Thursday 25 June 2015

The Colour Collaborative: June: Found


In the darker recesses of our house, tucked away in drawers and on shelves and squirrelled away in treasure boxes, there is a little selection of natural treasures.  I try to discourage wholesale plunder of the countryside and coast - in my experience boys would collect pebbles by the sackful if they could - but a few things come home with us from time to time as reminders of happy days of exploring and adventure.

The pebble above was one I found with the middle boy on a very beautiful afternoon at the remote Kimmeridge Bay in Dorset.  It's an important area geographically, being part of the Jurassic coast, and it's also a marine reserve.  All in all a place to treasure.  It's not easily accessed, and we got there late in the day when the tide was up high over dark flat rocks.  The sun was low and everything was a hundred different shades of grey.  It was stunning.  We slithered up and down the rocks looking at the fossils in the big boulders and searching for crabs.  It was one of those perfect moments that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.

We found this lovely dark grey pebble.  So simple but so striking.  It sits on a shelf in the bedroom and I look at it every day.  Sometimes I pick it up and feel how smooth it is and run my fingers over the seam.  I love it and I love the memories of a small hand in mine, the taste of salt sea spray and the sharing of childhood wonder.



The two big feathers are from a pheasant, but I'm not sure about the small one.  Unusual feathers are a rarity, most of the ones we see are still firmly stuck in a bird.  I don't mind the little people collecting these at all (once they're not in a bird any more).  They're exquisitely patterned and I keep them where I see them every day, in a pewter pot on the mantelpiece or the piano.




Shells from a holiday a few years ago.  It wasn't the best shell collecting area, but that just made the finds all the more special.  Chunks of thick ridged scallop shell, beautiful tan speckled cockles and an old barnacle encrusted slipper limpet.




A jar of sea glass that lives in the kitchen.  We regularly visit beaches that have a good supply.  Not a natural find, but one that I'm happy for the boys to bring home.  Little chunks of broken bottles that have rolled backwards and forwards with the pebbles so long that they have that smooth opaque quality.  The subtlest shades of blue and green, along with a few more vibrant pieces.


Our two nests are precious finds indeed.  This one was on the ground at the country park.  It had been built in an evergreen tree, and if you look you can see bits of dried tree in there, together with the softest feathers and animal wool.  There are llamas at the country park (or alpacas? I should know the difference), so no shortage of the finest quality softness to line a nest.



This one was on the ground in our back lane.  It had fallen out of the ivy, long after the babies had fledged.  It's bigger than the other one (a blackbird's nest?) and not lined in the same way.  The eggs don't belong to the nest, we found those separately, but I keep them in there anyway.




I love how you can see a little trial beak mark on the tiny blue egg.  A tiny bird had a go at getting out on that side before he finally nibbled his way out on the other side.  I'm guessing this is a hedge sparrow's egg, and the white ones are probably wood pigeons, although those are just guesses really.

When I look at our found treasures all together the thing that strikes me is the subtle beauty of the natural colours.  There's nothing bright or jarring here, just muted greys and whites, browns mixed with cream and a hint of blue.  The calm serene colours that nature does best.

To visit the other Colour Collaborative blogs for more of this month's posts, just click on the links below: 

                     Annie at Annie Cholewa                        Gillian at Tales from a Happy House

                     Sandra at Cherry Heart                           Jennifer at Thistlebear

                     Sarah at Mitenska

What is The Colour Collaborative?

All creative bloggers make stuff, gather stuff, shape stuff, and share stuff. Mostly they work on their own, but what happens when a group of them work together? Is a creative collaboration greater than the sum of its parts? We think so and we hope you will too. We'll each be offering our own monthly take on a colour related theme, and hoping that in combination our ideas will encourage us, and perhaps you, to think about colour in new ways.

42 comments:

  1. Oh CJ what a lovely post! We have a few little treasures too from days out and beach combing holidays and they seem to have become more precious now that the girls are grown up. The nests are wonderful, birds are such fascinating creatures. Thanks for sharing and enjoy the rest of your week. Jxx

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  2. Oh CJ what a lovely post! We have a few little treasures too from days out and beach combing holidays and they seem to have become more precious now that the girls are grown up. The nests are wonderful, birds are such fascinating creatures. Thanks for sharing and enjoy the rest of your week. Jxx

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  3. It just goes to show that there are wonderful natural treasures all around if you spend the time to look. The glass looks very effective all mixed together in the jar. :-)

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  4. I love your little collection of finds. I also have some similar bits and pieces collected over the years.

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  5. Treasure indeed. I especially love your jar of sea glass; it's so beautiful. I managed to collect a couple of pheasant tail feathers when 'Fergus' was moulting in the garden last year - I was hoping to add to it this year but no luck yet. That lovely pebble at the top looks like a biscuit (is it an oreo?) or maybe that's just my diet talking! xx

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  6. Beautiful post CJ. I really enjoyed it. I think the smaller of your two eggs is a Blackbird, judging by the colour, and the larger I agree is a pigeon. What lovely treasures. I know Kimmeridge well- it's a super place xx

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  7. That stone's beautiful - I'd display that too.
    We have many of the same treasures in our homes, it seems: found nests, feathers (with a few precious unusual ones), shells, sea glass... And yes, the colours are beautiful in their simplicity and subtlety. I'm on the lookout for a long tail feather from a pheasant but have never been lucky enough to find one - yet.
    This morning I did find a lovely feather in the lane behind the house: black with large white spots. It's now indoors with the rest of the collection. Sadly, nearby there was an egg which had either fallen down from a nest or had been knocked down by one of the resident bullies (magpies and jackdaws)...
    Beautiful post, and yes - these little treasures are all bound up with the memories of how we came by them.
    S x

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  8. Such treasures! I love pebbles and I just can't resist picking up the odd one that catches my eye when I'm on the beach. I only pick up one and keep it in my pocket so never very big but over the years I appear to have collected a lot! They are so beautiful and they're on a shelf that I pass many times during the day so I don't feel too guilty that I have my own mini beach. ;) Your photos of nature are stunning.
    Jess x

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  9. What wonderful found treasures!!! I would love to find some seaglass one day. Yours looks so good all collected together in that glass jar. You must have such great memories of all the times you found these things! xx

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  10. I really appreciate what you said about not letting the boys plunder the areas where you hunt together. I've always felt the same way; my children would haul interesting things out in a wheelbarrow if I let them, so I have to keep control of it. I especially enjoyed your sea glass collection, even if it's not a natural find. You have so much of it, it's wonderful and very pretty. I really enjoyed the bird's nest too. That's an amazing find. Thanks for sharing these beautiful things.

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  11. A lovely post and nice pictures. I always like looking at such items but I've never been a great collector apart from picking up any interesting bird feathers I find, which are few and far between. Flighty xx

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  12. A beautiful blog posting. You know, as many times as I have been to the ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, I have NEVER found sea glass. Yours are beautiful!

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  13. Wonderful. Mother Nature certainly knows how to create things of beauty. I remember collecting pebbles and little treasures from outings myself as a child but my parents weren't sentimental at all whilst spring cleaning or decluttering and they're long gone now, it's a shame as I think these little items which have been collected up and brought home can hold the most precious memories. It's lovely that you have these special little treasures to trigger some special memories.

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  14. Little works of art. Lovely to have memories attached to them.

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  15. Oh, such treasures! My mum has a pot of pheasant feathers she keeps on her mantel and I eye it up jealously every time I go round. Feathers are just endlessly beautiful and inspiring, aren't they? Great nests and eggs too. We've found an abandoned nest in a bush in our garden and I can't wait to pull it out and have a good look at how it was made and what those clever birds used to line it. I like the way you keep all your found treasures out on display, I'm thinking I should do that more.xx

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  16. Such exquisite things you've all found, and you're right, nature does these subtle colours so beautifully. Lovely post CJ :o)

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  17. Such beautiful treasures and such treasured memories.

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  18. How strange that all the pieces of glass have all ended up very similar shapes.

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  19. Hey CJ,
    Firstly what a wonderful set of images accompanying this post. I have a couple of pebbles that I find incredibly tactile. Two of them sit on my kitchen window sill. I like the weight of them in my hand, and their cool quality. I find their markings pleasing. Olly is always finding feathers. Today we came home with four black crows feathers.They are in his birds nest that he found. It's actually some dried mown grass, but I didn't have the heart to tell him so. Great post. They always are.
    Leanne xx

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  20. Lovely finds, our house is full of them too, baskets of shells, pine cones, jars of sea glass, bowls of pebbles, I love the tactile feel of the pebbles and the nature treasure trove we can bring home from a walk in the country or on the beach. Beautiful photos too :)

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  21. What a lovely collection of finds CJ, and the memories that go with it. Have a great weekend when it comes. x

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  22. Lots of lovely treasures. I think the fact that you don't allow the boys to take just anything makes them more special. The sea glass is my favorite, though.

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  23. I hadn't thought about the colour of natural finds before. We have pebbles all around our house and I love the way that they take you back to the place that you found them almost more than a photograph. Holding a pebble in my hand transports me back like nothing else. Now I'm thinking I would like to find more sea glass as I only have a tiny bit and it looks beautiful.

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  24. What fun to see some of your pretty collections CJ and to realize I have similar things I have collected [although I have not found such pretty sea glass]. When my children, now adults, collected their treasures we had to curb plundering a bit too, but honestly, I am the one who continues to need to be reminded to set reasonable boundaries in saving the natural wonders around me :) Thanks for your fine photos and thoughtful words that help me appreciate even more, natural hues, through your June: Found post. xx

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  25. Some great treasures there CJ - the nests are my favourites. We have a bowl of sea glass at home - reminds me of time spent with daughter on Filey beach. We also used to have a huge collection at one time of sticks by the back door!! Everytime we went for walk the children brought back sticks. Sadly they have now gone.
    Caz xx

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  26. utterly beautiful, such tranquil colours.

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  27. A lovely post. We've just come back from Dorset with our own collection of finds. My husband has just finished an OU degree and his last year was all about geology, so he had a great time studied the geology around Durdle Door and Lyme Regis. I have a tiny bird's nest on my desk as I write. It's the first one I've ever come across and it's so delicate - a very precious discovery. Have a lovely weekend. Lou x

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  28. What a heavenly collection - so nourishing to have them close-by - I'm drawn especially to the pebble, but love too the limpit colours and textures

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  29. Lovely, lovely keepsakes, CJ. I always pick up unusual finds - the beach near to my parents' house is in a Jurassic area so I was lucky to find a fossilised shark's tooth which I've now had for many years. (Great for Show and Tell when my son was at primary school!) Sea washed glass abounds in my house - I could almost smell the sea and hear the waves when I saw your photos! Feathers too, I have peacock feathers from the Isle of Wight and some lovely half black/half white ones that were blowing in the wind at London Zoo aviary - all reminders of happy gentle days spent with children. C xx

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  30. A super collection of found treasures and lovely reminders of special times.i found a robin's egg on a walk the other day, it was so tiny and fragile and the most beautiful sea-blue colour, but despite being wrapped in tissue and placed carefully in our lunch box it did not survive the journey home and disintegrated into fragments.

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  31. WOW these are some really great photos!

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  32. Awesome photos and I love your blog. You live in a beautiful place! The collaborative get together sounds like fun! I have just started a blog for my art/craft adventures. I would love you to take a look and tell me what you think? www.theartfullplace.blogspot.com

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  33. Stunning photographs CJ. I love the pebble you have at the very top. I collect a stone or pebble every time we go to the coast. xx

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  34. Hello!
    Pretty unique photos. Both in subject and hues. Very nice. :)

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  35. CJ, this is just an overall lovely post. Well written and great photos of some fantastic nature finds. I just read a book with my daughter today that mentions a limpet and I had never seen one before - now I have!

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  36. How gorgeous CJ, isn't it lovely how memories attach to these tiny treasures!

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  37. Love love love the calm and pleasant images and your serene writing. Sea glass is as wonderful as diamonds and rubies. I read a book called "Sea Glass" by Anita Shreve. It was pretty good. Have a wonderful weekend.. ((hugs)), Teresa :-)

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  38. You had me at the little hand in yours! My oh my your natural treasures are just extraordinary my friend! That sea glass!!!!! I would love to have a jar of that in my home and will make it my goal on our next holiday to find some!! Your photographs are stunning CJ! Sorry I am getting to your post late....been busy chasing the beans!! Lovely weekend to you! Nicole xoxo

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  39. This is my favourite colour palette, it's going to end up all over the house.

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  40. There's really nothing better than bringing home bits and pieces of a day's adventure or walk and placing it on the table or mantle as a celebration of that hour or day or season. Lovely post.

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  41. All my favourite finds, such gorgeous colours and textures that cannot be replicated except in nature, those feathers look so precious, always a source of inspiration! Katie x

    http://long-may-she-rain.blogspot.co.uk

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  42. Yes nature provides us with a beautiful and gentle palette doesn't it? I love that nest up close, so intricate, so fascinating!

    S x

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