second day of challenges...

and i was up! hmmmm, my list was very easy, but since miss julie gave us such a hard one yesterday i added a few words to most of my challenges to make them a bit more difficult. today i challenged ruth and julie to 'a bird in flight' photo! man oh man, it was harder than i thought, and i even had an accomplice helping me. i went to the dentist this morning and since i was so close to elki & zoe's house, i popped in and elki wanted to come home with me, so i got set up with my camera and then told elki when to chase the birds!!! easier said than done, i took maybe 70 photos, but most either had a tail and some feet, were way too blurry or nothing at all. it wasn't til my last photo did i get a good shot, well i think it's pretty good, but i will let you be the judge! and instead of trying to get a bird flying in into the air, i waited for this dove that was up on the wire to fly down, much easier!!! :)

photo-a-day challenge month


julie has decided to join ruth and myself for a photo-a-day challenge this month. when ruth and i did the april photo-a-day, we did a few challenges towards the end of the month and found them fun, so we are trying a whole month of them, and julie has decided to join us. each of us have come up with 10 ideas which we will post only the night before the actual challenge day! julie was up first with a challenge of a landscape photo with something in the foreground. after seeing ruth's and julie's, i've decided that mine sucks, but here it is anyway and i hope i do better in the days to come!

a couple of shots for a rainy day!

i gave clayton some 'portulaca' hair this year and the cardinal and blue jay were constantly in the yard today, but then again they usually are on dull days, that's why i filled up the bird feeder first thing this morning and had my camera ready!

here are a few photos that i thought you might enjoy from today, the female cardinal was taken by hubby.

it's a funny thing and i don't know why this happens, but those white irises in the middle were purple last year, go figure! maybe the soil!!! :)

i was wanting to have a hummingbird feeder in our yard for ages and i finally bought one on tuesday when i went to canadian tire for some bird seed. it says to hang it where you have seen the birds feeding before just so they find it and then move it closer, but i was not here all week and just left it hanging on the frame of the gazebo on the deck. well lo and behold this morning here was this little guy having himself a feast, YEAH!!!

the spring garden

my garden is looking so pretty today, i thought i'd share some of my favorites. the top photo is that same lilac that you saw as a bud and then the stages as it grew to this beauty. then the pretty little violets, my japanese irises and finally my rhododendron is getting ready to open.

hope everyone had a nice mother's day! the family came for lunch and we had sushi take out for supper, yummmmmmmmmmm, what a great day!

i hung this sock filled with thistle seed last monday outside the office window where we spend a lot of time (too much time sometimes ;) ) on the computer and finally a few little guys like this one found it yesterday. there are double windows there, and so i think they act as a filter for the photo so it's not that clear, but we get to see them up close and personal, that's for sure!

here is the progress of the same buds of the lilac bush. the backyard smells so nice today even though it's cold out there! everything is so green and the gardens are coming back to life, think i love this time of year in the garden best, because everything is so fresh and green and pretty.

another red one

here is another one that i took for the red challenge which of course if did not use. it's of our neighbor's maple tree and i just love the colors and that it's ready to pop! who knew how much prep stuff there is for leaves and why are these red and the leaves are green!!!

red challenge

here is the shot of the cardinal that i got on the day that ruth and i had the red challenge, but since i already had a cardinal in december's photo-a-day, i used a shot of a house fince that came into the back yard right after instead. plus there was a branch hiding this guy's beak, too bad, so sad! ;)

a walk through the woods!

we took a break from scrapping on saturday and took a walk through the woods and of course i brought my camera with me. it's a good job because look at all these wild photos!

last day of our photo-a-day april challenge

i had a much better shot of a little purple/blue violet today, but this one i had never seen before and especially not in my garden, so i had to chose it for my last photo of this month's challenge. it was a pleasure ruth!

wednesday, second to last photo for this month!

and i haven't missed a shot, even with reg being in the hospital for 4 days! i was trying for a photo of the girls playing hockey with their mother and grandfather (well he wasn't actually playing, but rather just standing in the goaler's net) when we went over for coffee yesterday afternoon, but that didn't work out! so i got this beauty of 'gilles', their cat!

tuesday

i planted this narcissus bulb about 20 years ago with many more, but this is the only one that comes back year after year! i took this shot this morning before it started raining and i'm so glad i did because otherwise i would not have had good lighting since it would have been in the shade this afternoon!

monday, monday!

i just love when the forsythia comes out! it's so bright and sunshiny especially on a gorgeous day like it was today. i took umpteen shots this morning, but this is the one that i like the best with all that fuzzy yellow in the background.

ruth's 'green' challenge

here is my rhododendron ready to sprout some new leaves for ruth's 'green' challenge today! check out ruth's photo here!

saturday challenge, something red!

i had every intention of sitting outside this morning with my camera and waiting for a cardinal to come along, and then i was wanted on the phone! as soon as i started my conversation with my s-i-l, who i had not talked to since before we went to florida, one was at the feeder, so i clicked, clicked, clicked and got some pretty good shots. right after i got off the phone, this little house finch came along and because i had a cardinal in my december photo-a-day challenge i thought i would use him as my something red! here is ruth's photo.

'raspberry blush' or lungwort

i prefer 'raspberry blush' for sure and they are all in bloom right now! i love that they bloom in different colors on the same plant, pink, blue and mauve!

23 april - didn't have a lot of time today with dh coming home and having dd and grandson here to welcome him home, but i did flit around the yard this morning taking shots in the garden and i liked this one the best because of it's color. if i remember correctly where i transplanted things last fall, this is a red astilbe.

yesterday's shot of the lilac was not very good, because of my rushing, but today's clicked on shows the fuzz on the leaves when it's large!

21st and 22nd april

since all day tuesday was spent in the hospital, what better subject for my photo but my dh's heart monitor. see how low it is, that's why he needed a pacemaker which he got last night and is now on the mend! luckily i had my point & shoot camera in my bag! ;)

and for today's shot, i ran out the back this morning before i left for the hospital and snapped this shot, with the bell guy up the pole in the back probably wondering what the heck i was taking a photo of, but you can actually see the purple now, so it won't be long before the back yard is smelling divinely lilac!

sign of disappointment ;)

this fedex non-delivery slip was waiting for me when i got home tonight after spending 11 hours at the hospital with my dh, :( i was so looking forward to getting my photo book that i ordered last week and now i have to wait until tomorrow and hopefully i will be home when they come back. btw, dh is resting comfortably at the hospital for observation tonight with a low heart rate, but hopefully he will be home also tomorrow! :)

squares or rectangles (my sunday challenge)

i took many photos today to get just the right square for my challenge and finally settled on this one just because even though they are squares, they are on an angle and i always think angles look better than straight! check out ruth's version of the same thing here!!!

ruth's saturday challenge

as i said yesterday, ruth's challenge for today's photo was something round or circular. this morning while looking out the back door i spotted what i wanted to take and here it is ruth!

easter flowers

i took this photo early this morning, before i even had breakfast, because that lily is making the whole kitchen smell divine! dd brought these over on easter sunday and they still look lovely although the rose is a bit wilty!

ruth has challenged me tomorrow for a photo of something round and smooth, hmmm, and sunday i challenged her for something square or rectangular. i think i have the easier time, since she has chosen a garden theme, whereas i don't have a theme, good luck ruth! but of course i know you don't need it, you are a pro!!! ;)

16th and 17th april

yesterday i was out all day and did not have my camera with me and missed a beautiful shot of the champlain bridge mirrored in the river at around 8:30 pm, so i had to settle for a flash shot of my book that i am reading at around 10 after watching LOST.

the shot for today is the bud for my double purple lilac bush that has finally started showing some life, love those lilacs!

finally something ready to bloom in the garden, but i have no idea what it is!

it's easter monday and here is the slice of cheesecake i had for dessert tonight!

ruth and i challenged each other for this weekend's photos, yesterday i picked a tempo shot, because we had both planned to take them down and easter sunday ruth chose easter eggs, of course. i had a hard time choosing which photo of which child to use, but i think zoe's concentration on getting that little chocolate egg ready to eat took the prize!

taking down the eye sore!

today we finally took down the tempo, well actually ours is a nanouk, but this is new last fall, but have always had a tempo. i challenged ruth to take a photo of hers today since we were both taking them down. i'm sure she has a more artistic photo than this. it's always a good day when it comes down and gets packed away for another year, a sure sign of spring!

friday, 10 april - this was taken with julie's camera through her living room window. sometimes there were 6 goldfinches feeding at the same time, but of course when i went to take the photo there were only a couple. i liked the fact that this one was turned upside down!

thursday, 9 april - it's not much with all that dreary background since i took this at around 7 tonight, but my irises are coming through it all!

wednesday, 8 april - i know, it's not in focus, but it's through the window and the squirrel was on the run! ;) that's my excuse and i'm sticking with it! i was sitting at the computer when i saw this little girl going running across the street, go up the fir tree and come down with her mouth full of whatever and ran back across and up our fir tree (and not just once), so either it was moving day or she was stealing from another nest to make hers.

tuesday, 7 april

ah ha, got my robin today!

monday, 6 april - i was told by someone in florida once to soak my shells in javel to clean them up and kill any organisms that may be still in them. so today in this lovely liquid sunshine that has followed us all the way home from florida, here are my 2009 collection soaking since i didn't see one robin today and that's what i had planned to take since there must be some fat worms in the grass for them in all this rain, but didn't see a one!

sunday, 5 april - froggie is not looking too good this morning, but there is a story to this big guy! we bought him in niagara falls for my mother-in-law about 25 years ago, because she collected frogs. when she died my sister-in-law took over her apartment and he has been there til my sister-in-law died last january when we took him and put him in the garden because we knew the grandkids would love him. he is supposed to be a garden ornament, but i presume that all these years being inside didn't do him any good, so now i either have a paint job to do this summer, if he has not started to crumble, or he is heading for the garbage, either one!

saturday, 4th april - ok it was 5 o'clock by the time i remembered to take a shot and it was just
at cocktail hour and with such a lousy lit day, what better object to take than my delicious marguerita, cheers!

friday, 3rd april - i took so many shots on the road today to get the shot for the day and i had some pretty intersting ones like the canadian & american flags at the border but this shot just melted my heart. elki & zoe were so excited to see us, but by 9 o'clock elki just couldn't keep her eyes open and zoe was still going strong!

thursday, 2nd april - we had just driven into west virginia and stopped to stretch our legs and get a coffee and it was so pretty i chose this shot over many, many others for my second photo.

wednesday, 1st april - we left for home early this morning and this is my first shot for our photo-a-day challenge. they have this beautiful way of marking the main roads off of route 95 in northern florida and here is one of them!