Winter scavenger hunt–February finds

nearly the end of the month so time to share my February finds for the winter scavenger hunt

I made good progress this month with

 

11 – polka dots on my shopping trolley

14 a partly built building – I know it just looks like scaffolding but the concrete floor has been poured and the underground carpark is built

 

10 a letter shape in nature – someone had kindly put the twig between the two trunks, creating an H

15 bunting – in my living room, I made it from William Morris wrapping paper

and with a feel of spring I don’t think I’m going to see snow drifts which is what I think of when I see ‘winter weather’ even though that is not the winter weather I experienced – which would be a picture of green grass or wind.  So here is the most snow I captured – a mere dusting that was gone within an hour (taken through a window that needed washing)

6 winter weather

Which leaves me with 5.  I’m thinking that I would have been wise to capture ‘someone wearing a funny hat’ before Christmas and ‘someone dressed for the season’ when it was colder.  It just means I will need to be more creative in the next few weeks. Street musicians are ever present in the city and I have several collections and I know which fish I want to photograph.

Thanks to Joy and Eileen for a fun winter hunt. 

Pairs on the tide

Another pair from my river walk and a game of 'spot the difference'

My walk is along the last stretch of the river before it joins the sea and so is affected by the tides.  Most of the time the tidal rise does not reach this little island but we have just had the highest tides of the year - the spring tides and the river was almost to the top of the restraining walls and most of the island had disappeared.

As I put the two photos beside each other I was also interested in all the little differences in colour and detail due to the change in weather and light.

Thank you to everyone who is joining in, I'm enjoying the variety of interpretations

Me on Monday

waving to you all with another 2 postcards from the postcard pile swap

The canal boats are from Krafty Karen and the dreaming swallows from Liz – a Scot now in USA – thank you both for lovely cards.  Just one more to receive.

On a blustery Monday I’m

doing my sign language class homework of preparing some sentences about a famous deaf person (I chose Jack Ashley who was the first deaf politician here),

and enjoying the site of spring bulbs in bloom out of the window – the purple crocuses have gathered the energy to emerge in their deeply coloured glory (thanks for that image Miriam!)

hoping you all have a great week and thanks to Sian for this Monday bloggy gathering

What is in your crafting treasure hoard?

I was talking to a fellow charity crocheter the other day and she was telling me about the beautiful wool she had bought on holiday last summer but not used yet. We went on to discuss our different craft supply treasure hoards – the items that we love to acquire but do not necessarily use (soon).

I realised as we chatted that, even though I crochet a lot, yarn is not an item that I covet.  Which does not mean I do not have a treasure hoard as the shelves in my crafty space show

on just this sample are - top shelf has embroidery threads; below that sticky tape and below that lots of beads and some coloured card then on the right plenty of pens and my pile of washi tape, and on the bottom shelf some cotton yarn and more pens.

Looking at it all and knowing what is on the rest of the shelves and in my drawers, and the digi supplies on my hard drive -  I think that colour is what I buy and hoard – pens and washi tape being the current focus but in the past beads and paper have dominated.

What about you?  Which crafty items do you find irresistible?

Pairs flying high

When I go for my daily walk by the river I never take music with me because I enjoy listening out for the water and the birds and other incidental noise.  One sound I particularly listen for is a swan in flight - they are so heavy that you can hear the beat of their wings.  When I hear them I always reach for my camera in the hope I will be able to capture them as they fly past - 9 times out of 10 I don't, but sometimes I do, and sometimes the image is in focus.

what do you listen for when out for a walk?  or do you take your own sounds with you?

Me on Monday

Waving to everyone with my two latest postcards for the Postcard Pile – from Katie and Sonja, thank you both for lovely mail. And an extra thank-you to Sian for giving me a reason to listen out when I see the postie out the window.

Sure signs of spring around here with plenty of snowdrops and yellow crocuses in the garden (why are the purple ones later bloomers?). Also signs of twitterpated birds in the garden and by the river. 

Another sure sign of spring in the UK is the 6 Nations rugby tournament taking up significant hours of TV watching during the weekend afternoons – I only watched 2 of the 3 matches this weekend and was pleasantly surprised at the smallness of the Scotland losing margin (hoping for a win takes more optimism than I have!).

The weather was seasonally mixed too – heavy fog on Saturday and bright blue skies on Sunday.  The fog really was heavy this time

Wishing everyone a great week with pancakes on Tuesday and the start of the Chinese year of the Sheep on Thursday.

5 in (1)5

We enjoyed lovely blue skies and sunshine at the weekend so my Dad suggested a drive along the coast, which I thought would be an excellent place to take photos to join Sandie for February's 5 in 5 – although this time it was not on the 5th and I took photos over 15 minutes – but I am sharing 5 photos.

We start our walk in the car park on top of the cliff at Gullane with fabulous views over the beach

the buckthorn berries are paler this year but still fabulous and abundant

it was windy so we walked along a path between sand dunes which provided lovely images of grasses against the sky

and birds gossiping on the tree tops

and then back up to the cliff top and past the row of benches which would be full in summer but too windy to stay still today, despite the sunshine

thank you Sandie for a monthly prompt to take lots of photos and pick 5 to share.

A pair of pastries

First Saturday of the month means the small food fair in a local park and my first stop is always the two lovely German ladies who bake

so much yummyness to choose from.  I usually have a slice of what I call beesting (bienenstich) and either a croissant or danish or slice of apple cake - almond croissant won this month.

I'm really enjoying the storytelling possibilities with pairs and loving how creative everyone is being.

Me on Monday

A double thank you to Sian as I wave today – first for suggesting the Monday wave and second for postcards

I received this today from Lizzy in Australia as part of the pile of postcards Valentine swap.  Lovely to receive a cheery card from the other side of the world.  I’ve posted my overseas cards and have the UK ones ready to post tomorrow.

It was a food market visiting; sun enjoying; beachside walking; rugby watching (only 1 of my 3 preferred teams won); crocheting and reading; snowdrops and crocus spotting in my garden; sending birthday greetings to my nephew in Mexico; kind of weekend.

Hope you all have a great week

January was

January was a typical month for reading – 5 books completed, 2 on my Kindle, and I thoroughly enjoyed all of them.  Having read some reviews of the third in the Divergent series I’ve decided to stop after 2 and imagine my own conclusion for the main characters.

I abandoned another book after a day when the only character I liked was killed off and I couldn’t remember which of the others were goodies and baddies.

January was productive crochet wise as I made 5 hat and scarflet sets for a local homeless charity.  all constructed from rectangles so easy to make while half watching the TV – especially shows that could really be radio like most news and lots of quiz shows.

January was a month of meeting old school friends who I haven’t seen for 30+ years and then chatting for hours about then and now and points in-between. Interesting how much our outlook and values still align, even on topics I’m sure we never discussed as teenagers.

January was a month of bought flowers and bulbs in pots as the garden remained green – but not white as we had only the smallest dustings of snow.

January was a month of wearing gloves and a hat and boots when I went out.  But not so cold that I didn’t want to go our for a daily walk – except on the 6 days when I had a heavy cold and lived on my sofa.

January was a month of fabulous low, golden light creating some wonderful views over the water, providing great shadows and reflections and providing plenty of camera opportunities.  This is one of my favourites – the glow of the sun caught on a flock of gulls being fed by the water

Pairs week 5 absorb the sun

I was in the city centre around 4.30 and noticed a lovely glowing sky to the west so walked up to a good vantage point to capture the outline of the castle and Church spires against the sunset.  Then I remembered some other pairs from previous weeks which had captured the reflected sun behind too so I turned to discover that the sandstone escarpment was glowing wonderfully in the rays of the setting sun.

Thank you all for joining in and providing great inspiration.

me on Monday

hello dear blog readers, hope this finds you well

I had a re-boot kind of weekend as I shook off the last of my cold that had kept me in a zombie state for most of the week. With the return of my brain it was a weekend of tidying and laundry and lists.

But my rebooted brain also wanted to create and play so there was also some time for pixel magic, playing with some photos of bare branches and water

and – sure sign I was well again – I had a yearning to crochet an amigurumi figure and given that I have been binging on Doctor Who (the David Tennant years) I searched for an appropriate pattern – part of the amigurumi thing is a geekiness and making characters from popular culture.  I wasn’t grabbed by patterns for a dalek or the TARDIS but this one had me reaching for my grey wool and crochet hook – I realise it will mean nothing to you if you are not a Doctor Who watcher (you can find the pattern here)

Hope you all find some time to play creatively this week.  Big thanks to Sian for prompting us to wave on Monday