“Always watch where you are going, otherwise you may step on a piece of forest that was left out by mistake.”
Winnie the Pooh

I needed a little escape Thursday morning.. fortunately, Bella is always up for something new. It brings such simple pleasure to change up her walks every day so that she never knows where we’ll go or what we’ll do. Every day is a little adventure for her. I think that’s good for her mind. I know it’s good for mine. A change up in routine is always a welcome respite.

Inspired by a Plein Air painting trip to Carburn Park on Tuesday, I thought it was time to take little Bella on a walk about through Autumn. We settled on Shouldice Park because I knew the leaves there would be well on their way to yellow. This is the same place I took photos of Katie and Phil a few short years ago. I’m learning about composition in paintings and my goal was to focus a bit on that when taking photos. While this photo of Bella is somewhat overexposed, I love how ethereal she looks on the path. Next time we’ll try it off-leash.

I’ve learned that paths and rivers should lead you into your painting or photograph, as this one does. I also loved the stand of trees and their linear trunks.

Painting and photos should also have a “stopper” that keeps your eye looking at the focal point. In this case the trees on the left keep you looking at the fallen branch. There were plenty of fallen and snapped branches about, I will be coming back here to pick up a few for my front steps.

An imposing dance of trees, sheltering us from any possibility of wind.. but we had the perfect Autumn day. It was warm, almost hot and so welcome after the snow last week!

This photo uses the rule of thirds, keeping the sky two thirds of the photo and the trees one third makes a more interesting photo or painting. I love this cluster of gold under horse tail skies.

It’s always great to have contrast in color and new perspectives in photos and paintings, like looking upward to the tops of trees into the contrast of a bluest sky,

and between branches of berries.

Always look to see where the light falls when painting or photographing. Here the sun painted dappled yellows with golden rays on these leaves.

This photo draws you down into the river for a dip..  a woodland fairy’s path to the riverbank where plenty of dogs were splashing their paws about, wildly romping.

A flicker of red.. foreshadows what’s to come and is a great surprise in a photo.

And the dry heated bed of smooth river stone pottered along before us. I love the curving line of the rocks in this riverbed.

Bella was quite patient today.. it’s tough to keep a steady hand on the camera while hanging onto a wild, nature-enthralled pup!

She managed to sit on a bench long enough for a few poses and treats. I thought a bench that memorialized an angel was the perfect spot for her “portrait”.

Next time I’ll have help and use a tripod.

♥

I’ve been gone for a wee bit, updating and changing the look of my blog.. despite a few anxious moments when I thought I’d lost everything, it was worth it…

The main navigation to pages is on the left hand side of the blog, that takes you to DIY, DECOR|DESIGN, PHOTOGRAPHY, VIDEOS, etc. At the very top of the blog are the links to each recipe type, Beverages, Breads, etc. Click on the Home page and you’ll see a few other clickable buttons and my favorite three blog posts of the moment. I’m still working on a workable mobile platform for the iPhone.. hopefully I’ll get that up and running tomorrow.. thank you for your patience:)

And I hope you like it too!

I’ll be back with a peak at some autumn decorating around my home. It’s time to pull out all of the garden annuals that were smashed by the snow.. but the loss of flowers will be replaced with the cheer of bunches of mums and sunflowers!