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Newish lemons: Lemons on a purple scarf
This is a detail from a painting which I started as a demo. at an exhibition, I did finish it at some point but everything was overshadowed by what happened in the 36 hours following the exhibition.
Lovely aunt came to the exhibition with her visiting carer, they had a look round and some coffee and cake and off they went, quite jolly really. By the next day my aunt was keeling over sideways in a chair so I called the paramedics who bundled her protesting into an ambulance, I was with her until 02.30am in A&E she was probably six hours on a trolley but we were at least in a cubicle. She had pneumonia but scans revealed more serious problems that were not going to get better. Its never going to end well when they look concerned and say was your aunt a heavy smoker? No she wasn’t but… that conversation stemmed from an initial misinterpretation of a scan and what was wrong was not related directly to cigarettes, rather old age. She recovered well enough to get back out of hospital and her triumphant grin when she got over here for Sunday roast was worth a fortune. She enjoyed Christmas, especially the halibut I bought for Christmas Eve. What do you do when you are standing in the fishmongers just before closing on Christmas Eve and there is very little left? I panicked and bought a magnificent slab of halibut and then some sea bass in case there was not enough…it cost as much as the goose for Christmas day! There was too much but it was utterly delicious and mother and lovely aunt both enjoyed it. I made a sauce with cream, lemon and capers from the pan juices.
She had lots of visitors during the winter and her live in carers worked very hard, so did I in fairness as I provided almost all the breaks for the carers. Lovely aunt had always given money to various charities but the only organisation that helped in this period in a practical way was the hospice to which she had never donated. Social services? give me strength…it can take two solid days to phone them, if you speak to someone they may promise to phone you back….they don’t get back reliably…they tell you that you have made a mistake and that there is a social worker attached to the Memory Clinic who will deal with you…there isn’t….it takes two solid days to get someone on the phone to tell them what they should know and they then promise to get back to you and of course they don’t.
Many charities ask for donations showing happy clients being supported at home by the charity…but don’t make it obvious how one accesses that help or only offer a service in other districts, advice lines are helpful but not the answer to everything. There is a great deal wrong with our system of care for the elderly….there is not really a coherent system for starters…visiting the hospital every day made it abundantly clear that there were terrible things happening to many elderly people.
My aunt died of cancer last month and there was a lovely funeral beneath the Downs on one of the first dry days we have had this winter of storms. The snowdrops were just opening then but now they are almost over and life must keep moving forward. I am belatedly pruning the cooking apple tree and splitting logs- it’s therapeutic.
This is the whole picture: 
Carob leaf and lemon – a painting a day
http://www.lemonaday-shop.co.uk/gallery-shop size 6 in x 6 in 15cm x 15cm pen and wash watercolour on heavy weight rag paper
A peaceful day:
I am still in Mljet in Babine Kuche it is the epitome of a Mediterranian fishing village. Steep stepped lanes lead up to tiny houses, the sea is a landlocked lagoon,palm trees line the road along the quayside.
I did three paintings today, first the lemon, then the view of the monastry on an island in the lagoon from the cafe,then the view of the villa across the lagoon. While I did this I sat on the sea wall with my toes in the water. A fish with stripes and blue and orange splashes went along the rock edge.
Bliss.
#107 a painting a day by Alison Warner on her lemon a day art blog
Lemon Surprise – a painting a day
for sale on Etsy 3.5″x3.5″ 8.5cm x 8.5cm watercolour on heavyweight rag paper
Not at all sure at this point what I will paint, the sky is a milky blue with the balance favouring the milk. I think that it would be the perfect weather for some digging up and replanting as it will rain on Tuesday (I think they said). As things warm up I try not to disturb plants unless there is rain forecast.
I want to do some more culinary pictures. I noticed that the garlic was not the most popular image I have done so far, but I still think that there is much more to see in a head of garlic than in a rose. It certainly has hidden strengths!
There are some bits of the garden coming on that I am pleased with, the new bed has been given a cheeky line with mowing stones ,or rather recycled concrete slabs that were in the garden already, they have the advantage of looking weathered. The bit by the front door which was drab and pinched a very short time ago has started to work again, there are primulas and primroses all the same shade, Pulmonaria and coming through from underneath are the striped leaves of Tulip’ New Design’.
Thus there are spots and stripes on the leaves and a limited colour range, I love it, when the tulips flower it reaches its peak, they have a pink cream and yellow colour mix which is so subtle you don’t really register what is there.
The whole shed business rolls on, we took the shed apart yesterday afternoon, the area it sits in is actually flat and it will be great to see it liberated and tidied up. It will form the pathway into the woody part of the garden. The path will lead past two hazels coppiced and my favourite holly. The holly tree was growing in the gloom made by the leylandii plantation, it has a trunk which has formed from two melded in several places leaving holes which go right through. One of the first things we did when we moved here was to start cutting down the thickets of 30’ high leylandii cypress trees which the previous owner had hidden behind. It’s a suburban garden and I swear we have taken out 50 of the dull green monsters, I know they are cheap to buy but 50 was insane. We have left one which is golden higher up and a landmark tree for the surrounding houses. There is one other straggly one but its days are numbered. We are still burning the wood from this mammoth tidy up and have enough for another winter.
It’s a lemon part zested, I am making rice pudding with sultanas and lemon zest, its cold enough for that I think.
Alison
#18 a painting a day by Alison Warner on her lemon a day art blog
Lemons on a blue cloth – a painting a day
5″x6″, 12.5cmx15cm, watercolour on paper for sale on Etsy’ lemonaday’ shop
This is a blog of two or three parts, it will have a painting every day or a drawing or a print.
There will be pictures of the food I buy or cook and of the garden or things from the garden.
This is where I spend my time ; on the phone to the school about teachers who persist in not marking homework, in the studio trying to forget about unfinished GCSE course work , in the garden trying to tackle the weeds and the grubs, in the kitchen, either making something that will do, or in the kitchen enjoying making something different. Before you ask, no, it’s none of it idyllic or remotely perfect. I could make it look/sound that way by being really selective, but I shall try not to.
When I write something I will most likely be rude about things or people, as it is what I do best, and it seems like a really good opportunity. After all there is such a wealth of stuff to complain about.
Please do not expect consistency or a constant stream of lemons, cherries and mandarins…have you noticed they are rarely satsumas when in an oil painting? Why are satsumas not artfully significant? Bananas do not feature much in fine art either, would Cezanne, had he had a good supply of cheap bananas, have painted them? In fairness, I think many of the painting-a-day lemons are lovely and I am amazed that there is such a voracious world-wide appetite for lemons in oils and similar themes. Lucky artists who are able to work like that. However when the portfolio consultant looked at mine she said…”do you have schizophrenia?” in other words I don’t do consistency. Sometimes I sketch, sometimes I print, sometimes I doodle and sometimes I do a cracking great painting. Annoying that if I would/could only do a lemon a day I could possibly be an e-bay millionaire instead of an overweight, cash-strapped, mother of provoking teenagers, with inky fingers and muddy shoes. Perhaps I should try the lemon diet…
Today I painted two lemons on a blue cloth in watercolour just to see what they came out like…ok. Tomorrow I shall find something from the garden and also get some prints ready to sell. I shall continue to chase the deputy head who has not marked my sons course work since at least January 25th when he wrote to us complaining it had not been handed in…it was on his desk all the time we discovered after we had had the house turned upside down and the mother of ‘don’t lose your homework ever again’ rows. When I was at school I spent my time hiding from teachers who were chasing me for homework which I had not done , now I am chasing teachers for my sons homework they have not marked. I suppose the teachers are from my generation and we are all monumental skivers.
Alison
#1 a painting a day by Alison Warner on her lemon a day art blog
Lemon a day 