feeling.....

feeling blessed by mother nature

feeling creative because of deb

feeling the love of the beach...still

oh,

and was i the only one out the other night when the "harvest" moon arrived? 

i hope not. 

unclog me.....

 {a pile of my moo cards}

if you know me, you know i'm talker.
i'm someone who can carry on conversations with complete strangers {sometimes more easily than with people i know} for hours and rarely am i silent. if i am, those around me want to know what's wrong.

so when i feel it's been awhile since i've blogged, but i honestly feel like i have nothing worth sharing, it's a bit disheartening. i want to be here. i want to be present. i want to share. i want to tell my story. i want to share my photos and my life. but then "blah" and "meh" step in and i feel i have nothing.

blogger's block. please send drano. or chocolate.

i've been taking deb's mishmash class and that's been putting a smile on my face everyday. she is one of the most loving, silly, artistic and talented women i have ever met. and yes, i did meet her in person. she is one of the many bloggers whose path i've been lucky enough to cross in real life and for that i am grateful.

it's was a year ago yesterday that my sixteen year old nephew was killed in a car accident and there's not a day that goes by that i don't think of my sister and her hubby and all that they have endured this past year.

remember, it's the "dash" that matters.

it takes a lot.....

{it takes a lot to make me want to peck out your eyeballs}

i love target.
i hate rude and selfish people.
today at target, everyone was in la-la land, which seems to be the norm lately.

people, if your children are kinder than you are, paying attention to the fact that YOU have left your cart in the middle of the aisle again, learn from them. if your children say excuse me and please and thank you when YOU should be saying it, learn from them.

adults, you do not have the right to just walk right out in front of a moving vehicle in a parking lot because you're in a hurry or texting. if your kids are doing this, it's because they have seen you do it, so stop yelling at them and teach them instead.

if you don't have your coupon with you, guess what? you can't use it. so don't waste the cashier's time asking if you can use a coupon you don't have with you and expect him to explain why not.

target is not a playground. just because it's raining outside does not give you the right to let your kids run loose through the place like it's a gymnasium.

more and more i'm aghast at the rudeness that i seem to see in so many people. almost everyday i go out and almost everyday someone has done something in a rude or obnoxious way in which i truly believe they think they are entitled to do just because they're breathing.

what has happened to our society?

i hope everyone reading this lives in an area where they can't even begin to relate to what i'm talking about. where everyone is beyond kind and full of manners that just ooze out of them.

if you do, please let me know where that is...i'm moving there.

this summer.....

our summer is still hanging on. it's been in the nineties and everyone seems to be complaining, yet the heat still feels yummy to me. don't get me wrong. i love my jeans and scarves, but i can take this heat for however long it wants to hang around.

funny, you'll never hear me say that about cold or snow. ever.
did i mention, EVER?

{i couldn't resist this fisherman in the park. i think it was his braided goatee}

two days after we got back from florida, our son moved into a new house. somehow that left my hubby and i fixing up his old place. we complained a little...even moaned...but we're a great team and the old {built in 1951} tiny condo looks fantastic. and yes, we actually had fun.
paint is an amazing thing.
new carpet and linoleum even better.

our son has a new job. he's a security guard. with a uniform {that has a tie...what?} and a huge gold badge. he talks about pepper spray, his radio, security cameras and when he can leave his post. he uses words like billy club, dispatch, do you copy and premises secured.

i think i liked him being a driving instructor.

reminding kids what a neighborhood speed limit is, which way to turn their tires to parallel park and making them feel better when normal joe shmoes treat cars with a "student driver" sign on it like they're idiots, just seems so much safer, no?

oh by the way, my hubby just retired.
yep. R  E  T  I  R  E  D. as in done. as in "we've crossed the finished line." as in now we get to do whatever we want to do.
many of you know that we've been together 32 years. we dated in high school and got married in 1984. from that moment on, we were gypsies. well not technically, but close. at one point we had 10 moves in 12 years. then 11 moves in 20 years. now we're at 12 moves in almost 29 years and the corporate life is being left behind. far far behind.

can you see me happy dancing? actually in the photo above, i believe he's the one happy dancing. i think i'm just tuckered out from all the dancing i've already done :)

australia update...
our daughter is dong incredibly well and seems to be very happy. lately i have found myself up at ohhh, 3 or 4 or 5 am...sigh...which leaves me wide awake to talk to her around 6am. {which is 9pm her time} we usually last an hour and then she's ready for bed.
she figured out the driving {other side of the road and steering wheel on the other side, too} easily and quickly. driving at night was the hardest part, but she's got that figured out now, too.

at this point, my worrying level has gone way down, but my missing her terribly level is still holding strong.

ps...blogger actually uploaded my photos correctly today for the first time in weeks. maybe months!!

almost done.....

seaside security

{snort}

me 

{caught shopping} 

and

the sandcastle we built

~

{no we didn't. but we could have if we wanted to. not}

~~

i had a note from caroline today asking if blogger was being a boob and i had to admit to her that yes, blogger has been a boob for many of us for quite some time now. are you part of this group? is it time we start throwing darts at them? shin kicking? something?

i still have lots of florida photos, but i think it's time to focus on something else for awhile...but to all of my beach strangers who haven't gotten their photos yet, the last of them are over here.

anyone else watching the ninja warrior competition on TV and constantly saying, "ohhhhhhhhhhh?"

finding my balance on the beach with black and white.....

there's an old mirror with scratchy black peeling paint on it, across from the pizza bar in seaside. other than making this photo black and white, this is exactly how it came out of my camera. i love it. plus my bicep looks amazing. snort.

i haven't shared the love of my life lately, so here he is. he looks so calm and happy. actually, blissful is a really good word to use here. simply blissful. {gosh, if you all only knew how much i love him}

the beach always does that to us. i wonder if anyone else notices the silly little grins on our faces and the softness in our hearts when we're there?

sometimes when he doesn't stop taking photos of me, 

he gets this. not very lady like of me, but funny.

another cloud with an image. 

do you see a plane?

this is my new little friend, E. he and his mom were playing in the sand while his dad was busy making dinner. he was so content to play and just be, the way kids always are, that he really didn't care what i was doing. i was completely happy to sit in the sand and just watch him.

it wasn't until i was editing photos that i even noticed the beach chair in the lower right corner of the photo above. because of that, i think this photo needs a name. maybe, "where'd you go?" or "waiting for you."

when softness falls.....

when we arrived in seaside, it was storming. a full out coastal rain. we had suffered through it's turbulence before we safely landed, but even with our feet on the ground, it continued to throw itself at us.

the next day it came again. this time filled with an anger i had never seen before. it forced us to stay inside, listening to what it had to say and blinded by its shades of grey.

i've never really been one to take soft photos inside, but our little cottage on a stormy day gave me an opportunity to play. to play indoors and out on our porch using the warmest shades of light. it was a such gift.

when your camera is cold from an air conditioned room and your lens fogs up when you step outside, you capture photos like the flower above. i love misty foggy photos.

we couldn't figure out what had created this design in the sand, but i was intrigued by it.

now that i've taken soft photos, i want to take more and more and more. in order to do that, i'm going to have to paint my walls white, order new taupe, grey and white furnishings and linens and move to the beach. well, the beach will be a stretch, but everything else is going to happen. i like how being surrounded in softness made me feel.

and last but not least, this little guy was on our bathroom floor one afternoon and scared me. we saved him and i put him out on the bench on our porch where he stayed long enough for me to photograph him. i think he knew i protected his life and was giving me a gift of being motionless.

~

ps...there are still a few people photos coming if you're waiting to see yourself.