Today

Autumn must be coming we lit the Aga at work today!!!

Photo courtesy of earnshavian on flickr

Go Wild and Create!!

I stumbled upon a blog called Create Tuesday and thought...I'll have a go!!!
Lissa at the memory of rain has set this up and there are several others who take part..please go over and take a look and join in if you like!!

The thing I find difficult about being creative is that you need....

1) a deadline

2) a subject

I had neither until now.....

So guys I hope you don't mind me joining in???

The subject was.....

The Wreck of My Memories

and this is my piece.....

I have to say that i preferred my first rough sketch...the problem was the colour..I couldn't find my paints and had to use water soluble pencils which don't have much range....

This is the first painting I've done (other than the lounge wall!!) in about three years and hope its the start of something.

Well, there is a credit crunch!!

It may seem to many readers that all I do is walk around the countryside with a scruffy (he needs clipping!!) and often times grumpy Scottish terrier at my heels and a camera in my hand........

Well I do but I work as well....as my profile says..'chief cook & bottle washer!!!'

I do like to turn my hand to other things to.........

My old english bull terrier Louis......god bless him......was a nightmare at times... ..i can't tell you how many things he chewed..but he particularly liked cushions..i recall one evening at Christmas while we were entertaining about 16 for drinks and supper he had been shut in the office out of harms way.......or so we thought .....on going to answer the ringing telephone i opened the door to a room full of feathers, the place looked like a flock of seagulls had just flown through in a whirlwind with Louis sat on the now cushion less sofa literally spitting feathers!! my vacuum cleaner was never the same again......however, i tell this story because my favourite and quite expensive armchair also suffered at that boys hands and for the past few years i have just covered its shabbiness with a throw..

But the time had come for a 'new cover'. I enquired and got a quote......£350 plus tax plus 5mtrs of upholstery fabric!!! What!! That's more than my new sofa cost me......


Fabric....off eBay £28.....one evening unpicking old cover to use as pattern, one hour cutting out and last night sewing.....

One happy lady!!

New Dawn, New Day.

In June and July the sun rises too early for me.......it is up and high in the sky, blazing while I am late on parade....missing the slow rise of brightness from behind the horizon...but now as the days draw in from the high point of the summer solstice I am in tune......

This morning was a beauty......as I walked across the newly planted fields..the clear blue gave way to a haze of pale lemon clouds, the brightness strapped behind just waiting to burst through those silver lined trails....steel gray..golds.....yellows..and peaches all ruffled and billowing like a beautifully elegant satin ball gown....all the reflections and sun bursts stopped me in my tracks and i just stood and watched......gradually the rays tore through the silk and the sky was ablaze....the freshness and beauty of a new day unfolded before me.....I was sure that all my cares and worries where put in perspective and the knowledge that as sure as the sun rises that everything comes right.....the optimism of a new dawn.

As I turned for home, the sun at my back..a row of painted white cottages on the hill were bathed in that sunrise glow.

I imagined someone over there, woken by the light filtering through their window, standing all soft and crumpled from sleep, looking out at the magnificent scene before them and also welcoming the new day.

Early Morning in Brighton

Today I was in Brighton.....for my darling girls birthday!!!.....a walk along the prom in the early morning sunshine......accompanied by the many joggers!!!!

The beach is very pebbly and incredibly painful to walk on in your bare feet..not to be recommended..

The ruins of the old pier..the iron structure slowly rusting into the sea against an apricot sky....

the many colours of the beach huts in a never ending row....a typical English seaside view...

Fabulous regency ironwork on the sea front buildings.....

some have been restored and some are very sad and run down...braving the salty conditions with a certain faded elegance....


Four storeys of beautiful stonework above my girls flat, huge windows let in the light into rooms with high ceilings and lovely proportions......

Queen Victoria silhouetted against the morning sky in all her formidable majesty..she is forever looking over the English Channel.......

So Sleepy!!

Last night I had to house/ child sit for someone......a rambling big house where the floorboards creak and the long shadows cast shapes in the corners!!!.............

It was a lovely evening and The Lodger and I spent the last drops of light looking over the distant hills at an apricot coloured sunset....owls hooting in the distance and the swifts chirruping in the clear sky taking in the very last bit of daylight to forage for bugs...........

Once inside for the night the Lodger boy sent up a hail of woofing at every creak and passing car and completely got me on edge..he was over tired not being able to settle in his usual spot on a handy armchair...(definitely not allowed in this house!!)

He barked at my young charge and was a very grumpy Scottie!!!.......he got sternly packed off to the boot room for the night.....he is not used to being shut in...he has always hated this but he must have settled down because I didn't hear him at all.....thankfully..

I sleep in a room which is lovely and has an old four poster bed in it..unfortunately I think the mattress is as old as the bed and I had a very disturbed night......

I gave up at 6am and went out for a walk..Scottie in tow...

It was an incredibly beautiful morning...a slight mist was laying in the valley.....the sheep in the field all gathered under the spreading branches of an ancient oak tree, horses peacefully grazing and a wonderful pair of hares gamboling across the field.....i love these creatures they are so somehow otherworldly..they heard us walking and just stopped in their tracks, laid they ears back and pretended to be invisible!!!

Later, having dispatched my charge into anothers care I went home.....and had a nap!!

So did the grumpy scottie..'Leave me alone, i am very sleepy!!!'

Calm

After yesterday..with all the reading of fantastic stories of changing moments in peoples lives...

A moment of Calm.

To walk the ancient paths,

the sun barely glimpsed between the clouds,

the crunch of the chalk stones underfoot

a happy dog at my heels

the sound of the skylarks forever climbing higher in the skies.

and the horizon stretching of miles in front of me

like an invitation.

Transformative Moment on my 100th Blog!!

Steven at the golden fish asked for bloggers to think of a transformative moment in their lives.....this moment started me on my life as it is...if this hadn't have happened I believe I would be a different person........

I was a somewhat mediocre student…slightly quirky and set apart, not great with the maths and sciences but pretty good at English and creative subjects.

My inspirational moment was with my careers adviser I can’t remember them, even to the point that whether they were male or female…

my school was an old Elizabethan building and the careers office was in the attics ..so creepy…they said

‘so what would you like to do when you leave school’…

I had no idea…

they said ‘what do you like doing’…

art……

'how about going to art college?’

Art college…. suddenly a whole new set of ideas opened up…I had never considered this as a possibility…I knew I was in the top three of my year but as a career?? Wow!!
A prospectus was got, the foundation course agreed on, a portfolio hastily put together and I was at the interview and in before I knew it.

Suddenly I fit in… I wasn’t looked upon as different…everybody was different!!(I was wearing vintage when it was second-hand from jumble sales and my poor mother was despairing of me!!)…
Being on that course showed me so many things.

How to see things properly for one, seeing the small things, the subtle changes of colours and light... composition.... photography..... the great wealth of art history.... how to work in a team..... how to think of a different perspective.....printmaking..... sculpture.... that any idea was a possibility just work out how to do it... how different our tutors were to our school teachers…they smoked Gauloise and came to the pub with us!!
I learnt never to walk around an exhibition with the catalogue…..see the art through your eyes and not the person who wrote the book... have your own opinions.. nothing that you said was ever wrong……The shock of our first life drawing class when the model just appeared and disrobed in front of us!!
God I was naive!!

And here I met someone who changed not only how I looked at things but how I felt about things….

the dissecting of ideas, beliefs, religions, experimenting with influencing each others dreams, telepathy…... ..minds that were so close sometimes words were never necessary….our influence over a year on each other was immense…

‘Two minds that ran on such parallel lines, though infinite they could never meet.’

I was 16….it was a lifetime ago…...it was yesterday..

If you go over to Stevens blog he has a list of others who have bared their souls to the bloggie world!!

Summer Sunday

Summer Sunday....
happy birthday...
82 years young.....
blue skies.....
warm breeze......
champagne corks popping.....
glasses clinking.....
dogs barking......
chatting and laughing....
bar-be-que smoking.....
chicken cooking......

strawberry cheesecake cupcake munching....
tea sipping.......
hours passing......
evening creeping........
goodbyes kissing.......

Harvest Home.

Yesterdays fabulous weather got the combines out to bring in the harvest.....these two worked late into the night and the fields around my house are laid bare...

Today I have seen the seed harrow replanting the field behind me......

So the seasons turn and turn......autumn seems ever closer.

The ones that got away!!

The air is filled with swifts and swallows....chattering and trilling ..can you here them?

The doe and her young buck are grazing here......don't go!!!!


The butterfly loves this little flower....flutterby butterfly......

Don't go ...let me get a close up!!!....

Ah! At last a little birdie.....smile for the camera.......

As you can see my attempts at wildlife photography fail miserably!!!!

Morning in the Clouds

Walking past my neighbours garden this morning....early.....I heard the sound of giggling children...they're out early I thought.......but then saw the tent pitched in the garden!!!......how wonderful a night spent out on a full moon, starlight night with the owls hooting and a midnight feast hidden under your pillow.............

..one of those experiences from childhood that stays with you forever............

'We don't remember days, we remember moments'...Cesare Pavese

Good morning Sunday.

Sunlight and Shadows

Late evening sunlight..at last... I love this stretch of trees, they remind me of the moving forest men in The Lord Of The Rings!!!.....Their trunks covered thickly with berried ivy and branches heavily laden...they seem as though they are mustering the strength to pull up their roots and move on!!!....Fanciful i know...

The sun making stripes out of the straw that has been awaiting the baler for days.....this field is behind my house...for the last week there has been a flock of Canadian geese in it...every morning they fly off to the lake for the day like squabbling day trippers, only returning at dusk to feed on the fallen corn......
..every day I have been out.....they fly over me...so low you can here the rush of the wind in their feathers.....every time I have forgotten the camera......but tonight I didn't........point..focus....and the battery runs out!!!.....I will try again tomorrow..

..A shadow of her former self!..(with new boots...the joy of dry feet)

Wild Weather Walks

If you saw the last post...its been raining here......for days.....BUT....you may also know that my Scottie Lodger demands at least three good walks a day..regardless of the inclemency of the weather.......

..lets go!!!
..the moss and ferns are so green..towering above us.....the leaden sky.

Lichens and moss.....tiny homes for a mass of creepy crawlies....( can you see the baby elephants head in the bark??? Ok who got me started on seeing things in things?? Sorry, its an obsession thats been dealt with before on this blog...)

Ivy trails...one of my favourite things.....

Many different mushrooms have sprung up with this wet and humid air....someones been nibbling at this one!!...I'm always too afraid to cook them...my brother in France can take his to the local chemist who will tell you if they are safe to eat......its a long way to go for a toasted cheese and mushroom sandwich.....

Pearl gray lichen on the jetty....

Where is the ferryman?......I was quite tempted to take this across the lake but sensibility overcame me....

I need new boots!!

For heavens sake someone do a Sun Dance!!!