful day today I thought I'd take a pic of the lake (Llyn Trawsfynydd) that I can see from my studio. Very inspirational.

Brrrrr! Chilly

No more snow overnight but it's really cold and the snow from yesterday has really frozen up. Pickle (who is a border collie for those who wanted to know!) took one look at me taking photographs of my paintings and decided that sitting in front of the log fire was a better idea. I was up to my knees in snow taking this pic!

Snow, snow and more snow

A good five inches of it at the moment and still it comes down. Hauling parcels up the hill to the post office has become an Olympic sport and somewhat treacherous at that. I could do with a pair of those nice spiky football boots really.
Anyway, I've been staying warm and busy in my studio and have been doing quite well with ebay sales in the past few days. I've also been working a little bit looser than my normal style which has been fun. Here is one of my triptyches called Skittles & Beer.

All this softening of the landscape is really rather beautiful. I let Pickle out for a run in the garden this morning and he promptly disappeared in a snow drift. All you could see were the tips of his ears twitching in a manic display of sheer joy. I took a picture of him once he had scrabbled his way to solid ground.

Still not smoking and am now on day 17. Think I might be almost a real non smoker .. hope so!