This week’s The Gallery prompt of Togetherness nearly had me stumped. I was doing my usual browse through my photo folders and was close to giving up for this week. I don’t take many pictures of people, and the ones that do have pictures tend to have only one person in. I couldn’t even thing of an abstract take on the prompt, and then I found this photo and wondered how I could have possibly forgotten it!

This was taken just after me and Gemma had returned from our Grand Canyon Helicopter and Ranch Adventure. It was a brilliant day, seeing the Grand Canyon was breath taking and then spending the time on the ranch was just perfect considering my love of cowboys. Seeing this photo again has brought back a lot of happy memories.

I took a week off from The Gallery last week because the prompt left me completely stumped. This week’s prompt made me much happier, Shapes.

When I was in Las Vegas I was absolutely fascinated by these spiral escalators in The Forum Shops at Caesar’s Palace. I couldn’t work out how they could be a spiral, and riding on one was a very strange sensation.

Another week and another lovely prompt from Tara at Sticky Fingers, Mother Nature.

I had lots of pictures to trawl through for this prompt, nature is one of the things I like to photograph the most. In the end I went with this photo of sweet peas in the flower tent at the Gardeners’ World show last summer. Sweet peas are one of my favourite flowers, we grow them every year and I love the way the vase is full for weeks and weeks on end. They’re so pretty and I adore the smell that wafts gently past on any breeze.

This week The Gallery is back at Sticky Fingers, and the prompt is Body Parts. I’m back home for a few days and have spent the last hour talking a million miles a minute with her so I thought I’d include her in my photo for this week:

My hand is the smaller slightly crookedy one on the left.

What a fabulous prompt this week from Tara! I’ve had great fun going through my photos to find a suitably funny one.

This was taken at my uncle’s retirement party. He started work for his company as soon as he left the army in the 1970s and stayed there for almost 40 years before taking early retirement. He decided to have a 70’s themed party to mark his retirement, it was suggested that some of his colleagues had never left their beloved decade behind! It was a great night, everyone dressed up and really entered into the spirit of it. My uncle is on the right of the picture, Starsky and Hutch are being played by my cousin (Starsky) and his best mate (Hutch). At least I think that’s the right way round… I never can remember.

I haven’t taken part in The Gallery for a few weeks, but now I’m settling into my life as a student I thought I’d get involved again. This week’s prompt is The Colour Red, with or without a Halloween slant. I’ve chosen to go without the slant, and instead pick this picture.

This poppy field is about 5 minutes drive from my parents’ house. Every year it is a wonderful sight when the poppies all come into bloom, but this year was probably the best I can ever remember it being. It was covered on tv, radio and newspapers – at the weekends people were driving for an hour or more to visit it and take photographs. Out of all of the photos that I took I think this one is one of my favourites – I have a copy of it stuck to my noticeboard above me desk. I love poppies and looking at it every day makes me smile and think of home.