All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins: A Halloween Weekend Update

A lazy Sunday post for a lazy Sunday day. We had a blast last night with my brother and sister-in-law at The Chambers Halloween party in Folkestone – and now G and I are nestled back home in our PJs.

I’m watching a couple of films for homework and later we’ll get stuck in to Stranger Things 2 (finally!). Which is the perfect end to the perfect weekend. 

I don’t even mind too much that Monday’s just around the corner…

Hope your Sunday is as blissful ❤

I’ve given good Halloween this year, if I say it myself…

Title of this post borrowed from Yayoi Kusama‘s All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins, 2016

My Week (and a bit) in Pictures – April 09 to 17

Pictures, left to right, top to bottom:

1. Tropical leafy nails to mark the beautiful Spring weather we’ve been having
2. An impromptu day date with my love, B
3. Trying on fabulous glasses at The Specky Wren. I definitely want these!
4. There’s just something about this Senior Girls doorway
5. Loving this stag briefcase, by @cassettelord at The Open Market, Brighton
6. A rogue turnip let loose in our work car park
7. Beautiful, beautiful Tatty looking chic on our lunchtime break
8. Great local graffiti at Saunders Park, Brighton. This one is by @radiosradio
9. I particularly love this piece by @skatinchinchilla
10. Pineapple and a super 80’s splatter design
11. My new ring (and friend)
12. Fringe benefits (definitely time for a trim)

Happy weekend all!

My Weekend in Pictures – March 15

Or rather, my Sunday in pictures. Saturday wasn’t the most photogenic of days, let’s put it that way! Unless you’re interested in the sight of me with a top knot, scrubbing the loo.

A couple of #selfies in there for you as well as some kick ass graffiti and the interior of a great new coffee shop.

I’ve a bit of a headache so I’m going to bed with my book for a bit. These happy pictures will have to represent me today, I’ll offer a better post tomorrow.

I’ve got a couple of mini film reviews to put up later and for once, I’ve actually drawn up a blog schedule, so there’s a lot planned for this week, which is quite exciting for me.

Basically, once I’m shifted this headache, you won’t be able to shut me up. Happy Monday!

Weekend 2: Photography 101

So this weekend I’m supposed to play with light at different times of the day; dawn, the middle of the day, afternoon and dusk. Well, ain’t nobody got time for that, I have things to do and people to see today. And hoovering to do.

However, I have something even better to share, I think.

Last night something made me think of my old Flickr account, so I went looking for it and found all my old pictures! While rummaging through my digital memories, I found an album entitled Scanners (2008). Basically, all I had to create these images was my mother’s scanner, a computer and – voila! – this series of incredibly pretentious shots was birthed.

Aren’t they special?

Now, when I look at these, all I see is a silly girl trapped in a life she didn’t want but the images are kind of great. Yes that’s a banana (and my boobs).

As for the rest of the pictures on Flickr, I’m tempted to delete them all forever. I’m tempted to pretend I was never that stupid hopeful girl; and maintain that I was always this together and flawless. (Insert maniacal laughter here).

Life isn’t like that though, nor should it be. We’ve got to hold on to the memories, no matter how sick they make us feel now. It’s all a matter of comparison, after all.

Have a great weekend, all!

Mystery

Show us something uncertain, and manipulate light around you to enhance the mood of your image. Via Photography 101: Mystery (13th March 2015)

I didn’t do anything to get today’s shot, I didn’t even get up. I merely snapped a shot from the comfort of my own bed and I was away.

I did use the light from outside to create the illusion of mystery. The road outside our window is always uncertain, sometimes the hum below brings comfort and sometimes, when I’m a stressy bunny, it makes me anxious and I can’t sleep.

Either way, you know not what is out there in the middle of the night.

Happy weekend all!

Solitude

Capture a snapshot that conveys the state of being alone. Via Photography 101: Solitude (6th March 2015)

Yes, this is a banana left in the sun

I love being alone. When I think of it, although I am surrounded by people all day and live with another human being, I am quite often on my own by choice. When I don’t get this quality time with Me, I start to get angsty and then I seek it out.

It’s usually nothing that drastic, just a wander on a Saturday or a walk in the park, but I like to be able to dissect and then reassemble my thoughts.

This image is a banana, left out too long in the sun. I feel like this banana sometimes, overlooked and no longer wanted, abandoned without thought to rot, basically.

(What am I, a 15 year old Sylvia Plath, without the talent or the authenticity?)

Really, it’s just a banana in the sun. But it’s kind of beautiful, don’t you think?

This sh*t is bananas

 

Water

For day three, we want to see your interpretation of water — how might your image reveal more about you? Via Photography 101: Water (4th March 2015)

Water is an interesting theme to me as it’s my biggest fear, however, I wanted to stay light today.

Hence this gentle reminder to self to drink more water. (There are two clues to who I am in this post, I’m a big scaredy cat and that I need to keep myself better watered, like a delicate flower).

Thanks to my boo, Tatty for coming outside for the photography session and being down with the whole concept.

Happy snapping, photo fans!

Street

Today, capture an establishing shot of a street scene in your neighborhood — or someplace new. Via Photography 101: Street (3rd March 2015)

I find myself slipping into a very literal mind-set when I attempt these assignments, I must say. I don’t think this way outside of a structured environment so will try to break through with a bit of originality before the end of the course!

That said, I did have fun with this one. I chose to go for a little walk against the current (the wrong way) up our road. Our street is pretty standard as far as roads in Brighton go. It has nice bits and scabby bits. I tend to love the scabbier bits the most, but that’s just me.

There are two houses I am in love with on our road (both not scabby), and I was drawn to using them in my pictures. But then I can’t choose which one I would rather, so might have to include them both.

That was my thinking, until I got nearer to work and found this:

Yes it’s a broken mirror. But it’s in the street by the side of my work building. Those are my chubby legs reflected back at me. I guess I have the power to be surreal when I want to be after all!

I chose the image over my actual street because it reflects my current mood. Slightly fractured and uncertain (creatively) but ready to take on the day (with an injection of leopard print, natch). There’s also a sliver of some local graffiti featured (not very good graffiti but it’s representative of one of my true loves). All in all, I’m happy with today’s photograph and subsequent post!

Do you want to see the images that did make the cut? Go on, then.

Pictures, left to right, top to bottom:

1. Made a little friend this morning while admiring this house, which I really love. It’s essentially right next door to our building.
2. My street, from the attractive end
3. High tech local graff
4. This place *heart eyes emoji*. Eff knows how much it would go for but I have a hunch it will never be in my price range.

And that, my friends, is Street.

Home

I’ve been inspired by Hayley Margaret of A Stitch to Scratch to take on Photography 101, starting today. Poetry 201 was fun to begin with but I couldn’t keep up and felt a bit silly in the end. I think my future career as a beatnik poet is now firmly on hold. Sorry, world.

Photography 101 looks like lots of fun though and having seen Hayley M mention it on her blog last night, I hopped firmly on the bandwagon too. I’m very original like that.

Today’s theme is Home (and Getting Orientated). This is about taking the concept of what ‘home’ means and running with it, in whichever direction I see fit. The Orientation is more about getting to grips with my equipment (not a euphemism).

Since I am going to simply point and click my trusty Samsung Galaxy S4 whenever the mood takes me, I’m already pretty comfortable. However, there are a few features I’m sure I haven’t explored yet, and this might well be the opportunity I’ve been waiting for!

To the theme!

Home

I’ve taken the word home and gone quite literal for my first assignment. This is my front door. I’ve always liked it despite it’s slight shabbiness and ugly wiring up the side of the building.

This morning’s light was gorgeous and although there is a subtle filter on this image, I still think it captures the small stab of joy I felt when I got to the bottom of the stairs and looked back up towards that baby blue door.

Home to me is wherever I am with my love. That sounds incredibly cliché but it’s honest. We have a good deal on a nice place now, having had varying degrees of luck with our previous living situations, both together and apart. But I could live anywhere with him, if I had to.

When I think about joy and love and living together, I think of the lyrics in Cell Block Tango from Chicago (stay with me):

So, we started living together.
He’d go to work, he’d come home, I’d
mix him a drink, We’d have dinner.
It was like heaven in two and a half rooms.

Sure, the relationship takes a turn for the worse when she finds out she’s just one of his wives and poisons him with Arsenic but until then, I know exactly how she feels.

Our home is heaven to me, even when the washing up is piled high, there’s nowhere to hang my knickers and I’ve tripped over his shoes for the seventh time that afternoon. But it’s wherever he is.

Photography 101

My Week Filtered

This week has been a good one with many highlights. Here are a few of them, from Left to Right, Top to Bottom:

1. It was pissing down at 9am yesterday but by lunch it looked like this: I like to call this image ‘Narnia after the thaw’. Despite the title of this post #nofilter
2. The prettiest tree I have ever seen, right in time for the upcoming Christmas period #nofilter
3. Short classic red nails. This may not seem like a big deal to anybody else but this week I cut my very long nails down to this length and I think they can stay! It feels so fresh, modern and practical
4. #obsessed 
5. What’s a lunchtime stroll around the cemetery without a dorky #selfie?
6. This is one of the coolest charity shop finds I’ve ever unearthed. Love Miranda July, and I bloody love the British Heart Foundation! Saturdays are for the Open Market and charity shop rummaging (except today as I think I may have food poisoning from some dodgy chicken last night)
7. This happened! I love it so much, it feels like a sexy secret tattoo that in the end only Glynn and I will ever see. My friend Ella has just started tattooing and she’s ace. She does dotwork and it’s so delicate and beautiful. It could become a big problem for my tattoo addiction… #never
8. This also happened and I adore it! I’ve wanted a paper fortune teller like the ones I made as a kid for a long time, and this is perfect. Also by Ella
9. Anyone who follows me on Instagram knows I’m a bit of a sucker for graffiti. I don’t know quite why this appeals so much, but I like it a lot #brightongraffiti

Happy weekend all!