What to Do when you are Sitting Down a lot.....

On Monday I had an appointment at the hospital. New x-rays, and a (gentle) examination. They took the plaster cast off and this is what my foot looked like after 2 weeks. Puffy and swollen with deep bruising on all sides, and my ankle bone had disappeared from view entirely. It looked kind of reddish-brown. Very nice to feel the fresh air.

I was given a "moon-boot" and told to start putting a bit more weight on it over the next few weeks, and then start some physio. Hurray, I can take showers again!

It feels so much better now on Friday; I have put my whole weight on it a few times today, but only with the boot on. Without it hurts a lot. But I shall be so pleased when I can walk without crutches again, very frustrating not being able to carry stuff....

Autumn colours. One of the last peachy roses, a dahlia like a flame, and a knobbly orange pumpkin. So exuberant!! The pumpkin will be used soon to make pumpkin-curry soup.
I have been reading this book lately, by Rice Freeman-Zachery. It's written to help you find the time and head space to find your creativity, and fit it into your life. I really like it, and the book has beautiful art work on all pages by lots of different artists, there is loads of different advice from real artists in it, which is very comforting. None of them have perfect lives.

It has a lot of talk about what I call "creative flow", when you are "in the zone".When time disappears. It's really a wonderful feeling, one I like to keep going.

Until you get a phone call from school and your daughter asks if you are going to pick her up at all.....

This has happened a few times over the years (blush) At least they were safe!..
The book gets you to do these exercises, lots of writing things down. So I decided to make a journal to do that in, so I keep the "flow" going. I used an old cook book, this one had bound pages and was a good size. I pulled out half the pages and glued the left over pages together in pairs. Then gesso-ed everything, and started decorating with old papers and water soluble crayons etc.
So here 4 of my favourite pages. I actually finished the whole journal before I have started using it this time.

Strangely enough it turned into a weird little story about a girl being lost in the woods and then realizing she actually lived there and knew the way after all. I used text cut from a children's encyclopeadia from the 50's. The original had a different storyline, but you just put words together to make a new story.

Leaving lots of room to write with flowing ink pens in different colours.

I go over some of the glossy pictures with coloured gesso, otherwise the writing inks won't show up or wipe off again. The gesso gives it a bit of roughness.

Of course I had to make a bookmark for it as well, with the words "keeping it simple" and an elmtree on the back. A length of antique lace, a red vintage button and a pretty white feather from my brothers' pigeons sets it off nicely.

And what are the odds of finding a monogrammed dressing-table coverlet, with my own initials on it??!!.... (I believe 1 in 676)