Holiday painting, Darwin and Muffin the Mule

Dear All I have been on holiday last week, so catching up with my blog now.
During the holiday I did some observational work, little paintings and drawings in my sketchbook. These were not related to any research, but good practise to do, anyway.
We went to quite a few art exhibitions but one which particularly interested me was were artists had used some of the theories of Charles Darwin in their work. Several weeks ago I had been to an exhibition about Darwin at the Fitzwilliam Museum and had already decided that it had given me ideas for a painting about my son, Leo. However, I am not quite ready to reveal how this will work as my ideas are to jumbled up yet, to explain in print. (It is at least two paintings away, so no rush!).
I also went to an interesting exhibition celebrating 60 years of childrens television and showing some of the favourite puppets from that era. The first and the most famous was Muffin the Mule and I have already used him in one of my earlier paintings about my brother being fifty. I may use him again in my 'Darwin' painting, we shall have to see!