I stubbed my toe quite often but it was worth it to feel the world beneath my feet. Maybe, if I had been allowed sneakers...

EDM Challenge #199 Draw a toe

Muma and Dada lived next door to us in Boarhills. They weren't really relatives - we just called them that. Muma had the most musical laugh. She cleaned at the school and did the lunches. She always wore an apron and made the best cakes and cocka-leeky soup. They actually displayed the photos of their children, who they named after themselves.


Dada was always smiling. He was Polish and once walked home from Siberia. He was the ploughman and had to get up very early to feed the cart-horses so they would be ready for work. I think Muma and Dada believed they were the luckiest people in the world.



Dada kept racing pigeons in a loft in his back garden. He was so proud of his winners.


Late in the Autumn, when we heard the wild ducks flying over, Daddy and Dada would set off at dawn to go duck shooting. Once, I crept out of bed and followed them a while.




EDM challenge # 125 Draw some birds

For some reason, I always had to have long hair - such a bother and so painful. Mummy brushed it in the mornings while she tested my brother on his tables and latin.

"(bang)11, (bang)12, (bang)13, right 8 times now, 8? (bang)17, (bang)18 ... " - "64"

"3?" - "24"

"(bang)33, 34, 35...now, amo"

"amo, amare, amari..."

"...(bang)99, (super-bang)100"

EDM challenge #118 - draw some hair and memory painting

EDM challenge - Draw something round
A pumpkin pincushion - sort of round! Toni, at Forum, gave this to me - just what I needed for my sewing spot by the fire.

EDM challenge # 74 Draw some clouds and memory book painting

When it was a little less cloudy than usual, my mother liked to note that, "there's just enough blue in the sky to make a cat a pair of trousers."




I think the 'cat' actually referred to sailors, hence the 'need' for some blue.

EDM challenge #71 Draw a sport and memory book painting

Some winters, we did a child swap with our down-the-street cousins - I went skiing with them and their littlest stayed with us. I loved to ski but by the end of each morning class my feet were sooooooooooooo cold.







EDM challenge #69 Draw a favourite beverage and memory book painting

.... we had lunch in the Combi-van - hot tomato soup - and watched the droplets race down the steamed-up windows. Then, out into the cold again for a free session, all of us together.

EDM challenge #70 Draw something you fear and memory book painting

At last, the day came when I felt big enough and brave enough to walk along the highest wall of the pier. It was very windy up there.

EDM challenge #67 Draw something Mum and memory book painting

Every day, soon after breakfast, my mother said, "I must go and put my hair up".

EDM Challenge #66
Draw a fire hydrant

Very early one morning, over 20 years ago, I was helping my boyfriend, Ralph, type up an essay when we heard a huge explosion and then a very strange noise. We crept outside, and there, down the street, was a surging fountain! We walked closer to inspect and found a car with a fire hydrant wedged under the front. The driver had fled - most likely he was intoxicated.

How amazing after all these years, I should be prompted to think of that night and even draw it. Ralph and I are now married and our children stay up late to finish university assignments!

EDM Challenge #65
Draw some noses

This nose actually can't smell very much- it is always the last to notice something burning and it cannot be trusted to recognise if something in the fridge is off. It doesn't mind how much 'lemon' scented insecticide is sprayed around to dispatch one friendly spider and isn't repelled by eucalyptus oil or oil of wintergreen. Nevertheless, we manage to live together very happily.
Pencil! cos I had to do rubbing out.

EDM Challenge #64
Draw your sink

Oops! A few lines are skew - never mind - you get the gist - MESS. I really want to honour our dear old yellow bowl which is now cracked beyond repair. Somewhere, we have a photo of our eldest child, then aged about nine months, sitting in it . She is now 20. It has been mainly used for bread making but also mixing Christmas cakes, pickling onions, dyeing fabric and keeping goldfish in.

EDM Challenge #63 Draw what you find on a 'nature walk.'
'Nature walk" - I don't think I hear that term very often in Australia. Anyway, here are some things I collected round the bluff from Pebbly Beach. I could have picked up millions of sea urchin spines - the 'sand' seemed to be composed mainly of them and lots were unbroken. I love the black and white shells - three different varieties, I found when I looked them up. And some false limpets - how do they find their way back to their personalised dimple when they've tired of wandering?
Pen and watercolour, page washed first.

EDM Challenge #62 Do something you haven't done before.
Late last night, already in bed, with Hubby urging me to put the light out, I started working in a new little journal - a stitched one so I can't tear the pages out without feeling very criminal. I found the white spread very intimidating and had no idea what to do. Then I saw my lovely corduroy quilt making a mountain over my legs... I used my watercolour pencils which I've had for ages but not used and washed the background with tea.

A grouping of two - I caught these ladies at the library, discussing the difficulties of independent living and how they don't want to be a burden on their daughters. I loved the hands of the woman on the right but she kept moving them ... and then they left to buy a coffee.
Unbeknownst to me, another old lady had been standing behind me, watching me draw. When I finished, she said what fun she'd had watching the picture emerge. Out of nothing, smiles all round!

These condiments are a competitive lot.
"Mirror, mirror on the wall
Who is the fairest of us all"

EDM challenge #61 Draw a Grouping
I have been meaning to do a 'Morandi' style grouping so thought this would be a good time. I went to the kitchen to find some suitable contenders for a line-up - and something else happened...

EDM Challenge#60 Draw a car
2B pencil in sketchbook

A quick sketch while the pasta boils. We have downsized to one car so now I only have my car on Thursdays. The rest of the week the driveway is empty. I ride my bike. I love my bike.

EDM Challenge#59 Signs of Autumn.
Ink pen and watercolour.

Nothing very autumny is happening in my garden as most of my plants are evergreens and I have already pruned the seeds or fruits away. However, I found the remains of an agapanthus seed head and a silver birch catkin. The vase is a turned banksia nut.
Actually Autumn here is a time of renewed invigoration for me as the drying days and oppressive nights are left behind, replaced by crisp mornings and cycling/bushwalking/doing weather.

EDM Challenge #58 My favourite raffia hat.