Copyright and other blogs currently being worked

Happy Year of the Dragon. Here is my Dragon Girl Bird sculpture from 2018.

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Monday, July 31, 2017

Summertime joy

Yes, the living is easy.  Taking a deep breath.  So grateful to be able to.  Another deep breath.

The guppies have fresh water and food.  Cat is curled on chair cushion, having first and second breakfasts in her tummy.  I'm on my third half-cuppa.  That's half decaf and half regular coffee, and I just keep adding to a half full mug.  Not sure how much caffeine that makes!

OK, here are the pots for today.  More tea-bowls, cups, or small bowls.  A few pleasant designs added to the basic off-white glaze.  I admit to not having been able to paint designs lately, so these are from springtime throwing.

4 inch diameter for sipping with a sea turtle swimming with you - $20
Would you otter, or maybe another little critter who loves fresh fish?

Lots of good ladybug luck on this little cup.  Pale yellow roses on the other side.

All for just $20 each

...and free shipping for orders of $25 or more in August in the 48 US states.

Sunday, July 30, 2017

I'll plant something anywhere

Here my favorite (and first) spirit house has some dirt (maybe a half inch) in the floor, and is sprouting some geraniums happily.

I've already shared about these little houses a few years ago, (Here and HERE  and even with a snow covered view Here)and most of them have sold.  I keep a few around to attract friendly spirits, and of course to keep away any that would wish me ill fortune.

I may make some more soon...we shall see.

And today is the birthday of my Grandpa Bud Webb, who died at 28, when my mom was 2 years old. Sometimes when I see young families, I think how awful an accident can happen to take away the young fathers.  Grandpa Bud was electrocuted accidentally in 1919...when wiring might not have been that well designed.  I've shared about him before HERE.

Here's his draft card...

And here is his grave marker, as well as the other family markers, and cemetery gateway.






I imagine my grandmother has a headstone there now, as well as Grandpa Bud's parents and siblings. I don't know who David William Carroll was, (b 1871) who has a headstone next to Grandpa Bud's.  There were some Carroll's way back in the family of the Booths, my grandmother's mom's family.

I'll check and see if I can find anyone on Ancestry.  Going under for a while, not holding my breath!

OK, here I am after chasing David W. Carroll back through ancestry, he married Grandpa Bud's sister,  Marguerite, which is why he's buried next to him. Marguerite Carroll lived until 1951, so that tells us the photo was taken before that date, or she'd also have a headstone there.

And my other Carrol roots?  It was Carrol Witty, not the last name, but the first one, for a man.  He was from Alabama...and his daughter Eugenia Almeta Witty married Richard Booth. They were my great great great grandparents.


Saturday, July 29, 2017

Dried sunflowers



I grow them, enjoy them for a few weeks, and then there are the seed-heads, which when dried provide great seeds for birds...but I'm not allowed to have feeders for birds (except hummingbirds) where I live.  That's because of bears, you know.

Different stages of drying seed-heads of sunflowers.  Since I've grown the yellow ones from my own seeds, I am pretty sure they will also make seeds for new flowers.  The red ones are probably hybrids with non-fertile seeds.  Doesn't mean they aren't edible though!


I must share a story as well.

I gave my first batch of seed heads to my friend, Ann.  She took them home and hung a couple together below her squirrel-proof bird feeder.  A squirrel couldn't reach the sunflower seed-heads, and finally jumped upon them.  They had been hung with rubber bands, so the squirrel and seed-heads bounced up and down a while.  Mr. Squirrel finally had enough weight and bounce that he brought down one of the seed heads and started carrying it off into the woods.  Of course several other squirrels saw him by then, and followed along.  I laughed out loud at the bouncing squirrel!

I still purchase my sunflower seeds and love munching on them, already hulled!

Friday, July 28, 2017

Bridges and Sepia Saturday "Sepians"

Why do I read Sepia Saturday? 
 To learn what I don't know already.  My interest in things ancient includes the visual, and sepia photos (of any topic) are learning about history, either mine, or those folks who posted them.

To see vicariously what I never would in person.  Posts are by folks in Australia, the UK, and various parts of the US, including 15 miles right down the road.  But Mike has a completely different set of  knowledge than I have, and I honestly would never have learned about the bands, the instruments, and the military connections that he weaves into his posts every week.  I'm frankly amazed.

I like making friends who I'd ordinarily not run into in my lifetime.  These folks have one thing in common, and that might just be it.  What an interesting bunch of people!

On learning new things...it's a scientific fact that it helps build new neuron pathways in a brain (mine) and helps prevent dementia.  Not just doing the same thing over and over, which only strengthens old neuron pathways...learning new ones.  Thanks Sepians!

Sepia Saturday...a great community, changing over the years, where bloggers share their oldest photos. A theme was suggested, and most of us followed it, unless we had something more interesting and we would sometimes post that non-related blog.

But bloggers are becoming few and far between.  I now send my blog posts over to FB, where I'm pretty sure more friends read them.

Why do I post on Sepia Saturday? 

It's a discipline that I sometimes enjoy, to sleuth out my own or other's photos on a topic, or at least most of the time on or near the topic.  It's like telling an artist to paint a tree.  Oh my goodness, all the varieties in the world are possible.

I can share my experiences with others and receive feedback from them.  I respect everyone who posts and comments...and I feel their respect back when they read and comment on my posts.  These  are short conversations...seldom more than a couple of sentences long.  But sometimes it spurs me to do something more with what has been posted.  And blog comments are more than FB comments and "likes."

I can archive my old photos under various topics this way...mainly the ancestry ones.  But I admit that I've veered away from them lately.

Perhaps there are limits to what resources I actually have, though I admit to using the internet when I run out of my own photos, to kind of pad my post.  I think I've done this because I never thought to take a picture of "this, that or another," which is something important in my life, and I really want to illustrate that.  Many photos of typewriters and telephones later, I'm grateful to have found them illustrated on the net.

I don't go antiquing like others do, and haven't purchased any old photos.  I've been sharing my own, having several boxes and albums which beg to be scanned still, but they are mainly of family members.  I think that I can post them only every once in a while here.

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So the bridge is the theme this week.  A link for transportation from one side of a river (?) to another.  Check out what other Sepians have contributed HERE.  Look at their names at the bottom of the page and click on them as links to their blogs.


I've lived near water all my life, though haven't ever been right on the water!  Bridges, oh my, let's see what I have to offer! (Additional clarification, never lived right on the edge of water, when I said I'd never been right on it!)
Let's go to St. Louis and the mighty Mississippi!
Daddy with those shoes! and Mary Beth on left, myself on right on Admiral
 Around 1951 summer, Riding the Admiral pleasure boat on the Mississippi.  Bridge in the background is the Eads Bridge, where cars traveled at the topmost level.  I believe trains traveled on a lower level.

Wikipedia gives this info: Opened in 1874, it was one of the earliest long bridges built across the Mississippi, the world's first all steel construction,[5] and built high enough so steamboats could travel under
Barbara, Mary Beth and mom, Mataley Rogers
 Better shot of bridge in background, and a tug also, which was the trade on the Mississippi, pushing barges up and down the river.  And there's another bridge also in the background, perhaps the MacArther Bridge, or the Municipal Bridge, or now the Martin Luther King Bridge.

A 1930's view, dated since the roadway was removed for a time and only rail use remained after that.



The Admiral at Eads Bridge, when being towed after top deck had been removed.  It was turned into scrap in 2011.

Is this a third bridge from St. Louis, MO to cross to East St. Louis, IL in the background?  It may be just a view of the Eads as it nears land...where there are these arches. Yes that's me looking at my dad with camera, while Mother gives me the stink eye, and Mary Beth is just sitting there.  She's probably 4-5 and I'm 8-9...it was 1951-2.

Eads Bridge under construction, opened in 1874.

Eads Bridge showing the arches near land.

I'll do another post about the Admiral in the future.  An interesting history.



 

Thursday, July 27, 2017

Mermaid and cooling off

Floating along in the deep blue sea...
with the heat these days, just thinking of being immersed in water is cooling.

I took a tub bath yesterday, a nice hot one.  Coming out was the cooling bit of that experience.

What do you do to keep cool in the summertime?

These little tea bowls with designer liner decorations are for sale...of course.  If I show it here, I've got to let it go...to it's forever home.

I do like drinking something hot out of a tea bowl in the winter, letting my fingers feel the warmth.Somehow the cool sides when filled with iced tea just turn wet in the humidity, and I don't feel much cooler by the touch, just the drink.  I also like iced coffee!

Hope you have a great day!

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Sunshine and birds again

I've never seen this bug-eyed look before
Harvesting day, to take these lovelies to the Tailgate Market.  I donated them to the Mudbuddiess Booth.  There were a lot of disappointed bees.

I was still not clear of antibiotics which make it really uncomfortable to be in the sun.  So I had to get there early!.

Pat Levi's tall vase.
(I heard it sold with the flowers in it!)

I think this pitcher was made by Marsha Cozart.

I suggested that they give flowers to customers who bought a pot.  I don't know how that went.  Maybe the mudbuddies took some of the flowers home with them!  I'm just glad to share them.  I went home and took a nap.


Though many of my feeder's visitors looked like juveniles or females, this ruby throat sure zapped the camera as he flew away.  I think getting this much captured made my day!




Sorry about quality.  Taken with Nikon this time, but through double-paned glass and a screen.  Pretty difficult to get good images.

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Sigh...

Monarch Mandala wall pillow, hanging on wall, $75

Monday, July 24, 2017

Pale flowers and leaves


Thrown and altered shape, with pale pink, yellow and greens to suggest many petaled flowers.  6" tall, $25.

Sunday, July 23, 2017

Old entertainment and baby fowl

The source of many a program which would get a family to gather 'round.
The Texaco Radio Hour, Amos and Andy, Jack Benny, Red Skelton, The Lone Ranger, Gracey Allen and George Burns, and many many more! Do you have radio (pre-TV) memories?

For Sepia Saturday (HERE) to remind us of times when entertainment meant we could see the things happening...as depicted by this sailing family with their rabbit-eared TV.  Here in the land of the free we no longer get free TV reception, but have to pay for someone to beam it into their box in our homes.



Today I have some baby fowl to share with you...first the Canada Goose family, with a couple of fluffy goslings at the foot of a column on the picnic pavilion...can you make them out?  It was really hard, because of course those are very wary parents!



Not sure why the goslings are sitting in a puddle, but they look like they were cold.

 And here were a couple of baby swifts...there tucked into the beams under the Senior Center's porch.
Located at the junction of where porch changes direction, the beams seemed just right for the Swift family, who returns to nest here every year.

A quieter area, but not the choice for the nest, also under the porch.





Nest is in far left upper corner
I'm guessing 3 mouths open wide...
I tried watching and standing further away, but parents waited until I was gone completely, as well as people walking their dogs.



Saturday, July 22, 2017

The blues have it

Someone said yesterday that she just loved blue pottery.  Here's another one with blue flowers.

 About 4-1/2 inches tall, $25

Thrown shape, then altered, additional buttons for flower centers, then glazed with Mayco Designer Liner and Stroke n Coat glazes.  Rim was dipped into plum glaze for the drippy effect.  Clear glaze over all.