Different things to notice at Coombe Wood and Art update

COOMBE WOOD
This morning's walk with a friend began in the Coach House Cafe. While my friend had a coffee I tried an Intensely Beetroot Burst tea. I love the colour - I think it looks brilliant in the glass mug. It tasted fruity, not too sweet - I'd definitely have it again. I'm looking forward to trying the other new flavours soon too.

As I was looking at the tiny alpines one of the cats joined me.

The plants in the trough are really tiny. I don't know if these pale shovel-like structures are flowers or seeds. Perhaps I need to take a magnifying glass with me.  

A large party of walkers arrived - we headed in the opposite direction. Around the corner - a very small bright cyclamen. 

I was reluctant to linger too long taking photos in case my friend got bored. As a result I rushed and ended up taking a lot of dreadfully blurred photos - however on the plus side my friend noticed several things I hadn't spotted before. I must go back and try to take better photos of them all. These dark berries looked a bit like blackcurrants.

 My friend noticed a bunch of mistletoe growing in the hawthorn tree 

The snowdrops are doing well. 

The callicarpa berries are fading and shriveling up. 

Starry seed pods. . . 

. . . and the new flowers. 

My friend spotted a single attractively patterned leaf. I thought it had blown there but we discovered that it was attached to the ground. All around it and along the edge of the path were hundreds of tiny shoots growing from green seeds that had fallen there.

I have no idea what they are or how many will survive.

Roots can be seen emerging from the big one in the middle - some have rooted themselves.

 Pink camellias. 

From near the yew arch we saw the gardener pushing a wheelbarrow close to the little shelter. On our way to the gate I noticed some seed pods that I hadn't seen before. I must remember to try to get a better photograph of these when I'm there again.

Many of the flowers were flecked with bits of soil, thrown up by recent heavy rain.

ART UPDATE - A project for 2016

I wasn't sure what I was going to do - I wanted to continue the daily drawings that I did last year but do it differently. I started the year by drawing a pebble a day - the kind that have stripes on them. I tried them on a black background . . . 

 . . . then tried them without a black background.

I thought the lines on the pebbles looked a bit like oriental lettering - and inspired by the idea of the Japanese art of mending broken pottery with gold (Kintsugi) I thought "what if every stripe on each pebble was where it had been mended?" I cut the shapes of the stripes out of gold sticky back paper. (Reminder to myself: don't cut shapes that small again - it caused such terrible cramping in my hands).

Once again I tried them out on a white background . . .

. . . and on black - this time next to the original drawings. I don't like the two single stripes near each other - I might rearrange them or add some stripes.

I have also started experimenting with cutting the shapes from pages of an old book.

So where is this going in terms of a project for the year? I plan to start each month with 9 daily drawings of an object, or 9 similar objects e.g. pebbles for January, sticks for February, etc.

For the rest of the month I will play with interpretations of those drawings (could be quite abstract) using different materials. The aim is to produce at least 12, more if it goes well - could be 40 - 356 divided by 9) grids of nines during the year. At this stage the outline of the project might still change direction - but I'm putting this on here to encourage myself to stick with it and see where it goes. 

Thank you very much for joining me.