Meanwhile, back in the garden

It's like a race against time here trying to catch up with the garden, especially now our run of good weather is about to come to an end, with the return of rain and colder weather forecast for Friday onwards. It's been wonderful working outside and hearing buzzy bees and watching butterflies flitting about and listening to the birds singing. But I haven't been reaching for the camera - nope, too much to do! I did manage to take some photos last week especially for sharing, but the rest of the time I am concentrating on getting the garden in order. And anyway, sometimes you need a rest from your camera. Yes really!

Most spring colour is around the front of the house where all my Euphorbias are, most of the daffodils, and a number of spring flowering shrubs in front of the boring Leylandii hedge. 

Can you tell that I love my Euphorbias yet?
These flowers are covered in flies - and spiders!

My Forsythias are a bit pathetic this year
as I gave them a harsh chopping back last year.
I do this about every 3 years when they get too big.
The little bulbs in the foreground are the ones shown below.

Glory of the Snow (Chionodoxa) bulbs.

A Nursery Web Spider (Pisaura mirabilis) on a Glory of the Snow flower.
There are lots of these spiders on the Euphorbias as well.

The Euphorbias against the house wall are all self seeded.
The stump is the remains of the Mimosa which kept getting frosted.

Most of the Aubretias that I planted years ago have disappeared
but this one survives underneath a large Lavender.

The tree that I call the 'Purple Leafed Prunus' - common as muck
and wonderful at this time of year! This is the first time it has
flowered really profusely since I planted it about 5 years ago.

I have tons of these double daffodils that came with the house;
the more interesting ones which I planted will flower later.

A pink Primrose, which has spread seed and there are many
around this area with tones of pink now!

But I still love the originals best which just glow, especially the ones growing naturally
in the grass which look cheerful even on a cloudy day.

Dried Hydrangea flowers revisited. I guess it's time to snip them off!
This is the time of year I dread harsh frost
which will get those tender new leaves.

Peach blossom is out now - one of my favourite blossoms.

Japonica or Flowering Quince (Chaenomeles) by the lake.

I could have done with the big zoom lens here!
The moorhens are very active and have already built a nest.

I don't have much opportunity to get close to the ducks since they don't leave the vicinity of the pond any more. However one day I found Freckles lying on the bank up the woodland end and as I crept closer to her I wondered if she was injured as she was not moving away from me. I needn't have worried, she was just chilling out and when I got too close for her liking she slid off into the water and sailed away!

Freckles, my old white duck, about 7.5 years old now.

And off she sails into the evening light.

My Graduation Challenge album

My course is over but I'm still feeling my way along because I've switched to using Lightroom and it's taking me twice as long to deal with my photos now. Not to mention the fact I've started shooting them in RAW in the last week! Anyway here are the photos that I shared publically on Google Plus as my Graduation Challenge album. We were given themes and had to share one to two photos for at least three of the following themes: Nature, Silhouette, B&W and Flash (or Creative Lighting). 

I wanted to challenge myself further so decided there and then I would not take any florals or macros! It meant getting out and about as I couldn't take all these pictures at home but luckily the weather changed for the better mid week. All my photos are taken in manual mode which is what the course was all about after all - teaching us how to use our cameras properly!

The photo below was my first attempt at longish exposure with a tripod. I went there late in the day to practice taking photos of the chateau which overlooks this lake but it was overcast which was a bit of a shame. Suddenly the sun peeked out and shone further along the lake, hence this picture which I reckoned I could sneek into the category Nature! Click on the photos to open them up larger by the way, as the landscape ones don't show the details this small.

Combourg Lake (Nature)

You may wonder why I've included a bird photo as a challenge. That's because I wanted to have a go at bird photography using a 75-300mm lens and my dslr in manual mode. It's a lot heavier than my SX50 which I use in shutter priority when shooting birds. Capturing them in a natural setting is hard anyway, particularly the little flitty birds, so I'm quite pleased with this one.

Blue Tit (Nature)

At first I was horrified when I saw one of the themes was B&W. I've never liked B&W at all and didn't have a clue how you are supposed to process it. So I googled and read up a bit about B&W and learned how to process it in Lightroom. It's quite a skill and I have learned to appreciate B&W and monochrome now! I chose the tatty old chicken shed door due to the textures of the peeling paint, rust and lichen covering it.

The Chicken Shed Door (B&W)

I was looking all around for some trees that I could shoot as silhouettes and finally found this nice view late in the day. This one is my favourite.

Breton Countryside at the End of the Day (Silhouette)

We spent a week learning about flash which was nowhere near long enough as it's a huge subject. But I've learned about diffusing light and bouncing it off other surfaces rather than directing it straight at your subject. I could practice this kind of stuff forever and probably still learn new things. We learned straight off in week one how important light is and when you add another dimension, a secondary main light source, it gets all the more complicated!

Tomatoes (Flash)

My OH came in handy during flash week as I needed a model, and other times even when I was trying selfies he came in handy so I could manually focus on him and then get in front of the camera myself. I'd got a nice picture of him at home with a sunset behind but this time I wanted to try night shots in a town with some lights. It was bloody hard and the poor guy posed for me for about 3/4 hour before we gave up and went home. I learned tons about what doesn't work! This was my last shot and thankfully it came out OK as I took a lot that were fit only for the bin!

Portrait of a Husband in Downtown Combourg (Flash)

So here I am, I have come out of the other side after an incredibly intensive six weeks, that were worth every minute, and got out of it every bit of blood, sweat and tears that I put into it! But now the garden beckons and I need to spend time in it as spring has sprung with a vengeance. :-)
 

I'll be back!

I haven't forgotten my blog but this is my final week of my photography course so I've been mega busy working on my 'Graduation Challenge' album. This is taking up all my time so you'll have to take my word for it that I have daffies galore in flower, and amazingly the moorhens have even built a nest already! That's crazily early for them.

But I'll be back next week with more news from the Chateau, and my Graduation photos to share, along with some other outtakes! Take care everyone. :-)