Blue Skies, Kites and Sunshine

O.k it's been a long old while since the last post - been super busy photography wise with the exhibition preparation which is well under way with the prints ordered there are now not too many things left to do.

Anyway last week (?) I took a little trip to the downs and because Barney has not been photographed a little old while I bought my camera along.

Autumnal Arboretum

The Arboretum just outside Bristol is somewhere I have been wanting to visit ever since finding out about it's existence given that it is such a spectacle of natural beauty and so near by it seems silly not to pay a visit at least once, and what better time of year than Autumn when all the colours of the leaves flare up, a last spectacle before they inevitably die. One hindrance however is that the Arboretum  is not the cheapest of attractions, at £9 a head you have to be prepared to make your moneys worth while there.

However last Sunday for whatever reason at around 4pm, a comfortable hour and a half before sunset, there was absolutely no one kindly waiting to part me from my hard earned cash ... Result!

And then things just went from good to better ...

And then better still ...

All in all a very successful trip. We were not there for a very long time but the time that was spent there was worth every penny we didn't pay!

First tooth

My baby bro has his very first tooth, still very small but none the less - exciting!

New layout

Why? Because pictures look better on black backgrounds in my humble opinion.
Now enjoy some pictures:

Bath Time

I defy you to find a cuter baby!

New life makes losing life easier

Lots of people say that raising children teaches you about God and yourself, and how you relate. As I rocked my baby brother to sleep in my arms late one night last week I experienced this for the first time. The thing is, he is crying because he wants comforting but despite being in my arms for a good ten minutes he was still crying. This not because he wasn't comforted by my presence, the simple truth is that it takes a lot longer to get over something than it takes to get on top of you. Fortunately, by comparison to my brother, I am incredibly patient so I held him through the crying and the after sniffles, right through to deep sleep. That's when it stuck me, God isn't a whole lot different. He hangs on in there, from before things go bad, right through till they are better again. We might be too busy crying to notice that he is holding us, but he is a lot more patient than we all are so when we come to our senses and find him by our side, we look back and see that through the dark night, he was there, holding us all the while... A simple truth that I have heard a thousand times, but never experienced the impact of it on my life until now.

That is so oxford

Here comes yet another tale from last weekend... On our way over to East Grinstead we had to pick up my brother Josh, who lives in Oxford. It was an amazingly clear and sunny day so we weren't too keen to make it a flying stop, we would much rather lap up the rays of funshine in the amazing scenery that is Oxford rather than the hot seat of an over-full car. Josh was already on the ball and had decided to organise a game of tennis (pun intended) so that is exactly what we did.

We then proceeded to explore the surrounding park.

Yea, Barney was there too... or should I say 'El Barno' 

On a final note, all of the above is Oxford, but none say 'this is Oxford' quite like this:

It made us laugh...

Babysitting

'Tis a common occurrence in the world of Ben to be asked to sit for his baby brother Barnabas. It can be a pleasure for him to hang out with his younger brother who often reminds him of his older brother, or even his father in both looks and mental aptitude ( that was a joke )

Recently Ben was asked to carry out such a task and of course accepted as he had no good reason not to. As Ben had, just the previous day, received his camera lens back he supposed this a good opportunity to welcome back his baby ( the camera, not his brother ) Given that he had not taken a recent picture of Barnabas, as is a habit of his - in an attempt to record his development, this was an opportune moment to be seized.

'Smile'

'Hand off'

'Distracted'

'Budding photographer'

'Baby phone home'

'Mummy!'

Barry Lewis Art Exhibition

All credit must go to this man for all of the following works of art that I simply took pictures of.

Today was a wanderful day in weather and company. So the addition of an art exhibition only made things more enjoyable. Further, the exhibition was free and my step mum happened to know the artist which bought all the peices to life that little bit more as he talked us though some of the more spectacular and perculiar pieces.

Thankfully he was not only happy for me to take pictures of the gallery but also allowed my dad to place my baby brother on some of the larger sculptures!

So see if you can spot:  Lion(metal) : Corcosaurus : Dragonfly : Cheeky Monkey : Pegasus : Lobster : Girraffe : Crane Fly : Scorpion : Tarantula : Grass hopper : Boxing Rabbits : Saxaphone Bot : Seahorse : Dragon : Centipede : Jughead : Bird : Fishamajig : Hermit Crab : Aslan (stone): Owl


These are just a select few, there were several more that I dont have the memory or the time to name, but on the plus side, if you happen to be in bristol between now and the 27th of Feb 2010 then you can go see it yourself at the Grant Bradley gallery in Bedminster (very near ASDA) 


Things I liked the most about this exhibit:
 - The eco friendly ethos behind it all
 - The intricacy of all of the peices (especially the fish knives)

- The friendly chap who made them all
- The ingineuity and self restraint to make all of the peices from recycled scap.

Thats all for now. Enjoy !

Categories

so I have been wandering how I should go about organising my photos, at present I have broken down my photo collection into 8 categories:

1. arty 
2. bake 
3. barnabas 
4. misc 
5. nature 
6. old 
7. portraits 
8. events

Now this is working for me at the moment the problem I can forsee however, is an awful lot of overlap, for example portraits and events have a fair amount in common also pretty much all of the photos of barnaas are portraits and is it not possible to have an arty picture of nature?

I guess what I mean by the name 'arty' is that I have constructed and composed an environment specifically For the purpose of taking an artistic looking photograph, I have also used this as a label in previous posts and will continue to in later ones if you were wandering what I was on about.

Now, some pictures of baby Barnabas: