Sunday, November 30, 2008

Salad Tongs (Macro Monday)


Macro Monday is easy to play, snap a macro (or close-up) photo, post it on your blog and come back here and sign Mr Linky.


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A few years ago my mom was looking for a set of salad tongs and we came up with these.


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We really liked them because at the time we were living in Texas and they made us think of the beach.


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They really are rather gaudy, and heavy!


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Maybe now I need to find her some snowflake ones.


Saturday, November 29, 2008

Overwhelmed

While computers are joyous creations - all my friends live in here ;0) - life sure is diffcult when they act up.  I am spending today trying to get caught up on some blog reading left over from our trip, and reinstalling things on my computer to make it more better.  Dang I depend on this thing a lot for my memory and when its memory got wiped so did mine and I am spending tons of time trying to remember the important stuff that is now lost to me and to it. :(

See you back here tonight for Macro Monday.  I try to put the linky list up every Sunday evening at 7:30 pm Central.

Friday, November 28, 2008

Fluttering by

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This butterfly has a daddy longlegs friend to the right.


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And when she flew to a new spot she found another friend.


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A different butterfly with a different little friend (on the left).  All of the above photos were female Cabbage Whites.


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The one above is a male Cabbage White.


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This male Clouded Sulpher landed on me so I handed hubs the camera.


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And the wicked wind helped make more of him visible.


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Apparently butterflies like company.


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Camera Critters

A Group of Winners

Of course I think you are all winners but the title is refering to the winners of my giveaways.

The unusual salt and pepper shakers are going to #11: Pamela

The Mephisto Club goes to #4: Lareine

#2: Barbara (I will email as no blog was listed) is the winner of Cause for Alarm

The Apprentice goes to #2: Martha

The Bone Garden goes to #1: Kristi

and Harvest/Life Support goes to Jeanna

Please email me your mailing addresses and I'll mail them out in the next couple of days.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

A story with a twist

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Many, many moons ago (I think I was still in high school, early 80s), my aunt made me a tiny little doll. At the time I think miniature shelves were pretty popular and the doll was made to go on a shelf but really, I’m old, oh so old, and have forgotten the whys. But while I was going through things and reorganizing I came across my little doll and thought she would be fun to photograph.


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I set about trying to find the best way to photograph her and finally ending up wedging her tiny feet into the top of my birdfeeder. I thought I would be telling about how my aunt hand sewed all of her tiny seams, little dress, and French knot hair.


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But, the story I thought I would give with the photos quickly turned as I went around her to get all of her sides.


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It was right about now that my 19 year old decided to get in on the action. He tried to eat her, but I wasn’t quick enough to catch that shot!


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Doesn’t he look guilty?!


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She now sits in Haden’s belly. I’m not so sure I want her back if she makes it back from her trip.


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She was cute, and lasted many years. . . until my sons got ahold of her!  But boys do keep life interesting!



PhotoStory Friday
Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

Lucky Loser

HAPPY THANKSGIVING – Hope you all had a wonderful day filled with family and food.


Did you hear the angels singing earlier? Well I was rejoicing with them!


3 days ago, while in Missouri, my computer crashed. It was not a soft little fall to the ground, oh no, it was a full fledged push-my-buttons-all-you-want-I'm-still-not-going-to-do-anything crash! Surprisingly, I did not cry, I did not throw a fit, I did sulk.


I was surprised to find that my computer losing all of my information – all of the important little tidbits I share with it – made me feel like. . .well, like a Loser. My self esteem crashed along with my laptop. But I held, deep inside, a tiny little crumb sized morsel of hope. I had (I was sure) a start-up disc at home (Have you made yours? Can I recommend doing so?). So I packed my beloved friend away and awaited our return trip.


Shortly after getting home last night – so shortly that I was still wearing my coat and stepped right past my dogs without even a 'hello' – I dug out the disc and waited with fingers crossed and baited breath for my magnificent husband to fix my world. I quietly held my breath as he inserted the disc, and after I woke back up from passing out, I found my beloved laptop was still dead.


I grabbed the paperwork that came with the computer and was excited to see that the recovery disc was right there ready to be of service. Dennis warned me that it would most likely erase everything from my friend's memory if we used it and that it might not fix the problem.


I was on board to try it as the last resort, but only after we tried everything else. Luckily, I had recently backed up my photos so I was only going to lose a month's worth of photos. But wiping the hard drive meant I would lose everything, every photo, every program, everything! My heart cried NO! We did call Gateway and found out that the warranty expired 2 days before the fatal crash – just my fricking luck!


The recovery disc was our final option and the one that worked! Dennis got my computer back up and running and I have been spending every free moment trying to get things back on it and where they need to be. We got a hard drive case and put my hard drive in it, attached it to Dennis' computer and copied all my photos and such onto an external hard drive before Dennis put it back in my computer and made my computer breath again.


I have just a few minor issues now and some of them will be worked out over the next few days as I reinstall my programs and try to bring my friend out of his amnesiac state. The one thing I worry about is that I may have missed an important email. So, if you have tried to get my attention and have been ignored please know that I am not slighting you, I probably didn't see it, so please forgive me and try again.



Last chance to enter the book and tadpole/whale/sperm/melting marshmallow things. Winners announced tomorrow evening.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Q is for Quail

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I saw this little Quail at the Manitowoc Zoo and thought he would be perfect for letter Q in Martha’s A-Z Photo Challenge.

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However, he wasn’t very cooperative. It was a rainy day, and he was behind glass and hiding behind the twigs and . . .oh well, you get so-so Quail photos for letter Q.

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Still, he’s really pretty colored and fat, isn’t he?

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Hope you all have a great Thanksgiving. :)  We'll be eating turkey and such with our kids today.  Then I'll be trying to catch up on blog visiting now that we're home.   Then tomorrow I'll be doing the random generator for the book giveaways, hurry and sign up if you haven't.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Indian Pipe Flowers

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For the first time this year I got to see some Indian Pipe Flowers (aka ghost flower, corpse plant), scientific name, Monotropa uniflora.


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The plants are small, growing to 4-10" tall with flowers that are about ¾" long. The entire plant is white and turns black when damaged. A gel-like sap is said to have been used medicinally by Native Americans for treating eye problems.


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Once pollinated, the flowers turn upright and the plants turn brown. Hopefully next time I see them they will be fresher.

Monday, November 24, 2008

Chippy Lil Chipmunks (or the thorns in my side)

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As you know, this summer the chipmunks drove me nuts. This one was hilarious! He kept using this branch to access the birdfeeder, then I moved the birdfeeder. Too funny to watch him keep going to the end of the branch, just to turn around and go back. He did is many times, guess he’s a slow learner.

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Another chipmunk decided to explore this little birdhouse as a possible home.


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They started preparing for winter, stuffing cheeks as full as possible.


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These were taken last month (before I got sick), and I haven’t seen a chipmunk in a while, believe it or not, I kinda miss them.

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Good thing I have my chipmunk statue.


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Sunday, November 23, 2008

Macro Monday - A Bird in the Bush


Macro Monday is easy to play, snap a macro (or close-up) photo, post it on your blog and come back here and sign Mr Linky.


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Where there’s berries there’s often birds.


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And I looked and looked and did find some birds.


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However, they were camera shy!


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This lone frog was the only creature willing to pose for a moment.





I will be slow making the rounds due to currently being in Missouri and having to borrow my mom's computer to do this post but as soon as I can I will be around. :)