Sunsets and Moonrise

Moth arrived home late afternoon on Tuesday. He had been to Portugal and Gibraltar for some church conferences. As we drove home this was the sunset! Not digitalized I promise!



The sky was changing every minute, but even after an 11 hour flight, Moth turned down a road towards the sunset so that I could take these photos.


Unfortunately all the power lines were in the way, but the skies were still amazingly beautiful!

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On Wednesday, I had been working at the church office and I was heading home. Once again there was another gorgeous sunset, but instead of photographing it, I caught sight of the full moon rising in the pink sky made by the sunset. I almost missed it because the sky was changing so quickly and I had to find a safe place to pull over and take this photo.





By the time I got home I was able to take the photos above and below from the back yard.


Tonight we had another gorgeous sunset!

This is our typical October/November weather. The sunsets were late arriving this year. We are having another Santa Ana weather condition from today through Sunday. The temperatures will be hot and the humidity dry, but fortunately the winds will not be so bad -- so they say. The danger with the winds is, of course, fire.

Buena Vista Lagoon still coming up. Stayed tuned.

Carlsbad's Finest

Came home one day to find the fire engine in front of our house. Don't panic. The fire station is at the end of our circle and there is a convenient fire plug outside our house. I think this was just a training session for a new fireman, but it gave me an opportunity for a good photo.

When we first moved here thirty-five years ago, there was a good sized vacant lot at the end of our circle and it stayed empty for many years. The boys used to play baseball and football (their version) there. Then we heard that a fire station was going to be built there. At first we were a little concerned that property values would decline. But they built the station in the style of the houses in our area.

Now, I have to tell you that they are good neighbors to have! They do not turn on their sirens at night, and in the day time they wait until they are on the main road. It's a good security measure for our street because there is always somebody up and around at the fire station. Since the bad fires last year we are very thankful to share our street with them.

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TWO MORE ATC'S

This first one is based on a newspaper photograph taken of some Hindu women bathing in the River Ganges, as is their custom.

I was impressed by the reflections of their brightly colored saris. The photograph was probably better, but it was an interesting experiment. I want to practice drawing water more.

REFLECTIONS

CHRISTMAS BRANCHES

This one too, was an experiment. One thing you can't do with Prisma colors is make something white. Gillian of The Faded Rose told me this secret. Place a thin piece of paper over your drawing and then draw whatever you want white onto the top piece of paper. Press hard so that the imprint will come through. Then remove the top paper and color lightly over the imprint. Presto! White snowflakes! This too needs more practice.

Next we are going to visit the Buena Vista Lagoon. Stay tuned.

Get out the Wet Noodle!!!

I was just looking over my last few posts and realized I'd made a horrible error! Truly horrible to this English teacher and ex-high school principal! I have corrected it now and I'm tempted not to tell you what it was, to see if anyone else had caught it. I think my sister might have, since she is also a writer.

Oh, oh, oh! I abjectly apologize to all my former students, especially those whose hated receiving papers from me covered in red ink! (They're probably not reading this old fashioned blog any way).

O. K. here it is: is this word spelled 'wierd' or 'weird'?

By the way, can a blog be old fashioned? After all, blogs are only a few years old.

HMMM!!!???

Did someone get into my blog of yesterday I wonder? It was expressing my disappointment that when we are supposed to be at our most democratic we have too many derogatory comments, stealing of signs etc. But this we know, that God is control over all. He raises up leaders and brings them down in His own good time.

This was the gist of what I said but most of it was erased sometime over night leaving just a couple of lines and some garbled stuff. Later the whole thing was gone. I wondered if Google took it down, but I assure you it had nothing offensive in it. I didn't even mention either political party.

I did have one comment from someone which must have been written before the whole blog was taken down. It was a pleasant comment.

We did have some nasty stuff going on down here, so who knows! Anyway I removed my bumper sticker today, which was in support something. I don't need someone trying to intimidate me when I'm driving. That can happen without election hype.

It's a sad commentary on some people's idea of freedom of speech.

IT'S OVER!!!

I can't tell you HOW GLAD I am that the elections are finally over. I thought the day would never come.

Birds, Singing in the Rain

This is my first video EVER so please excuse the quality. I wouldn't have posted it except I actually caught the birds singing their heads off in the tree right after the rain -- which lasted all of 5 minutes (the rain that is). See post below. There are at least 25 birds in this tree although you can't see any. I must try videoing again and get good at it. I didn't think it would be so easy.

Weird, Wet Stuff

What is that weird wet stuff falling from the sky??? Oh! It's RAIN!! I'd almost forgotten what it looks like. It's hard to photograph rain but you can see it pouring from our down spout, and a little glistening on the patio table.
This is the first rain we've had since April. Such excitement! You can see the little white rain drops against the greenery and along the patio beam. The birds were delighted! You should hear them chorusing in the bushes even as I type.


This photo below, was taken yesterday in Magee Park, Carlsbad. It was my friend's son's 40th birthday. I stopped by for a little while and it was just a beautiful day.



The birds may be loving it, but this was Bailey's response.