Clare Davis Etheridge

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Through The Lens Thursday #28 Eyes

This week I chose these game pieces as my ‘eyes’ photo (s). They are from a game called ‘Go to the Head of the Class’ and I only have the players, no board or instructions. I like that the eyes are very simply drawn but they are all so different and convey each character so well.

I am not sure how politically correct these schoolyard stereotypes are now, but I really like them and their funny little faces, ready to go to the head of the class!

Through the Lens Thursday is hosted by Writing Wishing and Gfunkified blogs and I am learning so much.

I took the pictures on my Canon Rebel and collated them in Canva.

June Photo a Day 2014

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Here are the photos from June, a little late, but here we are huffing and puffing and sitting at the back. What did you get up to in June? Is it summer or winter with you? It is heating up here and I am already looking forward to cooler weather, I know, I am a cool weather girl.

1. Joy. I find great joy in Flow magazine, it is one of my favourites.

2. Doing. Playing Top Trumps – Horrible Histories (and they really are!) with my youngest.

3. Family. Off to mow our neighbour’s lawm.
4. Ordinary. An ever growing patch of mint.
5. 11 o’clock. The edamame is growing well.
6. Adventure. To the top of the Gateway Arch!
7. Pattern. Gorgeous funghi.
8. T is for. Trainers, back from a run. Even though I live in America, I still call them trainers rather than sneakers or tennis shoes (I don’t even play tennis, come to think of it, I don’t do much sneaking either).
9. We Live Here. St Louis on an old brick.

10. Flying. Clouds, flying through the sky.

11.. The Beginning..of my grow out to natural hair colour = grey!

12. Pastel. Pastel oil pastels

13. Simply. Tomatoes.

14. Cross.

15. Lovely. These sweet peas will be lovely when they grow.

16. In the Shadows. We made micro monsters!

17. Peaceful.

18. Quirky. Some quirky moves on the Slip n Slide.

19. Habit. Ice cream is a good summer habit.

20. Yay! Fire pit lunch.

21. Here I am. Catching the Metro Link.

22. Growing. Sunflowers are getting big!

23. In this moment. Waiting for cookies to cool.

24. What June looks like.

25. Sun Flare.

26. Dreaming. Of fairies under the toadstool.

27. Loving. This style! Swim shorts and boots, perfect summer dressing when you are 9!

28. Bed. Lavender bed.

29. Delight. Harvesting garlic.

30. The End.

Photo a day completed for half of 2014. I love to look back on them and see the snow and the cold and then the days warming up and the plants growing. I have been taking a photo a day since September 2012, nearly two years, and they are all compiled here from my old blog.

All of these photos were taken on my iPhone4 (I know, vintage model).

Weekly Photos 27/52 and Green.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

What a lovely week, the weather was so lovely, cool (less than 80 degrees counts) and sunny. I went to Warped Tour with my 13 year old and we had a great time, the garden is awash with green and tomatoes and flowers and we had a trip out to Shaw Nature Reserve on another delicious cool day.

Of course I know we are to expect many days reaching a million degrees, but these pockets of bearable are so worth it. It means we can get out and about and see what St Louis has to say for itself.

This is what is said this week, in photos.

1. The inflatable schedule at Warped Tour, St Louis

2. Harvest of garlic and lavender.

3. The ever growing sunflowers are now 6 feet tall (I measured the tallest).

4. The Hibiscus flowers are unfurling.

5. Thistles at Shaw Nature Reserve.

6. The Sod House at Shaw, who doesn’t want grass on the roof!?

7. Pretty Black Eyed Susie flowers.

8. A very dry creek, these stepping stones are usually in the water.

9. A crop of Day Lilies near Cherokee Street, St Louis.

10. Green as part of the Color/Colour project hosted by Hula Seventy and Xanthe Berkeley. Taken around Cherokee Street.

11. Green part two. Taken at Shaw Nature Reserve.

That was last week and this week is beckoning, have a great week everyone!

Six Word Saturday

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

We went to Shaw Nature Reserve today and the weather was cool, the sun was shady and the flowers were out.

I snapped lots of photos and this one became this week’s Six Word Saturday.

If you want to make a Six Word Saturday, snap a photo and write over it using an app like Rhonna Designs (the one I used here), A Beautiful Mess, Over, Phonto or Little Moments to name a few. This font in Rhonna Designs is one of my current favourites.

Once you have your pic and words (six please), share on your blog or on Instagram using #SixWordSaturday. I will come and see them and smile a great big smile! Yay.

Happy Weekend.

10 Mom Tips to Survive and Enjoy Vans Warped Tour

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

10 mom tips on how to survive Warped Tour.

Peace Tea Truck. Warped Tour 2014 St Louis.

1. Get there early (really early, like 3 hours early), watch bands plug their set and sell CDs, get free bags and stickers. Take a small bottle of water for the wait. We were lucky with the weather, but the sun is still beating down as you stand still in a line, ready to pass out due to dehydration at any minute. My mini zip loc of raisins saved my lining up experience, not cool, but remember it is not my job to be cool, I’m the Mom!

Discarded Boy Meets World sign. 12.30 Kevin Says stage.

2. Make a note of who you want to see and which signings you need to attend. Choose wisely as everything overlaps. You can buy a schedule for $2 but we just made a note on a card I had in my bag. Leave enough time to line up for a week and a half for signings (get there early if you can).

Telle from The Word Alive crowd walking!

3. Check out the local flora and fauna, boys in undies, everyone with ear plugs and gauges (it’s a thing) lots of coloured hair and body art. Does it make you feel old? Yes. Take you right back to teenagedom? Little bit, but remember when I was a teen, I had to use black eye shadow as lipstick and nothing I could fathom would make my floppy hair stand on end (believe me, I tried) none of this new fangled hair product and make up to make it easy!

I Fight Dragons tent.

4. Favourite t shirt of the day ‘I eat glitter for breakfast’. Love it! I would have snapped a photo, but the wearer looked terrified by the whole experience, so I didn’t want to freak her out any more.

5. Be entertained by the ‘Tips’ boxes on the merchandise stands. Most seemed to be for engagement rings and one band was saving for a flight back to England! What a romantic lot these alternative/metal core/punk bands are.

Motionless in White rock the main stage.

6. Laugh heartily at the $14 Lime-er-ita $11 beer, $3 water and $8 soda as you fill up your water bottle at the free water station and chow down on the PayDay candy bars you brought with you.

7. Eat the sandwiches you made with pride and buy merchandise with the money saved. I know this is total Mom behaviour, but we would have been without band t shirts if we had to fork out (ha, nice pun) for expensive food. Remember kids, don’t be too cool for school, make your sammies and have a Warped picnic!

Fearless Records and cool evening clouds

8. Wince at the lobster skin colour in the shape of a tank top on those who forgot sunscreen (DO NOT forget sunscreen).

9. Bottle the energy coming from the stage and the crowd as the bands perform and yell and bounce and rock! Don’t do this in front of the bank of speakers if you want to hear sometime in the next week.

Playing ball with Breathe Carolina.

10. Enjoy the atmosphere and don’t worry that the performer wearing the Cure ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ shirt was most likely not even born when you were listening to them… (Chris Motionless, I am looking at you).

Through The Lens Thursday 27. Mess.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Through The Lens Thursday is a weekly challenge to get us to use our camera on manual setting and learn all about those pesky numbers and how to combine them to get a successful photo. As you can tell, I am quite the professional already by my discussion on ‘the numbers’. I am getting the hang of manual slowly but surely and I haven’t flicked back to ‘auto’ all year. Yay!

For today’s photo prompt ‘Mess’, I had an idea to get the boys to shake their messy hair and I would magically capture the moment in freeze frame. How on earth do I do that? What numbers do I need? To the interweb we go. I read about freezing the moment and getting the blur and decided to try both.

I didn’t want my models shaking their heads into dizzydom, so I snapped a few, changed settings and snapped a few more.

Numbers for this one are 1/1000, f4.0, ISO800.

The white wall was not the best location as it overpowers the photo I think, but I love that the hair is caught in messy motion.

Numbers here are 1/60, f8.00, ISO800. Bit more surreal here, but I don’t hate it, the white wall still isn’t helping, but I am pleased I tried both options so that I could see the difference.

This is what I learnt, what did you learn today? Are you a camera whizz or just learning?

Weekly Photos 26/52 and Pink.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Last week was hot hot and more hot with a couple of storms thrown in. I had one sick kid for a few days and we managed to Slip n Slide lots. I dug up some of the garlic and it is looking good, there are some teeny tiny tomatoes growing too.

1. Pink was the colour to find last week and I almost failed, managed to find a few though. Part of the Color/Colour Lovers project hosted by Hula Seventy and Xanthe Berkeley.

2. A rare, almost extinct pay phone. I wonder if it even works?

3. Slip n Slide in the sunlight.

4. You didn’t think I would deprive you of a mushroom shot did you!?

5. Itsy bitsy pine cones.

I hope you had a great week last week and are looking forward to an even better one this week! I am going to the ‘Vans Warped Tour’ concert on Wednesday with my teen….wish me luck. I will snap a few photos to share!

Six Word Saturday

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I made scones today and added a handful of blackberries and a lemon’s worth of zest. Got to eat them quick though, they will be dry by tomorrow. Frothy coffee and a scone, perfect afternoon snack.

Share your Six Word Saturday in the comments or on Instagram, #sixwordsaturday.

Happy Weekend!

A Cup of Tea with Me and a few of my Favourite Things.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I am linking up with the rest of my class at Blog With Pip (want a blog course to blow your socks off? This is the one,) for a communal, over the interweb cup of tea and a chat. The other links are here if you want to pop over and meet them all.

The course has been a mixing bowl of new students and graduates of previous courses (I did the course in February too) and everyone brings their own talent to share. Designers, writers, idea drivers, technical wizards, all in the same class and meeting up many many times a day to chat on Facebook in our own private group. I have learnt so much from the class and my fellow students, much more than I thought I ever would considering the course is all online, based in beautiful Australia (students are world wide though) and I have never met any of them in person.

I have made new friends, learnt new things and am striving for new goals. Oh, and it is because of Michelle from That Summer Feeling that I am currently letting my hair go au naturel in the grey department – added course bonus!

What about all of those favourite things I hear you cry? Good question, what are my favourite things at the moment? Here are five.

1. Watching the birds balance on the feeder outside the window, there is a bright red cardinal on there right now and he is a little big to fit so he is swaying about precariously! I love to see a gaggle of finches and sparrows on there playing the ‘how many little birds can we fit on the feeder’ game!

2. Messing about with apps on the phone and iPad. I recently got Super 8 for making little films on my iPhone and I love it, I will hopefully get lots of summer filming done and maybe even make an actual short film by the end of it. Tahnee of Milk Please Mum got my brain thinking about making short films, she makes such beautiful films and photographs.

Talking of apps, have you tried the new Little Moments app from Chantelle at Fat Mum Slim? I have downloaded it, but haven’t played with it yet. It looks like a combination of ‘Over’ and ‘A Beautiful Mess’, in a good way, I am excited to try it. I already do the daily photo challenge ‘Photo A Day’ which I love, so I am sure I will get lots of use out of Little Moments.

3. Finding cool stuff where you wouldn’t expect too. Don’t you find yourself discovering all kinds of cool information or things exactly where you would not expect to? I know I do, all the time. Like nearly every day we walk through the woods at the end of our road, there is a new mushroom peeking out to see me. Of course I dive onto my knees and snap a bevvy of photos! Within the next few days it is gone without a trace and further down the path a new beauty has popped up.

We sometimes find ourselves paddling about in the local creek and we see all sorts of things, from crayfish scuttling about to old cool bricks (yes really, they are ace!) and one of our recent finds was a delicate, beautiful, tiny figurine of an Indian girl and her cow. The only parts which have been lost over time and being swished about in the creek are the cow’s horns and whatever the girl was playing (looks like a flute type instrument). The details of the lotus flower she is standing on and her jewelry are amazing. I don’t know anything about her, but I am trying my hardest to find out.

Update on the figurine. She is a he, it is Krishna, commonly depicted playing the flute and accompanied by cows.

4. I love to read, on paper though please, you won’t find this girl reading on her phone or iPad. I like to turn the pages and cut out interesting stuff from magazines and stick them in my sketchbook.

Flow and Frankie are my most favourite magazines and our local international newsagent keeps them for me. Hurrah!

5. Printables are so great, I have never really used the printable stuff I see on blogs, but I have been loving these comic strip blanks from Doodles and Jots. My youngest loves to draw comics and he has been filling these up a storm.

Then there are these cool observation book printables from Handmade Charlotte and I am going to print them off for me and anyone else who wants a quick sketch. There is even one for drawing clouds in, I know a few adults who would love to fill a mini book with clouds. Me, me, pick me!

What are you loving right now? The weekend is here and I hope you have a lovely one.

Meet you back here tomorrow for Six Word Saturday.

Through the Lens Thursday 26. Imperfect.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

We are half way through the ‘Through the Lens Thursday’ project which means we are halfway through the year (yikes). I am so pleased I have been keeping up and taking a photo with my DSLR on manual every week for 26 weeks. In fact I haven’t switched back to auto all year, so I am a proud photo taker. Thanks to Alison at Writing Wishing and Greta at GFunkified for keeping us all going.

This week’s prompt was ‘Imperfect’ and I was racking my brains trying to think of something….my hair (going grey nicely, thanks for asking!), doughnuts for breakfast, video games, the burst slip ‘n’ slide in all of it’s duct tape glory….when we passed this wonky ‘stop’ sign and the decision was made.

We dropped the shopping at home and I grabbed my camera and walked back (not far thankfully) and snapped the leaning sign. I like the way the sign underneath it warns of angry cars, good to know.

Are you doing any year long projects? Is is worthwhile for you? I love the collection of photos I am getting, a weekly snapshot. I need to post all of the photos so far here at Girl Fifteen as most of the photos are currently residing at my old blog CatsEatDogs.

Happy photo taking!