Still Doodling.

I am miffed at having wasted all the lovely days we have had, in between the grotty ones, when I could have been gardening, but I have found doodling to be very therapeutic.  Sadly my leg hasn't  prevented me from doing housework!

I started off using just a black pen then thought it might be good to play around with colour.  Most of the patterns are done freehand but I did use a ruler to create the grids, and as you can see doing the background with a fine grid has it's dangers and if you are not very careful you find that your lines have gone astray somewhere.

Most of my patterns start with randomly drawn lines to see what shapes I will come up with.

I used a ruler for these straight lines.

This one took me by surprise as it was going to be grid based and then changed it's mind!

This one makes me think of crows battling against the wind.  Very fitting for today's weather which has very strong gusts which keep blowing the bins over.  I'm not sure it is finished yet - I may add to it.

 Luckily it isn't cold and the sun is shining.

My leg seems to be improving slightly and I have even managed to christen my garden hoe and banished few weeds this morning, after which I rewarded myself with this little posy of rescued  polyanthus that the wind had blown about.

Hope you all have a lovely Easter and that the weather wont be too unkind to us.

Tea for Two!

I wouldn't be surprised if these two tried to build a nest in this bird feeder.   In past years collared doves have reared two chicks on the bracket of our Sky dish.

There are plenty of signs of spring in the garden this week.  Everything is doing it's stuff and if you don't look too closely it's all looking lovely.

I love polyanthus and have planted quite a few all round the garden.

The birds often peck at the yellow ones - I think there must be something nutritional to them in the yellow petals, but these seem to have escaped their attention.

Year after year I have watched our big daffodils blown down into the mud so have switched my allegiance to the dwarf varieties which stand up to bad weather so much better.

More lovely hellebores - they are spreading really well now and having babies all over the place.

These Jerusalem Cowslips are a wonderful blue, slightly washed out by my camera.  The bees love them.

These little violas have been flowering their socks off since last October and cope with anything the weather throws at them.

Last week the first frogspawn appeared in the pond.  It was about the size of a clenched fist - now there is a huge mass, so there should be lots of little froglets this year.

We won't need any early calls if these two build a nest in this tree.  It is right beside our house and there will be a great deal of 'karking' going on.

We have had several beautiful days which would have been perfect for gardening, but my wretched leg is still painful and I don't want to make it worse.  I only look at the tidy bits and try to ignore the areas that are crying out for my attention.  I had a new hoe for my birthday and haven't been able to christen it yet.  All in good time.

Long time no see!!

As I have no inspiration at present I have taken to doodling.   I actually started on this book well before I did the bird book but it has come in very handy while I am suffering withdrawal symptoms.

The first five pages are made with pieces torn from paper napkins and glued to the page.  I then drew into and around them adding shading in places or maybe extra leaves and flowers here and there as in the one below.

There wasn't much I could do with these lovely ammonites apart from deepening the shadows and sharpening the contours.

The left hand page above started me off on several black and white doodles which became quite addictive, but I'll show you those another time.

Another nice idea was to tear this photograph of a driftwood tree trunk in half, stick it down to the pages and draw between and around the two halves.  

Then I thought I should not forget to use my own drawings so wrote these lines from Chaucer and drew between them.  'There sprang the violet al newe and fresh pervinke rich of hewe, and flowers yelowe, whyte and rede: Swich plentee grew ther never in mede, Ful gay was al the ground and queynt and poudred, as men had it peynt.'   I just love the ancient spelling.

The garden is beginning to look lovely with all the primroses, polyanthus, miniature iris and daffodils in flower.  I must do some work out there before the weeds all start going mad.

 I am walking like a drunken sailor at present having had chiropractic treatment for a trapped nerve in my left leg.  It is more comfortable than it was but needs time to recover.

I'll try not to leave it so long before my next post.