A busy week

The week before Easter began with continuing the mural I am finishing for my dentist, Mark Smith. Mark is fixing my teeth in exchange for me decorating one wall of his son Zachary's room with a medieval scene.
Zachary is 9 and his mural is based on an original drawing of his showing a knight in armour astride a rearing horse holding his sword up in a bravura gesture and viewed from a castle interior through the stone arch. The mural is painted on canvas and stapled to the wall and the stone arch is made of polystyrene and ply and is screwed to the wall so it is removable. I tried to make it interesting enough that Zachary will still like it when he is older and his tastes may have changed.
It's been a fun job to do because there is no money involved and Doctor Smith is a fun guy, manic, creative and interested in everything and he and his wife Diana have three boys and their house is always filled with energy. I come out of their house smiling, good people, excellent job to have

Finished and photographed Zachary's mural Tuesday and you can see it on this blog, at the bottom of the page.
Wednesday I was continuing to draw up the doll museum painting and Wednesday evening was Life drawing class and Thursday was to be an early start driving to Paeroa to pick up my pal Barbie and on to Hamilton, an hours drive away, to attend our etching class.
I am very keen on printmaking and have all the gear in my recently finished studio but felt I needed a refresher course to get up to speed on etching and to organize the etching part of the studio in shipshape and Bristol fashion.
As I had Mary the doll museum owner coming on Thursday afternoon to check on my progress with her job I decided to miss the etching class for that week as I felt a bit overwhelmed.

Yes, stress... I am thin and nervous and capable of doing six things at once but then I can lose it and get shot down and have to work desperately hard to avoid crashing and burning...
Depression is my nemesis and ally and the adult monster I have to keep tucked up and safe from.

Thursday evening Barbie and Sandra came to visit and they drank a little wine and I drank more than a little brandy and coffee and Sandra helped Barbie and myself with our blogs.
Sandra is a good friend a great artist and computer whiz and the three of us have fun playing with and planning blog ideas.
We are just kids having fun, I think that's one of life's meanings; play, have fun - I hope you have fun in your life dear reader..

Good Friday I spent in the garden keeping ahead of the jungle and getting stress release and all the rest of the weekend was spent working on Mary's doll portraits, a difficult and intense job but very satisfying because so challenging.