Oh dear... Desmond! Look at the state of him...notice the look on his face that meant " you can have my brambles, but only if you can catch me" 🤣 I didnt he lead me a merry dance for more than 10 minutes... I will take a bucket of food to separate him from them later 😍

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So first observation in my critical reflection... these dont feel like my work! I like some of them but I dont understand where they are coming from... Maybe I have changed? Maybe it's this strange time in which I am trying to make meaningful artwork...???

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This beautiful boy is always first to greet me, such a gentle soul ... 😍🐑Walter🐑 😍

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More poetry with these swallows I haven't seen one yet as I haven't been out very much but I am sure they are here, have you seen them? Summer may be different in cornwall this year... Work and Play by Ted Hughes The swallow of summer, she toils all the summer, A blue-dark knot of glittering voltage, A whiplash swimmer, a fish of the air. But the serpent of cars that crawls through the dust In shimmering exhaust Searching to slake Its fever in ocean Will play and be idle or else it will bust. The swallow of summer, the barbed harpoon, She flings from the furnace, a rainbow of purples, Dips her glow in the pond and is perfect. But the serpent of cars that collapsed on the beach Disgorges its organs A scamper of colours Which roll like tomatoes Nude as tomatoes With sand in their creases To cringe in the sparkle of rollers and screech. The swallow of summer, the seamstress of summer, She scissors the blue into shapes and she sews it, She draws a long thread and she knots it at the corners. But the holiday people Are laid out like wounded Flat as in ovens Roasting and basting With faces of torment as space burns them blue Their heads are transistors Their teeth grit on sand grains Their lost kids are squalling While man-eating flies Jab electric shock needles but what can they do? They can climb in their cars with raw bodies, raw faces And start up the serpent And headache it homeward A car full of squabbles And sobbing and stickiness With sand in their crannies Inhaling petroleum That pours from the foxgloves While the evening swallow The swallow of summer, cartwheeling through crimson, Touches the honey-slow river and turning Returns to the hand stretched from under the eaves - A boomerang of rejoicing shadow.

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Wild Geese By Mary Oliver Seems very appropriate just now...but somehow it always does. 😍 You do not have to be good.You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again.Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting over and over announcing your place in the family of things. #maryoliver

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I quite like this one even without a bird... yesterdays were a bit bland I thought... this was painted over some that I really disliked just before I left my studio, I was surprised to find I liked them this morning 🙃

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Beautiful Sausage! 😍

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Would you like to read my April bird of the month...on Lapwings! its FREE! 😊 If you would like to read it, it comes as a link to a free download when you subscribe to studio insights via the link in my profile or using https://ift.tt/2OAUfYX Just a monthly newsletter and ebooklet pdf download no catches. Next month I am going to add a bit about Desmond too but more about that later 😊

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The face of a sheep getting a really good scratch!!! 😍🐑😍

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Can you spot anything strange?.. Desmond has a new party trick, he was scratching his head on the back of my legs as usual while I was scratching Walter's head... then suddenly he thought he would get in on the act... straight THOUGH my legs 🤦‍♀️🐑😍

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So many dandelion seed heads... and we cut the grass last week although I only cut it because I needed the cuttings to mulch the veg beds 😊I like my garden wild!

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Desmond just letting everyone know he is feeling much better this evening, Spoonie is also feeling better so all good again here! 🐑❤🙏❤🐑

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Another little composition with Curlews..

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Playing with paint today and abstract landscapes, still stuck in my burnt sienna vibe and this feels too busy in the current locked down world but...I with evaluate with some birds tomorrow because that maybe all they need 😍

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Curlew this time on a background with burnt sienna painted a year ago... still not ready to commit to a final composition 😂

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Just occasionally when the grass is long or on the croft land which is always wild and overgrown, I accidentally flush a snipe out of the vegetation... always lovely to see...a d its John Muirs birthday I believe so here is a quote I love "In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks"

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I love the tales that surround the saints... St George was a Roman soldier born in what is now modern-day Turkey in around 280AD and died around 303. Very little is known about his early life but it is believed he was born to a wealthy Christian noble family. When he grew up he became a soldier and joined the retinue of Emperor Diocletian. In 303 Diocletian, as part of a crackdown on the growing influence of the Christian community, ordered that all Christian soldiers in the army should be expelled and all Roman soldiers be forced to make the traditional pagan sacrifice. St George refused and denounced the edict in front of his fellow soldiers, declaring he was a Christian. Diocletian initially tried to convert him with offers of wealth and land but when he refused he was beheaded on 23 April 303. The myth of St George slaying a dragon originally appeared in stories told by the medieval Eastern Orthodox Church which were brought back to Europe by the Crusaders in the 10th and 11th centuries. According to one story, a town in Libya had a small lake with a plague-infected dragon living in it. The townspeople were gradually being killed by the dragon and started feeding it two sheep a day to appease it. When they ran out of sheep the king devised a lottery system to feed it local children. One day his own daughter was chosen and as she was being led out to the lake St George happened to ride past.....' During the Middle Ages, people believed that St George was one of the 'Fourteen Holy Helpers' – a group of saints who could help during epidemic diseases. St George's protection was invoked against several nasty diseases, many fatal and with infectious causes, including the Plague and leprosy. From around 1100, St George’s help was also sought to protect the English army. In William Shakespeare’s Henry V, the monarch calls on the saint during his battle cry at the Battle of Harfleur in the famous “Once more unto the breach, dear friends” speech, crying “God for Harry! England, and St. George!” Five hundred years later – during the First World War – a ghostly apparition of St George is said to have aided British troops during their retreat from Mons.

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And a Raven over Ninemaidens 😍

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Buzzard over Blackrock ...I do love these colours burnt sienna is so vibrant and always speaks of bracken moorland and high wild places 😍

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Peas survived the 1st night in the ground, hoping they will still be there tomorrow 🙏 🌿😍

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I have been playing with these colours again today...but I feel like they belong more to my autumn landscape than spring...i am not good with green paint though and the world is very green just now 😊

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I am now starting work on my May bird of the month... and also an introduction to the all new Desmond Diaries 😂The April bird of the month is not only about Easter, I gathered a few other bits and bobs about the Lapwing! If you would like to read it, its out now ...and its FREE! It comes as a link to a free download when you subscribe to studio insights via the link in my profile or using https://ift.tt/2OAUfYX and dont forget Next month I am going to add a bit about Desmond too...

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Sat on the garden for lunch surrounded by the flutter of sparrow wings and conversation...bliss.. Just as it was a Trelissick when I decided to include a sparrow in this lino cut to celebrate 125 years of the @nationaltrust exhibited at @nttrelissick with @cornwall_crafts but had to close due to the lockdown. . . .

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Today is #worldcurlewday i thought I would share this wonderful quote "never heard the solitary whistle of curlew on a summer noon without feeling the elevation of soul” Robert Burns. But also found this,😣 I know that so many of our birds are threatened and I look at this so often it is one of my main focuses but somehow this news passed me by ... Britain holds a quarter of the world’s curlew population and the @RSPB_love_nature report that the population has at least halved and in some places dropping by 81% raising awareness can help hopefully 🙏 but more can be read more at RSPB https://ift.tt/2xN7iSK or Wildfowl & wetland trust @wwt https://ift.tt/3eCshYV #curlewcrisis

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I heard a cuckoo today! Looking back over my records I heared one on the same day 2 years ago as well 😍 I know the @btobirds reported their return a few days ago...good to know that our local bird has made it back...

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Todays tea, nettle, dandelion, willow, ginger and turmeric...doesn't taste great (quite bitter) but I am doing a bit of a trial, yesterday u didn't put willow in and it wasn't as effective for my inflamed joint ...

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What can I do to help? I have a couple of paintings of grey seals this is one of them...i will be selling it to raise funds for the Cornish Seal Sanctuary. 100% of the proceeds with go to them (+£25 p & p uk) the current price of the painting is £345.00 it is 60 x 60 cm on canvas. Please make your best offer to me via dm or email and I will let it go to the highest bidder (whatever that might be) on Friday 24th . Please share if you can, the seal sanctuary do an amazing job of caring for and releasing many injured wild seals...as well as looking after some who can't be released. @thecornishsealsanctuary • • • • • • Cornish Seal Sanctuary We need your help. With the necessary updated extension of the Coronavirus lockdown, we are now deeply concerned about how we are going to continue to be able to cover the costs to feed and care for our animals. It costs us £23,000 a month for our dedicated animal care team to feed, provide daily care, vital medicines and equipment to the Sanctuary’s residents. . . To donate to our appeal, and help us please click the link to our Just Giving page in our bio. Even a small amount would go such a long way, and help to protect the animals at the Sanctuary that have been a huge part of Cornwall’s heritage for over 60 years

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Can you help? #Repost @thecornishsealsanctuary • • • • • • Cornish Seal Sanctuary We need your help. With the necessary updated extension of the Coronavirus lockdown, we are now deeply concerned about how we are going to continue to be able to cover the costs to feed and care for our animals. It costs us £23,000 a month for our dedicated animal care team to feed, provide daily care, vital medicines and equipment to the Sanctuary’s residents. . . To donate to our appeal, and help us please click the link to our Just Giving page in our bio. Even a small amount would go such a long way, and help to protect the animals at the Sanctuary that have been a huge part of Cornwall’s heritage for over 60 years.

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A bit of excitement in my @btobirds garden birdwatch this week Robin 2 Black bird 2 Great tit 2 Blue tit 2 Goldfinch 2 Chaffinch 2 Dunnock 2 Sparrow 3 Rook 4 Pheasant 1 Jackdaw 8 Magpie Wood pigeon Herring gull 2 Buzzard And last bu not least a Sparrow hawk swooped in first thing this morning and sat on the gate for a minute, I always find sparrow hawks completely disregard humans, I have felt one fly past my ear on a couple of occasions...we are too slow to be a threat I think 😍 #btogardenbirdwatch

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I thought I would share this picture of Firefly today, I was lookkng through some older photos and found it, it's not just the sheep you see, all my creatures are very expressive 🤣

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Thank you for sharing 😍#Repost @nsanewlyn • • • • • • Penwith Keeping in touch with our members during this period of lockdown, here are some paintings and drawings by Suzy Sharpe. Suzy shares her positive approach to being an artist in lockdown: “Someone suggested thinking about this confinement as a residency... I have just started with this, I have no idea where this will lead but I have enjoyed gathering some images, drawing things i would not normally draw...my "stay at home artist residency" ... I am finding that my greenhouse offers me a positive and useful 15 minutes or so each day ... I am struggling with finding the purpose for doing things most challenging, as all my exhibitions have been postponed, however i am beginning to realise that i have been social isolated for as long as i can remember! I have also been drawing my sheep Desmond et al (I only have 6) who seem to have a bit of a following... they seem to raise people’s spirits at this time... I have attached a few of those images also... I personally find time spent with my sheep, drawing them (mindfully so not too much pressure!) is very beneficial if I start to catastrophise which I am a little prone to from time to time.” @suzysharpeart @nsanewlyn #mixedmedia #watercolour #cornishlandscape #rurallife #sheepfarmerartist #contemporarycornishart #sheep #drawingsheep #artistresidency #artistsinlockdown #artistsoninstgram #newlynsocietyofartists

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Well that's a bit cheeky Desmond 😋🤣😂🐑😂🤣

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The excitement of a greenhouse!

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Last night there was a Blackbird singing in the dark... I know from researching my September bird of the month they will sometimes do this but it seemed very unusual and reminded me again for the song by the Beatles - Blackbird Blackbird singing in the dead of night Take these broken wings and learn to fly All your life You were only waiting for this moment to arise Blackbird singing in the dead of night Take these sunken eyes and learn to see All your life You were only waiting for this moment to be free Blackbird fly, blackbird fly Into the light of a dark black night Blackbird fly, blackbird fly Into the light of a dark black night Blackbird singing in the dead of night Take these broken wings and learn to fly All your life You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

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A bit of gorgeous giddiness from the boys a year ago ... bless their little cotton socks ❤🐑❤🐏❤

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And here is a few more made with weeds and ink 🌿😊🌿

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I have been playing with the idea of absence and presence, negative shapes etc just to create some pages to play with maybe collage... ideas from around my home for my #stayathome artist residency 😊 it's kind of nice to allow the process to unfold at the moment without worrying about where it is going ...

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This collage isn't in my bird of the month...but I wanted to continue the theme a little longer 😍

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First feeds Desmond with my littlest daughter @elliegregor one year ago 😍🐏🐑😍

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I love those instagram pics where everything is in its place and there is a crisp graphic feel and a beautifully designed quality to it... unfortunately I just seem to make a mess, but having fun if I can just find my bush under all these papers 😂😂😂 #inthestudio

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For this weekday @btobirds garden bird watch I recorded the following Robin 2 Black bird m + f Great tit 2 Blue tit 2 Goldfinch 4 Chaffinch 2 Dunnock 2 Sparrow 4 Rook 2 Pheasant 2 heard Jackdaw 10 Magpie 2 Wood pigeon 2 Ma.y of whom are enjoying a lovely food mix from the @gardencrowd 😍. . you can get a 10% discount from garden crowd using suzysharpe_gc10

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The April bird of the month is not only about Easter, I managed to gather a few other bits and bobs about the Lapwing! If you would like to read it, its out now ...and its FREE! It comes as a link to a free download when you subscribe to studio insights via the link in my profile or using https://ift.tt/2OAUfYX Next month I am going to add a bit about Desmond too...

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I just have to post this lovely picture of our lovely Desmond & Walter with my daughter ❤🐑🐏❤

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Lapwings and links to Easter Which starts with the historical tradition for Plover Egg hunts. Plover’s eggs were an expensive delicacy in Victorian Europe, Queen Victoria favoured her plover eggs cooked in aspic and Mrs Beaton supplied several recipes. They may in fact be the original Easter Eggs, Egg pickers, desimated the populations of Lapwings and in 20 years they had stripped the whole of southern England as far up as Lincolnshire. In the later 1880’s plover eggs had to be gathered from the Scottish highlands and Holland. In 1926 the Lapwing Act (Wild Bird Protection Bill) officially stopped the practice and prohibited anyone to take, use, have possession of or consume the eggs or birds and also protected their nests. Historians believe the origins of Easter eggs are derived from custom of the egg hunt. As Lapwing eggs hidden in the long grasses the would be fairly difficult to find it was possible that the garden and chocolate Egg became a good substitute. Also there is a link to the easter Hare (previous post) Hares, (unlike rabbits who have burrows) hide from predators by making a shallow indentation in the soil known as a form. Lapwings often inhabit the same territories as hares and make a scrape of a nest on the ground. Lapwings were known to use a hare’s form as a nest and so eggs where often found in a form and therefore assumed to have been laid by the Hare. If you would like to read my whole Lapwing bird of the month you can find a link in my profile... is all free 😊

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If you have read my Bird of the month for April you will already know this but is it an Easter Hare or a Bunny? It is thought that the Easter bunny was originally a Hare but it was so steeped in Pagan folklore that it was deemed ‘unfitting’ for Christian purposes. The Hare is also at its most visible at this time of year in Norther Europe, they become more social as part of their mating behaviour. Hares can be seen in the fields boxing. The sight of groups of hares in the fields would have been a sign of the onset of spring (and therefore Easter) probably then connected with the German and Dutch tradition of the Easter Hare Link to a Lapwing I feel we have now come full circle back to the Lapwing. Which given the historical tradition for Plover Egg hunts this part seems to be closest to a possible truth. This Hare original was painted in acrylic on canvas sold sometime ago and she now a greetings card 😊. Link to studio insights and bird if the month is in my profile if you would like to read it in full (free pdf download) .https://ift.tt/2OAUfYX . . . . . . .

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Today is a very important day! 🎉🥳🎂🐑🐏🥳🎂🎉 It is the day we first met Desmond & Walter ❤ they were not born on this day but were no more than 3 days old when we collected them so today is their official birthday...ots of people have been telling me to write a book about them but that seems a bit daunting so I am going to start to tell the story of their 1st 12 months with us in my newsletter (as a free pdf ebook) so if you would like to read it there is a link in my profile, the first edition will be out in May 😊

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A few sketches of reclining sheep from today #stayathome art residency 😊

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Here is your daily Desmond... in the role of gate keeper. Actually he is being very intelligent, as are the others sat in the shade in a breezy part of the field keeping cool and away from the flies which seem to be bothering them at the moment. Of all the places they have access to this field is the windiest...its too hot if you have a big fleece on so they have all been sitting in the shade in the day and active in the evening when it cools down. 🌞⛱😎🐏🐑🐏🐑🐏🐑😍

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A other #Stayathome artist residency drawing, there is a bird building a nest in this box a great tit I think 😊

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One of my "stay at home residency" drawings from yesterday... I am finding that my greenhouse offers me a positive and useful 15 minutes or so each day ... I am struggling with finding the purpose for doing things at the moment most challenging, as i am beginning to realise that i have been social isolated for as long as i can remember

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