I am finally reunited with my blog!!

        I finally discovered the setting I needed to change on the blogger website in order to prepare a new post.  So here I am!  I hope my readers enjoyed the most recent three posts --- about the Arctic Circle and Norway.  I continue to be amazed that I really went there.  My thanks again to Patty who kept me from giving up hope about ever being able to make the trip and for all the laughing we did, just like that week 50+ years ago when we met while training to be VISTA Volunteers in eastern Kentucky (me) and eastern Tennessee (Patty).

      Here we go!!!  

     I have wanted to share some favorite photos from the dozen or so years I have been doing this blog.  I may try to give the title or date of the post for each photo soon so that additional photos that go with it can be visited. If anyone wants to encourage me to do that, please let me know.  Enjoy!

mourning dove, out the kitchen window

April on the ridge, near my home

 

George Ella Lyon, after she gave a presentation at Natural Bridge State Park

George Ella and her college roommate/friend Chris, showing up to speak out in Kentucky's capital (Frankfort) about the damage done daily by MOUNTAINTOP REMOVAL MINING.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes I have visited family in England and in France:
 

winter grazing in England

NOTRE DAME, a year before the terrible fire that was felt around the world.

my son on the Seine  (River in Paris)

                                                            Now the inside story --- for the rest of us!

                      

on Christy Creek, almost to Morehead, one spring evening, for my photo class at MSU

Christmas decorations at my nearby friend Sandy's, lovely every year

More soon in two weeks, I sure hope. This all reminds me about how I love seeing what I see with a camera.

All on an October day

         Yesterday was filled up!  I went to Lexington to take part in the nationwide rally for women's reproductive rights.  (I also went grocery shopping at the Good Foods Coop where George Ella Lyon and I met up to go to the rally together downtown.)  On the way home I drove along our ridge in great evening light so I had to risk my life a bit to take a few photos --  I can't help myself.  When I arrived at the house, I could see that Preston Netherly had been by that day to do the October mowing of my field. I was barely in time to see it with the hint of lovely mist.

 

This is my favorite photo from the rally -- I didn't take all that many.

mother and daughter

BACK ON THE RIDGE, NEAR HOME, though not in chronological order:

PLUS:

brand new neighbors!

For now, the mowing happens twice a year. 

Once again, I hope every one who can be is now vaccinated, for the sake of each other.  

At the same time, thanks for sharing an unusual day with me. I appreciated the energy I received at the rally!  I also am grateful for the beauty around me where I live.

More in two weeks!  Ann

Bonnie's flowers and family, later, after the burial

    I went by the house later, to photograph the flowers Bonnie's family had kept up with during her illness.  Bonnie loved her flowers, and her family, many of whom were still there. I have shown other flowers of hers other years, but this was now.  It will never be quite the same, so we can honor her in this way.

 

Bonnie's sister, who, I believe, did most of the flower keeping. She's on the porch, and I really like this photo of her.

    May we all enjoy the beauty of flowers and of each repeating season. I'm grateful so many people I know take such good care of the outside spaces they have.  I have a sister who knows all about plants and who has been sharing her knowlege of native plants for years. My other sister has invasives on her mind, and she plants trees when she is not chainsawing. I can not manage either of their obsessions, but I am glad, at least, I can take photos of gardens and woods.  Thank you, wildness.

     Three more photos:

            The first is one I had to try hard to make, but then I didn't do the work until now to get it off the camera and on to the blog.  I love my little pond, which, at the moment, seems loaded with red-winged blackbird activity after these dogwood blossoms came and went.

        Two weeks ago I promised another iPhone video, which I will indeed try for tonight. Again, if it's not there when you visit this blog, it will mean EITHER that I didn't get it to work OR it's still downloading.  Enjoy your family and friends. Don't believe the lies about who is our legal president. (It's Joe Biden.)  Thanks as always for visiting here. Be safe. And vaccinate!

                                                                    along Mauk Ridge

annual autumn amazement here in eastern Kentucky

post #359
       This week is the beginning of my 7th year of weekly posts on this blog!! Every year about now I try to talk myself out of taking still more beautiful photos of the leaves and the light this time of year. My effort to say "enough already" is NEVER successful. I just love it all, and I can't keep from making photos. This year there have been more than 14 days when it has been lovely, lovely, lovely!
        O well, here is a sample of this year's fall moments near my Kentucky home. I hope you enjoy them! The road by my house has been recently repaved and is looking very spiffy.

Looking west from the mailbox:

 Looking east from the mailbox:

  On a walk to one of my nearest neighbors:

     Evening view from the barn (see the first photo above):

     The Purnell farm house, with its magnificent tree and steep fields:

     another view along Route 504, still in the Mauk Ridge part:

mistletoe

   and now a few photos from where I lived until a year ago:  

driveway

on the way to the pond

a duck on the pond, first time that one has come to stay

the fall version of a leaf not yet fallen, from a yellow-poplar

        Of course I feel the same love about spring: all those wildflowers, buds on trees, so much new life emerging.  Every dogwood-gone year! What's a photographer to do except feel lucky to live here!
        A reminder -- click on one photo and they will all line up at the bottom of the screen just waiting to be viewed in a larger format, one by one!! Thanks for visiting with me here in eastern Kentucky.     Ann