a table for Halloween...

Yikes! Two posts in one day. There must be something spooky going on.


I'm not sure when purple and bright green became Halloween colors in addition to the traditional orange and black but I like it.

The bottles were made with labels printed on my computer. The labels were from this generous person who shared them on flicker. So talented! I just used whatever bottles I could find. My daughter found some for me. I also admit to spending too much on a bottle of olive oil for the long skinny black bottle. I love a good olive oil.










Hope you all have a wonderful Halloween!

For other tables, many with a fall or Halloween theme, check out this.

picture fall, week four...

This workshop has been so good for me. It has forced me to get out with my camera every day. You can see I had trouble deciding on just one photo for some of the challenges this week.

"darks and lights"






















"repetition"








































"family matters" This was a exercsie to use the auto timer and get a family portrait. Our portrait was rather empty. I thought about holding up a photo of our kids.


"fall colors"
This take on fall colors was from the mountains close to home.


Fall colors in the desert are a little hard to find but this was the sunrise I woke up to this morning. It was certainly colorful.





















"open heart, open mind" The first light of the morning gave this a rather magical look. I am a bit clueless about Photoshop so I have to depend on the light helping me out.


"leafy love" I put the camera on the ground for this one.


The blurred background is aspen leaves. This was a crop of an old photo.


"the great pumpkin" Okay, my pumpkin is just a little one but who could resist that stem? I always pick out pumpkins based on the stems. I really want to try growing some of these mini ones next year.


I will be sorry to have this workshop ending on Sunday.

picture fall, week three...

These are the images for week three. There are days that I definitely have to think about the prompt for a while before something comes to me.

"messages" - my father's favorite expression:

"juxtaposition" - things have changed a bit since I saved my allowance to buy my first Beatles album when I was nine.

"bounty" - my nephew so happy to be able to collect fall leaves




















"muse" - since my children grew up, my muse is nature. This butterfly let me get so close with the macro that her spots are bokeh.

"scattered" - wanted an authentic scattered rather than setting something up. This box of candles seems to follow us around from table to table when we are outside.

"connections"




















"serving up kindness" - a night meeting for WB so we met for a very early dinner.

all is right in my world...

I love October.

I never thought it would happen...

{WARNING: turn away now if you are squeamish about spiders}
My daughter has been interested in all kinds of bugs (okay, insects and spiders, excuse me, archanids - see, I have been listening!) for years. She has a degree in biology and her favorite classes were entomology. She rescues every bug ever seen in the house, sometimes upending furniture to find them and then stepping outside during a thunderstorm to let them free. We all tease her a bit but this week, I am joining her ranks. I am obsessed about the behavior of our resident spider, (I want to insert the name, Charlotte, here but I will try to refrain). She lives outside (thank goodness!) and I am finding myself checking her every morning to see how she is doing. She is there, kindly allowing me to photograph her, from all angles. She never complains about the posing and allows me to find just the right light to bring out her good side. This morning I was able to watch her take care of breakfast, a bumble bee who left the security of his favorite lavender salvia and flew inadvertently, I am sure, into her territory, an amazing web. She is fascinating.























and even spiders can make a little magic:


I am so behind at visiting many of you. Life has been a bit crazy lately but I look forward to "seeing" you soon. I do appreciate your comments so much.

picture fall, week two...

This is the second installment on my photos for Picture Fall. I take one photo each day, following the prompt that is given to us. For example, the prompt for the last picture of the glass was "unexpected enchantment", finding the magic in an ordinary object. I actually take many photos each day, but only post the one or two that I think are the best on the workshop site. Tracey's next workshop is "Picture the Holidays".

























When I took this glass outside, I was surprised to see all the color and reflections.

picture fall, week one...

I am participating in a photo sharing workshop called “Picture Fall”. It was just what I needed to jump start my photography after a long, hot summer. Tracey gives us a prompt and we photograph it. Sounds simple, doesn't it? I find myself thinking and thinking about these as I go about my day. I pick up my camera many times as something else comes to mind. I love it! Here are this week’s images:

have a little faith...

We spent some time in Santa Fe a few years ago. On the last day of our trip, we walked to into an antique store, finding many treasures that we would have gladly taken home. One that was actually affordable and would fit in the car was a lavadera (wash basin). I knew I would fill it with leaves in the autumn and pine cones in the winter. We brought it up to the cash register to pay for it. The owner told us that she didn’t take credit cards. We asked if she would hold it so we could go find an ATM and pay cash. She said not to bother. She would give us the lavadera and we could send her a check when we got home. We were a bit flustered by her offer and again said that we would be glad to hunt down an ATM. She insisted we just take it. I thanked her profusely and asked if this was an offer that she made routinely. She said that in all of her years of business, only one person hadn’t sent her a check. We left her store feeling so happy to know that someone had such faith in people and it had been rewarded. Of course, we immediately sent a check when we got home.






I always am happy when it is time to set an autumn table around the lavadera. You can see this one went through quite a few changes. It may change again before we actually sit down to dinner.


So the lavadera does sit on our dining room table most of the year. M and K have given me many of the treasures that find their way into the lavadera – an autumn leaf from Paris, a pinecone from Oregon, a cone of some sort from Washington D.C. There are some sticks from my beloved aspen trees. Yesterday, I picked seed pods from the ground in front of the library.



Hmmmm, I am starting to see why my kids tell me that I like to bring the outdoors in and the indoors out.


In addition to the beauty of the piece and the vacation memories it evokes, it reminds us that even when it starts to seem impossible, it is really a good thing to have faith in people.