Day 3 - multilayers

Day 3 of creativity boot camp and the word of the day is multilayers. Plenty of ideas with this one, first thing that came to mind was layered cake! yum yum. Unfortunately no layered cake in the house at the moment, so had to think of something else. I found some great layers in the roses. Here is one pink rose out in my front garden.

Then I went for a walk in the woods with Millie and tried to capture the layers within the woods. The hedges and the trees and the grass. Where I am thinking this has more impact is in the countryside with the bright yellow rapeseed fields against the green backdrop. Thanks to this creativity course I think I will go out there and actually take some photos of the yellow layered against the green, instead of just looking at it. Watch this space! But I did find some layers within the woods. I like to think that the woods themselves contain layers within layers. Not only is it a lovely place for us humans to enjoy with our youngster and dogs and horses, but deeper down a layer are the mammals - the squirrels etc and even deeper down another layer are all the insects. The woods mean different things to different people/wildlife. I absolutely love going out there and exploring the textures and layers that are seen in the countryside.

Finally I took a picture of Millie in the garden. She managed to pose for a full 2 seconds, long enough for a shot. She had been a good girl in the woods and had not moved a muscle when we came across these squirrels having their dinner within 10 feet of us. She was on a lead though!

Day 2 - picnic

I took some photos using Andy's camera as I knew it had macro on it. Found out later that I have macro on mine too! I have taken the picnic photo on his camera and wont be able to upload it until tomorrow.

But thinking of picnics, we had a picnic in a country park with my nieces and nephew. This is a photo of Andy enjoying a swing with the kids.

Day 1 - Ivory

Racked my brains for ivory as per instructions for day one of the creativity boot camp online course that I am doing. The first thing that came to mind was ivory skin, then ivory satin shoes for a wedding. I looked through all the blogs and the images that others doing the course had created. There really are some great unsung artists out there.

Finally I went for a walk in the woods today and took some photos in the woods and in my back garden too. Here is a rose which is from my back garden. We have a large climbing rose over the fence and it really looks amazing this time of year, so I usually take loads of photos when the roses are in bloom. This is as close to ivory as I can get.

Creativity Boot Camp

Creativity Boot Camp - Day 1

Right, enough of the procrastinating. I have looked at other people's work on the links from the creativity boot camp blog, and they are fabulous. So, of course, I think I am no where near good enough! When I look at some of the creativeness that people are producing I know they are artists and I am not. Why do I not think of myself as an artist. I like to create, I feel that I do have a creative soul. I just am never happy with the end product, I guess. But then who is? I guess that is why there are so many tortured artists. My God, I am an artist after all! LOL.

I can't paint, I can't draw, my photography is a bit of hit and miss and my digital scrapbooking is pretty basic. Occasionally I am happy with something. I guess that is what it is about. You need to take hundreds of photos sometimes, and somewhere in there is the masterpiece. The one that works. I just need to strive to find that more, to practice more. Not just take photos and hope one is okay. So practice, practice and practice some more, I guess is the way forward.

I have been procrastinating as well in deciding what is going to be my medium. Photography, when it can take some time to set things up, and the lighting has to be just so. Or digital scrapbook pages, which are easier to do at any time, day or night, but probably wont push my creativity as much as I would like. And......I really do want to improve my photography.

I am happy to share my work with anyone online and probably my husband too. If there is something really good, I might even share it with close family via facebook.

Creativity Boot Camp

Have gone on to DSP chat for the first time in months. As usual after the one hour chat I am full of creative ideas and have loads of websites on. Usually takes me several hours to go through it all. I often end up on the most wonderful websites and blogs as well.

Just came across this blog - http://creativebootcamp.blogspot.com/2010/06/day-1.html

It's a bit late now to start getting into it, but will start tomorrow and journal my journey on here.
Quite excited as I haven't done anything creative for ages.

Climbing trees and other adventures

Millie having a great time whilst out for a walk last weekend.

Have been having a great time out caching with some great adventures. Last weekend was really good. On Saturday I went round a series of 6 caches in a mile long circle. One of the caches was about 25 high up in a tree. I left my bag and walking stick on the ground and walked along the large trunk that had fallen at an angle. It was a bit nerve racking but I managed it slowly and carefully. Millie was going crazy howling and crying. I reached up and signed the log and put it back. Then started coming down. Millie thought she would join me at that point and lend a helping paw which made things tricky. I was so worried that she would fall off. Anyway we both made it down safe and sound.

I continued along the footpath that was in a dark wooded area that was absolutely covered in bluebells. The smell of the bluebells was really strong in the enclosed area. The next cache was interesting too. It was a box inside a large log that had been cut out. Very clever.

Then on Sunday I joined my caching pal Jill to drive round a local town to pick up some caches. We found everyone of them. Two of them were brilliant as they were not the usual plastic clip and lock pot or 35mm film container. One looked just like an apple but was hand made out of some unknown substance with the pull out core as the log. It was in a very dark part of the woods so difficult to get a photo. Howeve I did manage to get a photo of the next one which was a clay, I think, mushroom. Very enjoyable.

I will finish off with a fantastic view across the English countryside. We had found a cache under a bench and were sitting on the bench signing the log. The sun was shining and the world was a good place to be in that day.