Summer in the Park

Yesterday we went for our first walk in the park since lockdown - it's within the 5km radius, it was a beautiful day, it's a holiday weekend and C had been up to his eyes in work last week so he needed a total break (as much as possible in current circumstances) from the house.

It was beautiful. Very warm... The deer were all lying down in a huddle, which I would have thought would make them warmer, but maybe there was some cooling effect. It was cute seeing the budding antlers. Across the grassland we could see swallows and we are fairly certain we saw skylarks, too. 

Many of the ducks by the pond were also too lethargic to do anything other than sleep in the sun - mallards, and a Muscovy duck. 

But round the side of the pond as we walked back towards the car, there were a couple of adult coots and some very scrawny looking chicks rustling their way through the lily pads. The adults were constantly calling - I wondered if it was so that the chicks could locate them in the dense growth. A totally different bird soundscape here to the open grassland. 

And down by the lower lake in the woodland area, it was cool and shady and a third, different bird soundscape.

 

I hope it's possible to click on these photos - I was trying the new version of Blogger which will become the default in June. 

April Favourites

Despite feeling a major lack of mojo, April was a good month on the card front!

The header is some wild irises growing along the canal bank, one of the very few photos I took last May.

 There was a challenge to be inspired by the work of Mary Delaney. I have always loved her botanicals against a black background. When I received this lovely wrapping paper on a birthday gift (a design from the V& A collection, by William Kilburn  it wasn't hard to decide what to use for my card.

Using those pours...

Back in March I shared photos of the acrylic pours I made over the St. Patrick's Day extended holiday weekend. Ever since, I've been pondering how to turn them into something.

In a way, the small canvas was easy - it didn't need much. The other two were harder. Between Lorraine's comment that one reminded her of Monet, and the fact that C had to shop my stash for a birthday card for me and gave me one with a  mouse and waterlily image on, that helped inspire the first one. And I love it so much that maybe I'll keep it for another few years and it can be a birthday card down the road.

All along they had made me think of water, and I'd tried a couple of ideas like the dolphin edger die, but nothing was coming together. Then I was cutting up some wrapping paper that came with a gift from my sister, to make a different card altogether. And I thought that some of the softer, more frondy pieces would make good seaweed, so I cut some of them out too, and added an octopus into the scene and that gave me a second card.

It still leaves another mini canvas and 6" square for another day; probably another 5-week gestation at least, give the difficulties I had using these. The octopus is a bit deeper orange, but he has clear embossing powder to it was hard to photograph.

Another canal walk

I've never seen so much active traffic along the canal - all I've ever seen before is the boat that does the dredging.  Two weeks ago I saw a lovely yellow one moored down by the train station (called The Yellow Sub), which was going the next time I passed. And one day last week we saw this one going upstream.

Moorhen

 This is the one I've shown the front of before, the non-chimney. It was a hot sunny day when we walked past and the doors were open - fun to see how they are painted on the inside too.

Easter Greetings

It most certainly doesn't feel like Easter - it's hard even to keep track of what day it is, and that's even though I am still working. But, according to the calendar, Easter it is - so here are my greetings, taken along the canal on Saturday morning.  I believe we saw three different duckling families. Until the little ones are old enough to fly, we'll probably keep on finding them in the same place down near the lock. I'm not sure what the white egg is from - it was at the edge of the path under a tree absolutely wreathed in ivy. But I'm pretty sure it wasn't a duck egg, as it was along the stretch where the canal runs through a cutting and is a lot lower than the path.

Canal Walk

I had a day off on Wednesday, and as it was a beautiful sunny morning, I walked down along the road to post a couple of cards, and back up along the canal.
The first treat was to see a mother duck and what looked like at least a dozen little furballs paddling along madly behind her.  I want to walk back down to the lock tomorrow and see if I can find them again. We're lucky at the moment to have such a pleasant place to walk, almost on our doorstep. The "2 km radius from your home" that we are currently allowed for exercise will take us nicely up or down the canal to suitable points for walking back along the road if we prefer.

A bird of another feather, the chimney cowl on one of the houseboats moored alongside the train station.

And a magpie, taking a quick bath. He then flew up to a branch to sun himself. It was so warm that I could even smell that coconut aroma from the gorse growing along the bank.

And the rest of the photos are just wildflowers and trees. I spotted some early violets, too.

Feeling Blue?

I walked over to the local post-box yesterday to mail a few cards. There's a little cluster of trees in the green area, and I spotted these Spring (and other) blues nestling in amongst them.  Actually, I'm kicking myself for not having stocked up on gloves when I knew we were nearly out a month ago. I'm not fussed about wearing them for protection now, but I regularly use them for messy techniques, any time I'm using Tack it Over and Over glue, and jobs like changing the filter in the cooker extractor hood (needs doing) and taking bottles to the recycling. And C usually has a couple in his jacket pocket in case the chain comes off the bicycle.

The mixed media challenge on SCS yesterday was a faux blue-print. I took the blue literally (something I have never done with my actual blue-print style stamps. I hated covering up most of my background, but went ahead and did it anyway.