November 2009

Hi All dear friends Peregrinos and relatives
(See I still know English the Aussies would say rellies for relatives!)

We send here a Christmas card to you all.

To get you into the Christmas Spirit, Maisie has put a video on Maisie's Blog which is a compilation of her Millennium Carol (which she wrote in 1999 ready for the new millennium) and some family and friends photos, which we hope you will enjoy!

What happened to this month? We seem to think about it and it's gone!!!
Maisie stretched her birthday into this month as well as last!

We had Josie, Simon and the girls round for a belated tea with Josie making another of those yummy Baked Alaska cakes, baked meringue and ice cream. Not much use putting a candle for each year now and this cake you pour brandy all over it and make a bonfire in the middle of the table chuckle. Then came Simon's birthday with more yummy food eaten at Josie's. (See the photos in the November 2009 album our web page)












Next came the big Canning Show that is held at the dog race track near us. Josie and the girls had entered a number of photos, paintings and drawings in different art categories there and were very successful. (Also see the photos in the above album)



















Last of all we went to Lizzy's School to see the children race these little jet gas powered cars that they had built and painted. Quite amazing things that travel the set track attached to a nylon fishing line in split seconds. The art is being able to press the button at the right moment! Lizzy won her heat so was fastest on the button, well we always knew that, chuckle! (Photos in the November 2009 album and a short video clip on Maisie's Blog)







In the meantime if you remember I had been given paint and canvases on my birthday in October to get me painting again after some 25 years. It worked, the class I chose to go to with Josie was very informal, so I was able to paint more or less just what I wanted. This month I tried to do a small self portrait first and as this went fairly well, I decided to paint the whole picture of myself talking to Christopher! I remember the moment well, as the lovely Holde was snapping photos of us as I was quoting some of the stories and experiences I had had getting to this point of the camino just past Castrojeriz. Holde is a photographer hence this wonderful photo I received from them afterwards.















Having sketched the rough outlines at the end of last month I painted them in brown and washed in some of the shadows to get the feel on the picture.












Next I rapidly painted the sky and background. This was easy as much was deliberately blurred in the photo and I thought it should stay the same in the oil painting.




I spent about a week doing the face and I think it is a better copy than my first attempt.




Now I had a go at the right hand (that’s the left as you look at it holding the brown staff) and my jacket


While I managed this, I was not happy with it and would return many times just touching this or altering a finger and it was one of the last things I did when the painting was complete.

I worked mainly left to right and down the picture. Soon I came to the wheel of the bike and found I had to redraw this a couple of times and filling in was also difficult. I was lucky to see a bike on my daily walk with the disc brake fitted and so understood what the bit in the centre was and this helped a lot. Christopher was fairly easy as he was turned away from the camera and I couldn't believe my luck when I painted his handsome leg and it went right first time, chuckle. Well you can, I hope, see the end result and some of the progress as I went along on the video below. Maisie wrote the song we have put with it. It is called 'I Lost My Love'. She wrote it many years ago, well before I even thought of walking Caminos! ( She also put the comment on the end of the video clip too, but she hasn't managed to get rid of me yet, chuckle!)






I have now attempted to paint a moment in Oviedo but am having problems with hands again. In this one she dances with castanets and is in the action of tapping them and half the fingers are blurred and don't look right to us that don't play these things. I had it almost right one time but on a bad day lost it and had to scrub it all out and start again. I hope to get it right soon and will change the photo of it if I do, just added it. If I do get this one good enough I will try to paint the whole scene. We will see what happens next month.
What a magic moment that was as I stood with Vigi and watched the dancers!



















The coming month will be quite chaotic with Christmas celebrations but we hope to chat and swap emails with many of you. Perth at this time of year is a nice place to be with the jacaranda trees all out and the orange Christmas trees coming into flower, sorry no photo of these.

































I saw the dolphins in the river the other day but sadly there has been a lot of unexplained deaths of them this year. There only seemed to be one on this day, not sure if he caught this fish but it looks like he did. On this sunny morning he was working with 2 pelicans to school the fish for dinner!
















Hope you all have a good Christmas and New Year! See you all again in January 2010 with all the Christmas holiday news.
Abrazos
Michael