PINK!!

When I was just shy of three years old, my parents bought a Victorian house in a small town. My mom decorated my room because I was just a tiny peanut, and she made it a girly paradise. One wall had wallpaper that consisted of various shades of narrow pink stripes on a white background, and the other three walls were papered with various shades of pink cabbage roses on a white background. There were pink drapes on the windows and a white eyelet bedspread. For my younger readers, a bedspread is NOT anything like the duvets etc. that you all are used to. They were the exact size of the top of the bed with a seam or a ruffle running around the edges of the mattress, finished off by a skirt that fell from the seam to the floor. It was beautiful and very, very, girly. That  house and that room instilled in me a love of old houses, toned down Victorian style, houseplants and of course, pink.

I like to lean back against things with my camera and take upside down pictures. I have no idea why I enjoy this particular activity, but I do, don’t judge. This house is in New Orleans and it is clearly pink.

Ironically, my current home doesn’t have much pink in it, but I love pink flowers and shirts.  Everyone looks good in pink, just like I’ve yet to see anyone look bad in lavender.  Doesn’t matter what color your skin is or your tone is, pink makes you look healthy, and despite the rumor, redheads look great in it too.  You just have to find the right tone.  Anyway, here are some pictures of pink things.  It’s gray and blah and I figured everyone needs to look at some pretty colors.

Here’s some pretty rock candy on a stick at the French Market in New Orleans. The speckled jawbreakers are pretty too.

Tea Roses blooming at the Chicago Botanical Garden last summer.

Some other kind of pretty pink rose blooming at the Chicago Botanical Garden last summer.

Peonies putting on a show in Chicago.

I think these were some kind of peony as well, but these were growing in George Washington’s flower garden at Mt. Vernon.  Obviously I manipulated this image. I don’t usually do that, but I recently got some software that lets me do this stuff and it’s kind of fun. They really were pink, I didn’t do that.

My daughter’s prom dress and finger nails.

A mountain top in Alaska last week.

Sunset at Blind Pass between Sanibel and Captiva Islands Florida

I hope you enjoyed a little pop of pretty color on this winter afternoon! Have a great Saturday, stay safe and be nice! 😊❤

Children of the Corn

Indiana is corn central.  My little seven acre spread grows wildflowers, weeds, wildlife, trees, more weeds, grass, the flowers I try to put in to make the place look more manicured, lightening bugs, and a lot more weeds.  We have two garden areas we are starting to work on, but it’s not easy.  We don’t have farm equipment, we have garden equipment, and it makes the work harder and longer.  Farm equipment is very expensive, so for now, garden equipment it is.

All around us though, are farms.  Corn and soy beans are the two main crops, but this year we’ve noticed more wheat fields popping up.  Corn and soy bean prices are flat, so I suppose the farmers are branching out.  Immediately adjacent to our property on one side is a corn field.  It has to be GMO corn, because the corn fields of my childhood couldn’t hold a candle to these guys.  The stalks are about ten feet high, there’s barely any room between them and they are so glossy and green they look like plastic.

Last night my daughter and I walked over to the next door field and took some pictures.  I didn’t have either of my good cameras, so these are cell phone photos.  Some of them are pretty good quality, some of them not as much.  I hope you enjoy them.  🙂

Giant clump of Queen Anne’s lace, weeds, and sticks at the end of a work area.

Sunbeams shining through waning weeds.

Corn, behind the weeds that are actually the main crop of the country.

Queen Anne’s Lace, or pretty weeds.

I grew up in the boonies, don’t remember corn roots looking quite this way.

More root fingers.

Corn tunnel.

I have no idea what this is, but it was really tall and kind of pretty.

Don’t really need to worry about he who walks behind the rows, cause he can’t get through them…

Another angle on the corn tunnel.

Baby corn starting, or is this where politicians come from?

Just pretty.

Country roads.

Almost full moon over the corn.

Soy beans across the road.

Ahhhhhh…

soooo TALL!!!

I hope you’ve enjoyed my untouched cell phone pix.  I’ll have to take the camera out next time!

Have a great day, and please, be kind to someone.  Please.  🙂

Abandoned Apple Farm Part Two

Since I posted my first entry featuring pictures from Fagley’s Apple Farm a while back, I’ve received a number of requests for more pictures from that day.  Since I’m still recovering from a particularly nasty case of bronchitis, I have some extra time and thought today would be a good day to make this post.

Just the front window.

Grape Arbor out front.

More orphaned books.  I don’t remember them having so many books, but I was pretty little when Mom took us there.

The place was just full of stuff that they just walked out and left behind.

I just like this.  I do remember their products being sold from these baskets.

This photo was taken from the side of the store and shows the old house that goes with the property.  It also looks completely abandoned and allowed to begin to decay. The windows seem to be gone.  It’s open to the weather.

This bottle was sitting on the mantle in the store.  Sorry it’s a little blurry.  I like it anyway.

I have no idea what these are from, but I thought they looked cool.

This is what I like to call a Walking Dead photo.

Fall colors

Immediately behind where I am standing to take this photo, is the highway.  It wasn’t this close in the past.  Where the sign is, giant mounds of glowing orange pumpkins used to lay in autumnal glory.  Also, to the right of the corner of the building, were giant mounds of pumpkins, and there were long tables filled with gourds under the arbor. It was beautiful.

This is another Walking Dead scene.  I can just picture zombie arms coming through those slats.  It was a seriously gloomy fall day until right before I left, and my imagination was running wild.

I hope you enjoy these photos.  When I left here, I went over to Eastfork Lake and took some pictures over there.  You can find what I’ve posted so far in First Photo Post: Old Bethel Methodist Church.  Click on photography in the word cloud on the page and scroll down til you find it.  Also, follow me on Facebook.  Just search for Message Discipline is Required.

Have a great day! Hold fast, SPRING is coming.  Be kind to one another.  🙂

 

Faces of the Audubon Zoo : Part Two

I originally intended to put all my faces in one post, but once I got started, I realized I had more than I thought and I don’t like to make photo posts too long.  Hope you enjoy my non-mammals. 🙂

Lovely flamingo. They were very vocal.

Some kind of duck.

I love peacocks so much. I’ve always wanted one but they are so loud, I’ll have to be satisfied with peacock art.

Turtles are cool.

Weird zombie chicken duck bird. Fitting for New Orleans.

Some sort of pelican.

I love these birds and I think their eyes are fascinating.

I like to take pictures of faces because they are so expressive.  I believe that animals have very similar inner lives to humans and I enjoy trying to capture a little of that.

Have a beautiful day and be kind to someone. 🙂

Faces of the Audubon Zoo : Part One

New Orleans is the home of my soul.  Seriously, I think I lived there in another life.  On my latest trip, I finally made it to the zoo.  I have very mixed emotions about zoos.  I love the conservation work they do, but caged animals, even when they are in lovely habitats make me sad.  Nevertheless, I went, I enjoyed, I saw some beautiful animals.

Bored bear.

This leopard was asleep until he heard my camera noise.

Fantastic face 🙂

So handsome.

I told him he was handsome, and he smiled at me.

Orangutan hanging in a hammock.

Rhino

Ahhhh, that feels good…

I love giraffes.

I hope you enjoyed my mammal faces edition.  Birds and reptiles will be next.

Have a wonderful day and be kind. 🙂

Cades Cove, TN

We live about five hours from Gatlinburg, TN. If you’ve never been there, it’s a town just outside the entrance to the Great Smokey Mountains National Park. Gatlinburg has gone over the years, from being a sleepy little mountain town to a tourist mecca. It has a decidedly German flavor to many of the buildings and in the summer, there are beautiful flowers everywhere. I know lots of people don’t like tourist towns, and I often don’t like them either, but I like this one. It is a great gateway to the beautiful park, and inside that beautiful park is Cades Cove.

Cades Cove was a community way back in the mountains. Today, it is basically a museum of past Appalachian living. There are a few houses, some churches, a nice visitor center and a campground. We decided to take a bike ride on the loop road, and quickly discovered that it’s a lot hillier than we ever thought it was from the car. We had to bale, but in the meantime, I got some awesome photos.

A morning view from the Loop Road.

We got there early, it was shady and cool. Suddenly, the sun rose all the way and the humidity began to creep up.

The boy beginning to realize that a black shirt was a bad choice…

The Loop Road.

We realized that we were going to all die and dry up like empty corn husks if we kept going, so the sight of this cross-over road was a welcome sight.

Posts along the cut over road to chop that trip in less than half.

The boy was in the worst shape because he had on a black shirt. My husband is the kind of person who trades us for crappy meals in restaurants, and will give you the shirt off his back. His shirt was NOT black and large enough to allow for air circulation when it was put on my son, so they traded shirts. I’m not sure if it shows well enough for you to tell, but that black shirt was TIGHT on the hubs. It was really funny, and a little embarrassing…

The hubs goofing off because the boy’s shirt was too small for him, the boy dying.

Lesson learned from this? Just because you can handle an eight mile loop road bike ride on a perfectly flat island in Michigan when the temp is in the low 60’s, does NOT mean you can handle a loop road bike ride on a hilly, 80 degree, humid Tennessee morning. Just say no. The Cades Cove Loop Road is for cars. Use one.

Have a great day full of level walking/riding paths, cool temps and low humidity. Be nice 🙂

Nighttime Michigan Avenue

Although I live in the suburbs, and honestly, would live in the forest if I had the chance, there are a couple of big cities that I love. New York and Chicago being two of them. I recently got to spend a long weekend in Chicago, and the first night there, we went out for a walk on Michigan Ave. I was having trouble with my flash, so in some places where I needed it, it didn’t work, so a couple of things came out a little blurry; in other places, I didn’t want the flash, so I was happy that it didn’t work and I got some cool pics of motion, and some pretty pics of the nighttime lights. I hope you like these.

PURPLE!!!!!!!!!

I have no idea why there is a painted horse on the sidewalk, but I thought it was pretty. Actually looking at it again, maybe it’s decoupage…

I was trying to get a photo of the shops and the lights, but this bus drove through my shot and I thought it wound up looking cool.

I liked the color of the leaves.

I hope you all had a blessed Thanksgiving filled with food, friends, and family; or maybe you’re more the understated holiday type and you wanted and got a quiet time by yourself or with those who are the closest to you; whichever, I hope it was great. Don’t go get trampled in stores for “stuff” today, stay home and look at pretty photos or eat leftovers, or put up your decorations for the next holiday you celebrate, or read a book, watch a movie, take a nap, hug a dog, kiss a baby, help someone or just veg out in front of the t.v. We’ll be starting on the Christmas tree. Don’t do anything stupid and be kind to someone, we all need it! 🙂

Abandoned Apple Farm

My Facebook friends have already seen some of these pictures, so I apologize to them for posting stuff they’ve already seen.

When I was a little girl, my mother took my brother and me to this apple farm every year to get our Halloween pumpkins. It was awesome and the inside of the store smelled like apples. I’ve thought of it often over the years, so a few weeks back, my husband and I took a drive out to see if it was still standing. It was. Sort-of.

The store.

Old Mrs. Fagley’s spot.

Right next to the fireplace, beside that white pillar that you see, the grandma of the family sat. She reminded me of a Russian fairy tale grandma. She was always bundled up, and working on some kind of crafty thing. She never looked up. If I am remembering it correctly, she smoked a pipe. I was simultaneously fascinated and terrified of her. I wanted to talk to her, but I was too little to have the guts to do it.

Abandoned books and an apple cider sticker.

If the books hadn’t been so moldy and gross, I would have liberated them from their depressing captivity. As it was, I had to leave them behind. A sad state of affairs for a book lover such as myself.

Freezer door. Beautiful.

What was BEHIND the beautiful freezer door. Scary, scary, scary. Didn’t linger here…

Speaking of abandoned books. I love this photo. So simple, so bleak.

I think that’ll have to do for this post. I have a lot more pictures from this day. I’ll have to do another post with some of them another day. Don’t wanna bore ya.

Have a beautiful day, send positive vibes into our troubled world and be kind to someone. 🙂

Mission at San Juan Capistrano

When I was a little girl, California was a kind of promised land for my mother. She always wanted to move there, and we went on vacation there a number of times growing up. I came to love it back in the day, but part of the problem travelling with my dad, was that he never wanted to pay for anything. I think he figured once he paid for Disneyland, he was tapped out. We drove past lots of cool places, but it wasn’t until my husband and I started travelling, that I actually got to go into most of the places I’d seen, but never really seen. Does that make sense?

This is one of my favorite places.

The Mission at San Juan Capistrano.

The Mission was established on November 1, 1776 by Fray Junipero Serra. It is the only Mission in Orange County, and it is beautiful.

This reminds me of Hotel California by the Eagles.

The ruins of the original Mission, destroyed in an earthquake. It reminds me of something from Greece or Italy. Very beautiful.

I can almost picture monks or friars moving down this walkway.

And finally, as a person who was a kid when the Hotel California album by the Eagles came out, the next photo brings that 70’s icon to life for me. The Mission Bells.

If you ever get to southern California, I highly recommend a side trip to the Mission. It is beautiful and peaceful, and I have a billion more photos of the joint that I’ll get around to posting sometime. If you are freezing or buried in snow today, I hope the beautiful California sunshine you see here helps a little. Have a beautiful day and for God’s sake, be kind to somebody. 🙂

Flowers and Butterflies

Beautiful orchid

The Krohn Conservatory in Cincinnati Ohio has a Butterfly Show each spring. After a long, cold, snowy Midwestern winter, everyone around here is ready for some greenery and color. In fact, more than the cold, the dreary browns and grays of late winter, after the snow is gone, but before it gets warm, is the thing that does the biggest number on my psyche. I love the Butterfly Show. The crowd stinks, but the warm air and life inside that giant green house is good for my soul.

Bonsai roots

Indoor waterfall.

These butterflies are iridescent blue when they are opened up and relaxed. Unfortunately, the butterfly show is over run with little kids who are apparently there without parents. They try to grab the butterflies and swat at them sometimes and it’s hard to get them still on something, I’d be satisfied with ANY butterfly sitting still. This beauty was way up high on the side of a tree, I captured him with my zoom.

Trying in vain to get a picture of this guy opened up and relaxed.

Got one!

Easter Lilies everywhere!

I love the Easter Lilies. The place smells so sweet.

The Krohn is beautiful all year long, but the Christmas season and spring are my favorite times. I’ll add some Christmas pics when the season gets closer. Enjoy your day! 🙂