248/365 A new adventure begins - 24 in 12

Time for a new door to open! I have been reading on a few other blogs how people set themselves a goal list, usually "30 before 30" i.e. 30 things they want to do before they reach the age of 30, since if I include the age in mine, it might depress me ( *grin*) I decided that this year instead of a New Years Resolution list - which every year is the same old list "Get Healthy", "Exercise More" etc, and quite frankly is too boring and gets forgotten every year by February at the latest. I decided for 2012 I would write a list of things I wanted to do or try during the year instead. 

Then me being me, I got very excited and wrote the list immediately, and have already started planning some of them! So I thought "bugger it! I don't want to wait until 1st January to get started!" So in typical "Jules style" my New Year starts tomorrow - 1st November, you never know it could become a new tradition! 

So here they are: 24 adventures in the next 12 months (1st Nov 2011 - 31st Oct 2012) or 24 in 12 :)

1. Learn to crochet - I'm starting!! and getting excited! and my first real project!
2. Start a second photography blog - Done! see here
3. Buy a macro lens and get into macro photography
4. Start a vintage camera / accessories collection - Started!! Check them out! and some more added here!
5. Experiment with some coloured paint in our VERY white and beige house!
6. Visit Windsor Castle
7. Start an inspirational photographic book collection
8. Make some home made fudge
9. Buy a book of poetry
10. Re read Bleak House & A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
11. Explore Richmond Park - Started! here, here and here!
12. Go on a thrifting spree! - online! who knew? and more great finds!
13. Go back to Maui, and Miami on the way!
14. Visit Butterfly World with my family
15. Try selling something I have made on E bay or Etsy - First items posted for sale! and no luck selling any!!
16. Watch an Ice Hockey match
17. Go on a picnic - carpet or real one :)
18. Go back to Iceland - Planning to in Feb  2012! 
19. Try falconry
20. Go ice skating
21. Print some of my photos on canvas - you can see them here!
22. Go to a jazz / blues club
23. Make some funky paper projects using old maps and papers - First project completed here! and another here!
24. Start a daily diary - started!

247/365 Datchet Photo Trip

When I bought my camera back in February, my first "photo trip" out to play with it was to the cute adorable little village of Datchet. So today when my best friend Tim brought his new DSLR over, there was only one place to take him for his first test photo session :) So much to see and take shots of in the autumn sunshine! Looking back on the shots in took 8 months ago, I really pleased with my development, clearly I have got used to the camera and can now manipulate it to get the shots I can "see" in my mind, but I can also see my photographic eye continuing to develop, and I have a much clearer idea of how I want to capture a subject now than I did then. Project 365 has been integral to this process, I am convinced that if I didn't have to publish a photo a day, my camera would sit on a shelf gathering dust until a holiday, or special day out, and I am guessing I wouldn't have seen much development at all in 8 months. So as I enter the last third of the project, I am guessing it's very much going to be part of my life again next year too :)

246/365 Do you work for Ford?

Was the question the gas man asked me when he serviced the boiler recently! You'd think so wouldn't you with all the Ford memorabilia about the place!

245/365 Runnymede in the sunshine

244/365 Autumn Sunshine!

243/365 Back to work clothes, bye bye swim wear!

242/365 And back!

To alot of washing!! But its worth it :) This is actually the ONLY real "relic" of my childhood, it's my baby blanket! I found it recently, and now have it out on display as it's got some real memories embedded in its fluffy woolness! 

241/365 Last Day = Chill time!

240/365 Climbing, caves & Minoan archaeology

239/365 Adventures in a 6,000 year old cave!

This is the Dikteon Cave, allegedly the birth place of Zeus, it was SO deep, and took a good 20 minutes up a huge mountain to reach and then a long climb into it, it was breathtakingly awesome, and not a little spooky with all the stalagmites and tites and a lake at the bottom, could have been straight out of a Lord of the Rings film :)

238/365 The Milky Way!

We were driving back from the restaurant last night and stopped somewhere out of town and saw the stars were really bright, so pulled over at a viewing point, and saw this!! I didn't take this photo, I didn't have my tripod with me, but this is the closest I could find to what we saw, WOW! We were just awestruck! There are not many places in the world left now with low enough levels of light pollution to allow you to see it, and so we feel really lucky, to see where abouts on this galaxy our little solar system is sitting! SO cool!

237/365 Monasteries and Lakes!

236/365 Sunshine! woo hooooo!!

Time to hit the beach baby!

235/365 Knossos

234/365 Erm more rain??

Weather.com TELLS me its going to be sunny and dry tomorrow here in Crete.... erm it had BETTER BE, or I will have to spend another day having 3 course lunches with ice cream frappes and ouzo with my love, and that's going to ruin my new "skinny jean" addiction. End of. :)

233/365 CretAquarium!

I LOVED this place! Took at least 1 million photos! Weather was cloudy and rainy today, with a huge storm in the evening!! NOT what I signed up for holiday wise! BUT these guys above and the gorgeous guy I'm travelling with MORE than made up for a bit of rain!

232/365 Going on holiday!

231/365 Sculpture Garden

There's a small but very cool sculpture garden at the Runnymede memorial gardens, there's something about art in an outdoor setting that really does it for me, and in the glorious autumn sunshine I wished I could have stayed all day!