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THE FIRST BUDS OF SPRING
The First Buds of Spring watercolour, 25 x 16 inches, signed and dated 1885Lionel Percy Smythe It is still very cold here but the first buds of Spring are opening bringing us hope that soon winter...
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PAPIER-MACHE EASTER EGGS
Beautiful Easter shoot by Green Wedding Shoes.See their work Here:I like papier-mâché and used to have a collection of Easter egg boxes. I've no idea how or why I began to collect them, like so many...
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STORYTELLER - Daisy's Diamonds
Carey Mulligan plays Daisy Buchanan in The Great GatsbyDiamonds by Tiffany & CoThere is something really retro about summer that makes us all dreamy and sleepy. Thinking back to past times, the...
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MELLOW YELLOW
Although I have always loved art I have no talent in that sphere. From an early age I realised this (yet still delighted in art classes) and began to think in terms of colour and texture. I gathered...
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BLACKTHORN AT BELTAINE
Of all the trees that grow so fair,Old England to adorn,Greater are none beneath the SunThan Oak and Ash and Thorn.(Puck of Pook’s Hill, by Rudyard Kipling, 1906)Munchkin our Main Coon avoiding...
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SUMMERTIME BLUES
 Candle lit sandcastle by the sea, source unknown.  Summer is a riot of flowers. This year on clothes as well as in the garden, and every year we are reminded how well Lord Leighton captured the heat...
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I HAVE A DREAM
Martin Luther KingCome senators, congressmen Please heed the call Don't stand in the doorway Don't block up the hall For he that gets hurt Will be he who has stalled There's a battle outside And it is...
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BOOK PORTALS
This book proved impossible to resist. We had a third floor in our old cottage in Devon which was comprised of a large 3 roomed attic in the eaves. The smallest room became our study, the cats lounged...
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ARABIAN NIGHTS - in Holland Park
Dalziels Illustrated Arabian Nights EntertainmentsLondon: Ward, Lock, and Co. 1870. A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw: It was an Abyssinian maid, And on her dulcimer she played, Singing...
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Two Doors Down From The Witch
Two Doors Down Once upon a time in the 1980s I lived in an ordinary looking house in a terrace, (especially on a bright sunny day as this), in East Twickenham, by the river Thames, two doors down from...
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And Then There Were Three
Minerva and Morpheus Black Mrs Black and her naughty kitten IsabellaWe have been a family of two cats since November two years ago when Mrs Black, missing both her late husband Morpheus, and their much...
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in the Company of Wolves
A mystical version of Santa Clausfrom Arthur Rackham's Book of Pictures published in 1913. This painting was done in 1907, pen, ink & watercolour on paper, and is in a Private Collection. Photo ©...
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The Kindness of Strangers
'Catching Butterflies' by Colleen ParkerHERE:I don't publish blog posts as often as I mean to. I have a folder full of subjects and images which whisper to me, spinning their stories like dream...
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David Bowie ~ The Stars Line Up
Bowie fans lay flowers at the mural created in 2013 by Australian street artist James Cochran.The wall of Morley’s department store, in Tunstall Road, Brixton. It wascommissioned as part of the...
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The Gothic Wardrobe
The elaborate carvings at the top of The Gothic Wardrobeof vine leaves, gothic arches and Tudor rosesI'm busy Spring cleaning and have just dusted the carvings on this Gothic Wardrobe. Which reminded...
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Queen Elizabeth II - 90th Birthday
The Queen Mother with the then Princess Elizabeth, 1937Happy 90th Birthday to Queen Elizabeth II. This week seems to be one of anniversaries, some good and some bad. The 200th anniversary of the birth...
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Sweet Prince
Resplendent PrinceHis flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise.Samuel Taylor...
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William Shakespeare - For all time
William Shakespeare detail from The Cobbe portraitKnown to be Shakespeare"He was not of an age, but for all time."William Shakespeare is a man for all seasons though in truth we barely know the man...
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Mid Summer Dreaming
"If a June night could talk, it would probably boast it invented romance."- Bern Williams This summer in the English countryside has seen no sign of Flaming June. It has been a landscape of muddy...
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Beatrix Potter ~ 150th Birthday
Beatrix Potter levels her strong gaze at the camera as a childI hate missing anniversaries, and of course as history steadfastly carries on further down the path the chances to stand still to enjoy an...
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