A daily adventure.... Hour by hour.

Am I really only blogging this now?  Can't quite work out how I managed to forget that I took part in this challenge a couple of weeks ago....

A few of my photographer friends had inspired me to have a go at this.  I was surprised at how difficult I found it really.  As I'm also doing my 365 I didn't think an alarm going off every hour between 6am and 8pm would put me in such a state, but it did.  Possibly more so as my day changed from the one that was planned at around 10am.  It would have looked a lot different under usual circumstances.  That's not to say it would have been any more interesting.  Probably a lot less actually!  Anyway, I'll stop rabbiting on and get to the images.

Here you go..... Thursday 29th January 2015.

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Thanks for looking ~ Fleur x

Claire's adventure - Preparation and preservation...

I arrived at Claire's house on a bright morning with our theme for her session set in my mind.  I've been lucky enough to shoot here before.  Twice in fact.   Claire and Chris already have a beautiful little girl, and now they are preparing for the arrival of a bonny baby boy in around 6 weeks time.  

Preparation:  Claire is busy getting ready for baby boy in the comfort of her bedroom, sorting out his first outfits and baby suits to take to hospital.  They are hung at the moment on tiny blue hangers and are the softest of greys and muted blues.  Soon they will be lovingly folded and packed along with all those other essentials needed at the time of birth...

Preservation:  Big sister will be moving out of the nursery shortly.  She has spent almost 2 years in the bright and airy room, painted the calmest of lilacs and adorned with lovely trinkets and family heirlooms.  Claire and Chris want to remember how this room looked for their first born.  It won't be long before it's a shade of blue....

Enjoy!

Thanks for looking ~ Fleur x

Jaana.... A sunset adventure.

I'm just going to start by saying - I ADORE this collection of images!  It's not often that I get to shoot this way...  But Jaana embraced her photo session with brilliance and beauty.  We strolled along the promenade in New Brighton for about 45 minutes on a Saturday at sunset.  Perfect - Mother Nature at her best and a striking lady to fill the scene.

Enjoy!

Thanks for looking ~ Fleur x

What Trot the tortoise does all winter.... Hibernation adventures!

This blog has been a few weeks coming....  I've finally got around to it.

We have a Tortoise.  His name is Trot.  He is almost 5 years old.  And every year he spends a couple of months in the winter hibernating.  This isn't a straight forward process.  It takes a lot of preparation and planning.  He hibernates in a refridgerator (not one that we use for food) and it has to be temperature regulated to be kept at around 5 degrees celcius, give or take a degree.  Each day we have to check that he hasn't had a wee, we don't want dehydration, and then each week we weigh him to make sure he isn't loosing too much mass.  This is all recorded and monitored closely.

Trot managed 9 weeks this year.  He could have probably done an extra week or two as he only lost a tiny bit of weight, but he is still fairly young.  Here are a few images to show his hibernation adventure......

Trot's home for the winter.

This is how he sleeps....  In an ice cream tub lined with soil from his housing.

After his first week he has lost one gram in weight.

Towards the end of his hibernation he has only lost 6 grams, he's done great.  Miles likes to help out when we monitor.

Here's his record for this year.  The 162g at the bottom is the weight he could get to before coming out of hibernation.
As you can see he got nowhere near and held his body mass brilliantly!

The day has come to start warming him up again.  He stays in his box at room temperature until his eyes open,
which usually takes about half an hour.

His eyes are open!  Welcome back to civilisation Trot. :)

Once he starts stretching and moving, a nice warm bath encourages him to get his appetite back and hydrate.

A nice welcoming meal of weeds and dried flowers.  He's ready for this...

Chomping away....

Thanks for looking ~ Fleur x

Bath time - A mini moment for Miles

Miles enjoys time with his Nanny on a Wednesday morning.    A week or so ago he bribed her into buying him some new bath toys while they were out shopping.   When I picked him up he immediately declared that we should go home and have a bubble bath.  Usually he has to share the bath with his sisters; imagine his delight at getting the whole thing to himself.  Being able to sprawl out and splash! :)

Here's the adventure he had, captured in a handful of images....

Thanks for looking ~ Fleur x