To what lengths will you go when you're bored?!

“I’ve got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom!”
^{Thomas Carlyle, Scottish Historian and Essayist, leading figure in the Victorian era. 1795-1881}

Done in my Moleskine 200gsm Watercolour sketch-book

It’s amazing what you’ll do when inspiration fails to materialise. I just couldn’t think of anything to sketch – a landscape? No, boring! Some animals? No, boring! I was at my wit’s end, trying to come up with something, so I decided to really challenge myself and do something I really hate – still life!

I looked around the kitchen and grabbed a couple of things lying around and just started sketching. Before long I was totally immersed in capturing the see-throughness of the plastic wrap and the vibrant colours on hubby’s favourite mug – even my hake lying close-by got roped in!

Moving out of my comfort zone and doing something new made me realise that we so easily become entrenched in the ‘known’, that excitement and passion can easily ebb away and leave us feeling drained.
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“Often what we call procrastination, a lack of inspiration or boredom, is really just being trapped in the shell of our own comfort zone. Our comfort zone offers a safe haven, a trusted beaten path for us to follow. However the comfort zone can easily become, over time, our liability zone!”
<sup>- Dr. Sharon House – Creativity for Life

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A shelf in my garden shed

Gardening is about enjoying the smell of things growing in the soil, getting dirty without feeling guilty, and generally taking the time to soak up a little peace and serenity. 

 - Lindley Karstens

W & N Watercolours on Bockingford 300gsm – 12″ × 8″ 

A shelf in my garden shed where I keep my collection of Terracotta pots and watering cans, seedling trays, egg shells to plant seedlings, tools, hats and all else a gardener needs to make her life easy! 

I think the true gardener is a lover of her flowers, not a critic of them. I think the true gardener is the reverent servant of Nature, not her truculent, wife-beating master. I think the true gardener, the older she grows, should more and more develop a humble, grateful and uncertain spirit. One of the most delightful things about a garden is the anticipation it provides and my green thumb came only as a result of the mistakes I made while learning to see things from the plant’s point of view! When one of my plants dies, I die a little inside, too. On every stem, on every leaf,… and at the root of everything that grew, was a professional specialist in the shape of grub, caterpillar, aphis, or other expert, whose business it was to devour that particular part. Despite any gardener’s best intentions, Nature will improvise. It takes a while to grasp that not all failures are self-imposed, the result of ignorance, carelessness or inexperience. It takes a while to grasp that a garden isn’t a testing ground for character and to stop asking, what did I do wrong? Maybe nothing.
- Compiled from some of the thousands of quotes I have on my MAC

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Pink mums

“Why don’t you get a haircut? You look like a chrysanthemum.” 

- P. G. Wodehouse

W&N watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm

I’ve just bought some potted Chrysanthemums from Woolworths, and I don’t know why I do this, because I never have much luck with their potted plants I buy! What I HAVE discovered is that there are Mums and there are HARDY mums, and obviously the potted variety for sale in pots are NOT the hardy variety! So planting them in the garden, like I usually do after they’ve finished flowering, is a useless exercise. This one will therefore just stay in-doors and I’ll enjoy it until it expires!

The chrysanthemum is the November birth flower, which means with love and cheerfulness. The hidden meaning of this beautiful flower is you’re a wonderful friend. Although Chrysanthemums are native to Asia and north-eastern Europe, they are widely grown all over the world.

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Cloudy day

W&N watercolour on Aqua acid-free 300gsm

Summer-time in Magaliesburg, Gauteng, South Africa. 

It is windy today. And cloudy. Perfect.

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Hydrangeas speak of Summer

W&N watercolour on X-pressit 300gsm

Hydrangeas on my kitchen table

To me Hydrangeas speak of Summer and their fading colours speak of Autumn. In winter they are silent and in Spring they shout, “We’re here! We’re back! And Spring has come with us!”

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