A weekly miscellany

I spent the day in Hay on Wye yesterday. For a bookaholic like me it's a real treat and as it's less than a couple of hours away I am lucky enough to go there quite often. This was a 'consolation' day out as I was planning to visit my friend Sue and see her demonstrating at Art in Action but I left it too late to book an overnight stay en route and missed the opportunity for yet another year! I was determined to treat myself with a bit of retail therapy with these couple of King Penguins from the 1950's that I collect informally. I tend to buy them specifically for the cover artwork , here provided by Paxton Chadwick on the butterfly book and Peter Shepheard with the bird book. I also treated myself to a book about textile designer and artist Robert Stewart but I'm saving it as a treat to read later. I am a huge fan of 1950's design and can see the butterfly cover design as a printed textile any day of the week.

I was eager to get home though to see what postcards have been posted this week as part of the Postman's Knock project. My offering this week was for Jo. Her theme is 'Yee Ha! Ride 'em cowboy' and I've been pondering on it for a while. This is week 9 of 11 so we're nearly at the finishing line. I've had plenty of time to gather things and pursue lots of ideas. In the end I found a book in a local charity shop on outlaws so I cut up the cover and painted it, photographed it and added one of the images inside of the outlaw Belle Starr. I then got fixated on women of the wild west and made a small accordion fold book with a few outlaws in , as well as images of Calamity Jane and Annie Oakley. It was real fun to work on but there's equal pleasure to be had in what we receive.

I had this foam card from Cathy, encrusted with seed beads, individually sewn on to it to represent the snow that Rudolph has to fly through. You have to wonder at her ingenuity and patience!

One of Cathy's signature ideas with Postman's Knock has been to include a you tube link with every card. Her choices have always been eclectic and 'spot on'. Well I had two links, one of which made me laugh so much. If you can suspend disbelief that you're sat there in glorious summer sunshine watching a video about a white Christmas then go to this link and enjoy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooc5eJc5SHA

Because it was so warm last night we decided to try another moth trap . Now I know that these are not everyone's cup of tea and my last post about the bee bearding was a bit near the knuckle for some, so, if you are of a squeamish disposition do not read on..... but if you love the colour and variety of these beautiful things here's a selection from what we had.

Rosy Footman

Bloodvein

Mother of Pearl

The Spectacle - no points for seeing why!

Lilac Thorn

... and finally an insect we have never had in a trap before. It is a sexton beetle and we had two of them. They are nature's gravediggers as they bury down into the soil and drag down the carcasses of dead things with them - birds, rodents, other insects, you name it and they will try and bury it. They don't do this because they are naturally tidy but I won't tell you why as I don't want to get a reputation for being too gruesome!