water fight ensues
dog wins by racing inside
dripping wet in chair
The Daily Post weekly photo challenge: Jubilant
Wet Dog (haiku)
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Tag Archives: photo essay
B&W: Bird in the Bush
You can fly, but you can’t hide…
Or can you?
Eurasian Collared Dove on top of power pole.
Northern Flicker in gravel.
Mallard Duck in fountain.
American Robin in pine tree.
Okay, sometimes you really can’t hide:
Chicken, not hiding very well behind tree. Can’t fly very well, either.
Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge: Hiding or Camouflaged
Art + Work = Art Work
Blended
Labors
Induce
Sweet
Surprises
Work Pants
Paint on Work Pants
Art?
Art Work
Blogging U. Day Four: Bliss
Oops! The Case of the Runaway Hole in the Wall
So there I was, sitting in my living room staring once again at that little bulging hole in the wall underneath the window. It was about the size of a thumbnail, with a couple of cracks running about three inches out from it.
Its location under the window made me concerned that the window might be leaking water and causing the damage. But aside from my water concerns, that little hole just irritated the heck out of me every time I looked at it.
For some reason this year I got it into my head that I was going to be some kind of do-it-yourself super warrior. So even though I’d never done any type of wall repair before, I set out to fix that annoying anomaly.
First I took my handy dandy utility knife (I absolutely LOVE my utility knife; it’s just so… utile), and cut out some of the wall sheetrock to see what I was dealing with.
Then I accidentally cut into a prior mesh patch (oops!) and ended up removing it. So I had a bigger hole to fix.
This was more than I had bargained for. I paused to consider my options. While pausing, I made a temporary patch using a pizza box and duct tape (I absolutely LOVE duct tape. It’s just so… ducky).
At least I didn’t have to look at that little hole in the wall anymore.
As the saying goes, “In for a penny, in for a pound.” I forged ahead, replacing the pizza box with sheetrock, and taping and mudding and sanding the new repair. The offending little hole spot now looked like this:
A little texture spray and new paint, and the wall under the window looks as good as new, except for the missing baseboard that I tore off. But that’s a totally different do-it-myself super warrior story.
Daily Post weekly photo challenge: Oops!
Four Diagonals & Two Thankfuls
This week Cee’s Compose Yourself Photo Challenge focuses on diagonal lines, with extra credit for a couple of photos illustrating things for which we are thankful.
Here are my diagonals:
First up, these clever weeds who had the wherewithal to grow in rows.
A tree splintered in a windstorm.
These branches reaching toward one another remind me of Michelangelo’s “Creation of Adam” frescoe. They also remind me of the rose hip jelly my granny used to make.
A caterpillar makes his escape across a railroad tie.
And my two “thankfuls:”
I am thankful that nature hasn’t given up on us. And thankful that there are numerous people and organizations working to preserve nature and repair the damage we’ve done to this planet.
I am thankful that humanity hasn’t given up on itself, and that there are multitudes of kind, caring people despite what we might see to the contrary in our newsfeeds.
Cee’s Compose Yourself Photo Challenge: Week #8 Diagonal Lines
Life Squared: The Instagram Junk Drawer
I try to not get sucked into social media: Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, Flickr… whatever else is out there with cute misspelled names. I have a love/hate/hate/hate relationship with Facebook, and I probably definitely give it much more space in my life than it deserves.
And Instagram? At first I couldn’t see any point in taking photos with a cell phone, formatting them into tiny little squares and then posting them to… exactly where was it they were posted to???
When I finally got a cell phone that had capabilities beyond conveying conversations, however, I simply couldn’t resist the urge to document all the minutiae of my daily life. And of course once one goes to all that bother of snapping a photo, they need to share it with someone, right? Enter, Instagram.
I see it as my photo “junk drawer.” Junk drawers don’t really contain junk. They hold any number of useful things that just don’t have a designated spot to hang out. Sometimes I take photos that I simply find amusing or pretty or whatever, but don’t really want to share on Facebook for the whole world to see.
Today I thought I’d pull out a few items from my Instagram junk drawer to share with you, but don’t show them to the whole rest of the world like Facebook does, okay? Promise?
Instagrams seem to fall into certain categories. We have…
the oddities:
A gate held shut by chains and a padlock, but there’s no fence. Anyone see a security risk here?
A glove balloon in the shrubbery outside a hospital. Bored interns?
the beautiful:
Summer flowers, autumn leaves, winter snow, spring flower and leaf buds and melting snow…
The obligatory sunrise/sunset taken through power lines.
silly captions:
“I think I’m lost. Has anyone seen the ocean? Big… blue… wavy…”
Rare sighting today: the yellow-bellied sap maker.
pets: (silly captions optional)
I wanted to continue our walk today, but Chules just wanted to leaf.
adventures:
When you forget where you packed your utensils, you have to get creative.
and of course, Selfies!!!!
Taking selfies isn’t as easy as it looks, kitty.
Now I’ve shown you mine… What’s in your junk drawer?
Trick? or Treat?
The Daily Post’s theme for this week is “Treat.” We are invited to share a photo of “something that you consider a marvelous treat.”
For me, tackling do-it-yourself projects is a fun treat. Usually.
I live in a modest house built in 1955 in a housing tract. I can walk for blocks in most any direction and find row after row of houses that are some rendition of the same floor plan as mine. It’s interesting to see what others have done to personalize their homes. Shutters, brick facades, porches or decks, remodeling to convert the attached garage into more living space…
Maybe if you didn’t know it was a housing tract you wouldn’t recognize that you were looking at the same house over and over and over. But, nah… I think you would.
When I purchased my house, it had previously been used as a rental property. I continually find areas where slipshod repairs and fixes were made on the cheap. No “pride of ownership” is evident.
The good thing about that is that the less-than-pristine condition of the house gives me confidence to attempt do-it-yourself home improvement projects.
Nothing elaborate. Yet. But things that I have not done before: replacing light fixtures, patching drywall, adding tile to walls, replacing ugly rubber baseboard with much better looking wood baseboard.
Not long ago, I was painting (pre-existing) baseboard in my living room, and came to a spot where I had patched my carpet.
Yes, that is duct tape; the “patch” was mostly to keep the ripped seam from spreading while I decided what to do about it on a more permanent basis.
As I was pushing the carpet edge out of the way of the wet paint, I thought I saw…
…was it?
Did I just win the “old house lottery?” Was there really a hardwood floor beneath that natty carpet? Did the value of my home just increase significantly?
Was this a trick? Or a treat?
I was cautious at first, pulling up a small corner of the carpet.
Yep, that was hardwood. Next question… what condition was it in, and how far did it extend? Given the nature of the previously discovered “repairs,” I could imagine all sorts of “tricks” that might be hidden beneath the underlayment.
So I pulled up a two foot by 10 foot strip of padding. This is what I saw:
Yikes! I got a damp washcloth and wiped at the white stuff covering the floor. Now, this was promising!
Ultimately I pulled up all the living room carpet, and now there’s no turning back.
So I guess I’ll learn how to refinish a hardwood floor. I may find it easy; I may find it troublesome.
But just the doing of it… that’s the treat.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Treat
Branching Out
When you’ve got an outdated iPhone (first world problem, I know), and a dog on a leash tugging at your arm, and you’re trying to zoom in to get a shot in the split second between the time when the camera focuses and when the dog lunges after a leaf that just blew by… well, the results aren’t always stellar.
So… when life gives you blurred photos, make lemonade. And then play with your photo editing program.
I play with my food, too, despite my mother’s admonishments, but I’ll save that for another post.
Find any of the photos compelling? Like to drink lemonade? Play with your food? Share your thoughts in the comments section.
B&W: Trees
Shape Shifter
artful shape shifter viewed from every angle redefined each time
Weekly Photo Challenge: From Every Angle
What Rhymes with Stanza? 