Poppies have been busy..

Poppies have been very busy this summer after the auction of the wonderful Kubella the Seaside elephant mosaiced for The London Elephant Parade.

We have been running fun and messy childrens' art workshops during the summer holidays including exciting eco projects such as painting eco bags to save using plastic ones, creating eco cities using household recycling, making memory boxes for ' found treasure' found during the holidays. We have been mosaicing panels based on drawings from 'Bug week', which will showcase our native garden bugs we can all find and help to survive. Making bee hotels and ladybird homes, along with sewing wild flowers all help the survival of bugs and are a simple way to help, as well as being fun to make and watch!

We also enjoyed making many hundreds of badges to the very popular 'Big Fest' festival in Andover last weekend, with lots of happy children drawing. colouring and stickers galore in a beautiful Indian tent.

Big Fest had loads of cool eco stuff too.. from willow weaving, making bee hotels, wild flower quizes, free eco bags with refillable water bottles from Southern Water, recycling challenges, hand painted flags, storytelling with a great big stage for music and dancers to entertain.

We have also enjoyed working with the wonderful Children charity Julia's House, a hospice for children based in Corfe Mullen and made many badges, handbag mirrors, keyrings during their summer BBQ at the rather beautiful The Orangary in Winborne, with the sun shining, the smell of BBQ in the air, magicians entertaining, a great time was had by one and all!

We are looking forward to creating a Dorset blue butterfly mosaic at Julia's house in a couple of weeks to brighten a bare brickwall in the new extention, with help from children, thier siblings, families and staff. Watch this space for photos after 22nd August!

4 million raised!

Well, the latest update from the elephant family is that £4 million has been raised from the London Elephant Parade, that's double what the charity hoped for!
I am still waiting to hear who and where Kubella will be re homed. The charity have written to all the winning bidders to ask their permission to tell the world and the artist whom they are or if they want to stay anonymous...fingers crossed, we will know soon. I promise to keep you posted.
In the meantime, Poppies have been running some wonderful other charity projects, mainly mosaics in Dorset and I will post photos and details later.

Kubella the Star and the final journey..The Grand Auction

Well what a day! Kubella was finally sold at The Grand Auction in a marquee in the grounds of the Chelsea Royal Hospital yesterday for a stunning 20K. The day was perfect. The sun shone, the champers flowed, the live jazz played in the grounds and many celebraties mingled amongst the elephants including Terence Conran, Tommy Hilfiger, Rula Lenska, before the big event. I went to check Kubella looked her best and was surprised to see she was gone!!

Just the stand left with her footprints..slight panic came over me. I looked around and just couldn't see her - the only place left was the marquee..

The marquee was a sea of orange and shocking pink tables with a handful of elephants lining the edges. Kubella was at the entrance to the main room of the marquee looking gorgeous, panic over!

There she was at the entrance to the main room with a big vase of flowers in case she got hungry, placed in front of the air conditioning in case she got hot and in front of the fire hydrants in case she needed to be a hero or had to stop someone at the entrance.

I was very nervous as she was lot 26, after Julien MacDonald's Bertie, so a couple of glasses of champers were consumed and small round sandwiches were served, along with bite sized smoked salmon bagels and shots of cold pea soup... Then her photo appeared on the screen and Harry Dalmaney of Sotheby's started the bidding...within minutes she was sold!

Unfortunately I couldn't see who brought her or if it was telephone bidder..but will hopefully find out where her final home will be this week from the Elephant Family..maybe she will be coming home to Poole, brought by Lush or even Sunseekers or live in someones grounds backing onto the sea with boats in tow..a restaurant in a harbour somewhere...fingers crossed Iwill be able to get a photo to share...

Kubella has taken many many hours, weeks, months of TLC and thanks to everyone who has helped along the way..mum, family and friends, who have helped listened and made tea, Reed Harris for their donated dark blue tiles that look great, Azzura for the discounted tiles for this project, the public for helping to stick and the wonderful crowd at the sadly now closed Kube gallery in Poole for the space, help and constant tea and the wonderful support from everyone!

A day and a half before Kubella is finally sold at auction on Saturday and goes off to her new home. She is currently £5750 on the online auction site, I think she might make more on the day too!
Fingers crossed she goes to a wonderful new home, where she can settle in well. I will keep you updated! The Grand Auction is looking to be a rather grand affair, with live jazz and a champers lunch. I promise to take photos and post them here.

Kubella the twinking star at the Royal Chelsea Hospital

All the outside elephants are together, in the ground of the Royal Chelsea Hospital, on the area used for the Chelsea Flower Show!

Kubella getting a pat from a Chelsea pensioner

Kubella in line with some of the other elephants..

Well, Kubella is currently at wait for it...£4251 on the online auction site http://www.givinglots.co.uk, with one whole week before she is auctioned at the live Grand Auction.

I visited her on Friday to make her toes twinkled, the small missing piece in her tail was fixed and she had a polish ahead of the auction in the grounds of the Royal Chelsea Hospital.

Whilst I was there, she had many admirers with wonderful comments like 'She's my favourite, out of all the elephants'. One couple even asked if they could take her home on the coach (they live in Bristol). Kubella did twinkle in the wonderful sunshine and seems to be enjoying being with the herd.

I wonder where she live after the auction? By the seaside somewhere, someone's mansion gardens, in a shop or even in a lobby, maybe she will have to get a passport and end up somewhere else in the world...well not long now, before Kubella's great journey ends!

Elephant news update

Kubella is now up to a bid of wait for it...£3251 online at www.givinglots.co.uk and there are 3 weeks to go before the Grand Auction where Kubella is one of the lucky ones, to be auctioned live by of Sotheby's Harry Dalmeny.
The Grand Auction should be rather special, as the tickets are £75 each! I will endevour to take photos for you all to see.
Farwell to the elephants on the streets of London..
All the elephants will go 'extinct' on 20th June- which means they will be uninstalled and taken away to the Royal Hospital of Chelsea. On the 25th, 26th and 28th, all elephants will be available for viewing to the public. In the period from 21st June until the beginning of July, The Elepahtn family will be arranging for all the elephants to be restored to saleable condition.
Kubella will soon be on her new journey to another part of the city and then on to a happy home within the next month.
I will be going to give her a clean and tidy up on 25th June before the auction, so hopefully she will shine!
She has received many lovely comments this week, including:
'Kubella is by far and away the best looking elephant I have seen to date, and should generate some good bids'.

Bidding of kubella

I have just had a look online at :www.londonelephantparade.org and checked the online bidding and Kubella has a bid of £1500 to date. She will be part of the live auction of 3rd July at The Royal Hospital and fingered crossed she will raise a good amount for the charity and of course, find a good home to live!