Blue, blue, blue…

I have been continuing on with my 52 Weeks of Blue project.  Here are the next five in the series:

Week 21:

This is yet another great sign we saw on our trip to North Carolina.  I am finding it very hard to believe that we’ve been home from there for a month already.  Where does the time go??

Week 22:

When we got home, the Bluets were in bloom.  I think they are just wonderful, cheerful little flowers.  They are gone now that it has gotten warmer, but they are not forgotten.

Week 23:

I was beginning to get desperate during Week 23 because nothing was flipping my blue switch so I decided to take a ride in the country.  I found this beautiful old colonial house, Deer Meadow Farm,  that was built circa 1780.  Being close to an antique myself, I am way past wanting to live in an antique house.  Our fifty year old home has enough problems, thank you very much.  But it never fails to send me back to Memory Lane when I see a beautiful place like this.  When we first moved up to these parts, a house like this was just what I wanted, although I have to admit to being a bit more partial to the style of the Cape house than to the traditional Colonial.  I have to admit that these days all I want is a two bedroom condo that was built within the last ten years with all the modern amenities and none of the work.

Week 24:

“No water, no life, no blue, no green” is part of a quote from Sylvia Earle.  According to Wikipedia, Earle “is an American Marine biologist, explorer, author, and lecturer.  Since 1998, she has been a National Geographic explorer-in-residence.  Earle was the first female chief scientist of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and was named by Time Magazine as its first Hero for the Planet in 1998.”  I’ve seen two versions of this quote, the one I quoted above and used in my photo and this one:  “No ocean, no life. No blue, no green. No ocean, no us.” Regardless of Earle’s exact words, I think the message is clear.  The ocean and water, in general, is our most precious natural resource and we need to remember that every day.

Week 25:

Isn’t it so nice when someone gives you something out of the blue?  This beautiful little vase of flowers was a wonderful gift from the two lovely women who come to help me keep some order in this house every other week.  The charming pink roses have gone by now, but I have vowed to fill it with wildflowers all summer long and right now, it is filled with wild yarrow.  I love it!

Normally, I would be linking up on Friday with Tanya's Around Roanoke Willy-nilly Friday 5, but Tanya is taking a little break for the month of July to move houses.  Hoping Tanya has a easy and uneventful move and that all of you in the USA have an easy and uneventful Fourth of July!

Perspectives on the Eagle’s Voice…

On Prince Edward Island, Greg and I (and Olive, the pug, of course) rented a cottage for the week.   We were pleased with our choice.  It was a comfortable rustic chic house with a wrap around deck and Adirondack chairs to relax in so we could enjoy the wonderful view of Southwest River and the farms beyond.

But the most spectacular thing about our view was this…

Would you shut up, kid?!

…a bald eagle baby.  The owner of the cottage told us that there was a bald eagle family living in a tree a couple hundred yards away from the back deck.  We were thrilled be able to see the nest.  But, we didn’t see the baby the first day and were afraid that he had grown up and was off on his own.  As it turns out, we sure heard him the next morning at 4:30 on the dot as soon as the sun started to rise.  He made quite the racket calling for one of his parents to bring him breakfast.  Greg found out that closing the window of the bedroom shut out most of the noise and we hoped that this vocalization wasn’t a daily habit.  But the next morning, there he was yelling at the top of his lungs for food or whatever it is that baby eagles yell for.  Since I had never been around bald eagles, I was unaware of their habits and not too thrilled about this particular one.  We did get used to it eventually and learned to enjoy watching the “little” one up in the tree bellowing out his demands.

The eagle made me think while I was watching him.  He made me think of a photograph I remembered that was taken by a Flickr friend of mine, Mary Virginia Stroud, who lives in Alaska.  (She’s an excellent photographer, by the way.  If you have a few minutes, you might want to check out her Flickr site.)  Mary Virginia has a photo of a slew of eagles sitting in an “eagle feeding” area.  There are about 20 bald eagles sitting there.   I have to wonder if people who approach them need earplugs to drown out the din.  I’ve heard that eagles are not that well liked in Alaska because, in large numbers, they can be pests.  It just reminded me of the relativity of things.  Getting to see one eagle (or two…because the mother/father did show up one day while we were watching) was a joy for us.  Having twenty of them land on a picnic table nearby might be a little frightening.

It also made me think that I wish I had one of those fantastic long lenses that cost about $10,000 and the patience to use it.  Oh, well… maybe in another lifetime.

Prince Edward Island Recircled…

Prince Edward Island is a magical place with cozy, colorful houses...

and magnificent views.

Lighthouses that aren’t lighthouses…

and lighthouse that are.

Red roads...

and some of the world’s best mussels.

There are birch trees,

meadows full of wildflowers,

and lots and lots of potato fields.

And I have barely begun tapping into the 2,000 or so photos I took while I was there.

  So I hope you like visiting PEI!

Back in the Hunt!

It has been a month and a day since I got my new knee.  Generally speaking, I am doing well with it.  I'm still battling the fatigue factor but I am hopeful that that will go away soon.

  

In this past month, I have done very little with my camera but I did manage to put a few together for this week's Scavenger Hunt.   Here are the prompts for this week:  Home or Thankful, In the Kitchen, Couple, Bubbles and Trees.  And here are my entries:

Home sweet home!

Here's a glimpse of my merry, messy kitchen.

A couple of cute little visitors to our bird feeder.

I have a bottle bubbles and intended to take a picture of a few of them floating around, but it was so windy here yesterday that they just kept flying toward the house and getting stuck on the slider.  So this is what I got.

This is our European Beech tree that  sits in our front yard.  It's a beautiful tree and always the last to lose its leaves every year.

Linking to Ashley Sisk's Scavenger Hunt Sunday.