With the winter solstice, and these festive images, I want to thank you all for another year of sharing thoughts and musings! I am so happy and grateful that we have met and keep meeting here on WP. I hope to see you soon again…keep blogging!
Come join me on a Tivoli walk – and get some Christmas feeling!
They have everything here, theatre, music and dancing…
Play of water to Wiener music…
Nice people, good food and warm drinks…
And some Christmas trees!
This year the sun was shining and we spent a fine day together. Biking to a local greenhouse with an amazing bloom of cacti and geraniums. And millions of tadpoles – and a leech. I do love tadpoles, we always let some grow up in a big bowl, and then let them out when all four legs had arrived. A nature’s wonder. Leeches though…naaah. Not one of my favourites…
Goodbye 2020 – Happy New Year!
Thank you All in the blogosphere for helping us stay reasonably sane this year ♥ We made it so far, and I believe there is a light in the tunnel for 2021. Take good care of yourselves and each other – hope to see you soon again! – Ann-Christine
Early this morning, my mother unexpectedly passed away. This is the last photo, from August when we celebrated Emma turning 30. In the header, June this summer, Mother turned 85. Always a beauty, always shining, always funny, always – Always Mum.
Thank you for Everything. You chose such a beautiful day to leave us, warm and sunny, I believe the last day of summer. A day of no wind, of stillness and the yellow garden flowers glowing. But nothing can ever glow like You.
How frail is a life – yours went from laughing and joking on Monday, to gone forever Wednesday morning. Wherever you are now, I know your company is smiling.
Pick a word and illustrate it with a photo! This used to be a favorite challenge of mine when held by Paula of Lost in Translation. Unfortunately she is not running it anymore. So – how about a revival at Lens-Artists? It is easy: Choose one (1) word or more – choose all of them if you like! The words available are the following:
Comfortable
Growing
Tangled
Crowded
Exuberant
In the header – Comfortable? Yes! If you are safe and living in the Galapagos Islands!
Growing
Growth itself contains the germ of happiness.
– Pearl S. Buck
Crowded
Tangled
A word garden blooming within the tangled weeds.
―
Exuberant
Exuberance is beauty.
Thank you for a marvelous response to Patti’s Everyday Objects – you really made us all open our eyes and SEE what we have around us!
A new announcement: We have the pleasure of having Rusha Sams of Oh the Places We See as guest host for September 5, #113. Be sure to visit her! Until then – stay well and safe, and be kind, to yourself as well.
Have you seen these:
“One day you will wake up and there won’t be any more time to do the things you’ve always wanted. Do it now.”
Paulo Coelho
And many of us tried, hard, this summer.
Last week we saw a tremendous amount of beautiful answers ”Under the Sun”, hosted by Amy. This week, ”We’d love you to share with us the ways you’ve fueled and satisfied your creative energies these past few months as the pandemic has restricted our ability to move freely.” And this time, Tina is our host.
When all this started, I had just visited my daughter in Umeå, and bought a fascinating jigsaw puzzle with many house plants – most of which I some time over the years had grown in my house. And, puzzling hade not been on my mind for some 20 years…This was february, and we knew nothing about what would happen only some weeks later.
Emma’s birthday is in September, so we decided to celebrate during her summer vacation instead. She wished to take a short course in ceramics and clay work, together with some friends. I joined in as well, and we all had a creative day at the small farm, where the artist, Caroline, had her studio.
During the whole summer, Emma kept working on the costume for her graduation. She also made a prototype for sewing her leather spats. Much work, but I am sure it will look really good in January for her Big Day. Posing for me? Well, some minutes only – it was 37 degrees C that day…so fast I had to be!
For her birthday, of course I made her favorite lamb pies with lots of vegetables and fruit. For me it is a joy to cook for her when she comes home – I want to make her feel relaxed and having nothing to worry about. Being a student for so many years is tiresome – not least doing all the cooking yourself.
We did many other things togehter of course, but these were some of those that made our summer worth remembering. I think we worked on 5 puzzles at least, and we had so much to talk about and debate – things that might never have come up an ordinary summer. Summing up, this Covid summer went from hopeless to meaningful in the end.
Emma has left now for her final term, so maybe this was her last stay ”at home”. And the last puzzle we started together, I have to finish on my own. It has a name: Universe Creator, by artist Lora. Autumn is coming, and I sit in the warm evening light, looking at Lora’s painting. It shows a little girl cycling, and a giant panda blowing soap bubbles that sails through the air, making new planets and galaxies. I like that idea.
Finally, are you interested in learning more about about the team behind the Lens-Artists Challenge? If so, we invite you to visit TCHistorygal.net where you’ll find our recent interview with Marsha Ingrao of Always Write. It was great working with Marsha and being a part of her Artists’ Interview series. We thank her sincerely for her efforts on our behalf.
We hope you’ll join us next week for Patti’s challenge #111. Until then, take care and stay safe.
This week Tina wants us to go on a Treasure Hunt! Our challenge is to search for specific items – either from your archives or newly captured – from the list below. Extra credit items are a bit harder to find, as are multiple items in a single image. Focus on quality over quantity and hit us with your best shot(s)!
Sunset is a moment where all emotions are experienced: Melancholy, amazement, intoxication, casuistry, admiration, love, sadness…
―
In the opener – sunset, seascape, birds and boats in The Netherlands. The other scenes were found in Bhutan, Tibet and Poland.
Come Fairies, take me out of this dull world, for I would ride with you upon the wind and dance upon the mountains like a flame! – William Butler Yeats
Dance is the most fundamental of all art forms. – Twyla Tharp
Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole.– Roger Caras
This Boxer-like sweetie gave me a real fright. When I was passing this shop, he suddenly jumped up at the desk – the shop owner looked a bit shocked as well…I had to be quick to catch the moment!
Knitting not only relaxes me, it also brings a feeling of being at home. – Magdalena Neuner
An old photo, but I still remember these lovely Tibetan ladies waiting for market customers – and making a useful time of it. They were very shy, but smiling when I asked about their knitting and told them I knitted too.
All my images are self-portraits, even when I’m not in them.
―
I met this beautiful lady on the pilgrim trail to Taktshang (Tiger’s Nest) in Paro. She stopped to offer some nuts and dried fruit (I was a bit poorly looking…), and then passed me with a vigorous step – reaching the temple at least half an hour before I did. She was 75, and no sign of panting in the thin air…
Each and every animal on earth has as much right to be here as you and me. – A.D. Williams
We were fortunate to see the national animal of Bhutan – the rare Takin. Folklore has it that the animal with a goat’s head and a cow’s body was created by The Divine Madman, a famous holy man from Tibet. The Takin lives in the alpine zones, at 1000-4500 meters height, and weighs about 300kg.
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination
and life to everything.
― Plato
I enjoyed these skilled street musicians for almost an hour, in Lodz, Poland. Not until after uploading the photos, I noticed the spooky thing behind the musician to the left…
Thank you, Amy, for the fun Narrow theme last week!
A Special Announcement: All of us at Lens-Artists are delighted to announce that the March 7th challenge (#87) will be hosted by our special guest host, Miriam Hurdle at The Shower of Blessings Please be sure to visit Miriam’s site on Saturday, March 7th to view her challenge. For the rest of February and March, we’ll follow our usual weekly schedule:
Leya 