One of those "duh - it's so genius ideas!"

I like to think that Annabel Rainbow is a bit of a quilting friend. We have only met a couple of times, but when we have I have had a lovely, warm glow. 

Now Annabel is a mean quilter! But none of those twee blocks from her. Oh siree no! Her quilting is a bit radical. She paints incredible ( and in a way, slightly subversive) portrait quilts. 

Go and explore her 'Life Quilts' gallery here. 

Now Annabel works with the equally lovely Laura Kemshall to produce Through Our Hands. 

And they've persuaded the Festival of Quilts organisers to have a very simple portraits gallery at FOQ this year. 

And this isn't any old gallery. This is where the genius comes in. You (yes you!) can do a portrait to hang in the gallery. And there are no rules about the medium you use. It will be very interesting to see the range of styles. 

Ok, you say, but why is this such a brilliant idea. 

Well - first of all, it's in aid of Save The Children. And second of all, you won't get your portrait back. Instead there will be a shuffle and you'll get a random portrait back - you could end up with something from a famous artist. 

But, I'll stop waffling on. Rather than me banging on go over to their dedicated Blog to read all about it, and maybe sign up. 

When it's cold and dark I find my studio very unwelcoming. It's a conservatory off my bedroom. A lovely size and fabulous light but freezing cold and when it rains it's like being in a snare drum. 

Consequently I have been finding it tough to get in there in the evenings. By the time I have walked the dogs and made supper the evening is in full swing and it's too easy to slump on the sofa watching some junk on tv. 

And this is where Instagram has come into its own. 

A few artists post frequently and seem to do something daily. And I have been really inspired by Alisa Burke, Julie Fei-Fan Balzer and Laura Kemshall. 

Alisa Burke posts frequent little sketch book videos filling her little journal with flower sketches. 

Julie Balzer went mad in December with a little daily stamp carving. 

Laura Kemshall recently posted a blog post about how her studio was in turmoil and how a little portable arts caddy was a fabulous way to grab a few minutes on the coffee table. 

Inspired, I grabbed my holiday art bag and a new sketch book ( I seem to have a little stash of new art books - how did that happen?) 

I'm keeping it very simple. A little water colour palette, a koh-I- noor inks palette, a tin of Inktense pencils and a pencil case ( which in all honesty needs a bit of an edit). 

The book is A5 with good quality paper able to take water. And I'm keeping it to 20 minutes. 

And it has been a brilliant exercise so far. 

Thanks so much for dropping by, and if you are doing a 'sketchbook page a day' or something similar pop the link in the comments so we can all pop over and share the love.

I've just participated in a Webinar!

Now - how cool is that? 

Made doubly cool by the fact that this very cool gal presented the Webinar and it was hosted by these cool people. (OK - enough with all the 'cools' now!)

Right - I might need to explain a bit!   

A webinar is an on line seminar or conference.  Basically the participants are given a login to a hosting site for a given time (sometimes with a live telephone call as well so that it is truly interactive) and the presenter or trainer can then deliver a presentation (usually using Power Point) and 'talk' just as if they were giving a presentation in a face to face class room.  If you are interested you can find out more here. 

We use Webinars at the day job (not very professionally - but it is my job to try to lead my colleagues kicking and screaming into the 21st Century) and indeed I have been known to host them myself.  But this one was made all the more exciting because I was joining from "Across The Pond".  (I had to find a website that converted BST into Eastern Time!  They were sitting in New York at 2pm - or at least Julie was - and I was sipping a glass of white wine at 7pm).

And the topic?  Well it was all about Blogging!  So how appropriate that I am blogging about it!

Julie knows her stuff!  A lot was common sense, but a lot was really good solid information about how to build a blog if you are an artist.  I took copious notes and I will try to put some of this stuff into practice to improve my own blogging.

But meanwhile, head over to Julie Fei-Fan Balzar's site to see what is going on in NYC and to see how a real pro does it.