Winter doings

It's been a busy winter.  Ordinary tasks seem to take over in Winter - feeding and caring for the horses, walking dogs in the rain, and just keeping the family fed and looked after. I'm an unsociable bod, and when the days are short and the nights long, I am impossible to drag out from the fireside of an evening.

Although I am always happy to be out walking these bleak and beautiful hills in the daylight hours.

I love the way that you can feel them responding to the light returning, in the same way that I feel myself respond, and by Imbolc you know for sure that life is springing again. Even if it there are no visible signs, you can almost hear the energy just below the surface of the soil, the sap rising in the trees.

Here, in our mossy cloaked valleys, there is green even in the deepest winter.

 

Although the moors themselves are bleached bare, bones exposed.

Such harsh beauty.

 

However, winter does mean I get much more painting done than I manage in summer! I've been working my socks off, and am well on  the way through the Oracle Deck project. 12 of the 13 Moons are  completed. (I introduced them here: Thirteen Moons project  )

And all 8 of the wheel cards.

As well as that, I've had work published in the new Earth Earth Pathways Diary diary (my favourite ever diary!)

and I have had a couple of book covers published. You may remember , a few years ago, I painted a little picture of Beltane Hare ? Well, that has become the book cover for Moon Song, a brilliant and magical novel by Elen Sentier. There is an excellent review by June Kent, and purchase links for it HERE

And then I went on to paint the cover for Following The Deer Trods, also by Elen. This is a sequel to her book in the Shaman Pathways series, Elen of the Ways. Elen Of The Ways 'fell into my lap' a couple of years ago,  in the way that fate has of giving you just what you need, when you need it! It is a fascinating, well researched and insightful view into our own native spiritual heritage, and it led me to meet and subsequently go on to work with Elen Sentier.

Now, I've got several exciting projects and collaborations in the pipeline, but nothing I can share yet. In the meantime, I've got seeds to plant, and ponies to ride, and a pack saddle project to finish!