Bumblebee Three Different Ways

 Struggling today with my various Tourettes and ASD associated symptoms - IBS, flaring eczema, rampant ADHD and all that stuff. 

We've been having more "Four seasons in one day" weather, and it was a brighter interlude that I got a decent capture of a buff tailed bumblebee feeding off bramble. 

In one of my fits of inspiration this evening, I decided to try and do a watercolour of it. I really am no kind of painter whatsoever, and I've never found a way of doing it that works. For this attempt, I decided to outline the subject matter in fineliner pen, before filling in with watercolours from my travel paint set. 

Not sure this has worked. 

In a flying flap of creativity, I then doubled down and did a soft pastel version which I am much more happy with, happy in the sense of not wanting to throw it on a bonfire in the morning. 

I suppose this is neurodiversity in manic action, I guess. I've started creating work relating to my Tourettes, but golly lolly gee, I won't be posting that here. 

Si 

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 04.06.26 

Sketching Again - Have a Look

 God bless The Works. It has brought me a large amount of art supplies for very little money, because me spending more than a fiver on pastels and paints is a complete waste of money. 

I like my pastels and black paper the best, as they seem to give the most vivid results. I choose local subjects, working in life or from my own photos.

I know I'm no artist, but I find it really helps my brain to concentrate on art for a few minutes. It helps my Tourettes for those periods, maybe helps with motor co-ordination. . Also, it's something to add to my creative archive. 

And I just like filling books with stuff. I can never have too many notebooks. I might time capsule them somehow. 

Si 

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 28.04.26

Late Night Sketching

 Just dropping my first attempt to do an oil pastel of a natural subject.

I think you could just about tell what it is, even if I hadn't labelled this.

I make no claim on having any talent whatsoever.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 16.03.23

Just Some Quick Sketches

 I've been gifted some more art supplies, and bought some myself to add to my ever growing collection of random A6 sketchbooks. I have pencils, graphite sticks, oil pastels and also some very gothic black paper to use them on. 

But none of the fancy stuff today.

I've knocked up a couple of bird sketches, using one hardbound sketchbook and a rather limited pallete of felt tip pens I had to hand. 

I work quickly, and with all the skill and dexterity of a five year old. Nonetheless I rather enjoy doing them, thinking - stupidly - that they are like Bill Bailey's sketches in his excellent bird guide I got a couple of Christmases ago.

I present them to you now for your "enjoyment".

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 09.02.23

Robin Says "Seasons Greetings"

 Hello everyone, I'm back from my sister's place in Bristol - more of that in the next few days - and I'm re-adjusting to being on my own again after being with my family for a lovely spell. 

I'm starting to cycle locally again when weather allows, hunting snowdrops and aconite and relishing the outside world. At least when it isn't hammering down. Goosander aren't on the Blue Lake at the moment, which is surprising and indeed when I went today the usual geese weren't there either. 

I'm still enjoying doing my little sketches, so I thought I'd drop you off this seasonal little robin artwork for now, and I'll see you soon.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 29.12.22

Bee-ing an Artist

 I keep inheriting little notebooks and felt tip pens in various places, and so when I get the chance it is fun to do a little sketching here and there.

My latest ones were done with no visual reference, and golly gee it shows! I couldn't remember how the stripes on a red admiral went, what actual colour a tawny mining bee was, and didn't have a purple pen to "illustrate" a buddleia. 

Still, I kind of like the results, and feel like I've upgraded my work to about seven year old levels, which is nice. 

I also guess drawing them makes up for not actually seeing them, these dark cold months.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 04.12.22

Gentle Meanderings

 I'm still not doing a lot of walking; I am now doing rehabbing exercises for my ankle - including a lurid orange foam roller with medieval torture instrument vibes - and wearing an ice pack when I remember.

I therefore apologise for the lack of riveting content, it is very frustrating for me to be not outside and also the weather is too atrocious for bike riding. The rain seems unrelenting, but I'm guessing our reservoirs need it so I'm not complaining about that. 

I can at least do my best to get outside, and just enjoy the sights and sounds. The harsh honking of the geese at the marina is rendered almost melodic by distance, and there is usually a robin to be heard singing somewhere.

There's a new noise too, one I've only recently discovered. The little sculpture outside Rumbles cafe, which I thought was actually a pretty little piece of polished metal, is actually a sort of steel drum as I found when I heard kids tapping it in their mittened hands, a soft "bonging" rather less tinny than a steel drum in actual fact.

It's a sound oddly out of place under skies of battleship grey. 

Si

Now, Trying with Coloured Pencils

 This weekend has been so utterly grey and wet, there's been barely anything of note to see.

That being the case, I bought some coloured pencils and decided to have another go at sketching. Using pencils is rather more time consuming than doing big toddlerish swipes of felt tip pen, and produces a rather more subtle result - hardly a surprise!

So, I present to you a honey bee, drawn from a photo in a blog post from a couple of weeks ago. 

Looks about the standard of a ten year old, I'd say.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 06.11.22

Nature Sketching

 I've some how ended up having a flu shot and a covid shot at the same time today when I wasn't expecting it, so I'm sat here with a rather sore arm sneezing and feeling a bit rough. 

I suspect tomorrow may be worse!

I was feeling bored, so decided to do something I've been procrastinating over for a while - trying my hand at doing colour sketches of some of my nature photos in my childlike style, using a packet of ten felt tip pens and a dinky sketchbook. 

So, here's what I spent 5 minutes doing earlier, a sketch of one of my ivy mining bee photos.

Don't be harsh on me.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 31.10.22

Vivid Art on the Cycle Track

 I'm managed to get in another two hour walk without my ankle giving out, brought on largely by guilt as I had a very lazy weekend avoiding the freezing gales of Storm Arwen, although we did not have any of the snow that fell so plentifully not too far away. 

I took myself through the cemetery and round the lakes, complete with my new cheap monocular, looking for early snowdrops - they've sprouted but nowhere near flowering - and also early goosander which were very much present; 15 of them on the Blue Lake, drakes and ducks earlier than I've ever seen them here and in greater numbers too.

As ever, they were far too far out to be able to photograph them, even if I'd had my bridge camera. 

The good stuff on this walk was actually along the N64 cycle track, and was safely immobile, easy to get close to, and made of brick and paint.

After a few years during which the previous artwork had become faded and graffiti'd over, artists were again commissioned to team up with local schoolchildren to create new environmental and socially conscious designs to be painted on the bridges, which have been tidied up in an attempt to reduce crime levels in the area.

Well good luck with that one, but the designs themselves are absolutely stunning, vivid paint bringing all sorts of animals to life. Hopefully the odd passing family may be inspired to become more aware of what they can see around them, and become more inclined to protect it. 

That would be a result.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 02.12.21

The Subsidence of Lyricist

"He is Lyricist" it said.

He still is. But now though his paint is still bright, his home on the back of the has now reclaimed by nature as the buddleia inevitably colonises anywhere like that little triangle of brownfield site at the back of the floorists with the hot yoga studio on top.

I knew him. Know him. He'd just done his first hip hop album when the mural went up and was working in the pub where I drink. I think fatherhood kind of overtook the music, and hence Lyricist went into abeyance.

But his mural still persists, watching over the butterflies and bees as they feed in summer. It's also a Pokemon stop; it has earned a place in legend.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 20.12.17

Tour De Rubbish Tip

I had a very gentle run last night, 6km, and although it went ok at the time, it was a bit sore afterwards so I decided to stay off it today and go for a bike ride.

It ended up being a very short bike ride, a mere ten miles, because during them time it took me to eat my lunch, and get out there and pump the tires up, the wind suddenly got up and veered around to the north west. As soon as I was out of the protection of buildings, it turned out that my preferred route was going to have the wind hindering me virtually all the way.

So I decided to just make it short, rather than a 25 mile job.

Still it was good exercise, I was able to ride safely on the cycle track, and a wind from that direction meant I wasn't exposed to the full vomity miasma of Cotham rubbish tip.

Bizarrely, this is a popular spot for birdwatchers due to the huge numbers of gulls it attracts over the winter months - amidst the thousand plus herring and black headed gulls there's occasionally a glaucous or iceland gull, rare visitors from the arctic circle.

Somehow these "gullers" are able to pick out these different birds at a range of 400 metres through a spotting scope, something I'd never be able to do.

The official graffiti artists have also made it out this far. Virtually all the bridges along the cycle track are now colourfully decorated. Rather cheerful.

See what tomorrow brings!

Si

Still Life Sketching over a Pint

Not exactly Doctor Sketchy stuff, but I like doing it.

For some daft reason drawing, as opposed to photgraphy or writing, makes me feel a more cultured person. Pure snobbery on my part. Why does the ability to wield a pencil make you better?

Familial envy is another issue - everyone in my my family has a higher art qualification apart from me, be it graphic or fine.

Heaven knows what my talentless genes are a throwback to!

Si

Trompe l'Oeil

Well it's not really a "Fool the Eye" job, but this mural has graced Appletongate in the town for as long as I can remember. I've always loved the low level fauna, the scurrying cat, the ducks in the river...it does have a rather dated feel to it I admit, and it's not going to make the owner of the house it's on rich like a Banksy, but it is a Pokemon stop.

I think.

Such are our cultural aspirations in this town.

Cod Philosophy By Night

No nature hunting, as I'm now in the time of winter when it is dark both as I leave for work, and when I get home.

But I do get to see other things, walking along, sticking my curious head into various nooks, crannies, allies and follies.

Like this ping pong table, a reinforced structure that sits sadly unused outside a bar I frequent, where by some miracle it hasn't been turned into a giant ashtray. It never gets ping-ponged upon, even in summer. But in winter, with a thin rime of damp and frost upon it, it became an irresistible magnet for crap philosophy, for writing things upon it that look really good when you instagram them.

My magic finger wrote, I felt smugly artistic.

For a very short time inded.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 23.11.16

The Asperger Child

I was trying yet again to get rid of a load of horrific clutter in my horrifically cluttered flat, when I found various notebooks that I have kept haphazardly at various times in various places.

Most of them are comparitively recent and full of various scrawls; the book of holidays, which is red, and the book of moon-a-mucks, which is brown, and horror and prose and thankfully no bad poetry whatsoever.

What I also came across was a very 80s design A4 notebook, which I was using in about 1987.

This was the book of planetary geology and economics, of flying saucer sightings, interstellar space craft design and a navy belonging to a nation and history that never existed.

These are all my designs. My stories, the external expression of what went on in my head and what still does, endless design of aircraft and navies and cricket teams and all sorts.

I had no idea back then, but thanks to reading Oliver Sacks I have since discovered that this is very much a trait of Asperger Syndrome, as is the obsessive bowling of tennis balls against trees while commentating on it in Richie Benaud voices. Which I've greatly enjoyed doing since 1980 and never will stop doing.

Tourettes and Aspergers do often run together, their spectrums ribbon around each other like friendly snakes, and both share OCD and ADHD co-morbids. What I am, and which bit of all this does what, is very unclear to me and doesn't matter anyway.

So here it all is, the created universe of Si!

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 15.11.16