Wet Day, Birthday and Boys Make Puppets

So what do you do when it is pouring with rain all day and you have two active grandsons to entertain? Obvious - you head to the studio and make puppets! These are what my two grandboys Laurence (14) and Xavier (7) did to make the rainy day pass faster. They sculpted the heads with paperclay over foil and a cardboard tube and sewed the cloth bodies. Even Xavier managed some of the machine sewing all by himself - his first go! Then it was into the paint - green for the frog and purple with spots for the alien. I made Xavier an insect on a wire (which is just visible in the photo) to tease his hungry frog with. It stopped raining last night, which is just as well, because I was considering the possibility of needing to make an Ark if it rained for much longer.
It is my birthday today (not that I really like too many reminders of advancing age these days!) and it is wonderful to have the grandchildren around to celebrate the double (Father's Day). Might pop the champers tonight!

Here is a picture of part of my exhibition in the barrel room at Holm Oak Vineyard. The room has a gorgeous fermenty smell and pleasant ambience and by some serendipitous turn, a couple of my pieces were painted in almost identical colours to the subtle and stained barrel colours. I sold a number of the pieces, which is always a bonus.