The inventor and his companion

 

I was rummaging around in my little store room today, and I pulled out a half-finished painting I had forgotten about and lifted it onto my easel.  It's about 60-70% done..........maybe I should finish it. 

I like paintings with meanings or narratives (that is not to say that I don't enjoy art without these things).  I like characters and something to build a story around.  

In my head I conjured up an image of man with a little mechanic bird resting on his hand..............

****************************

 There was once an inventor who lived alone, up in a home amidst the rooftops of Paris.   He was used to being by himself, but eventually he felt the pangs of loneliness, and it drove him to create a little mechanical friend.......a little bird which wouldn't fly away like the rest, a companion that would stay with him..........

The little bird was kept in a golden cage, and woke up the inventor every morning with its song so he could start work.......  

but after a while, he saw that his little friend looked on to its natural counterparts with envy.  Without room to fly, its wings became harder to move and the little bird became sad, and so it stopped singing in the mornings.......

....then one day, the inventor decided to do what was best for his little companion's happiness, even though he would miss him.   He went to the window, and opened the cage............

.......the little bird hopped on to the inventor's hand and looked up at to him .  The inventor bid fairwell to his companion, and let it fly away.......

****************************

Back home

I've been away for about a week........and the train journey there wasn't exactly pleasant!  The constant rain has played havoc with many train routes in the U.K.  Some rail tracks have been mangled by the force of the overflowing rivers, as if they were just toy sets. Usually my journey to my parents house takes around 5 hours 15 mins, but this time it took 6 hrs 20mins, which means I was lucky I suppose as many people had to wait much longer than that.  1 taxi tide, a packed coach, 2 trains, and a car journey later and I arrived at my destination. 

 Never mind.........a cozy house and chocolates made up for it............and there were many,  many chocolate bars - dark chocolate with mint, dark chocolate with orange, dark chocolate assortments.....so I think I'll be stocked up for a while.  :D 

Old room

 One day I'd like to move out of my city, and move somewhere greener so I can look out of my window and see what I used to see out of my old room.  You can just about see Tremadog Bay, a part of the Irish Sea
 in the distance.

Waiting........

Can't wait until my silver leaf arrives this week (fingers crossed) - then I'll be able to work on some of my pieces.  

These ones in the bottom picture are quite festive I think (maybe not the spiral one)!  I wanted to make something festive and whimsical, and that's how I came up with the candy cane idea.

I really want to finish that candy cane one actually.......the one with the mica flakes centre......but I can't finish them properly until I have that silver leaf.  I'll have to post photos of these again, in daylight, because at the moment it's dark so much of the time that it's really difficult to get some good light.  Apparently some new light bulbs will be available to buy in 2013 that are better than LEDs, and even better than full spectrum light bulbs since they won't contain any nasty mercury (I've had to massive light-saving ones shatter on me recently, and as it's not the best thing for your health, I'm a bit scared to handle them now)!!

Jester - Part 9 & 10

Art nouveau pendant

Hmmm......I think this is going to be quite a difficult one......

Tins

I don't usually do this, but I couldn't resist!  Today I saw a beautiful biscuit tin in a supermarket.  They were on sale with 50% off the original price - they were £5 down from £10 (I wouldn't have bought it for £10, though).  I liked them so much I bought two as Christmas gifts.........and one for myself. 

The chocolate biscuits inside are nice (made with butter, no vegetable oils) , and I love the design on the tins.  Very Parisian art nouveau I thought.  It reminds me a little bit of some of Alphonse Mucha's work.  I went to their website, and it turns out they have more collectible tins! 

http://www.biscuiterie-mere-poulard.fr/boutique/fr/14-coffrets-collector

Maybe it's a good thing I can't buy them as well....lol.

Pink flower macros

I've bought myself a new camera :D, because the old one was a bit pathetic and wasn't working proper;y anymore.  Even though the old point & shoot was prone to taking blurry shots, the one good thing that it did manage to do was macros. 

I'm looking forward to testing out my new camera over Christmas.  Sadly, there probably won't be any pretty frosty shots this year because it's simply not cold enough yet.

Anyway, here are some pink flower macros I took with my previous Canon A1000 (a nice colour to have around when the weather is dull and miserable).

 

Pendant gifts

Today I've been working on two pendants that are meant to be a gift for a relative of mine (shhh!).  I know she likes small, delicate pendants, so that's what I'm making for her.

One is going to be a treble clef, and the other is a tiny celtic knotwork pendant. They're both going to be plated with silver.  I'll post more pictures soon!

 This one is a larger version of the same pendant, and it's going to go into my Etsy collection. 

Language articles

Some interested language related articles I found this week -

http://news.discovery.com/human/brain-language-learning-120319.html

http://news.discovery.com/history/ancient-scotland-written-language.html
 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121127094111.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110314132531.htm

  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/02/110218092529.htm

The Discovery article at the top suggests that people who are good at learning languages may have brains that are more efficient in certain areas.  Even though I'm not surprised at this, I'm sure that many people will use articles like this to explain why they're just not good at languages.  They'll somehow think their mind is somehow inadequate compared to those who find it easier to learn.  Motivation, attitude, time, patience and enjoyment are very important factors when it comes to learning a foreign language.  Yes, age can influence language learning as well, but isn't this true with everything?  Should this mean that we should just give up on learning any new skill, just because we're over the age of 20? 

Celtic Horse Pendant

This pendant is almost finished :) Just got to add some finishing touches.

When I've made enough of these pendants, I'll open my Etsy shop.  At the moment I'm thinking of calling it 'Ceridwen's Trinkets', 'Ceridwen Designs', or 'Ceridwen's Trove'

Celtic Horse Pendant

Celtic Horse Pendant

Carl Warner - Amazing Foodscapes

I present to you Carl Warner - a creator of foodscapes, an art where he makes landscapes out of food and photographs them.  His work is fun, imaginative, and interesting to look at, so take a peek at this photo set that was published in a newspaper a while back.  I tried to get his permission to show his photos on her, but I haven't had a reply yet :(  As I'm reluctant to include photographers' work in my blog without their permission, you just have to click the link to enter his world of whimsical foodscapes. 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinkpicturegalleries/9664001/A-World-of-Food-amazing-foodscapes-by-Carl-Warner.html?frame=2392485

Jester head - Part 5, 6, 7, 8

Jester - Part 7 & 8

Making celtic pendant

  There didn't seem to be an easy way around this celtic knotwork.  This time I decided to draw it by eye.  Anyway, here are some pictures of the finished pendant.