Brilliant local artists

Ann Hutchings hand embroidered view of the South Downs

Helen Thair's stunning portrait of a fox cub

Wendy Denham sea scape

Niloo Wickramasinge's Grasses

These are a few of my favourite pieces at this year's PACS exhibition.

See more of Helen Thair's work on instagram @helenthairart and find out more about Wendy Denham through her website wendydenham.wixsite.com

Arundel Gallery Trail - on today and tomorrow

Catalogue cover art by Deborah Richards

Visit Andy Waite's venue - 54 Tarrant Street

Looking Out Over England by artist Karin Moorhouse,venue 8

Fowey sketch by Deborah Richards, venue 7 above the library

On Wednesday I spent a magical few hours on the Arundel Gallery Trail. If you can get there today or tomorrow I urge you to do so. It runs from 12pm to 5.30 but some of the venues don't open until 2pm.

The great thing about the trail is that you can walk to all venues around the town (and see some beautiful houses and good art in the process.) The difficult thing about the trail is finding somewhere to park the car.

On weekdays venues are only open from 2pm to 5.30pm so if you want to visit all 61 venues you'd have to literally sprint round. Better to do it in chunks over two or more days. I started at the library and enjoyed the energetic art of Deborah Richards who does oil on paper monotypes and mixed media paintings. deborahrichards.co.uk

Nearby in School Lane is Karin Moorhouse at Venue 8. This talented and versatile artist offers a house full of pictures you'd love to own. At the same venue a familiar face if you ever watched The Great Pottery Thrown Down is Jim Ranson showing his ceramics. karinmoorhouseart.com  jameserinceramics.com

Round the corner in Tarrant Street is venue 24 - a treat of a house showing beautiful oil paintings by Andy Waite. andywaite.net

Decades ago this artist was famed for his pictures of fruit, done in his own inimitable style. Now landscapes and cloudscapes, some of which have an almost spiritual quality.

I hope this gives you a taste of the Arundel Gallery Trail and, if you can't visit this year perhaps you'll be able to visit next year. Highly recommended.

It's all happening this week- the Hampshire Art Trail is on and so is the Petersfield Art show at the Festival Hall in Petersfield. The PACS show ends tomorrow but is on all day today. So many interesting paintings and pieces of craft , again it is difficult to see everything in just one visit so I'm going again today. I'll try and take some pictures to share with you. 

Art scarves in the shop by Gemma Bedford

These large, soft scarves show paintings by local artist Gemma Bedford. Gemma came into the shop yesterday and immediately the first scarf shown above sold to a customer. www.gemmabedfordart.com

I think these scarves make great presents.

Making

I made a dozen of these colourful tree decorations

Found - one of my old painted badges. I used to make these for Country Living shows

Justine Jenner's gorgeous pots - the Handmade Happiness shop has the best craftspeoples' work

My family went to Whipsnade Zoo on Sunday and saw this beautiful bear!

This week I realised how very special the Handmade Happiness shop is. The handmade items are the very best you will see anywhere in the country. I am proud to work in this shop and I hope it can survive the chilly wind that is blowing through retail shops at the moment. 

In order to promote the shop to people that might not otherwise know about it I've agreed to do two craft fairs in October. One is Blackmoor, a nearby apple farm which has an annual village day. I used to do this fair pre-shop and this year I'll hand out lots of shop business cards but will only actually sell things made by me. The other is a local charity event. 

On Sunday my family all met up at Whipsnade Zoo and had a wonderful time watching tigers and giraffes and bears. The most magical of times was in the Butterfly house when the butterflies chose to fly onto little grandaughters' hands and stay there!

In the zero plastic shop today

Carol Smith has made a round cushion like her Picasso-esque purses.

Bird mugs and jugs by Kate Hackett  have just flown in

Pretty babies knitwear knitted by Jenny Drant and Patricia

People I meet are really concerned about plastic. They want to change their life-style so they don't have to buy any more plastic. Yet in the supermarket everything is still packaged in non-recyclable plastic. It seems impossible to avoid. And now we are all aware of how it drifts on our oceans, clogs up our waterways and piles up on our beaches or pavements making beautiful nature ugly.  

This week I heard of one woman who is doing something about it. She has started a business  called Keep Old Containers. She re-fills peoples' empty plastic bottles with  shampoo, moisturiser,washing up liquid etc and a re-fill is cheaper than buying another plastic bottle from the supermarket. She's based in Surrey and has regular pop-up shops promoting the zero waste lifestyle.

@keepoldcontainers on Instagram.

This year the shop has become a zero plastic zone. I miss bubble wrap especially for wrapping mugs, bowls and jugs but I'm using thick paper kindly given to me and customers seem to be happy about it. And I've always made my own bags and carrier bags from magazines that again people are thoughtful enough to give to me rather than put into the recycling bin...

I'd like to offer a good alternative to plastic toys. If anyone can suggest a wooden toy maker it would be lovely to stock good wood toys, especially in the run up to Christmas...

Meanwhile I'm pleased to say the shop has had lots of re-stocks this week. Potters Justine Jenner, Kate Hackett and Samantha Robertson have all re-stocked their displays and Carol Smith has brought in more of her quirky purses and a cushion in the same style. She is going to make more cushions and larger, make up bags.  Carol also added more of her popular monoprint trees cards.

I've been making more tree decorations and boxes and I plan to make needlefelted bags in the same colourful style as the tree decorations. 
By the way, if you want to see more pictures like the ones above why not follow me on Instagram. Check out @jenny_handmade_happiness

Samantha Robertson’s work

Mugs, bowls and coasters all made by Samantha Robertson

Samantha Robertson's work pictured in Handmade Happiness

Samantha Robertson's latest planters are selling particularly well

Yesterday Samantha Robertson of sjrceramics.co.uk re-stocked her shop display. Samantha teaches pottery and her work is distinctively individual with a blue and green theme.

All the potters that supply the shop throw their own pots and then fire and decorate them. All the handmade items in Handmade Happiness are designed and made from scratch by the talented makers who sell there. That is what makes the shop so special.

I'll post again tomorrow as I have lots to share with you at the moment! Enjoy your day.

Closed Today Saturday.

Exceptionally, I have to close the shop today to help family. So sorry for any inconvenience. The picture shows carrier bags I just made out of wallpaper samples.