August Be Home Free Winners

As every week goes by the BeHomeFree gallery fills up with more and more incredible images. The task of whittling it down becomes harder with the passing days and that is a good thing.  Thank you to everyone who uses the hashtag, it is growing into a really lovely gallery.  

These four remind me of the my outdoor adventures this month, the natural colours and sense of fresh air and sunshine. 

@melindajk @sigridsminde @niki.at.the.cottage @christinagreve

Our sponsors for this month have been One World Trading who are gifting a vase, and the winner for this prize is @justjane17 whose washing blowing on the line says all there is about summer days.

Southwood Stores have also offered to be a sponsor with their glitzy sequined basket. And the winner of this will be Dorte of @lewesmap for this quiet and still image in a church, with lovely soft light and a sense of calm.  I really love exploring inside churches and around the graveyards, this photo speaks of the cool air and special smells of old churches. Perhaps it is also a reminder that children don't always need plastic entertainment.

Can Jane and Dorte please message me through instagram to arrange delivery of your gift from Be Home Free, One World Trading and Southwood Stores. 

Next month's sponsors will be announced at the beginning of September when I will also be unveiling the work I've been doing to change my bedroom around, which during this mini heatwave has been quite a task as the paint is drying really fast.

Please continue to join with the hashtag with a chance to win. Many thanks to each and everyone who has contributed so far. 

Love and peas ... Janice

Slowlived Summer Photography

Victorian style photos that look like paintings are my current interest and folly.  Photography is my main passion, although I am very enthusiastic about a lot of things as you probably realise. Photography opens another sense, it bring an awareness for light and detail, composition and placement.  It is my motivation to get off my butt and see the world, (or maybe even just a few hours away).

I stayed in the most amazing Air bnb this weekend and the location just lent itself to more photos inspired by old paintings. We had such a typically English feel set on a farm near Petworth, that Victorian style John Constable influences were in abundance.

The old farmhouse is surrounded by lovely gardens full of roses and fruit trees, meadows and ponds. 

To make the photos more atmospheric I applied some effects using Florabella.  With these applications in your photoshop you can mess about with filters and overlays, adding sun, flare, brown tones, hazes and so on. You can see a few of the effects here ...

this photo has actual real lens flare which happened at the time of taking it.

Shopham Bridge Farmhouse Petworth have three places to where you can put your head down and unwind, the Hay Loft, where we stayed, A shepherds hut and a converted horse box.  Set alongside a stream with weeping willows and a hammock, the setting is like something out of a painting. So we took lots of photos in the style of old English painters, part of a series that I'm working on.

I can see why Mary is a Super Host, as I've never been to such a well equipped and well provided for Air bnb before. I didn't expect to be writing a blog review of Shopham Bridge but we had such a magical time that it would be impossible not to recommend.

By taking the dslr out of auto mode, I am shooting more dark and moody photos at the moment, however, despite the fact that I learnt on manual cameras some forty years ago, I still find the digital settings confusing. In fact dslr's are so advanced that they can be overwhelming to someone who just wants to take photos and not get bogged down with instruction manuals and techno babble.

Deliberate lens flare adds a sparkle of magic. Sometimes it's good not to get too technical or controlled.  When I shot on film I would use a black and white film which I would then get processed in a colour developer, the results were extremely random, Sepia tones, and, of course, you didn't know what the results would be until after you had the prints developed. 

The wind blew the willow branches across the frame .. the sunlight streamed through the tree catching highlights of hair and hand.

And with a slightly sad heart to leave, we packed our bags and set off to the a secluded beach at Clymping.

The clouds looked like they had been painted in the sky and the wind blew away the cobwebs. 

I hope this may inspire you to take up photography and play with the idea of unusual portraits, ones with atmosphere and memories.

To find the Air bnb I stayed in search for "Shopham Bridge Farm House Petworth" they have three listings on there.  We stayed in the Hay loft and it was ample space for two and includes the roll top bath seen above.   The coast was about 45 mins drive away.

Making Memories

This week for me has definitely been about exploiting the 'free' part of Be Home Free. I've been exploring the local area, finding some new places and managed to do it all without getting rained on.

Magical places have been found on my doorstep. We made some beautiful memories.

Buckinghamshire is such an abundant county and sometimes it takes a lot of travel to realise how pretty England is.  I moved out of London nearly ten years ago and have made a concerted effort not to get complacent about the rolling hills, fields of gold, red and blue, spectacular stately homes and gardens, winding lanes and wildlife.

This year my plan is to get out more, to visit friends all over the country, stay for odd nights in Yurts and Air bnb's, mooch about previously unexplored towns and shops and have some adventures. Sometimes you don't even have to go very far to witness the spectacular, and this week was one such example.

Through a friend on facebook I heard about the poppy fields at Chesham, so we packed a picnic, took a book to flick through and headed off up a winding lane until we saw the flash of scarlet on the horizon.

We couldn't believe our eyes, it was so incredible that it felt unreal, like being transported into a painting or film.  And not for the first time that week either because a few days earlier we found Castle Ashby.

Situated in Northamptonshire, I had spotted something about this place and wondered how we had never stumbled across it before, even my step-daughter who lives quite close had not come across it. 

The Orangerie is like something from a Pre-Raphaelite story, you can see Rossetti setting up his easel, a stunning model playing Beata Beatrix or Ophelia languishing in the warm muggy atmosphere of this indoor greenhouse.  Light dances around the lush plantation, for here things thrive and the soul is fed with possibilities. We wanted to stay, to move in and live there ...

Proving that sometimes, it's the little things, the free stuff, the nature around us which is the most marvellous of all. For me a day in a poppy field is worth more than a week in a hotel, get out there good people and ... be home ... free ...

making it wonderful everyday

The latest hashtag I've been going crazy for is the Ikea one, #WonderfulEveryday. It completely describes what I'm trying to achieve in my life.

It warms the cockles of my heart that so many people are embracing the concept of slow living, something I definitely did not do in my youth, but I'm well and truly ready for it now. 

Whether approaching retirement or just choosing not to work so much, filling the empty spaces between what you have to do and need to do, is very important. Time is precious and as it ticks away I'm making plans, always making sure that there is something to look forward to in the diary.  Taking life by the scruff of the neck and giving it a massive shake. But fulfillment doesn't have to be frantic. 

Keeping my hands busy at all times, making things for myself or others, this ethos of creating something from nothing is integral in my life.  A hand knitted gift is always well received. It is also very therapeutic, a great stress reliever and proven to lower blood pressure. 

Volunteering in areas that you love, donating your precious time to help others, there is nothing more rewarding.  For me it's animals and particularly wildlife and on our rescue missions we meet other animal lovers who, like us, will go the extra mile to help out the wildlife around them. Fresh air, finding new places and interacting with nature, all these go along with the work.

Earlier this week we were called out to save a swan who had been attacked, unfortunately she did not make it and died on top of her eggs on the nest. We moved her body so that the male swan could take over, he seems to be doing very well on his own, so we hope he manages to rear the baby signets as a single parent. The people living locally are buying swan food and keeping a very close eye on him. So many people were deeply upset by the death of the female swan, there are a lot of other animal lovers out there. 

No these aren't swan eggs, they are quail eggs which were bought out of some complete madness by my other half. So I used them in some photos. They may go in a salad.  Tattoos, oh yes lots more planned, Ive got bookings with three more brilliant lady tattooists including Rebecca Vincent and Aimee Cornwell. And whilst this might sound like a bizarre way to nurture yourself, yes it is very painful - silly question - it is an incredible culture to be involved with. 

Lots of travel booked too, I can't believe how cheap flights can be if you are able to travel at any time. So Sweden next week, Romania in the Autumn (I shall be talking more about that soon), and plenty of exploring around the UK.  

So whatever the extent you go to in pursuing some nurturing for yourself, whether its a small bunch of flowers, some lovely healthy food or an adventure, I hope you find some moments between the madness to explore - both the physical and mental.

Share your love where you can good people, and be good to yourself. 

Instagram lovelies and hashtag fun

For the last few months I have been getting messages and questions from friends and colleagues about Instagram.  Several of my blogger friends have been running online courses to help you focus on the look of your feed but the one thing I get asked a lot is "who do I follow" and "which hashtags", for the beginner who wants to get involved in this community here is just one small element that has taken me the last year to distill. These are my personal choice of people I have watched and interacted with and maybe this will give you a starting point if you are feeling overwhelmed.

Before I start on the lists, please please, forgive me if I have missed you out, I put this rough list together in just the last few days. Since getting the menopause (theres a month of blog posts right there!) I have suffered from chronic fatigue and forgetfulness.  So I started to write down notes and take screen shots of posts on Instagram to remind me of things I wanted to take part in and that I thought would be good photography tasks.

As you investigate the accounts and hashtags that I recommend you will become familiar with the style of their work and theme. The photo above is something that I would consider for Emma Harris's tuesday challenge #aquietstyle, taking a moment of quiet in the day for peace and calm and a bit of styling. 

You may have seen some of my posts for Urban Jungle Bloggers, this is a community for plant lovers, they set a monthly topic to style your plants in a certain way, so above is my #plantshelfie.  Urban Jungle Bloggers is a worldwide community set up by Igor and Judith. If you have plants in your home then you may want to sign up with them, info can be found on their UJB site.

For interior design lovers who are proud to show off their homes and peer into others, then At Mine is a community for you. It is a website of members homes which is constantly being updated. On Instagram they also set monthly challenges, so the pic above is one for Style At Mine table settings this month. 

Instagram hashtag challenges are often set up as collaborations by two accounts.  The first I ever tried is dear to my heart and it is 'A Year Of Moments' with Lobster & Swan and Candy Pop.  Every month they give you a topic to interpret, this month it is #ayearofmoments_magical so I took the above photo with fairy lights to add a bit of sparkle and seasonal magic.

This photo could span several topics, it show a cup of coffee so could be put in for #adoremycupofcoffee  and #mythursdaybreaktime as I have used the autumnal colours, leaves and pumpkin it also fits with any November themed tags - #cherishandrelish_november #natureinthehome #stylingtheseasons 

Styling The Seasons with Apartment Apothecary (Katy) and Lotts And Lots (Charlotte) is a big favourite of mine too.  Usually I style a whole area of the house and totally enjoy doing it.  But this month it's a flat lay as they have joined with Emily Quinton to win a place on a course with her. So the hashtag this month is #STSxmakelight.  Emily started the huge hashtag #floralfridaycompetition, and like many weekly hashtags it runs on a certain days. The clue is usually in the title like #mymondaymoodboard with Jess and Lucy (it also has its own instagram account). Others are like ; #mystillsunday #itsamoodywednesday #mandalamonday #mymonthofsundays 

Some larger hashtag communities have their own devoted accounts and nominate guest hosts every week to choose the winners and set the topic. Accounts like It's My Week will set a tag like #myweekofwhatisee #myweekofabstract.

There are too many people here for me to set up direct links to, I have also compiled a Pinterest board showing lovely photographers you can find it here, this is just a small selection of accounts that style in a way I find pleasing. They may give you ideas of what kind of pics you want to take yourself. Remember that Instagram is all about the photo. 

My personal advice is not to bother with a hashtag that says #flowers #pink and general descriptive words of that nature, but to find a group of people producing say a pink floral image - this may fall into floralfridaycompetition as an example.  Anyway I think you get my point about which hashtags to use and research. The best way to suss it out is just to go on there and click on the # to see what comes up, explore for yourself.

The themes are so many and varied, it will be possible for you to find ones that fit with the kind of pictures you want to take, it just takes a bit of hunting.  So the one above would be suitable say for Capturing Colour with Capture By Lucy, a colourful lifestyle theme.  

This is quite a list to type so you will need to sift through it and keep referring back I expect so here goes with the hashtags and themes I have been looking at this week :

#laidbacklivingis with @dorisleestudio, #stsxmakelight #stylingtheseasons with @aptapothecary @lottsandlots, #oftheland and #fosterthoughtfulness with @toasttravels, #ayearofmoments_magical with @lobsterandswan @candypop.uk, #cherishandrelish_november @allenandbear @flojoro123, #natureinthehome @littlegreenshed, #mythursdaybreatime @littlemaldod #myseasonof_florals @claireyclaire @hellolaurajane, #nestandflourish @xxbirdhouse @liveandbloom, #petalsandprops @aalmadr, #thesestoriestold @rosehippaper, #sundaysatmine @atmine, #capturingcolour @capturebylucy, #floralfridaycompetition @emilyquinton, #aquietstyle @aquietstyle, #mystillsunday #fouriadorefriday @kimklassen, #slowliving @geoffreyandgrace @hippieindisguise, #thisjoyfulmoment @ruthlgarner,#byarrangement with @sarahnotes 

There is no quick fix with Instagram, it takes time but is a very rewarding community to be involved with, unlike Twitter it seems to focus on support, positivity and kind words and as a more artistic based app, I think reflects the nicer nature of artistic people. 

They say the like-minded people flock together and no better place than on Instagram.  Bullies can keep their cowardly rudeness over on that other place, and what miserable lives they must lead, but not us with our flowers and scissors and bits of faffery, oh no.

If you want to take your instagram more seriously then perhaps do an online course with someone like Emily Quinton at Makelight or Me And Orla (the Instaretreat) and for more info about hashtags have a read of Lucy's blog this week  (click on that to link).  


Always feel free to ask me questions on instagram and to engage with the hashtag setters themselves, Im sure they would love your feedback.

Urban Jungle Bloggers and Woven Wall Hangings

Im really quite excited at the moment by two elements of interior styling and the use of colour. One of these elements is the re-discovery of house plants through the network of Urban Jungle Bloggers and the other is woven wall hangings.

If you are wondering what Urban Jungle Bloggers is all about then let me give you an idea here.  Set up by two lovely souls, Igor and Judith, they have brought an online community together of people who love house plants.  At first I thought it was for people living in the city but now I've met Igor and Judith I realise its for everyone who likes plants in their home and who like to style with them. 

As I've mentioned before, I attended a blogging conference a few weeks ago, primarily to meet in person the people behind some of the most inspiring things on the internet.  Bloggers are people who often are working in complete isolation and this can become far too inward looking if you're not careful. So when you meet the creators of a cool online community and they are really nice with a great philosophy and attitude, its a bonus for sure.

Having travelled extensively when I was in the music business, to over 42 countries around the globe, you find that some nations have very cool attitudes to life and I think that this is exuded by Igor and Judith in bucket loads. Their 'no rules' approach and philosophy is so rare these days, the idea to facilitate the meeting (virtually) of like minded people for no financial reason is a Karma which will return to them Im sure. This is also something I would love to emulate in my #paintpassion community.

Setting a theme monthly to their house plant stylings Im delighted to say that in my first month they have chosen my area - colour - to be the topic, giving it the hashtag #plantcolorpop (and don't forget its the American spelling of color not the English spelling - Colour.

Since working with Annie Sloan's Chalk Paint(tm)for Painters In Residence, Ive continued to explore this paints properties and abilities. Becoming more and more free with my approach I've been developing a technique of working with a wet brush and just dipping the same brush into different colours, then working it with water and so on, to blend and wash.  Ive chosen to do this on some back boards as a way to practice but Im intending to expand onto canvases too.

The backboards give me the possibilities to try out colour combinations and see how they work with different objects on and around them.  So to my third element here, the woven wall hanging.

I studied textile and embroidery for A level in the late 1970's, so the revival of the this type of wall hanging has amused me enormously. Its been a right trip (in the hippy sense of the word) to pick it up again and be able to play around with it for interior styling. 

Last weekend I went to Yarnspiration2015, a day of workshops and socialising for people who love their yarns, like alcoholics anonymous for wool hoarders - where do you keep your hidden stash?, did you secretly spend the housekeeping on cashmere and silk yarn, oh the confessions.  Hello my name is Janice and Im a yarnoholic.

It's Fibre East at the end of July, a big yarn related show which I shall be popping along to and reporting back on.  Its my nearest big wool show, in Ampthill. 

Anyway, back to the wall hangings, Ive tried two on the small basic hand loom and one utilising a tapestry frame.  I don't want to give a tutorial here yet until I feel Ive tried out a few things and can tell you the do's and don't from first hand experience. Like anything, practice makes perfect so I shall practice a bit more and let you know.  

You can find Urban Jungle Bloggers here and I'd put money on it that after looking you will be rushing off to the garden centre.

Im back off to do some more weaving and paint sploshing now, please tag me and #paintpassion so I can see what you have been up to.