Meet the family

I have had a go at painting on and off in my life, but it has never stuck. Probably because I don't really know how to paint, and never liked anything I painted. I did art at school for only as long as I had to, again because I never felt particularly encouraged to continue... my enduring memory of art is my teacher sitting down and taking over my drawing of an eraser shaped like a cat while I watched.

I did have subjects I liked at school, by the way, admittedly it doesn't sound like it at this point.

My parents-in-law gave me some money for my birthday in January and I bought another bunch of paints and (tiny) canvases and gave it another burl. I have been very very inspired by Emily of The Black Apple. (In fact looking at her blog gave me a little push to try this painting thing again.) Not being an arty person I don't know how to describe her work, but I just really like it, you know?And she takes such obvious joy in creating it's contagious. 

The above picture is our family portrait which I painted a few months ago. The likenesses are tenuous, but my camera did its face detection thing which made me chuckle. Certainly they look like faces.