Where have February and March gone! I was just beginning to recover from an injury to my right index finger (all I will say is: always look before you shut your car door…). Then after spending a lovely week in the snowed Highlands, I got a cold that seemed to come and go uninvited for over a month leaving me exhausted. Still, I managed to make some progress, completing some small pieces and sketches and I also began work on three larger pieces.

My Caledonian themed portfolio continues to increase this year with two commissions. I’m privileged to be painting a Scottish baroness of utmost delicacy, wife of a Scottish Chieftain. I was also touched to be commissioned to paint a posthumous portrait of Margaret Morris, Lady of Balgonie and Eddergoll which will hang at Balgonie Castle as a companion piece to the portrait I painted of her husband, the 30th Laird of Balgonie.

Finally, I also had the pleasure of meeting Professor Sir Godfrey (Geoff) Palmer OBE in Edinburgh for our first sitting. Prof Sir Geoff, lectured at Edinburgh and at Heriott-Watt Universities and in 1989 became the first black professor in Scotland. Meeting the professor was a humbling experience. He is such an intelligent and modest gentleman with a splendid capacity to engage in conversation. His achievements go beyond the realm of scientific discoveries and reach out to championing equalities and human rights. It’s an honour to be working on the portrait of a gentleman of such moral calibre.

April is almost here and the spring and summer will surely bring the lovely Northern Scottish light that so much love.