Isn't it amazing how one thing leads to the next?  From a February post, Pink Flowers or Undies, I came up with the idea to buy flowers for $5 and photograph them.  What fun I had and this winter I'll continue searching for inexpensive flowers to add cheerful beauty to life and photograph the posies every which way.

I traveled about Ohio...a few days in Cleveland...

A July weekend in Toledo...

Wandering the backroads...

There were sunsets...

And sunflowers....

A new garden after many years...

Canning...

And Cookies

Oh no...everything wasn't always lemony sunshine...

A broken arm

Grieving a lost pet

Still light shone...

Above

And below

Everywhere there was beauty...

Inside

And out...

2010 was a good year of memories made with family and friends. There were ups, downs, and lessons learned.  There were times of confusion, but the celebrations outweighed the frustration.  And now...it's time to tuck this year away and welcome in a new one, fresh and clean awaiting pens, paper, the camera lens, words, and the imagination creating life one day at a time.  

I'll catch a fairy in my hand and make a wish before releasing her to the winds of fate...

 My wish is for each of you to gather in all the joys that await you in life...

I wish you laughter with family and friends, old and new

I wish you success in leading a life of bliss

I wish you prosperity

May you always find a a loaf of bread and a glass of wine at your table

I hope nature, from the lowliest insect to the highest mountain, thrills you

May you find beauty in simplicity and enough imagination for the complex

I wish that love would kiss each of you on the cheek everyday

Together, I hope we strive for peace and remember the dark shadowy corners of the world  

A Few Favorites from 2010

 If I had to choose the one photo that I love the best from the hudreds I took in 2010, the photo I call Puddle Jumper comes in first hands down.  Yes, I wish I didn't have the brick buildings in the background, I wish it was just a bit sharper, but it tells a story that always makes me smile.  I captured my grandson in his rain boots just off the ground as he was jumping.  Even his shadow shows up ever so slightly in the puddle behind him. This is a happy photo of childhood glee. 

Coming in a close second is a photo I took of my daughter one evening.  I decided to tweak it and go the black and white route.

I don't take alot of photos of people or portraits.  I'm simply not good at capturing the character unique to each individual.  I'm not crazy about posed or staged photos of people, but prefer candid shots.  I'm finding that capturing those candid faces is a really tough task.  Once in a great while I luck out, but most of my people photos are mediocre at best. 

Tomorrow it's about nature in all it's wild and wonderful glory. 

Have a grand evening! 

Collage Favorites

I have hundreds, maybe thousands of photos on my computer.  Some files have more than a hundred photos of one subject.  Yikes! What better time to organize all those files than now before the  new year begins?  Each photo is placed in one of thee files:

1. Really bad...delete without haste 
2. Love, love...place into favorite file
3. Not that great of a shot, but tells a wonderful story none-the-less...keep in monthly or subject files

So that's my process. 

One of the cool things I learned in 2010 is how to create collages with photos and other images, including backgrounds, textures, and text.  Here's my favorite collages for 2010.

March Rain

What's not to love...cupcakes, a favorite cup, and jumping in puddles.

While many attack dandelions in their yards with hoes, chemicals, and cursing, I rather like dandelions, the unloved recovery plant that smiles at the world in sunny yellow and eventually sends off downy kisses on spring breezes. 

My two sisters and I spent a couple June nights in a cabin. Not far from the cabin was a stand of pine trees shading funny, magical mushrooms that popped out of the ground with exuberance.

Pink...soft, sweet, happy, feminine, elegant, sexy.  Pink is one of my favorite flower colors and nothing says pink with a pinch of panache like coneflowers.  

Yes, I created many collages over the year.  Some for the Cottage, others for Write in Amazement, and others for fun.  There were collages with people, places, and things; animals, flowers, and food.  It was a new way for me to share photography love with all of you.

As I file away 2010, I'm planning to share my favorites of the photos I took throughout the year.  Then I can open a new page in the book of 2011 and begin telling a fresh story. 

A Christmas Card for You

Dear Friends...thank you for all the support and love shown me as I muddled through this year of confusion. I appreciated each and every one who visited the Cottage. I found inspiration and much food for thought within the comments left behind. Thank you, thank you, thank you...

I hope you enjoy my version of a Christmas card just for you...

"Christmas Card"

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Cranberry Inspiration

"Christmas waves a magic wand over this world,

and behold everything is softer and more beautiful." 

~ Norman Vincent Peale

Try as I might, I cannot take a decent photo of the Christmas tree, so I looked elsewhere for inspiration. Last summer I read about placing items in the bottom of a glass canning jar and photographing the contents. So I thought...

I wonder...what if I frosted the cranberries and placed them in stemware?  One egg and a bit of water mixed together and brushed on to cranberries became the glue for sugar.

Frosted cranberries look so elegant. *snap*



I wonder...what if I put  a few frosted cranberries in the bottom of a martini glass...  *snap* 

I wonder...what if I dipped the lip of the glasses into water and then sugar to create an icy edge...*snap*

Hmmm...there's silver dragees waiting to be added to cookies.  What if?  *snap*

I had such fun experimenting and snapping photos.  I ended up making a centerpiece using the clear glass stemware with edges sugared. One glass even has drips that look like ice melting.  I filled the glasses with frosted and unfrosted cranberries.  Silver dragees line a flute and hold a candle in place.  The look is elegant and quite lovely on a creamy white placemat.  I'm thinking the same could be done using crushed hard candies and candy canes. 

I hope everyone is enjoying this last weekend before Christmas day!     

Gingerbread Love

And I had but one penny in the world.  Thou should'st have it to buy gingerbread.

~William Shakespeare "Love's Labour's Lost"



Cream sugar, molasses, & shortening.  Add ginger,soda in water and flour, flour, flour... 

Knead in more flour.  Roll out dough...

                                 

Cut out shapes

Bake @ 350 degrees

Decorate

Finished just in time for Master Horatio Rabbit's tea.

December Beauty

    Waking up to a frosty pattern on the window

    Finding a splash of winter beauty on the kitchen window

   
    A sparkle of light added by the sun

   
    Ephemeral art on a wintry cold morning in December

Stay warm my friends! 

12 Days of Christmas: He's Everywhere

Yes, I know the 12 days of Christmas historically take place between Christmas and epiphany, but I'm taking my journey now with a small challenge:  post every day for 12 days which leads me up to the 22nd.  The weekend of Thanksgiving we hauled out the boxes and began decorating. I collected Santas for many years.  Each year the jolly old elves take up residence in a different area of the house.  This year it's the mantle.
 Oh yes, Santa is making appearances all around the house.  He's everywhere!

He's a tin ornament, and one of my favorites, on the tree.

He's peeking from behind greens, waiting in the snow for a glimpse of the naughty and nice.

He's driving his sleigh on to a vintage wrapping paper.

He's dressed all in green with a half-moon vibe and a favorite of my daughter. 

"He had a broad face and a little round belly.  That shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly." 
       ~Clement C. Moore

The favorite of a son, the roly-poly Santa never failed to make us all chuckle.

On Christmas Eve, a brown-eyed boy will place cookies on the Santa bedecked plate, anxious for morning

"Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus."  
                           ~ Written in the Sun Times by Francis Church in 1897

An Amazing Christmas Gift

If you haven't seen this amazing youtube video, take five minutes to watch it.  It was so beautiful...the music for sure, but the pleasure of the faces listening to a surprise concert is simply enchanting.
 

We are Sisters

"Sisters are the different flowers from the same garden."

~ Anonymous

When a sister is in trouble, sad, or in need a silken cocoon of love and attention is woven about her by her other sisters.  One call and I hurried to the side of one of my sisters.  After 48 hours of staying as close as humanly possible, I came home and began pondering what it is to have a sister and be a sister.  I'm a fortunate woman because I have two, both older, who have each in their turn guided me through the growing-up years.  Over the weekend I thought about how, like three flowers grown in the same earth, watered from the same heavens, and tended by the same gardeners, we can be so very different in color, form, and texture.    

The flower that I think most represents my oldest sister B is the  flamboyant, joyful sunflower...

 B faces the sun with a joyful heart that simply amazes me.  She finds the good where I often fail to.  Her bold spirit slayed the dragons that first borns must, making the path a little less blocked for those following close behind.  Like the sunflower, she makes no apologies for her choices, but follows her heart's content.  

My middle sister reminds me of a soft pink rose...

  Like a rose, N is delicate. At times I want her to unfurl her tight center and open herself to the endless possibilities of life.  Her spirit, too gentle for the world, concerns me that without just the right sunlight warming her face and just enough water to keep her roots happy, she'll fade.  Yet, when she blooms she is striking in her beauty.

And what of me?

 This one took some pondering because we don't always see ourselves the way others do.  I decided I was most like a morning glory.  I like to climb and explore.  I like to try new things, experience new places, and find my bliss on out of the way stops.  Somewhat traditional, my roots lie near the surface in Ohio soil, but given the opportunity I wander gladly.  Opening to morning light, but closing at the first sign of clouds is very much a part of who I am.

Yes, we are sisters.  We play together whenever we can.  We share long distance phone calls pouring out our souls to one another.  We're the first to celebrate each other's victories and the first to embrace the sorrow of disappointment.  We laugh and cry with each other, if not in person, in spirit. 

"We are sisters.  We will always be sisters. 

Our differences may never go away, but neither for me, will our song."

~ Elizabeth Fishel