That last one was the bad post that I needed to write. I wanted to get it done before going back to the studio on Monday January 6th. For me the new year begins then! My children are rejoicing in the room next door as the first school day back has been declared a snow day! Which means that when I’m back in the mill tomorrow, I will have company. We set up a HUGE scalextric track over the holidays so they’re going to come in for one last play on it before putting it away. I can then reclaim…

It’s a tricky one, this. It’s a blog post I feel I should write, though my husband says I shouldn’t. He says I should forget about it and move on. He’s right – but just in case this could be shared with someone in time to stop them making the bad decision I made, I’m pressing ahead. This isn’t for sympathy, and it isn’t for vengeance. It’s for information. Speccy young me in National Health Specs Just over 5 years ago I did a little post about having corrective eye surgery. It was December 2019. I was excited, I wasn’t…

I had an exciting meeting at Bankfield this week, about something that’s going to be keeping me busy in the winter months. It’s going to be lovely to be able to hide away in a sea of colour whilst it’s colourless outside. I don’t think I can say too much until it’s all agreed. It’s half term next week and I want to encourage you to go to Bankfield and see the exhibition while it’s still up! It’s there until Dec 21st, after which many of the paintings will be going to their forever homes, and they’ll never be all…

When did having ‘your 5 a day’ become a mantra, likewise your 10,000 steps? They’re all just ideas in the public consciousness that are just out there, and maybe we adjust our behaviour a little because we are aware that this is something we all SHOULD be doing. I think it’s time for new one to launch into the ether and it’s 5 human interactions a day Though it may need a snappier title. How about ‘Hi -5!’?? Human Interactions x 5. Any suggestions? It is becoming so very easy to spend days at a time without any kind of…

I had a lovely end to last week. The ‘Cragg Vale’ painting (in my last blog) sold last week and will be shipped to Houston, Texas in the New Year! Exciting to be so well travelled… I love to know where my paintings go, and they were such nice people. So, after I’d stayed very local in the coldest winter months (though it’s the darkness I mind more than the cold), my friend Nancyann dragged me out to see her bits of Calderdale. After painting Akroydon a few years ago, I knew of Edward Akroyd’s other model village at Copley:…

And it was lovely! Thank you to everyone that came along on Friday 28th June. Filling that big hall with work has given me sleepless nights. Pictures that seem vast in my studio diminish in size as they are carried up the Museum’s grand staircase. But it did all fit, and I have to say that I was very proud of how it’s all come together. It’s years worth of work, pretty much. I was sat by Lake Annecy last July, with a notebook drawing out a plan. A plan that began with a map! We were all sat around…

At the end of June this year I shall be holding a new exhibition at Bankfield Museum in Halifax. I was invited as part of ‘Culturdale’ – a celebration of all things Calderdale. We played around with all sorts of titles and themes. ‘The Industrialists’ – too formal. Too much about what’s gone. ‘Legacy’ – was met with much scoffing. “Too much mentioned in wills”. I was trying to come up with a title that was unique to Calderdale and what shaped it. One day I jokingly said “Okay – how about ‘Engineers and Chocolatiers”. That’s all the mills, all…

I don’t know what happened this year. I’m usually so ready for my children to be back at school – mainly because I’m panicking about the jobs that are piling up, and I’m quite ready for some quiet creative time. Maybe they’re older and easier, need less organising. They definitely help more. They are so interesting! Anyway – for the first time, I’ve not quite wanted summer to end. We had some great adventures in ‘Henri’ – our camper van. Henri is new to us and we’re new at campervaning, so this was a bit of a major maiden voyage….

I’m not going to lie; I almost bit off more than I could chew with this exhibition. Turns out that there are A LOT of letters in the alphabet. I got to letter 12 and said to myself “I don’t think you’ve thought this through…”. But I did it. I even did an ‘X’! I’ve displayed them framed all together and on little clipboards at Heart Gallery (they can be bought as the full set, or individually). You can see the individual letters here. The very last painting I completed before my final trip to the framers was this one:…