Orange You Glad It's Friday #40

Happy Friday! - Won't you join me over on Maria's blog, (Life's Sweet and Spices) for Orange You Glad It's Friday.

I was out taking some photo's awhile ago and decided to snap a few of one of the lilies next to my mom's storage shed.  Just as I was snapping away a small fly landed on the petals.  I thought it looked pretty against the orange color of the lily so here is my submission.

Enjoy your weekend!  Don't forget to check out the other participants entries.

Scavenger Hunt Sunday - May 26, 2013

Welcome to SHS -  For those in the U.S.  I hope you have been enjoying your Memorial Day holiday weekend. 

This weeks prompts are:  Vacation (what's that?),  Food, Sound, Texture and Anything.  - Click to Enlarge Photos for more detail.



VACATION:  We haven't taken a real vacation in several years.  Most of our vacations consist of 1 day trips like the little jaunt we took on Saturday up to my brother's cabin in the mountains. 

Coleen is enjoying the view from the balcony and a vacation away from home.

FOOD(S):  My brother and his wife served up some great burgers and fixings.

SOUND:  This one is a bit of a stretch or maybe not...

One of the views from his property.

TEXTURE:

A portion of their fire pit area.  I like the contrast of the burnt wood/coals with the rusted metal rim and the concrete background and twigs.  Lots of different texture there.

ANYTHING:

I decided on this little wild flower for my "anything" shot as I have not seen anything like this before today.  It could have been used for texture too, just look at the feather like fuzz on the petals.

A Bonus Shot of Coleen with the Mushrooms (Morel's) that my brother helped her find.

 

 

Orange You Glad It's Friday #39

Hello everyone.  I hope you've all had a great week.  Mine has been "crazy" nothing major just a lot of frustrating things to deal with (calling insurance companies is such a pain!  I was "on hold" for 45 minutes on Monday), sick cats to deal with, road construction detours, waiting in lines for ever etc....you get the picture.  So yes I am glad it's Friday!

Time to share with OYGIF  I have 2 pieces today.  One is SOOC (Straight Out of Camera) with no editing.  The other was edited by adding a texture and a quote.  I hope you enjoy them.  Click to Enlarge.

Some Gerbera (fancy ones) Daisies in my mom's flower garden.  I thought about adding a texture to this but there was something about the photo that I liked just the way it was so that's what I went with.

Below is the "original" photo.  I am amazed how some cropping and adding some texture can change a not so great photo into something so beautiful.  The texture is from Lenabem-Anna (#168) and can be found HERE:

See what I mean.  This shot is not so great but the final edited version takes on a whole new life of it's own.

Cattitude Monday and a Birthday Shout Out.

If you are here for SHS (Scavenger Hunt Sunday) click on the link.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY  to my Dear Hubby,  Mike.
Here is a card I made for him and also a picture of him and Coleen taken at the Ducky Derby this past Saturday.  Photo's for Cattitude Monday will follow.


Click to Enlarge:

 

 

This first photo is a bit of a "selfie" and was one that I planned to use for the Cuddly prompt for SHS but went with the puppies instead.  It's me and our adopted cat, Piglet (who lives at my mom's house next door.)  He is such a devoted cat and loves for me to hold him.

 





Next up is our sweet cat, Snickers.  She was quite ill on Friday (vomiting for no reason) so she made a trip to the Vet.  The blood work results were back today.  She does not have a Thyroid problem.  But her Kidney Enzyme levels are elevated so they want to do another blood work up to determine if she is starting to show signs of kidney failure or if this was just a random thing.  She's doing okay now and has been eating and drinking just fine since I brought her back home and didn't get sick again so hopefully it was just some random bug that caused her to be sick.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by. 

Scavenger Hunt Sunday - May 19, 2013

Welcome and thanks for stopping by.  It's time to join Ashley(Ramblings and Photo's) for this weeks, Scavenger Hunt Sunday.

This week the prompts were:  Three, Hand(s), Fence, Cuddly and Sign.  So without further ado....let's get started on the hunt.



THREE:  Today was the annual Ducky Derby race for prevention of Child Abuse here in Walla Walla.

These 3 ducks seem to have become separated from the pack.  Needless to say none of my 5 ducks were winners (yet again) this year.  Oh well, the money goes to a good cause.

 

HAND(S):  There were lots of activities for the kids at the Ducky Derby.  One was planting a flower.  Coleen picked out a Pansy and a Petunia.

 

 

 

FENCE:  This fence was across the creek area from where the Ducky Derby was held.  You can see the "Blue Mountains" in the background.

 



CUDDLY:  They had some animals for the kids to pet at the Derby.  What is more cuddly then a...........PUPPY!

Wait for it....how about 2 Puppies!

SIGN:  This is the only prompt not taken at the Ducky Derby.  There were signs there but I had spotted this one downtown earlier in the week and just had to use it.

A bonus shot of Coleen next to the signboard out on the sidewalk:

Orange You Glad It's Friday - May 17, 2013

It's been some time since I've participated in Orange You Glad It's Friday so I thought I would jump in today and post some photos.



I have a beautiful Orange Iris (sorry I don't know the name of it) that recently bloomed.  I'm sharing some photo's of it before the rain and after the rain.

Click to Enlarge

 

 

 

Tuesday Muse - May 14, 2013, Let Your Heart Soar

 

Welcome & thank you for popping by. - I'm linking up again today with Nancy (A Rural Journal) for Tuesday Muse.

 

 

This past weekend was the 39th annual Hot Air Balloon Stampede here in Walla Walla.  For the past few years we haven't gotten up and went to the actual launch sight because it's always so crowded and hard to find parking, then walk to the sight. My mom just isn't able to handle doing much of that anymore so it's easier to stay home because...Generally the balloons float right over our houses so we have a front row seat.  Why I can even watch them in my bathrobe with a cup of coffee to enjoy!

 

This year there was a "new" balloon here that we hadn't seen before and we really liked it.   CLICK TO ENLARGE

 

 

 

 

  

 





Both of these pieces have been edited using textures from Nancy's Painted Skies collection.  I used Pic Monkey for my editing and also used a few of the editing features there. 

 

Have a wonderful day.

Cattitude Monday - May 13, 2013 - Introducing Helix

Hello and Happy Monday! - If you are popping by for Scavenger Hunt Sunday please click on the link for my entry.

Today I'm sharing some photo's of another one of the neighborhood kitties.  This one belongs to the same family that own Fluffy (the new mama kitty) that I showed on SHS.  His name is Helix.  He's a shy sort of cat and at times it's very hard to get pictures of him.  I managed to snap a few one day that I liked before he got tired of the clicking of the camera and ran off.  Funny thing was unbeknownst to me one of the people we attend church with was driving by and happened to see me laying out in the yard snapping photo's of the cat.  He made a comment about it on Sunday.  You just never know who's watching you!

Relaxing on my mom's porch after his morning breakfast.

He headed for our front sidewalk and I caught a few poses before he headed off across the street.  This next one is my favorite:

"Hey lady will you put that darn camera away!"

Scavenger Hunt Sunday - May 12, 2013

 

Welcome to Scavenger Hunt Sunday

Before we get started on the hunt I want to wish all you "Mom's" out there a HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!  This week our neighbors cat, Fluffy (she's been featured on my blog several times) had her kittens.  So in honor of Mother's Day I'm sharing a couple of pictures of her and the kittens first.  They aren't the best photo's but they will have to do.  Click to Enlarge:

The Calico one is my favorite.  I wish we could take one of them but with 6 cats of our own adding another one is out of the question.














Now let's get started on the hunt.  This weeks prompts were:

Perspective, Golden, Bloom, Dark and Local.


PERSPECTIVE:

While I was out at the local Community College getting another of the prompts I happened upon these awesome wind collages and captured this one.  I loved how the picture turned out so I searched for a suitable quote about perspective and added it to the photo.

GOLDEN:

The Dome (Gymnasium) of the college is indeed quite Golden:

 

BLOOM:  This was going to be my original shot for Golden but then I went with the college dome instead. 

 

 

This is a bloom from what is commonly known as a Golden Chain Tree.  This tree was loaded with blooms just like this and absolutely gorgeous.

 

DARK:

 





My daughter bought some LED garden lights (flowers and dragonflies) and I went out after it got dark and snapped a photo of the dragonfly lights.

LOCAL:  This weekend a local event (39th Annual Hot Air Balloon Stampede) took place.  I snapped this shot of a few of the balloons as they went over our house this morning.

That's it for this weeks hunt.  I hope you have enjoyed your stay.  Be sure to pop on over to Ashley's blog now and check out the other participants.  Have a great day.

Tuesday Muse on Wednesday

Yes,  I'm a day late (and probably a dollar short as well) but here is my entry for Nancy's Tuesday Muse:

 
 


 Click to Enlarge:

I spotted this wonderful bush in an alley on my way home from the store so I stopped to take a few pictures.  This bush is called a Snowball bush. 

Scavenger Hunt Sunday - May 5, 2013



It's time to join in on the fun of Scavenger Hunt Sunday hosted by the lovely and talented Ashley Sisk (Ramblings and Photos).  Each week you get a list of 5 "prompts" to look for and photograph through out the week.  This weeks prompts were:

Background, Spotted or Dots, Weather, Motion and Sweet.

I was wondering what I would find for some of the prompts and found them in unexpected places and events that I attended with Coleen this week.
Click to enlarge photo's.

BACKGROUND:  Now this is a "loose" interpretation of this prompt but I like it.

The shade from our back fence provided just the right "background" to capture the sunlight on this dandelion and make it shine. 

SPOTTED or DOTS:   I was worried about this prompt until  I took Coleen to an art exhibit this morning.  She had a piece of artwork from school at the exhibit and when we got there we discovered that they had some arts & crafts for the kids to do while they were browsing around.  One was called,  "Dot Walla Walla" and featured a table with a bunch of cut out circles of patterned paper that the kids could glue together and then place on these long white cloth panels hanging from the wall.  This is a portion of one of those panels.

WEATHER:  After we left the art exhibit we went to several places to buy flowers.  The "weather" was perfect for buying and planting.

MOTION:  Friday the kids at Coleen's school put on a Cinco deMayo program and she was in one of the dances that the kids performed.  I hadn't planned on attending but was glad that I did.  The dances were great and I was able to capture some fun motion shots. You get 2 for this prompt.

These were the 1st graders doing the Fisherman's Dance.  I loved how the little girls were waving their dresses about.

I also caught Coleen in her dance and was excited to spot that I'd captured her just as her feet came off the floor in a little jump portion of the dance.

SWEET:  This one will surprise you.  I had planned to show a shot of the cupcake that I bought at the Art Exhibit this morning but then spotted something else on our walk back to the car.

It's a sign advertising our Walla Walla "Sweet" Onions and here they serve Sweet Onion Sausage Sandwiches and other items featuring the famous onions.  Oh my they are tasty & awesome on hamburgers too.  Check out their website : www.onionworld.com .

That's it for this weeks hunt.  Be sure to check out the other participants by visiting Ashley's blog. - Up next week: Perspective, Golden, Bloom, Dark, Local