When I included some magnolia flower images in my recent monochrome spring flowers post it was to celebrate their sculptural forms in particular. But while black and white really emphasises those forms, draining them of colour isn’t to everyone’s taste. And to be honest the shapes are just as beautiful and distinctive in colour; while the different shades from pure white through delicate pinks to deep reds and purple are equally worth celebrating.
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With the recent change in fortunes of our football team, Newcastle United, following the (some would say controversial) sale to rich owners, there is a sense of optimism among the Toon Army. And who are the Toon Army, you ask? They are the fans who follow the Toon (Geordie dialect for ‘town’) through thick and thin, good times and bad.
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Keeping up my resolution of taking at least one photo a day was very easy in the first part of February and much less so towards the end of the month. For the first two weeks we were in Costa Rica and I was in travel photography heaven – and overload! When we got home however the weather was cold and I was jet-lagged. It was hard to get motivated to look for images among the familiar scenes of home after the novelties of travelling.
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I started this year with the intention of doing the 365 challenge, taking and sharing at least one photo a day. Having seen a reference to Blipfoto as a platform for this, I signed up; only to find that what I thought was free membership actually carried a fee after the first month. Sneaky! So I abandoned Blipfoto and with it my short-lived challenge. Instead I thought I would share some of my favourite January images here.
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If you have lived in a city for a long while, maybe all your life, you find yourself photographing its sights less and less, however lovely there may be. Do I really need another photo of the Tower of London? Of St Paul’s Cathedral? Of the river Thames?
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On the outskirts of Nairobi is a very special place, where orphaned baby elephants find safety and refuge… Thus I started a blog post last May about the amazing work being done at the David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage. Imagine how thrilled I was when many of those residents made their way, in sculptural form, to London’s Spitalfields Market!
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In a previous post I took you on a walk along the River Tyne in Newcastle and introduced you to its famous bridges. But I neglected to mention all the public art to be found along the Quayside. So now I want to rectify that omission.
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Although we love to travel, we have always spent Christmas at home in England. Not for us the snowy ski slopes of the Alps, or the tropical shores of the Caribbean or Far East. Tempting as the latter sound, we save trips to warmer climes for February, when the long chilly season is really dragging. Christmas is a time for the comforts of home, and for family.
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It would be hard to visit Dorset without at some point coming across the name of novelist and poet Thomas Hardy. He is inexplicably linked to the county, so many places in which featured in his novels. On a recent visit to the county I found links to Hardy everywhere.
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When the Domesday Book was written, in 1086, what is now the pleasant London suburb of Ruislip was known as Rislepe, ‘leaping place on the river where rushes grow’. The book also tells us that it had more pigs than human inhabitants. These pigs roamed the extensive woodlands; and Ruislip Woods remain to this day, although smaller than they once were.
