Restless weekend

The weather wasn't exactly super nice this weekend and I felt too restless to settle down on any one thing so.....

I started on the next chair...the very very ugly one. This one is going to be super simple. The top will be this old green color. The legs another more turquoise-ish color, and then the crossbars a nice blue. 

I got this far and had to find something else to do.

Debra at She Who Seeks, posted her art space, so while I was organizing my messy space, I thought I'd take a crack at mine.

This is what it looks like where I keep my paints while I am in the middle of a project. Messy. Messy. I do clean it all up and make it tidy at least a few times a week since I dislike clutter.

I have another space where I do a lot of my table top photography. 

The tubs hold bits and pieces I've created for Diorama photos. I use the bits for creating scenes.

I have bits and pieces of cardboard and repurposed 'trash' to make scenes. The original thought was to toss the 'bits' when I was done with them. However I keep using them over and over in different scenarios so I had to find a spot to store them.

The different drawers hold Lego Minifigures along with some other little 'toys' that I like to use for photography.

Toys are my favorite thing to do.

[Everything in the shot below except the little Droid are bits of things that were trash. I painted the bits, used old dried coffee grounds glued to surfaces for texture, and made a lot of whatnots ---> that's okay, I don't even know what the whatnots are!]

Sometimes I attempt still life shots of interesting bits of plants.

I'm not very good at this, but I need to keep practicing to get better at it.

Hopefully I will! These were supposed to be 'flat lay' shots. I didn't like the shots that much but found the textures of the plants and the old wood I placed it on to be interesting.

I worked on making a wire tree. I'm still practicing how to do water droplet macro photography. Right now the outdoor world and forest isn't exactly inspiring.

So I took this wire 'tree' and used a clip to hold it upright. I took a wooden block I'd painted years ago and stuck it behind the 'tree'.

I was going to practice 'water droplet' macro photography. So the tree looked like this.

I used a heavy gauge wire and then had wrapped jewelry wire around it to make surfaces for water to cling to.

The fun part was the macro 1:1 part. This is where focus and what I saw through the lens got interesting. I took a lot of shots, but this one is the one I settled on.

When working with with these small droplets and this close up, everything is manual. 

That lead me down the road to the world of abstract macro photos. The shot below was a red feather I had in my craft stuff. I used an old CD as a backdrop. I did a double exposure sort of and ended up with this.

Does it mean anything? Nope, not really, but the colors are vivid and it was a brain engager. 

My table top looked like a disaster when I tried something else and it didn't work. I put everything away. When I get frustrated, it doesn't help creativity at all. I have to clean up and give it a rest.

I took a walk in the crunchy and icy snow instead and got a breath of fresh air.

When I came in I looked at my desk and thought....I should be answering my Aunt's letter. She is old fashioned, we write hand written letters. 

I took out my Lensbaby lens and ... well....

this is the shot that made my day.

By the way, I was still to restless to sit down and properly write my Aunt back. 

I really should do that. 

Do you have a creative area that you knit, sew, cook, or do something amazing in? I don't do most of those things. 

Why we do we decorate for the Holidays?

November is nearly over. And here comes the Brown Icky Dreary Season.
The clouds are low and grey, last night it rained nearly one and a half inches. The rains pelted the house and blew in from the north and east.

From down in our little hollow we can hear the winds whipping this morning through the bare branches on the ridge. It sounds a bit ghostly. A mist or fog is moving in to make things look even more dreary.
This would be a good day to stay indoors and read a book. Or nap.

Yesterday started out wonderful. The frost came off the land in a beautiful fog. The sun peeked into our hollow and shone brightly. It was warm, it was nice.

This is a view of our place yesterday afternoon after I'd walked up to the neighbor's and checked on their chickens and goats. 
I also walked their dog Dexter.
I am startled by the difference in the remodel and I am not used to seeing it this way yet.

Our porch lights will light up the hollow in the night and can be seen from the ridge now that the leaves are down.
Today though it is yuck. Super Yuck. The sort of day that you want to pretend is over.

So I started to get out some Christmas Decorations. Rich walked into the house and saw some bags of decorations next to his computer desk.

"Decorating already?" He wondered.
"Well, thinking about it." 

I know why people decorate in our neck of the woods right after Thanksgiving. The gloomy days set in and a person has to have something to brighten their days.

No one else really comes to the house and enjoys our decorations. Our Christmas Eve and Day are generally spent with just ourselves or we go visit Rich's mom so she won't be alone.
I don't mind really.

I went out and got the Christmas Chair. The horrid ugly chair that I found buried in the garage a few years ago. It needs refinishing, gluing, and ... well. It should be just tossed out into the rubbish pile.

But. I like to take ugly things and pretty them up.

It will be interesting to see what I come up with this year. I try not to let any two years be the same.
Well, except for the ugly chair.

Let the fog/mist/rain/grey/dreary stuff roll in. Deer hunting is over, the blaze orange can be put away. The fall decorations can be stashed.

It's time to decorate and brighten the indoors up.

Stay tuned. The broken down chair will be transformed again this year.

And just in case you didn't know. I love to take Still Life shots of the decorations.