Up close and personal…

The third week in May has finally arrived!

Upin the North this gives us the go ahead to start planting, and wouldn’t you know it we have a frost warning for tonight, not fair…

Most days I can be found on my hands and knees mucking about in rich soft earth. BTW, this is the only time that I actually enjoy any of this. Given my fickleness with gardening matters, I know that this enthusiasm won't last long. The intoxicating ‘garden high’ I feel will soon pass and my poor garden with so much promise will eventually take on the look of an abandoned child, probably by the first week of August.

But late in May I am completely intoxicated with the smells, the colour, the fresh earth the gentle breezes. Ah, and my garden plan…this is not unlike art, my canvas being the rich black earth. I will add colour, line, shape and texture. I pick plants and vegetables based on how they will contribute to the whole, the look -- certainly nothing practical.

Oh, and then there are visitors to the garden. In the Spring I love them all having been starved all winter. Some I manage to capture with a help of a borrowed lens... this image captured last August was languishing at the bottom of my blog images bin and demanded to be featured.

You have to admire the exquisite complexity of the bi-wing span of this magnificent little creature. If you click on the image you will see what I mean. I have seen many a dragonfly done with fabric and thread, but I wonder if it is at all possible to really capture this?

OK, back to my plantings…

Some attention is needed here...

When I decided to visit my blog earlier this week I saw a visually attractive site, but sadly one that has been neglected for a very long time. My choice was either to close it down or to breathe new life into it. I have chosen the latter option.

I am now committed to building this blog into a more vibrant site and have taken specific steps to help me do just that. So I signed up for a 4-week BlogTriage class with Cynthia Morris and Alyson Stanfield. This class began today and already they have given me lots to think about and write about.

For starters, I want to state up front that I want this site to reflect and be a record of what is happening in my studio both for me and my readers. I have discovered that it is great to go back over previous postings and see a chronological and visual record of my studio progress these last couple of years. I only wish I had more on record. I want to share this with my readers - students, collectors, gallerists and other artists - both regional and across the web. We are all neighbours through the internet! I hope that with regular practice I will be better connected with this community many of whom also work alone in their studios. I welcome feedback, enquiries

This said, I don't want my blogging practice to be some medicine I need to take daily... yikes! Instead I hope that regular blogging will allow me to share the exitement and discoveries that I experience daily in the studio. I want the blogging part to be a natural output of my daily studio practice. Let's see how it goes.