Zentangles

I have gone crazy for zentangles! Here are some ATCs that I have done recently for my yahoo group.

ATCs 04-17-08

ATCs that I have recently done for swaps.

Spring has sprung-finally!

Here are some new photos. It is so nice to get out and about again.
Ahhh flowers!

Canada Geese

Here are 3 Canada Geese enjoying the shallows on the river. Some were amorous, as in the second photo.....Titled: C'mere Pretty Mama! The third is just an early spring shot of a roundhouse on the river.

Do you LIKE snow?

It is pretty, so even though I am very tired of it,
I am going to share some of my recent photos.

Back to Summer

We had a dumping of snow again last night. It is pretty. However, I am ready for warm weather again. I taught a digital photography class last night, so that makes me anxious to get out and take more photos. This photo was taken in the early fall, and this earwig (I imagine) thinks that we can't see him hiding in this lily pod skeleton. You do see him, don't you??? LOL

Bossy Cardinal

With all the snow recently we have been busy feeding the wild birds. I of course, am taking zillions of photos of them. I love this one because it looks like Mr. Cardinal is bossing around the poor little Junko.....though he might be ignoring Mr. Cardinal. The junkos out number them.

We have had up to 5 pairs of the cardinals. I have even captured a woodpecker and some starlings.

Yes, I am having fun.

Sunrise on the Rock River

A beautiful sunrise on the fridgid Rock River.

Photos of the ice storm

I didn't drive out in the ice storm on 12/04/07. I stayed home from work that day. However the next day I did make it to work with a few stops along the way to take photos. Hope you like them. Yes I took lots and lots. I took more on the way home. AND the one of the pine tree is taken from the 3rd floor breakroom window at work.

The early morning drive to work in north central Illinois often involves lots of farmland, creeks and woods. It is a beautiful peaceful drive. Some mornings the sunrises are just awesome. While this one didn't have a lot of color, I decided to use the phone poles as the focal point for the sun (usually you try to avoid the poles when taking photos) and I was please to have the geese or ducks in the background. Overall, I liked the photo. Beauty is after all, in the eye of the beholder....and I be holdin' the camera.

Reading books & Climbing trees

On Grandparents day at school, one of the other grammas was reading a sort of scarey story about a little boy who thinks he is dying because he was falling apart....losing teeth and hair, etc.

As you can see by the expression on my granddaughters face, she was 'into' the story. Seems the little boy was experiencing the normal growth of a child and the book ends with him holding up a finger and asking if he isn't falling apart, what is this yellow stuff leaking from his ears.....to which all the kids went ewwww! It was cute.

This is my 40 yr old son....showing his son the wonders of his childhood....climbing the maple tree in the front yard. Not that any 7 yr old needs to be shown, but the 40 yr old needs to relive the glory, I guess.

The grandson thinks the tree is quite glorious and is his new clubhouse.

Isn't father/son bonding wonderful????

Whazzzzzzup!

A couple weeks ago, I was trying to get a close up of a bumble bee. Having succeeded, I was rather pleased with the results. However when I put it up on my screen on the computer, I discovered a little green bug had popped up over a flower on the left hand side of the screen. It looks like he is saying, "Whazzzzzup!". It makes me smile everytime I see it.

OMGoodness---I got bit!!!

I got bit (Monday 8/27) while I was out taking photos and went to the emergency room at the nearest hospital.

I was walking around the flowers in a field...in the mowed portion, so I was not in tall grass or weeds, when I felt something like a stick stab my ankle. As I walked back to the car, it began to burn a little, so I looked down at it and it was bleeding quite a bit. I got in the car and wiped it with a napkin, and I could see two little puncture marks. Not a single hole in my panty hose. I began to be a little alarmed. It looked like a snake bite...two puncture holes, no damage to the nylons, bleeding profusely (for two tiny holes anyway), and the burning sensation. I called my hubby Ron and said I think I have been bitten by a snake...he said to go the hospital, I said even if it was only a garter snake? He asked if I had seen it, I said no, he says go to the hospital.
So I did. They got me in immediately. When I took off my panty hose I could see a little teensy tiny abrasion line, so I actually got stuck with a stick. I said "Well, this isn't going to be much of a story....snake bite sounds much better than stick bite!" I told my sister, "Hey!! it was a very very vicious stick, and very very noxious! It burned!!!"

So the good thing was that it wasn't a snake bite and the bad thing was that it was a horrible mean stick bite and I might be crippled for life. Ok, so they cleaned it up and they were happy for me that it wasn't serious and it will probably cost me $200+ for this darn stick bite and I hope you are laughing your hind end off!

AND I did get this great photo of a Monarch butterfly:

Then the ladies on my scrap booking group on line said I should go back and get a picture of the stick that bit me. I went back but I couldn't find it anywhere. I was telling the ladies that when I went back through my photos and found one of the stick waiting for me to come a step or two closer!!! One lady asked how I could miss seeing it because it was so huge, but I was busy looking at the butterfly and didn't see it. It is quite graphic so be prepared.

Then I was taking photos in my back yard pond of the froggies and the reflections.

THEN I discovered there were sticks in my pond!!!

OMGoodness I am plagued by sticks now!!! LOL

Hope you enjoyed my story….all of which is true, but embellished for entertainment! I did doctor the stick-bite photo with a stick and a tyrannosaurus rex skeleton head.

Where has the time gone.

I always think I am going to blog more often....and then life happens and I get side-tracked. I have taken well over 3000 photos this summer and would like to share a few in each blog. I have had so much fun with my new camera (Kodak Easy Share Z710). I took this photo of the moon....in daylight, with a flash and just the zoom on the camera.

I was just plain impressed with this darned camera!!!

Fishy Photos

I am hooked on the fishies at the moment. I have a couple spots where you can often see them feeding. They are just carp, but gosh, still fun to watch. The one that lives closest to me I have named Carl (or Carla, since I really don't KNOW). Last week I saw a bullfrog tadpole swimming in the creek. Oh how I wish I could have caught him for my pond at home. I have the cacophony of pond and tree frogs, and it would be well rounded with the bar-rumph of a bull-y frog.
So here are the fishy photos, Carl first. Next is one from the slough.

And to finish today's log off a

lovely peaceful photo of the Rock River.

How easy it is to unwind after a day

at the office when you can stop at the

River for 5 or 10 minutes. Only thing

better would be to have a huge cup

of coffee and a lounge chair while I am

doing that. Ah! Life is good!

Wait....are those alligators in the

water?????

Is this Lake Placid????

Just the Right Photo

I was talking about taking pictures at work one day, and one of my coworkers that doesn't know me real well asked if I carried my camera with me all the time. I was a wee bit surprised that she asked. My answer: yes!

Back when it was early spring...like in April. I saw the coolest 'picture' of a dead tree mirrored in an old backwater pond. Well THAT day, I didn't have my camera with me and was so disappointed to have missed a perfect photo. So I started carrying the camera again. But the weather never cooperated. It was either windy, rainy or too darned cold to get out of a warm car to snap a photo.

I have an hour commute to and from work each day, so I am always on the lookout for a good photo. I really wanted this photo bad. Finally after about 3 weeks the perfect day came again and I stopped to take the picture. I was very happy with the color and texture of the final shot.

While I was there, I thought I would go to the other side of the road and snap a shot of the swamp there, figuring with the sun shining on that side the shot would be nothing to speak of. But I was there, so over I went. I took my shot. Then I was standing there absorbing the peace and tranquility. I love water. Something about it is very soothing and restorative.

I looked over the edge of the bridge into the water.....what a shock for me. The water was perfectly clear. I figured it was stagnant swamp, but in fact it is a slough (backwater (3) : a creek in a marsh ) and the water was running through it. So I took a photo of how clear the water was. And stood there absorbing more peace and quiet, when zip! a big old carp came swimming out from under the bridge. I didn't have my camera ready so he got into the reflective area before I could capture him. Not to worry, 3 more zipped out and I got them. Then about 6 more came out and I got part of them. What a thrill for me! These little puppies are about 12" long and as you can see, well fed.

I hope you have enjoyed my fishy story. It continues. I stop often to see how they are doing. Some days they are not visible at all. One morning I did get a photo of them laying near the top of the water. I will post it later.

Aaahhh! How I wish I was there right now. Western Pennsylvania. Makes me wish I had a big mug of coffee and a handfull of snails. Heaven. Now before you start retching, snails in W. PA are actually pastries. They are like pie dough rolled with cinnamon, sugar and butter. My grandma used to call them sugar-pies.

This photo is from Linn Run State Park and it is a beautiful spot east of Pittsburg about an hour. I love it there. As you can see, there is still snow on the ground in patches. It was March '07 when I was there last.

That water is so clear. Around here....Northern Illinois, it is rarely THAT clear. It is mountain fed, so I suppose that explains most of it.

blogger empress--not

Guess I am going to have to get busy and keep this up to date. I will win no prizes for blogging, will I? I have a new grandchild due anyday now. That is always exciting to me. My daughter is hoping for a girl. She has a son 8 yrs old. We had several of the kids and grands here for a bonfire last Monday night (memorial day).

One of my kids gave me a new digital camera and I have been having a ball with that. Of course, I had to take photos of the birdies at the feeder. We have tons of wild canaries. We have had indigo buntings, orioles, purple finches, morning doves, and rose breasted grosbeaks. And the hummers are back too.

Went to see Pirates of the Caribbean III, and LOVED it. Yes, we dressed in costumes. We were the first in line and we interviewed for the local paper. Our 15 minutes of fame.

Hubby has been rebuilding the support beam on the front porch. We both took a week off of work to get some projects done here at home. I have been working in my scraproom, cutting all the cereal boxes I have saved into ACT forms (artist trading cards), so I have well over a 100 blanks ready to go. Anyone want to swap? Here is one I did for a mega swap on Swap-Bot.

My sister came to visit last weekend. She only lives 20 miles

away, but she spent the time here because she wanted to. We went to a Bead Retreat party. She had never been and was so overwhelmed that she said she loved her bracelet, but never again. LOL the next day she got into my stash and made 2 bracelets, one for each of her daughters. So I went to Wally and got her a small stash of her own and shared part of mine.

She is having some medical problems and can't work right now, so she has the time to 'play'.