EMPS #70 -- Gallery

This week's Ellipsis Photo Shoot from Carly is themed "Gallery," and is to be a gallery of whatever photos we choose from 2009. I have chosen my grandchildren.

First is a shot taken when I was visiting Bend, Oregon, where my oldest grandchildren live. Here are Alex, 8, his mom Kamie, myself, and Michael, 10.


















Next is a shot of my son Tony, Michael and Alex's father, clowning around with his sons.


















Here are my other grandchildren, Noah, 7, an engineer on Halloween, and Emily, 3, as Tinkerbell.
















Last of all are my grandchildren building their own pizza on Christmas Eve day at the family celebration. First are Emily, then Alex, then Noah, then Michael.


















If you would like to play, go to the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot link in the first sentence. It's fun!

EMPS #69 -- Holiday Music

For this week's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot, the theme is "Holiday Music." It can be any holiday but I have chosen Christmas, since I have my Nativity Scene up. The song that I am thinking of in consequence of that is "We Three Kings of Orient Are." The lyrics go:

We three kings of Orient are
Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Field and fountain, moor and mountain
Following yonder star

O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect Light

Born a King on Bethlehem's plain
Gold I bring to crown Him again
King forever, ceasing never
Over us all to rein

O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light

Frankincense to offer have I
Incense owns a Deity nigh
Pray'r and praising, all men raising
Worship Him, God most high

O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light

Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume
Breathes of life of gathering gloom
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb

O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light

Glorious now behold Him arise
King and God and Sacrifice
Alleluia, Alleluia
Earth to heav'n replies

O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light

This is especially pertinent because I just received my third king in the Mary Englebreit Nativity Scene mentioned above and pictured below.



















If you would like to participate, go to the link in the first sentence. Carly would love to have you!

EMPS #68 -- Holiday Decorations

Today I am back to participating in the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot thanks to Carly's Ellipsis blog. I don't have a lot of decorations up, it just being myself here and not having a regular tree, which I kind of miss (although I don't miss the needles and clean-up that go with a real tree). Here are my decorations -- a small artificial tree, which is rather ugly from being bashed up so much -- with Socksie next to it, and my new Mary Englebreit nativity scene.



















If you would like to participate in the EMPS, go to the link in the first sentence. It is always fun!

EMPS #65 -- Giving Thanks

I'm posting a bit late for this week's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot, as Thanksgiving was Thursday and I'm just getting organized now that it's Sunday. I'm squeezing in before the deadline!

Here are some things that I'm giving thanks for. First is 3 1/2-year-old grandaughter Emily, who is so full of vim and vigor and spunk! She's a joy to be around.


















Next are 7-year-old grandson Noah and his dad, my son Jeff, here playing with some Star Wars toys my son J.D. has around for children who are guests at their house. Noah is extremely knowledgeable about trains.


















Here's half the group eating Thanksgiving dinner. The food was plentiful and the company was fine. We had a very nice time.


















This is the other half of the group eating dinner.


















Included were friends of Kris and J.D.'s, my DIL and son who hosted the dinner, Chris and Jolie, Kris's sister Tiffany and her friend Paul, son Jeff and DIL Steph, nephew Nick, the two children, and me and, of course, Kris and J.D.

If you would like to post to this Ellipsis Monday Photo Challenge about Giving Thanks (and I think it's obvious that I give thanks for my family and plentiful food), it's not too late. Just go to the link in the first sentence and follow the directions.

EMPS #63 -- Downtown

The theme of the present Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot at Carly's blog is "Downtown." We were to take shots of the downtown of our city or town or hamlet. I guess you could almost call Canby a hamlet -- it's not very big in the downtown area.
Here are the pictures I took of downtown Canby today. They go from the new movie theater, to the grocery store, to downtown stores, lastly showing the bricked circular intersections that have added class to the city.
























To go to the meme and play the game, follow the link in the first sentence.

Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #62 -- Autumn Fruits and Vegetables

Today's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot by Carly is about Autumn Fruits and Vegetables. I don't have too much in the way of such things but I do have a couple of small tomatoes on a scraggly vine out behind my house. One of the tomatoes is actually two that have grown together. I'm not sure how clear that is in the following picture.
















I may have to go down to my business and pick some of the Granny Smith apples growing on a tree down there, too. So this entry may not be finished yet.

I didn't go down and get any of the apples at my business; instead, I am featuring the sweet potatoes I had for dinner tonight (Tuesday) along with some ham.



















I love autumn fruits and vegetables, although I'm a creature of habit and generally forget to get them.

To participate in the meme, go to the link in the first sentence and Carly will tell you on her blog how to do that.

Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #61 -- Halloween

I am having to obtain pictures from my archives for this Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot in a different way, by obtaining them from Flickr. Previously I could save them but that no longer seems to be an option. So here they are, one at a time.
Princess Stevie 1 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

The theme is Halloween this time and I have fairly old pictures of a couple of my cats dressed up. This is of Stevie, as a princess. The next one is of Chester, as a pirate.
Pirate Chester 1 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

The next is of me and Steve, dressed up as his mom and dad for a Halloween party back in the late 1970's.
Me and Steve on Halloween on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

And last is grandchildren Noah and Emily dressed up as R2D2 and Raggedy Ann last year.
Close look at R2D2 and Raggedy Ann on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

I'm sorry I have to refer you to Flickr but they have apparently changed their format for saving archived photos to our picture files. I think that's a total bummer! Anyway, I hope you don't mind checking these pictures out.

To go to the Ellipsis site, just go here.

Round Robin Photo Challenge -- Shooting in Low Light (Indoors and Out)

Today's Round Robin Photo Challenge has the theme "Shooting in Low Light (Indoors and Out). My low light shots seem to be nearly all outdoors. The first two here are near-sunset shots from my front yard/driveway area, which I love to take.




















This is my now-gone kitty, Chester, up in a flowering plum out front near sunset.
















During my recent trip to the beach, I caught the following near-sunset and sunset shots from my motel room window in Newport, Oregon.



















To see more low light pictures and/or to play along, go to the link in the first paragraph.

EMPS #58 -- Bridges and Walkways

Today's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot is about bridges and walkways. I love bridges in particular, and I have also captured a photo of a walkway with a bridge in the background, so I'm all set. The first shot is of the Yaquina Bay Bridge from my rented condo room in the Yaquina Bay.
















Here is the spectacular bridge over the Snake River Canyon at Twin Falls, Idaho, where my mother lived until her passing almost 2 years ago.
















This is the Astoria-Megler bridge, which soars high enough to let large ships pass beneath it, in Astoria, Oregon. It crosses to the Washington side over the Columbia River.
















Here is the Florence, Oregon riverfront, the shot with the walkway and the bridge in the background. I'm not sure which river this is.
















To see more pictures of bridges and walkways, go to the link in the first sentence and follow directions, especially if you want to participate, which is fun!

Round Robin Photo Challenge -- In Motion

The creatures who are nearest me and who are always in motion are my cats. Here are some pictures of them doing their thing.

Socksie likes to get up on my bedroom door and scrabble around up there. She is doing just that in these two shots.

















Socksie starting to go in the closet, up over my basket of shoes that I can't wear thanks to my bad toes.


















Here are Silver and Stevie in a fight. That's the ultimate of motion among the cats!

















To see the other Round Robin Photo Challenge blog links, go here.

EMPS #57 -- Weeds

Carly at Ellipsis has designated this week's Photo Shoot as being about weeds. I don't have as many weeds around my place now that I have a landscaper but I found a couple of plants growing in my field next door. Here they are:

















As Carly says, a weed that could be used in a flower arrangement gets extra credit, and I think that either of these could be.
To go to the Ellipsis meme, and especially if you want to participate, head for the link in the first sentence.

EMPS #56 -- Welcome to Autumn (Leaves or Flowers)

Today for Carly's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot, we were to shoot fresh (as in not archived) photos of signs of autumn, if we lived in an area where they were available. I was thinking it might be too early until I took my SLR and went outside and found these brown leaves on the ground out back. I believe they are from my oak trees on either side of the driveway.
























To go see more such items on various blogs, go to the link in the first sentence. If you would like to participate, just follow the directions. It's fun!

Round Robin Photo Challenge -- Chickens

A couple of years ago, at my business, we had a couple of shop cats (my kitty Socksie's brothers) who were outside cats and who we consequently fed outside. A chicken showed up and began eating the cat food. She was quite a funny girl! Here she is going towards the food.




















Here are the chicken and shop cats eating together.



















Another shot of the chicken and the shop cats.
















She subsequently disappeared, and one of the cats (the black one, Duke) was hit by a car and the other one, grey little Max, went to live with my son J.D. and his wife Kris.

For more chicken pictures, go to the Round Robin Photo Challenge.