Trees, Fairees, and Artees.

I finally put the finishing touches to my topiary tree painting yesterday and am quite pleased at the 3D effect the modelling compound gave. Definitely something I would like to try again. However I spent so much time fluffing about with it that I hadn't even begun refurbishing the frame for my faery painting. I applied the high build on Monday afternoon which allowed a good long drying time. I began painting this within 24 hours and after only half an hour I had a base colour applied and was dropping in deep blues, purples and various half shades. I was so onto it that within 90 minutes I was certain I had finished the painting part.

Evening came and I spent an hour working on labels for the paintings at our group exhibition next week. I then spent more time in front of TV listening to "House" cutting them out. Then I decided I needed to change some of the colours on my frame. An hour later I wasn't happy but it was getting late so I forced myself to go to bed. I kept waking up throughout the night thinking I was sleeping late so that by the time it was daylight I truly resembled "Kiss without the makeup" to quote Robbie Williams. Propping my eyelids open I quickly painted over what I'd done the night before and hauled out the old epoxy glue to stick the faery to the frame.

First there was the fight to get the tubes unstuck from their plastic holder. Then my hands got stuck to the tubes trying to undo their lids. When I finally prized these loose and unstuck the fingers from them I managed to squeeze some glue onto a card. mix it together and apply it to the painting and the frame. After sticking everything I didn't want stuck it was a profound disappointment when the painting peversely fell off the frame.

By this time Gay had arrived so on our way through town she stopped into Mitre 10 to ask if there was a proper glue for the job. There was- it was PVA glue albeit a professional grade. Although there were many people at Otane delivering their paintings for hanging my only thought was for my loose faery. I applied the glue and on explaining my dilemma a very kind art teacher fetched bricks and after carefully laying newspaper over the painting weighed the whole thing down with these and our handbags! Unfortunately soon we needed to hang the thing in position and after an hour or so of being shifted about the faery's wings began to droop forwards off the frame. She was unceremoniously removed and I reapplied the glue and she is presently lying on a table covered with newspapers with four bricks on top. In educated circles they say "You can't keep a good faery down..." so here's hoping my faery is very very bad and will end up very very stuck up.

After lunch we finished labelling the paintings before heading to McCauley's for a hot drink. As usual there was some interesting conversations going on. For example in the space of a few hours today we discussed pig welfare, battery chickens, dogs eating manure, pregnant fairies, how coffee conscious Kiwis have become, old cars, and how hard it is to get the smell of chicken poo off your hands. Perhaps it might sound weird to a "normal" person- you just have to be there.