Biting the bullet and Last day of cooking

Ok I am biting the bullet and swallowing my pride and everything else to show you these studies I did out in London. Oh they are terrible I know, probably becauase I have not been 100% well or that is my excuse at least. I uploaded these several times and deleted them but at last I thought I need to get some critic so please don't be just kind and say nice things about these paintings just tell me where I am going wrong and where I need to improve if you can.

Have to finish all the food stuff in the fridge as this will be my last day of cooking for 2 weeks.

Onions are chopped ready to go into the pan . Chicken pieces are washed and ready. Heated oil with garlic, ginger, onions, curry powder, coriander powder, chilli powder and a few spices and roasted till brown Now the chopped tomatoes go in and are cooked till brown

Finally the chicken pieces go in and are cooked on slow fire. Voila! you have chicken curry.Sorry can't show you the finished product as I am in a bit of a rush now.I am leaving on Friday. So I will probably not be able to blog until I get back now. So talk to you all soon. A bientôt!

Things that go bump in the night

Bump! bump! BUMP! Now what was that noise that woke me up in the night? Were there burgalars in the house, can't be as the alarm would have gone. So I got up and crept down the stairs. As I came down this is what I saw...... Ouch! that was not a soft landing.

Darn why can't they make these settees smaller for dolls to climb up easily? Hey lady why do you have to live so high up. It took me ages to climb up to you to talk! Oh did she really? you don't say..... I thought she had bought that dress from a shop... (oh nothing like having a bit of girly gossip along the way)

No one told me to come in my dancing costume. Now I can't come with you for the dance party.

Oh look who is this? There is a baby too. Certainly this is much more fun than a dance... I am a bit peckish now sigh! I wish I could eat these.. At last I can put my feet up.

Now that Pepi has gone to sleep I can tell you a bit more about her. I am going to teach her in India when I go there in a weeks time. I made her as simple as possible as from past experience I know I will get students who don't even know how to thread a needle lol! I hope I will get enough students too. I would have liked to have made her in a brown colour fabric but unfortunately I couldn't find any in that colour in India. I used Indian fabric so that the students will be able to buy it there. Inspite of being able to get such fabulous silks and cottons in India I just am not able to find plain cotton in different shades which have a very high thread count. So I have to make do with what I get. For those who don't know, cotton fabric with high thread count works well for these kind of dolls as it does not fray easily. Ofcourse one could use synthetic fabrics but it is not the same.

Something cute arrived!

A few months ago I took part in a challenge called 'Pay It Forward' challenge in Connie's blog. The first three people to leave a comment on her blog would receive a gift from her for passing along the PIF challenge on their blog. I had almost forgotton about it until yesterday when the postman brought me this cute little gift. Isn't is lovely? It is one of the cutest pincushion that I own now. Thank you Connie for this lovely gift and it was fun taking part in the challenge.

Strange happenings!

This morning as I was just about to go out, I noticed from the doorway that something strange was happening in my conservatory. I came back and had a closer look and this is what I found. Then I had to go out again to get some food and when I came back what do you know? I found a stranger sitting on my settee. Mmmm..... I wonder if I go away again it will transform into something else again...

What sun does to a garden

Last week I kept seeing two tiny birds, I think they are Blue Tits, flying to and fro from the gutter to the trees. At first I thought they must find a lot of bugs in that gutter. I decided to go and have a look and can you see that little hole in the wall? Well looks like they found it and have decided that it will be their little home for this summer! I think the chicks have hatched as I can hear some chirping going on there. Will have to do something about that hole once they leave. One needs only a little bit of sun to get the flowers blooming and last week's glorious weather has made our garden to start blooming!

Chantilly

Meet Chantilly. I started her more than a year ago I think. She stopped speaking to me so I left her alone for a long time. But suddenly she started yelling at me just before I went to US and I had to put my foot down and tell her to stop it as I was too busy with other things and I would attend to her when I got back. Well as you know I haven't been keeping too well but she has not stopped bugging me. So slowly I have at last finished her. She doesn't want to smile at me no matter what I do so now I have just left her. She can sulk if she wants to. I am not pleased with her face painting at all.

Her whole body is made from silk fabric. Her bodice has leaves and flower petals which were ironed on to the fabric. A pity the flower petals all faded away. They were lovely when fresh. I thought of painting on top of them but then decided to leave them as they were. I also stamped her hands and legs with Jacquard's Lumeire paint. In a garden centre florist I found a packet of dry flower arrangements which had various bits coloured in orange. I seem to be into orange colour at the moment. Her belt is made out of luffa bits that was in the packet and her hat is made out of some kind of dried citrus fruit and a shell of some fruit. Her shoe has also bits of luffa stuck to it to give some texture. Like all kids she wants to wear the grown up shoes so the shoes are one size too big for her but she loves to wear them and won't take them off lol!. I then embellished her with beads and I felted some balls and embellished them with beads to use on her hat. She is a big doll by my standards as I usually don't make such big dolls. She is about 21" tall.

Watercolour painting

We are learning to paint the environment this term and last Friday we were taught to paint tree trunk so here is my effort. I was in two minds whether to go or not but I am glad I did as it took my mind off the pain for a while at least. The second painting is my homework. I am afraid it is not up to the mark. We were asked to do a tree unfortunately there are no interesting trees in my back garden so the tree I painted is terrible. I know I could have done the leaves with sponge which makes it look much better but I wanted to do it with the brush and I just can't get the hang of painting bushes at the moment.

My little puppy wants to say hello!

I have not been blogging much lately as I have had some health problems since I came back from US. I still can't sit too long on the computer but my little doggie keeps barking at me and saying that I have been very unfair not to show a picture of him to you all. So here he is little Choc is his name and I made him in Nancy Gowran's class in Albuquerque. Even though he has got a bit of a wonky face I love him and enjoyed making him. Below are some pictures I took on the way to visit Pamela of The Treasures of the Gypsy who has a beautiful place in Mountain Air. The little town felt as though any moment John Wayne or Clint Eastwood would coming walking down the road. The scenery on the way was beautiful as you can see.

PS. I will visit all your blogs when I am more upto sitting on the computer so bear with me. I miss all of your blogs and the groups. I will try and visit whenever I can. Take care all