Open Monday: Photo Madness

Once again, I have quite a few photos to share with you today, some of them are from my beach trip and the others are of a very simple, easy creation of mine.

Look! One of them is purple! PURPLE!!

This is a little blurry, I know.  I took this under the Avila pier, where you can walk down some stairs down to the water underneath. There were plenty more star fish on the other pillars. I had never seen a live star fish before; personally I think they look like strange creatures from another world that crash landed on Earth and are now living in our oceans. Sounds like a science fiction novel, doesn't it?

Sea biscuits? Where's the butter?

I'm very proud of this photo. This was taken in a souvenir shop in Avila beach; it's a close up of a bucket filled with sea biscuits. I thought the soft lighting and texture of these little guys were beautiful.

In black and white

Yeah, this is the same photo only in black and white, I think it makes the lighting even more dramatic, but which is your favorite version?

Sea urchins?

This too was taken in Avila beach, same shop, different bucket.

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My Chalkboard

So here is my simple creation I mentioned at the beginning of this post. I'd been wanting a chalkboard, something I can put goals on that will be visible every time I walk into the room to keep me motivated and inspired. Ideally, I wanted to paint one of my sliding closet doors in chalkboard paint but I wasn't sure how my landlord would have taken to that, so, I improvised. I had taken an art class and one of the required tools for the class was an artist's board just like this one:

 

I covered the parts I didn't want painted with blue painter's tape and then covered it with two coats of chalkboard paint. On the back and on the wall, I attached the command strips that are for picture hanging, so that I didn't have to do any drilling into my chalkboard or wall (lord knows there's enough holes in my walls)

These work great

And voila! My chalk board. I love it, and since I already had the paint and the artist board it didn't cost me anything extra to make. It's perfect for brain storming, keeping to do lists and ideas on it. I also love the clippies because I use them to hold the rag I use to erase with and my design sketches. Some day though, when I have an entire room to use as a studio, I want to paint an entire wall in chalk board paint with magnetic paint underneath, so I can brainstorm to my hearts content.

What do you use for an inspiration board? A chalk board similar to mine? A dry erase board or bulletin board? Or do you have an entire wall (So jealous!)?