It had to be done. Making a decision about what art to keep and what art will be sold, gifted or recycled before we move house (and studio) next year. And that is what I have spent the last few days doing.

The sad reality is that the older the piece gets the less likely it is ever going to be exhibited again so some decisions were easy. Others, not so easy especially as I needed to think in terms of what would I show in a retrospective exhibition which sounds uncomfortably pompous but a girl can dream. And then of course are the pieces I love most and can’t quite bear to get rid of.

You can see the pieces that I have decided to sell in my online shop or by clicking here. They range from small panels to medium sized quilts. There are pieces from my older series that I know I won’t be going back to - Hidden Messages, Print, Structures and Dunure (Still / Storm) along with some pieces from series that are still ‘active’ - Cadences and Traces (the coal mining series). And there are a few old ball pieces. I have reduced the cost of the pieces by 60 - 75% so the prices range from £40 to £495.

(And yes, I am keenly aware that selling art cheap can undermine the value of newer works but I would rather these pieces find a new home than end up being recycled …. something we could have a long debate about)

Let me know if you have any questions and please, please, spread the word! Thank you.

We’ve just got back from an important trip. Twelve days on the west coast of Scotland deciding where we will move to next year. I had already made my mind up (Largs) but wanted to take a deeper look at an alternative (Troon) just in case. Hubby was undecided and still anxious about leaving a big city for small town life so we planed on visiting different towns and having a trip into Glasgow.

Que lots of driving up and down residential streets, lots of coffee and cake and beer and food as we sampled what different towns had to offer and lots of promenade and beach walking in the mornings (for me, hubby rarely does mornings). We started by visiting ‘book town’ Wigtown in Dumfries and Galloway as a treat for hubby although I bought more books than he did and a rather splendid jigsaw. Not a house move target, more a carrot to dangle in front of hubby as we ‘enjoy’ the high and lows of the move.

We then drove to Stranraer and up along the Ayrshire coast to Troon. A beautiful drive. Troon was our base for a week whilst we visited other towns nearby. We both decided that Troon was a good option albeit that there are a couple of areas where the seaside / harbour smell was a bit too strong so we’d need to deploy our noses when house hunting! We discounted most of the other places we looked at (won’t name them!) either because the town centers were depressing or there was no suitable housing that was both close to the sea and to the shops. Prestwick which has lots of independent shops and a lovely sandy beach could be a back up but doesn’t have many properties of the right size in the right place.

We then moved further up the coast to Largs via a trip to Glasgow where we visited The Burrell Collection (my favourite museum ever). The road from Glasgow to Largs is a bit wiggly but it was a proper road with white lines down the middle … I turn into a nervous wreck when driving on narrow, narrow roads!

We spent five days in a flat close to the town center with views across the water to the island of Cumbrae. Heaven. Wonderful walks along the coast with stunning views, small town center but with everything we would need, good transport links, bungalows of the right size within spitting distance of the sea and the shops, a decent collection of restaurants and pubs, a second hand book shop (top of hubby’s list) and Nardinis (ice cream heaven and they serve a damn fine cup of coffee!). SOLD.

Now the reality is that we will be renting before we buy and there aren’t many rental properties in Largs so we may end up in Troon or Prestwick or even Ayr at a push while we buy a place in Largs. And that process might take a while as we want to find the right place. I’m anxious about being without a studio but we are both agreed that it will be worth the wait!