Grandmas Garden

There is nothing better than the sound of the wood pigeons calling and the knowledge that your’e up before the rest of the world on a sunny day. Even in the depths of winter, a bright crisp morning can still bathe your face in unexpected warmth if you wrap your self up and head into the garden or your balcony or your park with your coffee . ( make it real coffee, favourite mug, don’t wake anyone else up.. )

 Mum’s garden in Sussex.

Sometimes it’s possible to wait years to allow yourself permission to be happy. It isn’t a cliche, or something smug people are telling you to annoy you. To give yourself the freedom to feel, and create and be, gets you back to that kid you have pictures of in a drawer somewhere. The kid that went out in the garden and knew the power of right now, being spontaneous and looking for magic in everything..

Its not gone. The grass is still there. Some days the sun will even come out! Some days if you can only draw with your left hand with a big chunky kids crayon, do that. It might become a layer in your best work ever. Just let the process be the fun.

I am as guilty as the next person … of not creating until my ‘proper’ work is done. Of completing my to do list before I get my sketchbook out or only stepping into the zone when the ironing is neatly folded or the bathroom clean.

Thing is.. you never have a clear list. Blink and twenty years go by. You’re the parent or grandparent in the garden instead of the kid.. Because you always thought that it was an all or nothing thing this making lark.. either you were a famous artist or why bother.. you maybe just put it to one side until the perfect day came.

No day is perfect. Like us. Like our creations. Lift the pressure off and it feels like Christmas. I’ve discovered sneaking in odd little moments of it to shake myself up. scribbling in tiny sketchbooks as freely as I might have done before Art school squashed the life out of your randomness! ( Although I have to thank them for temporarily getting me to concentrate on learning to felt and getting a degree I guess!)

Remember Doing this?

Squeezing that little bit of pure unadulterated joy in, regardless of who gives a monkey’s is essential for your enlightenment as a human and also for you to connect with the person you were always designed to be.

Today. I am meant to be resting my hands after an injection for arthritis in my thumb joints, that are fusing together. I got too excited about writing to you and showing some pictures .  I promise to get the Voltarol out, but before I go I just wanted to share the kiss I got last night… Ha ha, don’t get too excited. We are on holiday, my daughter cavorting at the kids disco..It was from a tiny boy, on the cheek, because he was sitting playing a game on his own on his ipad, stitching up people. Great fun. We had a great chat, and as we left, my own child fit to drop, he bashfully asked his mum if he could give me a hug. Ahh.

Go play.. it reaps dividends !! xxxx

Felt artwork  ‘At Your side’

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