- Whitby panorama in pen & Ink

I've always had in my mind to do a proper full width Panorama of the right bank of the River Esk at Whitby Harbour in pen & watercolour. Here it is (another adulterated version) - 600mm wide and the pristine version will be at the "10 Artists & 10 Paintings Exhibition" at Baslow on Saturday & Sunday 22nd & 23rd October.

Fornalutx, Mallorca (again)

Fornalutx, Mallorca, where the best Police and most honest Taxi Drivers on the Island helped recover my mislaid wallet in September 2014 - forever grateful. A postcard of Fornalutx tumbling down the hillside from a work colleague was the reason we first visited the Soller Valley in 1999 and almost every year since - quite often twice in the same year.

- make someone happy!

Apart from my sparkling wit and repartee I can't usually make people happy. I'm not a life-saving doctor, an accordion player or a stand-up comedian. However recently, when I was drawing and painting in the narrow street outside ARTiMANS Art Shop & Gallery in Soller, Mallorca where my prints of local scenes were on sale inside, an old gentleman with a walking stick stopped and spoke to me like a machine gun going off. My complete lack of Spanish/Mallorcan matched his English! The Shop owners were able to translate. Turned out that he wanted me to do a painting of his house a few doors away for the same price as a print. We gently (I hope) explained that an original painting is worth a lot more than a print. Overnight, I thought, I'll give him a surprise and do a sketch of his house as a gift. So I secretly stood outside his house and did the deed. The Shop owners kindly translated my description on the back of the painting explaining it was a gift to him. The following week, when I was painting in the street again, he happened by. I stood up and presented it to him. He smiled, kept walking away, kept coming back and shaking my hand.... he seemed very happy and it made me feel very, very good! Attached is me and my new best friend Jaime Umbert Vicens!

- White Edge Lodge near the Fox House

White Edge Lodge above the Grouse Inn and Froggatt in the Derwent Valley, Derbyshire, very close to Chatsworth House. We pass it twice every week on our way from Sheffield to Calver to enjoy 2 of our beautiful grandchildren. My memory is of the house silhouetted above the moor with a threatening sky - I think I might have overdone the threat! Again, I've faded out the edges of the painting to protect the innocent.

- 432 cards to Sheffield Millennium Gallery Shop

Spent most of the last 4 days printing, folding and packing cards into envelopes & into poly bags. I'm not complaining It's the 4th repeat order since my first order in January for another 432 cards for the Millennium Gallery Shop in Sheffield. It's next to the BBC TV "outside" studio for the World Snooker Championship 2016 in the Winter Garden. There are 216 cards in the attached photo - I delivered a previous 216 package on Thursday! Perhaps I can get back to actually painting tomorrow? Hopefully a little acrylic?

- a bit of business.... then RELAX!

Posted the first 100 prints (of 500) to ARTiMANS in Soller Mallorca this morning, called into the Millenium Gallery Shop and discovered my Sheffield Prints and Cards are now on display... nice sunny day, some free time - went on a short cicular walk from home, down into Porter Brook Valley, up through the beech woods, along Fulwood Lane, looked down on Sheffield City 5 miles below, past the Alpaca Farm and back to the Village - Home Sweet Home!