handmade

I came across this great website, online magazine and blog dedicated to making all things Handmade. The magazine is full of beautiful images and really useful information, as well as connecting makers. It helps with advice and resources for it's members, and promotes the handmade online.

What a fantastic find!

le jardin

Just a few photographs taken today in the garden. It never fails to inspire, sculptural, fresh, tactile and it has the most stunning palette of colours, I adore it.


The onions have gone to seed.



Sweet peas and honeysuckle.



Poppy heads and artichokes.

left handed life 2

Sweetpeas from the garden 10.7.10
Agapanthus 10.7.10

More drawings using my left hand, mostly flowers again i'm afraid but they are so bright and cheerful and seem so forgiving! I've tried drawing things with harder lines and edges but they all appear as if they've been drawn on a boat in a force 8 gale!

left handed life

Two weeks ago yesterday I broke my right (drawing hand) wrist and have been in a cast since. After the shock of not being able to use my right hand to do any of the things i'd usually do, having taken for granted these things for 29 years, i've been learning to use my under-used left side (I have most definately been right sided dominant).

It has been the most unusual and frustrating experience, marks, lines, shading that I would have normally expected to or were used to making using my right hand I couldn't reproduce with my left. I have had to go back to nursery school and learn to write and draw all over again.

Until I can cut up fabric again with a pair of scissors ( I could go out and buy a left-handed pair) i'm just sticking to practicing and playing with pen and ink.

The images above are my first attempts at drawing and colouring with my left hand... it's been akward, annoying and very frustrating but some how rewarding in the end as I hope through the process of using my left side more, to become a more even and balanced creative person.