If a picture paints a thousand words

This blog is a place for me to work on my photography. My goal is to submit a new picture every day and to get better as the moments go by. I take all pictures with my digital camera. I worked for years with a 35 mm minolta, and this is a learning experience for me. I am afraid that I got lazy and allowed the camera to choose most of the settings for me. This is my journey of learning how to shoot a camera that is not in a program mode. It is harder than I ever imagined. That makes this challenge both a new experience and a joy for me.

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Just Big Enough

 
All life is an experiment.
The more experiments you make 
the better.
Ralph Waldo Emerson


May you live all the days of your life.
Jonathan Swift

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Grandma Mum's Lot



Snowmen fall from heaven.......Unassembled!



It Just Keeps Coming


“I love snow for the same reason I love Christmas: It brings people together while time stands still. Cozy couples lazily meandered the streets and children trudged sleds and chased snowballs. No one seemed to be in a rush to experience anything other than the glory of the day, with each other, whenever and however it happened” 
― Rachel Cohn, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Christmas Concert


When I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable. I see no foe. I am related to the earliest times, and to the latest.
Henry David Thoreau

Anya And Her Violin


If music be the food of love, play on.
William Shakespeare



Life is one grand, sweet song, so start the music.
Ronald Reagan



If one plays good music, people don't listen and if one plays bad music people don't talk.
Oscar Wilde



Without music, life would be a mistake.
Friedrich Nietzsche

Friday, December 23, 2011

Sledding - Happy Birthday Beautiful Girl!!

This is a wonderful day for this young lady.  She is turning 15 at last.  It is going to be a big year, with driving priviliges and responsibilities.  She has grown from being a little girl into an amazing young woman.  What a joy she is in my life!


Most of us can remember a time when a birthday - especially if it was one's own brightened the world as if a second sun has risen. - Robert Lynd


If you want to be happy, be. - Henry David Thorreau


The best way to keep children at home
is to make the home atmosphere pleasant,
and let the air out of the tires.
- Dorothy Parker



It's not hard to make decisions when you know what your values are.
Roy Disney

Thursday, December 22, 2011

In All The Little Places


To appreciate the beauty of a snowflake,
it is necessary to stand out in the cold.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Out The Back Door


Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather.  John Ruskin

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

This Old House


Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories.
~From the movie An Affair to Remember~

Winter Wonderland


I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape - the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show. ~Andrew Wye

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Down The Long Road


Life is one big road with lots of signs. 
So when you riding through the ruts, 
don't complicate your mind. 
Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. 
Don't bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. 
Wake Up and Live!
Bob Marley

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Snowy Way


Advice is like snow - 
the softer it falls, 
the longer it dwells upon, 
and the deeper in sinks into the mind.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Waiting for Warmth

The toys of summer are put away
as winter comes, once again, to play.


The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.
Bertrand Russell

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Settling In For Winter


And finally Winter, with its bitin', whinin' wind, and all the land will be mantled with snow.
Roy Bean

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

The Last Leaf


"Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can—working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed. Patience is not simply enduring; it is enduring well!"

Monday, December 12, 2011

Cactus in the Woods


The only difference between a good day and a bad day is your attitude. 
~Dennis S. Brown~

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Following the path


“Remember that happiness is a way of travel, 
not a destination.”
Roy Goodman

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Wearing the Past

This tree is along a creek and it has flooded it's banks a time or two, as you can see from all of the branches that it wears.  


“One day at a time--this is enough. Do not look back and grieve over the past for it is gone; and do not be troubled about the future, for it has not yet come. Live in the present, and make it so beautiful it will be worth remembering.”

Friday, December 9, 2011

It's a good day


It's so hard when I have to, 
and so easy when I want to. 
 ~Annie Gottlier~

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Hold On, The Light Will Come


"The message of this moment is so clear;
And as certain as the rising of the sun.
If your world is filled with darkness doubt and fear,
Just hold on, Hold on; the light will come."
Michael McLean

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Wearing Red


"Nature never hurries.
Atom by atom, little by little,
she achieves her work."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

In Daddy's Arms


“That best portion of a good man’s life,
His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.”
- William Wordsworth

Finding Leaves


“To bring up a child in the way he should go, travel that way yourself once in a while.”
- Josh Billings

Oh Mom!!!

You have no idea how many pictures I had to take before I could get to the last one (which is one of my favorites!)  She has a sixth sense for when mom is taking pictures, and she hates to have them taken of her!




“Feelings of worth can flourish only in an atmosphere where individual differences are appreciated, mistakes are tolerated, communication is open, and rules are flexible — the kind of atmosphere that is found in a nurturing family.”
- Virginia Satir





  Linking up with Rebecca at The Simple Things.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Leaves are falling all around


For man, autumn is a time of harvest, of gathering together. 
 For nature, it is a time of sowing, of scattering abroad. 
 ~Edwin Way Teale

Friday, December 2, 2011

Yellow twisting beauty


When I admire the wonders of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands in the worship of the creator.
Mohandas Gandhi

Thursday, December 1, 2011

On A Hike


"You never climb the same mountain twice, not even in memory.
Memory rebuilds the mountain,
changes the weather, retells the jokes, remakes all the moves."
-- Lito Tejada-Flores


"It's always further than it looks.
It's always taller than it looks.
And it's always harder than it looks."
-- The 3 rules of mountaineering

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Arizona Marshland


“To stand at the edge of the sea, to sense the ebb and flow of the tides, to feelthe breath of a mist moving over a great salt marsh, to watch the flight of shore birds that have swept up and down the surf lines of the continents for untold thousands of year, to see the running of the old eels and the young shad to the sea, is to have knowledge of things that are as nearly eternal as any earthly life can be.”  Rachel Carson

Gnomio and Juliet


"Juliet: He is a blue.
Gnomeo: She is a red.
flamingo: And I am pink." - -- Gnomeo And Juliet

Tall and Proud


Don't try to be different. Just be good. To be good is different enough. ~Arthur Freed

Laws control the lesser man. Right conduct controls the greater one. ~Chinese Proverb

Dancing With Daddy


Any man can be a Father
but it takes someone special to be a dad.Anne Geddes

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

More For Fun

The Bride loved the examples of these pictures that she found on the internet.... I loved her shoes, so we both had fun with setting these up.


"To laugh often and love much...
to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others,
to give one's self... this is to have succeeded."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson -


"Follow your bliss." - Joseph Campbell

More Pictures of the Bride and Groom


"Love doesn't make the world go round. 
Love is what makes the ride worthwhile."
Franklin P. Jones


"To the world, you may be just one person.
But to one person, you just might be the world."
Brandi Snyder


"True love stories never have endings."  Richard Bach