Right, well this is finished but the quality of the image is crap compared to the original. I'll have another go at photographing it tomoz in the daylight. It's pretty big too, which makes it impressive in real life and not so good on screen. Oh well.

So I'm sitting at my computer having just had a nice long chat with hubbie who is in Lviv at the moment. Funny how you don't think you'll miss them and then you do. I thought he's just going to the Ukraine on business for a week, won't be long - but could I sleep last night? Could I hell. I missed his warmth, his breathing. I missed his being.

Roll on Friday! Meanwhile, I've just finished a watercolour portrait of Josh Homme (a hero of mine) and I'm pleased with it. Will photo it when I get back from work tomoz. Trouble is, I'd like to sell it as a print, but I can't find out who took the photo. Rather scared of getting into trouble, but what can I do? Any ideas?

Finally got round to putting the Green Day pic on prints etc. Still need to get a much higher res pic for the enormous prints, but everything else is there - prints, mugs, mousemats, puzzles etc.

Get your Christmas pressies for Green Day fans here!!

Meanwhile, I'm just about to put up a pic I've just finished of Tokio Hotel (for my daughter's friend, Ellie) in watercolour. They were a great couple of boys to do - although everyone who has seen the pic thinks they are girls. Unfortunately, I used old photographs from when they were younger, so I may have to do another to update. After that, it's got to be Muse.

And finally a quick rant. Missed going to see Kasabian live at Bmth BIC cos I was working that night (I teach). The lesson went really well, but did feel sad when I picked up Hubbie and Son from the gig later that night - they both clearly had a brilliant time. I'll see them eventually....

Here are some more pics of our little family. One of them appears to be a Gremlin and probably the son of a siamese that pops into our garden occasionally.











And this is my studio - thought you might like to see it. To my left is a large leather chesterfield sofa (nice to collapse into) and a big bookcase and another antique cabinet containing all my valuable samples. To my right is another cheaper cabinet with more of my samples (when I make anything for the big companies I ask for a sample at least). Behind me is another chest of drawers with all my paper/sketch books etc and a full size skeleton - very useful. There are 2 big wardrobes on the right and a nice Victorian fireplace (nice to have a real log fire). If you look in the garden you can see the railway line!

Life is nearly back to normal, but last few weeks after hols very exciting. Poppy, one of our 5 cats, had kittens. Kat had his hernia operation. My bank account was wiped clean. Finished a puppet head. Started the autumn teaching classes. And more.

So here we go again. Poppy had 4 kitties - 3 grey and 1 black. Here they are at just one week old. Now they are over 2 weeks and much fluffier, their eyes are open and they are just beginning to see and hear. They are also taking their first steps - they stagger about like drunken babies.














My lovely hubbie has finally got his hernias fixed - this makes him sound ancient, but he's only 36! He was a very brave little soldier (must take tongue out of cheek). Anyhoo, he healed nice and quick and is back to work on Monday.

And yes, somewhere along the line I banked online and gave some nasty person all my card details. I don't know who gave them to whom, but last Friday the bank kindly told me that I was overdrawn to the tune of £500. I picked myself up off the floor and discovered that someone somewhere had purchased two large items from Littlewoods Direct with my ruddy money. Turns out Littlewoods are a popular company with fraudsters because they'll deliver to other than the account holders address. I was lucky though and got my money back.

And art. Well, I'm starting a little website and devoting it to my watercolour portraits. But just lately I've been working hard on getting lessons ready for my September courses. Quite fun. It gets you up to speed on techniques and particularly materials. I was not really aware that Alkyd Oils are so readily available, for example and that there are so many other things you can buy now to speed the drying time of oils (should you want that). And you don't have to have those awful turps smells - buy Sansodor. It's amazing. Currently I'm working on handouts for my students on Watercolour Pencils and Coloured Pencils - again, I'm blown away by the standard of the work out there. Will be putting up my samples as I do them!