Finding joy in the everyday

Recently I watched the movie“Sully” about the Captain Chesley 'Sully' Sullenberger who successfully landed his plane on the Hudson River, saving the lives of 155 people. When the crash investigators examined the crash, they strongly believed that Sully could have turned the plane back and safely landed at LeGuardia airport. Sully told the investigation that it would have been impossible. In their attempt to prove him wrong they re-run the crash using computer simulations and sure enough, both the computer simulations and the simulations using pilots all said he could have returned to the airport.  However, when Sully watched the pilots reenacting the accident on the simulation he asked “how many times have they done this”, Sully was told the pilots had practiced 17 times before they did the “real-test” simulation. Sully replies: No one warned us. No one said "You're going to lose both engines at a lower altitude than any jet in history. But, be cool, just ...

I was visiting a friend last weekend and noticed her calendar - the pictures  were beautiful and so full of detail.  I just loved them. The artist is Bev Doolittle (born January 10 1947)  an American working mainly in watercolours paints. She paints scenes of the American West and feature themes of Native American life, wild animals, horses, and landscapes.  Look closely at her paintings and you will see hidden animals. Check these out - the first one is my favourite:

'Maggie the Messmaker" Charles Wysocki is another folk artist that I just love the work of, they contain such richness of  colour  and such eye for detail.  I am particularly fond of the car series which I have included just a few. Charles Wysocki was born in 1928 in Detroit of immigrant parents (Polish), dying in 2002 aged 73.  He worked for AMCAL and from 1972 his works have been reproduced into calendars, like the one I have in my study of his most famous cats which I will enjoy in 2010.   "Too Pooped to Participate" 'Max'

Dear brother the painting in the last post and the one above (Beauty under the orange tree) was done  by a French artist called Emile Vernon, born 1872 and died in 1919 (however some sites give different dates), he belonged to the Romanticism and period.  He liked to paint pretty women.  The painting below is called A Summer Rose. The link below contains 43 of his paintings.  I think they are lovely. http://www.artsunlight.com/html/artistbn/N-V10-P001.htm

While I was in Adelaide we visited an Art and Craft Market where we looked at some artwork by Grant Young. The pieces were beautiful and I couldn't help myself and I bought a painting of a still life (flowers). Below is our lounge room and the painting is above the lounge suite (1 x 1m). Tristan and Caius both love it, in particular Caius - he loves the texture and layering of painting (this is what attracted me to the work). And it still smells like the acrylic painting. This is the garden beds I have been working in this weekend. I planted lavender x 3, curry plant x 3, daisies (yellow, coral and purple) x 3 + another flowering plant (x 4) which I can't remember the name of! Then mulched it all. I have also ordered 100 Autumn bulbs!!! AND now it is raining which will give everything a good watering. The lavender is doing so well this year - so good that I have planted 3 more (Italian Lavender). Did you know that it is 8 weeks to Christmas??!! and 9 weeks to the end of ...