This Christmas though, he has surpassed himself. About a year ago he took an old cigar box and turned it in to a watercolour box to hold my Daniel Smith watercolour paints (which I squeeze out in to empty half pans) and a few weeks ago we discussed 'upgrading' this idea in to something that will hold every colour I own.
Let me point out, this is no mean task as I own MANY tubes of watercolour, but he rose to the challenge and not only hand crafted a box to fit 266 full pans (yep, you read that right) but it also holds my new ceramic palette and my folding water pot too.
It is a thing of absolute joy.
The box folds out flat on my drawing board without tipping, it houses the trays in the lid so that I can work from them while using my palette and waterpot, and it even has a small 'travel' tray so that I can decant out the colours that I am using that day and have seperate from the main box if I so choose.
Of course, I have completely lost my head over it and have now started labelling all the pans with the pigment information so that I can compare make against make...my obsessive tendancies are just loving every minute.
Just in case you wondered, I do know how lucky I am and I promise that I don't take it for granted that I have this amazing man in my life. Question 'What do you get the artist who has everything?' Answer: A bespoke watercolour box which she will always treasure.