Tuesday Treat: When it’s Spring Again

Posted on April 13, 2021 by crispina kemp

I’ll bring again Tulips From Amsterdam

Putting the new camera to the test

I promise next week we’ll be back to wild flowers

Posted in Photos | Tagged | 15 Comments

Behind Enemy Lines

Posted on April 12, 2021 by crispina kemp
image by Matthias Burtscher on pixabay

Who’d be the youngest in the brigade?
I swear it isn’t fair
Do this, do that
Groom the horses
Fetch the water
And never mind the danger
Off you go to forage.
————————
No, I’m not a deserter
I’m foraging food and water
Was I to know these are enemy lines
Did I pass a sign, don’t tread here?
Was there anything to say beware?
An older man might have known
That older might have shown me
Are you going to shoot me?

82 words written fro Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Forage

Posted in Mostly Micro, Poems (Some Silly) | Tagged , , | 19 Comments

Sunday Picture Post: A Different Way

Posted on April 11, 2021 by crispina kemp

My new camera arrived on 3rd April. Impatient, the next day I take it for a walk. I’m out early. The light isn’t good and it’s cold, but…

Catkins (pussy-willow with pollen): 4th April 2021
Little Egret tests the range of my new zoom: 4th April 2021

Too cold to walk on Breydon bank, I join a farm track across the grazing marshes to Burgh Castle

Seeing these everywhere amongst the reeds: 4th April 2021
Another test for the camera, will it focus through the reeds? 4th April 2021
Just two weeks ago this track was silver with pussy-willow; now it’s green and gold: 4th April 2021
Willows come in many species: 4th April 2021

At Burgh Castle I turn on to Angles Way, a route I’ve not used since late summer (tends to get boggy and miry with rain)

White violets = Spring: 4th April 2021
Wayside flowers, such a treat to see: 4th April 2021
A real star! See how he’s giving me his best profile: 4th April 2021
The route takes us across arable land: 4th April 2021
and past this characterful old house: 4th April 2021
To thread us along this behedged path: 4th April 2021
A glimpse of the marsh at the end of this lane: 4th April 2021
Finally onto a another pasture (here’s usually the soggiest stretch of path, today isn’t too bad): 4th April 2021
And here I find a pair of nesting gulls (and another chance to test the extent of zoom): 4th April 2021

After that, I’m onto a busy road with the sun at last shining. Hope you enjoyed the walk. I did (once I warmed up)

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New Camera

Posted on April 10, 2021 by crispina kemp
8 April 2021

What do you do when you can’t get out because Winter has descended again and you have a new camera you’re itching to try? You focus on the tulips in the vase by the window.

Fill the Frame from the list provided for #2021picoftheweek provided by Maria Antonia

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CCC126: Primmy Primrose

Posted on April 8, 2021 by crispina kemp

Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Primmy Primrose, prim and proper
Won’t look up till a new Spring calls her
Calls with balmy sun and melting snow
With whispered winds that gently blow
No torn leaves and tattered petals
For Primmy Primrose is too precious

Posted in Crimson's Creative Challenge, Photos, Poems (Some Silly), Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 11 Comments

Crimson’s Creative Challenge #126

Posted on April 7, 2021 by crispina kemp
CCC#126

Welcome to my weekly challenge—open to all—just for FUN, FUN, FUN

Here’s how it works:

Every Wednesday I post a photo (this week it’s that one above.)
You respond with something CREATIVE

Here are some suggestions:

  • An answering photo
  • A cartoon
  • A joke
  • A caption
  • An anecdote
  • A short story (flash fiction)
  • A poem
  • A newly minted proverb, adage or saying
  • An essay
  • A song—the lyrics or the performance

You have plenty of scope and only two criteria:

  • Your creative offering is indeed yours
  • Your writing is kept to 150 words or less

If you post a link in the comments section of this post I’ll be able to find it
If you include Crimson’s Creative Challenge as a heading, WP Search will find it (theory)
by ‘Searching’ in the WP Reader (fingers crossed)

Here’s wishing you inspirational explosions. And FUN

Posted in Crimson's Creative Challenge, Photos | Tagged , , | 16 Comments

Tuesday Treat: Wayside Flowers

Posted on April 6, 2021 by crispina kemp
Blackthorn, sparkling in the sun: 30th March 2021
Red Deadnettle & Euphorbia: 30th March 2021
30th March 2021
30th March 2021
30th March 2021
For me this is the epitome of spring: 30th March 2021
The less common white violet: 30th March 2021
30th March 2021
The daisy-like flowers of stitchwort: 30th March 2021
Narcissus, naturalised in woodland: 30th March 2021
30th March 2021
Yes, truly, these are native-grown wild primroses: 30th March 2021
What’s this: Berries on holly? 30th March 2021
What is it? The early flowering “Abraham, Isaac & Jacob”, a naturalised form of borage: 30th March 2021
Posted in Photos | Tagged , | 23 Comments

Afternoon Tea (II) with Crispina Kemp — Sammi Loves Books

Posted on April 5, 2021 by crispina kemp

Crispina Kemp, author of the five-book epic fantasy series, The Spinner’s Game, and the newly-released Learning to Fly (available 1st April 2021) is visiting Sammi Loves Books to answer a second set of Afternoon Tea Interview questions. You can read the first Afternoon Tea interview here, my review of Learning to Fly here, and an […]

Afternoon Tea (II) with Crispina Kemp — Sammi Loves Books
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Decidedly Sanguine

Posted on April 5, 2021 by crispina kemp
image by Sebastian Ganso on Pixabay

It is, my dear, quite absurd
The uttermost garbage I’ve ever heard
Why, to think they call the penguin a bird
And more, they say, it’s a distant child
Of T.Rex’s cousin, in the wild
Imagine a petition filed
For paternity payment support
Imagine the court report
Ha! At length the pterosaur is caught…
Leaving our absurd little penguin
Decidedly sanguine

61 words written for Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Absurd

Posted in Poems (Some Silly) | Tagged , | 17 Comments

Sunday Picture Post: Lothingland

Posted on April 4, 2021 by crispina kemp

Lothingland is the ancient name for the North-East corner of Suffolk, and that’s where we’re heading as we catch the 8:00 am bus. We get off just past the James Paget Hospital

In a small woodland, the local children have decked a tree with tributes to the staff of the local NHS hospital: 30th March 2021
The next surprise in the same woodland… 30th March 2021
What a beautiful place, indulging my passion for pylons: 30th March 2021

It was to be an adventure… so there has to be challenges

Went the wrong way. Backtrack or climb the padlocked gate? 30th March 2021
The pines around Lound Lakes: 30th March 2021
The lakes are accessed by fishing licence only: 30th March 2021

I could devote an entire post with photos from the wooded hill around the lakes… but time to move on

Potato planting: 30th March 2021
Off road now, we head to Ashby St Mary’s church: 30th March 2021
Such a delightful Easter view: 30th March 2021

And after a while, it’s back to road-walking

The never-ending perimeter wall of Somerleyton Hall: 30th March 2021
A distant view of the Hall: 30th March 2021

And again off-road via farm-tracks and footpaths

Something’s not quite straight: 30th March 2021

And neither is it quite right. Our path peters out, delivering us into a ploughed field. Um. Lost. We should not have asked for an adventure

This is not where we’re supposed to be. But good news… there’s a bus stop at the end of this very long lane. And it is pretty: 30th March 2021

Hope you’ve enjoyed our walk. It was hot… one of those days that spring borrows off summer. Flowers? Oh, yes, I’ll post those photos on Tuesday

Posted in Photos | Tagged , , | 21 Comments