A Breath of Fresh Air!

Our topic for August for the Focus On Life: 2014 Weekly Photography Challenge is

 'Outside' 

and for week 32 Sally prompted us with

 'Fresh Air'

and told us to "Spend a little time taking a deep breath of fresh air, feeling the sun or the rain on your face!"

Here's the 'rain on my face' while sitting up at the very top of the tree house the day before we left the cabin.

You can't see the drops coming down through the trees, but it was heaven for sure!! 

 

The View From The Top of the Tree House!

Now, let's see what 'Fresh Air' everyone else captured!

Until Next Time,

 Peace, Love and Breathing Fresh Air!

 Cheers,

~Shel~

An InLinkz Link-up

Celebrate the Season - FOL28

Our July theme for the Focus on Life:2014 Weekly Photography Challenge is "Celebrate" and for week 28 Sally, over at The Studio Sublime, prompted us to

"Celebrate the Season"

Each summer we spend time at my sis's cabin in the mountains and I love to 'Celebrate the Season' by capturing photos of all the lovely wild flowers growing all around!!  

Please stop by and see how every one else is Celebrating this Summer Season,....

Until Next Time,

Peace, Love and Celebrating Summer!

Cheers,

~Shel~

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14 - Week 27

The theme for the month of July for the Focus on Life 2014 Weekly Photography Challenge is 

"Let's Celebrate"

Week 27: Celebration!  "There are so many little celebrations that occur everyday and you may not realize that they happen.  A quiet toast between friends, a smile for a job well done, a candle on a cake, a sparkler all aglow.   Let's Celebrate the season, family, love hope and life!"

Monday was our son's 17th Birthday. 

He absolutely hates having his photo taken - even on his birthday!

Logan, Day 1 - in the hospital.  Then this summer at the cabin actually smiled and let me take a photo before he went on a motorbike ride!! (yippee!)

I snagged a pic of him blowing out the candle on his cheesecake (he's not a fan of regular cake) and then he turned around to see I was trying to snap another photo.

You can tell by the photo that he's not standing still and the look he's giving me is one that says, "I can't believe you're even trying to take a photo of me, mom!" 

Oh well, I still love it. And him!  

We also celebrated our country's birthday yesterday.

The good ol' USA turned 238 years old. 

So, Cheers to Birthdays and wonderful celebrations!!

Click on the links below to see what everyone else is celebrating this week!

Until Next Time, 

Peace, Love and Celebrating Life's Special Moments!

Cheers,

~Shel~

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14 - Week 26

Wow - half way through the year.  The first part has flown by, if you ask me.  Hopefully the second half of the year will slow down just a tad bit so we can all catch our breath, right?!

For week 26 of the Focus on Life 2014 weekly photography challenge, Sally has given us this prompt:

June 2014: Putting the Fun In Photography

Week 26: Free Space!

"Like the good old bingo cards state, "FREE SPACE" right smack dab in the middle of the card!  We have reached the half way point of the year, REALLY!  

We are half way through 2014!  

For this week you have a "free space" to photography what ever you would like in what ever way you would like."

Oh, so many possibilities.

I took some pics over Memorial Day Weekend while we were up in the mountains at my sis and brother-in-law's cabin.   

I rather like the look of this one, so I played around with editing it a bit. 

And, being our country's symbol of Freedom, I thought it would fit nicely for our 'Free Space' prompt.

I haven't watched the video that Sally no nicely put up on 'softening' your photos - so I'll have to do that because this one might look cool that way. 

Please check out the below links and see what every one else chose as their 'Free Space' this week, won't you?! 

Oh, and be sure to come back 
here tomorrow for the 
Pearls! Pearls!! Pearls!!! 
Blog Hop - Link Up.

I'd love for you to link up with us and show us what you've created with your pearls!

Until Next Time,

Peace, Love and "FREE" Space

Cheers,

~Shel~

Free Space to Grow! ;-)

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14 - Week 22 -

May's topic for the Focus on Life 2014 weekly photography challenge is 

'In, At and About' 

and for week 22, Sally (The Studio Sublime) gave us this prompt:

"This week we are focusing on what is IN Bloom!"

The only thing blooming here in the desert right now is the heat.

Well, there's tons of saguaro blooms that are looking pretty awesome right now, but I couldn't capture a good pic of those this week.

And, bougainvilleas and bird of paradise are always in bloom here when it's summer and super hot, but the pics I took of those didn't come out as well as this shot of one of the last roses in our rose bush. 

The pics from the top looking down on the rose showed all the scorched petals, so I chose this angle because it looked the prettiest!

Okay, back to the bloomin' heat!

Until Next Time,

Peace, Love and Beauty In Bloom!

Cheers,

~Shel~

*A little side note,...

Today would have been my Dad's 95th Birthday. 

Happy Birthday Dad!! 

Miss you so much - every single day! 

 

May 31st, 1979- My 8th Grade Graduation and my Dad's 60th Birthday

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14 - Week 19 - Good Things Inside

May's topic for the Focus on Life 2014 weekly photography challenge is 

'In, At and About' 

and for week 19, Sally over at  

The Studio Sublime, gave us the prompt:

Good Things Inside

She told us that this was a good prompt to think 'outside' the box.  

Not quite sure I've accomplished that this week or not but since Mother's Day is Sunday, I thought a photo of these might fit the bill and be rather appropriate.

 These are Kiki's eggs. 

Coco and Kiki are our Peach Faced Lovebirds.

Coco's on the left here, and Kiki's on the right.

 

 Coco's my baby and can do no wrong. 

But Kiki,...she's a piece of work!  

I still love her though.

She's just barely 2 years old. Coco is somewhere between 8 to 10 years old (I simple can't remember the year he was born - bad mommy!!).

 None of their eggs have ever had anything 'inside'. Well, one did last year, but it didn't form all the way and after about 28 days or so, she just quit sitting on them. As I cleaned up their cage the other day and held these up to the sunlight, it doesn't look like there's anything at all in these little guys either.

Poor Kiki. She's such a good little 'Mama in preparation'. 

She's still sitting on her little eggs, protecting them with all she's got and building her little nest. 

Driving Coco nuts. (you know, just like normal pregnant women do to their men!)

And, she's got 'good things inside' as far as I'm concerned. 

Good instincts and a pretty little song voice. 

And one of these times maybe she'll have eggs with 'good things inside'. 

Coco and Kiki "Inside" their "love shack"! ;-)

Hop on over to all the other participants this week and see what 'good things' they have 'inside'! 

Until Next Time, 

Peace, Love and Happy Mother's Day to all of you Moms out there!  (Including Kiki!!)

Cheers,

~Shel~

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14- Week 17 - Evening Moments

Continuing with April's theme of 'Moments', Sally, over at The Studio Sublime, gave us this prompt for week 17 of the Focus on Life: 2014 weekly photography challenge:

 

 

 

Evening Moments

 

"There is a moment when the day begins to quietly slip away from the earth and the calm of evening floods over the land.  Colors deepen, stars peek through pin holes in a twilight sky.  We begin to exhale and slowly let the world of the day slide from our shoulders."

 

Dusk, next to dawn,

is my favorite time of day.



 

Especially in the desert.

 

 

 

For my birthday last month, my sister took me to the Desert Botanical Gardens to see the Chihuly Exhibit. 

 

His glass sculptures are out of this world!
 

 

It was so cool to see how the sculptures mimicked the desert vegetation.

 

We went an hour or so before sunset and enjoyed all the beautiful flowers blooming on the various cactus.

 

 

 

Then, as the sun settled down and the day turned into evening, we were able to see "Chihuly After Dark".

 

 

 

 

It was a breathtaking 

Evening Moment in the desert.

 

 

This one was my favorite. The way the sunlight glistened off the tips of the glass as day turned into night
made for a very special moment indeed!

 

 

Until Next Time,

 

Peace, Love and Life's Evening Moments!

 

Cheers,

~Shel~

An InLinkz Link-up

FOL14 - Week 11 - Beauty All Around

It's week 11 for the Focus on Life 2014 Weekly Photography Challenge and Sally over at The Studio Sublime has given us the theme of

"Checking Out" for the month of March.

 

This week's prompt is:

 

 

Beauty All Around

 

You've all seen the sunrises and sunsets I've been posting lately, which would have been super for this week's prompt, but I'll spare you yet another one!

 

I was out walking in the neighborhood keeping a keen eye out for something to photograph that would embrace this prompt.

  

This was some of the
beauty I found all around.



Pretty flowers outside our subdivision

And, even more.

Beautiful Bougainvilleas

 

 

Okay - so I couldn't resist.
 
Here's another sunset.

Friday Night's Sunset Over the Big Lake
(sorry I couldn't make it bigger w/out it running off the page!)



And here's a duck landing on the water, too!

  

 

 

 

Please go check out the "Beauty All Around" that everyone else found this week, won't you?

 

Until Next Time,

Peace, Love and Beauty All Around!

Cheers,

~Shel~

 

 

 

An InLinkz Link-up