All things floral

I spent the weekend drawing, painting and printing in a small sketchbook. There's method in my spring madness - we're making a short series of videos for DMTV and I need lots of new work. Not that it's a hardship you understand - I love nothing better than idling the day away with pencil or paintbrush in hand, especially when it's lovely weather and I can work out in the garden.

My sketchbooks are usually a mish mash of different themes. I might start off thinking I'll work in a systematic and orderly fashion but that idea all goes to pot when I'm in a hurry and I tend to grab any sketchbook that has a blank page or two. This time I've resolved to keep a book just for flowers and foliage. It's a subject I think our members will like and I have plenty of plants to choose from. 'He Who Gardens' always leaves a corner of the lawn unmown (is that a word I wonder - spellcheck doesn't think so) at this time of year.

Here's the reason why. So pretty with every pastel colour you can imagine.

Every year there are more and more tiny plants with no effort on our part at all. OK, so a few dandelions sneak in there too but we can live with that! I haven't painted any of these yet but I am going to steal a couple of the prettiest flowers while he's not looking and press the petals between absorbent paper to preserve them. I often like to include dried flowers in my sketchbooks although they are quite fragile unless they are well protected with a layer of acrylic medium.

At the other end of the scale there are these huge beauties. They are at least a metre high and look ridiculously exotic at a time when we are still having night time frosts!

With so many lovely plants bursting into life I have no shortage of inspiration. I've sacrificed actual leaves to make this print.

The veg patch didn't escape my attention either! If you are a DMTV subscriber, you'll be able to see the first of the sketchbook videos in a couple of weeks' time and I hope some of you will join in with me to make your own flower filled sketchbook as a reminder of summer 2013!

And to finish - here's Amelie sporting a fetching top and matching bandana in Madras check. What you can't see in this picture are her purple harem pants. Whatever happened to romper suits? Seven months old and a fashionista already!

Thanks for dropping by - I'll be in touch again soon. Linda