Photo Challange: Anything Halloween

Time for a new Brenda Photo Challenge! The theme is Anything Halloween.

I took this photo in the little cemetery of the Bruton Parish Church at Colonial Williamsburg. The church building dates back to the year 1715, and its services were attended by many of our famous Revolutionary founders. One of the crypts in the graveyard is carved with a cherub face. It assumed a creepy appearance with the deep shadows created by strong overhead sunlight. I modified the image with multiple applications of special effects text. The camera settings were f/5.6, 1/200 second, and ISO 200.

Happy Halloween, everyone!

Flurry of Activity

I really appreciate all the wonderful comments that my friends have left for me, and your concern to not overdo my bionic knee. I am holding up just fine, and working through a few aches and pains associated with the increased activity levels. I really regret that I do not have much time these days to visit your blogs. There is just not enough time in the day! However, I promise that to catch up with everyone later on in December!

We have had a flurry of activity here. We’re making good progress on the packing. It looks like a train wreck inside, but we have a system going! We have secured our condominium rental home and did a walk-through this morning. Utility arrangements have been completed. The mover and cleaners are scheduled. We have been having discussions with the builder for our new home, and we are currently reviewing a draft contract. Additionally, we have been donating excess furnishings and selling some antiques.

For two retired folks who have been living in the slow lane for a couple of years, we are managing quite well! Thank goodness we haven’t forgotten a few organizational skills from our career days.

Thank you so much for all of your good wishes, and please keep praying that everything continues to proceed smoothly for us! Marty, my furry blog greeter, is blowing kisses to you! (He's such a flirt.)

Hanging in There

It’s only a week before Halloween, so I thought I would show you a picture to creep you out, LOL! This praying mantis critter was crawling on the door to the garage the other day. It was huge – probably a good 6 inches long! We have a lot of them in our gardens and they especially like to stay in the lavender bed. In fact, hubby just found an egg case on one of the daylily stalks, right next to the lavender. This is one of the few bugs that don’t make me scream. But I had to admit, zooming in on that face in my Photoshop program did give me a little bit of the willies! Geez, it’s got wings and could have flung itself on my face! See how my wee noggin wanders?

Anyhow, we are “hanging in there” this week. We have a long to-do list to make our move next month a successful one and we’re achieving some progress! We’re making arrangements and packing boxes with some semblance of organization. We have been cleaning out and selling things for a couple of years now. But, we still pause and question our sanity about how many things we have accumulated. Despite our best efforts, we know we will be unpacking boxes next summer and won’t be able to figure out where to put everything.

Our backs are getting a workout, and we’re sore in places where we haven’t been sore in years. So don’t pay those fitness centers for your exercise! Come on over and we’ll give you a free workout! If you can’t make it, please do yourself a favor and clean out one of your closets or cupboards. You’ll thank me for it later!

Grey Havens is Sold!

It’s time to spill the beans! Our Grey Havens cottage and property have been sold!!! Our former contingency buyers came back after unexpectedly selling their home. We’re still waiting on the satisfaction of all the contingencies, but we expect to close on the property in late November.

So we’re getting it into high gear to get everything packed! Yikes! We’ve found a terrific condominium rental for us to “camp out” while we build a villa home. We are already in the process of finalizing design plans and details with the builder.

As you can imagine, it is a whirlwind of activities for us right now! We will greatly miss our rambling country cottage. But it is time to make a switch to a smaller place that will be kinder to us in our senior years. We are ready to finally begin a new chapter in our lives!

This blog may be rather neglected for a little while, and time will be limited for visiting with my many blog friends. Please stay tuned because we are going to have a lot of adventures to share while we build our new Grey Havens cottage. And I welcome all your good thoughts and prayers that we get through this major move smoothly, preferably with our bodies and sanities still intact!

Photo Challenge: Highways & Byways

Time for a new Brenda Photo Challenge! The theme is Highways & Byways. For this challenge, I am presenting a cross-section of beautiful countrysides we have visited in the grand USA.

First up to the plate is a scene from Parke County, Indiana, known as the Covered Bridge Capital of the World. Beautiful country roads lead you to 31 historic covered bridges. This is the lovely Melcher Bridge (1896) in the early fall season. It is 83 feet long and crosses Leatherwood Creek. The photo was taken at f/8 and 1/125 second.

Last year, we were fortunate enough to take a jeep ride in the hillsides of Aspen, Colorado, at the autumn peak. The jeep driver stopped along the way for us to admire spectacular scenes like this one. The camera settings were f/7.1 and 1/200 second.

And, as luck would have it, a caravan of horses passed us on a dusty trail in Zion National Park. This image is a perfect “the end” shot for our slide shows! The photo was taken at f/9 and 1/320 second.

The Cleanout Campaign

Yes, I have been preoccupied lately and not visiting many blogs right now. Not to worry, dear friends! We are on a cleanout campaign!

The garage has been our first target. You see, we were overconfident when we initially put the house on the market. We packed up a lot of possessions and put things in temporary storage. Time passed. We finally decided to bring everything back home last year and clear out the storage unit. We also held a couple of garage sales and have leftover items from those events, packed away in boxes. We’ve gradually have been unpacking boxes and sorting ever since.

Now that the weather temperatures are moderate again and my knee has healed sufficiently, we have resumed our ambitious cleanout project. All I can say is “UGH”. I sure wish some of you, my bloggy friends, lived nearby! I could load you up with all kinds of goodies and treasures! We consider ourselves pretty thrifty folks, but we are not immune to the disease of overabundance.

So please don’t fret about my temporary absence! I will pop in and visit with many of you when we get tired or throw in the towel, whichever comes first!

P.S. The follow-up visit with my orthopedic doctor went well yesterday. I am scheduled to return 6-7 months from now. The knee still pops now and then and residual pain and swelling remain. But the doctor says that all of that is normal and will continue for about a year. Mastering stairs continues to be my biggest challenge. Lately, I’m doing better walking down stairs, but not improving going up. There's more work to do on those quad muscles!

Thank You for Autumn Giveaway Goodies!

I have won a gorgeous assortment of autumn decoration goodies from Donna at An Enchanted Cottage! I haven't entered any giveaways lately, so I was quite surprised and delighted when she picked my entry. Talk about instant decorating for the fall season!

This is one of the pictures
that she posted on her site:

Thank you so much, Donna, for these lovely treasures! I am quite fond of birdies, and the two figurines look like an old married couple to me. One is yapping and the other is listening, LOL. I enjoy visiting your site and am glad to have you as a new bloggy friend!

And everyone else, please go visit her blog! Just be sure to have a napkin handy in case you drool while checking out her lovely cottage furnishings!

October - A Look Ahead

October means the fall season to me! This is one of my favorite months in the whole year. I adore fall colors, as you could tell by all of the pictures I shared on the blog last year. God has already been dabbing with his paintbrush and started his magic again. The dogwoods have donned a scarlet cloak and the maples are beginning to turn. I’m regularly sweeping acorns and pin oak leaves off of the main walkway to the front porch. The weather has turned decidedly cooler in the past few weeks, and it has been a refreshing change. The vegetable gardens have been put to rest. Yard work tasks are winding down, except for leaf and flowerbed cleanups. Fall - bring it on!

Our little trip last week went well. My bionic knee held up acceptably as long as I didn’t overdo it. Let’s just say that I’m glad I took a few pain pills with me, LOL. We had a lovely visit, and we were happy to get away for a brief time to clear the clutter in our noggins. If I continue my rehab progress, we should be able to take several long journeys next year. Yeah!

My sister-in law is healing up well from her hiatal hernia surgery a couple of weeks ago, and my mother is bouncing back nicely from her gall bladder surgery in August. I appreciate the prayers that my friends have offered for both of them.

We had lunch with a sweet friend last week, right before we headed out of town. We had not seen her for over a year. There was a lot of chatting and catching up to do! It was grand to see her again. She and her husband have had quite a few medical challenges lately, so our hearts go out to them.

We don’t have too many firm plans for the month right now. We have a couple doctor visits scheduled for follow-ups. We got our flu shots last Saturday. We’ll be working out at the fitness center regularly. We’re continuing with our studies of Photoshop CS4 and Elements. And, I committed to making some Christmas ornaments for an exchange with friends in an online forum. I better get cracking on them!

Will it be a relaxing or a busy month? I have given up lately trying to predict!

Photo Challenge: Pets

Time for a new Brenda Photo Challenge! The theme is Pets.

One of the delights of living out in the countryside is having horses as next door neighbors. My favorite equine is Cosmos, a lovely Appaloosa with a gentle disposition. She always comes over to the fence when she sees me. After a treat of carrots or apples and a little petting, she doesn’t mind posing for the camera.

Here is Cosmos grazing for her lunch, with the beautiful Cumberland Mountains in the distant background. The camera settings were f/8, 1/200 second, and ISO 200.

The modified image below is a surprise! I learned a new Photoshop technique recently and decided to showcase the results. I framed a portion of the image to highlight Cosmos and converted the rest as black and white.

About a month after my surgery, my sweet hubby helped me walk out into the yard a little ways toward the vegetable garden. The sunflowers were starting to bloom, and he wanted to help cheer me up. I was weak, tired, and holding on to my cane and him for dear life. I brought my camera and managed to take a few half-hearted pictures of the sunflowers.

As hubby was helping me walk back to the house, out popped a rabbit from the garden! When he saw that we were moving in extreme slow motion, he stopped and paused about 30 feet away from us. With the late afternoon sun providing perfect lighting, I was able to capture the moment below. Marty, the infamous rabbit, was the magic medicine I needed that day. I went back to the house very tired, but happy to have a rabbit patiently pose for me. The photo was taken at f/11, 1/100 second, and ISO 800.

And here is the special framing effect to highlight a rabbit resident at Grey Havens.