Illustrations of wonder

How lovely is this?

Koldo Barroso is creating wonderful illustrations to go with the lyrics for the new album. If you look at his blog on his website, you can follow what he is doing for me.

And if you look at his portfolio you can see more of his wondrous creations... some of them are kind of whimsical but with a slightly sinister edge..... but his little animals are so sweet they ought to be cuddled.

Cold here and going to get colder, but the witchhazel is flowering and snowdrops have appeared so there is always something to say 'ah!' to.

The dogs are watching me, each with one eye open...obviously in case I rush off to the kitchen to find them something edible... they have been here for 5 months now and I am at last getting the hang of them,

Whizzy is a bit of a nervy thing, doesn't like to be left behind and would like to attach herself to me permanently so that I can't go anywhere without her...
Flower is like a lollopy colt, the muscles in her back legs are not strong so she does a sort of flailing run if she gets left behind. She is so long that she can't turn round quickly and I keep treading on her toes by accident - yelp! yelp! I am so cruel..... She hasn't put on any weight, her bones are still very prominent and I guess she is just one of those dogs that gets very thin when they get old... Whizzy however is getting to be quite plump. Well -plump for a greyhound anyway. but they both seem happy enough...

Right then. More later :-)

Hooray hooray!!

The album is just about finished and ready for mastering. It will be called 'Talking With Strangers' which is something that I seem to do quite a bit..

If you look here , you can see who has been kind enough to play for me. I am just so delighted with the end result. It makes me grin every time I hear it..

Next step is to let it out into the world and hope that others enjoy it. Gulp! Always the difficult bit. But no use writing all this stuff and making all this music and then hiding it away in a cupboard is there? Tempting though the thought is....

I may have to sing live somewhere. If I do and you see me, I will be clutching some screwed up bits of paper containing the words. Absolutely terrified of forgetting them and going blank... I think I will worry about that later...

What else? Pensionerhood and Grannydom are beckoning in the first part of this year. That's going to make life even more interesting. I shall claim my bus pass and go out for discounted meals. Yippee! It's funny how each new decade seems to bring a new change to my life. I expect it happens to everyone though..

I did a bit of a garden clear up yesterday, just tidying up the japanese anenomes, which seem to have become bullies here.,taking over every bit of spare garden.. Very pretty though in the autumn. And the little witchhazel tree has begun to flower. It is usually out fully by my birthday and has a wonderful smell.

Oh yes and I had the roof fixed. There was a little leak where the previous repair to a flat roof hadn't been properly joined to the main roof. It only leaked when the wind was in a certain direction and it was pouring with rain, but as it was above a doorway and the door was beginning to warp, I really had to do something. So I did. The trouble with having stuff done to a roof is that it doesn't look any different when it's mended. Ho hum..
But the roofmen managed to knock a few of the crystals off the crystal tree so I had to thread them all again and rehang them.

Dear me! This is turning out to be a boring old blog isn't it. I'll try and do better next time..

Jude xxxx