Laughter is the thread that binds us.

I am a huge lover of on-line tutorials and a voracious consumer of on-line how-to videos; I taught myself to knit using Youtube. More recently, when I wanted to learn to paint, I turned once again to the Internet for help.
From the moment I saw people doing art journals, I knew this was for me. I have been art journalling for years (I just didn't know that was what it was). My notes from university are covered with drawings, I now understand that I did this as my way of staying present (mindfulness in action) as it was often the less engaging lectures where I found the need to draw. Up until just over a year ago my journalling was sporadic and then that I discovered The Documented Life Project. You can head over there yourself to find details. Suffice to say that it is an awesome project that anyone can become part of, for free. Lots of tutorials, inspiration and support from a generous group of teachers. I started just reading the blog posts and how to's and incorporating techniques into my pages and have been doing my own thing, while reading what the artists do. That was until the last 2 weeks.

The prompt for this week is about laughter and stitches. It made me think about all the laughter I had with my mum while sewing. She taught me to sew when I was very little. I used to make dolls clothes and bed linen and homewares for my dolls' house. She had so much patience, allowing me to make mistakes and helping me work things out. Many years later we would sew together, one Christmas we made 30 separate garments as presents. Mum does not sew any more. I thought about how much we laughed together over the years, we had so much fun! We had such a bond, creating things together and laughter was very much part of that bond.

Last week the theme was about using fabric to get texture into your work. So how could I resist? I started with a piece of fabric left over from a project I did with my daughter and this is the result. 

Mum used to paint. We were always painting when I was little. She dedicated a whole wall for our gallery when I was a little girl. Showcasing our latest efforts with pride. She stopped painting a while ago, but lately I have been helping her to paint again. I introduced her to intuitive painting, stencil use and collage. She is no longer able to hold a brush steady, so we are doing work that does not need a steady hand. I should be able to show you some results soon.