Category Archives: flickr

Mar25

Orchids were the only thing ushering in Spring around here

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On the 23rd, Brian and I met my mom and brother over at Longwood Gardens. I bite the bullet and renewed my yearly pass. I say this as I was wondering if I could do the walking there after the past few months. Actually this is bazaar thinking on my part. I ‘need’ to go there for my gardening, flowers and photo fixes. My brother just bought a pass too! He will be bringing my mom out here now. That’s pretty neat.

Brian went along too. As we were walking in, a lady ‘waved’ a ticket in front of his face and said ‘do you want a ‘free’ ticket? Before I could say anything, he said ‘no’! He said he figured I will get a free pass for him via my membership, but still, you have to pay attention to what someone is offering. 😉

It was a nice display and mom said she liked it better than the flower show.

(Brian took a lot of photos too, I can’t remember which he did and I did, so we both will take credit for these).

This was so pretty to walk in to see from the blustery, but sunshiny day:

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Yellow is one of my favorite flower colors.

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I mean ‘wow’!

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I’m a big fan of true blue flowers too! Who doesn’t love these Blue Poppies?

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I think these are African Daisies or mums?

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Did I mention I like Chartreuse too? Maybe this is a bit more lime color.

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Warm colors are nice too.

I like this one for the demo effect-look at the gardeners’ hands. LOL

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And what they were making:

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Oh I could show you 80 more photos or more! I will be uploading them to Flickr. You will see them in my sidebar there.

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A nice man took this on Brian, my mom and me.

Mom has been a bit worn out from her long walk and standing a lot, so I hope brother will push her around in a wheel chair sometimes. Can’t wait for them to see the rest of the gardens!

In the next few days, I’ll share with you our daytrip to Crystal Cave and Roadside America!

Feb1

Goodbye January!

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Glad to see such a blah month zip by. We had so many days of gloom and fog as you saw in my previous posts. We did try and take little drives, etc. to help with cabin fever. And of course we helped Sean deal with his accident and the breakup of his girlfriend. Sean’s car is still in the shop and won’t be ready for another week. He is driving a nice rental which helps us a great deal.

I like February a little better because it’s a short month and Valentine’s Day breaks it up in the middle. I already got a couple of gifts from the hubby…a pretty storage box and ‘Downton Abbey Chronicles book’! I happen to be fascinated with that time period because my grandmom Ruth was a teen in the 1918s-1920s.

I’m still suffering with aches and pains when I overexert  or stand too long. I have an appointment with one rheumatologist in March, but I was trying to get an appt with another. They haven’t returned my call yet. My right knee bothers me the most as does the original hurt from a year ago on the left hip side.

I’ve been trying to clean out the picture files on my laptop. I just did the geocaching adventures one and there were over 400 photos over the last 9 months! This was one Brian took at the Brandywine Battlefield (incidently the day my back ‘really’ complained) and I added a verse for a Kenny Loggins song to it.

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We may be going with Sean to Los Angeles in a few months. One reason I want to get to a doctor. I’d love to have something to ease the aches so I could sit all that time on the plane and walk around and sight see!

When Brian is off, he is nice enough to drive me down to my mom’s house for a visit. We usually take her shopping and the last few times have been Home Goods. She had a gift card and used it. Sean had given me a cute tea cup and strainer, so I got some ‘Tiesta’ tea and had some when we got home. It was delicious! There is nothing that compares to loose tea. I went on the website and ordered a few more small bags of it!

We also took mom to a little Chinese restaurant where she enjoy shrimp in a mustard coconut sauce which sounds weird, but is good. I had beef and broccoli and Brian had something similar to me but with chicken and shrimp too.

We looked for a cache with mom in the car. Of course it was dark, and I thought we were going to a parking lot by the cache description. I figured it was probably a sign as we saw no parking lot in the area. Mom thought we are crazy, yet we drove through a neighborhood she had never been to before. That’s one of the fun parts about caching-going to new places! We made a note of the cache to check again sometime, dropped her off and tried another and it would have been looking around a wooded area-nope. I am up to 221 caches now!

Jul23

Nasturtiums starting to bloom

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Hey Zoey! I’m not sure if these are the nasturtiums you sent me a few months back, but they may be close. I don’t think yours have the color inside. These are pretty though.

I’m doing a few Artist trading cards today as it’s so blazing hot and I’m tired from not sleeping well as I am getting hot flashes as soon as I lay my weary head on the pillow. I was asked to make a few ATCs for a Flickr group, so I thought, why not?  I’ll share soon.

Mar14

So be careful

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I’m sure a lot of you have heard about the debates about using Pinterest and copyright issues.  They ‘basically’ own the photos you put up. They can do with them as they please, even sell them. I get a bit nervous using other’s photos and make sure the original link to the blog or source is connected to the image. I’m not as worried about recipes. If a person has a blog, they should consider that their images may be used. I’m not one to water mark every single photo. I have all my photos on Flickr which makes them copyrighted-did you know? I use about 95% of my own images on this blog. I noticed some pals use a lot of people’s photos to explain a topic, etc. Just be careful…someone may get unhappy. I’ve been asked if my images could be used and most times I say yes. The one exception was an android or iPhone travel app. I think a little compensation would have been nice and I said no.

Mar8

Took a little walk in the wind

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Well I was up in air as to what to do today as it was a bit breezy, but warm. Longwood Gardens is having their orchid displays until the end of March, so I decided to go for walk and some photo taking. I renewed my membership for the year which went up $5, but they also give you two free tickets for your guests. It pays for itself after about four times.

Here are some of my favorite shots:

What you see when you enter the one end of the conservatory
Gorgeous Orchid display
A very tame squirrel. I had fun editing this for a friend
I know a good place to live
White columns of orchids
White Orchid Columns
Begonias and Aechmea
Begonias and Aechmea
Amazing Stargazer lilies
Stargazer lilies
One of my favorite flowers-Blue Poppies
I love Blue Poppies
Hanging orchids and an archway
Arch of orchids and hanging orchids
A trained Nectarine tree with blooms
Nectarine blooms
Yellow butterfly bushes that smelled like exotic honey.
Yellow Butterfly bush
A moth-like orchid the Calathea
Calathea up close
Take it from the Longwood gardeners-how to prune a rose bush-many only had one or two main stems!
How to prune a rose bush
Mother of Thousands plant
Mother of Thousands
I’ve been taking Olive leaf capsules for my blood pressure (think it is helping-thanks Dr. Oz). Here is an Olive tree
Olive tree
There are more photos in Flickr-just click on a photo above.

Jul21

Having fun paper collaging

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Crowabout #88 Fairy Challenge, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

During these definite ‘dog days of summer’, I stay where the air is cool, since we are paying heaps of $$$ for it lately. Best thing we ever did to this house. I am in a few Flickr and Swap-bot groups and I trade with people every week. This little wooden plaque was a challenge I don’t have to trade at all! Every week on Flickr, the group coordinator offers up a sheet of photos/designs. We are to use at least 3 from the sheet. On this one I used the pink blossomed tree and stream, the moth fairy, Hummingbird, fairy sign and red leaves. I added a row of butterflies and a skeleton leaf I added glitter to. I think this turned out cute.
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Our garden is giving us mostly Cucumbers! The Zucchini are all flowers and the Green Beans are just giving us a few beans. The tomatoes are good but a bit on the small side. I swear something is tunneling under the garden as a Green Pepper and Tomato are wilting-they are near each other. All that dry and now all this wet! Mother Nature is playing a game with us. I shouldn’t complain as I have had some nice Roses and Daylilies, but you can’t eat them!

Jul5

One of my favorite hobbies

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Page from my swap book, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

When I was a teenager, I loved to get mail. I think this stemmed from a couple of different events in my young life. Once my mom wrote to Whitman Publishing Company saying their coloring books, cards and stuff were the cat’s pajamas. Well didn’t they send us a nice big box full of products corresponding with the new movie at the time- ‘Chitty, Chitty , Bang, Bang’.
Another time was when my paternal Grandmom sent me a box of Ginny dolls with oodles of little clothes and accessories. I still have them, but not all the clothes.
I also sent letters to pen-pals. I got published in a magazine once too.
Mom has this really long stone driveway and I remember going every day to check for a letter from a pal from across the country or in the next town (really!)
This is leading up to my grown up enjoyment of receiving little pieces of art in the mail from all over the world. I’ve gotten ‘art trading cards’ and other hand made goodies from places as far away as Israel. This is an example of some of the cards, though the blue one and the tag were a gift from Sherry in England for my last birthday. I believe this binder has 10 pages with 9 spaces each, so I have 90 cards (plus) just in it! The artist’s personality really reflects in their pieces.

Swapped items from Flickr groups
Some of my Flickr swaps…a dress, paper doll, flower and bird.
My gifts from Sherry and Judith
The most recent swaps or ‘gifts’ from my pals in England. I sent them teapot ribbon holders.
My art table
My little work space-yep-very untidy with some works in progress.