A Kitten Called Betty - October Challenge - Shades of Autumn

We're almost at the end of October and I haven't posted any photos from the October challenge over at A Kitten Called Betty

The theme for October was Shades of Autumn and here are my photos

I made this squishy squashy fabric pumpkins 

(you can see more of my makes over at my other blog Mad About Bags

I have seen some great ideas about photographing leaves on the internet so here are some that I found in the garden.

I stuck this leaf onto the window of my car to get these shots.

The pyracantha bushes are full  of bright orange berries at the moment.

My youngest has just started school and I take my camera with me some afternoons on the walk up to school I couldn't resist these bright red rose hip berries.

And I love the contrast of the purple and red berries in this shot.

The one good thing about the damp weather is the fungi, I spied these "fun guys" on a log in my garden.

I rotated this photo to give it a different perspective, this fungi was growing out of the side of another log in my garden, so this is looking down the side of the log but rotated.

We have this tree in the garden that has the most wonderful colours in autumn everything from yellow through green to the brightest red. Each year I try to get a different shot of the leaves.

you can see last years photo here

I have some macro rings which I decided to play with one rainy and foggy morning, I still have lots to learn about them and getting the focus right in macro but it did produce some great shots or the raindrops on the spiders webs.

And finally, whilst on a trip to our local country park to feed the ducks I spied these fabulous orange toadstools, I'm convinced there must be fairies living under them.

the ducks didn't seem very interested in our haul of bread, too well fed I'm afraid) but the seagulls were happy to fight over the pickings.

There will be a new challenge posted very soon for November if you would like to join in this facebook group please leave a comment below.

GREEN DAY (link up)

I've seen this link up on several other sites but haven't had time got my bum in gear to post any photos myself until today....

so here is my photo linking up with GREEN DAY 19 

over at 

Raindrops and Daises

If you fancy playing along here are the rules taken from Raindrops and Daises' blog

The object of the link up

is to post a photograph of something green.

The photos can be of anything you like

once they have a green theme,

green fields, pretty green things, green clothes, 
green leaves, green foods,

anything at all that takes your fancy!
I hope that you will join in the fun.

the boring bit...

1.   Please do not post anything that may be deemed offensive to others.

2.   Only post material that belongs to you.

3.   Please link back to Raindrops and Daisies

4.   Link directly to your Green Day post and not to the url of your blog

5.   Please visit some of the other participants and leave a comment

A Kitten Called Betty - Monthly Photo Challenge

The monthly photo challenge over on the facebook page 

A KITTEN CALLED BETTY 

has a new them for the month of September

Here are my fist two photos :

I took this shot as we were travelling home from Wales on the 1st day of September and love the way the long exposure has created a pattern with the lights.

I couldn't resist  the bold yellow and black stripes on this old diesel train.

If you would like to join in with this month's challenge then leave a comment below and I will send you an invite to the group.

A Kitten Called Betty - Nature

A few days ago we spent the day in the garden and I was able to take a couple of photos of some of the flowers before we started the hard graft.. It's mostly greenery in our garden, which always means lots of pruning. I have been know to get a bit carried away with the secateurs and yesterday was no exception, we even roped all the kids in as there was so much debris from the hedge/tree!

 Anyhow, this next photo did make me chuckle and my husband Paul came up with the caption!

Fifty Shades Of Purple!!!

There has been rumours that I pruned this with my nail scissors but this is all mother nature's work!!!

I love the delicate stamens on these yellow flowers and managed to capture this hover fly waiting to be seated at the dinner table!!

We spent a lovely day at a local country park with friends recently, the sun shone (until the rain came!) and the kids were able to get the kites out and make the most of the breezy day. So this is my interpretation of one of Mother Nature's invisible wonders - The wind.

A Kitten Called Betty - Nature

I didn't think I'd get an opportunity to take many photos yesterday as we had several hours of rain but by late afternoon it had dried up and I decided to take my camera up onto the lane outside our house to see if I could photograph the thistles. My youngest was with me and he pointed out several bees buzzing around collecting pollen from the thistle flower heads and I managed to capture these shots. It was definitely a case just snapping away as once the bees decided to move it was very hard to keep up with them.

We're off the the park today so I'm hoping to capture some more nature shots as well as the kids playing.

Have a lovely day where ever you are.

August Photo Challenge

I can't believe it's August already, I'm not quite sure we've had our summer yet so with the promise of sunny days (I can dream can't I?) and a new theme for the monthly photo challenge over at A Kitten Called Betty I'm hoping that August brings lots of photo opportunities.

If you would like to take part in this fun and friendly challenge over on facebook then please leave at comment below

May Photo Challenge

I think I have been so caught up with finding letters of the alphabet this past month that I completely neglected the May Photo Challenge organised by Kathy over at Postcards from the PP. I have trawled through my albums for May and have managed to put together the list of themes.

Fragrance

Every day on the way back from pre-school we drive past these wonderful yellow fields of rapeseed and Tomas opens his window and and we have to smell their sweet fragrance.

Currency

Not the monetary kind but the swapping of talents kind I swapped two pincushions and an ironing friend for a beautifully made zipped pouch bag 

Yellow

The field opposite our house was full of buttercups until the man came to cut the grass! Luckily I had popped out there the day before to catch the early evening light and the lovely yellow buttercups. 

Station

I love listening to BBC Essex during the day so it had to be a picture of my little retro radio. 

Good Things

Delicious cakes definitely are good things. You can find more good things over at Cakes by Barbara Jane

Nine

Nine pennants on my crochet red white and blue bunting. 

Small Packages

I have received some lovely packages through the post recently these pretties were from a birthday giveaway that I won over at Dosie Rosie. 

Beverage

Technically not a beverage but this starry mug was in the pick package above and I did enjoy a lovely cup of tea in it this morning. 

Historic

I have to say I didn't have many photos in my May albums that could be classed as historic but this is our local church and is very very very old!!! 

Front Page

I have been having a clearout in my workroom and I decided to list my unwanted copies of Mollie Makes, if you have any that you don't want they fetch a good price on ebay especially the early ones!!! 

Nose

I have to confess the last two photos are from my archives.

Barney's nose! 

Do You See What I See?

I've been wanting to use this photo in a challenge or competition since I took it last year and now I can - I love it!!! 

Phew! I think I scraped in by the edge of my teeth!!!

Pop over to the link page of Postcards from the PP to see everyone else's interpretations

The final four....

Here are the final four photos of this month's A Kitten Called Betty A to Z photo challenge.....

A play on words for W (double U) in the shape of these two horseshoes, I had to play around to get the angle right but I think it works, don't you?

Living in a rugby mad house H could only be one thing and that's rugby posts, even Tomas says H is rugby posts as when he first started using the computer it was an easy way of remembering the letters! I did have to highlight this quite a bit to make the posts stand out and in doing so lost the top right hand corner a little but I think you get the gist! 

We have some beautiful churches in our local area and I knew that I wanted to incorporate some of their architecture in this challenge. The arched windows make an excellent M.

What I have found though is that you can't always crop out everything as you can loose what the image actually is.

Living in a Victorian house we have lots of lovely period features one of which is this cornice brickwork around one of the upstairs windows which formed a great L.

This has been a great challenge and I very nearly thought I wouldn't get them all I will be working on my collage over the next few days and post a picture as soon as it is finished.