pegboard pineapple

my studio has started a new annual tradition. last year we had a studio group exhibition at our local pub. i blogged about it here. the exhibition coincided with the annual SALA (south australian living artists) festival. somehow we now have a permanent booking at the pub for the SALA show as a studio. last year we all worked with the circle theme, and this year we are all working from a piece of pegboard.

this whole thing has happened rather organically, but it seems each year one of us will 'curate' the show. ie: select the format or some aspect that our work needs to include, like working on a wooden circle, or in this case a rectangular piece of pegboard.

my pegboard was waiting for me when i finally made it back into the studio after my overseas travels. with all the other commitments i have coming up i knew i needed to make some quick decisions and get this pegboard piece done right away. 

now i am not sure what it is but i have a strong connection to the pineapple as an image or drawing. i also love to eat it and have 2 -3 fresh pineapple and ginger juices a week (one of the perks of working at a juice bar) somehow pegboard pineapple just made sense. and sometimes you just don't question ideas that just seem right.

a quick stop at my local crafty shop, and the hardware and i was ready to start making my piece.

 

i drew a pattern on some paper, to work out the line work and scale of the pineapple.

 

i decided that the line work would not be enough but that i needed a block of colour to set the pineapple up on the pegboard.

 

i taped and pray painted the body of the fruit

 

and then did the same with the green leafy bits.

from here it was basically like doing an over sized cross stitch.

 

i started with one colour on the body, and then added a second brighter orange to the body of the pineapple, and then started the line work for the leafy section, and then i even worked on the background.

all up it was about a week of on again off again work. i had fun and enjoyed the process. the group show goes up in a couple weeks, and i will show you my finished pegboard pineapple then along with the rest of the work from the exhibition.

studio closing party pics

about 2 weeks ago now the studio i was in closed down. the landlord wanted his building back.

we cleaned out the studio, no small feat - some people had been there for over 10 years.

once the building was empty and beautiful we threw a party.



the cute little ute in the middle of the main room, also doubled as our cooler with the back tray filled with ice.

we had three bands playing in the upstairs back room with lots of dancing.

the theme of the party was fancy dress, or wig or moustache. there were some great costumes.

the drummer of this band was a studio member, and they sounded great in the studio.

a few early party goers, getting going for the evening.

me and borris half way through the night.

the party was fun. it was great to see the building all lit up and empty, if only it could always be like that.

since then life has been too busy to be sad or nostalgic, but it has been made easier for me because i have moved into a new studio space. some images of that will be here soon.

SWIMMING POOL BIRTHDAY CAKE!

my weekend was spent doing some work in my studio and making the swimming pool birthday cake. it was actually pretty easy to do. just lots of simple steps to follow.

first make the cake from scratch.



let it cool for a day.



the next day, make your butter icing and colour a part of it green. colour some coconut green as well and sprinkle this on the green icing to make the grass for the base of the cake.



cut out a 1 inch deep well in the cake, to make the area the water will go into.
Place the cake onto the grass base.



colour the rest of the butter icing with cocoa and ice the top edge and outside of the cake with the icing and press the chocolate biscuits around the side of the cake, creating the fence.

be sure to make the blue jelly for the water a day before you want to fill the pool.



the butter icing is also used as a glue to make a musk stick and licorice ladder, and some pool toys.

the day the cake is to be served the pool can be filled with the mashed up blue jelly. the small dolls with their custom painted bathers can be set into the jelly in their candy floating rings, and some candy balls placed in the water.



the result is a swimming pool cake that looks great, and even apparently tastes good too.

here is the birthday girl with her cake, happy as.

swimming pool birthday cake!

this is my good pal shel. its her birthday this weekend.



this is the re-released 1970's birthday cake book.



this is the swimming pool cake, from the book that i will be making over the next few days for shel.

i spent the morning today gathering the necessary supplies. tomorrow i start making.
stay tuned for the results.

tweed run

the other week the annual tweed run was held in my city. my neighbour is really into cycling and he invited me and borris along for the ride. he even got us some tweed jackets to wear.



we met at the town hall and then the gang of tweed wearing cyclists took to the streets.



there were some cool bikes, like this custom penny farthing. it was beautiful.



i got dressed in my tweed-ish socks and my crochet moustache for the event as well. the moustache was a big hit.



this is borris in the gang. there were approximately 160 people on the ride. it was a beautiful day and perfect for peddling around the city.

and here i am posing at the edge of the crowd that is covered with tweed.

it was a fun day, i think i will go again next year!

exploding tulips!

last night borris and me and my friend shels went to the mid winter ball.
it is a good excuse to get dressed up and go out in the middle of winter and have some fun.



shels and i decided to head out to the charity shops to find out outfits for the evening. i luckily found this beautiful exploding tulips number for $9. i actually really like the pattern and will probably try and copy the pattern to make a nice plain cotton version. i may even wear it again to an exhibition opening i have with later this year with a garden theme.



shels luckily fit into this retro and fitted purple number. she actually already owned matching daisy earrings to go with the dress. shels looked great!

we got together before the ball to get ready and do our hair. i became a little involved in watching hair demos on you tube and came across this hair bow tutorial that i followed. it is hard to make out in the photos but it took an hour for me to get this hair bow in my hair. really if i am going to sport up dos in the future i need to practice.

this is me and the lovely borris just about to step out for the evening. we made it home by midnight before we turned into pumpkins and had a great time.

now if only spring would explode into action we could stop being so cold and in hibernation mode.

ravioli

last week i had some friends over for dinner. i had planned on making pumpkin ravioli.
i managed to talk everyone into helping make dinner.

we had a great time together, many laughs and mistakes, here are the highlights.



we each had a job in the production.



i got to roll out the pasta dough.



dani got to try and problem solve the ravioli tray that was suppose to make everything easier.



but our dough just stuck to the tray. it took dani most of the time to clean the tray to try again.



in the end she did get great results, after so much laughing my sides hurt.



the result on the left is the first ravioli she made, and the one on the right was the much improved second batch.



tip: use lots of flour and don't over fill the tray.



we took over the whole kitchen and flour was everywhere.



shelsy made ravioli the old fashioned way, by putting the filling down on a sheet of pasta.



then covering it with another sheet and pressing it down,

and cutting them with a roller.



she had the hang of this right away.

these are some of the ravioli we made.



they cooked really quickly in the water, the filling was roasted pumpkin mixed with ricotta and parmesan cheese and nutmeg.



i also made a brown butter and sage sauce to go with the ravioli. i had never made it before and it sounded to easy to be true, but it was great.



so after the huge mess, and so much laughing and many many mistakes we did end up with a really great meal, so good that there was none left!