25: Youth First paint again

A great afternoon painting with Youth First London. This time one group of 5: Aaliyah, Leo, Henry, Maya and Lyra. It was intense working on the more detailed areas, the fox, bee and ladybird, really 4 is the ideal limit to be able to give everyone enough attention in this scenario. However, it went really well and I think everyone enjoyed contributing to making this busy tunnel walkway and cycleway colourful and bright. It's great that 13 young people from the local Youth First clubs have been able to contribute – plus little Olive and Ivy who lent a hand one Sunday. Darae from YOYO popped down to record again which was super.

It was a late one just adding some of the details and tidying up overall. Tomorrow morning I should be able to finish, which is perfect - in time for Tuesday and the protective coat application.

Some passerby comments today:

"It's brilliant, by the way"
"It's lovely"
"My son will be pleased, he'll be excited about the fox tomorrow"
"My son loves it, thanks for all the work (chat about lewisham and Catford mural/street art)"
"Are you still working on this mural, haven't you got a home to go to!"
"Did you get a fox to pose for you, it's really good"
"It looks good"
The little boy on the bike came past and stopped, "the fox, it's really good, amazing"
"Any idea why the river is this colour, it wasn't like this when I passed before [previous comment "is this your own initiative [I explain], it's really great"
A little boy dressed in a Chase top with his mum stopped to watch and refused to leave
"My artist is back, I came by last week and you weren't here" [chatted about the kids painting yesterday]
"It's much brighter, uumm-hummm [smiling]" I explain about the project and "we are going to paint the tunnel and the outside" "umm-hmmm", "so I was going to keep it quite natural colours outside but inside more..." "brighter, umm-hmmm very good"

The oldest passersby have the best comedy comments

A very elderly man, "will you be exhibiting at the Royal Academy"

And a lady "Oh you've added animals" "Yes the youth group came back to paint" "Oh I do like the bee, and he's very cheerful [points walking stick at fox], ... what's that? [points stick at orange dot in the middle] My reply "yes I went a bit abstract nature, giant pollen" [chatted about the youth group painting]