Snapshot Sunday #5

 

Wow, I can’t believe it’s Snapshot Sunday again already.  In truth, it’s just after midnight, so really, I’m running a little late for the thing, but what’s a couple of hours between friends?

I’ve had a pretty decent weekend.  The whole family was over yesterday to visit, play board games, and watch some Sooner football.  And, today was just a lovely lazy day.  Napped, had some quesadillas, watched the season premiere of Doctor Who from last night—not bad, as Sundays go.  I even squeezed in just a tiny bit of homework, but not very much.  It’s been nice not to worry about it too much for the weekend, but that means tomorrow is going to have to be a buckle down type of day to get a lot of reading done.  But that’s okay; it was worth it.

Okay, on to the daily photos . . .

 

 

  Prompt:  Dream.  My dream, maybe having a dream of his own.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Tap.  Nothing but the kitchen sink, with a little bit of HDR action edited in for fun.

 

  Prompt:  Clock.  Tuesday evening, done with school for the night.

  Prompt:  Down.  The birds are down to the last little bit of seeds.  I have to confess, this is my least favorite pic this week.  My practice is usually to snap several photos throughout the day that go with the theme, and then use whichever one I feel best about.  I took this one pretty much first thing in the morning, but then ended up mostly living on my couch the rest of the day, so it was the only one I ended up with.  Still, thank goodness I started early, eh?

 

  Prompt:  Card.  Or, in this case, cards.  And some of my favorite kind, too—the kind you can spend.

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Hidden.  Confession time:  I didn’t take this picture this week; it was earlier in the summer.  But I love it so much, I just had to use it.  I was out on the patio one day, just going to kick back and enjoy the sunshine, and when I pulled the chair over to stretch my legs out on it, I saw this little frog hiding in the fold of the cushion.  I thought it was adorable.

 

 

 

So that’s that, the final week of August Photo a Day.  September has started, and you can find the prompt list here if you’d like to play along.

There wasn’t a whole lot of other picture taking going on this week, but I do have a couple:

 

 

 

 

  A couple of birds cooling off in the bath.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And a short video of the splashing around.  As a warning, leave the sound muted.  I didn’t add a music track, and you can hear the annoying focusing of the camera.  But it’s cute to watch.

 

 

 

                         And, lastly, this year’s blue moon, both the natural version and the edited for fun one.


And there you have it, my week in pictures.  I hope yours went well, and that the upcoming week is even better.  Whatever you’ve got in store, take a minute to snap a few pictures as you go about your daily routine.  There’s nothing better than a little creativity break to make everything a bit more fun.

Snapshot Sunday #4

 

When I began Snapshot Sunday, the plan was to try it out for the month of August, and then decide if it would be continued.  Well, the jury is still out on whether it will be continued for the long term, but there will definitely be at least one more installment next week.  Why?  Because there’s almost a full week of August daily photos left to snap, so there’ll be at least one more Sunday round up of those pictures.

As for photo a day, the jury is also still out on whether I will continue participating after this month.  As I’ve said many times, I really do enjoy it, but I am currently days behind on posting my photos.  They’ve all been taken, and even edited (well, today’s pic is still unreviewed, but it has at least been taken), but then I didn’t do anything else with them.  I don’t want it to get to the point where picture taking feels like just one more task to mark off a list every day, so we’ll have to see how it goes.  For now, though, let’s see what last week held . . .

  Prompt:  Hole.  I’ve had this set of kitchen knives for probably close to twenty years.  Sometime in the past few months, one of the steak knives disappeared, so now there’s a single unfilled hole, mocking me every day.

 

 

  Prompt:  Today.  First official day of the semester, devoted to my online courses, including political science.

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Cool.  Pineapple island breeze slush from Sonic.  Sort of like a virgin piña colada, though light on the coconut.  But it’s icy and cool, and plenty tasty.

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Home.  The view from my driveway on a warm, sunny evening. 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Pair.  A pair of taillights in front of me while I sit in traffic heading home after class.

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Path.  In my yard, the path leading to our shed.

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Fresh.  Freshly baked bread we had with lunch Saturday, at Saltgrass Steakhouse.

 

 

So that’s the daily prompts this week; what else was going on this week?  Well, in truth, not much.

There were some clouds I thought looked pretty cool . . .

 

 

 

 

These were from several different days, including Saturday, when we did get a nice big rain during the night.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Brian and I had to spend a bit of time working on Billy’s car . . .

 

 

  In truth, my role was mostly that of light-holder and tool-grabber, but I was still spent several hours out in the 90° heat (with humidity of at least 90% to boot), leaning over a dirty car, so I’m taking credit for it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, there were plenty of visits from feathered friends . . .

 

I think Brian has finally succeeded in keeping the squirrels off the feeder, but they sure are scratching up that pole trying their little hearts out anyway!  But now there’s plenty of food available for the birds to have a party.

 

 

 

        
                                              

                 

   The cardinals usually get the place to themselves, because they run everybody else off.

And, yesterday, the day the world lost Neil Armstrong, you know I had to take a picture of the moon, even if I didn’t really have the right lens for the job . . .




And that’s about it, my week in pictures.  Feel free to tell me a bit about your week, too, won’t you?

Snapshot Sunday #3

 

Welcome to Sunday!  It’s been a pretty low-key week for me, mostly just hanging out, feeling whatever I was feeling, and getting myself mentally prepared to begin school next week.

Now that the weekend is winding down, it’s time for the weekly round up of pictures recently known as Snapshot Sunday, so let’s get to it, shall we?

First, the daily entries for Photo A Day:

 

  Prompt:  Spoon.  The spoon here is pretty ordinary, but what it’s in?  Skinny Cow ice cream is yummy!

 

 

 

 

  Prompt: Simple.  There is nothing simpler than some chocolate chip cookies made from ready to go cookie dough.  Not much better, either.

 

  Prompt:  Arrow.  Lots of arrows while paying for a drink at my favorite place, Sonic.

 

 

  Prompt:  Ready.  Dinner is ready.  I had intended to shoot the casserole dish full of the chicken breasts all nice and juicy out of the oven, but dinner was late that night, and I was in a hurry to get it dished up—almost forgot to snap a picture at all!

 

 

  Prompt:  Food.  Yeah, we’re a bit of a pre-packaged family.  Not the healthiest choice, I will grant you, but pretty darn tasty.

 

  Prompt:  Faces.  Three of my favorite faces, Brian, Tanya, and Taylor.  Posing for me after my birthday dinner at Olive Garden.

 

 

  Prompt: Inside.  Inside the theater yesterday, waiting to see The Odd Life of Timothy Green.  I thought it was really good.

Fun, as always, deciding what to use for the daily prompts.  If you want to join in the fun, be sure to check out Fat Mum Slim.

As for the rest of the week . . .

   

   This past weekend brought the annual Perseids meteor shower.  I set my alarm for about 3:00 Sunday morning, only to go outside and find the sky covered in clouds. I’d been out about five minutes when it actually started to rain.  It didn’t rain hard or long, but there was no point in waiting it out, because the clouds stayed behind.  I called it a night.

 

 

I tried it again Sunday night/Monday morning with better luck.  Clear skies and not a drop of rain.  However, I did discover I have neither the skills nor the equipment to photograph shooting stars that could appear from any direction and at any time.  Still, it was a beautiful night, and I saw 22 of the meteors while I was out there.

                                   

The area of our yard I like to call the “bird resort” is still a popular photo object for me, especially when the cardinals come to visit.

 

    And, finally, to end the week,  some much-needed rain. 

What did your week look like?  Tell me all about it in the comments.

Snapshot Sunday #2

 

Welcome to the second installment of Snapshot Sunday.  You can check out the inaugural edition to find out why I’m doing this theme.

First, the shots from the daily photo challenge.  I’m still having fun with this, and encourage you to check out Fat Mum Slim’s site if you’d like to play along. 

 

  Prompt:  Logo.  Lawry’s, on seasoned salt in this case.  I love this stuff.  When I was a kid, I’d pour a little pile in my palm and just lick it off.  Now I recognize the health reasons to avoid eating pure (or almost pure) salt, so I refrain.  Mostly. 

 

 

  Prompt:  Writing.  Working on my daily blog post.

 

 Prompt:  8 O’Clock.  As with most of the time-centered prompts, there’s really only one option for me (I’m rarely out of bed before nine, and not likely to set an alarm just to take a picture.)  Anyway, after days of 100+ temperatures, it was refreshing to be cooling off a bit this evening. 

 

  Prompt:  Glasses.  Since my the drinking utensils for my family typically have logos from restaurants or theme parks, these are considered my “good” glasses.  Pretty sure I got them at Wal-Mart for $2.50 for a pack of four.  Really, I’m happier with the plastic.

 

  Prompt:  Messy.  Anyone who knows me at all knows that this would not be a difficult capture for me, clutter queen that I am.  Really, in my case, the only decision to be made would be just how messy I’d be willing to show the world.  The easy shot was my current pile of messy mail.

 

  Prompt:  Ring.  I’m not much of a jewelry girl, so the obvious approach for this prompt wasn’t doing it for me.  I was tempted to do some sort of screen-capture from the Games that are currently capturing the world’s attention, but—even highly edited—I’m pretty sure that’s a pretty strictly copyrighted image, so why risk that?  But I do have several key rings, including this one.  Though it makes me sad to think that the Star Trek Experience no longer exists out in Vegas. 

 

    Prompt:  Purple.  Last night’s dinner, with a little bit of editing help from pixlr-o-matic.  My sister was just recently telling me how good bacon is on a PB&J, so when I posted the pic on Facebook, she had to ask if I had tried it out.  I definitely love me some bacon, but I’m pretty much of a purist when it comes to peanut butter and jelly.   

And what else have I been snapping photos of this past week? 

 

  

 

 

   As I mentioned last week, the bird feeder is a popular spot.  Unfortunately, it’s also become popular with the squirrels.

 

 

 

 

This isn’t a great picture, but I like it.  If you look closely, you can see a cardinal on a branch over on the left, waiting patiently for the squirrel to finish up and move on.

 

 

  He never ventured to the feeder or bath, but we did have a visiting woodpecker.  I’ve had a glimpse of what I believed to be woodpeckers a time or two before, but was never able to see them so clearly, or when I had my camera. 

 

 

 

And, lastly, a cloudy sunset sky from that same cool evening when it was only 82° outside.

So that’s my week in pictures.  Some nice moments, I think.

What’s been going on in your life this week?  I’d love to hear about it in comments, or even link me back to your own photos where I can see what’s been happening with you.

 

Snapshot Sunday

 

I want to try something a little different today.  In keeping with my August commitments, I’ve been taking (and posting to Facebook) the pictures for the daily photo challenge I’m in, as well as the occasional other photo here and there.  In the past, I’d posted these photos here most every day, usually creating a post around the picture.  But I haven’t done that in a while, and I think that was another reason it became easy to drift away from the practice of daily photography. 

So, for the month of August (and maybe further on, if it suits me), I’m going to introduce Snapshot Sunday.  I thought I’d do a weekly round-up of my daily challenge photos, as well as any others that I might be fond of this week.  I play along with some memes from other blogs during the week (check out my entries under these labels: ABCW, #5QF, and 6WS) , but this is the first theme of my own that I’ve introduced here, so it’ll be interesting to see how it goes.

First, this week’s challenge pics (though this week actually began in July):

 

Prompt:  The last thing you bought.  As I mentioned before, I’m going to put a few of my photos in an Etsy shop, so I had to get some basic supplies to get them printed.

 

Prompt:  Calm.  This is a gazebo in my neighbor’s yard.  Anytime I go by there, I think how restful it would be to have such a place of my own.  I’ve never seen anyone out there.

 

 

 Prompt:  Toothbrush.  Not really much to say about this, is there? Except that my batteries died a couple of weeks ago and I haven’t gotten around to replacing them yet.

 

  Prompt:  Outside.  Outside dining at my beloved Sonic.  Of course, around here, it’s rarely actually comfortable weather for outdoor seating, especially when it’s 110 degrees!

                                                            

 

  Prompt:  One.  One lonely cookie, and a bit of playing around with selective color.  I think you can’t tell that very much, because the box and crumbs are not obviously black and white, but it’s an early attempt.  Also, before the night was done, the lonely cookie had been put out of its misery.

 

 

  Prompt:  Coin.  My grandfather liked to collect coins.  Nothing really rare or valuable, just the slightly unusual, like silver dollars.  He gave me this when I was just a girl, and it became my lucky coin.

 

  Prompt:  Somewhere you sat.  My stability ball.  I spend far too much time sitting on my butt, what with all the TV watching and computer browsing I do, so I try to make sure at least a couple hours a day or so are spent sitting on the ball.  More if I can, but while it’s easy enough to watch TV while bouncing, the movement has to be slowed down when I’m reading, and I can’t bounce at all when I’m writing.

So those are the photos from the challenge this past week.  I don’t know that I think any of those are really spectacular prompts, but still sort of fun, and they give a glimpse into my daily life. 

Other than the daily photo challenge pictures, my most common photos are of the birds in my yard.  Here are a few from this week that I sort of liked.

 

 

 

 

The feeder is a popular spot.  This is a painted bunting, and (I believe) a grey jay.

 

 

 

 

The cardinals rarely venture too far out of the tree line, but this pair was interested in something on the deck—either some sort of dead bug carcass, or the ants said bug was attracting.

When I’m watering the cypress tree, the birds would much rather hang out there than in the bird bath, but close to the ground and the fresh water.

 

Okay, that’s it for the inaugural installment of Snapshot Sunday.  I’d appreciate hearing your thoughts on the theme, the pictures, or anything else that’s on your mind.