tiger food

Life

leaves
Originally uploaded by custardmonkeys

Yesterday a friend popped in and said "you and John go and have lunch together somewhere nice and I will watch the kids and feed them." Not many people would offer to watch 11 kids for a couple of hours. John and I grabbed the opportunity and went for soup at snapdragons in Newcastle Emlyn. As we sat there by the river just enjoying the peace and quiet and each other I realized our need for others. I think sometimes I like to feel I can cope just fine by myself as relationships can be hard work and demanding. But it is that old philosophy of 'what goes around, comes around' and when we reach out to those around us amazing treasures come back to us like lunch at snapdragons.

jpg mag

Made me laugh

Ron Mueck

This image above is my favourite. As a photograph it works perfectly never mind the brilliant sculpture.






Ron Mueck is a London-based photo-realist artist. Born in Melbourne,Australia, to parents who were toy makers, he labored on children's television shows for 15 years before working in special effects for such films as Labyrinth, a 1986 fantasy epic starring David Bowie.

Mueck then started his own company in London, making models to be photographed for advertisements. He has lots of the dolls he made during his advertising years stored in his home. Although some still have, he feels, a presence on their own, many were made just to be photographed from a particular angle??one strip of a face,? for example, with a lot of loose material lurking an inch outside the camera's frame.

Eventually Mueck concluded that photography pretty much destroys the physical presence of the original object, and so he turned to fine art and sculpture. In the early 1990's, still in his advertising days, Mueck was commissioned to make something highly realistic, and was wondering what material would do the trick. Latex was the usual, but he wanted something harder, more precise. Luckily, he saw a little architectural decor on the wall of a boutique and inquired as to the nice, pink stuff's nature. Fiberglass resin was the answer, and Mueck has made it his bronze and marble ever since.

Ron Mueck's work became world-famous when a poignant sculpture of his dead fathers small, naked body caused shock waves in the Royal Academy's Sensation exhibition in 1997. The attention to detail and sheer technical brilliance of his figures are incredible, but it is Mueck's use of scale that takes your breath away.

His work is lifelike but not life size, and being face to face with the tiny, gossiping Two Women (2005) or the monumental woman In Bed (2005) is an unforgettable experience.

The huge 4.5m crouching Boy was the centerpiece of the Millennium Dome in London and of the Venice Biennale in 2001. The artist's work is becoming ever more intriguing, ranging from smaller-than-life size naked figures to much larger, but never actual, life size. Consequently his hyper-realistic sculptures in fiberglass and silicone, while extraordinarily lifelike, challenge us by their odd scale. The psychological confrontation for the viewer is to recognize and assimilate two contradictory realities.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/gallery/2005/12/29/GA2005122900888_index_frames.htm?startat=1"> Click here for more

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To the sea!

I have lived near the sea most of my life. As a teenager I would go to the sea when ever I was frustrated or sad and scream at the sea. Not really sure why, I'm sure a psychiatrist somewhere would have a theory. I just felt it was somewhere I could go and not be judged and just scream my head off. I have done this a few times as an adult, but unnerving passers by is a little more on my mind now. And perhaps being sent to the nut house :) I also feel that the closed in feeling you get when life seems a bit too much can be eradicated when surrounded by space.
Last night we took all the kids to the beach for some family therapy. We played wrestling, sandcastle building, kids getting soaked and adults trying to stay dry :) John went to the local chippy and we enjoyed fish and chips on the beach. What could be better.

Sunday, Sunday

It is my nephew Thorin's ninth birthday today and Cameron, Owen and Harry celebrated it by sleeping out in the tree house in our woods Friday and Saturday night. Thankfully they didn't freeze to death or get attacked by some psycho as me the paranoid mother worried about :) They had a great time and did what lads their age should! I hate the fear factor that comes with kids. They just want to innocently walk down to our local shop to buy a bag of sweets and I am watching the time until they have arrived home. John helps by asking me to think about the very worst thing that could happen and the best and then find some rationality somewhere in the middle :) That is usually something like - they go to the park on the way home from the shop so take a little longer.
Anyway above is Thorin opening his new tarp which he got with a hammock so he can sleep out under the stars without getting wet.
Cameron who is pictured above looking lovely in his suit, was set apart today as the teacher's quorum president. Bishop set him apart and it was a lovely blessing - I reminded Cam on the way out of Bishop's reference to listening more to his parents :)
Beautiful sunny afternoon and while the kids played pass the parcel John and I escaped up to Wilkins to get Dave and Marie a Wilkinet for their baby due now. John's mum and dad left today to fly over to see them both, and to await the new arrival. We are all excited to see what Dave and Marie's offspring will look like, send us lots of photos Dave !!!!! xx

Have a happy Friday!!

Work and play

Saturday was the 'running with angels' run that I have been training for and I got a job in Cardiff at the last minute, so money took precedence over marathon. But my girls went and took part, it was a 5k run and Ceilidh won! She showed determination and fitness and John and I are so proud of all the girls for completing it. The run was for raising money for breast cancer, an all female run.
The job in Cardiff was for a family that are emigrating to Australia in a couple of weeks and want to leave some family portraits for friends and family. (Niamh above was such a little character, she had us all laughing!) So I couldn't change the date. It was my first on location shoot in their home and it went smoothly. John and I always love having time together and with the great support from his parents who had Will, Caleb and J. Shelly who had Harry and Imogen. Catherine who had Caitlin. Angela who had Cam and Owen. Hazel who took Ceilidh, Devon and Cerys to the run - wow we have such great support. We had a child free day, working and then went for lunch at Ikea and bought Imogen a pop up tent :) Which she has lived in since, we even had to make a bed in it so she could sleep in it.
John and I marvel daily at how things all come together, we look at our lives and see a wonderfully organized chaos with family and friends loving and supporting us through it! Thanks people!!

William's baptism

Triple baptism with his two cousins, Emma-Lee and Becky. We all gathered at my brother Scott's home for a bbq afterwards, our family has out grown all our houses now so we were grateful it didn't rain and enjoyed the garden. There was water fights, a bouncy castle and lots and lots of food!! Thanks Scott and Deb for a great day :)

fire!

fire!
Originally uploaded by custardmonkeys.

SPLASH!

ready, aim

ready, aim
Originally uploaded by custardmonkeys.

Today we headed home from visiting family and stopped at Lake Bala. There seems to be a strong impulse in all humans to pick up rocks and hurl them into the water - why? Perhaps that is the very reason we do it, because there is no reason we can just throw them and watch the splash!

cultivate the good, purify the mind

Clocks

Imogen is three today!! Three years ago I delivered her myself in a birthing pool and held her as she took her first breath. Three years seems to have gone by with no regard! Just walked out, no goodbyes, no note, no pre-warning. I feel like a jilted bride stood at the alter waiting for it to jump out and and say "boo! Just kidding I am still here". Like blowing the dandilion clock poof -my four oldest have grown from children into young adults, poof- my roof has been fixed so the drip, drip, dripping in the loft has stopped, changes now seem to spin past me and I get a glimpse and I smile at the flash of life I get to observe. I have always wondered at the theory most older generations have of time speeding up as you get older, now I am living it and know it to be true. I remember as a child a day lasting forever, I would pack in a million events into just a few hours. Now I lean down to pick up a pile of laundry and I glimpse at the clock and see another hour has passed. Who takes it? What thief cheats us out of our childhood timeless state and leaves us naked, penniless and with a remote in our hands with the fast forward button stuck down. Doesn't matter how much I beat the flippin thing it only speeds up. But on a more positive note I ponder on the fact that to my children that moment I took to play badmington with them and to go swimming and read a book took forever.