Isn't he beautiful? I couldn't do this with a spider...
But there is something very endearing about cockchafers. This fellow was rescued from a bucket of water by Andy. I have been doing my own rescuing, but of a somewhat more extreme nature...
A quantity of standard Adana equipment and presses which were in need of a home. It looked worse than it was...I had a day's hefting about, (and the kind use of a neighbour's shed corner for the presses). Luckily most of it was cabinets of type and stacked nicely up the walls in dead space. I have taken a solemn and terrible oath not to bring home any more 'stuff'. There really is no more room at the inn.
So what am I going to do with it all? Well, precisely nothing at the moment, it was simply a mercy dash (as much as you can dash with lead type) to get it from there to here. There is plenty I plan to do with it, in the future - but right now I have my hands full. The new book job is wonderful, a dream project, but very intense; with three toy orders to fulfill, if I am not drawing, I am needle felting. And my toy shelf is emptying again. Mavis - who languished on the shelf longer than anyone and watched enviously as her friends were packed off to new homes - has been posted across the Atlantic, where she is destined for a very special chicken shed indeed. And not before time; she was starting to get ideas about the Rooster Boys...
