Two of our daughters are semi-professional artists. Today I’m going to tell you about one of them – the one who won the art comp as a nipper (last week’s blog) Her name is Haddie.
When our girls were very small, they would draw paint, colour (and one year collage) Christmas cards for me to send to our friends around New Zealand and the world. One of our boys still does some pretty amazing Christmas cards for his chess club leader, using a chess theme. It was amazing seeing their individual styles develop over the years.
I am not sure if they still create their own Christmas cards, or not, but their art still does my heart good. However…
I was super happy to receive a beautifully framed pen and wash from Haddie for this Christmas just past. It is now up in the kitchen adding to the general theme of the room, picking up, accenting the basic colour scheme. Perfect!
I have had several of Haddie’s works up in different homes; so along with the limited selection of clothes and gear I squeezed in my suitcase to bring to the UK, I was able to slip in a pen and wash of our old home in Devonport.
Haddie sketched it for me some ten years ago, just before the house went to auction. She had done one similar for our neighbours when they sold up a couple of years prior. They were so thrilled to have a memento of their twenty plus years living and raising their three children there.
On the strength of their delight, Haddie decided to secretly sketch our home, so that I could have a memento of all the lovely years we’d been in the house; and where our children spent their formative years. More than that, for it was the house that my husband had grown up in. making the decision to sell had been a hard one. But once it was sold, we have never looked back.
It came to England with me, not just because it was an important house we lived in, not just because I thought, at least that would be one of her pen and washes to have in our home in England, but because it was a special present for me – me the nest builder!
On the wall of our library in our converted pack house back in NZ, I have hung not only Haddie’s prints, but our eldest daughter’s fabulous acrylic on canvases. The four canvases were painted some ten years ago, in her early teens. This poor quality photo is all I have here with me, but it will give you an idea of three of them.(In this photo they are on a wall in another home we had).
It is a sizeable wall set aside for any art work done by any of our children. A brag wall of sorts and I get to choose their placement and frames. I have to get in on the act!
These two below are now framed and on the wall. Sailor Moon was all the rage for young girls when my eldest two were around five, so it brings back memories. Looks like Sailor Moon is all grown up as well!
But here’s one of my all time personal favourites of Haddie’s works –
this Tea Party is one of those quirky paintings that isn’t going in a nursery any time soon! But, for me is a keeper. What I love best is the innocence of it. I haven’t got it on the wall yet, but I will!
You can connect with Haddie’s art on the Facebook page Just Bearable
Browse her art works for sale at her etsy store!
https://www.etsy.com/nz/shop/JustBearableArt
Or watch her live on youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJT0TTvCWS4&t=7s
All our children’s art work continually delights me, whether doodles on A4 copy paper or serious works.
Antoinettejames.com 