Closing the gallery and coffee shop... at least for a while

At the end of August we closed the gallery and coffee shop at The Painter's Palette with very mixed feelings. It's great to say cheerio to the stress of making ends meet each month, and just scraping by, but I loved the gallery ... I loved chatting to the folk who came in; I loved baking scrummy carrot cake, scones and fun cup cakes; I loved the faces on the kids (both young and old) while they were choosing sweets and ice creams in an atmosphere of fun, colour and joy; and of course my special kick was to share the pleasure many folk felt looking at the sunny and bright paintings. We never did allow anything negative an inch past the front door, and folk loved that too!

Thank you to all our loyal customers ... we miss you and your chatter!

I'll be continuing to teach oil painting, maybe watercolour painting, and also maybe glass painting so have the pleasure of reacquainting myself with my students quite soon - in the Dance Studio above Evergreen in Moycullen. And Alan will be continuing to frame from his workshop in Maam, so don't think we're sinking away somewhere! Our www.ThePaintersPalette.ie website will still be continuing as well so please keep checking in there.

Alan and I are in Cornwall right now (in a manor commissioned by Garibaldi of The Red Shirts fame) reminding ourselves what it's like to be normal humans without work pressure 24/7. We've just spent two weeks babysitting our two granddaughters, Holly and Evie (pics below) aka The Two Adorables, have a few days here in Fowey, and on Thursday we drive up to Pentonhook Marina from where we'll be traversing the Thames on a barge for two weeks. Yippee ... that sounds like loads of fun for us two oldies who love to not grow up!

What's so very nice is that I have more time to paint now and to develop my style. I have an idea how I want it to go, how I want it to develop, but we'll just have to wait and see how it all pans out. I've so far not hauled out the oil paints - I'm saving that for the two weeks on the barge - but have sketched and masked four potential watercolours of birds.

It's a bit of a challenge I'm setting for myself to see if I can get to a stage where watercolour excites me as much as oil painting. Hmmm, it ain't workin' so far ... but let's see once we (I) get past the sketching and masking stage to the applying paint stage. I do believe that the more you do something the more able you become at doing it - but that doesn't at all mean that you become wholly good at it or enjoy it any the more! The fact that I love to capture energy in my paintings is the most important thing to me and something which I find I can do rather enthusiastically with oils ... but with watercolour?