My blog is 10 years old!

I've never kept a traditional written diary (except for holiday journals) but somehow I've kept this blog going for 10 whole years!

My first blog post shows the amazing tidy and sunny vegetable garden 

the vegetable plot, March 2007

. . . and here's the same view today

Looks like I need to do some weeding! The main change has been the Pigeon Proof Pen which keeps the Purple Podded Peas and brassicas safe!

Inside the wall the garden is looking Spring-like and much neater, with lots of daffodils in flower and yesterday Cliff cut the lawn for the first time this year.

Our cockerel, Mr Cheep is now 5 and a half years old, here he is supervising Ivy pecking grass (Ivy, our youngest of the surviving 3 hens, needs no supervision ... she has one spur and occasionally tries to crow! she also lays beautiful brown eggs).

The other hens are Saffron, who is Mr Cheep's biological mum, seen here paddling in the pond ... of course, under supervision!

And finally Nutmeg, who is the same age as Saffron. She was in the nest box preparing to lay one of her lovely blue eggs ... yes, Mr Cheep popped up into the hen-house to supervise!

In the view of the walled garden above, you can also see the Ginger Studio Assistant strolling across the lawn. He and is Tabby sister were very young apprentice assistants when this blog started. She prefers to walk on the wild side!

This blog charts the past ten years of working in my studio, I've found it a useful way to record work in progress and the different things I've done and places I've visited.

I've decided to keep blogging from time to time, but electronic communication methods change rapidly these days, and I'm finding Instagram (which didn't exist when I started blogging, Instagram is only 6 years old) fits easier with busy times ... you can find me on Instagram here, where I'm posting my photos of my Lent sketchbook, Meditations on the Colour of Trees. You can also find me on Twitter.

Thank you for visiting, I know some of you have been following from the  start. And welcome to new visitors who have just stumbled into the Purple Podded Peas blog.

To celebrate, here's a discount code 

BLOGBIRTHDAY10

to get 10% off anything 

in my online shop

valid until midnight on 31 March 2017

A whole decade of my life, recorded in a blog! Who'd have thought?!

I wonder where we'll all be in 10 years form now?

Celia

xx

Cambridge Original Printmakers Biennale 2016

At 10.30am this morning (about half an hour from now, as I type this) the Cambridge Original Printmakers exhibition will open to the public. If you live near enough to to Cambridge to visit, it's well worth the trip . . . over 500 framed prints for sale, representing probably every printmaking technique you can think of.

How do you organise about 40 artists to arrive at a venue in the historic centre of Cambridge during the rush hour; each of them unload about a dozen framed pictures, carry them to their allotted stand and hang them on the only just erected display stands? Did I hear some-one say 'herding cats might be easier'?

The answer was 'time-slots' so not everyone arrived at once, my arrival time was almost the last - 7.15pm, so by the time I'd carried my work to my stand, I had precisely an hour and half hang my work. There would be no extra time, 9pm meant 9pm. No pressure! 

In fact, contrary to popular opinion, artists - particularly printmakers - are usually organised and focussed. With only 45 minutes to go the collective creative adrenaline and effort was heating up the exhibition rooms like a sauna.

So while many of you were watching Bake Off, I was doing Art Off! We even had a 'Sue' who shouted "half an hour to go", "15 minutes!" etc

As I grabbed by bubble wrap, bags and discarded cardi, I managed a few quick snaps of my stand . . . 

A huge thank you to Cliff, without whose help I would never have managed to hang my stuff (he didn't need a stepladder to reach the top) and another thank you to the person who suggested I'd need to take a stepladder - I nearly didn't and glad I did.

So, Phew! it's all on the wall and right now people will be walking through the doors.

And today . . . actually I'm going to have a little rest today and maybe do some drawing out in the fields; tomorrow I'm on duty on the front desk/sales area; I'll be popping in and out over the weekend and looking forward to attending some of the talks. On Monday at 2.30pm I'm demonstrating Hand-burnished Linocuts (so I really should get things together for that!).

Celia

xx

PS I haven't forgotten the Newfoundland crafts and wildlife posts, they'll follow soon.

How to make a Merry Christmas rubber stamp

When I blogged about my 'Winter Evening in Bull's Wood' print and the cards for sale from Suffolk Wildlife Trust, I promised to blog about making a rubber stamp to print a Christmas greeting inside a blank card.

Of course there are many Christmas greetings rubber stamps for sale in craft supply shops and stationery shops, but it's fun to do your own – here's how I did mine . . .

You will need a rubber stamp block (mine is a Speedball Speedy-Carve block) or a large eraser would work too.  

Draw your design then trace it onto tracing paper (or tissue paper) and turn it over so the letters are reversed. Now you need to transfer the design onto the block - I rubbed blue chalk onto the tracing paper then drew around the letters with a hard pencil. This transfers a faint mark, so it's worth inking over the letters with a non-permanent, water-soluble pen.

Now carve away the block around the letters using lino-cutting tools. The rubber block is very easy to cut, but mind your fingers – always keep them behind the blade!

The block (and your fingers) will get a bit messy! So when you've finished carving, give the block a gentle wash with a little hand soap and water then dry it gently with a paper towel.

Before printing, it's best to mount the block onto something firm and perfectly flat – either a block of wood or, as I've done, a couple of pieces of sturdy corrugated card stuck together. I used double sided tape to stick the card together and the rubber stamp on top.

Now, you're ready to print . . .

Either use a large ink stamp pad or a little ink pad that you can dab over the surface of your stamp – I can recommend Versacraft Small Ink Pads, they come in lots of lovely colours and print onto fabric and paper.

If you haven't time to carve complex lettering, try cutting a star or a simple snowflake to decorate inside the card or the envelope.

I hope you have a go.

Celia

xx

Testing my new online shop

I've been busy framing and packing my two new woodcuts 'My heart leaps' and 'Love song' for sending out to galleries; and the new range of 'not just for Valentine's Day' cards is in my card shop. But I wanted an online shop for selling my original unframed prints directly from my web site . . . and I think I've found a way . . . there's nothing like jumping in the deep end, is there?!

I've found that the only way to really learn and test these things is to go live in a small way and see if it works. You can find my new online shop via my web site (when you get there, click on 'the new online shop' in the web site menu, I'm not giving you a direct link, because I want to test that it all works).

I'd really appreciate feed back, so please let me know about the things I've missed that you'd need to know about the prints that are for sale; or stuff that doesn't work; or anything bad (or good). It's the only way I'll learn and make the shop work.

And if anyone does really want to buy one of the new unframed woodcuts via the new online shop, hopefully it will work but in case it doesn't please give me a shout and I'll put on my 'customer services hat' to sort it all out for you.

**** The shipping prices to UK mainland addresses are now working ****

**** Found a solution for additional overseas shipping charges ****

Celia
xx

New galleries, exhibitions, a magazine feature and something completely different

The last few weeks have been busy – and even more that I expected!

Just before we went on holiday in September, the arts journalist Hazel Foxon spent a morning with me in my studio to research an article she was writing for the 'arts in the east' magazine Venue. If you live in Beds, Cambs, Essex, Herts, London, Norfolk or Suffolk look out for it in libraries, galleries and theatres – it's a glossy colour mag with David Bowie on the cover and it's FREE
. . . or you can see the article here.

I've framed prints and packed unframed work in time for the pre-Christmas rush and delivered it to Edwards & Todd in London; the Jessica Muir Gallery in Long Melford and Smiths Row in Bury St Edmunds.

My work will be included in a special exhibition of "Smaller Pictures" at the Church Street Gallery in Saffron Walden, starting on 1st December and continuing throughout December.

I am very excited to have been invited to exhibit in two lovely galleries . . .
Cambridge Contemporary Art is a beautiful bright exhibition space within sight of King's College Chapel right in the historic centre of Cambridge. I will also be delivering some framed work for inclusion in their Christmas exhibition which runs through December.
The other venue is in Suffolk but right over on the coast – it's The Gallery at Snape Maltings, I've delivered my prints just in time to be included in the Winter exhibtion. This is probably Suffolk's most famous arts venue in a beautiful setting beside the River Alde at the end of a long estuary. The concert halls, shops, galleries and restaurants attract lots of visitors throughout the year; if the sun is shining (as it was yesterday!) the views of the river and the boats are stunning.

As you can imagine, I've been spending lots of time framing prints and writing lists; but among all the requests from galleries I received an invite from Southwold Life Boat Crew:

"We're having a tweetup on 24/11 would love it if you came.
If you can't make up your mind then how does tea,
cake & lifeboat display sound?"

Well, although I live in Suffolk and enjoy reading the morning weather tweets from the life boat station right over in the diagonally opposite corner of the county, a 150mile road trip for cake was a bit keen! I politely declined. Then I received a message from a photographer who lives only a few miles from me "I'm going, I'll give you a lift" and before I knew it I had a place reserved on a boat to go out on a training exercise with the life boat crew! You can read what happened and see Celia Bartlett's fantastic photo-essay of the day with Southwold RNLI.

Celia Bartlett ready for action at sea!

Well they say 'a change is as good as a rest', and being bounced over the grey waves of the north sea with salt water waves crashing into my face certainly blew the cobwebs away! If that's what a 'calm day' is like the volunteer life boat crews have my full respect for going out in all weathers to rescue those in danger off the Suffolk coast. Please consider giving your support to the RNLI.

Celia
x