Clare Davis Etheridge

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New York Photos from my June visit

I had a very interesting, informative and photo-ful trip to New York and Brooklyn last month.

Some highlights were the Punk exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum, Coney Island even with the Mermaid Parade chaos, Tinsel Trading (my new favourite shop) and seeing friends and friends.

My trip into the big city on Friday. The Met for Punk Chaos and Central Park for a sunny walk with a lovely friend.

I came across Tinsel Trading as I was heading from a magazine shop to Muji and I am so happy I did, the place was amazing, I wanted to move in there! Trims and buttons, vintage and ribbons as far as the eye could see all displayed in old cabinets and drawers. Gorgeous. I came out with some beads, silk ribbon and metal thread. I thought I was rather restrained, I hope you are proud of me!

Coney Island colour and fun!

My last day in Brooklyn. I had to visit the Momofuku Milk bar and Union Market. I picked up some international magazines and caught the ferry over to Governor’s Island and back.

So, that was the New York round-up from me. Hope you liked my little photo collection.

Have a happy week!

Challenges and an actual challenge.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Monthly, daily, weekly challenges. Do you love then or do you hate them. Or do you love the idea of them and hate that you never stick with them?

I have been doing the photo a day challenge with prompts provided by Chantelle at Fat Mum Slim for almost a year now and it is now totally part of my day no matter how busy I am. Some photos are snaps which barely meet the prompt and some are worked on with filters and all sorts of nonsense from a variety of apps.
I started the daily photo thing with Hipstamatic who also do a prompt based challenge on Instagram. I love the Hipstamatic app, but I don’t want to have to use it for every photo.

I saw a challenge on A Beautiful Mess today – The 30 day self portrait challenge. My initial reaction was holy squashed avocados, even I don’t want to see a month of photos of me!

Why would any modest person want to do this, blah blah, blah. Then I saw it again on Instagram and saw some comments – ‘great idea’, ‘I’m in’, ‘isn’t that a bit vain?’ Among the many many comments. I decided I agree on all points and I am in!

Maybe a bunch of selfies might be a liberating thing I am thinking (as I try to justify this rather vain undertaking!). Maybe it will bring out the best in my non ability to take a decent photo of me. I always look cross or just weird, or both which isn’t a great look.

Part of the challenge for me is posting them all, I mean I can post them, I know how, but will I want to? What if I am having a mirror melting day? Oh, I know, there will be an app for that! Or of course there are always the good old feet photos…

I am looking forward to geting some practice as my blog photo is in the snow (ahem, needs an update).

My Etsy photo is of my back (need one with jewels which I have made methinks).

Maybe I can turn this challenge frown upside down and use it to my advantage and get some decent and appropriate profiles out of it.

I know, first day and I am hiding behind a turnip!

Any challenges tickling your fancy? Photos, sketches, writing, poetry, art? Don’t you just want to do them all?! I do! Find me on Instagram @catseatdogsmakes.

Shell pendants and button bracelets

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

Remember these beauties? Found on Chatham beach in Cape Cod, holes and everything.

I utilized those handy little natural holes and made some pendants and added a freshwater pearl for a little bit of fancy.

I have also made these simple button bracelets which are great all layered up. I use one fabulous vintage button on leather and let it be.

I think I am liking these so much I am going to add them to my Etsy store for sale. Want one?

I found a new funky photo app for the phone, I am still playing around with it, but I do love it. I used it to make the button bracelet photo. It is the Rhonna Designs app and it lets you add text and icons and phrases and all sorts of bits and bobs. There are lots of options and a great colour choice which I think is missing from alot of other apps.

Check out the website (that’s the link a few lines up), it is a thing of beauty and I am going to check out the creative exercises right now.

When I have had a play with this app, I will do a review and demo using it. Yay!

Found any groovy apps lately? Want to share?

My Grandma was ace!

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

My Grandma was ace! She was a baker, knitter (you know the professional knitter who can watch TV, hold a conversation and still knit a pair of socks) and a gardener. Her name was Mary and she lived in Waddington, Lincoln, UK.

My Grandad owned a red Mini and whenever me and my brother went to stay for a week over the summer, we loved going on a trip into town (the heady destination of Lincoln) in the back of the mini with Grandma and Grandad.

The first thing that springs to mind when I think about my Grandma is that she was a wonderful cook and especially her baking. So many delicious pies and cakes and biscuits. She always welcomed help from me as far as I remember, even when I was little I would help sift flour and put the weights onto the scales.

She had a little stool which I could stand on while I was helping and I am happy to be the proud owner of it now. Lovely reminders like that stool make me a happy girl every day.

I am so glad I have her recipe books now, they are full of recipes I still use and I love all of the little extra comments she has written with the recipes – ‘economical’, ‘very good’, ‘too sweet’. My favourite is ‘The vital ingredient in this cake is 1/4 pint beer’ in Beer fruit loaf. Sounds like an obvious statement, but don’t forget how we all try and substitute ingredients if we don’t have the exact ones! I am assuming a 1/4 pint of Dr Pepper wouldn’t quite work!

She also noted who gave her the recipe or where it came from ‘Eva’s’, ‘Weekly News’, ‘Kathleen’ (my Mum).

My recipe cards are kept in a little grey index card box, not at all pretty, but I am happy to have a gathering of recipes I use all the time and some I forget about all together! I will write on them and cover them in ingredients – my ‘Banana/peanut butter/chocolate chip bread’ recipe is covered in peanut butter stains!

I look forward to passing my crabby box, or my lovely recipe book (when and if I gather the energy to transfer them all over onto a pretty book. Frankly unlikely) onto my kids or grandchildren or whoever wants an old fashioned written collection of recipes from various sources.

Don’t get me wrong I love Pinterest and online recipe gathering and get lots of recipe ideas from there, some of which are in my little box. But I like to follow a recipe from paper where it won’t switch off to a black page every time I turn my back. I might need to hold open the pages of my new recipe book with a couple of cans, and cover the whole lot in flour and butter, but I can’t write a note on my iPad screen, which has just gone black, again.

July ten on the 10th

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

As usual (it seems!), it is raining on the morning of ten on the 10th. At least it is cooler that way, so no complaints here.

Following some thunderous storms in the early hours, it was still raining when we planned to set off to see Despicable Me 2 at the cinema. So, we grabbed the umberellas, stopped on the way for illegal snacks (how much are cinema sweets? Too much, I tell you!) and off we went.

I got a funny poster picture of a minion from the movie theatre which also fitted today’s photo a day challenge theme which was ‘Smooth’. He he.
Space man toy.

My button tin, just some of my vintage buttons which I love to use in jewelry but I am often unwilling to part with them!

Button bracelets, made with the aforementioned buttons. I wear these two, but I am planning to make some to sell, if I can stop myself from claiming them as mine!

During the summer, we usually end up at the YMCA pool every day for an hour or so.

I do like the pool colours and mosaic signs. I remember when both of my boys thought this end was deep too!

The spaceman dude through my sunnies.

My boys have re-discovered their soldier guys!

The Enormous Turnip!

Beetroot from the garden ready for my salad!

A very nice summer day! It wasn’t as hot as I thought it was going to be and the rain stopped falling on our heads.

Sun prints revisited

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

We are getting into the sun prints this summer. Might as well put the scorching sun to good use!

The prints we made last week have been made into new pictures with the help of me, some markers and my eight year old son!

As we finished drawing on the original prints, Bodhi told me he had already put some more items out to ‘print’!

What projects have you got up your sleeve for the summer holidays?

Sun prints

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I read about sun prints in a post by Jeanette at Artchoo I think, I honestly can’t remember where I saw the idea, but I am sure it is not my own! Anyway, go see Artchoo, it is chock full of kids art projects and ideas!

We used construction paper and random objects and put them in full sun for the afternoon.

After a few hours (about 5), the magic was revealed! I think there is more we can do with these ‘prints’. Watch this space (mainly because I haven’t done anything with them yet!).

I made a heart with buttons which moved slightly during the process and gave a double exposure effect. I love the scissors, the blue paper was very successful.

Construction paper fades out so quickly I am sure this would work well in less sun and less time.

I see more sun print experiments in our summer break. What are you up to? Making lots of art and having a great time I hope!

June 2013 Photo a day

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I cannot believe how fast June has zipped by (I am sure I say that every month!). At the same time, when I look back at the photos from the beginning of the month, they seem so long ago.

We have been on holiday to Cape Cod for two whole weeks, then I was back in St Louis for about 10 minutes and I was off to New York for the Alt Summit and a lovely weekend in Brooklyn.

It has been hot and cool and wet and stormy.

I followed the A Month of… prompts from Just B Australia for most of the month, but by the last week I was back to Fat Mum Slim. Apparently it is harder to break a habit than I thought! I do enjoy the FMS prompts though even though they do circle round on a regular basis, but that just makes for a new photo challenge, n’est pas?!

Well, here are my June daily snaps.

1. Tea

2. Story.

3. Fabric

4. Party. Pie from Marion’s Pie Shop!

5. Comic. The Sassafras tree has funny leaves!

6. Game. Found these cards in a cupboard in the holiday cottage.

7. Word. I bought a set of vintage stacking blocks at a flea market.

8. House. Moon Snail house.

9. Dress. Beach dress/shoes

10. Mother. Having a bonkers moment!

11. Book. Another flea market buy, just for the cover!

12. Baked. Teeny tiny seastar, baked in the sun.

13. Art. Shells on the beach

14. Print. The uniform of Cape Cod!

15. Kitchen.

16. Child. A gift from my youngest child, a set of vintage brass swans.

17. Memory. I went to the gym and forgot my shoes!

18. Style. Washi tape style.

19. Toy. Another flea market buy.

20. Music. Crafts at Alt Summit – music to my soul.

21. Film. Times Square, NYC

22. Family. Coney Island, full of families.

23. Colour. Governor’s Island, NYC

24. Holiday. Time to make bread for breakfast in the summer holidays.

25. Hair. Very dirty hair on this pup.

26. Empty Fat Mum Slim prompts from here.

27. Into the sun. Nearly made star earrings.

28. Red.

29. In my bag.

30. Handwriting.

A busy month indeed! I will be following the Fat Mum Slim prompts for July.

Are you playing along? Do you do any photo or writing or sketching challenges? Do tell!

St Louis Art Museum Grand Re-Opening and ‘Stone Sea’

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

This weekend I am joining in with Tasha Chawner’s weekend photo prompt. The latest prompt is ‘hands’. I wondered what I would use for the photo for a while, then stopped thinking about it.

While we were at the St Louis Art Museum‘s grand re-opener, there was a stand where they were making seed bombs, using mud and clay with grass and flower seeds. So my youngest got in and started rolling up seed bombs and getting nice and dirty in the process. Well, here were my ‘hands’. Busy making good things happen.

We have been looking forward to seeing the new wing of the museum open as we have walked by it regularly as it was being built.

We were not disappointed. It is a lovely airy, cool space and smells of new wooden floors. It is almost a museum in itself with the wide variety of art on show.

It was a joy to see some of my favourite pieces all housed together, from Chuck Close’s ‘Keith’ to the ever beautiful ‘Betty’ by Gerhard Richter (the girl in the red, one of my favourite paintings in the whole wide world).

‘Spectrum II’ is spectacular as ever and I was happy to get a couple of clear shots of it with all of it’s colours.

I was very excited to see the Andy Goldsworthy ‘Stone Sea’ and it is amazing, I thought it would be all closed in, but the top is open to the elements, so it will be interesting to see how it changes over time.

I caught it today in a rain storm!

I love the way it is all crammed in and the arches all are forced to work together.

For out last visit, we walked through the new sculpture hall and outside to see the Yoko Ono ‘Wish Trees’. We got outside and thunder greeted us, but no matter, we admired the trees and of course the ‘Stone Sea’ (in my opinion the best view is from outside looking down).

The labels and pens were grabbed and we ran for shelter to write our wishes and took turns attaching the wishes to the trees as the rain poured down.

The rain cooled the temperatures and watered our gardens and the Wish Trees, so no complaints.

We are already looking forward to our next visit to the Art Museum. I don’t think I will ever get enough of the ‘Stone Sea’.

Alt Summit NYC June 2013

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

I have consulted my notes, chosen a few photos and here is my Alt Summit round-up.

Of course it was an amazing experience and my brain was and still is full to the lid with people, information and ideas. Mission accomplished, but how was the day?

When I arrived at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, I shared the elevator with a very peppy young man who jumped in (yes, almost literally) and told me the news that Dolce and Gabbana had been arrested for tax evasion. Next floor he jumped (yes, again) out. Morning news flash – complete.

I found a seat and a coffee and took it all in for a minute or two.

Over breakfast there were lots of crafts on offer to make while you munched on your granola and downed as much coffee as possible (that part may have just been me, following a nervous and sleepless night). I made salt scrub, started a thread bracelet and got an embroidery kit and immediately began to wonder how I was going to transport this out of the Summit, let alone home!

I swapped a few business cards and met a few bloggers I follow on Instagram or on Bloglovin’. I must say that it was quite hard to find specific people, especially those whose blogs I follow and I don’t really know what they look like. Short of randomly grabbing name badges, I failed at this and consequently missed a few bloggers I would have liked to talk to. Thank goodness for the interweb! I did meet Emily from A Beautiful Hello and Becky from Little Siddall Studios and Paige from Approaching Joy.

I want these fantastic heads for my walls!

The speakers were full of information and I scribbled like a crazy person in my purple notebook, hoping my writing could keep up and that I would understand anything when I looked back. The moment of truth is here as I find some of my favourite moments.

Grace Bonney of Design Sponge “Do not waiver based on other peoples fears”.

They Draw and Cook “Play is the highest form of research” Wise words from Salli Swindell.

Every word and slide from Valentine Freeman of Ace Hotels. Especially “Heart of Power, Heart of Sudden Lights” which sounds like a fabulous song lyric.

Garance Dore “Arrive on Time” and “Arrive Smiling” Great advice which everyone on the planet should follow.

Finally another from the beautiful and amazing Garance “People don’t expect you to be perfect, they expect to understand your message”

The view from the roof of Martha Stewart Living and the ‘apres summit’ cocktail party. Great place to grow lavender and feel the breeze in my very full brain.

On the way back to the Metro, laden down with books, boxes, magazines and information, I spotted this guy. Of course I had to struggle my phone out of my bag to snap him!