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Today was an absolutely gorgeous, Wyoming day! Today’s weather report:  mid to high 70’s, slightly cloudy, and a 99.9% chance of wind (which I’m still coming to terms with…).

Rather than taking a walk, as I had discussed in yesterday’s post, I decided to bust out my bike for a Tour de Cheyenne! My husband, a Wyoming native, told me about this trail called The Greenway, which is comprised of chunks of paved pedestrian/bike trails that run throughout the city! Here’s a description, taken from Cheyenne’s Official Website:

“The Greenway serves as a safe and accessible recreational corridor; a key component of the non-motorized transportation system; an open-air science, ecology, history, and health classroom for students of all ages; and a vital public space integral in building sustainable, vibrant and healthy neighborhoods and a cohesive community. The man made and natural barriers that traditionally divide a community are the…

Today begins the Nature Crochet Art Challenge! For this challenge, I will be exploring the surrounding natural environment through the art of crochet…Specifically, crochet EMBROIDERY.

For today’s challenge, I focused on creating the canvas for my crochet explorations. Choosing a grey/blue yarn, I decided to crochet from the center outwards, creating a square. For purposes of this challenge, I kept my square relatively small 12″ x 12″–though, depending on the time that you have to dedicate to this challenge, you could definitely go smaller than this. Here is my resulting canvas:

For tomorrow’s challenge, take a walk with your camera! Soak in the sites, smells, and overall FEEL of the environment around you. Take a few shots of the beauty that surrounds you. When you return from your walk, brainstorm ideas for your composition. Create rough sketches, or select several pictures to inspire your work. Enjoy experimenting and exploring different…

Learn more about World’s End here.

When I looked outside my ktichen window this morning I saw a blanket of clouds covering the sky.  Every color was muted.  People moved by at a meandering pace with umbrellas tucked beneath their arms.  No one seemed particularly sad or depressed by the weather, just lost in thought, as if walking in a waking dream.  Dreams … that’s what I thought of as I snapped these photos of raspberries from this morning’s breakfast.

Recently, on a warm day in the city of Boston, I raced through one of its many squares toward my favorite hot dog vendor.  I’d already spent most of my half-hour break running errands and knew that I was going to be late returning to work, but darnit, I needed to eat and wanted a good hot dog.  As I made my way through the square, an elderly man stepped into my path.  He said, “Can you spare a quarter?”  I gazed into his watery blue eyes and said, “No, but would you like a hot dog?”  I don’t know why I said what I said that day, and he certainly wasn’t expecting me to say what I said.  He frowned and blinked a few times and then said, “You don’t have a quarter?”  I didn’t quite put my hands on my hips in exasperation, but I did raise an…

You know those cards that have the seeds embedded in the paper?  Well, a friend gave me such a birthday card a while back.  I’m sure it was meant to be planted outside but I tend to grow things indoors now.  And so I tore up the black-flecked purple card embedded with wildflower seeds, and pushed the paper beneath the soil of a planter or two.  I’d almost forgotten that I had done such a thing and then one day I noticed in a pot of marjoram, new green growth of a different hue. Wildflowers!  Still, I did not think that they would grow very much.  But the spring sun worked its wily ways and one day I peeked into the hallway where the pot does sit, and this is what I saw.

I hope you’re spending this special weekend with those you love!

Tomorrow begins the Nature Crochet Art Challenge! In preparation for the challenge, crochet your blank canvas using using a simple chain stitch.

Once you have the length that you want for your canvas, use the single crochet stitch to build on your chain until you reach your desired canvas size.

For the purposes of this challenge, I would recommend crocheting a smaller sized canvas, as our focus will be explorations through crochet embroidery.

As I’m sure you can guess, tomorrow’s challenge will focus on constructing your canvas for your embroidered explorations!

‘Til tomorrow…happy explorations!!

As promised, here is one technique that will be used in this month’s challenge: The Chain Stitch.

For those of you who have never crocheted anything in your life, here is a wonderful website to get you started with the crochet basics.

After you have crocheted your blank “canvas,”using basic crochet stitches,  you will begin the embroidering process!

Sketch your design onto your blank crocheted canvas using a washable fabric pencil. Then, begin following the lines with your chain-stitch.

To begin, insert your hook through the crocheted canvas and pull a yarn loop through.

Then once again insert the hook through the crocheted canvas, grabbing hold of the yarn underneath.

Pull that string through your loop to create your first stitch. Repeat until you are finished with your embroidered line.

The visuals provided in this post are from this excellent website.

Tomorrow, I will be posting more about crocheting your…

I have officially moved west! While I will definitely miss exploring the beauty of Austin, the mountains are calling my name! 🙂 I will have to take a few photography adventures in the coming days! In the meantime, I’ll start the ball rolling for June’s challenge (can’t believe June is only a week away! Yikes!)

For June’s Nature Art Challenge, I’d like to shake things up a little bit–moving to a completely new medium: yarn! In the coming days, I will be posting information about crochet and crochet EMBROIDERY (which is the technique that I will use for my nature explorations).

Here’s one example that I came across:

Click on the image to see close-up images of this embroidered work, and tune in over the next couple of days to learn the techniques that will be used for this month’s challenge!

Tools that you will need for the challenge:

yarn…

Respectful and attentive. This is what the country should be like.  Thanks for the reminder Dawn!

My absolute favorite flower is the peony. Of course it’s only in bloom for a few weeks but while they’re here I got a few photos of them.

This shot is up for voting at Static Instants May Photo Challenge so go vote!

Finally a garden bouquet.