A sigh of relief

 

I managed to complete the 5 sets of Daily Leaf Words; and seven sets of love, hope and peace inspiration leaves.

I enjoy creating these pieces that can go out into the world and hopefully bring quiet and joy. However, making multiples is always a little tiring - so good to have them competed.

Some process photos follow.

The sets were gathered and photographed on a table in the DEP studio in preparation for going into inventory and my online shop. The opening photo is of the 5 Daily Leaf Words sets; and the photo below is of the love, hope, peace inspiration trio of leaves.

Yesterday I was asked if I could make a leaf with a child's name on it for pick up today. As you can see below I did manage that.

If you are interested in either the seta of Daily Word Leaves or trio of inspiration leaves then check out my shop.

New online shop and website

 

Fiona has been working hard to create three online shops and websites for us - based on Square point of sale template. She has created one for Deckled Edge Press, one for herself and this one for me.

I'm just sharing a few screen shots from the site here; but I encourage you to use the link above to take a bit of a tour of the site.

I have a new online shop  - a few gems to check out - but over the next little while I will be adding to it.  At the moment there is no cost for postage in Australia; and a flat fee of AU$9 for international postage  - a real bargain.

I hope you enjoy a wee tour of the website - it will grow over time. 

Featuring some of G's current orchids

As some are aware I often feature a couple of Graham's orchids in my Wednesday posts as I tend to swing by his orchid house on my way home from my morning walk. 

Given G has so many orchids in bloom at the moment - as you can see from the photo above -  I thought I might just share a stash of them in this Wednesday blog post. 

In addition to the orchids in the house he also has lots of crucifix orchids growing outside the orchid house and outside his home. Below are just a few of the colours.

There is no doubt about it G has a green finger for orchids - they just bring a smile to one's face.

Time to have a heart

 

In these times it is important that we are able to have a heart and reach out to folks - individuals and refuges - including those from Afghanistan; but also hold on to love for ourselves.

I have been making a few melted metal hearts from my silver-plated offcuts. Usually I make hearts that are more for holding in one's hand or as a small sculptural reminder beside the computer or in some special place in one's home. But I have decided to make some pendants - thinner than the sculptural ones. As you can see from the opening photo and that below, I have ended up with 5 including two that feature the base side of the pour. Fiona gave one a test run to see how it would hang.

The metal is poured into graphite moulds such as that below.

I have finished grinding and polishing 6 more sculptural hearts as you can see from the photos below.

It takes quite a while to grind the rough poured hearts and then polish them. A heart with a hole through it to let the love and light in is shown below.

As part of the metal melts I also pour other bits and trim bits from hearts. The pieces below are rough but will become gorgeous earrings,  pendants etc.

Some small gains

 

I had set out to achieve quite a lot today but the universe thought otherwise - there were quite a few folk who needed a little support and health.

Fiona and I (really Fiona is) are building three Square websites - one for Deckled Edge Press (DEP),  one for Fiona's art and one for my art. All have shops included in the sites. Fiona has developed and launched the DEP site and her site. Today I was a finishing some work to go on my site - some Daily Leaf Word sets and trios of stamped inspirational leaves. At the end of the day I did get one set of each done for photographing. Daily Leaf Word set above.

A few more daily word photos. 

A few process photos.

And a few photos of the trio of stamped love, peace and hope inspirational leaves.

I hope to get the other sets finished on Sunday. Daily Leaf Word sets and the trios of stamped inspirational leaves will be for sale in the new shop. The bowls and leaves are made from high quality silver-plate cut from silver-plated placemats.

In exhausting times - open up to small miracles

 

Today I woke with a sad heart - there is a lot to be sad about at the moment.

 As if the impact of the pandemic has not been enough to challenge us; we are then faced with the sadness of Afghanistan. So many people who are and will suffer for what? We appear to have never learnt that control and violence is not the answer.

I was reminded of a John O'Donoghue poem titled "for one who is exhausted".  A couple of lines that resonated with me today - in times of sadness - are: "Take refuge in your senses, open up to all the small miracles you rushed through."

When I set out on my walk I was determined to note and take in many of the small miracles - some that I share in this blog post. I love the tiny spider sheltering in the fragile beauty of the flower in the first photo above. I love the droplets on blossoms - refreshing - hopeful.

Maybe by taking refuge in the small miracles of natural beauty we can gradually return to ourselves. May we pick ourselves up and hold on to beauty, hope and peace.