French Quarter walks

Lowe's buckets make good drums?











We don't have hot dogs carts at home, lol.





Seems most of the silver paint in the US gets sold in New Orleans.

happiness

There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and after that, to enjoy it.  Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second. ~Logan Pearsall Smith

A big thing that cancer taught me was to enjoy the moments.  Life is too short!  I will enjoy as much as possible and avoid as much stress and drama as I can.

~ You can see the explanation behind this project by going here or see the all posts in this category by going here.

Pixel and friends

April of 2009 I had a contest to name our resident flying squirrel and she ended up with the name Pixel. She's a darling, you can see photos of her on that post.  Well Pixel and her babies have been very busy.  Here we are a little over a year later and every night I feed my fliers and I have a count of at least 6 coming to visit.

You can set your clock by them. They come at 9:15 every night, it's so fun watching them fly in! I was surprised when we had a cook out that lasted until about 11pm and they still came. People were able to get within a few feet of them and watch them.

While my parents visited we sat out every night to watch them. Over time we have worked up to being able to use a flash on them. We replaced our yellow bug bulb with a white one. Later we brought out a big shop light, like a flood light and still they came. And now we can put the flash on the camera and freeze them in action.

Now that we've got a few decent shots I'm back to just feeding and watching them. Every night I feed them seeds and some sort of fruit. I've found that they do not like cantaloupe. lol  They are the busiest in the yard right at dusk, but they are still here throughout the night.  I've been out as late as 1am and seen/heard them.  Come on over, they're more fun to watch than tv.


Hosted by Cecily and Lolli

The Stripe on the Moon

One evening I decided to shoot for the moon. This was actually taken while it was dusk, not yet fully dark, just the settings I used made it appear darker than it was.  I would love to get even closer, but at least I can see some craters.

I often take photos of the moon, I just love it and can't help myself.  But I'm stubborn and won't use my tripod, lol.

So when I was in Missouri, and the moon was full, I had to shoot some more. It was darker out when I did these and the moon shows up as a different color too, maybe because I was in Missouri instead of Wisconsin? lol

But as I looked at the photos I had taken, for the first time ever I noticed a streak, stripe, something going across the moon. The photo above it's located towards the top and on the right.

This one shows it continuing on. The two photos were taken seconds apart and the next photo it was gone again.  Wonder what it was - any ideas?

Hosted by Cecily and Lolli

Waiting for the blizzard :0)

THE STORM IS EXPECTED TO REACH AN INTENSITY LEVEL NORMALLY OBSERVED ONLY A FEW TIMES EACH DECADE...AND THE AREA HAS NOT BEEN AFFECTED BY A STORM THIS STRONG IN YEARS. ~I find this very exciting!

It has been snowing little flakes all day.  I'm so excited we have a blizzard coming tonight!

...BLIZZARD WARNING IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST WEDNESDAY
NIGHT...
...WINTER STORM WARNING IS CANCELLED...

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN GREEN BAY HAS ISSUED A BLIZZARD
WARNING...WHICH IS IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST WEDNESDAY NIGHT.
THE WINTER STORM WARNING HAS BEEN CANCELLED.

* SNOW WILL GRADUALLY INCREASE IN INTENSITY THIS EVENING BEFORE
BECOMING HEAVY WITH NEAR WHITE OUT CONDITIONS OVERNIGHT AND INTO
WEDNESDAY MORNING BEFORE DIMINISHING WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON. THE
HEAVIEST SNOW SHOULD FALL BETWEEN MIDNIGHT AND 9 AM ON
WEDNESDAY.

* 8 TO 14 INCHES OF ACCUMULATION IS EXPECTED.

* THE COMBINATION OF SNOW...WINDS THAT COULD GUST AS HIGH AS 45
MPH IN CENTRAL AND EAST-CENTRAL WISCONSIN LATE TONIGHT THROUGH
WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON...AND NEAR ZERO VISIBILITIES WILL LEAD TO BLIZZARD
CONDITIONS AT TIMES AND MAKE THIS A DANGEROUS WINTER STORM.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A BLIZZARD WARNING MEANS SEVERE WINTER WEATHER CONDITIONS ARE
EXPECTED OR OCCURRING. FALLING AND BLOWING SNOW WITH STRONG WINDS
AND POOR VISIBILITIES ARE LIKELY. THIS WILL LEAD TO WHITEOUT
CONDITIONS...MAKING TRAVEL EXTREMELY DANGEROUS OR IMPOSSIBLE.
THIS IS A POTENTIALLY LIFE THREATENING SITUATION. DO NOT TRAVEL.
IF YOU MUST TRAVEL IN AN EMERGENCY...HAVE A WINTER SURVIVAL KIT
WITH YOU. IF YOU GET STRANDED...STAY WITH YOUR VEHICLE.

Niagara Falls, New York

We went 4100 miles, in 12 days, covering 12 states (IL, IN, OH, PA, NY, VT, NH, ME, MA, RI, CT, and NJ) on our vacation.  You have to really love the people you're traveling with to be able to practically live out of a car for that long and not kill each other.

Going full-throttle every single day, sleeping maybe 7 hours a night.  The proof is in the reality that although I let myself be lax in my diet, even had cheesecake, doughnuts, and brownies (resigned myself to gain a few pounds) I did not gain one pound!  I was thrilled when I saw the scale read the same as the day we left!  But, of course now I'm back to the diet.

We made it all the way to Niagara Falls, New York our first day - very, very long day! We checked into the motel, grabbed our gear and walked down to the falls. They were magnificent!

Rushing and tumbling.

The lights change colors periodically.

A photo cannot do them justice. These are some magnificent falls! Just to stand and listen to all the force - the noise of them drowns out all other noise and puts you in your own little world of solitude.

I have no idea who these people are but I thought the silhouettes looked cool so I snapped. As you can see, we weren’t the only ones out enjoying the night lights at the falls.

Horseshoe Falls

There’s a little story about my first trip to Niagara Falls. In 2006, Dennis and I took a spur of the moment trip up to Canada. We decided to go see Britney in Pennsylvania and since neither of us had been to Canada we went via that route (spent a night in Sudbury). We’re crazy like that.

So, on the 4th of July we passed by the falls. Dennis had seen them as a child, but I never had. Well, being 4th of July and all it was wham packed busy, on both sides of the falls. We could not even find anywhere to park and we needed to continue our journey - and we had our dogs with us and could not leave them in the car for an extended period.

A plan was formed, I turned on my camera, Dennis drove on the crowded road and when he was right in front of horseshoe falls I jumped out of the car. I ran up to the railing (on the Canadian side) and snapped away, then quickly ran back to the car and off we went.

This trip to Niagara Falls topped my first view by a long shot.  We spent a couple of hours there at night and another three the next morning.

I wouldn’t want to be in those rocks - ouch!

The views kept us up late that night - just so breathtaking.

I totally wish I could have captured the sounds as well.

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

Nothing but Net

NEARLY NIGHT

NOTE found in a geocache ‘To Kate Started a love here back in the 70’s, had message on birch tree. Stopped to see (if) it was there! Only dead tree, like the love I guess! Found the box under the exact tree. Life is sure funny - it goes on but love gets deserted. Well the box is here and it goes on! What a day! Think I will go fishing JC’

Lots of NUMBERS

NICKEL on a NOTCHY rock

NOTEBOOKS with NAMES

NINE

NOTHING in the NEAT basket made by my son’s NIMBLE fingers

NAIL polish remover, NAILENE NAIL polish, NAIL file, NAIL clippers

All my NAIL stuff has helped me grow my NAILS.

NOT these NAILS.

If you want to finish up the alphabet with us, or see all the “N” entries, just pop over and see Martha (A-Z Photo Challenge).