The eclectic learner

It's Christmas time and - not surprisingly - not a single snowflake has graced rural Norfolk. You know me - I had to do something about it, because I was itching to see a white mantel around me and my children building snowmen in the garden. As the weather has been fantastic, with blue skies and sunny days, I drew my very own winter scene, added snowmen, a robin and a Christmas star and uploaded the artwork onto my favourite Facebook colouring group ( Adultcoloringworldwide) Thankfully, some good souls have taken up he challenge and shared with me their interpretation of my artwork. As usual, I am delighted by the colour choice and how the whole things plays out. Mercedes Matè  has captured the real essence of a white Christmas with Colorino crayons and Raffael pastels. I love how the blue skies blend in the green hills, gradually becoming white in some area only. A detailed, whimsical choice of colours and blending. Many thanks for your addition to my hall of fame! (You

  Well! Reginald seems to be the most loved of my recent creations. Both in the UK and in Italy, customers who bought the magazines made sure that Reginald had all sort of colours and combinations for his mantel. I particularly love the iridescent light blue shade chosen by Tina for Colorare Zen . It's so striking! Plus, she added a background with a delicate stained glass feel. Every detail has innumerable variations and an almost rainbow effect. Great imagination! Thanks, Tina for interpreting my design in this way. Franz

As I have started studying Chinese characters in June 2016, I thought it would be nice to draw a Chinese dragon. I was born in the Year of the Dragon (so I'm supposed to be a winner, huh? Nope) and therefore I added the writing, Born in the Year of the Dragon on the left. I uploaded my grayscale drawing to Facebook and Karen Senerchia kindly used her time and talent to give life to my creature. I love it! Start green, almost fluorescent, coordinated with a blue-violet skin, and softened by a rich strawberry pink on chest and belly. If you are a member of Adult Colouring Worldwide you will see the original post here: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10203147346402236&set=gm.1574255162881513&type=3&theater Crayola colored pencils have been used for the colouring. Let me know if you have coloured a dragon, too! They are sure fun to tackle... 

How a friend healed from Paronychia  (bacterial nail infection) with herbs! About a week ago I went to my local supermarket and I noticed that the till assistant had a sling on his bandaged middle finger. I am curious by nature , so I couldn't help asking him what happened to his finger. Carl, that was his name, promptly showed me and my daughter his finger (after taking off bandage and sling of course). To have an idea of what it looked like, have a look at Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paronychia It looks painful, doesn't it? He said that when he was watching a football on TV, he didn't realise that his nail-biting had gone a bit over the limit, and he had torn some flesh. His doctor was about to see him in two days, he reassured me, and he probably expected to be given antibiotics to treat the infection. Not happy with what I saw, I suggested a few herbs that could help him earlier than his G.P. appointment. However, once I got hom

The parrot Reginald is on the cover of Colouring Heaven... And the Italian magazine has chosen the Pirate…

Growing crops in a commercial size polytunnel I'm having great fun in my 12.5 mt long polytunnel. Not only I get to see my plants thrive in almost 39C during sunny days, but I fight some cute rabbits every day as they dig under the doors and destroy my cauliflower and boccoli plants! I'm not a professional gardener or photographer, but I hope you will enjoy my basic photos of plant life in the hottest spot of my garden. You will also see that we captured a baby rabbit who was guilty of untold damage and a then we released it (he was sooo cuddly!)  But 2 weeks later, we caught him again and this time we released it in a park nearby (full of other rabbits, water etc) so he can eat plenty of produce - just not ours! A video is available on the bottom of this page. The first night we moved the strawberries outdoors, they were not protected, and the morning after the rabbits had eaten most of the plants - leaves and all! Needless to say, we rushed to build a protected U-shap