photography – Page 103

Nov 24, 2010

This is the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I worked til about 1:00 and then the guy came to install the new blinds in the gameroom. I’m hoping they will ward off the cold this year. And just in time, too! It has been crazy hot and muggy here all week. We had a high of 87 today. But TOMORROW night it is supposed to be in the 30’s and then perhaps into the 20s on Friday night.

I think this is the cold blast that brought snow to Seattle over the weekend… it’s just taking its time making it down here.

This is a shot of part of the little forest in our backyard. We have a normal back yard/lawn area behind the house, beyond that a thick stand of trees, and then beyond that a clearing in the part of the back yard by the shop that gets full sun.

I really love my little forest of trees in the middle. We have hacked at the scrub trees and pruned tons of branches every year to help out the native trees – but it still looks wild.

The sun was sinking low on this last warm autumn afternoon. I’m looking forward to some rest and relaxation. I hope you are too.

Nov 23, 2010

Finally got away from work this afternoon. I started checking things off my holiday-vacation-to-do-list.

This is a shot of the sky above IKEA, stop #2 on my list for the day. I thought the light and shadows looked interesting and tried to capture some of it.

I ended the day with a nice dinner at Chez Nous. Delicious! Thanks Lori, Laura and Ann!

Nov 21, 2010

We had another nice weekend. The weather was really warm – in the 70s. Monte worked on the boat and I worked on fun stuff.

If you recall my post a few weeks back about the catboat windtoy that monte made me… well this weekend I painted it and we put it up, and it works great! Here is a link to an animated gif to see it in motion (you’ll have to wait a bit for the 2+ MB file to load).

I also tweaked my blog a bit and have indulged myself by getting a dedicated domain name for it: sheila365.com. It’s still hosted on WordPress, but you can get to it directly with the new domain name. Any and all old links to sheila365.wordpress.com will still work, too.

This is a shot of the Chinaberry tree outside the shop. All the leaves have fallen and it’s just loaded berries. Monte suggested taking a picture of the many chinaberries looking up against the sky. This is my take at it. The sun was just dropping so there’s a bit of pink in the sky.

Nov 20, 2010

I saw the early morning sun filtering through the leaves in of the red oak in our front yard this morning. By the time I got my camera and went outside the light fog had lifted and it wasn’t quite as pretty as I saw through the window.

But it is a beautiful tree and a beautiful Fall morning.

It got pretty warm today, actually. But I know the cold days are on the way.

…and pretty soon all of these leaves will be on the lawn.

Nov 19, 2010

Since today is Macro Friday I was looking for a good closeup shot to take.

When I travel to a new country, I like to pick up a little trinket for myself to remind me of the visit. This is a small porcelain jewelry box from Scotland with a hand-carved celtic pewter medallion.

Nov 18, 2010

I was searching for a subject to shoot tonight. One of the things I happened upon was this dried bouquet of flowers that I keep on top of our wedding album. I like how the shot turned out. But, I like it also because of the memory the bouquet brings back every time I walk by.

We had booked an awesome estate called House on the Hill for the weekend where both our out-of-town families stayed. It had a main residence, 3 cottages, a pool, beautiful grounds and an amazing view of the Hill Country. It was also the location where we held the rehearsal dinner and reception. (it was AWESOME)

But I digress. On the day of the wedding, the florist was supposed to deliver the bride’s bouquet to the House on the Hill for the formal family photos, and the rest of the flowers to the church.

Well, it didn’t work out that way. When the time came for photos before everyone headed to the church… no bride’s bouquet. Uh oh. Ok, no biggie. We would just take the photos without a bouquet. My sister, Noreen, disappeared and came back about 5 minutes later with a hastily assembled bouquet of flowers and ribbon from the rehearsal dinner the night before. How sweet is that? That was the bouquet we used for the photo shots, which turned out lovely.

While I LOVE the brides bouquet that I picked out for the wedding, and did get to carry that down the aisle, this small bouquet is the one I kept and the one I remember fondly.

Nov 17, 2010

Yes. That’s right. Another shot of a zinnia.

Could be the last one of the year.

But I’m not making any promises. 😉

Nov 14, 2010

Cow Creek is a lovely spot on Lake Travis. It’s not one we get to see very often because it’s about 20 miles up river.

The walls are always raining with water from the rocks. The fall color this weekend was really beautiful.

Our friends Teri and Ace invited us to stay with them on their boat, since Cupholder is in the shop. We had a fantastic time – they are awesome hosts. I got my dose of laughter to tide me over for quite a while.

Nov 12, 2010

The morning glory that I planted from a single seed back in the spring has grown up and over the 5 foot iron obelisk it was meant to cover. Most of the leaves and blooms have dried up and are dying, but at the very top there is one bright, beautiful flower left that opens every morning.

I thought I’d capture it before it closes for the last time.

I’m trying something new this Friday. I’ve learned of another blogger @ bloggingfrombolivia that hosts a just-for-fun contest every Friday in which other bloggers can enter a close-up, or macro shot. Sounds like fun. This is my modest entry 😉

Nov 10, 2010

The neighbor’s crepe myrtle has turned a beautiful shade of crimson. I just had to take a picture.

Nov 7, 2010

After many weekends of work-working and rushing around I have finally enjoyed a weekend working on a fun project that I have put off for too long.

When we went to the Abacos last summer, we stopped at Man-o-War Key. We walked up and down the island, and one house had the most awesome wind vane in the front yard. It had four boats with real sails that tacked as they rotated on the pole. I wanted one!

When we walked by again on our way back to the dock the owner was in the front yard adjusting it and we asked him where he got it. He said somewhere in Washington State. Well, when I got home I searched for this little gem online and was not able to find it.

Christmas came around and guess what was under the tree? Monte had hand carved four little catboats with masts and barn door rudders just waiting for sails. He’d made me a sailboat wind vane of my very own!

Well, THIS was the weekend I was determined to make the sails. So I hustled off to the craft store yesterday and today cut out and sewed the sails. We just finished rigging them. They’re so cute!

Now all we have to do is mount it atop a pole somewhere in the yard. The biggest challenge will be digging a hole in our backyard, where we have about 1/4″ of topsoil ontop of solid limestone. 🙂

I can’t wait to see them sailing around.

Nov 5, 2010

Friday!

We bought last minute tickets to see the 40th anniversary show that Asleep at the Wheel played at the Long Center tonight. The show was put on in partnership with the Austin Lyric Opera. The stage setting was for the La Traviatta show that is starting tomorrow night, but it made for a cool backdrop. When Ray Benson opened the show he said they’d turn the grand old opera into the grand ole opry for the night.

They played for almost 4 hours!

They kept bringing onstage more and more musicians that had played with the band over the years – they had 4 horns, 4 or 5 pedal steel, 2 pianos, 6 fiddles, … Lots of great old swing sound.

Towards the end, Willie came out and played with the Wheel.

It was a great way to kick off the weekend.

This is a shot across Town Lake taken from the Long Center.

Nov 4, 2010

We have really enjoyed our herb garden this year. Well, we do every year, but this year the queen of the garden was the basil. We made many batches of pesto, margherita pizza, and caprese salad. We still have some left. We usually pinch off the flowers, but this time of year it’s better to let them go to seed in the hopes that we can get some seed for new plants next year.

This shot caught a sunbeam as the sun was dropping behind the trees.

Mmm, can’t you just smell the basil?

Oct 24, 2010

We worked on the boat today. We’ll be sore tonight – I guarantee.

While the coals were heating up for dinner tonight, I was stalking several of the last beautiful butterflies that have been fluttering about in the way back. There were 3 or 4 that were flying back and forth through the trees right over my head. They were pretty large and had a wing span of 4 or 5 inches. As they flew by, I could hear the flutter of their wings.

One of them cooperated and allowed me to get several shots. This one’s body is black with white polkadots which blend right into the wings.

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