Leaves from Juliette

Thank you for this page Juliette. Its going to be a great addition to the book of leaves which I intend to start putting together next week.

Sneak Preview for Juliette

Your September page started its trip across the pond today.   I'm soooo pleased to have finished it before the 15th!  Albeit, barely!

Seashore

This is the page I sent at the end of March for Juliette, so I do hope that she won't mind my posting about it. I was so glad to hear that it had arrived.

The photo in the insert was taken on the island of Grand Turk in the Caribbean.

I included a description of the piece, which you can read about here. (Just click on the photo and it will enlarge.)

I had been lucky enough to travel to the Caribbean on a cruise earlier this year, and knew that this spot had to be used for Juliette's "Seashore page". The colours of the sea were truly amazing. Living in the UK, the sea always seems various shades of grey with some blues. This depends on the time of year, of course. In the region of the Caribbean, the colours were so intense, it really took my breath away. I took a number of photographs.

One shows the sand and a footprint left by the man I had seen sweeping the leaves from the beach a few hours earlier. I had woken very early just as dawn was rising and was able to watch activities to clean the beach ready for the passengers to disembark. It is truly surreal to see a huge cruise ship visit such a tiny island. It dwarfs everything around it. But life goes on as usual, calm and unhurried.

As I had mentioned to Juliette, I was reminded of a passage from a children's book much loved by my own daughters when they were younger. I was able to share the book with the classes I taught too. You can read it below. Margaret Mahy is a superb writer. I love her descriptions, they are so vivid. The photo is of a scan I made of the page in my battered, much read copy.

Should you wish to read it for yourselves, the ISBN number of my copy is this: 0-14-050624-1.

It is called "The man whose mother was a pirate."

A seashore for Juliette

Well, your page is a mass of pins at the moment, Juliette. At least I have started it. I can't wait to get rid of said pins though. Not good for the fingers............

A funny story for you. I had finished painting some muslin (loose woven cotton) when I heard a sound behind me. My cat Felix had jumped up and yes, landed on said still damp fabric............. He was stunned to a rather, for him, unusual silence when I grabbed him and marched him off to the bathroom to wash his paws. Strangely enough, there was no trace of his paw prints on the fabric....................... it was the only thing that saved my sanity. That, and his staying out of my way until tea-time.

Isn't it surprising just how quickly a human can be forgiven when it is time for food..................?

Juliette's page from Kath

A bit of a flat representation of cording and muslin waves
onto the seashore but you get the idea!

Juliette's page

Hi Juliette, I've just posted your page. Hope you don't mind if you get it early, we've so many strikes going on here in Greece now I thought better safe than sorry! Hope you enjoy whenever you receive it.

Snippet for Juliette

Here's a peek of my page for Juliette plus a photo I got off the web hoping to be able to emulate in Kantha, but I chickened out! However hope it brightens the February weather for you! Are you due the snow again? We've got strong southerly winds at the mo; means it's quite warm, but also that we get 'Gadaffi's revenge' that is a lot of Saharan sand so the sky is about the same colour as part of your page!!