5 Random Thoughts and of course a little orange mixed in.

It's Friday and time to share a few random thoughts with you via Nancy's blog, (A Rural Journal) and Random 5 Friday.  -  Also along for the ride,  Orange You Glad It's Friday hosted by Maria over at Life's Sweet and Spices.

How's that for some Orange!  (My entry for Orange You Glad It's Friday).

Random Thought 1:  You probably know that my hubby plays guitar but did you know that in Junior High (they call it Middle School now) I played the Viola.  Not the Violin (my parents couldn't afford one of those) but a Viola.  The school supplied them for Free while you were in Orchestra.  I have an embarrassing story about running after the bus with my Viola Case in hand but let's just save that for another time.

Random Thought 2:  I love to bake (and eat what I bake, it shows!)  Today's baked goods....Strawberry Streusel Muffins.  They were yummy.  So was the new recipe I tried for Spanish Pork Steak today as well.  Big Hit with everyone,  didn't take any pictures though. 

Random Thought 3: Why can't I have every cute kitten that I see?  The neighbor kids brought down all 4 of Fluffy's kittens today.  My favorite though is a little Calico.  I'd love to take her but with 6 cats already inside it's out of the question.  But seriously isn't she adorable.

Random Thought 4:  I have a weird memory.  Oh nothing like Marilu Henner's  but I memorize license plate numbers, phone numbers, etc...super easily and I can pretty much tell you the layout of furniture for the rooms of every house that I've ever lived in. It's weird but true.

Random Thought 5:  I'm dying to go read the latest book by my favorite Sci/Fi Fantasy author,  Terry Brooks, (Witch Wraith)  It's the 3rd in a series and I just started it last night.  I usually only read after I go to bed though as I'm busy with other stuff during the day and then I tend to stay up till 1:00-2:00 sometimes as I get so engrossed in reading I forget that I need to go to sleep.

Well that's it for this week.  Do pop on over to Nancy and Maria's blogs and check things out.

Tuesday Muse - Lilies of the Field

Hope your week is off to a great start.  It's time to join Nancy from (A Rural Journal) for Tuesday Muse.

For my entry this week I chose to use her lovely texture called, Mulberry Whisper on my photo.  I love the soft colors and the subtleness of the text within this texture.  I think it paired well with my lily photo and hope you do as well.

 
 

Click to Enlarge Images:



 
 

 I love to add quotes or scripture to photo's and whenever I see lilies I always think of this scripture so it just seemed fitting to add it to my photo. 

Please join Nancy and everyone who participated in Tuesday Muse by checking out their wonderful photos.  Have a great day.

 

A new Meme and a Scavenger Hunt - July 14, 2013

Welcome to Scavenger Hunt Sunday and the new Song-ography Meme:

First up for Scavenger Hunt Sunday are the prompts:  Relaxing, Inspiring Person, Written Words, Memories and Best Friend.  I must say that I found this weeks prompts to be the most challenging ones ever.  I almost skipped this week but persevered and while some may be a bit of a stretch I think they will work.  So let's get started hunting:

 

RELAXING: 

 



Our cat, Harley looks pretty "relaxed" here in the back window soaking up some sun!   

INSPIRING PERSON:  My mom has always inspired me.  She is always doing things to help other's out including sometimes weeding my flower beds.  She's not one to like having her picture taken (that's why you don't see her face in this shot) but I snuck this shot of her one day when I caught her weeding out some of my flower beds for me.  She's nearly 85 years of age and I find her to be very inspiring.  I can only hope to still be able to weed when (or if) I make it to age 85.

 WRITTEN WORDS:  I wasn't sure about this one.  Should I find actual hand written words or just what?  Coleen and I took a trip to the library today where I took this shot:

I think books have plenty of written words in them don't you?

MEMORIES:  I kept thinking of the lyrics from the song/movie: The Way We Were when I first read this prompt and wondered how I could fit that into a photograph but then I baked a Blackberry pie and my mind went in a totally different direction for the prompt.  Are you confused yet?  Never fear I'm sure you'll understand once I explain this shot:

When ever I made pie's when my dad was alive this is what he always said.  It's one of my favorite "memories" of him now that he's gone.

BEST FRIEND:  Coleen had a chance to have over her "best friend, Ella" this Friday for a play date.  She was thrilled to death to spend an entire afternoon with her friend.  What's really cool is that when Ella arrived her and Coleen were wearing pretty much the same color of clothes.  This made for a pretty color coordinated shot.

On a funny note while searching for a Friend quote I liked I came upon this one that made me laugh.  I hope it makes you laugh too:

Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.
Groucho Marx

Don't forget to pop on over to Ashley's blog and check out the other participants entries for the Scavenger Hunt.

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There is a new Meme starting on Sunday over on Kathy's blog:

You'll Shoot Your Eye Out.  -  It's called,  Song-ography and if you click on the link you'll find the information about this fun new meme.
This weeks song is:  Simon and Garfunkel's,  Homeward Bound. 


I really like this song.  When I graduated from high school I went to a small Bible College in Canada but was so homesick I only stayed 1 quarter.  I drove my "roomie" crazy playing this song the week before I went home. -  Since you can interpret the song any way you want using photography I remembered this old ticket that we found inside our walls when we tore the front porch area off to build onto our living room.

When we found it the ticket was still all in one piece but today when I took it out of the book it's been stored in the ticket had broken in several place so I pieced it together as best as possible and photographed it.  It's really pretty cool when you start looking at it.  The date of this ticket is:  Nov. 25, 1901 so that makes this piece of paper 112 years old!!!

I did some research and found out that the Market St. Railway Company was located in San Francisco.  You can read about it HERE:

Please stop by Kathy's blog and support her new Meme.  I think it's going to be a fun one.

Some Random Facts and A Bit of Orange

Thought I would join Nancy (A Rural Journal) for her Random 5 Friday and of course Maria (Life's Sweets and Spices) for Orange You Glad It's Friday.

Random Fact #1 - I love flowers!  It's the doggone weeding and watering of them that I'm not all that fond of.  With summer heat in full force recently the weeds have almost taken over.  It's cooler today so perhaps a bed will get weeded (or not)!

These are Nasturtium's from my garden.  I think they are so pretty and this is my entry for OYGIF.

Random Fact #2:  Baked a Blackberry Pie yesterday (no photo of the pie because it will be used on Sunday for another Meme) but I tried a new recipe where you put Cinnamon in the filling.  Everyone seemed to like it although my mom thought it was odd putting in cinnamon. She said that's for Apple Pie, not Blackberry Pie!

Random Fact #3:  It's Muggy in the Swimming Pool where Coleen takes her lessons.  It's indoors and they keep the Temperature in the room between 80-85 degrees and I feel so stuffy sitting there watching her for the 40 minutes she swims.

Random Fact #4: Crazy Drivers drive me crazy.  The other day I was driving down the road and a Garbage truck had pulled half-way out onto the road trying to make a turn.  I decided to go past him since I had the right-of-way and the stupid guy honked his horn at me like I was doing something wrong!

Random Fact #5:  I need a hair cut badly.  My hair is so fine and thin and well it's just bugging me.  I'm thinking of a lose perm once I decided to get it done.

So that's my 5 facts and I'm sticking to them.  Do pop in on Nancy and Maria's blogs and check out everyone's photo's and facts. 

Have a great weekend!

Tuesday Muse - July 9, 2013

Come join me as we hop on over to Nancy's blog (A Rural Journal) for her Tuesday Muse.  She's got a lovely piece there today that you won't want to miss.  Plus many others have shared their photo's so you'll want to check them out as well.

Here is my contribution this week.

Click to Enlarge:





Version#1

For this version I used Nancy's texture:  nc_Arapaho.  I edited on Pic Monkey and also added a frame called (leaves) from Pixlr.

Version#2

I'm not sure what textures I used on this version as I forgot to write them down.  I know I used some Star Bokeh from Pic Monkey effects and one of their textures and the frame. 

So which version is your favorite?  Below is the original photo without edits.  I was bummed that the shadows from this shot were covered up when I added textures but I liked both the results in spite of that.