Clare Davis Etheridge

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Coloring Sheets for Adults (or anyone!)

Creativity is a marvelous thing in my opinion and I think we can all be creative in one way or another. A very popular way of celebrating our personal creativity is a coloring book. Now adults get their own, instead of shoving the kids out of the way and nicking their favorite pencils, we can officially have our own book and choose our own pencil case and fill it with abandon (or pens, whichever you prefer).

I love to doodle and draw and I will often color in my own pictures, but I don’t color in official books. Having said that there are lots of amazing coloring books to be had, featuring everything from patterns to seasonal pictures via mandalas and animal kingdoms.

As I was doodling around and coloring in my sheets of drawings, I thought maybe you might like a coloring sheet to print off and get stuck in, right now! Grab those pens/pencils/paints/crayons and print one of my coloring sheets. I made two for you. Just click on either image to get the printable version.

Print the circles by clicking on the image or print the village by clicking on that image. Have fun coloring and maybe you fancy adding some doodle onto the blank circles and houses and trees!

Looking for more? Some very cool coloring books I have seen are-

A Special Edition Coloring Book from Flow magazine.

Coloring books by Lisa Congdon are super fun.

Johanna Basford coloring books are gorgeous.

There are a gazillion of them, so happy coloring! I hope you enjoy coloring in my pages too, there are more to come!

Four + One = Life. Weekly Photos 45/52.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

1. Blue sky and orange leaves, one of the best things about this time of year.

2. I snagged some hydrangeas this week and even thought they are kind of past their prime, they are still so striking. This book is my new favorite cookbook and I was happy to see that there are more books by the same lady which I have ordered from the library. Hurrah for libraries!

3. These mica powders arrived this week which I am excited to be able to add to lip balms and maybe a gentle blush with a hint of shimmer. I will be sure to let you know how they turn out.

4. It is not tennis weather I know, but my youngest and I decided this weekend was the time to channel our inner Wimbledon. I thought I would wear alternative tennis attire as you can see and jeans and boots worked just fine in our friendly knock about. We found this ball at the tennis courts which has a valuable message – Practice. Yes indeed, I need lots of that, maybe in the correct shoes next time!

A good week was had, the weather was Novembery and full of Autumn which is how I like it! I hope you had a fab week and enjoy the week ahead.

I am joining with Isabel at Nanjing Nian in this week’s Four+One=Life post, pop over and see what everyone has been up to!

Happy Monday!

Through The Lens Thursday #45. Bright.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

We have a teeny tiny Dogwood tree in our front garden which I have nearly mowed down to the ground on more than one occasion! Thankfully I missed it every time and it is growing slowly but surely. This year it has a little collection of leaves which have turned a fabulous orange pink for the autumn.

A little bright beacon shining from my front lawn, some trees in the autumn see to be their own light source and this is one of them.

A perfect example of ‘bright’ for this week’s Through The Lens Thursday. Next week is ‘Smile’.

Happy Thursday!

Bharta. Aubergine/Eggplant curry.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I have had a bumper crop of aubergines this year and when they started to grow, my first thoughts were ‘great, the aubergines are growing, but I don’t even like to eat them!’ I gave some away, made some recipes I didn’t like and then my friend Tracie at Beets and Birch blog suggested making Bharta. I did and I loved it! So my final batch of aubergines and chili peppers are all going into the curry. This meal will use up the last of the coriander in the garden too I think.

Bharta or Aubergine Curry. (adapted from Madhur Jaffery’s book – ‘Madhur Jaffery’s World Vegetarian’

1 large or a few smaller aubergines

4-6 tomatoes

1 onion

Fresh chili(es)

1 tsp ground cumin

1 inch grated fresh ginger

Prick the aubergines, tomatoes and chilis with a fork a couple of times each, then roast on a foil lined tray at 425 degrees for 40-60 mins until the aubergines are soft and have started to flatten. Meanwhile chop the onion and fry in olive oil until cooked but not brown. Add grated ginger then cumin and turn off the heat.

When the aubergines are roasted cut each one from stalk to bottom and empty the insides into the onions. Peel the skins off the tomatoes and add them. Chop the chilis and add them too. Mix up well or blitz with an immersion blender for a smoother Bharta. I used a potato masher to smush up this batch of Bharta.

Eat with naan and/or rice, top with plain yoghurt and a sprinkle of fresh coriander.

Happy Wednesday!

One+Four=Life. Weekly Photos 44/52.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

1. I went to see Twenty One Pilots in concert this weekend with my teen. They are so good live, they put on an amazing show and they are funny and chatty too. I do like some entertaining chat when I see bands live, nothing more boring than a band who just warbles through their back catalogue then leaves. There is nothing boring about a Twenty One Pilots concert, and not to sound like a middle aged mama, but I just love that they don’t swear every other word. Most bands seem to think they have to ‘f and blind’ (now I sound like a right old fart) the whole way through their set. Not true! I took this photo using the Hipstamatic app on my iPhone.

2. On Sunday morning there was a bit of fog hanging about so I went out for a little walk into the woods to see if the fog was worth a photo. No fog to speak of, it was all in the tops of the trees, but the dew left behind had coated these red leaves rather dramatically.

3. I liked the way the shadows were dancing on this door on Cherokee Street on Sunday morning.

4. This week saw the start of the Tinkersketch challenge hosted by Tinkerlab, get all the details here if you fancy sketching/making art every day through November. For day one, the prompt was ‘Pattern’, so made a pattern tile and repeated it over the page then added some extra lines and colour. Maybe I do like coloring in after all!

Lots going on in November, it is one of my favorite months. Could be cold, could be warm, but the trees will be gorgeous. It has my birthday in it too. The kids get three days off school for the Thanksgiving break, so we all get to drive each other nuts!

I am joining with Isabel and friends at Nanjing Nian for a One+Four=Life party.

Happy Monday!

‘I like’ Fridays. The Happy Edition.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Things that have made me happy this week are-

Making green tomato pickles.

That my kids like the pickles I have already made.

Rock cakes.

Cutting the branches into a stick pile in the garden.

Watching my last four aubergines grow.

Playing with Zentangle and finding cool posts like this one from Craftwhack.

Looking forward to the November Tinkerlab sketching challenge.

Halloween treats from Grandma in England (chocolate eyeballs!).

Successful school Halloween parties.

Scoring some great bargains at Goodwill, in this weeks haul, we got a 1960’s baby blue typewriter (which was very heavy to carry home!), some milk glass mugs and a ‘Tornado’ maker!

Playing Cluedo with the kids.

Watching the Great British Baking Show on PBS.

The chilly weather and crunchy leaves.

Power Yoga at Core 3 Fitness.

What has been making you happy? Lots of things I hope.

I have included this week’s Through The Lens Thursday in today’s post as I missed it yesterday (oopsie). This week’s prompt is ‘Happy’, pop over to Greta’s blog to see her photos too. She is the fearless leader of Through the Lens Thursday.

Happy Friday and have a lovely weekend!

Plugged + Unplugged

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Plugged and unplugged, words which have added new meanings to their definition in recent years. Gone are the days when only an electrical item was plugged in or unplugged. Now music is unplugged, art is unplugged, ears are plugged and of course our topic for today, social media is most definitely plugged and makes us all feel as if we are also plugged in. Fingers on the pulse, don’t miss a thing, fear of missing out (I am not young enough to say FOMO…), keeping up with the plugged in Joneses. We all like to know what is happening, but do we really need to know every microcosm of information available to us?

Neighbours used to chat over the garden fence or at the butchers about last night’s TV or what Mrs So and So is up to, now we seem to want to actively create our own gossip. We put it out there, of our own accord and we put our family gossip out too. Posts on Facebook, endless photos which used to be reserved for a get together with willing family and friends, a glass of Martini and the slide projector on a flock wallpapered wall or if you were extra fancy, a screen dedicated to slide viewing. An evening of photos from the Costa del Seaside featuring sunburn and out of focus landscapes with the odd castle thrown in for good measure.

Now we feel the need to post every single photo we have ever taken on Facebook for all to see, comment on and ‘like’. Is this a bad thing though? At least family and friends can all see what you are up to, not just the invited few getting squiffy on Bacardi (from the Duty Free shop of course). I do think we rather over share on social media, I am not convinced we need to see you on the beach in your bright yellow cossie twenty nine times. Just because we can take two hundred photos on our phone, to get ‘just the right one’ doesn’t mean that they all need to be shared.

It is nice to see what friends are up to and be able to leave a little comment here and there. I also think that it is still a lovely thing to be able to get together and flick though the albums after a wedding or holiday, have a chat and maybe a craft beer or two.

At least if we are discussing telly face to face there is less chance that Mrs Brown will give away the ending to last night’s Game of Thrones! Social media and spoilers is not a good thing.

Chatting is a good thing though and I think that we can chat with all the people we want to via Facebook or FaceTime or Skype and of course chatty e mails are a marvelous thing too. I love that I have met so many fab souls because and only because of the internet, there is no way I would have got to know these people without it. Blogs, Facebook groups, Instagram are all lovely places to see what we are all up to and find like minded sprites to hang out with either online or maybe you will be lucky enough to meet one day. Hanging out online is definitely a reason I like to be plugged in and not unplugged. Everything in moderation is a good phrase to be applied here I think, chat to your people, but don’t worry too much about keeping up with everything and everyone. Keep up with you and yours, not them and theirs.

Letters, remember letters? When we had to write to our pals across the country or the world and pop on a stamp. Pen Pals. Do people have pen pals now? Email pals? I love that email is so nice and quick, especially if you need something right now, immediately please, but I also love a letter with nice spelling and correct grammar and the handwriting which usually you can read but there is always a vital word which you just can’t figure out. Letters and postcards are the best, postcards from holiday destinations with a photo of the hotel on the front where you have made a biro cross over your room! Yes, more of that please. It was always a rule of childhood holidays that we send out postcards and I still do, they are such a joy to zoom across from city to city or country to country bringing news from afar or not so afar. I love email and it is super useful, but you can’t hold it in your hand and admire the exotic stamp in the corner!

Ironically as I write this, my e mail is not working, I have had no emails for two days now. The horror! Not really, I am sure the latest Old Navy special offer can wait for my attention along with the vital news from Amazon about lingering items in my cart. I have to admit to having a little (okay a medium size) panic when I realized that I was getting no e mails through. I tried to fix it, then realized that I am inept at such tasks and should just get a cup of tea instead and brace myself for a chat with my email provider’s ‘technical support’. My email remains unplugged today as I have school Halloween events to organize and attend, so Target’s latest 50% off will just have to wait.

Are you a plugged in or an unplugged person? Or are you keeping a balance? Everything in moderation.

This post is part of a series inspired by this post from Erin at Design for Mankind. More posts on the subject can be found at Pip’s blog Meet Me at Mikes where we are all chatting in the comments section. Pop over if you like.

I am also adding this post to the fab Weekend Rewind over at Maxabella Loves.

One+Four=Life. Weekly Photos 43/52.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

1. A fire pit with (veggie) sausages and s’mores on a Autumn evening is the best! I picked this fab vintage fire pit up from a yard sale and it is the perfect size.

2. As I walked through the park past the same bridge I see almost every day, I was drawn to the bright red tree. I am sure the leaves have turned brown and dropped off by now, which makes me grateful to see the trees everyday so that I don’t miss their glorious colour change at this time of year.

3. I picked this giant two tone tomato this week and it is ripening nicely, I might get a few more red tomatoes and the rest are heading for pickles. Most of the ripe tomatoes are being chopped with a chili from one of my plants and some coriander to make a salsa, I am eating fresh salsa at every opportunity.

4. We had our annual Halloween street party this weekend and everyone had a lovely time meeting each other and catching up. It is amazing how we live on a little street yet, still don’t know half the people who live here. The kids played hide and seek and made a massive leaf pile which they hid in and threw about! I came home with a pile of leaves for my composter and a smile on my face. These ‘feet’ were soon discarded by our resident Hobbit as they were a hindrance when he was climbing trees and chasing friends!

I am joining Isabel at Nanjing Nian and some other lovely bloggers in a ‘One+Four=Life’ link-up.

Six Word Saturday

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I got this idea from Pinterest (of course) and I think it worked rather well! These are for the kids on our street and I am going to make them for the school Halloween party next week. I want to add some plastic spiders or bugs to the school ones – extra creepy!

Are you a big Halloween fan? There is no getting away from it over here, so you might as well embrace it!

Happy weekend!

‘I Like’ Friday.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

It has been ages since I wrote an ‘I like’ Friday post. I have been liking lots of ace things, but I haven’t shared, how rude!

So I plan to put that right and keep the ‘I like’s coming on a regular Friday basis. A little gratitude sharing as well as things I like , it is important to look back and remember the good things from a week or a day isn’t it. My lovely neighbour brought me a piece of freshly made coffee cake this morning, it was delicious and I was very happy to have been the lucky recipient.

What else have I been liking this week?

I have been gathering some Christmas presents in earnest, I like to get organised for Christmas pretty early, so I don’t run out of time to mail it all back to the UK. I enjoy buying gifts for people, it is so nice to think about what they might like (and hopefully get it right).

The weather has been a dream this week, cooler mornings turning into blue sky afternoons with warmer temps. The trees are starting to turn into their stunning Autumn hues which are so much brighter against a bright blue sky. Some of the trees in the neighborhood seem to glow with yellow or orange leaves, then in a couple of days they are faded and leaves are dropping. What a lovely thing to pass the trees daily and see their colours. Having said that, it is threatening rain today which is great for the remaining veggies in the garden, but I will be grabbing my brollie before heading out this afternoon.

I have been dipping into some very good books this week ‘Craft for the Soul’ by Pip Lincolne is always an uplifting read and I often pop it in my bag if I know I will have a few minutes to read a page or three. I have been delving into Mr Wilkinson’s Vegetables by Matt Wilkinson for menu ideas for the week ahead. I always find myself getting lots of inspiration from the Illustration School books by Sachiko Umoto, so they are on the table alongside my sketchbook right now.

I have been working out lots lately because I do love to exercise. It’s true, I am one of those people who needs to move!! I was a big aerobics fan in the 90’s and I loved Popmobility in the 80’s, anyone else a Pobmobility groover from nineteen eighty something? Lately, I have been particularly liking my pilates, yoga and surf classes, although if there was a Pobmobility class in my area, I would be signed up in a minute!! In case you are wondering what on earth I am blabbing about this Popmobility, it was usually held in the village hall or the school gym and a local lady in a leotard and tights would put on a record (yes, I said record, I am that old!) and we would all follow along in an exercise/dance routine fashion. I suppose the nearest we have now is Zumba. There would be routines to funky classics like ‘Pass the Dutchie’ and ‘Blue Jeans’ followed by the stretch routines which were always to Barbara Streisand or Elaine Paige songs. The good thing about using records for the songs was that there was always a little break while we waiting for our leotarded leader to change the record, time to catch your breath and get a little spot of village gossip too!

I am joining in with Maxabella Loves and A Quirky Bird for Weekend Rewind, which as usual is full of great reading!

I hope your week was ace and you are looking back over it with a smile.