1st January 2010 - that's a wrap

Well I have done it!! I have taken a photo everyday for a year and I have really enjoyed documenting my year. It has been an interesting and active year - I must have walked hundreds of miles - wish I had put a pedometer on!

I am so glad that I have taken part in this project. This my finished album - its huge!

I am so pleased with my lovely album and I will enjoy looking back on it in years to come - fondly remembering all the people I have spent time with and recalling the beautiful places that I have visited. This is the front page:-

and this is the back page:-

The following are just a small selection of pages from my album.

Thank you to everyone who willingly or unwillingly allowed me to take their photo for my daily record.

Thank you very much to everyone for visiting my blog - I hope you have enjoyed sharing a year in my life.

Thank you to all the other girls in the 365 photo group on UKS - I have really enjoyed seeing all your daily photos as well - you have all be very inspirational - thank you for sharing your lives with me.

Thank you to everyone who has left comments - I have really appreciated reading them.

I had been hoping to take a well earned break from photography now- but Pam has scuppered my plans by putting out a new project here over at UKS - which I just cannot resist! Its called 52 walks with my camera and we should take photos on our weekly walks and post them to the Flickr group - here. It sounds real fun as as I love my walks and this will help make sure I choose lots of different & varied places to walk, so I should be able to complete this project. And it does not involve daily blogging - I think my family would lynch me - if I tried to continue doing this each day. I am going to take a little rest from blogging for a while now.

I still have lots of other projects that I also want to concentrate on such as scrap booking. This 365 project has forced me to push my scrap booking on the back burner and I have really missed it. I have so many ideas buzzing around my head - I have just got to get them down on some layouts before my little brain explodes!

I have enjoyed recording my year - so I am going to do something similar this year, but on a much smaller scale - Scrapbooks etc. is doing a scrapbook project - using sketches by Becki Fleck - who will provide a double page sketch for each month - so I will end up with a 12 double layouts - showing my year.

I also want to do some new projects - sewing 4 quilts for the children and actually finding time to learn how to take photographs properly. I have felt the pressure to take a photo everyday, quite acutely - I concentrated on finding a topic or subject each day - rather than technique and if I have learnt anything this year - its that my photo taking skills could be much improved if only I was not rushing each one - so I am going to read, learn and attend classes - so that when I attempt this project again in 10 years time (when I am 60) - the photos should be much better.

Thanks for dropping by!

31st December photo - last day of this 365 project and the start of a New Year

Happy New Year to you all!

Today - New Years Eve is the last day of my 365 project and the photo above is going to be my POTD. I am toasting the start of a new year and new opportunities - while Steven is toasting to the fact that he will never ever have to have his photo taken again or hear the words 'I have just got to do my blog first' , when he comes home from work and expecting his tea on the table!

We have spent a quiet day - enjoyed a walk along the riverbank, studying the bridges that cross the River Severn in Shrewsbury, in preparation for a new geocache that I am in the process of setting up.

The Welsh bridge.

The English bridge

Kingsland toll bridge

Porthill footbridge.

Back at home I did my traditional New Year duty and filled in my new Calendar and diary.

We indulged in another tasty Chinese takeaway (can be a whole week since we had our last takeaway, on Christmas Eve?) before settling down to watch Jools Holland bring in the New Year.

Happy new year to you all and please pop by tomorrow to see my final blog post.

30th December photo - snow at last!

3-4" of snow is what the weather forecasters promised overnight - so I went to bed quite excited thinking that at long last I could get a snowy photo before the end of this project. Imagine my disappointment when I looked out of the window and saw rain! Not to be deprived of a snowy photo (as everyone else has one!) I decided that action was needed and set my sights on Wales - where I was sure there must be some snow. Steven sensing my determination, realised that it was better not to disagree with me and just got in the car and kept quiet as I drove through howling wind & rain - clearly thinking I had turned into a mad woman.

Anyway - I was proved right and we found some snow and I got my snowy photo!! This photo is taken at an earth cache where millions of years ago lots of rocks tumbled down the valley from the top creating a river of rocks. There is nothing to find at an earth cache - you just have to have your photo taken to prove you have been there.

We drove to just outside Llangollen and started the walk at Valle Crucis Abbey and did 6 geocaches along a 4 mile route - which did feel quite a bit longer as we had to tread carefully as there was still quite a lot of ice about. Actually it was a really nice after Christmas walk with beautiful scenery and the snow just added to the magical (but cold) feel of it and by the end of it, I think he was quite pleased that I had dragged him out into Wales.

Despite wrapping up warmly - we were quite cold after being outside for 3 hours or so - so we headed into Llangollen town and found a lovely cafe and had a bowl of tomato & chilli soup which certainly warmed us up before heading home - with me smugly pleased with myself that with just one day to go - I at long last, had got my snowy photo!

Just one slight problem now - which of these 4 photos do I print out for my album!!

29th December photo - categorically speaking

Today we played another of Jessica's favourite games - Categorically Speaking. Steven insisted that we keep the letter 'Y' in one of the rounds - much to our protest - then he fumed cause he could not think of any words beginning with 'Y' for alcoholic drinks, Disney characters, things in the sky and symbols found on maps!

He is a very naughty boy - because when I ran off to fetch my camera - he thought it would be funny to rearrange the letters to spell a rude word - hoping that I would not notice and post it on my blog for the whole world to see! Men!

28th December photo - Lou's wedding

A friend got married today at Shrewsbury Castle - she looked absolutely gorgeous and I like this photo best - but it is in portrait mode so won't go in my album, so this second one is the actual one I will print out.

The proposal and wedding were so romantic - Scott proposed her out of the blue - she had given up hope of him ever asking her! Both her son's are going to serve abroad in January - so in just 6 weeks she had booked and arranged her wedding and it went off without a hitch.

Shrewsbury Castle is such a lovely setting for a wedding. It is now a military Museum - so it was quite fitting, given that both her son serve in the British Army. Lou with her Father & Sons'.

The castle looked lovely today and the rain kept off for her.

It was nice to be with friends - Judith, Flunky & Gael

27th December photo - lovely choccie bics!

Oh dear - we have all eaten far too many of these gorgeous chocolate biscuits. These are our favourite ones.
I think a very long walk tomorrow is called for!

26th December photo - Boxing day

Today my sister's family came up for the day and Peter very kindly agreed to be my POTD as I had not been able to go out and take the photo that I had got planned in my head.

Thanks for coming to my rescue again peter!