Daily Life

Friday 27th March 10.00am Paddy (18) hangs the washing on the line. It’s whites, and consists of sheets, towels and a few socks and pants. He says if we think he is ...

Thursday 26th March 3.00pm I am upstairs in my home, about to get ready to go out for a walk. Liv (15) and I coo over Reuben, the fluffy white terrier, who ...

Tuesday 24th March All day I’m sewing in my studio. I cut and iron and pleat. I’m stitching away when Paddy (18) comes down to my studio for help with his Spanish ...

Takes longer than fast action yeast…especially if you sketch it first Monday 23rd March 9.00am I’m supposed to be on my way into the Natural History Museum on Merrion Square in Dublin to ...

Friday 20th March 9.00am Liv (15) is up and ready. “I can’t wait to get out and do some gardening!” she says. I follow her out half an hour later. She is ...

Thursday 19th March 10.30am I host a Zoom session with my husband Marcel, Paddy (18) and Liv (15). The idea is to find a way to continue teaching online. It is moderately ...

Wednesday 18th March 10.00am The government is showing great leadership. Yes, the “lockdown”, such as it is, could have come a bit more quickly, but a good balance was struck between doing ...

St. Patrick Tuesday 17th March 1.00pm It’s St. Patrick’s Day. It’s raining. With the best will in the world I just can’t muster enthusiasm to go out for a walk. I decide to ...

Monday 16th March 9.10am I sit down to breakfast. Paddy (18) already has the books out on the dining table. Liv (15) is his study buddy, and she is nowhere to be ...

Hello folks! I will start by saying thank you for your effort in getting here: my links to this blog on the various social media are refusing to work. I ...

Thursday 12th March 1.00pm The Irish government announces that all schools are to close from the next day, Friday, and will remain closed 13th-29th March. Later, my good pal Lorraine collects ...

Today was the last day the kids I teach could submit the paintings they had done for the Texaco Art Competition. This competition has been going for decades in Ireland: ...

They say we do funerals very well in Ireland. Well, my mum says it, because she’s Canadian, and maybe they don’t do funerals as well there. As I started class ...

They say we do funerals very well in Ireland. Well, my mum says it, because she’s Canadian, and maybe they don’t do funerals as well there. As I started class ...

One of the most satisfying things I do as an urban sketcher is to capture my family in sketches. While I’m not one for putting into words the love I ...

January is awful, weather-wise, and this year is no exception. However I’m cheering myself up with a good bit of sketching. Technicolor in Neachtain’s After a long gap, Urban Sketchers Galway ...

I saw this TED Talk the other night, and I had a few thoughts that I’d like to share with you. Joseph G-L seems like a very nice person, and ...

30th December 2019 My students are so full of enthusiasm for sketching in 2020 that it has inspired me in turn, so I am making sure my sketching kit is never ...

Christmas Eve It’s Christmas in Kilcolgan, in our little corner of windswept west of Ireland. On Christmas Eve my daughter Liv and I went up the road to the ...

A Christmas Shopping Safari One crisp, cold winter’s night a few weeks ago, in Dublin on a sketching trip, I came to the end of South Anne Street, entered Grafton Street ...