a year of inspiration

Inspiration.
That's what I think of when I think about this wonderful wild ride of a year. One year of inspiring Muse posts, one year of inspired companion photos. One year of amazing and inspired photos in the Mortal Muses flickr pool, one year of lovely inspired views of your Everyday Beauty and over six months of inspired photos of your Life in B&W. Collectively that's over 53,000 inspired views of your world. I can't thank you enough for participating and sharing that with all of us.

I mentioned in one of my early posts, how much I enjoyed surfing the MM flickr pool, glass of wine in hand, Dave Matthews Band playing in the background and I still enjoy doing just that. The Mortal Muses flickr pool is my favorite source of inspiration, admiration and downright awe.

inspire 264/365 by jan@twoscoopz

But inspiration alone wasn't the initial reason we came together as the Mortal Muses. We wanted to create a collaborative blog, a place to support and encourage other photographers. Hopefully a welcoming place where you can make connections, new friends. I sincerely hope that you have made those connections, found new friends. That's the part I treasure the most. The sweet friends I've made this year. From the Muses, to many of you who join us week after week, sharing photos in the flickr groups and commenting on the posts, and photos in the flickr groups. My life is so much richer for having met all of you. And hopefully, through the different themes you have been challenged to learn and grow with your photography as we often were. (Heh, the behind the scene discussions we've had about some of those themes. Often they were just as challenging to us.)

158/365 Waiting for the dawn… by Tina M89

I will also admit that when Tammy first contacted me about becoming a Muse, I was excited beyond measure. And then a little terrified. However, not surprisingly, it was simply an answer to a dream of mine. I had written down a list of dreams just a few weeks before, and one of them was to participate in a collaborative photography blog, even though I had no idea what that would look like. I'm grateful that Tammy did. Thank you Tammy, for making a dream of mine a reality and giving me the opportunity to contribute to the Mortal Muses. Thank you fellow Muses for making this such a fun ride. {Oh. My. Goodness. the fun we have had.} And thank you to our followers for your participation, without you, it simply would not have worked. I love that so many of you embraced the idea and have joined us along the way. It has been an amazing year full of so much fun and beauty and I can't wait to see what the second year of Mortal Muses brings.

happiness by life stories photography

As you have probably concluded, some of us founding Muses are stepping out, making room for new Muses, new visions, new inspiration. After much thought and consideration, I have also decided to hand off  my muse spot.

Untitled by soulaperture

I couldn't be happier to welcome Christina of Soul Aperture as one of the newest Muses. Like me, she is a midwest girl, she has a love of vintage, textures, still lifes, a nice glass of wine, and she's also been featured in Artful Blogging magazine. But she is so much more than that. Christina has an amazing eye for details and her blog and photostream are full of beautiful,  slice-of-life everydayness photos.  Her photos inspire me to pick up my camera and look at my world a bit more thoughtfully, seeing the beauty in the simplest things. I'm sure she will continue to inspire as one of the newest Muses. Welcome Christina.

{i wanna drink with you all night until we both fall down...} by tumbleweed.in.eden

I won't say goodbye, as I plan to continue to participate with this wonderful group. I look forward to challenging myself with the new themes, contributing to the flickr groups, and continuing to support and promote the Muses as they move forward into an exciting second year. I also plan to enjoy all of the inspired photos added each day to the Mortal Muses flickr groups and I look forward to staying in touch with all of you as I enjoy the everyday beauty in your photostreams. And, of course you can also find me irregularly posting to my own blog, joyfully continuing my collaboration with fellow Muse Michel on our blog Mo&Mi, continuing my 365 project on flickr (perhaps now I'll get it all organized and posted) sharing my purple finds in the Happy PurpleTuesday group, and you can follow along with my newest obsession documenting my daily life on Instagram.

champagne by 2 peas and a blueberry

Waiter! Champagne for everyone! Cheers to another inspired year!

much love *sniff*
xo
maureen