Inspiration on a Dreary Day

First off, I have given my blog a facelift! I’ve been working on it for about a week now. I’m excited about the changes I made, and I’ll be adding more items to the top navigational menu as I have time. Now, on with the show!

Compared to the previous winters, we’ve had it pretty lucky (so far). But yesterday was a dreary & windy day. I had been working a lot, and needed to get out, and needed some inspiration.

I am fairly secluded since I work at home and live by myself. So I’ve decided I need to get back to weekly artist dates to get me out of the house and among the living. (I live across from a cemetery.) Even though it was almost closing time, I went to my “go-to” place on the way to the grocery store.

A winter weather advisory was starting. And based on things that have happened the last two winters, my knee-jerk reaction when I hear that now is to go to the store to buy a lot of toilet paper and a lot of food. And I needed to do that anyway. (Well, I didn’t need lots of either, but hey.)

My go-to place is a local nursery, Sunrise Garden Center,  not too far from my house. I love plants & flowers, so it’s always a pick-me-up when I go there, especially in the winter since it’s warm. But yesterday it was even dark in there. I was still able to check out all of the beautiful plants and snap some photos.

They had some lovely orchids blooming that were detailed with incredible color patterns.

The grafted cacti were bursting with color, but still look interesting in black and white.

Then I came across this beauty. I didn’t look at the tag to see what kind of plant it was because I knew I only had a few minutes left before the shop closed, and I wanted to take some more photos.

Since I was using my iPod Touch and the hipstamatic app, I wanted to shoot some variations of the blooming plant by using different “film” and “lenses.”

I think they turned out great! And now I have some more photos to use in my visual journal and in my art work. I prefer to use my own photos in my work because it makes it more personal. So getting out to take pictures is a great way not only to create more original material to work with, but to also stay inspired.

I went home from the nursery with two mini plants. They were so tiny & cute & inexpensive that I couldn’t resist. It’s hard to tell the scale in the photo, but their pots are only 2″ tall! They are the perfect size to put on my kitchen windowsill.