This and That

It's been a difficult week and I haven't been feeling very creative. At the same time it's good to keep up routines and to have something to occupy my mind. I had some books to return to the library yesterday. I took a bit of time to look for something new to read. I came home with some journals and contemporary accounts of early European explorers of the East Coast of Australia.

In case you're interested, my train of thought went something like this . . .

• Last week I was looking at flowers for the Creative Kids. I took out some books about Australian wildflowers as a resource.
• I have a long time fascination with botanical art.
• I'm working to improve my drawing skills.
• Collecting and recording strange plants and animals was a major task of the early explorers.
• I'm keen to learn more about history. Personal accounts and biographies are one way of doing that--and I'm especially interested in the way individual characters come through.

So I came home with several journals to read. There are are a few original drawings in Joseph Banks' published journals. The letter above is one written by James Cook prior to his departure from England in 1768. Coincidentally, I'm going to a free-motion machine quilting class this morning. The flourishes and curls on the capital letters remind me of the sort of work I hope to eventually be able to do with my sewing machine.

Book Beauty

Two books to look at this morning: The first, "Principles of Pattern", I picked up from the Guild Textile Bazaar some time ago. The second, "Plants and Their Application to Ornament" was an unexpected find in a little boutique in Rathdowne St before a coffee with my friend M recently. I'm hoping that the two together will help me to bridge the gap between my fascination with botanical art and my desire to decorate fabric . . . or at least to take some more small steps in that direction.

In other news, my eye is settling nicely with regular antibiotic drops. If you want a laugh, you can try to imagine a middle-aged, short-sighted woman leaning back in front of the mirror trying to land a drop of fluid into a blinking target a couple of centimetres across!