21 FREE Creativity tips and art ideas

Amelia Critchlow over at experimental art has very kindly put together a 21 day free creativity tips and art ideas programme to inspire and get the creative juices flowing. Here are my contributions so far:

Day 1 - collect 10 things which inspire you visually:

Day 2 - go on a photo walk:

Day 3 - alter a map:

In my map alteration, I photocopied part of an Ordnance Survey map of North Skye and traced around my foot, cut it out and hand stitched a trail walk I did whilst on holiday, I also added in the hand stitched heart to represent my love for this beautiful part of the world.

Whilst on a late afternoon walk down on the beach, I took this photograph of my daughter and one of our dogs (Jasper), I really like the soft light and the joyful connection captured between the two of them:

August Break Day 12 On The Table

August Break - Day 11. Handwriting

August Break

Getting slightly obsessed with pattern and shadow:

August Break Day 2 - Pattern

Pattern

August Break Day 1

The August Break is back again, it's a project run by Susannah Conway and in her words  "the idea is to take a photograph every day for the whole of August. This is a community project that has no real rules –  the idea is to simply take a photograph every day for the whole of August. That’s it. Pause, look around you and shoot what you see. Live inside each moment. Pay attention to what’s there. If it’s the summer where you are it’s a lovely way to be present to the moments that will be gone before you know it. If it’s the winter, what better way to liven up your day than with a creative project to play with? :)

You can use any camera. You could shoot every day or every other day or just on weekends. You can share your photos or just enjoy taking them without sharing. You can start and not finish. You can join in at the end."

For each day there is a theme, today it's "lunch". So, here is todays lunch:

10 a day - Day 9

After Wednesday's upset about my cat dying unexpectedly, I've been very much out of sorts and I've not been keeping up and recording my daily de-clutter items. However, I have done a little bit of catch up and tried to get back on track with it.  Yesterday a furniture collection service picked up for free an old coffee table and chair, these are the largest items so far to be de-cluttered on this challenge and  I've been de-cluttering smaller items as well.

The house is still feeling a little bit upside down, we have the plasterer coming in tomorrow to put a ceiling back in the bathroom. The workmen have finished sanding and varnishing the hallway and back-room, the next job is for us to paint the hallway and gloss the skirting boards in the backroom.

Hallway

Backroom

 

 

Backroom

Whilst the hallway and backroom are looking very spacious without any furniture in them, the same can't be said for the front sitting room, which is currently housing furniture out of the hallway and backroom.

We've managed to squeeze in the dresser from the hallway and the backroom TV stand, coffee table, various lamps and a nest of tables. 

I mentioned to the other half yesterday that if Bella were still here, she would have had a field day ay by now in the front room, she would have been sitting in the drawers which are currently sat on top of the dresser and would have squeezed herself inbetween the rest of the furniture.  She was one of those cats that would "pop up" anywhere and everywhere in the house, life is just not the same without her.

Bella snuggled up in the duvet at the bottom of the bed, one of her favourite sleeping places in the house.

A beautiful mystery

....she left us in the same way she found us, full of mystery and in an unpredictable fashion.

Two years ago this week, a beautiful little stray cat turned up on our door-stop and decided to make her new home with us.  Despite already having a cat and two dogs, this didn't deter her in the slightest on moving in and whipping her new owners into shape.

She had a short life, but the life she had with us was full of love, joy and curiosity. We named her Bella when she first arrived, these are the first pictures I took of her:

She was indeed a cat full of curiosity, one of favourite places was to be in the kitchen, and if there was a cupboard door left open, she would be in it.

After making herself at home in the spice cupboard, I quickly nick-named her "Spice" as this fitted her personality much better.

Where she came from and what her past held was full of mystery.

Her passing was full of mystery.

One of the workmen found her outside our front gate this morning, he didn't want to move her so quickly found my other half (Mark) who picked her up and realised all was not well. I had gone out shopping and had just driven up outside the house to see her in her Mark's arms, I ushered him into the car and drove to the vets, but by this time it was too late, she had passed away.  There wasn't any visible signs of injury to her body, we don't think she could have been hit by a car thankfully. She must have died from natural causes is the only conclusion we can arrive at.

She managed to get herself home to be found, she was once lost, then found.

Dear Spice, you have given us all such wonderful happy memories of you. I feel very honoured that you chose us to live out your days with us. You were deeply loved, and brought me much joy, but I suspect you already knew that, that's why you chose to stay.

For a small cat, you have left a massive hole in my heart, and it is me who is now feeling a little lost without you.